 Schmidt studied honey bee nutrition, chemical communication, physiology, ecology and behavior at the Carl Hayden Bee Research Center in Tucson, Arizona, before taking lead and devoting full-time to The Southwestern Biological Institute in 2006.As research director of the Southwest Biological Institute, he studies the chemical and behavioral defenses of ants, wasps, and arachnids.In 2015, Schmidt was awarded the Ig Nobel Prize for physiology and entomology.