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The Impacts Of Immune Challenges On Fish Behavior And Physiology, Teisha King
The Impacts Of Immune Challenges On Fish Behavior And Physiology, Teisha King
LSU Doctoral Dissertations
For species living in dominance hierarchies, social rank dictates access to resources and often contributes to reproductive success. To ensure survival, individuals constantly evaluate trade- offs between crucial biological systems, like the reproductive and immune systems, depending on their social rank and physiological state. Little is known about how social species balance interactions between immune system function, fluctuations in social status and reproductive fitness, and the performance of behaviors necessary for maintaining social status when sick, particularly in fishes, the largest and most diverse group of vertebrates. My dissertation research uses a whole animal approach to examine how physiological profiles …
Sodium Mediates Developmentally Plastic Responses In Plants And Herbivores, Luis Santiago-Rosario
Sodium Mediates Developmentally Plastic Responses In Plants And Herbivores, Luis Santiago-Rosario
LSU Doctoral Dissertations
Sodium plays a crucial role in organismal performance, trophic-level interactions, and eco-evolutionary dynamics. For plants, sodium impacts osmoregulation, growth, and water uptake. For animals, sodium is essential influencing osmoregulatory processes, muscle and neural development, and blood regulation. My dissertation aims to disentangle why sodium mismatch affects resource-consumer interactions and its influence on morphological and behavioral plasticity. First, I identified how sodium impacts plant performance and sodium accumulation strategies. I initially focused my research on understanding how increasing substrate sodium affects plant growth and tissue sodium accumulation strategies in controlled settings using a systematic review approach. I found that saltier plants …
The Functional, Ecological, And Evolutionary Morphology Of Sea Lampreys (Petromyzon Marinus), Bradley Morgan Wood
The Functional, Ecological, And Evolutionary Morphology Of Sea Lampreys (Petromyzon Marinus), Bradley Morgan Wood
LSU Doctoral Dissertations
Lampreys (Petromyzontiformes) are jawless vertebrates with an evolutionary history lasting at least 360 million years and are often used in comparisons with jawed vertebrates because some of their morphological aspects, such as the segmented trunk musculature with curved myosepta and a non-mineralized skeleton fibrous skeleton, are thought to resemble the condition of early vertebrates before the evolution of jaws. Although earlier authors studied the morphology of the skeleto-muscular system of the trunk of lampreys, their studies are not detailed and complete enough to allow a functional and biomechanical analysis that is needed as a basis for modeling the mechanics of …
Evaluation Of Reproductive Phenology And Ecology Of Eastern Wild Turkey (Meleagris Gallopavo Silvestris) Across The Southeastern United States, Nicholas W. Bakner
Evaluation Of Reproductive Phenology And Ecology Of Eastern Wild Turkey (Meleagris Gallopavo Silvestris) Across The Southeastern United States, Nicholas W. Bakner
LSU Master's Theses
Avian reproduction is known to be a driver of population dynamics across species and systems. Behavioral decisions during incubation such as habitat selection and nest attentiveness are thought to affect nest success. The incubation process is a costly period during which individuals are sedentary and must balance survival with reproductive success and overall fitness. Current understanding of Eastern wild turkey incubation behavior provides a limited view of the incubation period. Using GPS data collected from Eastern wild turkeys (n = 220), I evaluated nest fate as it relates to recess frequency, distance travelled during recess, and habitat selection during …