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Full-Text Articles in Life Sciences
Network Dynamics Mediate Circadian Clock Plasticity, Abdelhalim Azzi, Jennifer A. Evans, Tanya Leise, Jihwan Myung, Toru Takumi, Alec J. Davidson, Steven A. Brown
Network Dynamics Mediate Circadian Clock Plasticity, Abdelhalim Azzi, Jennifer A. Evans, Tanya Leise, Jihwan Myung, Toru Takumi, Alec J. Davidson, Steven A. Brown
Biological Sciences Faculty Research and Publications
A circadian clock governs most aspects of mammalian behavior. Although its properties are in part genetically determined, altered light-dark environment can change circadian period length through a mechanism requiring de novo DNA methylation. We show here that this mechanism is mediated not via cell-autonomous clock properties, but rather through altered networking within the suprachiasmatic nuclei (SCN), the circadian “master clock,” which is DNA methylated in region-specific manner. DNA methylation is necessary to temporally reorganize circadian phasing among SCN neurons, which in turn changes the period length of the network as a whole. Interruption of neural communication by inhibiting neuronal firing …
Thermal And Behavioral Ecology Of The Mexican Beaded Lizard (Heloderma Horridum), Kerry Holcomb
Thermal And Behavioral Ecology Of The Mexican Beaded Lizard (Heloderma Horridum), Kerry Holcomb
All Master's Theses
Previous investigations in the field of biological thermoregulation have primarily focused on small organisms that inhabit ecosystems that are not as strongly seasonal as the tropical dry forests found along the Pacific Coast of Jalisco, Mexico. Small organisms have little or no appreciable thermal inertia, and thus, reach thermal equilibrium with their immediate surroundings relatively rapidly. In this investigation, we describe the behavioral and thermal ecology of the Mexican beaded lizard (Heloderma horridum), which commonly weighs more than 1kg. This large body size means that this species has significant thermal inertia, which, depending on the characteristics of the …