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Full-Text Articles in Life Sciences

Habitat Preferences Of Blue Marlin (Makaira Nigricans) And Black Marlin (Istiompax Indica) In The Eastern Pacific Ocean, Nima Farchadi, Michael G. Hinton, Andrew R. Thompson, Zhi-Yong Yin Sep 2018

Habitat Preferences Of Blue Marlin (Makaira Nigricans) And Black Marlin (Istiompax Indica) In The Eastern Pacific Ocean, Nima Farchadi, Michael G. Hinton, Andrew R. Thompson, Zhi-Yong Yin

Theses

Overexploitation and climate change can reduce the abundance and shift the spatial distribution of marine species. Determining the habitat suitability of a mobile pelagic species, such as Makaira nigricans (BUM) and Istiompax indica (BLM), can help describe their spatiotemporal distribution patterns over a broad spatial scale, which is a crucial need for fisheries management. Using 14 years (1997-2010) of Inter-American Tropical Tuna Commission (IATTC) catch data from purse-seine vessels in the eastern Pacific Ocean (EPO), we modeled the dynamic habitat suitability of BUM and BLM in response to environmental variables within the EPO using a species distribution model (MaxEnt) with …


Bubble Stream Production By Belugas (Delphinapterus Leucas), Megan Slack Aug 2018

Bubble Stream Production By Belugas (Delphinapterus Leucas), Megan Slack

Theses

Bubble stream production in belugas has been poorly characterized and its function is not well understood. I examined behavioral states when producing bubble streams (“bubbling”), and when bubbling calls, to determine whether bubbling was significantly associated with a particular call category or behavioral state. Using 19 hours of video and audio recordings collected over a two-day period, I quantified bubble streams of a 4-month old calf and an unrelated adult female housed together. Based on the overall activity budgets and pool of vocalizations for both animals, I calculated the expected counts of bubble streams with and without vocalizations, assuming that …


Transcriptomics Of Learning, Pablo Iturralde Jul 2018

Transcriptomics Of Learning, Pablo Iturralde

Theses

Learning is a basic and important component of behavior yet we have very little empirical information about the interaction between mechanisms of learning and evolution. In our work, we are testing hypotheses about the neurogenetic mechanisms through which animal learning abilities evolve. We are able to test this directly by using experimentally evolved populations of flies, which differ in learning ability. These populations were previously evolved within the lab by creating worlds with different patterns of change following theoretically predicted effects on which enhanced learning will evolve. How has evolution acted to modulate genes and gene expression in the brain …


The Temporal And Spatial Dynamics Of Larval Supply, Settlement, And Adult Populations Of Chthamalus Fissus Within The La Jolla, California Rocky Intertidal, Catharine Hargenrader May 2018

The Temporal And Spatial Dynamics Of Larval Supply, Settlement, And Adult Populations Of Chthamalus Fissus Within The La Jolla, California Rocky Intertidal, Catharine Hargenrader

Theses

The role of post-settlement processes in benthic invertebrate recruitment dynamics has been well established; however, more recently, studies have been resolving the pre-settlement processes and environmental variables that may shape initial settlement. We examined the major space occupying barnacle Chthamalus fissus to determine the spatial and temporal dynamics of settlement in relation to larval supply, adult populations, and habitat characteristics (including elevation as a proxy for immersion, proximity to water’s edge, and the availability of free space) within the La Jolla, CA rocky intertidal. With respect to habitat characteristics, we investigated the influence of available free space on the dynamics …