Life Sciences Commons^™

Draft Genome Sequence Of Verrucosispora Sp. Strain Cwr15, Isolated From A Gulf Of Mexico Sponge, Sarah J. Kennedy, Eleonora Cella, Mohammad Jubair, Taj Azarian, Bill J. Baker, Lindsey N. Shaw

Molecular Biosciences Faculty Publications

Here, we present the draft genome sequence of Verrucosispora sp. strain CWR15, a bacterial symbiont of a Gulf of Mexico sponge. The genome consists of 35 contigs encoding 5,840 genes. The genome is the basis for future study and presents an underexplored taxonomy and biosynthetic potential.

Mir146a-Mediated Targeting Of Fancm During Inflammation Compromises Genome Integrity, Devakumar Sundaravinayagam, Hye Rim Kim, Tingting Wu, Hyun Hee Kim, Semo Jun, Jeong-Heon Cha, Younghoon Kee, Ho Jin You, Jung-Hee Lee

Molecular Biosciences Faculty Publications

Inflammation is a potent inducer of tumorigenesis. Increased DNA damage or loss of genome integrity is thought to be one of the mechanisms linking inflammation and cancer development. It has been suggested that NF-κB-induced microRNA-146 (miR146a) may be a mediator of the inflammatory response. Based on our initial observation that miR146a overexpression strongly increases DNA damage, we investigated its potential role as a modulator of DNA repair. Here, we demonstrate that FANCM, a component in the Fanconi Anemia pathway, is a novel target of miR146a. miR146a suppressed FANCM expression by directly binding to the 3’ untranslated region of the gene. …

First Genome Sequence Of The Gunnison’S Prairie Dog (Cynomys Gunnisoni), A Keystone Species And Player In The Transmission Of Sylvatic Plague, Mirian T. N. Tsuchiya, Rebecca B. Dikow, Loren Cassin-Sackett

Integrative Biology Faculty and Staff Publications

Prairie dogs (genus Cynomys) are a charismatic symbol of the American West. Their large social aggregations and complex vocalizations have been the subject of scientific and popular interest for decades. A large body of literature has documented their role as keystone species of western North America’s grasslands: They generate habitat for other vertebrates, increase nutrient availability for plants, and act as a food source for mammalian, squamate, and avian predators. An additional keystone role lies in their extreme susceptibility to sylvatic plague (caused by Yersinia pestis), which results in periodic population extinctions, thereby generating spatiotemporal heterogeneity in both …

The Establishment Of A Pelagic Sargassum Population In The Tropical Atlantic: Biological Consequences Of A Basin-Scale Long Distance Dispersal Event, Elizabeth M. Johns, Rick Lumpkin, Nathan F. Putman, Ryan H. Smith, Frank E. Muller-Karger, Digna T. Rueda-Roa, Chuanmin Hu, Mengqiu Wang, Maureen T. Brooks, Lewis J. Gramer, Francisco E. Werner

Marine Science Faculty Publications

Starting in 2011, coastal areas of the Caribbean Sea and tropical Atlantic Ocean began to experience extraordinary yearly accumulations of pelagic Sargassum brown alga. Historical reports place large quantities of Sargassum only in the North Atlantic (mostly in the Gulf of Mexico and the Sargasso Sea). Accumulations of Sargassum in the tropical Atlantic have continued. We used a numerical particle-tracking system, wind and current reanalysis data, drifting buoy trajectories, and satellite imagery to determine the origin of the Sargassum that is now found persistently in the tropical Atlantic. Our analyses suggest that during the extreme negative phase of the winter …

Heat, Health And Hatchlings: Associations Of In Situ Nest Temperatures With Morphological And Physiological Characteristics Of Loggerhead Sea Turtle Hatchlings From Florida, Kelsey Alexandra Fleming, Justin R. Perrault, Nicole I. Stacy, Christina M. Coppenrath, Alison M. Gainsbury

USF St. Petersburg Campus Faculty Publications

Incubation temperatures, in addition to an embryo’s genetic makeup, are critical in many aspects of adequate sea turtle embryonic development. The effects of high and low incubation temperatures on hatchling quality have been previously examined; however, many of these studies were conducted on relocated or laboratory-reared nests, which do not accurately reflect natural nest temperature fluctuations. To observe the impacts of varying in situ incubation temperatures on loggerhead sea turtle (Caretta caretta) hatchling morphology, various health variables and locomotor performance, temperature data loggers were deployed in 15 loggerhead nests on Juno Beach, Florida, between May and July 2018. Over the …

Observations Of Water Transparency In China’S Lakes From Space, Dong Liu, Hongtao Duan, Steven Loiselle, Chuanmin Hu, Guoqing Zhang, Junli Li, Hong Yang, Julian R. Thompson, Zhigang Cao, Ming Shen, Ronghua Ma, Min Zhang, Weixiao Han

Marine Science Faculty Publications

Water transparency, usually denoted by Secchi disk depth (SSD), represents the first-order description of water quality and has important implications for the diversity and productivity of aquatic life. In China, lakes supply freshwater and ecosystem services to nearly a billion people. Therefore, real time monitoring of lake transparency is of great significance. Moreover, understanding how and why transparency varies in space and time in response to different driving forces is needed to understand, manage, and predict lake water quality. Based on the time-saving and low-cost Google Earth Engine cloud platform, this study developed a new algorithm for quickly mapping SDDs …

West Florida Shelf Pipeline Serves As Sea Turtle Benthic Habitat Based On In Situ Towed Camera Observations, Heather A. Broadbent, Sarah E. Grasty, Robert F. Hardy, Margaret M. Lamont, Kristen M. Hart, Chad Lembke, Jennifer L. Brizzolara, Steven Murawski

Marine Science Faculty Publications

The use of marine offshore benthic habitats by sea turtles is poorly characterized due to the difficulty of obtaining in situ data. Understanding benthic habitat use that is important to the species’ reproduction, foraging, and migrations is critical for guiding management decisions. A towed camera-based assessment survey system (C-BASS) equipped with environmental sensors was used to characterize and assess benthic habitats on the West Florida Shelf (WFS) from 2014 to 2018. During these cruises, sea turtles were opportunistically observed during the surveys, and critical in situ data such as spatiotemporal information, species identification, habitat use, behavior, and environmental data were …

Cornus Officinalis Promotes Igfbp2 And Autophagy In Human 1.1b4 Pancreatic Cell Line As Revealed By Employing A Global Proteomic Approach Via Mass Spectrometry, Arielle Elizabeth Tawfik, Jennifer Guergues, Stanley M. Stevens Jr, Brant Roger Burkhardt

Molecular Biosciences Faculty Publications

Type 1 diabetes (T1D) results in the loss of pancreatic beta cells and subsequent loss of insulin production. Exogenous insulin is the only effective treatment, but there is still no cure or interventional therapy available to inhibit progression of T1D. Successful T1D interventional therapy must protect pancreatic beta cells from autoimmunity while enhancing beta cell survival and function. Our data suggests Cornus officinalis (CO) may be a candidate for interventional therapy to protect pancreatic beta cells from autoimmune attack and increase their function. CO has been used in traditional Chinese medicine (TCM) for over 2,000 years and has shown characteristics …

Molecular Tools For Coral Reef Restoration: Beyond Biomarker Discovery, John Everett Parkinson, Andrew C. Baker, Iliana B. Baums, Sarah W. Davies, Andréa G. Grottoli, Sheila A. Kitchen, Mikhail V. Matz, Margaret W. Miller, Andrew A. Shantz, Carly D. Kenkel

Integrative Biology Faculty and Staff Publications

As coral reefs continue to decline due to climate change and other stressors, scientists have proposed adopting genomic tools, such as biomarkers, to aid in the conservation and restoration of these threatened ecosystems. Biomarkers are easily measured indicators of biological processes that can be used to predict or diagnose health, resilience, and other key performance metrics. The ultimate goal of developing biomarkers is to determine the conservation value and utility of a given coral colony, including the host animal, its algal symbionts, and their microbial partners. However, this goal remains distant because most efforts have not yet moved beyond the …

Diversity And Abundance Of Dragonflies And Damselflies In Tampa Bay, Florida, Meredith A. Krause, Thomas Koster, Bryan N. Macneill, Daniel J. Zydek, Nicholas T. Ogburn, Jonathan Sharpin, Robert Shell, Marc J. Lajeunesse

Integrative Biology Faculty and Staff Publications

Little is known about the community of dragonflies and damselflies in Tampa Bay, Florida, USA. To address this gap, we conducted 2 longitudinal surveys of adult odonates in a natural floodplain of the Hillsborough River in 2013 and 2017. Along with abundance and species diversity, we also measured intraspecific variation in body size, sexual dimorphism, wing-cell asymmetry, and water mite ectoparasitism. Our first weekly survey from Oct 2013 to Oct 2014 sampled 327 adults (230 female, 97 male) from 8 dragonfly species, with the eastern pondhawk (Erythemis simplicicollis Say; Odonata: Libellulidae) representing 79% of captures, followed by the second …

Transmission Of West Nile And Five Other Temperate Mosquito-Borne Viruses Peaks At Temperatures Between 23°C And 26°C, Marta S. Shocket, Anna B. Verwillow, Mailo G. Numazu, Hani Slamani, Jeremy M. Cohen, Fadoua El Moustaid, Jason Rohr, Leah R. Johnson, Erin A. Mordecai

Integrative Biology Faculty and Staff Publications

The temperature-dependence of many important mosquito-borne diseases has never been quantified. These relationships are critical for understanding current distributions and predicting future shifts from climate change. We used trait-based models to characterize temperature-dependent transmission of 10 vector–pathogen pairs of mosquitoes (Culex pipiens, Cx. quinquefascsiatus, Cx. tarsalis, and others) and viruses (West Nile, Eastern and Western Equine Encephalitis, St. Louis Encephalitis, Sindbis, and Rift Valley Fever viruses), most with substantial transmission in temperate regions. Transmission is optimized at intermediate temperatures (23–26°C) and often has wider thermal breadths (due to cooler lower thermal limits) compared to pathogens with …

Phylogeny Of Terrestrial Isopods Based On The Complete Mitochondrial Genomes, Subvert The Monophyly Of Oniscidea, Rui Zhang, Ruru Chen, Jianmei An, Carlos A. Santamaria

Integrative Biology Faculty and Staff Publications

Background: Oniscidea is the only truly terrestrial taxon within the Crustacea, and vital to soil formation. However, the monophyly of suborder Oniscidea has been in dispute since 1995, with different studies disagreeing on whether the coastal Ligiidae are included within the suborder. To clarify the phylogenetic hypothesis of suborder Oniscidea, we sequenced the complete mitochondrial genomes of Ligia exotica (Roux, 1828) and Mongoloniscus sinensis (Dollfus, 1901).

Results: Like most metazoan, the complete mitogenomes of two species with circular double strands. The structure and characters of mitogenomes of these two species are analyzed. The constructed phylogenetic analyses show that Oniscidea is …

Mg/Ca-Temperature Calibration Of Polar Benthic Foraminifera Species For Reconstruction Of Bottom Water Temperatures On The Antarctic Shelf, Elaine M. Mawbey, Katharine R. Hendry, Mervyn J. Greaves, Claus-Dieter Hillenbrand, Gerhard Kuhn, Charlotte L. Spencer-Jones, Erin L. Mcclymont, Kara J. Vadman, Amelia E. Shevenell, Patrycja E. Jernas, James A. Smith

Marine Science Faculty Publications

Benthic foraminifera Mg/Ca is a well-established bottom water temperature (BWT) proxy used in paleoclimate studies. The relationship between Mg/Ca and BWT for numerous species has been determined using core-top and culturing studies. However, the scarcity of calcareous microfossils in Antarctic shelf sediments and poorly defined calibrations at low temperatures has limited the use of the foraminiferal Mg/Ca paleothermometer in ice proximal Antarctic sediments. Here we present paired ocean temperature and modern benthic foraminifera Mg/Ca data for three species, Trifarina angulosa, Bulimina aculeata, and Globocassidulina subglobosa, but with a particular focus on Trifarina angulosa. The core-top data from several …

Life History Of Northern Gulf Of Mexico Warsaw Grouper Hyporthodus Nigritus Inferred From Otolith Radiocarbon Analysis, Beverly K. Barnett, Jeffrey P. Chanton, Robert Ahrens, Laura Thornton, William F. Patterson Iii

C-IMAGE Publications

Warsaw grouper, Hyporthodus nigritus, is a western Atlantic Ocean species typically found at depths between 55 and 525 m. It is listed as a species of concern by the U.S. National Marine Fisheries Service and as near threatened by the International Union for the Conservation of Nature. However, little information exists on the species’ life history in the northern Gulf of Mexico (nGOM) and its stock status in that region is currently unknown. Age of nGOM Warsaw grouper was investigated via opaque zone counts in otolith thin sections (max age = 61 y), and then the bomb 14C chronometer …

Detedit: A Graphical User Interface For Annotating And Editing Events Detected In Long-Term Acoustic Monitoring Data, Alba Solsona-Berga, Kaitlin E. Frasier, Simone Baumann-Pickering, Sean M. Wiggins, John A. Hildebrand

C-IMAGE Publications

Passive acoustic monitoring has become an important data collection method, yielding massive datasets replete with biological, environmental and anthropogenic information. Automated signal detectors and classifiers are needed to identify events within these datasets, such as the presence of species-specific sounds or anthropogenic noise. These automated methods, however, are rarely a complete substitute for expert analyst review. The ability to visualize and annotate acoustic events efficiently can enhance scientific insights from large, previously intractable datasets. A MATLAB-based graphical user interface, called DetEdit, was developed to accelerate the editing and annotating of automated detections from extensive acoustic datasets. This tool is highly-configurable …

Mapping Benthic Habitat On The West Florida Shelf Using Multibeam Acoustics And Towed Underwater Video To Improve Fisheries Science And Management, Alexander Ilich, Jennifer Brizzolara, Sarah Grasty, John Gray, Matthew Hommeyer, Chad Lembke, Stanley Locker, Alex Silverman, Theodore Switzer, Abigail Vivlamore, Steven Murawski

Marine Science Faculty Publications

The West Florida Shelf (WFS) is an extremely important area for both commercial and recreational fisheries. However, the lack of habitat maps in this area makes planning fisheries independent monitoring surveys difficult, and hinders the ability to manage and monitor fish stocks and ecosystems over time. As of 2015, only 5% of the WFS had been mapped in high resolution using a multibeam echosounder with little effort expended to infer and verify habitat type. In 2015, The Continental Shelf Characterization, Assessment, and Mapping Project (C-SCAMP) began using a multibeam echosounder and towed underwater video to map benthic habitats and improve …

Disturbances Drive Changes In Coral Community Assemblages And Coral Calcification Capacity, Travis A. Courtney, Brian B. Barnes, Iliana Chollett, Robin Elahi, Kevin Gross, James R. Guest, Ilsa B. Kuffner, Elizabeth A. Lenz, Hannah R. Nelson, Caroline S. Rogers, Lauren T. Toth, Andreas J. Andersson

Marine Science Faculty Publications

Anthropogenic environmental change has increased coral reef disturbance regimes in recent decades, altering the structure and function of many coral reefs globally. In this study, we used coral community survey data collected from 1996 to 2015 to evaluate reef-scale coral calcification capacity (CCC) dynamics with respect to recorded pulse disturbances for 121 reef sites in the Main Hawaiian Islands and Mo'orea (French Polynesia) in the Pacific and the Florida Keys Reef Tract and St. John (U.S. Virgin Islands) in the western Atlantic. CCC remained relatively high in the Main Hawaiian Islands in the absence of recorded widespread disturbances; declined and …

A Revised Diet Matrix To Improve The Parameterization Of A West Florida Shelf Ecopath Model For Understanding Harmful Algal Bloom Impacts, Holly A. Perryman, Joseph H. Tarnecki, Arnaud Grüss, Elizabeth A. Babcock, Skyler R. Sagarese, Cameron H. Ainsworth, Alisha M. Gray Dileone

Marine Science Faculty Publications

Harmful algal blooms (HABs) are a growing concern in the West Florida Shelf (WFS) region. An Ecopath with Ecosim (EwE) model of the WFS explicitly simulating HABs was previously developed to illuminate the potential impacts of blooms of the dinoflagellate Karenia brevis (colloquially referred to as “red tides”) on the WFS ecosystem. However, the diet matrix of the Ecopath component of this EwE model (referred to as “WFS-HAB Ecopath”) was based largely on sparse, cursory information and not on local survey data. Here, we revise the diet matrix of the WFS-HAB Ecopath model using predictions of a robust statistical model …

A Synthesis Of Deep Benthic Faunal Impacts And Resilience Following The Deepwater Horizon Oil Spill, Patrick T. Schwing, Paul A. Montagna, Samantha B. Joye, Claire B. Paris, Erik E. Cordes, Craig R. Mcclain, Joshua P. Kilborn, Steven A. Murawski

Marine Science Faculty Publications

The Deepwater Horizon (DWH) oil spill significantly impacted the northern Gulf of Mexico (nGoM) deep benthos (>125 m water depth) at different spatial scales and across all community size and taxa groups including microbes, foraminifera, meiofauna, macrofauna, megafauna, corals, and demersal fishes. The resilience across these communities was heterogeneous, with some requiring years if not decades to fully recover. To synthesize ecosystem impacts and recovery following DWH, the Gulf of Mexico Research Initiative (GOMRI) Core 3 synthesis group subdivided the nGoM into four ecotypes: coastal, continental shelf, open-ocean, and deep benthic. Here we present a synopsis of the deep …

Mapping Hurricane Damage: A Comparative Analysis Of Satellite Monitoring Methods, Matthew J. Mccarthy, Brita Jessen, Michael J. Barry, Marissa Figueroa, Jessica Mcintosh, Tylar Murray, Jill Schmid, Frank E. Muller-Karger

Marine Science Faculty Publications

Wetlands are the second-most valuable natural resource on Earth but have declined by approximately 70 % since 1900. Restoration and conservation efforts have succeeded in some areas through establishment of refuges where anthropogenic impacts are minimized. However, these areas are still prone to wetland damage caused by natural disasters. Severe storms such as Hurricane Irma, which made landfall as a Category 3 hurricane in southwest Florida (USA) on September 11, 2017, can cause the destruction of mangroves and other wetland habitat. Multispectral images from commercial satellites provide a means to assess the extent of the damage to different wetland habitat …

Genome Sequence Of Vibrio Natriegens Phage Vb_Vnas-Aqkl99, Noah Yonas, Paige Boleman, Y Nguyen, Makenzie Kerr, Kema Malki, Anthony M. Greco, Mya Breitbart

Marine Science Faculty Publications

Vibrio natriegens is a naturally occurring marine bacterium that is emerging as a microbiological model system. Here, we describe Aquatic Killer 99 (AQKL99), a novel phage that infects Vibrio natriegens 14048. The genome of the phage is 58,464 bp long, has a GC content of 45.9%, and contains 51 protein-coding genes.

Environmental Dna Reveals Seasonal Shifts And Potential Interactions In A Marine Community, Anni Djurhuus, Collin J. Closek, Ryan P. Kelly, Kathleen J. Pitz, Reiko P. Michisaki, Hilary A. Starks, Kristine R. Walz, Elizabeth A. Andruszkiewicz, Emily Olesin, Katherine Hubbard, Enrique Montes, Daniel Otis, Frank E. Muller-Karger, Francisco P. Chavez, Alexandria B. Boehm, Mya Breitbart

Marine Science Faculty Publications

Environmental DNA (eDNA) analysis allows the simultaneous examination of organisms across multiple trophic levels and domains of life, providing critical information about the complex biotic interactions related to ecosystem change. Here we used multilocus amplicon sequencing of eDNA to survey biodiversity from an eighteen-month (2015–2016) time-series of seawater samples from Monterey Bay, California. The resulting dataset encompasses 663 taxonomic groups (at Family or higher taxonomic rank) ranging from microorganisms to mammals. We inferred changes in the composition of communities, revealing putative interactions among taxa and identifying correlations between these communities and environmental properties over time. Community network analysis provided evidence …

Future Vision For Autonomous Ocean Observations, Christopher Whitt, Jay Pearlman, Brian Polagye, Frank Caimi, Frank Muller-Karger, Andrea Copping, Heather Spence, Shyam Madhusudhana, William Kirkwood, Ludovic Grosjean, Bilal Muhammad Fiaz, Satinder Singh, Sikandra Singh, Dana Manalang, Ananya Sen Gupta, Alain Maguer, Justin J. H. Buck, Andreas Marouchos, Malayath Aravindakshan Atmanand, Ramasamy Venkatesan, Vedachalam Narayanaswamy, Pierre Testor, Elizabeth Douglas, Sebastien De Halleux, Siri Jodha Khalsa

Marine Science Faculty Publications

Autonomous platforms already make observations over a wide range of temporal and spatial scales, measuring salinity, temperature, nitrate, pressure, oxygen, biomass, and many other parameters. However, the observations are not comprehensive. Future autonomous systems need to be more affordable, more modular, more capable and easier to operate. Creative new types of platforms and new compact, low power, calibrated and stable sensors are under development to expand autonomous observations. Communications and recharging need bandwidth and power which can be supplied by standardized docking stations. In situ power generation will also extend endurance for many types of autonomous platforms, particularly autonomous surface …

Succession Of Microbial Populations And Nitrogen-Fixation Associated With The Biodegradation Of Sediment-Oil-Agglomerates Buried In A Florida Sandy Beach, Boryoung Shin, Ioana Bociu, Max Kolton, Markus Huettel, Joel E Kostka

C-IMAGE Publications

The Deepwater Horizon (DWH) oil spill contaminated coastlines from Louisiana to Florida, burying oil up to 70 cm depth in sandy beaches, posing a potential threat to environmental and human health. The dry and nutrient-poor beach sand presents a taxing environment for microbial growth, raising the question how the biodegradation of the buried oil would proceed. Here we report the results of an in-situ experiment that (i) characterized the dominant microbial communities contained in sediment oil agglomerates (SOAs) of DWH oil buried in a North Florida sandy beach, (ii) elucidated the long-term succession of the microbial populations that developed in …

Screening The Cultivable Cave Microbial Mats For The Production Of Antimicrobial Compounds And Antibiotic Resistance, Jerneja Ambrožič Avguštin, Patricia Petrič, Lejla Pašić

International Journal of Speleology

The current work extends the phenotypic characterization of a bacterial culture collection obtained from white, yellow, grey or pink microbial cave wall colonies that are common in the caves of Slovenian Karst. We have determined antibiotic resistance to 22 natural and synthetic antibiotics in 69 isolates from the microbial mats. Thirty-eight isolates (52%) were resistant to 1-5 antibiotics; another 27 isolates (37%) were resistant to 6-10 antibiotics; and 7 isolates (0.1%) were resistant to 11-17 antibiotics. We screened for production of antimicrobial compounds by growing cave isolates on five different media and overlaying individual cultures with ten Gram-positive and Gram …

Springs Of The Arabian Peninsula: Historical Trends, Current Status And Human Impact In Saudi Arabia, Oman And Jordan, Kamal M. Aljohani

USF Tampa Graduate Theses and Dissertations

This research was conducted to update previous studies of the springs of the Arabian Peninsula (Saudi Arabia, Oman and Jordan). Approach: 76 springs were surveyed in between March and July 2018: 15 Saudi Arabia, 41 Oman and 20 Jordan to ascertain the current status, water quality and zooplankton benthos and fish communities. Investigation of the changes of biota and chemical parameters downstream from the springs source in Saudi Arabia. Results: Mercury exceeded the WHO and USEPA maximum contaminant level (MCL) in 63 of 76 springs, Aluminum exceeded MCL in 8 of 76 springs, and both were the common dissolved heavy …

Hepatobiliary Analyses Suggest Chronic Pah Exposure In Hakes (Urophycis Spp.) Following The Deepwater Horizon Oil Spill, Rachel E. Struch, Erin Pulster, Andrea D. Schreier, Steven A. Murawski

C-IMAGE Publications

Prior to the Deepwater Horizon oil spill, we lacked a comprehensive baseline of oil contamination in the Gulf of Mexico's sediments, water column, and biota. Gaps in prespill knowledge limit our ability to determine the aftereffects of the Deepwater Horizon blowout or prepare to mitigate similar impacts during future oil spill disasters. We examined spatiotemporal differences in exposure to and metabolism of polycyclic aromatic hydrocarbons (PAHs) in 2 hake species (Urophycis spp.) to establish a current baseline for these ecologically important, abundant, and at-risk demersal fishes. Gulf hake (Urophycis cirrata) and southern hake (Urophycis floridana) were collected throughout the Gulf …

Physicochemical And Colligative Investigation Of Α (Shrimp Shell)-And Β (Squid Pen)-Chitosan Membranes: Concentration-Gradient-Driven Water Flux And Ion Transport For Salinity Gradient Power Andseparation Process Operations, Clifford R. Merz

Marine Science Faculty Publications

Chitin, and its derivative chitosan, is a naturally occurring biopolymer and an abundant polysaccharide containing acetylated units of N-acetyl-d-glucosamine. Chitosan membranes produced from shrimp shell (α) and squid pen (β) biowaste were prepared by solvent-casting, after which water flux and ionic transport diffusion experiments were conducted using a side-by-side concentration test cell under differing salinity concentration gradients. Physicochemical and experimental investigations were conducted, which confirmed that β-chitin possesses differing and enhanced performance characteristics than α-chitin with respect to diffusive water flux and ionic transport capabilities. In addition, novel colligative investigations through osmotic equilibrium were conducted to determine electrochemical characteristics …

Drivers Of Ant Composition, Richness, And Trophic Guilds In Neotropical Iron Ore Cavities, Rodrigo A. Castro-Souza, Thais G. Pellegrini, Marconi Souza-Silva, Rodrigo L. Ferreira

International Journal of Speleology

Subterranean habitats may be considered limiting for animal colonization, especially for ants, due to permanent darkness and mainly because of oligotrophic conditions. While not as deep as limestone caves, iron ore caves and other subterranean habitats may be more available for colonization because of their shallower depth. We use the richness and composition of ants to assess how differences in habitat structure affect the biodiversity and ecosystem function between cavities and surrounding epigean landscapes. We predicted that the distribution of ants would be different because of the variation in habitat structure and cavity conditions may act as a filter for …

The Peculiar Nature Of Florida’S Sandhill Wetlands, Ponds & Lakes— Their Ecohydrology, Relationship With The Regional Aquifer & Importance Within The Landscape., Renae Starr Nowicki

USF Tampa Graduate Theses and Dissertations

This dissertation explores the ecohydrology of Florida’s peculiar and poorly studied sandhill wetland and water features, particularly those located in west-central Florida. The primary research goals include: compilation and summarization of the available ecohydrologic information for features across Florida; comparison of water level and water geochemistry data between sandhill wetlands and waters and the regional aquifer to provide evidence of regional hydrologic control; and use of geophysical applications to examine the hydraulic connections between sandhill wetlands and waters and the regional aquifer.

From this research, a natural history of sandhill wetland and water ecohydrology is presented, highlighting: the differences between …