Biology Commons^™

Bryophyte Assemblages On American Hornbeam (Carpinus Caroliniana) And The Surrounding Arboreal Communities Within The Forest Of East Texas, Cassey Edwards

Electronic Theses and Dissertations

The bryophytes, the non-vascular plants, include the mosses (Bryophyta with approximately 13,000 species), the liverworts (Marchantiophyta with approximately 5,000 species), and the hornworts (Anthocerotophyta with approximately 150 species). Initial observations indicated that the midstory tree Carpinus caroliniana Walter (American hornbeam) has a bryophyte composition with an unusually high diversity of leafy liverworts. Voucher samples were taken from the four intercardinal directions (Northeast, Northwest, Southwest, and Southeast) from six Carpinus trees and their nearest neighbor that was neither Pinus nor another Carpinus at each of six sites across East Texas. Percent coverage, species richness, Shannon’s diversity and Pielou’s evenness were computed. …

Determinants Of Social Behavior In Captive North American River Otters (Lontra Canadensis), Olivia R. Beasley

Graduate Theses

Field Studies of North American River Otters (Lontra canadensis), documented social behavior atypical among its mustelid relatives. In the wild, river otters are most active during crepuscular hours and males have been shown to be more social than females, as they cooperatively forage within bachelor groups (Blundell et al. 2002). Most social behavior occurs at latrine sites, where feces act as a means of communication between conspecifics (Blundell et al. 2005). While scientists have conducted some behavioral research on wild river otters, detailed studies of interactions are difficult for a species that ranges widely. A full understanding of river otter …

Generating High-Order Optical And Spin Harmonics From Ferromagnetic Monolayers, G.P. Zhang, M.S. Si, M. Murakami, Y.H. Bai, Thomas George

Chemistry & Biochemistry Faculty Works

High-order harmonic generation (HHG) in solids has entered a new phase of intensive research, with envisioned band-structure mapping on an ultrashort time scale. This partly benefits from a flurry of new HHG materials discovered, but so far has missed an important group. HHG in magnetic materials should have profound impact on future magnetic storage technology advances. Here we introduce and demonstrate HHG in ferromagnetic monolayers. We find that HHG carries spin information and sensitively depends on the relativistic spin–orbit coupling; and if they are dispersed into the crystal momentum k space, harmonics originating from real transitions can be k-resolved and …

Diversification Across A Dynamic Landscape: Phylogeography And Riverscape Genetics Of Speckled Dace (Rhinichthys Osculus) In Western North America, Steven Michael Mussmann

Graduate Theses and Dissertations

Evolution occurs at various spatial and temporal scales. For example, speciation may occur in historic time, whereas localized adaptation is more contemporary. Each is required to identify and manage biodiversity. However, the relative abundance of Speckled Dace (Rhinichthys osculus), a small cyprinid fish in western North America (WNA) and the study species for this dissertation, establishes it an atypical conservation target, particularly when contrasted with the profusion of narrowly endemic forms it displays. Yet, the juxtaposition of ubiquity versus endemism provides an ideal model against which to test hypotheses regarding the geomorphic evolution of WNA. More specifically, it also allows …

Dynamics Of Prochlorococcus Diversity And Photoacclimation During Short-Term Shifts In Water Column Stratification At Station Aloha, Anne W. Thompson, Ger Van Den Engh, Nathan A. Ahlgren, Kathleen Kouba, Samantha Ward, Samuel T. Wilson, David M. Karl

Biology Faculty Publications and Presentations

The cyanobacterium Prochlorococcus is the dominant phototroph in surface waters of the vast oligotrophic oceans, the foundation of marine food webs, and an important component of global biogeochemical cycles. The prominence of Prochlorococcus across the environmental gradients of the open ocean is attributed to its extensive genetic diversity and flexible chlorophyll physiology, enabling light capture over a wide range of intensities. What remains unknown is the balance between temporal dynamics of genetic diversity and chlorophyll physiology in the ability of Prochlorococcus to respond to a variety of short (approximately 1 day) and longer (months to year) changes in the environment. …

The Study Of Alcoholic Liver Diseases, Seun Emmanuel Owoseni

Electronic Theses and Dissertations

Excessive alcohol consumption is the primary contributing factor in the development of alcoholic liver diseases (ALD). Nicotine contained in tobacco is a major addictive alkaloid, which enhances the effects of ALDs. The major enzyme involved in nicotine metabolism is cytochrome P450 2A5 (CYP2A5) which is produced in the liver. Alcohol can stimulate the CYP2A5 enzyme. We utilized cyp2a5-/- knockout mice in this research to examine the effects of CYP2A5.

The cyp2a5-/- mice and wild-type (WT) mice were fed liquid ethanol diet with or without nicotine to induce ALD. Nicotine enhancing effects on ALD were observed in WT mice but not …

Aspects Of The Reproductive Biology And Growth Of The Mississippi Silvery Minnow, Hybognathus Nuchalis (Agassiz, 1855) (Teleostei: Cyprinidae) From The Pearl River, Louisiana., Arely Ramírez-García, Kyle R. Piller

Southeastern Fishes Council Proceedings

The reproductive biology and growth of the Mississippi Silvery Minnow, Hybognathus nuchalis, is described from multiple sites in the Pearl River, Louisiana. Individuals were collected from August 2011 to August 2012. Ovarian weights, expressed as a percentage of body weights, peaked in December. Size structure ranged from 29.0 to 60.0 mm SL for females and 25.0 to 56.0 mm SL for males. Mature ova were found from November to January. Females reached first maturity (L50) at 37.0 mm SL and L50 for males is at 41.0 mm SL. Sex ratio (females:males) is biased towards females (X²= 18.57 p …

Shoreline Characterization In The Northern Indian River Lagoon, Melinda Donnelly, Michelle Shaffer, Suzanne Connor, Linda Walters

CEELAB Research Data

The purpose of this project was to evaluate current conditions of estuarine shorelines in the northern section of the Indian River Lagoon system, including Mosquito Lagoon, north Indian River, and Banana River. From January 2016 through June 2018, we evaluated structural and functional characteristics of 374 miles of shoreline, from Ponce Inlet in Volusia County to Sebastian Inlet in Brevard County (11,000+ data points). Hard-armoring accounted for approximately 50% of total shoreline, evenly divided between shoreline with bulkheads (25%) and hardened slopes (25%). Forty-five percent of shoreline without hard-armoring had anthropogenic alterations (i.e. mosquito impoundments, railroads and roadways, residential and …

Remote Sensing Of Sargassum Biomass, Nutrients, And Pigments, Mengqiu Wang, Chuanmin Hu, Jennifer Cannizzaro, David English, Xingxing Han, David Naar, Brian Lapointe, Rachel Brewton, Frank J. Hernandez Jr.

Faculty Publications

ield and laboratory experiments are designed to measure Sargassum biomass per area (density), surface reflectance, nutrient contents, and pigment concentrations. An Alternative Floating Algae Index (AFAI)‐biomass density model is established to link the spectral reflectance to Sargassum biomass density, with a relative uncertainty of ~ 12%. Monthly mean integrated Sargassum biomass in the Caribbean Sea and Central West Atlantic reached at least 4.4 million tons in July 2015. The average % C, % N, and % P per dry‐weight are 27.16, 1.06, and 0.10, respectively. The mean chlorophyll‐a (Chl‐a) concentration is ~ 0.05% of the dry‐weight. With these parameters, the …

Actuarial Senescence In A Dimorphic Bird: Different Rates Of Ageing In Morphs With Discrete Reproductive Strategies, M. L. Grunst, A. S. Grunst, Vincent A. Formica, M. L. Korody, A. M. Betuel, M. Barcelo-Serra, R. A. Gonser, E. M. Tuttle

Biology Faculty Works

It is often hypothesized that intra-sexual competition accelerates actuarial senescence, or the increase in mortality rates with age. However, an alternative hypothesis is that parental investment is more important to determining senescence rates. We used a unique model system, the white-throated sparrow (Zonotrichia albicollis), to study variation in actuarial senescence. In this species, genetically determined morphs display discrete mating strategies and disassortative pairing, providing an excellent opportunity to test the predictions of the above hypotheses. Compared to tan-striped males, white-striped males are more polygynous and aggressive, and less parental. Tan-striped females receive less parental support, and invest more into parental …

Molecular Fossils From Phytoplankton Reveal Secular Pco2 Trend Over The Phanerozoic, Caitlyn R. Witkowski, Johan W. H. Weijers, Brian S. Blais, Stefan Schouten, Jaap S. Sinninghe Damsté

Science and Technology Department Faculty Journal Articles

Past changes in the atmospheric concentration of carbon dioxide (PCO2) have had a major impact on earth system dynamics; yet, reconstructing secular trends of past PCO2 remains a prevalent challenge in paleoclimate studies. The current long-term PCO2reconstructions rely largely on the compilation of many different proxies, often with discrepancies among proxies, particularly for periods older than 100 million years (Ma). Here, we reconstructed Phanerozoic PCO2 from a single proxy: the stable carbon isotopic fractionation associated with photosynthesis (Ɛp) that increases as PCO2 increases. This concept has been widely applied to alkenones, but here, we …

Microbiomes, Biofilms And Bacterial Communities Cmb 420x, Michael Cerbo

Library Impact Statements

No abstract provided.

The Contribution Of The Descending Pain Modulatory Pathway In Opioid Tolerance, Lindsay M. Lueptow, Amanda K. Fakira, Erin N. Bobeck

Biology Faculty Publications

Opioids remain among the most effective pain-relieving therapeutics. However, their long-term use is limited due to the development of tolerance and potential for addiction. For many years, researchers have explored the underlying mechanisms that lead to this decreased effectiveness of opioids after repeated use, and numerous theories have been proposed to explain these changes. The most widely studied theories involve alterations in receptor trafficking and intracellular signaling. Other possible mechanisms include the recruitment of new structural neuronal and microglia networks. While many of these theories have been developed using molecular and cellular techniques, more recent behavioral data also supports these …

Imass Time: The Future, In Future!, Qingwei Ma, Eric Adua, Mary C. Boyce, Xingang Li, Guang Ji, Wei Wang

Research outputs 2014 to 2021

Joseph John Thomson discovered and proved the existence of electrons through a series of experiments. His work earned him a Nobel Prize in 1906 and initiated the era of mass spectrometry (MS). In the intervening time, other researchers have also been awarded the Nobel Prize for significant advances in MS technology. The development of soft ionization techniques was central to the application of MS to large biological molecules and led to an unprecedented interest in the study of biomolecules such as proteins (proteomics), metabolites (metabolomics), carbohydrates (glycomics), and lipids (lipidomics), allowing a better understanding of the molecular underpinnings of health …

Phylogeny And Population Genetic Analyses Reveals Cryptic Speciation In The Bombus Fervidus Species Complex (Hymenoptera: Apidae), Jonathan B. Koch, Juanita Rodriguez, James P. Pitts, James P. Strange

Ecology Center Publications

Bumble bees (Bombus Latrielle) are significant pollinators of flowering plants due to their large body size, abundant setae, and generalist foraging strategies. However, shared setal coloration patterns among closely and distantly related bumble bee species makes identification notoriously difficult. The advent of molecular genetic techniques has increased our understanding of bumble bee evolution and taxonomy, and enables effective conservation policy and management. Individuals belonging to the North American Bombus fervidus species-complex (SC) are homogenous in body structure but exhibit significant body color phenotype variation across their geographic distribution. Given the uncertainty of the genealogical boundaries within the SC, some …

Backpack Pcr: A Point-Of-Collection Diagnostic Platform For The Rapid Detection Of Brugia Parasites In Mosquitoes, Weam I. Zaky, Francesca R. Tomaino, Nils Pilotte, Sandra J. Laney, Steven A. Williams

Biological Sciences: Faculty Publications

No abstract provided.

Climactic Niche Model For Overwintering Monarch Butterflies In A Topographically Complex Region Of California, Ashley Fisher, Kiana Saniee, Charis Van Der Heide, Jessica Griffiths, Daniel Meade, Francis X. Villablanca

Biological Sciences

We use climatic conditions that are associated with known monarch butterfly overwintering groves in California to build a Maxent model, and focus on the fine scale probability of overwintering grove occurrence in a topographically complex region of the state (Santa Barbara County). Grove locations are known from recent and historical surveys and a long-term citizen science database. The climatic niche model performs well, predicting that overwintering habitat is most likely to occur along the coast and at low elevations, as shown by empirical data. We then use climatic variables in conjunction with climate change scenarios to model the future location …

Evolution Of Bidirectional Costly Mutualism From Byproduct Consumption, Lon Chubiz, William Harcombe, Jeremy Chacón, Elizabeth Adamowicz, Christopher Marx

Biology Department Faculty Works

Mutualisms are essential for life, yet it is unclear how they arise. A two-stage process has been proposed for the evolution of mutualisms that involve exchanges of two costly resources. First, costly provisioning by one species may be selected for if that species gains a benefit from costless byproducts generated by a second species, and cooperators get disproportionate access to byproducts. Selection could then drive the second species to provide costly resources in return. Previously, a synthetic consortium evolved the first stage of this scenario: Salmonella enterica evolved costly production of methionine in exchange for costless carbon byproducts generated by …

Establishment Of An Efficient In Vitro Propagation System For Iris Sanguinea, Ling Wang, Yu Du, Mahbubur Rahman, Biao Tang, Li-Juan Fan, Aruna Kilaru

ETSU Faculty Works

Iris sanguinea is a perennial flowering plant that is typically cultivated through seeds or bulbs. However, due to limitations in conventional propagation, an alternate regeneration system using seeds was developed. The protocol included optimization of sterilization, stratification and scarification methods as iris seeds exhibit physiological dormancy. In addition to chlorine-based disinfection, alkaline or heat treatment was used to break seed dormancy and reduce contamination. When seeds were soaked in water at 80 °C overnight, and sterilized with 75% EtOH for 30 s and 4% NaOCl solution for 20 minutes, contamination was reduced to 10% and a 73.3% germination was achieved. …

Lcp1 Mutant Zebrafish: A Look At Neutrophils, Cancer, And Gene Compensation, Taylor Mitchell

College of Science and Health Theses and Dissertations

Lymphocyte cytosolic protein 1 (lcp1 or L-plastin) is a small actin-bundling protein that is typically only expressed in motile leukocytes, such as neutrophils and macrophages. However, it is also overexpressed in cancer cells, which may be related to tumor metastasis. Using CRISPR/Cas9 gene editing, our lab has created zebrafish that are genetic knockouts for lcp1 in order to better understand the relationship between L-plastin and cell motility.

Previous studies on L-plastin knockout mice have shown that the mutants have a decreased immune response, and therefore I predicted that our zebrafish mutants might have impaired development or distribution of immune cells. …

Characterization Of A Basement Membrane Associated Protein Encoding Gene In Drosophila Melanogaster, Aref Ranjbar, Ajay Srivastava

Posters-at-the-Capitol

Title: Characterization of a Basement Membrane Associated Protein Encoding Gene in Drosophila melanogaster

Authors: Aref Ranjbar, Mayank Kapadia, Ajay Srivastava, PhD(faculty member, mentor)

Basement Membranes (BM) are important for normal development and tumor progression. In order to get a better understanding of BM dynamics we identified genes that encoded BM interacting proteins. One such gene is predicted to be involved in vesicle-mediated transport in Drosophila melanogaster. Here we characterize this gene by utilizing molecular biology techniques like immunohistochemistry, RNA in situ hybridization, and Western blot analysis utilizing antibodies generated in the laboratory. Western blot analysis identified this protein to be …

Discovery Of Unreported Sponge Taxa, With Potential As Species New To Science, From The Chicago Area, Jennifer E. Slate

Faculty Research and Creative Activities Symposium

No abstract provided.

25 Years Of Battling Academic Hegemony, Gender Stereotypes And Political Power: Deconstructing The Mantis Visual System In The Service Of Helping Children, Frederick R. Prete

Faculty Research and Creative Activities Symposium

No abstract provided.

Modeling Werner Syndrome In Drosophila, Elyse A. Bolterstein, Aaron E. Schirmer

Faculty Research and Creative Activities Symposium

No abstract provided.

Metabolic Processing By The Mtorc1 Pathway In The Zebrafish Yolk Cell, Jorge A. Cantu

Faculty Research and Creative Activities Symposium

No abstract provided.

Proceedings Of The First Annual Symposium On The Wright State Woods, College Of Science And Mathematics, College Of Liberal Arts

1st Annual Wright State Woods Symposium

The proceeding of the Woods Symposium held at Wright State University and sponsored by the College of Science and Mathematics and the College of Liberal Arts.

Resolving Authorship Disputes By Mediation And Arbitration, Zen Faulkes

School of Integrative Biological & Chemical Sciences (Formerly Dept. of Biology)

Background Disputes over authorship are increasing. This paper examines the options that researchers have in resolving authorship disputes. Discussions about authorship disputes often address how to prevent disputes but rarely address how to resolve them. Both individuals and larger research communities are harmed by the limited options for dispute resolution. Main body When authorship disputes arise after publication, most existing guidelines recommend that the authors work out the disputes between themselves. But this is unlikely to occur, because there are often large power differentials between team members, and institutions (e.g., universities, funding agencies) are unlikely to have authority over all …

Plantes: A Plant Electrophysiological Multi-Source Data Online Analysis And Sharing Platform, Chao Song, Xiao-Huang Qin, Qiao Zhou, Zi-Yang Wang, Wei-He Liu, Jun Li, Guiliang Tang, Et Al.

Michigan Tech Publications, Part 1

At present, plant electrophysiological data volumes and complexity are increasing rapidly. It causes the demand for efficient management of big data, data sharing among research groups, and fast analysis. In this paper, we proposed PlantES (Plant Electrophysiological Data Sharing), a distributed computing-based prototype system that can be used to store, manage, visualize, analyze, and share plant electrophysiological data. We deliberately designed a storage schema to manage the multi-source plant electrophysiological data by integrating distributed storage systems HDFS and HBase to access all kinds of files efficiently. To improve the online analysis efficiency, parallel computing algorithms on Spark were proposed and …

The Development Of Hybrid Lipid-Polymer Nanoparticle Architectures For The Sustained-Release Of Small Hydrophilic Molecules, Keegan Curry, Jill M. Steinbach-Rankins Dr.

Posters-at-the-Capitol

Introduction: Polymeric nanoparticles (NPs) have been utilized as drug delivery vehicles for a variety of applications. However, achieving sustained-release of small hydrophilic agents is a primary challenge for their use in prolonged delivery applications.

Objective: This study investigates how novel lipid-polymer hybrid particle architectures can be used to improve the release profile of small hydrophilic encapsulants. Here, PLGA NPs were produced via electrospraying and emulsions. Particles with a core-shell architecture were produced via coaxial electrospraying and the ability of this architecture to sustain release was examined. In addition, we combined polymeric core-shell NPs with a lipid coating to improve biocompatibility, …

Communicating Science Through Data Visualization Bio 230g, Michael Cerbo

Library Impact Statements

No abstract provided.