Ecology and Evolutionary Biology Commons^™

Causes And Consequences Of Variation In Female Mate Choice And Its Relation To Sexual Conflict In Drosophila Melanogaster, David Cs Filice

Theses and Dissertations (Comprehensive)

Female mate choice is a significant driving force of evolutionary change and can explain the evolution of exaggerated male traits and/or displays, and dimorphism between the sexes. Females are thought to choose mates based on the greatest provision of direct or indirect benefits. Despite this, we often still see substantial individual variation in female mate choice behaviours both within and across populations. Recent studies suggest that female mate choice is a complex decision-making process that involves many context-dependent factors. However, the precise sources of this variation, such as previous mating experience, are not completely understood. In Drosophila melanogaster, mating …

Draft Genome Sequences For Seven Streptococcus Parauberis Isolates From Wild Fish In The Chesapeake Bay, Ashley Haines, Emily Nebergall, Elvira Besong, Kimaya Council, Onaysha Lambert, David Gauthier

Biological Sciences Faculty Publications

Streptococcus parauberis is a pathogen of cattle and fish, closely related Streptococcus uberis and Streptococcus iniae. We report the genomes of seven S. parauberis strains recovered from striped bass (Morone saxatilis) in the Chesapeake Bay. The availability of these genomes will allow comparative genomic analysis of Chesapeake Bay S. parauberis strains versus S. parauberis cultured from other animal hosts and geographic regions.

Sex-Obsessed Or Just Sociable? Non-Copulatory Displays In The Hamerkop, Natasha Hagemeyer

Biological Sciences Faculty Publications

[First Paragraph] Non‐copulatory sexual behavior is surprisingly common among animals ranging from insects to vertebrates. Although sometimes considered unusual or aberrant within a species, in some taxa non‐copulatory sexual behavior is widespread, and may even represent the majority of sexual behavior. Such behavior can also happen in many other contexts, including accidental contact, courtship, social bonding, and social structuring (Bagemihl 1999).

Tick-, Mosquito-, And Rodent-Bourne Parasite Sampling Designs For The National Ecological Observatory Network, Yuri Springer, David Hoekman, Pieter T.J. Johnson, Paul A. Duffy, Rebecca A. Hufft, Holly D. Gaff

Biological Sciences Faculty Publications

Parasites and pathogens are increasingly recognized as significant drivers of ecological and evolutionary change in natural ecosystems. Concurrently, transmission of infectious agents among human, livestock, and wildlife populations represents a growing threat to veterinary and human health. In light of these trends and the scarcity of long-term time series data on infection rates among vectors and reservoirs, the National Ecological Observatory Network (NEON) will collect measurements and samples of a suite of tick-, mosquito-, and rodent-borne parasites through a continental-scale surveillance program. Here, we describe the sampling designs for these efforts, highlighting sampling priorities, field and analytical methods, and the …

The Small Mammals Of Southeastern Virginia As Revealed By Pitfall Trapping, Robert K. Rose

Biological Sciences Faculty Publications

Pitfall trapping is a poor method to catch small mammals but the only way to catch and study the Southeastern Shrew (Sorex longirostris), the primary mammal of interest in the field studies reported here. While learning much about its distribution and abundance, still more was learned about the other small mammals present in forests and fields of eastern Virginia. A total of 15 species was captured at 19 locations during the 1990-2013 period, including five shrews, two moles, and eight rodents, representing all but one of the common small mammals in eastern Virginia.

Diet And Foraging Behaviors Of Timber Rattlesnakes, Crotalus Horridus, In Eastern Virginia, Scott M. Goetz, Christopher E. Petersen, Robert K. Rose, John D. Kleopfer, Alan H. Savitzky

Biological Sciences Faculty Publications

During a 17-yr telemetry study, we examined the diet and ambush behavior of a population of Crotalus horridus in southeastern Virginia. Forty dietary items were identified from 37 fecal samples. We documented 722 instances of snakes in an ambush posture, 61 of which were in a vertical-tree posture, as if hunting arboreal prey at the base of a tree. The most common prey items were Eastern Gray Squirrels (Sciurus carolinensis), which accounted for 45 of all dietary items and represented an estimated 78 of total biomass consumed by C. horridus. Prey was not consumed in proportion to availability, …

A Novel Method Of Microsatellite Genotyping-By-Sequencing Using Individual Combinatorial Barcoding, Salla Vartia, Jose L. Villanueva-Cañas, John Finarelli, Edward D. Farrell, Patrick C. Collins, Graham M. Hughes, Jeanette E.L. Carlson, David T. Gauthier, Philip Mcginnity, Thomas F. Cross, Richard D. Fitzgerald, Luca Mirimin, Fiona Crispie, Paul D. Cotter, Jens Carlsson

Biological Sciences Faculty Publications

This study examines the potential of next-generation sequencing based 'genotyping-by-sequencing' (GBS) of microsatellite loci for rapid and cost-effective genotyping in large-scale population genetic studies. The recovery of individual genotypes from large sequence pools was achieved by PCR-incorporated combinatorial barcoding using universal primers. Three experimental conditions were employed to explore the possibility of using this approach with existing and novel multiplex marker panels and weighted amplicon mixture. The GBS approach was validated against microsatellite data generated by capillary electrophoresis. GBS allows access to the underlying nucleotide sequences that can reveal homoplasy, even in large datasets and facilitates cross laboratory transfer. GBS …

Transcriptional Regulation Of Specialized Metabolites In Arabidopsis Thaliana And Catharanthus Roseus, Craig M. Schluttenhofer

Theses and Dissertations--Plant and Soil Sciences

For millennia humans have utilized plant specialized metabolites for health benefits, fragrances, poisons, spices, and medicine. Valued metabolites are often produced in small quantities and may command high prices. Understanding when and how the plant synthesizes these compounds is important for improving their production. Phytohormone signaling cascades, such as jasmonate (JA) activate or repress transcription factors (TF) controlling expression of metabolite biosynthetic genes. TFs regulating specialized metabolite biosynthetic genes can be manipulated to engineer plants with increased metabolite production.

WRKY transcription factor are known components of both JA signaling cascades and regulation of specialized metabolism. The presence of WRKY binding …

A Tale Of Two Palmettos: The Foundation Of Ecosystems, Warren G. Abrahamson Ii

Faculty Journal Articles

Fruits of saw palmetto (Serenoa repens) provide crucial, high-quality resources to wildlife while providing a matrix for many southeastern US ecosystems. As a foundation species, saw palmetto plays a major role in structuring fire-maintained plant communities. Often living on nutrient-poor soil conditions, the thick leaves of saw palmetto are long lived, up to 2.8 years in shaded sand pine scrub.

Evidence Of Rock Kangaroo Seed Dispersal Via Faecal Seed Storage In A Tropical Monsoon Community, Chris Martine, Ally Boni, Elizabeth Capaldi, Gemma Lionheart, Ingrid E. Jordon-Thaden

Faculty Journal Articles

While some of the plant species of the ‘Sandstone Country’ along the escarpment of western Arnhem Land produce fleshy fruits and appear to rely on biotic methods of seed dispersal, little is known about the methods by which this is achieved – and few potential dispersers co-occur in the sandstone outcrop communities. For the present study, scat collections were made on outcrops in the northeastern area of Kakadu National Park with the hope of uncovering relationships between local frugivores and fruit-producers, and providing evidence for seasonal storage of mammal-dispersed seeds in scat prior to germination. The goals of the present …

No Cortex, No Cry, Vladimir Dinets

Animal Sentience

In his target article, Key (2016) argues that since fish don’t have a frontal cortex (part of the brain known to be important for feeling of pain in humans and rodents), they cannot feel pain or other noxious stimuli. I comment on the logic used in this extrapolation and other arguments presented in the paper.

Mediating Claims Through Critical Anthropomorphism, Gordon Burghardt

Animal Sentience

Key’s (2016) discussion of his claim that fish do not feel pain ignores the history of attempts to study the attribution of mental states to other species. Although willing to accept that mammals feel pain, Key claims that fish lack the mammalian neural mechanisms underlying pain and are unconscious of their experiences. Consequently, we do not need to be overly concerned about fishing practices that would otherwise be viewed as painful. Key uses a flawed anthropomorphic lens. All attributions of mental events to organisms other than oneself involve inferences derived from anthropomorphic processes through which we process physiological and behavioral …

Pain And Other Feelings In Humans And Animals, Antonio Damasio, Hanna Damasio

Animal Sentience

Evidence from neuroanatomy, neurophysiology, and neuropsychology suggests that the experience of feelings in humans does not depend exclusively on structures of the cerebral cortex. It does not seem warranted to deny the possibility of feeling in animals on the grounds that their cerebral cortices are not comparable to those of humans.

Where Is Pain In The Brain?, Marshall Devor

Animal Sentience

Key argues that fish cannot experience pain based on (1) brain imaging in humans, (2) consequences of lesions and (3) direct brain stimulation. Imaging indeed shows that pain-relevant signals reach the cortex, but not that they underlie the subjective experience of pain. Lesions and stimulation data are more to the point, but Key paints an idiosyncratic and misleading picture of their effects. S1 and S2 ablation does not eliminate evoked or spontaneous pain, although there may be up- or down-modulation. Likewise, stimulation of pain-associated cortical areas rarely induces pain, and pain almost never occurs at the onset of epileptic seizures. …

Fish Pain: Would It Change Current Best Practice In The Real World?, B. K. Diggles

Animal Sentience

Much of the “fish pain debate” relates to how high the bar for pain should be set. The close phylogenetic affinities of teleosts with cartilaginous fishes which appear to lack nociceptors suggests caution should be applied by those who seek to lower the bar, especially given the equivocal and conflicting nature of the experimental data currently available for teleosts. Nevertheless, even if we assume fish “feel pain,” it is difficult to see how current best practice in aquaculture would change. This is because of the need to avoid stress at all stages of the rearing process to optimize health, growth …

Falsifying The Null Hypothesis That “Fish Do Not Feel Pain", Brian Key

Animal Sentience

The reader of Animal Sentience may surmise that because the weight of the commentaries on my target article, “Why fish do not feel pain,” is leaning towards not supporting my argument, it follows that the premise "fish do not feel pain" is incorrect. However, science does not prevail by popular opinion. History is plagued with numerous (and often widely accepted) examples of biological phenomena being explained by mysterious forces. In the absence of a mechanistic understanding, the many different guises of vitalism (the principle that life involves a vital energy) are often invoked to explain the unknown. Spurious …

Upper Thermal Limits Differ Among Component Species In A Host-Parasitoid-Hyperparasitoid System, Kanchan A. Joshi

Theses and Dissertations

Among the predicted impacts associated with global climate change, warming is of special interest because the rates of physiological processes are temperature-dependent. Insects and other ectotherms are likely to be affected due to their limited ability to control body temperature. In this study, I measured the tolerance to extreme high temperatures, i.e., critical thermal maximum (CT_max), of component species in a tri-trophic system, including an herbivore (Manduca sexta), a primary larval parasitoid (Cotesia congregata) and a hyperparasitoid (genus Silochalcis). For wild insects, the parasitoid had the lowest CT_max, the hyperparasitoid had …

From Seed To Sky: Impacts Of Explosive Compounds On Vegetation Across Spatial And Developmental Scales, Stephen M. Via

Theses and Dissertations

Explosive compounds are broadly distributed across the globe as a result of nearly two centuries of munitions use in warfare and military activities. Two explosive compounds have seen disproportionate use; RDX (hexahydro-1,3,5-trinitro-1,3,5-triazine) and TNT (2-methyl- 1,3,5-trinitrobenzene), being the most commonly found explosives in the environment. The effects of explosives on biota have been studied in great detail; however, there is a general lack of understanding with regard to broader ecological impacts of these contaminants. My dissertation objective was to follow the impacts of explosive compounds on vegetation across scales. Impacts on vegetation at the species scale alter community composition via …

Independent Origination Of Floral Zygomorphy, A Predicted Adaptive Response To Pollinators: Developmental And Genetic Mechanisms, Ghadeer Bukhari, Wenheng Zhang

Theses and Dissertations

Observations of floral development indicate that floral organ initiation in pentapetalous flowers more commonly results in a medially positioned abaxial petal (MAB) than in a medially positioned adaxial petal (MAD), where the medial plane is defined by the stem and the bract during early floral development. It was proposed that the dominant MAB petal initiation might impose a developmental constraint that leads to the evolution of limited patterns of floral zygomorphy in Asteridae, a family in which the floral zygomorphy develops along the medial plane and results in a central ventral (CV) petal in mature flowers. Here, I investigate whether …

Seasonal Variation Of Fish And Macroinvertebrate Biomass Spectra In Southern West Virginia Streams, Andrew J. Kirk

Theses and Dissertations

The biomass size spectrum - the power-law scaling relationship between average individual size and total biomass - has often been studied in lake and marine ecosystems, but rarely in lotic systems. The objective of this study was to test for characteristic biomass spectra in small temperate streams. Seasonal fish and macroinvertebrate data, including population abundance and biomass estimates, were collected in three wadeable, southern West Virginia streams from October 2013 to May 2015. Fish abundances were estimated with 3-pass electrofishing (depletion) surveys and individuals were weighed in the field. Macroinvertebrates were collected with a Hess sampler and returned to the …

Differential Response Of Barrier Island Dune Grasses To Species Interactions And Burial, April Harris

Theses and Dissertations

Dune grasses are integral to biogeomorphic feedbacks that create and alter foredunes and barrier island stability. In a glasshouse study, Ammophila breviligulata Fern. and Uniola paniculata L. were planted together and subjected to sand burial to quantify morphological and physiological response. Ammophila breviligulata physiological and morphological performance declined when planted with U. paniculata but U. paniculata was not affected when planted with A. breviligulata. Burial had a positive effect on A. breviligulata and U. paniculata as indicated by electron transport rate and total biomass at the end of the experiment. Due to their different growth strategies, A. breviligulata and …

Emergent Interactions Influence Functional Traits And Success Of Dune Building Ecosystem Engineers, Joseph K. Brown

Theses and Dissertations

Stability of coastal systems are threatened by oceanic and atmospheric drivers of climate change. Sea-level rise compounded with increased frequency and intensity of storms emphasizes need for protection of inner island systems by dune formations. Dune building processes are affected by interactions between growth of ecosystem engineering dune grasses and environmental factors associated with disturbance such as sand burial and salt spray. Climate change may also cause latitudinal expansion of some species, resulting in emergence of competitive interactions that were previously absent. Topographic structure of coastlines, traditionally influenced by sand burial, could change as a result of competition emergence. My …

The Microbiome In Light Of Host Evolution, Alexander M. Waldrop Jr.

Theses and Dissertations

Recent advances in sequencing technologies have provided an unprecedented window in the unseen biological world. Accompanying this revolution is a growing appreciation for the ubiquity and diversity of beneficial interactions between animals and the microbes they carry. Given the symbiotic roles of microbes in host nutrition, immunity, behavior, development, and nearly every other facet of host biology, it is becoming increasingly clear that any understanding of hosts and their evolution would be incomplete without also considering the microbial dimension. Yet despite the growing body of evidence that many of these partnerships are rooted deep in evolutionary time, the majority of …

Genome Wide Epigenetic Analyses Of Araptus Attenuatus, A Bark Beetle, Chitra Seshadri

Theses and Dissertations

Phylogeographic studies have relied on surveying neutral genetic variation in natural populations as a way of gaining better insights into the evolutionary processes shaping present day population demography. Recent emphasis on understanding putative adaptive variation have brought to light the role of epigenetic variation in influencing phenotypes and the mechanisms underlying local adaptation. While much is known about how methylation acts at specific loci to influence known phenotypes, there is little information on the spatial genetic structure of genome-wide patterns of methylation and the extent to which it can extend our understanding of both neutral and putatively adaptive processes. This …

The Effects Of Tidal Forcing On Nutrient Fluxes In The Tidal, Freshwater James River Estuary, Va, Dana L. Devore

Theses and Dissertations

A 12-month study (January to December 2015) focused on the effects of tidal forcing on nutrient fluxes in the tidal, freshwater segment of the James River Estuary (JRE). Discrete sampling of nutrient chemistry and continuous monitoring of tidal discharge were used to determine the volume and timing of the tides, and differences in nutrient concentrations between incoming and outgoing tides. The goal of this study was to improve understanding of tidal influence on nutrient fluxes and their role in nutrient transport to the lower estuary. Results suggested that differences in nutrient concentrations between incoming and outgoing tides were small throughout …

Successional Changes In Leaf Nutrient Concentrations Of Woody And Herbaceous Species, Daniel Walter Kuchta

Masters Theses

Leaf nutrient concentrations are an example of a functional trait, a trait that can be used to understand community dynamics by observing how plants interact with their environment. I explored how leaf nutrient concentrations were affected over successional time by environmental changes. The majority of prior research on functional traits focuses on either woody or herbaceous species, but not both life forms simultaneously. To address this, I also explored the successional changes to leaf nutrient concentrations, separating the plant community into woody and herbaceous species.

Healthy, mature leaves were taken from 122 taxa of woody and herbaceous species in a …

Low-Head Dams On Habitat, Fish Functional Guilds And Genetic Structuring In A Midwestern River System, Shannon Cassandra Frary Smith

Masters Theses

The natural flow regime of the majority of rivers in the United States has been altered by anthropogenic structures. This loss of connectivity plays a strong role in shaping river ecosystems by altering physical habitat characteristics and shaping fish community assemblages. Although the impacts of large dams on river systems are well documented and often easy to observe, there are fewer studies on the effects of smaller low-head dams. Additionally, the influences of low-head dams on the genetic structuring of small-bodied riverine fishes have yet to be fully explored. I assessed the effects of two low-head dams on the Vermilion …

Demographics And Parasites Of Spotted Bass In The Wabash River, Evan C. Boone

Masters Theses

Spotted Bass Micropterus punctulatus Rafinesque are a popular sport fish primarily found in the streams and reservoirs of the south. The Wabash River, a large tributary of the Ohio River, contains a naturally reproducing population on the northern boundary of their range. Currently, the lower Wabash River is monitored using two different sampling designs, the Long Term Electrofishing Program monitors community assemblages using stratified random sampling whereas the Illinois Department of Natural Resources uses a fixed sampling design. Due to the wide distribution but low abundance of Spotted Bass throughout this drainage, captures from each design were compared to assess …

Diel And Seasonal Patterns Of Channel Catfish Movement And Habitat Use In The Lower Wabash River, Hanna Gibbs Kruckman

Masters Theses

Channel catfish Ictalurus punctatus are commonly found throughout the Mississippi River basin and support commercial and recreational fisheries in many large river systems. Understanding population demographics as well as movement patterns and habitat usage can provide a more holistic approach to species management and conservation. Within a 16-km stretch of the lower Wabash River, 27 channel catfish were implanted with acoustic transmitters to monitor fine scale movement and habitat use from September 2014 through April 2016. Channel catfish were located using active tracking during two types of tracking events. Site tracking occurred only during daylight hours and diel tracking monitored …

Stopover Ecology Of Neotropical Migratory Songbirds In The Northern Yucatan Peninsula, Mexico, Lauren E. Solomon

Masters Theses

Chapter I. Full-service hotels, convenience stores or fire escapes? Evaluating function of stopover sites for Neotropical migrants in the northern Yucatan Peninsula

Nearctic-Neotropical migratory songbirds incur the highest mortality rates during their annual migrations. Migratory songbirds use a network of stopover sites to rest, refuel, or seek refuge during times of poor weather conditions; and the time and energy expended at these sites exceeds that of migratory flight. In order to conserve stopover sites with the highest value to Neotropical migrants, a conceptual framework was developed to classify stop over sites into three functional categories based on their function for …