Physical Sciences and Mathematics Commons^™

Evaluating Sub-Lethal Effects Of Orchard-Applied Pyrethroids Using Video-Tracking Software To Quantify Honey Bee Behaviors, Erin M. Ingram, Julie Augustin, Marion D. Ellis, Blair Siegfried

Department of Entomology: Faculty Publications

Managed honey bee, Apis mellifera L., colonies are contracted to pollinate fruit and nut orchards improving crop quality and yield. Colonies placed in orchards are potentially exposed to pyrethroid insecticides used for broad-spectrum pest control. Pyrethroids have been reported to pose minimal risk to bees due to their low application rates in the field and putative repellent properties. This repellency is believed to alter foraging behavior with the benefit of preventing bees from encountering a lethal dose in the field. However, sub-lethal exposure to pyrethroids may adversely impact bee behavior potentially resulting in social dysfunction or disruption of foraging.

This …

Intrinsic Fluctuations And Driven Response Of Insect Swarms, Rui Ni, James G. Puckett, Eric R. Dufresne, Nicholas T. Ouellette

Physics and Astronomy Faculty Publications

Animals of all sizes form groups, as acting together can convey advantages over acting alone; thus, collective animal behavior has been identified as a promising template for designing engineered systems. However, models and observations have focused predominantly on characterizing the overall group morphology, and often focus on highly ordered groups such as bird flocks. We instead study a disorganized aggregation (an insect mating swarm), and compare its natural fluctuations with the group-level response to an external stimulus. We quantify the swarm’s frequency-dependent linear response and its spectrum of intrinsic fluctuations, and show that the ratio of these two quantities has …

Biochemical, Physiological, And Anatomical Insights Into Aphid-Bioenergy Switchgrass Interactions, Travis J. Prochaska

Department of Entomology: Dissertations, Theses, and Student Research

Switchgrass, Panicum virgatum L., a perennial, warm-season grass native to North America, is a candidate for development as a bioenergy crop. Previously, warm-season grasses were considered to be relatively pest free in their native habitats. However, recent studies using the hemipteran family Aphididae have shown phloem-feeding insects can lead to significant injury in switchgrass. The objectives of this research were to: 1) gain physiological, biochemical, and anatomical insights into insect-bioenergy switchgrass interactions to determine potential insect resistance mechanisms among susceptible and resistant switchgrass genotypes; and 2) to generate and evaluate diverse segregating populations of switchgrass, both resistant and susceptible, to …

Time-Frequency Analysis Reveals Pairwise Interactions In Insect Swarms, James G. Puckett, Rui Ni, Nicholas T. Ouellette

Physics and Astronomy Faculty Publications

The macroscopic emergent behavior of social animal groups is a classic example of dynamical self-organization, and is thought to arise from the local interactions between individuals. Determining these interactions from empirical data sets of real animal groups, however, is challenging. Using multicamera imaging and tracking, we studied the motion of individual flying midges in laboratory mating swarms. By performing a time-frequency analysis of the midge trajectories, we show that the midge behavior can be segmented into two distinct modes: one that is independent and composed of low-frequency maneuvers, and one that consists of higher-frequency nearly harmonic oscillations conducted in synchrony …

The Impacts Of Water Availability On Macroinvertebrate, Ector Matias Martell

Open Access Theses & Dissertations

In many regions around the world climate is changing and biotic communities are changing with it. In areas like the southwestern U.S., drought is one of the major sources of disturbance. Although droughts are an integral part of the natural hydrological cycles, they can have devastating effects on freshwater ecosystems when disrupted by extended periods of drought, resulting in changes to the structure and function of biotic communities. In this study, we surveyed four streams in the Sacramento Mountains of New Mexico from 2010 to 2014: Agua Chiquita, Rio Peñasco, Wills Creek, and the Sacramento River; These years encompassed an …

Speed And Resolution In The Age Of Technological Reproducibility, Shawn Taylor

Theses and Dissertations

The rate of acceleration of the biologic and synthetic world has for a while now, been in the process of exponentially speeding up, maxing out servers and landfills, merging with each other, destroying each other. The last prehistoric relics on Earth are absorbing the same oxygen, carbon dioxide and electronic waves in our biosphere as us. A degraded .jpeg enlarged to full screen on a Samsung 4K UHD HU8550 Series Smart TV - 85” Class (84.5” diag.). Within this composite ecology, the ancient limestone of the grand canyon competes with the iMax movie of itself, the production of Mac pros, …