France

Otoliths are paired calcified structures and are used for hearing and keeping balance of teleost fishes. Otoliths are mainly composed by aragonite, one of the three calcium carbonate polymorphs. However, the otolith carbonate structures often transform from aragonite to another polymorph, vaterite and the mechanism for this transformation remains unclear. To examine the transformation mechanism, we established a new method for changing otolith carbonate polymorphs. Ten individuals of an inbred strain of Oryzias latipes were independently reared in aquaria with adding SrCl2・6H2O to tap water. The other set of individuals were reared in normal tap water as a control group. Sagittal otoliths were removed after 114¬¬–146 days of experimental period. To distinguish between aragonite and vaterite polymorphs, strontium (Sr) and magnesium (Mg) compositions of otoliths were analysed using an electron probe micro analyser. The individuals reared in Sr-rich water had otoliths of which the margins were replaced with vaterite, while control individuals had entirely aragonite otoliths. Our results clearly show that the addition of Sr to rearing water induces polymorphic transformation from aragonite to vaterite. Considering that the polymorphic transformation from inorganic calcite to inorganic aragonite is induced by adding Mg to water, thermodynamic mechanisms possibly affect the observed transformation. Our findings have a potential to explore the impact of having vaterite otolith on fishes as well as to improve understanding of vaterite-forming mechanisms.

SEB Conference 2022

A new method to induce polymorphic transformation from aragonite to vaterite in Oryzias otoliths

Welcome to Delaware State University’s Annual Summer Research Symposium, and thank you for attending! Our symposium represents the culmination of students’ summer experiences in research at Delaware State University. This event showcases the work of college students working on faculty-led research projects, as well as middle and high school students experiencing research for the first time working in research groups. Whatever the case, this summer has been a unique experience for the students, and we hope a transformative one. Even for students who are not planning a career in scientific research, their summer experience has given them skills they will draw on for years to come. 
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 The student participants and organizers of the various summer programs at DSU would like to thank all of the research mentors who guided our summer program participants. There were many DSU faculty, graduate students, and other research and program staff who gave their time and energy to help our students have a fun and educational summer experience. Without their generosity and patience these summer programs would not be possible.
 For the research participants, we hope that you will maintain contact with your research mentors and colleagues. Science is a relatively small community made up of disciplinary “neighborhoods”. If you continue to work in a discipline, the other folks in that discipline will be like your neighbors that you run into regularly. Staying in contact with them will help you keep up with the news of the neighborhood, and open doors to educational and career opportunities. Whether you continue in science or take a different career path, for this summer you have been part of the world of research, and you will benefit from that perspective for the rest of your life.

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DSU Summer Research Symposium 2021

Welcome to Delaware State University’s Annual Summer Research Symposium, and thank you for attending!

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SEB’s Annual Conference is celebrated for creating the perfect composition of research, new discoveries and collaborative connections. Be creative and innovative by exchanging ideas and knowledge with masters of biology from all over the world.

2022 will find over 1500 experimental biologists from across the globe converging on the third-largest French city near the Mediterranean coast and the fastest-growing city in the country over the past 25 years.

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2022 found over 1500 experimental biologists from across the globe converging on the third-largest French city near the Mediterranean coast and the fastest-growing city in the country over the past 25 years - Montpellier, France.

The adaptive significance of sequential hermaphroditism, typically found in tropical fish and marine invertebrates, has been successfully explained by the size-advantage principle (SAP) and notable exception has not been reported. Here we focus on a novel type of protandrous sequential hermaphroditism in an intertidal holothurian as a case not amenable to SAP. This species typically participates as a male in the first three spawning events, and then spawn eggs at the fourth, which is followed by the second sex change to release sperm again. By incorporating published empirical findings into evolutionary invasion analyses, we successfully specified the theoretical conditions that a population containing the reversible sex change is evolutionarily stable. Our scheme is a natural extension of the classical Fisher's principle of sex allocation, and is also capable of consistently explaining a strongly biased operational sex ratio found in sequential hermaphrodites.

Protandrous hermaphroditism with male regression: An explanation based on evolutionarily stable mixed strategies

The relationship between temperature and wingbeat frequency has been the focus of many studies over several decades and it has been shown repeatedly, across taxa, that warmer temperatures lead to higher flapping frequencies. This phenomenon is thought to be driven chiefly by the muscle properties of the flight motor. There are knock-on consequences for the kinematic pattern of the wing stroke that is required in order to generate aerodynamic forces sufficient to balance body weight. Specifically, we might predict that as frequency increases, the stroke amplitude or angle of attack must decrease to avoid producing excess force. 
Since mosquitoes have very high baseline wingbeat frequencies for their size, they operate with low wing stroke amplitudes, resulting in unusual aerodynamic mechanisms that place a greater burden of lift generation on the supinatory and pronatory rotations during the wingbeat cycle. Temperature-modulated increases in frequency reduce the stroke amplitude still further. Here, we investigate the aerodynamics of male Anopheles gambiae mosquitoes during flights recorded over a range of temperatures spanning almost 10 degrees Celsius. The kinematics were captured in a new multi-camera arena, and the flow fields were subsequently simulated by solving the incompressible Navier-Stokes equations. We present noteworthy variation in Anopheles kinematics with temperature and the mechanism of aerodynamic force production across the range of recorded kinematics.

The effect of temperature on mosquito aerodynamics

The rabbit is a widely used model system in comparative and clinical sciences for understanding correlations between anatomy and function in the masticatory system. Experimental and simulation studies have hypothesised that the rabbit is able to modulate chewing mechanics to process a variety of food types with high efficiency. Through synchronously measuring 3D jaw motions (using biplanar x-ray videography), muscle length change (using fluoromicrometry) and muscle activity (using electromyography) during feeding on foods of varying material properties and maximum bite-force in-situ experimentation we have begun to test these hypotheses. Processing tougher food types resulted in an increase in whole chew-cycle duration, and particularly in the slow-closing proportion of chewing. Additionally, working side muscles appear to be recruited more during feeding on tougher food types. Finally, the capacity to generate force varies greatly over the entire gape cycle, with rabbits working at the lower end of the gape-force relationship. Our data suggest that the masticatory system modulates power output through two mechanisms, primarily through changes in masticatory frequency, specifically modulating the power stroke phase of the chew cycle, while also modulating muscle recruitment. Finally, our preliminary in-situ data suggests the rabbit functions outside the optimal range of the force-gape relationship. 

The dynamic role of rabbit masticatory apparatus during feeding

Bipeds provide a unique study system to address hindlimb allometry both across and within archosaurs and mammals — having size ranges spanning five orders of magnitude yet overlapping near 1 kg body mass for most major clades. Previous work on non-avian and avian theropods shows that hindlimb proportions cluster within 1/9th of available morphospace, centered around a 60:40 tibia:femur isoline. Here we expand on previous work by including bipedal hopping mammals and examining potential drivers of divergence. We investigate 1) within group scaling, 2) phylogenetic signal, and 3) differences between hopping and striding bipeds. Our avian analysis includes 374 species, spanning 74 families and 17 orders. Our mammalian analysis is restricted to habitual bipedal hoppers and includes 47 species distributed across 5 families and 2 orders. Prior to phylogenetic correction, significant hindlimb positive allometry is seen in Anseriformes, Gruiformes, and Palaeognathae, while significant allometry of some individual segments is found in nearly all avian clades. For mammals, significant positive allometry is seen in Macropodiformes but not Rodentia. After phylogenetic correction using PGLS, significant positive allometry persists in the metatarsal segment of Galliformes, Gruiformes, Palaeognathae, and Diprotodontia. (Macropodiformes exhibited positive allometry of the hindlimb, tibia, and metatarsals after PGLS.) Examining segment proportions revealed negative allometry of the femur with respect to total hindlimb length in these same groups. Hence, whether striding or hopping — avian or mammalian, significant positive allometry of the distal segment is a hallmark of both birds and mammals.

Variable scaling of limb segment proportions in bipeds: Does allometry drive divergence?

During flight, insects can make subtle changes to their wing kinematics that in turn have large effects on their aerodynamic forces. To understand and model the above, therefore requires measurements of natural flight with appropriate spatiotemporal resolution and duration. These factors are determined by wingbeat frequency, size, and behaviour, which are limited by trade-offs within the operating equipment. Here, we describe a new and flexible arena setup that uses ten high-speed cameras to record insects flying freely in an optically clear chamber that can scale from the smallest to some of the largest insects. Pulsed far-red LEDs are focused and aligned with the high-speed cameras to provide bright, uniform backgrounds that eliminate motion blur and are beyond the insects’ visible spectrum. Separate, stereo cameras function as triggers, using real-time image analysis when subjects enter the recording volume. These triggers can control additional stimuli, such as a white light, to induce flight manoeuvres at specific times. The resultant footage is coupled with a comprehensive voxel-carving software package to automatically calculate wing and body kinematics. This includes wing deformations in the form of wing torsion, which is important for accurate aerodynamic modelling. To date, we have documented  free-flight in several species, including Calliphora vicina and Drosophila melanogaster at 6,400 fps, and Anopheles gambiae at 12,000 fps. This setup will generate a large database of high-precision insect free-flight kinematics to better our understanding of this diverse class and be used to feed into studies of insect flight control and aerodynamics.

High-precision insect wing and body kinematics acquisition using a new and flexible free-flight arena

Boxfish (Ostraciidae) have peculiar body shapes, with conspicuous keels formed by their bony carapaces. Previous studies have proposed various hydrodynamic roles for these keels, including reducing drag during swimming, contributing to passive stabilisation of the swimming course, or providing resistance against roll rotations. We tested these hypotheses using computational fluid dynamics simulations of five species of Ostraciidae with a range of carapace shapes. The hydrodynamic performance of the original carapace surface models, obtained from laser scanning of museum specimens, was compared with models where the keels had been digitally reduced. The original carapaces showed no reduced drag or increased passive stability against pitch and yaw compared to the reduced-keel carapaces. However, consistently for all studied species, a strong increase in roll drag and roll added mass was observed for the original carapaces compared to the reduced-keel carapaces, despite the relatively small differences in keel height. In particular, the damping of roll movement by resistive drag torques increased considerably by the presence of keels. Our results suggest that the shape of the boxfish carapace is important in enabling the observed roll-free forward swimming of boxfish and may facilitate the control of manoeuvres.

The hydrodynamic function of keels in boxfish

When terrestrially locomoting, birds tend to swing the foot with the toes together, and then spread the toes prior to touch down, creating a larger surface area over which to spread the bird’s weight. However, on deformable substrates, particularly on very soft substrates like saturated mud, the ground does not fully, nor immediately bear the weight of the animal. Instead, the foot (and therefore bird) will sink some distance before finding support. We used X-ray Reconstruction of Moving Morphology to measure the digit divarication angle, or the spread of the toes, throughout the swing and stance phase of a Guineafowl walking over a solid surface, firm mud, and soft mud (11 trials). Maximum digit spread was slightly larger (82°) on soft mud compared with solid (71°) and firm mud (68°). However, our data show that at touchdown, digit divarication angle is more variable on soft substrates than firm ones. This indicates that in some cases, when the substrate is softest, the toes are still spreading as the foot sinks into the mud. We also found that digit divarication angle was much greater at mid stance when traversing soft mud than firm mud. Our data provide an interesting touch-stone for interpreting motions from deep dinosaur tracks, which may only present the surficial foot-sediment interaction. 

How digit divarication angle changes at touchdown and midstance as guineafowl traverse solid and deformable substrates.

Animal bite force is an ecologically relevant performance trait, crucial for individual fitness through its impact on food ingestion and intraspecific agonistic interactions. Despite its popularity in vertebrates, bite force has only recently begun to be measured across the huge diversity of insects. Bite force studies generally use either in vivo measurements or forces modelled based on muscle physiological cross-sectional area (PCSA), and very rarely compare both. PCSA can be measured in a variety of ways, in particular in insects, which have never been thoroughly compared. Here we compare several digitally computed estimates of PCSA (and its components muscle volume and fiber length) in the major mandibular adductor muscle of Schistocerca gregaria, together with an experimental baseline estimate. This experimental estimate relies on dissecting out the muscles, weighing them, dissolving fiber bundles in acid and measuring fibre length. The digital estimates are based on CT scans of the heads, in which it is possible to measure muscle volume, fibre length, and muscle attachment area. After scanning the heads of the specimens and segmenting their mandibular apparatus, we used manual and automated approaches to measure the above mentioned values, to assess the comparability of the various PCSA methods and proxies, as well as the reliability of the automatization process. In addition, using the different PCSA estimates and muscle stress values from the literature, we model bite forces, which we compare to in vivo measurements from the same individuals.

Modelling bite force in insects: comparison of different PCSA approaches with in vivo measurements

Rice (Oryza sativa L.) is one of the important cereal grains and a staple food for more than 50% of the world’s population. Increases in global temperatures have a negative impact on crop productivity. Plants undergo a variety of physiological and biochemical changes as a result of temperature stress in order to adapt to higher temperatures. In this study, we have used 204 accessions from the Bengal and Assam Aus Panel (BAAP). A total of eight replicate plant per accession were grown. All plants were grown in the greenhouse until maturity; thereafter, five replicate plants were randomly selected, their panicles at anthesis stage marked and were transferred to large growth room at 38°C for 24 hours to assess high-temperature treatments. Three replicates plants were not heat treated. Fertility was assessed as the proportion of flowers filled. Heat treatment significantly (P&lt;0.0001) reduced fertility by 17.4% on average and there was a significant (P&lt;0.0001) differences among accessions. In addition to that, there was a significant (P&lt;0.001) interaction between accession and treatment. Heat tolerant cultivars have been identified including the aus reference cultivar DJ123. Genome Wide Association Studies (GWAS) using 2 million SNPs will be used to identify QTLs and candidate genes associated with heat tolerance in the BAAP.

Genotypic Variation in Heat Tolerance in Aus Rice During the Flowering Stage 

The Arabidopsis gynoecium is a complex structure composed of different tissues. Development is regulated by hormone interactions, especially auxin and cytokinin, as well as the spatiotemporal action of transcription factors and chromatin dynamics, including epigenetic modifications of core histones. SPT is bHLH transcription factor involved in gynoecium development, specifically affecting both auxin and cytokinin responses. GCN5 is a histone acetyltransferase with pleiotropic biological roles including auxin and cytokinin responses in the gynoecium. CLV1 is a receptor kinase, part of the CLAVATA signaling pathway which suppresses the expression of WUS in apical and floral meristems. Previous work has shown that clv1gcn5 double mutants exhibit a plethora of phenotypes including fasciated meristems and abnormal flowers with increased number of stamen and elongated gynoecia with enlarged apical regions and reduced ovaries. In the double mutants, the stem-cell-promoting transcription factor WUS is ectopically overexpressed in the gynoecia. To elucidate genetic interactions between SPT, CLV1 and GCN5 we created all genetic combination between spt, clv1 and gcn5 mutants. We show here that spt mutations largely suppress the phenotypes of clv1gcn5 gynoecia. The enlarged stigma and style and ovary formation are restored in sptclv1gcn5 plants compared to clv1gcn5 plants. The spt mutation also reverses the WUS ectopic overexpression in clv1gcn5 gynoecia. Interestingly spt gynoecia have also reduced WUS expression compared to wild type. These results suggest that SPT mediates the CLV1-GCN5 synergistic interaction during gynoecium development, potentially acting as a positive regulator of WUS expression in the gynoecium.

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Protandrous hermaphroditism with male regression: An explanation based on evolutionarily stable mixed strategies

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