Search results for "plasticity"

Acclimation capacity and rate change through life in the zooplankton Daphnia

2020

When a change in the environment occurs, organisms can maintain an optimal phenotypic state via plastic, reversible changes to their phenotypes. These adjustments, when occurring within a generation, are described as the process of acclimation. While acclimation has been studied for more than half a century, global environmental change has stimulated renewed interest in quantifying variation in the rate and capacity with which this process occurs, particularly among ectothermic organisms. Yet, despite the likely ecological importance of acclimation capacity and rate, how these traits change throughout life among members of the same species is largely unstudied. Here we investigate these rel…

Tadpole Responses to Environments With Limited Visibility: What We (Don’t) Know and Perspectives for a Sharper Future

2022

Amphibian larvae typically inhabit relatively shallow freshwater environments, and within these boundaries there is considerable diversity in the structure of the habitats exploited by different species. This diversity in habitat structure is usually taken into account in relation to aspects such as locomotion and feeding, and plays a fundamental role in the classification of tadpoles into ecomorphological guilds. However, its impact in shaping the sensory worlds of different species is rarely addressed, including the optical qualities of each of these types of water bodies and the challenges and limitations that they impose on the repertoire of visual abilities available for a typical vert…

Intergenerational fitness effects of the early life environment in a wild rodent

2019

The early life environment can have profound, long‐lasting effects on an individual's fitness. For example, early life quality might (a) positively associate with fitness (a silver spoon effect), (b) stimulate a predictive adaptive response (by adjusting the phenotype to the quality of the environment to maximize fitness) or (c) be obscured by subsequent plasticity. Potentially, the effects of the early life environment can persist beyond one generation, though the intergenerational plasticity on fitness traits of a subsequent generation is unclear. To study both intra‐ and intergenerational effects of the early life environment, we exposed a first generation of bank voles to two early life…

Environmental factors modulating cold tolerance, gene expression and metabolism in Drosophila montana

2011

Eco-physiological aspects of adaptation to seasonal environments : the latitudinal range expansion of the Colorado potato beetle across Europe

2013

Improved camouflage through ontogenetic colour change confers reduced detection risk in shore crabs

2019

Abstract Animals from many taxa, from snakes and crabs to caterpillars and lobsters, change appearance with age, but the reasons why this occurs are rarely tested.We show the importance that ontogenetic changes in coloration have on the camouflage of the green shore crabs (Carcinus maenas), known for their remarkable phenotypic variation and plasticity in colour and pattern.In controlled conditions, we reared juvenile crabs of two shades, pale or dark, on two background types simulating different habitats for 10 weeks.In contrast to expectations for reversible colour change, crabs did not tune their background match to specific microhabitats, but instead, and regardless of treatment, all de…

CA3–CA1 long‐term potentiation occurs regardless of respiration and cardiac cycle phases in urethane‐anesthetized rats

2023

Breathing and heartbeat synchronize to each other and to brain function and affect cognition in humans. However, it is not clear how cardiorespiratory rhythms modulate such basic processes as synaptic plasticity thought to underlie learning. Thus, we studied if respiration and cardiac cycle phases at burst stimulation onset affect hippocampal long-term potentiation (LTP) in the CA3–CA1 synapse in urethane-anesthetized adult male Sprague–Dawley rats. In a between-subjects design, we timed burst stimulation of the ventral hippocampal commissure (vHC) to systole or diastole either during expiration or inspiration and recorded responses throughout the hippocampus with a linear probe. As classic…

Multidomain SBEM analysis for two dimensionalelastoplastic-contact problems

2012

The Symmetric Boundary Element Method based on the Galerkin hypotheses has found application in the nonlinear analysis of plasticity and contact-detachment problems, but dealt with separately. In this paper we wants to treat these complex phenomena together. This method works in structures by introducing a subdivision into sub-structures, distinguished into macroelements, where elastic behaviour is assumed, and bem-elements, where it is possible for plastic strains to occur. In all the sub-structures, elasticity equations are written and regularity conditions in weighted (weak) form and/or in nodal (strong) form between boundaries have to be introduced, to attain the solving equation system.

Protein levels of brain-derived neurotrophic factor in the hippocampus of low/high aerobic capacity rats

2010

Hippocrates and Plato have first documented the connection between a healthy mind and body, during a period which launched analytical thinking and philosophy in Ancient Greece. Modern research has also indicated the contribution of an active lifestyle to enhanced brain performance and decreased incidence of neurodegenerative diseases and mood disorders such as Alzheimer’s disease and depression respectively. This has been hypothesized to emerge through mechanisms which are enhanced by exercise and contribute on brain plas-ticity and health. The Neurotrophins hypothesis implicates several molecules in brain plasticity and healthy aging. Among them, Brain-derived Neurotrophic Factor (BDNF) ha…

Environmental effects on the covariation among pace-of-life traits

2019

Pace‐of‐life syndromes (POLSs) are suites of life‐history, physiological and behavioural traits that arise due to trade‐offs between allocation to current and future reproduction. Traits generally show covariation that can arise from genetic and environmental influences on phenotypes and constrain the independent evolution of traits, resulting in fitness consequences and impacts on population dynamics. The notion that correlations among traits may vary among populations along environmental gradients suggests an important role for the environment in shaping and maintaining POLSs. However, no synthesis has been attempted of the myriad ways in which environmental factors should influence POLSs…