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Erin Nash

For Marmots, Too Many Brothers Turns Gals into Tomboys | Masculinization, Sex Hormones ... - 0 views

    • Marcy Withrow
       
      Wow, that's crazy! I never thought of animals wanting to be the opposite sex, because of having too many of the same gender of siblings.
  • Extra testosterone from their brothers in the womb changes the females’ behavior.
    • Marcy Withrow
       
      I wonder if this can happen with other species of animals too? Or if it can relate to humans in a way...somehow!
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  • Previously, the researchers had classified marmots with long AG distances are males and shorter AG distances are females. Classification based just on AG distances first led to some confused researchers. Some of the long AG distance marmots, which researchers thought were males, seemed to undergo a sex change — they were actually females all along. Previous research has shown that these females with longer AG distances come from litters containing more males than females. And since the AG distance indicates testosterone exposure in the womb, the researchers figured the brother's testosterone had changed the female's AG distance; they wondered if it had any effect on the female marmots' behaviors, as well.
    • Marcy Withrow
       
      Okay, that is flipping crazy! So, females that have tons of brothers end up having a longer AG distance! That really stinks for them, because they have to blame their brothers and their brother's hormones. And yeah, this should have an effect on behavior! Especially if it's going to cause a physical change..
  • wandered farther and pursued more play-fighting with more play partners than the more feminine females.
    • Marcy Withrow
       
      So this is the behavior they saw with the "masculine females"
  • Whether a litter is male- or female-biased is dictated by the environment.
    • Marcy Withrow
       
      How can environment have an effect on what gender a litter will be? I thought gender was completely random..50/50 chance...?
  • Male animals traditionally need more investment from their mothers, because they are larger. In some conditions, like when the environment is steady and resources are plenty, it might make sense to invest more in males. "For instance,  when mothers are in good conditions they usually have male-biased litters, whereas in bad body condition they have female-biased litters."
    • Marcy Withrow
       
      Does this mean that it depends on the environment whether the moms want their sons to live or daughters? Do some end up dying to give these biased litters? Or do the moms store food for the babies, therefore getting more nutrition for males in better conditions? I feel like this can go many ways??
  • If hormones like testosterone from littermates are impacting marmots' behavior and reproduction, chemical pollutants that have similar structures could screw up these signals.
    • Marcy Withrow
       
      Ah hah!! Here is a lead :)
  • These pollutants, also known as endocrine disruptors, could interfere with the mothers' intended "decision" to have a female- or male-biased litter.
    • Marcy Withrow
       
      I still don't understand how the mothers choose what the gender of their offspring are. Wouldn't it have to be after birth?
  • "They explore much more of their environment. In a small area when you explore more you bump against more individuals," study researcher Raquel Monclus, of Universidad Autónoma de Madrid (though the study was done at the University of California, Los Angeles), told LiveScience. "They are the ones initiating the play more often than females from female-biased litters."
    • Erin Nash
       
      Okay - so I've read that the reason females are worse with direction/maps is because they aren't allowed to explore as much when children. Is being exploratory more of a"male" trait!
Sean Nash

Children's personalities linked to their chemical response to stress - 1 views

    • Jessica Ball
       
      How do we deal with stress? and is it healthy? --What triggers anger/aggression? what triggers angry rampages especially in those with ADHD? What upsets them?
    • Erin Nash
       
      That's an interesting idea - is that a current belief in psychology - "one healthy way of being?"
  • When the researchers exposed the children to a mildly stressful simulated telephone argument between their parents, distinct patterns of hormonal reactions emerged. Children exposed to high levels of interparental aggression at home showed different reactions to the telephone quarrel. Doves with parents who fought violently produced elevated levels of cortisol, a hormone that is thought to increase a person's sensitivity to stress. Hawks from such stressful home environments put the breaks on cortisol production, which is regarded as a marker for diminishing experiences of danger and alarm.
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    • Erin Nash
       
      Wow - it is interesting to actually back up an idea that seems to be almost "common sense" with actual data. It DOES make sense that children who are placed into stressful situations more frequently would have different physiological reactions than those who are not placed into those situations.
    • Jessica Ball
       
      have you heard of the study in which kids were separated from their mothers and introduced to other women? Depending on their relationship with their mother, they reacted in different ways. If they're stressed at home... would they be happy to get away from their mother?
  • Children's Personalities Linked to Their Chemical Response to Stress
    • Sean Nash
       
      Always realize that when you're looking at the intersection of these two elements:  human subjects & chemicals...  your chances for authentic research are limited. Perhaps impossible.  That does NOT mean this topic cannot lead to authentic student research...  it just means that you have to work to distill some element of this topic down... and transfer it to another topic/test subject/scale, etc.
  • Is your kid a "dove" -- cautious and submissive when confronting new environments, or perhaps you have a "hawk"
    • Sean Nash
       
      What does this dichotomy have, if anything, in common with the similarly-named dichotomy between political "hawks" and "doves?" I remember as a kid, the first time I heard the term was in elementary school when my Dad asked why I thought I was such a "hawk" ...  interested in war, weapons, battles, etc.  Funny today how much of a "dove" I would be seen to be in a political sense.  I wonder if one could look for correlations between those two facets of human behavior.
Erin Nash

Declining Male Fertility Linked To Water Pollution - 1 views

  • Some of these are contained in medicines, including cancer treatments, pharmaceutical treatments, and pesticides used in agriculture. The research suggests that when they get into the water system, these chemicals may play a pivotal role in causing feminising effects in male fish
    • Erin Nash
       
      Do these chemicals just cause these problems in vertebrates, like fish? Would it be possible to obtain chemicals like this, and test them on an invertebrate species?
  • Found in some industrial chemicals and the contraceptive pill,
    • Erin Nash
       
      Birth control pills could cause this? How would that actually work? How could a birth control pill cause a male to change gender? What levels of the hormone are required to cause this gender change?
Marcy Withrow

The Fattest States List | Gallup Poll & State Obesity Rates | LiveScience - 0 views

    • Marcy Withrow
       
      Couldn't there be other outside factors that could throw this research off? Did they take an even number from each state? And of those people were there any that had certain circumstances where they couldn't help but gain weight? Also, why January to June? That's coming out of the "winter depression" where a lot of people don't exercise. 
    • Erin Nash
       
      Very good points! This is a really good example of an article someone would possibly read in the general public, and they would just flat out believe it, never considering whether or not the science is solid. A BMI of 30 is pretty high, although BMI is not a very accurate way to measure obesity either.
  • South Carolina: 30.6 percent Louisiana: 31.2 percent Mississippi: 32.1 percent Delaware: 33.6 percent West Virginia: 34.3 percent
    • Marcy Withrow
       
      It seems like this research is suggesting that people towards the east coast are more obese. How could this be? Maybe they have a lot of Restaurants with unhealthy foods. it could be possible that they don't have a lot of orchards or state grown foods? I don't know much about these states. But, maybe they don't grow their own foods and have a lot of imports? 
    • Marcy Withrow
       
      Note too that these states are southern east coast.
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  • Colorado: 20.1 percent Utah: 21.6 percent Connecticut: 21.7 percent California: 22.1 percent Rhode Island: 22.1 percent Massachusetts: 22.6 percent New Jersey: 22.6 percent
  • Healthy Body Composition www.DrDavidWilliams.comNew TonaLean-3 Can Help You Maintain Heal
    • Marcy Withrow
       
      Now the skinniest people are here. There's a few from the west coast, but there are also a few from the northern east coast like Rhode Island, Connecticut, and New Jersey. I find it strange that the obese are in the south and the skinnier are in the north. Maybe it's the environment and people care more about their appearances in the North while in the South there are southern Belles and farmers? I really don't know much about these states or why one side is more obese than the other. it would be interesting to find out..
    • Erin Nash
       
      It would be interesting - there is definitely the perception that people don't eat as well in the South (lots of fried food, sweet tea, barbecue, etc. Not sure if those ideas are actually supported or not.
Erin Nash

Fair Trade at Plant Roots | The Scientist - 1 views

    • Erin Nash
       
      I never realized that I assumed this with symbiotic organisms as well. For example, I assumed that coral, being the larger organism, "controlled" the symbiotic relationship. I wonder if this is true for other symbiotic creatures, like green hydra?
  • Heike Bücking, a professor at South Dakota State University, and her team grew the legume Medicago truncatula with three species of mycorrhizal fungi that contribute different levels of phosphorous to the plant. Over the span of a day, the researchers saw that the most generous species received the highest levels of carbon in return, suggesting the plants somehow monitor their nutrient intake and reward their fungal partners accordingly.
    • Erin Nash
       
      They had results within a day? Wow.
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  • n another experiment, the researchers grew carrot roots with a single fungal species, but supplemented the petri dish with different levels of phosphorous. In this case, the same balance developed: those fungi with the most phosphorous to give received the most carbon in return.
    • Erin Nash
       
      This really seems highly feasible - I can almost envision the setup right now - different dishes with different nutrient amounts available - just not sure how to measure carbon output.
Marcy Withrow

Hens Eject Sperm from Unwelcome Suitors | Female Control & Battle of Sexes | Chicken Se... - 0 views

    • Marcy Withrow
       
      I think I learned this in DC Biology that hens can do that. which is crazy!!
    • Erin Nash
       
      Yes - we watched a video about this with ducks!
  • A new study has shown that, during an average ejection, a hen jettisons 80 percent of the sperm a rooster deposits in her reproductive tract. This has a huge impact on the competition among males fighting to father her future chicks, according to study researcher Tommaso Pizzari, an evolutionary biologist and university lecturer at Oxford University in the United Kingdom.  
    • Marcy Withrow
       
      This means that only the best of the best hens have chicks! That stinks for the loser hens..
    • Erin Nash
       
      The best of the roosters will have chicks - that's natural selection in action!
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  • Hens, however, often don't have a choice in mates. They prefer males at the top of the pecking order, but other roosters with lower status will force the hens — about half their size — to mate.
    • Marcy Withrow
       
      So, they know what they want. but, sometimes they get taken advantage of, because roosters are bigger than them. But, then they can reject their sperm and choose what's best for the offspring.
  • Scientists already knew that hens could eject sperm, but in the recent study, they set out to find evidence that hens were actively using this technique to control fertilization.
    • Marcy Withrow
       
      They already knew this, but now they are seeing if the hen actually controls the fertilization. that's nuts!
  • They then videotaped any sperm ejection that followed the mating and collected the results. To determine how this compared with the total sperm the roosters had deposited, the researchers captured all of their semen during another set of controlled mating attempts.
    • Marcy Withrow
       
      this is how they tested it. I wonder how you would videotape sperm exactly.
    • Erin Nash
       
      Ha! I wonder that as well!
  • When mating with a series of roosters, hens ejected more semen from the later mates. Since lower-status roosters don't get the first shot at the hens, for this reason alone, their sperm are more likely to be ejected, Pizzari explained.
    • Marcy Withrow
       
      It's like they know which ones are lower status and have timed it perfectly to get rid of their sperm.
    • Erin Nash
       
      They would know because of size, behavior, etc.
  • n addition, lower status roosters were more likely to ejaculate more semen in one shot, and the team found that hens were more likely to eject larger ejaculations.
    • Marcy Withrow
       
      I wonder why they ejaculate so much? Do they not get enough action??
    • Erin Nash
       
      Ha! Maybe they're trying to make up for their low status, in some odd way?
Erin Nash

Substance in tangerines fights obesity and protects against heart disease, research sug... - 0 views

  • studied the effects of a flavonoid in tangerines called Nobiletin.
    • Erin Nash
       
      I wonder if this is found in all citrus fruits? If so, others could be tested like oranges, lemons, etc
  • The second group of mice, fed the exact same diet but with Nobiletin added,
    • Erin Nash
       
      I wonder if they were just fed the compound, or if they were fed it from tangerines?  How much were they given? Would you get the effect from eating tangerines?
  • Mice became much more sensitive to the effects of insulin. Nobiletin was shown to prevent the buildup of fat in the liver by stimulating the expression of genes involved in burning excess fat, and inhibiting the genes responsible for manufacturing fat.
    • Erin Nash
       
      How did they measure this?
  •  
    Check it out, Marcy. Right up your alley?
Marcy Withrow

Warrior Wasp With Giant Jaws Discovered | Predatory Wasps & New Species | Indonesia Exp... - 0 views

    • Marcy Withrow
       
      Could this be from evolution? Will bigger jaws give them an advantage over other wasps??
  • The giant jaws may serve as both protection and a way to ensure males' genes get passed on to offspring, the researchers speculate
    • Marcy Withrow
       
      So it may be linked to "Survivor of the fittest" ? The wasp with bigger jaws gets picked by the female wasps. Or it could be protection.
    • Erin Nash
       
      Sexual selection is definitely coming into play here. I wonder if they can even use them to protect themselves (since they are so large)
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    • Marcy Withrow
       
      They assume this by another wasp species. The male protects the nest and mates with the females as they enter.
  • We don't know anything about the biology of these wasps."
    • Marcy Withrow
       
      A new species of wasp..
Sean Nash

Chronic high cholesterol diet produces brain damage - 1 views

    • Erin Nash
       
      Really? Could there be a link between diet and this disorder?
  • <2.5% have a genetic disposition
    • Erin Nash
       
      Wow - I had no idea that we knew for certain that there was a genetic disposition toward developing alzheimers.
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  • The aim of the study led by Humpel was to study the effects of hypercholesterolemia in adult rats. Male 6 months old Sprague Dawley rats were fed with normal food (controls) or with a special 5% cholesterol-enriched diet (hypercholesterolemia). After 5 months animals were tested for behavioral impairments and pathological markers similar to those found in the brains of patients with Alzheimer's diseas
    • Erin Nash
       
      The set-up here appears easy, but I have no idea how they would actually test for symptoms of Alzheimer's disease?
  • High Cholesterol Diet Produces Brain Damage
    • Sean Nash
       
      What is the role of cholesterol in humans? Don't be fooled into thinking it is an evil chemical. It has a very important and complex role. Further, (and what might be tougher to find) what is the role of cholesterol in other animals? Do non mammals even produce cholesterol? More importantly from a student research perspective... do invertebrates produce or use cholesterol?
Marcy Withrow

Socially Anxious Kids Are Bully Targets | Elementary School Students & Bullying | Bully... - 1 views

    • Marcy Withrow
       
      Well yeah, I can see that happening. It happens all the time!
  • it may be particularly important for withdrawn youth to develop and participate in friendships through organized sports, play dates, and other such activities."
    • Marcy Withrow
       
      I think that yeah! that is the answer. It may get youth more comfortable around kids their own age.
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  • An earlier study published in 2010 in the journal Child Development found that bullies pick on unpopular children. Gay and lesbian students, or kids perceived to be gay or lesbian, are also at risk.
    • Marcy Withrow
       
      They are seen as different or awkward. Maybe they need to rethink how people see them. Maybe they should try to get to know others.
  • Even compared with unsociable children, the researchers found, anxious-solitary withdrawn kids have fewer friends and are more likely to lose their friends over time. Anxious-solitary kids were also more emotionally sensitive than their peers and were more likely to be excluded and bullied. Having stable friendships protects children from victimization, the study found.
    • Marcy Withrow
       
      It must be hard, because the anxious-solitary kids WANT to interact, but are too scared to. That makes me feel sorry for them and maybe they are emotional cause they are lonely; they may feel like they have no one. So, i could see where these results are very true. Kids must have stable friendships.
    • Erin Nash
       
      Interesting how this study appears to be so "common sense" Does this suggest something about common human response?
Erin Nash

Females choose mates for their personalities, zebra finch study shows - 0 views

    • mrmatthewsharp
       
      WOW! That is so awesome! Can fish also choose mates based on personalities?
  • The research team assessed male and female birds separately for personality traits through a series of behavioural tests.
    • mrmatthewsharp
       
      (blue) I didn't even know birds could have personalities. Are they the same as human characteristics such as: being funny, out going, shy, ect. Or are they either mellow or angry all the time. If they feel a certain way...what causes that?
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    • Erin Nash
       
      If you were investigating this trait with fish, I wonder what "exploratory" would look like?
  • "Exploratory females seem to have the most to gain by choosing exploratory mates. We have shown previously that pairs of zebra finches that are both exploratory raise offspring in better condition than those that are mismatched or unexploratory. Similar patterns have been seen in other birds and fish. However, this is the first evidence that the personality of both partners plays a role in mate choice."
    • Erin Nash
       
      Is there an advantage to being "exploratory?"
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