INSIDE JEB
OUTSIDE JEB
RESEARCH ARTICLES
- Mechanisms and costs of mitochondrial thermal acclimation in a eurythermal killifish (Fundulus heteroclitus)
Summary: Eurythermal teleosts suppress mitochondrial respiration through NADH dehydrogenase (complex I) with no detectable loss of function during acute temperature shifts.
- Aquatic burst locomotion by hydroplaning and paddling in common eiders (Somateria mollissima)
Summary: Eider ducks are able to exceed their hull speed through the use of two kinematically distinct aquatic surface burst locomotive behaviors.
- Embryo oxygenation in pipefish brood pouches: novel insights
Highlighted Article: paternal embryo oxygenation improves with male size in pipefish but the notion of syngnathid closed brood pouches as well-oxygenated structures promoting the evolution of larger eggs is rejected.
- Vocal performance affects metabolic rate in dolphins: implications for animals communicating in noisy environments
Summary: Increased vocal effort by bottlenose dolphins has metabolic costs at the individual level, indicating energetic consequences for wild populations of marine mammals communicating in noise-polluted environments.
- Jumping mechanisms and strategies in moths (Lepidoptera)
Summary: Moths propel jumping by rapid movements of the middle and hind legs with or without wing movements in three distinct strategies.
- Body mass affects seasonal variation in sickness intensity in a seasonally breeding rodent
Summary: Inducing short-day-like seasonal body mass loss in hamsters housed in a long-day photoperiod attenuates energetically expensive sickness symptoms, such that they correspond with natural seasonal variation in sickness intensity.
- Oxygen safety margins set thermal limits in an insect model system
Highlighted Article: Larval but not pupal Bombyx mori are oxygen limited, with hypoxia significantly decreasing CTmax, suggesting that oxygen safety margins set thermal limits in air-breathing invertebrates.
- Modulation of heart rate response to acute stressors throughout the breeding season in the king penguin Aptenodytes patagonicus
Summary: Acute fight-or-flight stress responses to experimental stressors are modulated according to breeding advancement in the king penguin.
- Behaviour of the plathelminth Symsagittifera roscoffensis under different light conditions and the consequences for the symbiotic algae Tetraselmis convolutae
Summary: Symsagittifera roscoffensis lives in a photoautotroph symbiosis with the green algae Tetraselmis convolutae. The two partners have different preferences in light exposure.
- Memory block: a consequence of conflict resolution
Summary: Snails engage in the concept of ‘necessity knows no law’ as memories not to respond to a food substance are overpowered by hunger.
- Avian thermoregulation in the heat: scaling of heat tolerance and evaporative cooling capacity in three southern African arid-zone passerines
Highlighted Article: Heat tolerance varies with body size in African weavers in the Kalahari Desert.
- Effects of the juvenile hormone analogue methoprene on rate of behavioural development, foraging performance and navigation in honey bees (Apis mellifera)
Summary: The juvenile hormone analogue methoprene accelerates the onset of foraging behaviour in worker honey bees (Apis mellifera) but also reduces forager performance and longevity, indicating a limitation to the plasticity of bees.
- The roles of visual parallax and edge attraction in the foraging behaviour of the butterfly Papilio xuthus
Summary: Freely flying butterflies use motion cues to estimate the proximity of targets.
- Sexual differences in exploration behavior in Xenopus tropicalis?
Summary: Differences in exploration behavior exist between male and female frogs, with males exploring novel environments more than females; this behavior is decoupled from performance in both sexes.
- Disruption of amylase genes by RNA interference affects reproduction in the Pacific oyster Crassostrea gigas
Summary: Disruption of amylase gene expression reduces absorption efficiency and constrains reproduction in oysters; the reduction in energy intake is insufficient to affect reproduction, suggesting that dsRNA causes disturbances that increase maintenance costs.
- Locomotor corollary activation of trigeminal motoneurons: coupling of discrete motor behaviors
Highlighted Article: During swimming in Xenopus tadpoles, a locomotor corollary discharge is transmitted to the trigeminal nucleus, which causes retraction of the tentacles to streamline body shape and/or prevent sensory reafference.
- Directional sound sensitivity in utricular afferents in the toadfish Opsanus tau
Summary: Utricular afferents in the toadfish possess directional sound sensitivity and may contribute to the detection and localization of sound-specific intraspecific vocalizations.
- Scaling of left ventricle cardiomyocyte ultrastructure across development in the kangaroo Macropus fuliginosus
Summary: Scaling of cardiomyocyte ultrastructure across development of the kangaroo is associated with cellular transformation and improved contractile performance during in-pouch growth followed by a decrease in cardiac development and perfusion requirements during post-pouch growth.
- Aquatic surface respiration and swimming behaviour in adult and developing zebrafish exposed to hypoxia
Summary: Aquatic surface respiration in fish is a behavioural response that is reliant upon input from peripheral oxygen chemoreceptors.
- Dynamic changes in global and gene-specific DNA methylation during hibernation in adult thirteen-lined ground squirrels, Ictidomys tridecemlineatus
Summary: Dramatic changes in DNA methylation accompany stages of torpor during mammalian hibernation in the thirteen-lined ground squirrel.
This issue
Other journals from The Company of Biologists
Editorial – The changing of the guard
In his Editorial, Hans Hoppeler announces that he will be stepping down as Editor-in-Chief of JEB in July 2020. He reflects on the history of JEB, why he has enjoyed his tenure as JEB’s Editor-in-Chief and the recent developments in the publishing world.
Big Biology podcast
JEB is partnering with the Big Biology podcast and in this sponsored episode, JEB Editor Michael Dickinson talks to the Big Biology team about the aerodynamic mechanisms of insect flight, how insects control flight with their tiny 100k neuron brain and his recent JEB paper showing how fruit flies navigate using the sun and polarized light as a compass.
Editors’ choice – An appetite for invasion: digestive physiology, thermal performance and food intake in lionfish (Pterois spp.)
Invasive lionfish are a colossal problem in the Mediterranean Sea and western Atlantic Ocean. Now it turns out that they are successful invaders because they invest more energy in digestion than moving about.
Travelling Fellowship – Anti-ageing in the Greenland Shark
Find out how Pierre Delaroche’s Travelling Fellowship grant from the Journal of Experimental Biology took him to Greenland, where he gathered data to further understand the ageing process in the longest-living vertebrate known to science. Don’t miss the next application deadline for 2020 travel, coming up on 29 November. Where will your research take you?
Commentary – Yank: the time derivative of force is an important biomechanical variable in sensorimotor systems
The derivative of force with respect to time does not have a standard term in physics. In their new Commentary, David C. Lin and his colleagues propose that the term ‘yank’ should be used to denote the time derivative of force.
Runners waste energy every time their legs stop swinging, but now a team of scientists from the US and Canada have shown that a springy ankle tether can reduce runners’ energy costs by 6.4%, which is nearly the entire cost of swinging the limbs. Read the full research article here.
Journal of Experimental Biology is pleased to announce a new partnership with Publons! This allows reviewers to easily track and verify every review by choosing to add the review to their Publons profile when completing the review submission form. Publons also makes it simple for reviewers to showcase their peer review contributions in a format that can be included in job and funding applications (without breaking reviewer anonymity). Read the official announcement here!
preLights – Oxygenation properties of hemoglobin and the evolutionary origins of isoform multiplicity in an amphibious air-breathing fish, the blue-spotted mudskipper (Boleophthalmus pectinirostris)
Charlotte Nelson highlights work in mudskippers suggesting that a diversity in expressed hemoglobin isoforms is not required for the switch between aquatic and aerial respiration.