seasonality
- Gonads or body? Differences in gonadal and somatic photoperiodic growth response in two vole species
Summary: Development of the neuroendocrine system driving photoperiodic responses in gonadal and somatic growth differs between the common and the tundra vole, indicating that they use a different breeding strategy.
- Ecologically relevant thermal fluctuations enhance offspring fitness: biological and methodological implications for studies of thermal developmental plasticity
Editor's choice: Natural incubation temperatures enhance offspring survival in a lizard.
- Body temperature maintenance acclimates in a winter-tenacious songbird
Summary: Dark-eyed juncos maintain normothermia in the cold by modifying separate physiological traits at different time points in response to external temperature cues.
- Shift in worker physiology and gene expression pattern from reproductive to diapause-like with colony age in the bumble bee Bombus impatiens
Summary: Bumblebee workers exhibit a physiological signature (innate to workers, queen or the colony) corresponding to colony age with a shift towards a diapause-like profile in late-eclosing workers.
- Consequences of being phenotypically mismatched with the environment: no evidence of oxidative stress in cold- and warm-acclimated birds facing a cold spell
Summary: Oxidative stress appears to be closely matched to whole-animal physiology in cold-acclimated birds compared with transition birds, implying that changes to the oxidative stress system happen slowly.
- Acclimatization in the physiological performance of an introduced ectotherm
Summary: Introduced species use acclimatization to maintain high performance year round; therefore, phenotypic flexibility likely shapes the fundamental niche of both introduced and native species.
- Photoperiod modulates the gut microbiome and aggressive behavior in Siberian hamsters
Summary: Sex-specific changes in the gut microbiome are associated with aggression during the non-breeding season in Siberian hamsters, suggesting a potential role for the microbiome in regulating seasonal aggression.
- Seasonal muscle ultrastructure plasticity and resistance of muscle structural changes during temperature increases in resident black-capped chickadees and rock pigeons
Summary: Two temperate resident birds of differing body mass show phenotypic flexibility of their pectoralis muscle through differing mechanisms of muscle growth.