Comparative Physiology
There once was an old lady who swallowed a bullfrog…
Happy Halloween! As kids (and maybe a few parents) dig into their candy hauls, we’re checking out some wild creatures with even spookier taste…animals brave enough to snack on venomous prey! Scorpions beware! Pallid bats (Antrozous pallidus) are one of nature’s spookiest snackers. What’s on the menu for these fearless flyers? Scorpions, yikes! While most animals would steer clear of a venomous arachnid, pallid bats chow down without a worry […]
Primed for survival: How sea hares inspire new clues to protect the brain from low oxygen conditions such as stroke
Sea hares (Aplysia californica) live in coastal environments where oxygen levels can fluctuate unpredictably. Knowing this, researchers set out to explore how these animals tolerate regular exposure to hypoxia (low oxygen) with the hope of discovering clues that could teach us how to protect humans from hypoxia-related conditions, such as stroke. To do this, they compared offspring from two types of parents: those collected from the wild that likely experienced […]
Meet the Tuatara, New Zealand’s living fossil
No, we are not talking about the luxury sports car. The tuatara is a reptile that’s even cooler. Found only on 37 small offshore islands in New Zealand, this rare creature is often mistaken for a lizard. Don’t let their good looks fool you though, the tuatara is the last surviving member of the ancient order Sphenodontia, which thrived back when the dinosaurs ruled the Earth. In other words, it’s […]
Best Friend or Stress Test? What Pets Do to Our Bodies
According to the National Institutes of Health (NIH), 68% of households in the United States have a pet. Pets are thought to help people by decreasing stress and improving cardiovascular health. The NIH and Mar’s Corporation WALTHAM Centre for Pet Nutrition have teamed up to support research examining such questions, but the results have been mixed. According to Dr. Layla Esposito, who leads the NIH Human-Animal Interaction Research Program, people […]
Why leadership stresses everyone out: From birds to bosses
From birds to people, research demonstrates that leadership roles can be really stressful. In this post, let’s explore the physiology of stress and how it affects such relationships. Stress as defined by the founder of Stress Theory, Dr. Hans Selye (1907-1982), is the “nonspecific response of the body to any demand” (Tan and Yip, 2018). Our bodies were designed to deal will short bouts of stress by releasing special stress […]
Red, White, and Bison: Celebrating Freedom and National Bison Month
Happy 4th of July! What a perfect time to also honor National Bison Month! This month, we celebrate an icon of the American landscape. Bison are incredible animals, not just for their symbolic significance but also for their remarkable adaptations to extreme environments. As highlighted by the National Park Service’s Bison Bellows, their resilience in the face of brutal winters is extraordinary. Bison are uniquely adapted to harsh winter conditions […]
Muscle adaptations to endurance exercise
Happy Pigeon Appreciation Day! Okay, I know it sounds strange to celebrate pigeons – the animal best known for gathering in large numbers, causing a raucous, as well as perching and pooping on just about everything. For just a moment though, I would like to consider the unique athletic attributes of these popcorn and park loving birds vs humans engaged in endurance exercise. Have you ever heard of pigeon racing […]
Some like it hot: Genetic twists in warm hibernation
Hibernation was also a hot…I mean warm…topic at the American Physiology Summit last month in Baltimore, MD. Thomas Crippen presented research conducted with team members Dr. Dylan Barth, Zac Carlson, Dr. Frank van Breukelen, and Dr. Allyson Hindle at the University of Nevada, Las Vegas. Their study focused on golden-mantled ground squirrels, Callospermophilus lateralis, which are remarkable even among hibernators. These squirrels can enter torpor across a range of environmental […]
No air? No problem: Nature’s ultimate survivalists
Hypoxia and anoxia tolerance was a hot topic at the 2025 American Physiology Summit last month. Here are the highlights: Hafsa Yaseen and Natalie Anne Heath presented their research from Dr. Joseph Santin’s laboratory at the University of Missouri exploring how adult bullfrogs (Aquarana catesbeianus) protect their brain function following hibernation, a period when oxygen and glucose levels are often very low. The team discovered that bullfrogs could adjust their […]
Life Lines by Dr. Dolittle 