Catenazzi Lab
  • Home
  • Research
    • New species
  • Education
  • Members
  • Publications
  • News
  • Contact

News

Sociality and Fitness in prairie voles

4/1/2020

0 Comments

 
PhD student and lab member Anne Sabol published one of the chapters of her master thesis in Animal Behavior, titled "How does individual variation in sociality influence fitness in prairie voles?". Prairie voles vary substantially in their social behaviour, and this variation may carry consequences for individual fitness. Anne and her collaborators found that voles with an intermediate level of sociality had the highest mating success, and voles with intermediate sociality with all voles had higher reproductive success. Furthermore, males with an intermediate number of social connections had higher mean body mass. Therefore, it seems that intermediate levels of sociality was most favorable for fitness. Anne conducted this work during her master program at the University of Michigan, in the lab of Dr. Ben Dantzer. The paper was available online on 29 March (https://doi.org/10.1016/j.anbehav.2020.02.009). Congrats Anne!
0 Comments

Ecosystem role of leaf litter frogs

3/6/2020

0 Comments

 
During the last weeks of February we conducted field work in the high Andes, at the transition of cloud forest and grasslands, near Manu National Park. We are continuing an experiment with leaf litter frogs that we started last December. We are studying the ecosystem roles of leaf litter frogs, in collaboration with Dr. Sparkle Malone, Dr. Sarah Kupferberg and Isabel Diaz. 
Picture
Leaf litter frogs belong to the family of terrestrial-breeding frogs Strabomantidae. Most of these highly terrestrial frogs are small with short and compact bodies, especially at high elevations. We set up enclosures to compare the effects of frog presence (using the abundant Psychrophrynella usurpator) on ecosystem functioning in grasslands and cloud forest environments. We will measure these effects throughout the wet season (until June). Stay tuned for preliminary results!
0 Comments

Lab talks at FIU Biosymposium

2/2/2020

0 Comments

 
Picture
Rachel and Kenny will present at our annual Biosymposium at Biscayne Bay Campus next Saturday, 8 February starting at 9 am. Both talks are lighting talks in the afternoon session ( 3:30 pm):

Interactions between disease and consumer driven nutrient recycling in Andean tadpoles
Kenneth Anderson

The effects of Bd recognition and avoidance on marsupial frog offspring deposition decisions
Rachel Kaitlin Prokopius

0 Comments

Round table on the Andes and Amazon region

1/10/2020

0 Comments

 
Picture
0 Comments

Catenazzi lab returns to Pampas galeras

12/27/2019

0 Comments

 
​For the month of October the lab traveled back to the high elevation grasslands at Pampas Galeras National Reserve in Peru to conduct research on Telmatobius tadpoles. As part of his doctoral thesis Kenneth Anderson is expanding on the work done here by Andrew Rubio investigating the ecosystem role of Telmatobius, and how that role is changing due to chytridiomycosis.

Picture
While the Pampas Galeras National Reserve was founded to protect the vicuñas (a species of camelid prized for its extremely fine wool), it also protects native Telmatobius frogs which live in the streams throughout the reserve. Multiple species of Telmatobius frogs have suffered from major declines due to chytrid but the frogs at Pampas Galeras seems to be co-existing with the disease without massive declines. The effects of chytrid as an enzootic disease have been largely unstudied, so the goal of research on these frogs is to learn how chytrid changes the ecosystem function of these frogs.
Picture
​Telmatobius tadpoles are specifically useful for looking at this relationship because tadpoles do not die from chytrid. The fungus only grows on their mouthparts and at high levels of infection causes deformations. This is very useful for estimating infection levels in the field and it’s likely that the change to the mouthparts causes a change in diet for the tadpoles as well. We suspect that this change in diet, along with changes in energy and nutrient needs caused by disease will change how tadpoles cycle nutrients with their streams.

Picture
​To do this Kenneth, along with his dauntless field tech Yasmani Larota Calla, swabbed frogs for disease, and collected urine and feces of tadpoles for nutrient readings. Tadpole urine is easily collected by putting a tadpole in a bag and waiting for about an hour, the water is then filtered to separate the feces and brought back to the field station for ammonium chemistry in the field (using a Turner fluorometer). We’ll come back with another update once or data has been analyzed but we expect that chytrid will change the nutrient ratios in tadpole urine, and we expect that the amount of urine produced plays an important role in the nutrient cycling of these unique high elevation streams. 
0 Comments

Atelopus survival initiative

11/8/2019

1 Comment

 
Picture
Alessandro and Alex are just back from the first meeting of the Atelopus Survival Initiative in Medellin, Colombia. More than 80% of this symbolic genus of frogs are threatened by extinction. Together with biologists and conservationists from across the range of this genus, we worked to come up with concrete plans for research and management - focusing on developing capacity in countries of need and improving research across the region. While only the first step, we hope this meeting and the ASI will catalyze cooperation and lead to successful conservation of this incredible group. 

Picture
1 Comment

Just back from the wildlife society meeting

10/7/2019

0 Comments

 
Picture
Alex just got back from presenting a poster at the first ever joint meeting of The Wildlife Society and the American Fisheries Society in Reno, Nevada. He presented results from his dissertation and participated in the first ever North American session on Batrachochytrium salamandrivorans. Brandon LaBumbard, Catenazzi lab alumnus, also presented. 
0 Comments

Rediscovery of an enigmatic Andean snake

9/15/2019

0 Comments

 
Picture
Undergraduate student Chris Smaga published his first paper today, and it is a new snake genus! The name of the new genus Arcanumophis refers to the enigmatic nature of this small snake. Arcanumophis problematicus had previously been allocated to the genus Erythrolmaprus. Charles W Myers described the species in 1986 with the single known specimen from  the Field Museum, which had been collected in 1950 by Hilda Hempl Heller near San Juan del Oro. No other specimen of this snake was known until our rediscovery in 2016! The article is in collaboration with Alex Ttito (see full cite below). 

Picture
We rediscovered the species during a trip to the abandoned "Inca" mine of Santo Domingo, in the buffer zone of Bahuaja-Sonene National Park (Puno, Peru). This gold mine was very active at the beginning of the XX century, as seen in the photographic collection by Bruce Graham. The mine owners opened a trail through the Limbani Valley, crossing the Inambari river and ascending to Santo Domingo. Although there is little left of the mine, the trail is still in good conditions.

The path to Santo Domingo is narrow (and somewhat treacherous).
Santo Domingo is an important site for herpetological taxonomy because it is the type locality of several species, including species that are the type species of genera (e.g., Noblella peruviana). The main goal of our trip was to examine these type populations, documenting variations in morphology, coloration, etc., that could be useful for comparison with similar species from other valleys in southern Peru and in Bolivia. We were searching the leaf litter when we found the A. problematicus under mosses, very close to the original main camp site of the mine (see below). 
Picture
Picture
Santo Domingo around the 1930s (left, from https://bit.ly/2mjTJEp​) and in 2017.
Picture
A possible autoapomorphy for the new genus is the presence of a crease on the rostral scale (see photo of our specimen left). In his original description, Myers noticed this crease, but because the holotype was not perfectly preserved, he could not determine whether the crease was an artifact of preservation. The presence of such rostral modification suggests the snake might be semi-fossorial or at least ground dwelling. Our finding the snake in the leaf litter, under layer of mosses, is consistent with the idea that A. problematicus is a ground dwelling snake. But who knows? We will need more than two observations to learn about its natural history.

Picture
​Smaga, C., A. Ttito, A. Catenazzi. 2019. Arcanumophis, a new genus and generic allocation for Erythrolamprus problematicus (Myers 1986), Xenodontinae (Colubridae) from the Cordillera de Carabaya, southern Peru. Zootaxa 4671: 129-138. https://doi.org/10.11646/zootaxa.4671.1.10
0 Comments

POSTDOC POSITION IN ECOLOGY AND CONSERVATION BIOLOGY

8/30/2019

0 Comments

 
The Catenazzi Lab at Florida International University (https://www.catenazzilab.org/) is looking to hire a post-doctoral researcher to work on multiple projects related to amphibian biodiversity and conservation. Our lab pursues several lines of research including amphibian taxonomy, biogeography, conservation genetics, disease ecology and ecological physiology. The post-doc will lead and collaborate in data analysis, modeling efforts, preparation of manuscripts and proposals based on existing data sets and samples. The position offers opportunities for mentoring undergraduate and graduate students at an institution with a large proportion of students under-represented in STEM. 

Candidates should have a PhD and demonstrated record of publications. Starting salary for the position is $50k for one year (+ health benefits), with the possibility to apply for an internal Postdoc fellowship in Spring 2020. The position will be based in the Catenazzi Lab, in the Department of Biological Sciences at Florida International University in Miami (https://biology.fiu.edu/). Florida International University is classified by Carnegie as a R1: Doctoral Universities - Highest Research Activity and recognized as a Carnegie engaged university. If interested, please email acatenazzi@gmail.com and attach a single PDF that includes a 1-page cover letter explaining research interests and experience, a CV, and a list of three references by September 30th.
0 Comments

New species of minute leaf-litter frog from Peru

8/26/2019

1 Comment

 
Along with our collaborators Roy Santa Cruz and Evaristo López Tejeda from the Universidad Nacional de San Agustín de Arequipa, and Rudolf von May, Courtney Whitcher and Daniel Rabosky the University of Michigan, we describe a new species of minute leaf-litter frog, Noblella losamigos.
Picture
The description appeared today in a special issue of the journal Diversity. The new species has a snout-vent length of 9.0-13.6 mm (females are larger than males) and is distributed along a wide elevational range, from 200 to nearly 1500 m asl. Among species of Noblella, it is the only species with a distribution in both lowland Amazon and montane forests of the Amazonian Andes. Specifically, the new species is known to occur at the Los Amigos Biological Station, Madre de Dios, operated by Conservacion Amazonica, and at the Cock of the Rock Biological Station, Cusco, owned and operated by Peru Verde. It has also been found at intermediate elevations. 
Picture
Similarly to the other species in the genus Noblella, the new species is among the smallest anurans. Small size is a common trait of many leaf-litter frogs, as seen in other species of frogs in the same family (i.e., Bryophryne, Psychrophrynella, etc.), as well as species in other families, such as the tiny Brachycephalus of the Mata Atlantica, or the three species of Mini (Mini ature, Mini mum, and Mini scule) from Madagascar, suggesting similar selective pressure may be driving convergent evolution to small size in the leaf litter environment.

1 Comment
<<Previous
Forward>>

    Archives

    December 2020
    November 2020
    October 2020
    September 2020
    August 2020
    July 2020
    June 2020
    May 2020
    April 2020
    March 2020
    February 2020
    January 2020
    December 2019
    November 2019
    October 2019
    September 2019
    August 2019
    July 2019
    June 2019
    May 2019
    April 2019
    March 2019
    February 2019
    January 2019
    December 2018
    November 2018
    October 2018
    September 2018
    August 2018
    July 2018
    June 2018
    May 2018
    April 2018
    March 2018
    February 2018
    January 2018
    December 2017
    November 2017
    October 2017
    September 2017
    August 2017
    July 2017
    June 2017
    May 2017
    April 2017
    March 2017
    February 2017
    December 2016
    November 2016
    October 2016
    September 2016
    August 2016
    July 2016
    June 2016
    May 2016
    April 2016
    March 2016
    February 2016
    January 2016
    December 2015
    November 2015
    October 2015
    September 2015
    August 2015
    July 2015
    June 2015
    May 2015
    April 2015
    March 2015
    February 2015
    January 2015
    December 2014

    CATENAZZI LAB

    News from the lab

    Categories

    All

    RSS Feed

Catenazzi Lab

11200 SW 8th Street, Department of Biological Sciences
Florida International University
Miami, FL 33199

Contact Us