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Fall 2018
A full understanding of the evolution of novel forms requires inference about their origins through the study of variation in extant taxa and clues from the fossil record. However, the origins of morphological diversity in many groups are obscured by the scarcity of transitional fossils or...
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Development, Anatomy, and Phylogenetic Relationships of Jawless Vertebrates and Tests of Hypotheses about Early Vertebrate Evolution
DownloadSpring 2018
The origin and early evolution of vertebrates remain one of the central questions of comparative biology. This clade, which features a breathtaking diversity of complex forms, has generated profound, unresolved questions, including: How are major lineages of vertebrates related to one another?...
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Fall 2017
Leafrollers moths are one of the most ecologically and economically important groups of herbivorous insects. These Lepidoptera are an ideal model for exploring the drivers that modulate the processes of diversification over time. This thesis analyzes the evolution of Choristoneura Lederer, a well...
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Fall 2017
Three species of Cretaceous marine squamates are described or redescribed. The first, Pontosaurus ribaguster is described from a relatively complete specimen discovered on Hvar Island, Croatia. Preservation of identifiable nektonic teleosts within the gastric cavity (the first identifiable...
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Gene expression and sensory structures in sponges: Explorations of sensory-neural origins in a non-bilaterian context
DownloadFall 2017
The nervous system is present in all but two animal phyla – one of them being Porifera, sponges. Sponges have no neurons and yet have organized behavior and finely tuned sensation. Furthermore, sponges have genes involved in the nervous system of other animals (informally called ‘neural’ genes)....
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Respiration, Acid/Base, Ammonia and Ionoregulatory Strategies in the Pacific hagfish (Eptatretus stoutii)
DownloadFall 2016
Hagfish feed on putrefied carrion, which poses several environmental challenges to the scavenger including hypoxia (Low PO2), hypercapnia (high PCO2) and high environmental ammonia (HEA). To any other organism, these conditions would be physiologically challenging; however, hagfish seem to have...
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Spring 2016
Schlacht, Alexander Douglas William
One of the features that distinguishes eukaryotes from prokaryotes is the membrane trafficking system. This system underpins much of the functionality of the eukaryotic cell, and is necessary for feeding, motility and communication. Analyses aimed at addressing the evolution of this system have...
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Fall 2016
Transferrin is an evolutionary conserved protein that in addition to having a critical role in iron transport also has been shown to have a crucial role in host defence. Transferrin has been shown to sequester iron from invading pathogens, act directly against microbial pathogens, and is an...
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Fall 2014
Smallpox was eradicated using vaccinia viruses (VACV) as vaccines, including Dryvax, a calf-lymph vaccine derived from the New York City Board of Health (NYCBH) strain, and TianTan, a chicken egg cultured vaccine used exclusively in China. To take advantage of the next generation sequencing...