The Malpighian tubules of insects are an excellent model for examining the properties of secretion in a transporting epithelium. In this exercise students expose tubules from cockroaches or crickets to chlorophenol red and visually estimate the dye concentration in the lumen. By adding metabolic inhibitors and competitors or by substituting ion-free media they can demonstrate competition, specificity, and energy- or ion-dependence of active transport. Advanced students can design their own experiments after a review of the literature. This simple and inexpensive exercise provides students with a challenging and rewarding introduction to experimental design in the laboratory.
Evolution has resulted in changes in the sizes and forms of organisms. Everything about the biology of an animal, including its physiology, anatomy, and ecology, is influenced by its body size. Frequently there seem to be limits on the sizes that different organisms can attain, even when larger size might be thought to be evolutionarily advantageous. Often an increase or decrease in size is correlated with a change in proportions. Understanding the significance of a particular morphology or interpreting the factors that underlie a particular evolutionary trend involve studying the relationships that exist among size, shape, and function. This lab introduces allometry, the study of size and its consequences, using celery and woodlice as subjects.
There are many reasons to seek alternatives to the use of vertebrates, including cost and concerns with use of vertebrates in undergraduate laboratories. This major workshop explores examples of alternatives, including: a) an exploration of thermoregulation without using animals at all, b) an investigation of actomyosin function and membrane excitation using giant alga, and c) using insects to investigate taste receptors and digestion. This workshop explores the importance of providing good background information to vertebrate processes and connecting the alternative experimental system to homologous physiological processes in vertebrates. Students can appreciate the commonality in biological processes and the importance of underlying physiological principles.
By manipulating a simple kinematic model representing the leg and foot, students can get hands on information about the interaction of bones and muscles in humans. Having worked with the model, they then are able to predict and analyze the properties of bone/muscle systems in other vertebrates and understand how these systems have become modified during the course of evolution for a particular life style. By the end of the exercise, students have learned both traditional information (cellular structure, names of bones, taxonomy of vertebrates) and how to project the knowledge they gained from working with a model to the biological world.
The three parts of the learning-cycle strategy student exploration, concept formation, and concept application are the framework on which student understanding of 1 the interrelation of structure and function and 2 the coexistence of unity and the diversity among organisms are designed.
This laboratory exercise can be used to examine the anatomical, physiological, behavioral, and ecological components involved in reproduction in animals using a simple animal model.
This lab exercise tests the ecological principle of energy flow in a laboratory setting using roaches as an experimental secondary producer. Energy use is measured by respiration, energy storage by growth, and energy input as ingestion minus feces. The laws of thermodynamics state that energy intake should equal energy output; accuracy of measurements can therefore be determined. Growth rates, respiratory rates, and ingestion rates can be compared for different size classes. The exercise lasts four weeks allowing students to take part in a structured research project in which they must handle data and compare results to their own hypotheses and values found in the literature.
Use to develop experimental design of sex pheromone concentrations, and observing courtship behavior of cockroaches. This may be used in entomology or physiology laboratory classes.
This resource is a detailed manual of protocols and instructional information for carrying out an undergraduate laboratory exercise in invertebrate marine biology and physiology, including detailed student outlines and background information,
This laboratory utilizes two user-friendly computer programs from Neurosim (Biosoft, Cambridge, U.K.) that demonstrate various aspects of electrophysiological functions of neurons without sacrificing experimental animals. One program simulates passive conduction in a long length of axon while the second program simulates the Hodgkin-Huxley equations for the production of an action potential. While these programs allow students to try experimental manipulations that parallel those done in real electrophysiological experiments (changing ionic concentrations or voltage stimulus, effects of various drugs, etc.) it also allows them to change some of the inherent properties of neurons, such as membrane resistance and axon resistance. This enables one to see how neurons of different physical characteristics differ in their electrical behavior. This laboratory is suitable for students of varying backgrounds.
This experiment is meant to study water regulation in mollusks by observing the reaction of slugs, which are closely related to mollusks, to excess water.
This resource is a detailed manual of protocols and instructional information for carrying out an undergraduate laboratory exercise in invertebrate biology and animal physiology, including student outlines, instructors notes, and detailed introductory laboratory exercises to ensure that students have the skills necessary for carrying out the lab.
This study examines the metabolic costs of osmoregulation in a freshwater fish, the black molly (Poecilia latipinna). It could be used in either an upper-level ecology or physiology course. Students evaluate the metabolic rate of a fish at a particular salinity by measuring the continuous decrease in oxygen concentration in a sealed chamber over a ten-minute period, or the initial and final oxygen concentrations over a twenty-minute period. Metabolic rate is the slope of oxygen concentration versus time, or change in oxygen concentration divided by time. By measuring metabolic rate at different salinities, students evaluate the metabolic cost of osmoregulation.
In this investigative lab, students observe blackworm pulsation rate in normal conditions and observe how pulsation rate is affected by drugs. This lab stresses the circulatory system, but can also be used for homeostasis, behavior, toxicology, and nervous system labs. Part I guides the student through blackworm handling procedures and initial observations of the blackworm's behavior and circulatory system. Part II is a student-led investigation in which the students design and run their own experiments to test drug effects on pulsation rate. The students write their investigations as an informal report and orally present their design, results, and conclusions.
A laboratory exercise using surface recording electrodes, a small battery-powered pre-amplifier, and a small battery-powered audio-monitor for purposes of biofeedback to analyze electromyogram EMG activity from the gastrocnemius muscle in a freely moving, untethered human
A laboratory exercise to investigate the difference in metabolic response of representative endotherms (mice) and ectotherms (green anoles) to temperature changes and ecological consequences are studied through behavior and preferred body temperature in a temperature gradient.
In this lab, students measure their heart rate, oxygen consumption, and carbon dioxide production in various physical activities on a treadmill or cycle ergometer. After learning the techniques in the first lab period, each group of 3-4 students designs an independent investigation that is performed during the second lab period. To measure metabolic rate, students collect expired air in a Douglas bag, then measure the volume, the temperature, and the concentration of oxygen and carbon dioxide. With this technique, students can investigate the energetic cost of walking and running, effects of going uphill and downhill, efficiency of muscles, effect on muscle efficiency of varying force and velocity of shortening, relative amounts of fats and carbohydrates metabolized at different activity levels, and many other topics.
In this exercise, students place food at various distances from an ant hill or nest. Ants are then observes as they find the bait and lead other ants to it. At the completion of the exercise, students construct a graph which shows the establishment of trails, recruitment of workers, and depletion of the bait.
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