Fin des expériences ! (End of the experiments!)

Today marks the end of our experiments for the spring and summer 2018! It is a rather joyous ending, the experiment culminating with the release of baby lizards back into the natural habitats where we caught their mothers back in the spring.

Two baby lizards, perched on the literal edge of freedom, debate their prospects in the wild.

These lizards, however, have no qualms and enjoy their first moments out of the lab.

This baby enjoys its scenic mountain habitat.

As I wrote in an earlier post , this experiment involved collecting gravid female lizards from populations at low and high elevations, keeping the moms in labs at low and high elevations during gestation, and then incubating the eggs at low, high, and extreme high elevations. A total of 51 pregnant females were proud (we hope) to take part in the experiment, along with their 257 eggs. We repeatedly measured metabolic rates on the moms and collected blood samples to measure haematocrit and haemoglobin levels, which affect oxygen-carrying capacity of the blood. With the eggs, we measured heart rates and metabolic rates throughout incubation to further test how the physiology of developing embryos responds to high-altitude hypoxia, following up on some of our previous work (see Cordero et al. 2017 in J Exp Zool). I’m pleased to say the experiment went extremely well, despite the logistical challenges of maintaining animals and conducting measures in three different labs spanning nearly 150 km distance and 2500 m in elevation. This is largely due to the extraordinary effects of Laura Kouyoumdjian (master’s intern – see her previous post here) and Jérémie Souchet (a doctorant [PhD student], but certainly not a doctorant en carton). And so it is with great pride and relief that our measures have come to an end.

But this certainly doesn’t mean the work is done! There are still blood and yolk samples to analyze, embryos to examine, and lots and lots of data to analyze. The first step will be to prepare my talk for the Evolution 2018 meeting taking place next week in Montpellier. Preliminarily, we have some interesting results to share. For example, translocation to high altitude affects the heart rate of embryos and how these heart rates change during incubation. Furthermore, we found that embryos from high-elevation populations show a decreased response to hypoxia compared to embryos from low-elevation populations.

Embryonic heart during incubation depends on population of origin, gestation conditions, and immediate incubation environment.

This is my first time attending the Evolution meeting, so I’m looking forward with great anticipation to hearing new and exciting ideas, meeting some great researchers, and seeing some old friends. More updates on the meeting soon!