BU Biology

PhD candidate Brandon A. Güell’s treefrog photographs featured in BBC’s ‘Planet Earth 3’ and on the cover of Behavioral Ecology

Photographs taken by Brandon A. Güell showcase several male gliding treefrogs scrambling over one another and recently laid eggs in pursuit of mates and reproductive opportunities during a massive explosive breeding aggregation on Costa Rica’s Osa Peninsula. These captivating images were featured in the publicity for BBC’s landmark series ‘Planet Earth 3.’ Notably, one of these images was selected as the cover image for Behavioral Ecology, where his first dissertation chapter on explosive breeding in this species was recently published, with Biology Professor Karen Warkentin: Phenology and environmental determinants of explosive breeding in gliding treefrogs: diel timing of rainfall matters.

Majo Salazar-Nicholls of the Warkentin Lab will be presenting a seminar titled “Neural mechanisms underlying hatching plasticity in red-eyed treefrogs” on Wednesday, November 15 at 12:20pm in BRB 113.

The arboreal embryos of red-eyed treefrogs, Agalychnis callidryas, can hatch in seconds to escape from egg predators and other threats. However, key mechanisms underlying hatching plasticity – from cue sensing to capsule exit – are unknown and the focus of my research. Majo studies how hypoxia-cued hatching works (cue sensing) and how acute hatching enzyme release is regulated (capsule exit) by combining fieldwork, behavioral experiments, and molecular analysis.

Join us at the CAS Major Fair to learn more about the different College of Arts and Sciences academic departments.

The event will be held Oct. 30 from 5-6 pm at the Yawkey Center, 6th floor.

Meet with representatives from the Education Resource Center, the Center for Career Development (), Study Abroad (), and all other schools and colleges to learn about opportunities across campus.

Rhushikesh Phadke of the Cruz-Martín Lab, will give a talk titled: “C4 overexpression induces pathological synaptic loss in neurons by impairing AMPAR trafficking.” The regularly scheduled Neuro graduate student seminar will take place Tuesday, October 24th from 12:30pm – 1:20pm in BRB 113.

Overexpression of Complement 4 (C4), a risk gene for schizophrenia, reduces synaptic connectivity. His work elucidates a novel, non-canonical mechanism of C4 action.

Melissa Inge of the Siggers Lab will give a talk titled: “Profiling the interactions of epigenetic regulators and their control of cell states” on Friday, October 13th from 12:20pm – 1:15pm in LSE B01.

Her work involves systematically determining the interactions between transcription factor and chromatin modifying cofactor complexes to better understand how these complexes may regulate gene expression in a cell type or cell state specific way. She does this by performing a high-throughput, protein-binding microarray (PBM)-based approach called CoRec (Cofactor Recruitment) in various cell types and cell states.