Does the early subordinate catch the worm?

Issued: Thu, 07 Feb 2013 16:47:00 GMT

Paul Jerem started today on his new project 'Does the early subordinate catch the worm?' in which he will be examining possible relationships between circadian rhythm and social dominance in great tits. The project is part of his BBSRC funded doctoral training programme studentship

Once Paul completes his first project, he will then move on to looking at non-invasive measurements of stress in animals. Paul will be supervised by Ruedi Nager, Dominic McCafferty and Dorothy McKeegan.

Reliable, non-invasive measurements of stress in animals are extremely important tools for how animals cope with their environment.  Current approaches commonly rely on the measurement of levels of stress hormones.  While this approach is well established, it is invasive and has limitations because different circumstances can elicit similar responses. The aim of this project is to develop novel, more broadly applicable and non-invasive tools to measure the stress response.  Growing evidence suggests that changes in peripheral temperature accompany the stress response, which will allow us to develop a novel and non-invasive technique that uses infra-red thermography to monitor changes in the birds’ peripheral temperature. Such a new tool will greatly benefit the assessment of how free-living animals cope with environmental change.