Information Wellness Blog

Kelly was one of the foremost artist educators of her generation and amassed an extensive archive of syllabi, classroom notes and creative assignments from classroom teaching sessions she led as well as materials related to early performative classroom projects she initiated.

Ned Kelly has become a national hero, representing Australia’s struggle against oppression and colonial rule. Yet his true life may not always live up to this image.

Behavioral Ecology

Behavioral ecology is an interdisciplinary field that examines the intersection of evolution and behavior, originally developed as part of mainstream biology. The discipline examines animal behaviors as adaptations to their environments compared to more narrow fields like physiology or morphology which focus more narrowly. Instead, behavioral ecology takes all aspects of an organism’s environment into consideration when exploring why certain behaviors have emerged over time.

Biologically speaking, behavioral ecology holds that over time characteristics that produce more surviving offspring will become more widespread within populations. This so-called fitness principle provides insight into both how an individual’s behavior may have developed over time as well as its relative value among members of a population (Coulson et al. 2022).

Many different disciplines share an interest in how the environment influences behavior, but behavioral ecology offers several specialized subfields to study specific topics. For instance, behavioral ecologists frequently investigate how different environmental variables impact an organism’s foraging strategy success as well as how various innate and learned cues influence predator recognition and hunting success, among other subjects.

Other aspects of behavioral ecology explore how cultural practices impact an individual’s behavior. Human behavioral ecologists tend to study how culture shapes family behavior, such as decisions regarding whom or when to marry and when/whether to have children. Furthermore, they investigate cultural variations within family structures as well as how social institutions such as religion, education and work affect family dynamics.

Behavioral ecology, one of the subfields within anthropology, is best-known for its long-term studies of hunter-gatherer societies. Studies such as these provide invaluable information about how human populations have responded to environmental change over time, which is essential for understanding human behaviors and traditions like family size, marriage and childbearing. No matter their discipline of study, all HBE researchers utilize evolutionary theory as a framework for comprehending human behavior. According to this theory, behaviors which are adaptive in certain circumstances are selected for over morality – an example could be individuals choosing children even though the endeavor may be costly or risky, believing it will increase their chance of survival in future years.

Neuroendocrinology

Neuroendocrinology is the study of how nervous and endocrine systems interconnect to regulate body hormone production. More specifically, neuroendocrinology examines hypothalamus hormone secretion activity as it impacts other endocrine glands such as pituitary. Hormones have many functions within our bodies including appetite regulation, metabolism regulation and reproduction; disruption to their signals through disease or injury could have serious repercussions for health.

The brain receives many different endocrine signals, and has enzyme mechanisms in place to transform and amplify these signals. For instance, deiodination allows thyroid hormone T4 to convert to its active form T3, while interconversion converts testosterone hormone into 17b-estradiol which encourages early male development by leading to masculinization of early development stages.

An infection of the pituitary gland can interfere with neuroendocrine function and disrupt their normal production, often leading to overproduction or interference with certain hormones. A tumor in this area of the brain could trigger prolactinomas – tumors that secrete prolactin – a hormone responsible for controlling lactation mammary glands to produce milk from lactating mammary glands – leading to infertility or decreased sexual drive as a result. Prolactinomas tend to occur more commonly among women than men causing problems such as infertility or reduced sexual drive due to overproduction of certain hormones produced from pituitary tumors.

Other neuroendocrine disorders include carcinoid syndrome, which occurs when your body produces too many gastrointestinal or lung NETs (neuroendocrine tumor cells). This syndrome can lead to symptoms including abdominal pain, bloating or gas, loss of appetite and weight loss; diarrhea; constipation; indigestion as well as jaundice – where both skin and whites of eyes turn yellow over time.

Neuroendocrine tumors don’t always have an identifiable source; however, they often result from neuroendocrine cells experiencing mutations to their DNA that lead them to multiply uncontrollably and spread. A pituitary gland neuroendocrine tumor could potentially manifest with symptoms including headaches, blurred vision, enlarged spleen, swelling legs and feet or high blood pressure – if you notice these or similar signs make an appointment with your healthcare provider who will evaluate and determine whether the signs and symptoms could be indicative of neuroendocrine tumor cancer development before making treatment plans accordingly.

Developmental Neurobiology

Research within this department encompasses developmental neurobiology, which is an interdisciplinary field encompassing the study of neurons and their related organelles such as glia. More specifically, developmental neurobiology involves investigating neurons’ development over time including synapses, neural circuits, behavior control functions as well as their roles in controlling behavior and cognitive functions. Research in this area includes both normal and abnormal neural development including mechanisms related to autism spectrum disorders or other neurological/behavioral disorders.

This area of research seeks to understand the cellular and molecular processes underlying both normal and disordered brain development, as well as how nerve cells respond to external stimuli or internal stresses (such as inflammation or infection).

Developmental neuroscience focuses on understanding how neural networks form in an orchestrated fashion to allow complex adaptive behaviors. Neural network formation can enable an animal to learn new tasks or adapt to changing environments – essential functions that rely on brain functions adjusting their functioning for our survival as a species.

Researchers use various approaches, including behavioral, imaging and computational research techniques, to understand how neural networks function. Studies are often multidisciplinary in scope spanning neuroscience (behavioral systems and cognitive neuroscience), psychology, biology, anthropology sociology and cognitive science among others.

Developmental neurobiology can be an invaluable tool in the battle against MEB disorders, enabling scientists to pinpoint genes and environmental exposures that increase or decrease risk. Armed with this information, preventive interventions can then be developed that target children at highest risk based on factors like genotype/phenotype analysis, physiological or brain imaging measures or history of exposures.

One major contribution of Kelly research has been the invention of functional neuroimaging techniques like EEG and ERPs (early EEG and ERPs) as well as later ones such as fMRI, MEG, DTI and NIRS that enable us to examine how the brain operates. Before these technologies existed, scientists were limited in their study of disorders by looking for signs of their dysfunction within a particular organ such as the brain.

Social Behavior

Social behavior studies examine how animals interact with one another. This can involve verbal and nonverbal communication, body language and eye contact; also comprising group behaviour like that seen between packs of wolves or flocks of birds. Animal behaviorists, evolutionary biologists and the general public alike have become fascinated with social behaviour due to countless life science documentaries that showcase its drama and diversity.

Eusocial species display some of the highest-developed forms of social behavior among animals. These species live in large colonies where only a relatively few individuals reproduce; everyone else in the colony fulfills essential tasks like providing resources, defense and care of young. Examples of eusocial species include ants, termites, some wasps and bees as well as two mammal species (Naked Mole Rat and Damaraland Mole Rat), as well as reef-dwelling shrimp.

While social interaction often conjures images of friendly interaction, it’s important to keep in mind that social behavior may sometimes take on competitive characteristics. For instance, friendly interactions among children on a playground could quickly turn into intensely competitive ones leading to physical harm due to competing interests among members in a group who must share limited resources.

Researchers studying social behavior must carefully weigh the benefits and costs of groupings with other individuals when studying this area of research. More generally speaking, this field attempts to uncover unifying principles behind similar behavior across taxa while also understanding any significant species-specific variations that exist among such behaviors.

Aubrey Kelly earned her undergraduate degree in Psychology at the University of California San Diego (UCSD) in 2007 while serving as a research assistant in the labs of Drs. Robert D’Arcy and John Boren at UCSD examining courtship behavior among birds. For her graduate studies, Kelly used closely related estrildid finch species that differ in sociality as models to explore both convergent and divergent neural mechanisms modulating social behavior emergence.