Department of Biological Sciences

Abstract: Research in the Chtarbanova lab focuses on studying the changes in innate immune activation and function in the aging organism and how they relate to disease. We employ genetic, genomic and molecular approaches to understand how the process of aging shapes host-virus interactions, including immune defenses, and how older organisms survive infection. Indeed, viral infections are an important burden among the elderly and are often associated with higher morbidity and mortality. Importantly, with the increasing number of older individuals [...]

According to the NASA definition, life is a self-sustaining chemical system capable of the Darwinian evolution. Living systems constantly interact with animate and inanimate matter to maintain their highly organized and far from thermodynamic equilibrium status (homeostasis). Small changes to this organized state may result in the system to be living no more. A multitude of chemical interactions occur between living systems and their environments to maintain homeostasis. Our lab has been eavesdropping on some of these chemical interactions to [...]

The southern Appalachian Mountains are a global biodiversity hotspot for salamanders. Mountains may promote high species richness by acting as evolutionary catalysts and/or refugia. How mountains influence other dimensions of diversity – ecological and phenotypic – is uncertain. Here, we assess how abiotic factors that contribute to microhabitat availability vary with elevation gradient throughout the Appalachian Mountains, surrounding foothills, and lowlands. We compare this to elevational patterns in microhabitat use, phenotype, and macroevolutionary features (adaptive peaks), in a group encompassing [...]