DISSERTATION RESEARCH: Effects of an Endocrine Disrupter on the Development of Behavior in Threespined Stickleback (Gasterosteus Aculeatus)

University Of California-Davis, Davis CA

Investigators

Abstract

Judy A. Stamps Alison M. Bell Despite considerable public and scientific concern about the presence of anthropogenic chemicals in the environment that can interfere with the endocrine system (endocrine disrupters), little is known about the effects of chronic exposure to low levels of endocrine disrupters on animal behavior. The proposed project will: 1) Determine how lifetime exposure to environmentally-relevant levels of ethinyl estradiol affects behavioral development, life history traits and biomarkers of endocrine disruption in threespined stickleback (Gasterosteus aculeatus); 2) Determine how chronic exposure to low levels of ethinyl estradiol affects the developmental trajectories of full sib families of stickleback from two populations where adults differ in behavior, morphology and life history. The proposed experiment will examine the influence of lifetime exposure to low levels of an exogenous estrogen on the development of behavioral traits. It will contribute to the growing literature on endocrine disruption by relating widely-used toxicological biomarkers with ecologically relevant traits, such as life history and behavior. In addition, the study explicitly examines intraspecific variation (among full-sib families and populations) in susceptibility to endocrine disruption. These data will shed light on important questions regarding the source of population-level variation in stickleback.