Planning Visit to New Zealand and Australia for Cooperative Research on the Evolution of Respiratory Systems in Ancient Reptiles

Eastern Washington University, Cheney WA

Investigators

Abstract

0402070 Boggs This is a planning grant that involves visits by Dr. Dona Boggs of Eastern Washington University to several parts of New Zealand and to Melbourne, Australia in order to gather information and make arrangements for an international collaborative research effort that will involve several investigators and several types of animals. The general focus of the research collaborations being planned by the PI is the evolution and interaction of respiratory and locomotor systems in extinct and living vertebrates. The PI intends to collect data from museum specimens on some musculo-skeletal features of a living ancient reptile-like animal, the tuatara, which is found only on several islands off the New Zealand mainland. She will also develop more detailed research plans for studying several species of birds (flying, flightless, and diving species) in New Zealand and megachiropteran bats in Australia. This trip will also enable her to arrange the necessary research permits by meeting in person with representatives of Departments of Conservation in both countries and with authorities of the Maori community of New Zealand. The latter is required by New Zealand law. Intellectual Merit This trip is a preliminary step toward a project that would advance our knowledge of the coevolution of ventilatory and locomotor systems in several groups of vertebrates . Most of the later field research will be done in the countries being visited and will include investigators from those countries as well as experts in Germany. Broader Impacts The ultimate research project will enhance partnerships in research across four nations. The participants will include three female investigators as well as undergraduate and graduate student participants from a small regional American university. The results will be broadly disseminated to the scientific communities interested in comparative physiology and vertebrate functional morphology and evolution.