Conference: Hormonal Regulation of Whole-Animal Performance: Implications for Selection (2009 SICB Meeting Boston, MA)

Virginia Polytechnic Institute And State University, Blacksburg VA

Investigators

Abstract

Despite intense public and media attention given to steroid use by humans to enhance athletic performance, surprisingly little is known about how hormones regulate whole-animal performance traits, such as running, biting, and swimming ability. There is clear evidence that such traits are important to individual survival and reproduction, but there is a lack of a general understanding of how selection on performance, and indirectly it's underlying physiology (including hormones), affects the phenotype via the wide-ranging effects of hormones. One key aspect of the symposium at the 2009 Society for Integrative and Comparative Biology (SICB) meeting in Boston, MA will be to highlight the diverse ways in which hormones may affect various performance traits across a range of animal species. This symposium will encourage a synthetic approach by bringing together, for the first time, an international group of researchers working on hormones and performance in both vertebrates and invertebrates. These researchers span a wide range of career stages and geographic locations that do not normally have the opportunity to interact directly. Nearly one-half of the symposium presenters are from outside the USA, and several of the participants do not regularly attend SICB meetings. One benefit of this symposium is that it will provide an excellent opportunity for students and junior researchers to exchange ideas with more established investigators. This will be accomplished through direct interaction during the symposium, planned social events involving symposium participants and students, and a complementary contributed paper session. Participation by historically underrepresented groups, with nearly one-third of participants being women or minorities, is also being accomplished. Publication of the symposium's proceedings in SICB's journal, Integrative and Comparative Biology, will ensure that the intellectual products of the symposium are broadly disseminated.