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Recently, some lab members have been traveling and working with our Indigenous community partners! Last month, Jacklyn went to the Inuit community Kugluktuk in Nunavut to help implement the Kitikmeot Biting Insect Monitoring Program (K-BIMP) with Dani Nowosad. This program uses innovative scientific communication tools like 3D printed insects to show the differences between biting insects. While Joey was hosted by the Saugeen Ojibway Nation, in Neyaashiinigmiing, to visit and learn about their Coastal Waters Monitoring Program. This is in effort to increase the use of Indigenous knowledge in work with the Great Lakes Fisheries Commission.

This week, the Bernhardt Lab had the opportunity to visit the Canadian Phycology Collection Centre at the University of Waterloo. Thank you Heather, for showing us around and sharing your expertise with us. As well as for our first purchased stock of Chlamydomonas reinhardtii! Team temperature is hard at work already on thermal performance curves of C.reinhardtii from 5°C to 41°C .

Aviva conducted a project examining the effects of growth rates associated with a warming and the potential impact of diel vertical migration (DVM) on the smaller body sizes of Daphnia magna as dictated by the Temperature-Size rule. Jacklyn’s research looks at bridging Indigenous Knowledge and Western Science to understand the influence of biting flies on caribou in the Arctic and how that impacts Inuit health. This year Ijeoma studied the interactive effects of temperature and nutrient limitation on phytoplankton competition, this paper investigates how species R* can predict the outcome of competition. Sara’s project investigates how diel vertical migration affects Daphnia magna fitness in the context of a warming climate. Kevin has looked at phytoremediation of Lemna minor.

We’re onto the second stage for our experiments! We are currently evolving Candida glabrata over a temperature gradient to learn about potential cross tolerance to drug resistance. Our Arabidopsis thaliana seeds have been transferred to one growth chamber with a few pots flowering! Finally, we are in the last stage of our fish nutrients project analyzing data in R.

Our undergraduate research assistants Ijeoma and Sveta have been working hard juggling various projects this summer. For the College of Biological Science’s undergraduate research Poster Day, Sveta presented a poster on the temperature-dependence of population growth of Nakaseomyces glabrata, a part of their ongoing experiment about cross-tolerance between heat and antifungals in this fungal pathogen.

The summer research projects are well en route! The undergraduate research assistants have made a thermal performance curve of Candida glabrata as a part of a larger project about evolution of drug resistance in thermotolerant pathogenic yeast. Also, they have been growing Arabidopsis thaliana in preparation for a study on fitness effects of changing environmental cues. Lastly, they are finishing up a large-scale literature search on nutrient profiles in Great Lakes fish as part of a data synthesis project examining the relationship between fish nutritional value and their climate sensitivity.

Register for the first Annual Symposium for the Centre for Ecosystem Management (CEM) on Wednesday, June 21st! The vision for CEM is to partner with resource managers to become a world leader in organizing and conducting original and synthesis science needed to understand, monitor, and manage the health and sustainability of Great Lakes ecosystems.

Register Here!

The undergraduates from Integrative Biology are kicking off their research with a pizza lunch. Thank you to everyone who came!

Joey and undergraduate research assistants Ijeoma and Sveta went to visit the Ness Lab at UTM. Thank you to Dr. Ness, we got treated to an awesome lab tour, pizza lunch and fun science chats with Yeshoda Harry-Paul, who is doing some very cool thermal biology with Chlamydomonas reinhardtii!

The lab welcomes two undergraduate research assistants! Ijeoma is entering her fourth year in 2023 in Environmental Governance minoring in Ecology and she is passionate about conservation with a strong interest in aquatic ecosystems. Sveta is entering her third year in Biodiversity with a minor in French Studies and she aims to pursue her interest in seafood climate sensitivity.

Joey attends ESA in Montreal!

Woohoo! Can’t wait to meet up with friends old and new!

We are starting up the Bernhardt Lab!

Get in touch if you or someone you know is interested in joining us!