Publications by authors named "Gopal Billy"
Article Synopsis
- Animals respond to stress using intrinsic and extrinsic factors, and this study focused on wild dice snakes to analyze stress response variations across sexes, morphotypes, reproductive status, and feeding behavior.
- After capture, both glucose (GLUC) and corticosterone (CORT) levels rose sharply, with GLUC peaking sooner than CORT, indicating a significant stress response that remained high over time.
- Surprisingly, no differences were found across sex or morphotype, but snakes exhibiting death-feigning behavior had lower CORT levels, suggesting that low stress hormones may help facilitate this behavior, while those with partially digested food showed higher GLUC levels.
The prerogative of animal welfare science includes wild species and ecological studies. Yet, guidance enshrined in legislation is narrowly derived from studies involving laboratory rodents; legitimacy for non-mammalian free-ranging species is thus debatable. The European directive 2010/63/EU illustrates this problem.
View Article and Find Full Text PDFResource availability can impact immune function, with the majority of studies of such influences focusing on the allocation of energy investment into immune versus other physiological functions. When energy is a limited resource, performance trade-offs can result, compromising immunity. Dehydration is also considered a physiological challenge resulting from the limitation of a vital resource, yet previous research has found a positive relationship between dehydration and innate immune performance.
View Article and Find Full Text PDFVariations of natremia in sea kraits (Laticauda spp.) kept in seawater and fresh water.
Comp Biochem Physiol A Mol Integr Physiol
October 2013
Marine tetrapods evolved specific excretory structures (e.g. salt glands) that maintain salt concentrations within a narrow range of variation.
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