Publications by authors named "J B O'Brien"

Platypuses are a unique freshwater mammal native to eastern Australia. They are semi-aquatic, predominantly nocturnal, and nest in burrows dug into the banks of waterbodies. Quantifying nesting burrow characteristics is challenging due to the species' cryptic nature.

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This study investigated the speciation and aqueous dissolution of macronutrients in fire ash from diverse ecosystems and speciation of ash and smoke from laboratory burning, exploring the variations and their causes. The speciation of phosphorus (P), calcium (Ca), and potassium (K) in fire ash from five globally distributed ecosystems was characterized by using X-ray absorption spectroscopy and sequential fractionation. Aqueous dissolution of the macronutrients was measured by batch experiments at acidic and alkaline pHs.

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Contaminant monitoring programs use wild bird eggs, but determining whether measured concentrations elicit adverse effects relies on extrapolation from toxicity studies with avian model species. Here, we directly evaluated the relationships between whole embryo contaminant concentrations and mRNA expression in liver tissue of the double-crested cormorant (). Eggs collected from three North American sites (one from Lake Erie and two from the Salish Sea) were artificially incubated until pipping.

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The peripheral nervous system has been widely implicated in pathological conditions that exhibit distinct clinical presentations in men and women, most notably in chronic pain disorders. Here, we explored this sexual dimorphism at a molecular level. We expanded the available omics landscape in the PNS to include quantitative proteomics of the human dorsal root ganglia (hDRG) and nerve.

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