Department of Biology Graduate Theses
Recent Submissions
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PLASTICITY AND EVOLUTIONARY POTENTIAL OF ALLIARIA PETIOLATA LIFE HISTORY AND LEAF CHEMISTRY TRAITS IN DIFFERENT COMPETITIVE ENVIRONMENTS
Alliaria petiolata is an invasive biennial herb in North America where it has detrimental impacts on flora and fauna. Allelopathy, the chemical inhibition of plant competitors, is one explanation for why A. petiolata is ... -
Evaluating conservation strategies for a threatened population of gray ratsnakes (Pantherophis spiloides)
Wildlife populations across the globe are declining due to the effects of increasing anthropogenic activities. Among the most vulnerable taxa are snakes, which face several threats including road mortality and habitat loss. ... -
DNA Polymerization in Microgravity and the Future of Human Space Travel
The coming decades will represent a quantum leap in the field of crewed space travel, with planned missions back to the Moon, forward to Mars, and possibly beyond. The substantial biological threats of long-term space ... -
EXAMINING THE LONG-TERM ECOLOGICAL CONSEQUENCES OF GOLD MINING OPERATIONS, URBANIZATION, AND CLIMATIC CHANGES ON SUB-ARCTIC LAKES NEAR YELLOWKNIFE (NORTHWEST TERRITORIES, CANADA) USING DIATOMS AS PALEOENVIRONMENTAL INDICATORS
The mineral resource potential of Canada’s North has been recognized since the early 20th century with mines operating across all three territories. However, the long-term biological consequences of Northern mining operations ... -
ON THE APPLICATION OF THE THEORY OF ISLAND BIOGEOGRAPHY AND ITS MODERN EXTENSIONS TO SUBMARINE BANK COMMUNITIES
This thesis explores the application of a traditionally terrestrial-based ecological theory, the Theory of Island Biogeography (TIB), to a large marine ecosystem. Decades of testing of this theory have led to various ... -
Initial characterization of a subgroup of Arabidopsis group VIII receptor-like cytoplasmic kinases in immune and flowering time pathways
In order to defend against disease, plants have evolved a tightly coordinated signaling network to rapidly prevent the spread of infection. Given the severity of yearly crop loss to pathogen threats, further understanding ... -
Changes in climate and catchment processes over the middle and late Holocene in the boreal region of northeastern Ontario, Canada
The climate of North America has varied substantially over the Holocene. Holocene Thermal Maximum (HTM) warmth occurred earlier in the west with associated aridity, compared to the east which was humid. Specific regions ... -
Direct and indirect effects of host food quality on host life history, host susceptibility to parasitism, and parasitoid life history
Ecological communities are complex, comprising species and environmental factors that are so entangled in their effects on one another that ecologists and evolutionary biologists will forever be mystified by how they are ... -
Genetic and Geographic Boundaries in the Spring Peeper (Psuedacris crucifer) with Insights into Mito-Nuclear Discordance, Reticulation, Niche Divergence and Isolation
The reduction of gene flow is often associated with divergence and initial stages of speciation. In the absence of gene flow, sister lineages should diverge genetically from one another in a roughly clock-like fashion even ... -
Fire activity in northeast Ontario during the Holocene as inferred by sedimentary macrocharcoal
Wildfire management can benefit from knowledge of past wildfire response to changing environmental conditions. We extracted a high-resolution macrocharcoal record from a small deep lake with a relatively small watershed ... -
Do Species with Strong Apical Dominance Incur a Cost in Terms of Suppressed Potential Fecundity or Biomass?
Plants typically allocate axillary meristems to one of three principal fates: growth (G), reproduction (R), or inactivity (I). The latter is commonly enforced by ‘apical dominance’, promoting a growth form that favours ... -
Environmental influences on microbial communities of lake whitefish, cisco, and Arctic char on and surrounding King William Island, Nunavut
Partnered with the Nunavut community of Gjoa Haven on King William Island, a large-scale Genome Canada project, the Towards a Sustainable Fishery for Nunavummiut (TSFN) project endeavoured to integrate Inuit traditional ... -
Investigating low temperature resistance in Brachypodium distachyon, a cold stress and crop model
Low temperature poses one of the most biologically taxing and economically significant stresses for a variety of agricultural crops. To combat cold stress, resilient plants can undergo cold acclimation, a process involving ... -
Assessing long-term changes in chironomid assemblages linked to past fluctuations in Leach’s Storm-Petrel populations on islands in the Western Atlantic Ocean
Nutrient loading is an important factor that can indirectly deplete dissolved oxygen concentrations in lakes. In environments where seabirds nest and breed, guano is a prominent source of nutrients that can eutrophy ... -
Hypoxia and the metabolic phenotype of Daphnia
Environmental hypoxia is a phenomenon in which low oxygen conditions force organisms to respond behaviourally and physiologically to survive in an otherwise lethal habitat. Animals display different mechanisms to cope with ... -
Functional genomics to discover genes responsible for root architecture and heavy metal tolerance in Populus
Anthropogenic activities have led to widespread of heavy metal contaminants such cadmium and arsenic. When left untreated, they pose risk to both human and ecosystem health as well as further reduce arable lands. ... -
Mechanisms underlying anoxic coma and spreading depolarization in Locusta mirgatoria
Spreading depolarization (SD) is neurological phenomenon that results in the depression of neural activity and is found in both vertebrate and invertebrate systems. SD is characterized as a propagating wave of neuronal and ... -
Evaluation and Improvement of the Stoichiometric Homeostasis Model for Understanding and Predicting the Structure and Functioning of a Low Arctic Tundra Plant Community
Arctic tundra vegetation structure profoundly affects ecosystem processes and climatic regulation. Therefore, there is a growing urgency for more accurate biogeochemical models to better understand how tundra vegetation ... -
The effects of increasing chloride concentrations and temperatures on freshwater zooplankton communities
Across the Northern Hemisphere, chloride concentrations in lakes are increasing from decades of road salt use, imperiling aquatic ecosystems. Elevated chloride concentrations threaten aquatic organisms, and zooplankton are ... -
High sensitivity of freshwater zooplankton to low chloride concentrations is unaltered by nutrient level
Driven by decades of road salt use, freshwater salinization is prevalent across North America. Increasing chloride concentrations threaten freshwater species, and zooplankton are particularly sensitive. In Canada, the ...