Symposium Paper Published!

It was such an honor to be invited to the 2024 SICB Symposium "Feel the Flow." This chapter of my dissertation is out now in Integrative & Comparative Biology - read it here!

A little bit about the manuscript:

A. Vital flourescent staining of neuromasts (flourescent dots and bars) in a juvenile silverjaw minnow. B) The same individual cleared and stained for bone, showing the four lateral line canal segments on the bottom of the head.

This paper investigates an unusual morphology of the flow-sensing lateral line system in fishes in the silverjaw minnow, Ericymba buccata. While most fishes have one cranial lateral line canal phenotype, this fish has two, which led investigators to describe this system in detail, revealing a proliferation of surface neuromast receptor organs, more sensitive widened canals, and external taste buds located below the eye and along the lower jaw. This fish is known to feed on benthic prey nocturnally in the field, so researchers tested whether the regional specialization of the lateral line system on the bottom side of the head was crucial for this behavior in experimental trials. They found that vision, lateral line, and chemosensory (likely gustatory) input was important for benthic feeding in light and dark conditions, emphasizing the importance of multi-modal sensory input for important behaviors.