Alexander
Velasco
Sponsor: Stacey Combes, Ph.D. Neuro Physio & Behavior The Common Eastern Bumblebee, Bombus impatiens, possesses highly flexible wings due to an elastic protein, resilin, that is located within specific wing joints. We artificially stiffened the flexible joint in vivo to determine how wing flexibility affects flight endurance. Each bee was tested with both experimental and control treatments in a randomized order. In the experimental treatment, we splinted the major resilin joint by gluing a piece of glitter over the joint of both wings. This reduced flexibility in the chordwise direction, from the front to the back edge of the wing. In the control, we applied glitter at a position adjacent to the joint to control for the addition of mass without altering flexibility. Before each treatment, bees were fasted and fed 20% of their body mass in sucrose. Subsequently, they flew in a large, spherical arena that prevented landing, until they reached exhaustion. Their flight time was recorded as a measure of flight endurance. We compared the control and experiment groups to test the hypothesis that wing flexibility increases flight endurance. We predicted that the control group will demonstrate higher flight endurance. This data should add to our growing understanding that flexibility benefits several aspects of flight performance. Title: What Microbes are found in Watermelon Flowers and Seeds?
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Alexander Velasco
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Seeds are a vehicle for new plant generations, and they also house unique microenvironments in which microorganisms reside. These seed-associated microbes (e.g.fungi and bacteria) have many impacts on their hosts such as affecting germination, protecting against pathogens and bringing in nutrients from the environment. To learn more about these microbial communities, we studied the flower and seed microbes of commercial watermelon (Citrullus lanatus), a popular fruit crop grown near Davis. We sampled anthers, stigmas and seeds from watermelon plants in two commercial fields and isolated microbes from them in culture. Through Sanger sequencing, we are identifying the microbes to discover about their community composition and potential functions. There were more bacteria than fungi on flowers, but fungal diversity was higher. Reisolation frequencies from seeds were very low, suggesting a bottleneck in seed microbial community formation. Based on our sequencing results, we can use these data for future experiments revolving around plant health and microbe-microbe interactions. UC Davis 34 th Annual Undergraduate Research, Scholarship and Creative Activities Conference 172 Attention and Social Communication in Intellectual Disabilities Ember Venkatesh
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UC Davis / Plant Pathology / 2023
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Alexander Velasco