Symposium: Evolution of mechanisms controlling timing of breeding in animals; SCIB Annual Meeting January 3-7, 2009 Boston, MA

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This symposium at the Society for Integrative and Comparative Biology (SICB) focuses on how animals coordinate reproduction with a changing environment. Recently, significant advances have been made in unraveling the physiological and molecular mechanisms that form the basis of the reproductive machinery in mammals and birds. Further, new studies in evolutionary ecology are pinpointing the reproductive phenotypes on which selection acts to produce individuals that breed at optimal times of year in different habitats. The goal of the symposium is to meld these two fields, reproductive physiology /environmental endocrinology on the one hand, and evolutionary ecology on the other, so as to enhance progress in our understanding of the evolution of reproductive mechanisms. This symposium will unite at one venue international experts working on reproductive physiology and molecular endocrinology together with those working in evolutionary ecology and life history to integrate these historically separate fields. It will also serve to unite researchers working on diverse vertebrate taxa, which will stimulate exchange of ideas across taxonomic groups that often are approached in quite different ways. Consequently, the symposium will facilitate progress in the field of integrative biology generally, and will specifically enhance our understanding of both basic (e.g., evolutionary) and applied (e.g., conservation) implications of the mechanisms by which animals adjust their annual cycles to variable environmental conditions. SICB is heavily student-oriented, and the annual meeting is attended by many graduate students, undergraduates, and even some high school students. The meeting is also attended by representatives of the media, and the society provides press releases regarding presentations of significance to the general public. The content of this symposium has particular import for understanding how animal populations are likely to be affected by human-induced environment modification, a topic of ever-increasing general public interest, and will consequently provide rich opportunities for communicating with the general public about how basic science furthers applied goals. The list of presenters includes several young investigators and women, as well as a balanced complement of domestic and international researchers.