CAREER: The energetic costs of active sensory and communication signals: Integrating research and education through organismal, cellular, and molecular approaches

动物通过主动和被动感觉系统的结合来感知环境，以探测和响应外部刺激。由于载体信号（光）来自太阳，像视觉这样的被动感觉系统几乎不需要动物的能量输入。主动感觉和通信系统，如蝙蝠的回声定位是有利的，因为它们不需要外部能源，但这些动物必须消耗能量来产生声波载体信号。管理这些能量需求和应对能量短缺对它们的生存和生殖健康至关重要。耗尽产生信号的能量会使感觉系统“失明”，从而无法找到食物，对竞争对手的威胁做出反应，或吸引配偶。在某些种类的电鱼中，感知和交流的能量需求是极端的。电鱼是一种产生并感知周围水域的电场的动物，它们可以在黑暗中想象自己的世界并进行交流。该项目旨在阐明使动物能够管理和利用能量昂贵的感觉和沟通渠道的组织原则。研究者将调整从本项目研究活动中发展出来的知识、软件和技术方法，以提高地区、国家和国际的科学素养和教育。该项目将以弱电鱼Eingenmannia viriscens为模型系统，验证能量需求是在生物体、细胞和分子水平上形成主动感知操作和调节的主要力量这一假设。该研究计划将研究被称为电细胞的特殊电器官细胞的同步动作电位产生的电器官放电，以(1)发现激素如何在正常情况下调节电信号强度并应对代谢应激，(2)发现产生电信号的细胞如何提高其能量效率并应对能量不足，(3)确定电器官细胞离子通道和离子泵中优化能量利用的分子适应性。该项目将通过研究允许动物使用代谢要求的感觉和通信信号的机制，将研究和教育结合起来。该项目的教育部分将实现四个教育目标，扩展研究者整合研究和教学的记录：(1)扩大和改进研究者的外展计划，“电鱼路演”，在从小学教室到退休社区的各种环境中促进科学素养[www.markhamlab.com/outreach.html]]。(2)扩大小学和初中课程计划的范围和分布，以及高中和大学神经生物学课程教育软件的国际部署[www.EOTNprogram.org];(3)改变学生科学家-教育工作者在研究者实验室的培训方式；(4)在研究者所在院系开设本科生实验班，让学生直接参与与项目研究目标相关的高水平研究活动。

Animals sense the environment using a combination of active and passive sensory systems in order to detect and respond to external stimuli. Passive sensory systems such as vision require little energy input from the animal because the carrier signal (light) comes from the sun. Active sensory and communication systems such as echolocation in bats are advantageous because they do not require external energy sources, but these animals must expend energy to produce the acoustic carrier signal. Managing these energetic demands and responding to energy shortfalls is essential for their survival and reproductive fitness. Running out of energy to generate the signal renders the sensory system "blind" and makes it impossible to find food, respond to threats from competitors, or attract mates. The energetic demands of sensing and communicating are extreme in some species of electric fish - animals that generate and sense electric fields in the surrounding water to image their worlds and communicate in darkness. This project aims to elucidate the organizing principles that allow animals to manage and exploit energetically expensive sensory and communication channels. The investigator will adapt knowledge, software, and technical approaches developed from this project's research activities to improve science literacy and education regionally, nationally, and internationally. This project will test the hypothesis that energetic demands are a major force shaping the operation and regulation of active sensing at the organismal, cellular, and molecular levels using the weakly electric fish, Eingenmannia viriscens, as a model system. The research plan will study the electric organ discharge produced by the synchronized action potentials of specialized electric organ cells called electrocytes to (1) discover how hormones regulate electric signal intensity under normal conditions and in response to metabolic stress, (2) discover how the cells that generate the electric signal increase their energy efficiency and respond to energy shortfalls, and (3) identify molecular adaptations in the electric organ cells' ion channels and ion pumps that optimize energy utilization. This project will integrate research and education through investigating the mechanisms that allow animals to use metabolically demanding sensory and communication signals. This project's educational component will achieve four educational goals that extend the investigator's track record of integrating research and teaching: (1) expanding and improving the investigator's outreach program, "The Electric Fish Roadshow", that promotes scientific literacy in settings ranging from grade-school classrooms to retirement communities [www.markhamlab.com/outreach.html]. (2) extending the scope and distribution of grade-school and middle-school lesson plans regionally and nationally, as well as international deployment of educational software for high-school and college neurobiology classes [www.EOTNprogram.org], (3) transforming the way student scientist-educators are trained in the investigator's laboratory and, (4) developing an undergraduate laboratory class in the investigator's department that involves students directly in high-level research activities related to the project's research goals.