- Docente: Alessandro Poli
- Credits: 6
- SSD: BIO/09
- Language: Italian
- Teaching Mode: Traditional lectures
- Campus: Bologna
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Corso:
Second cycle degree programme (LM) in
Biodiversity and Evolution (cod. 8419)
Also valid for Second cycle degree programme (LM) in Sciences and Management of Nature (cod. 8209)
Learning outcomes
Sensing the environment
Sensory receptors (mechanoreceptors, electroreceptors, photoreceptors, magnetoreceptors, etc) ant their adaptation to detect the chemical and physical changes in the external environment and elicit responses to maintain the internal medium homeostasis.
Effects of temperature
Biochemical and physiological adaptation to changes of external temperature. Control of body temperature. Ectothermic and endothermic strategies. Pecilotermic and omeothermic strategies. Termoregulation and specialized metabolic conditions. Cold and warm adaptation.
Muscles and locomotion
Different muscle types. Terrestrial locomotion. Aquatic locomotion. Aerial locomotion.
Respiration
Respiration in water and air. Animal adaptations to diving (reptiles, birds, and marine mammals) High altitude respiration. Role of respiratory pigments.
Excretion and osmoregulation
Ammonotelic, ureotelic and uricotelic animals. Osmoregulators and osmoconformers. The rectal gland in elasmobranchs. The role of gills in the regulation of osmotic pressure in freshwater and seawater vertebrates (catadrome and anadrome fish). The salt gland in reptile and birds. The role of kidneys in different vertebrates.
Digestion
Feeding strategies in different environments (including the use of toxins) and functional charateristics of the digestive tract in the various vertebrate classes.
Course contents
The Course is aimed at providing students the theoretical basis and methodological tools for learning and interpreting, under an evolutionary perspective, the physiological mechanisms and adaptive strategies that allow animals to survive and reproduce at the different environmental conditions.
Readings/Bibliography
Alessandro Poli et al.: Animal Physiology, Ed. Edises (2014).
Alessandro Poli and Elena Fabbri: Marine Animals Physiology, Ed. Edises (2012).
Teaching methods
Frontal lessons and laboratory
Assessment methods
The final examination will be performed through an oral colloquium. In addition the student, on his/her choice, may want to discuss a report on one of the topics object of the course, prepared by deep reading of updated scientific literature.
Teaching tools
pp slides
Office hours
See the website of Alessandro Poli