Mammalogy Class

Part of my job as a curator at a museum that happens to be located on a university campus is to teach.  I happen to teach a course in the fall on mammals (Mammalogy).  This class is for graduate and undergraduate students here at the University of Florida.  However, today, I have the day off.  I have a great group of graduate students who work with me on the PhD research.  And, they are available to give guest lectures for me in my class. Today, one of my students, Angelo, is teaching my class about echolocation in mammals.  Its amazing how much similarity there is in the ways that different mammals have evolved the ability to echolocate.  In fact, some bats and whales even have a gene for hearing that is very similar through convergent evolution (two different organisms that have converged on the same type of amino acid sequence).  You can read about it here.  Thanks Angelo.

Capybara in the house

OK, well in my last post I was getting ready for a mundane meeting about parasites on humans, when I get a message that somebody is bringing in two young Capybaras and asks "do we want to get some tissue samples from them for genetic work?"  Well, I had to say yes.  Here is a pic of one of the little guys.  Capybaras grow up to be the world's largest rodent.  There is a population in north Florida that is thriving after an accidental introduction.  He was remarkably docile and cute as anything.  Anyway, Capybara wrangling was way better than a meeting in my office.  I love being a curator.