Neurogenomics of Parental Care
Neurogenomics of parental care in the rock dove: (With Becca Calisi) Becoming a parent causes big changes in behavior. For animals that exhibit parental care, the successful rearing of offspring involves a shift from aggressive and sexual behaviors to caring and nurturing ones, but what in the brain mediates this transition? How flexible are these changes in response to unpredictable environmental perturbations, and how is behavior altered because of them? In a rapidly changing world, understanding how the environment affects the brain and how, in turn, the brain affects the behavioral transition into parental care will shed light on how changes in environment can ultimately affect fitness. In an interdisciplinary collaboration, Dr. Calisi-Rodríguez (Barnard College) and Dr. MacManes (University of New Hampshire) will characterize changes the entire transcriptome and specific proteomic levels in the brains of male and female rock doves (Columba livia) during the transition into parental care and, via environmental manipulations, discover the cause of these changes