1. lifelines
  2. White Nose Syndrome - What do we know now?

White Nose Syndrome - What do we know now?

By dr. dolittle on August 29, 2017.
i-ebcc26a7ac8cec5ca806aeb5307a613a-3842close-upofnosewithfungus-300x200-thumb-300x200-69021.jpg Image source: Smithsonian Institution

You may recall prior Lifelines posts discussing the devastating effects of white nose syndrome (WNS) in bats. WNS, Pseudogymnoascus destructans is a fungus responsible for the deaths of millions of North American bats over the last ten years. In a new study published in the American Journal of Physiology - Regulatory, Integrative and Comparative Physiology, Dr. Craig Willis examined the effects of repeated arousals from hibernation induced by the fungal infection. Data from this new study provides evidence that infected animals do have higher metabolisms while hibernating than non-infected animals. In addition, infected animals lose more water through evaporation. Both of these effects are thought to contribute to the demise of infected bats. The hope now is to use this knowledge to design treatments for infected bats.

Source:

LP McGuire, HW Mayberry, CKR Willis. White-nose syndrome increases torpid metabolic rate and e vaporative water loss in White-nose syndrome increases torpid metabolic rate and evaporative water loss in hibernating bats. American Journal of Physiology - Regulatory, Integrative and Comparative Physiology. Published 23 August 2017 Vol. no. , DOI: 10.1152/ajpregu.00058.2017  
Tags
Life Science
bat
fungus
White nose syndrome

More like this

Passing rewarming saves energy
Image of Gould's long-eared bat from http://www.wiresnr.org/Microbats.htmlImage by: Lib Ruytenberg I came across a neat study published recently in the American Journal of Physiology - Regulatory, Integrative and Comparative Physiology which examined how bats arouse from hibernation, a period…
Bats and fungus
The caves in the Dordogne department in southwest France are most famous for paleolithic cave paintings at Lascaux (the Dordogne is also famous for the being the home of microdot, whose blog The Brain Police is one of my daily reads). Now it has yet another claim to fame: the discovery of the first…
Effects of environmental temperature on fruit flies
Image by Botaurus - Wikimedia commons A changing climate has the potential to greatly impact ectotherms, which depend on the environment to regulate their own body temperatures. In a new study published in the American Journal of Physiology- Regulatory, Integrative and Comparative Physiology,…
The ultimate desalination plant: the eel esophagus
I love fish. The diversity of these aquatic creatures is so vast, I find them fascinating. Take the eel for example: Image of a Japanese eel (Anguilla japonica) by opencage, CC BY-SA 2.5, https://commons.wikimedia.org/w/index.php?curid=14520151 In a study published this month in the American…