Meeting Abstract
It has been hypothesized that below an optimal temperature, a 10 ° C increase in temperature induces a twofold increase in the rate of muscular contraction. This doubling of physiological rate can translate into a doubling of performance of functional systems driven by physiological rate processes. However, previous research revealed that feeding kinematics in fishes has no or little response to temperature. We investigated the effects of temperature on feeding kinematics in teleost fishes to elucidate the sources of variation in organismal response to temperature change. Two sets of experiments were conducted. In one, we compared the thermal sensitivity (Q10) of kinematic velocities among different sizes of an invasive teleost. In the other, we compared the thermal sensitivity of kinematic velocities between the northern and the southern populations of an invasive fish. In addition, we compared the thermal sensitivity of the expansive and compressive phases of the feeding repertoire in these invasive fishes. Results revealed that thermal response of kinematic velocities are confounded by (1) body size or life-history stage of fish, (2) geographic location of fish, and (3) phases of the feeding event. It is conceivable that teleost fishes have the ability to mitigate the consequential effect of temperature change on muscle shortening velocity, thus, are able to perform equally well under fluctuating environmental conditions.
