Meeting Abstract
How do traits vary across the tree of life? Our ability to address this question is diminished when species go extinct. In the era of mass extinctions, it is imperative to accelerate data-rescue efforts before poorly understood species are lost. However, traditional specimen preservation does not permit researchers to consistently retrieve neuroanatomical data at high resolution. We experimentally developed a protocol using novel field-based procedures for brain preservation while collecting chameleons in Africa. We found that brain tissues preserved under remote field conditions were comparable to laboratory prepared tissues. Further, immunostaining for small neurotransmitter and neuropeptide biomarkers were similar between our comparisons. Concordantly, our field-preservation approach was tractable with diffusible iodine-based contrast-enhanced computed tomography (diceCT), allowing for the documentation of soft-tissue structures. We integrated our field-based protocol into a pipeline that aims to examine the cranial diversity of chameleons. This pipeline involves CT-scanning field-collected specimens to reconstruct high-density tissues. The same specimens are next stained with Lugol’s iodine (I2KI) and re-scanned to visualize soft-tissue structures. Finally, tissues are then de-stained and used for histological preparations to examine cytoarchitectural features. Our results set up the potential for comprehensive, comparative approaches to elucidating the cranial diversity of poorly known and often inaccessible species across micro- to macroscopic scales of analysis.
