Lizard lungs!

You probably haven't heard me go on and on about how awesome Colleen Farmer's seminar at UMass was so you will hopefuly bear with me that here I am posting links to the coolest little write-ups she and her lab are getting in Science News, Phys.org and Science Daily etc...!  I thought that even though they are not bats you might be interested in this finding of how air flows in the lungs of monitor lizards its a slick study with exciting findings.  Colleen Farmer is an Evolutionary Physiologist who has primarily worked with crocodilians and other 'herps*' but she is very integrative so it is difficult to put her research in a nicely labeled box.  The first author Emma is a postdoc working in Dr. Farmer's lab and has a really cool website.

 

*Herp: in the biological world refers to reptiles and amphibians and comes from the from Greek root aherpet-, meaning "creeping". Along these lines one could be a Herpatologist (study amphibians and reptiles) or go 'herping' i.e.. look for amphibians and/or reptiles.

 

The citation of this new paper is below but the doi doesn't work yet so expect more soon!:

Emma R. Schachner, Robert L. Cieri, James P. Butler & C. G. Farmer. Unidirectional pulmonary airflow patterns in the savannah monitor lizard. Nature, 2013 DOI: 10.1038/nature12871

Write ups:
http://beforeitsnews.com/science-and-technology/2013/12/unidirectional-airflow-in-the-lungs-of-birds-crocsand-now-monitor-lizards-2658958.html

http://phys.org/news/2013-12-mystery-lizard-one-way-airflow-million.html

https://www.sciencenews.org/article/lizard-breath-has-surprising-birdlike-flow



Ok for no particular reason this song seems to 'fit' this cool finding (beat not lyrics)!  I mean it has to be something with a big presence so here you go.