How do physiological processes affect animal thermal biology and global ecosystems?

Richard Hill

Associate Chairperson and Professor, Zoology

My current research is in two areas that seem entirely disparate but in fact are united by a common emphasis on study of mechanism in relation to ecology. Marine sulfur metabolism is one of my areas of specialization. I have focused on the metabolic fate in ecosystems of an important compound, dimethylsulfoniopropionate (DMSP), that is synthesized by many marine algae. Metabolism of DMSP can give rise to atmospheric dimethylsulfide, a gas that affects cloud formation and climate over the oceans. DMSP metabolism is also a potentially important factor in the tastes of food organisms that receive DMSP via food-chain processes. Recently, I have given special attention to DMSP in animals such as reef corals that contain algal symbionts.

Hill, R.W. and G.A. Wyse. 1989. Animal Physiology. 2nd edition. Harper & Row, New York 656 pp.

Hill, R.W. 1992. The altricial/precocial contrast in the thermal relations and energetics of small mammals. In Mammalian Energetics: Interdisciplinary Views of Metabolism and Reproduction, T. Tomasi and T. Horton (eds.), pp. 122-159. Cornell University Press, Ithaca, NY.

Hill, R.W., P.E. Lederle and D.L. Beaver. 1993. Effects of captivity on peak rates of oxygen consumption of winter-caught deer mice and black-capped chickadees. In Life in the Cold: Ecological, Physiological, and Molecular Mechanisms, C. Carey et al. (eds.), pp. 131-139. Westview Press, Boulder, CO.

Hill, R.W., J.W. H. Dacey and D.A. Krupp. 1995. Dimethylsulfoniopropionate in reef corals. Bull. Mar. Sci. 57:489-494.

Hill, R.W., B.A. White, M.T. Cottrell and J.W.H. Dacey. 1998. Virus-mediated total release of dimethylsulfoniopropionate from marine phytoplankton: A potential climate process. Aquat. Microb. Ecol. 14:1-6.