We have started a collaboration with Benedikt Hallgrimsson and his colleagues at University of Calgary, Marta Vidal-Garcia and Avrille Aiello.

They are scanning one year old Arctic charr that Sarah Steele raised in her plasticity experiment. That study focused on comparing morphological differences and plastic responses between derived and ancestral populations of charr, to understand differences in growth, allometric changes in shape and inheritance of these traits.

The pilot project with the Hallgrimsson lab focuses on comparing three morphs, the anadromous charr from Fljota (putative ancestral morph) and two derived morphs from Lake Thingvallavatn, the Large Benthic and Planktivorous charr. They were all raised on the same diet, and are similar in size. First scans from Avrille and Marta, of an LB individual, are shown below.

The top figure is lateral view (with an angle slightly from the front) and the lower figure is a view from the top of the head (first vertebrae can be seen on the right).

The fishes were about 1 year old when killed and frozen. Fixed in 10% NPF for 10 days, prior to CT scanning.

In this phase of the project we will scan 20 fishes per morph, and characterize the diversity in shape of the feeding related bones, snout area and the cranium.

And hopefully be able to scan the other treatment, wild fishes and progeny from crosses in the future if funding becomes available.