Related Experiment Video
Updated: Aug 5, 2026
06:50
Sandwich-like Microenvironments to Harness Cell/Material Interactions
Published on: August 4, 2015
Cell-type Plasticity Supports Behavioral Adaptations at the Water-to-Land Interface
Andrew Mm Matheson1, Jamie Woych1, Therese G Zinga1
1Department of Biological Sciences, Columbia University, New York, New York, USA.
Biorxiv : the Preprint Server for Biology
|August 1, 2026
Summary
Newts adapt their nervous system and behavior when moving between water and land. This study reveals how cellular plasticity in newts supports these environmental adaptations.
Area of Science:
- Neurobiology
- Evolutionary Biology
- Amphibian Physiology
Background:
- Most species are confined to either aquatic or terrestrial environments.
- Vertebrates face distinct physiological and sensory challenges in water versus on land.
- Newts uniquely inhabit both environments, exhibiting phenotypic plasticity in morphology.
Purpose of the Study:
- Establish the Iberian ribbed newt (Pleurodeles waltl) as a model for studying neurobiology of environmental plasticity.
- Investigate behavioral and neural adaptations of newts transitioning between aquatic and terrestrial habitats.
- Explore cellular mechanisms underlying nervous system plasticity in response to environmental change.
Main Methods:
- Experimental manipulation of newt environments (aquatic vs. terrestrial).
- Observation and analysis of morphological changes.
- Assessment of sensory and motor behaviors, including gait and odor response.
- Transcriptomic analysis of the olfactory system and neurogenesis quantification.
Main Results:
- Environmental transitions induced morphological changes mirroring wild observations.
- Newts showed plasticity in walking gait and odor responsiveness between environments.
- The olfactory system underwent significant remodeling, with reversible transcriptomic changes and increased neurogenesis upon land transition.
Conclusions:
- Nervous system plasticity, particularly in specific cell types, facilitates behavioral adaptation to diverse environments.
- Newts serve as a valuable model for understanding vertebrate nervous system evolution and adaptation to aquatic and terrestrial life.
- This research highlights convergent adaptations in nervous systems shaped by environmental pressures.
More Related Videos
Related Concept Videos
01:01Neuroplasticity
Neuroplasticity reflects the brain's remarkable capacity to adapt and evolve, responding dynamically to learning, experiences, or injury by reorganizing its neural circuitry. This reorganization involves creating new neural connections and refining old ones through a series of biological processes that contribute to the brain's lifelong development and adaptability.
01:33Whole Body Regeneration
Regeneration is the process of restoring injured or lost tissues, organs, or body parts. While simpler organisms generally show greater ability to regenerate their whole body, few complex animals show similarly exceptional regeneration. For example, planarian flatworms have a unique regenerative potential making them a popular study organism among biologists to understand the mechanisms of whole body regeneration. Other organisms, such as hydra, also show extreme regeneration potential; even...
01:57Adaptations that Reduce Water Loss
Though evaporation from plant leaves drives transpiration, it also results in loss of water. Because water is critical for photosynthetic reactions and other cellular processes, evolutionary pressures on plants in different environments have driven the acquisition of adaptations that reduce water loss.
00:59Tonicity in Animals
The tonicity of a solution determines if a cell gains or loses water in that solution. The tonicity depends on the permeability of the cell membrane for different solutes and the concentration of nonpenetrating solutes in the solution within and outside of the cell. If a semipermeable membrane hinders the passage of some solutes but allows water to follow its concentration gradient, water moves from the side with low osmolarity (i.e., less solute) to the side with higher osmolarity (i.e.,...
02:22The Colonization of Land
Changes in the environment of the early Earth drove the evolution of organisms. As prokaryotic organisms in the oceans began to photosynthesize, they produced oxygen. Eventually, oxygen saturated the oceans and entered the air, resulting in an increase in atmospheric oxygen concentration, known as the oxygen revolution approximately 2.3 billion years ago. Therefore, organisms that could use oxygen for cellular respiration had an advantage. More than 1.5 years ago, eukaryotic cells and...
01:06Fixed Action Patterns
A fixed action pattern (FAP) is a specific, hard-wired sequence of behaviors that occurs in response to an external stimulus, called a sign stimulus. The behavior is “fixed” because it is essentially unchangeable—proceeding similarly across individuals of a species every time it occurs.