Environmental toxicology and physiology of fishes. Several fish populations, including those that are commercially important or at risk, exist in environments contaminated with chemicals such as pesticides and pharmaceutical drugs. My lab aims to determine how realistic contaminant exposures (i.e. to low concentrations of complex mixtures) affect animal fitness. A specific goal is to understand how alterations at lower levels of organization (e.g. protein) affect higher levels of organization (e.g. organismal). As an example, one of the current projects is exploring the interaction between detoxification enzyme induction and behavioural responses in a model fish species (zebrafish) exposed to mixtures of herbicides found in Canadian fish-bearing waterways. Much of our work is being conducted in collaborations with Fisheries and Oceans Canada (DFO) and Environment Canada (EC).
