An arrangement or design consisting of columns of short parallel lines, with all lines from one column slopping in an opposite direction from the next column.

At a right angle, perpendicular

Re is an abbreviation for Reynolds number.

Ridge like structures used to disrupt laminar flow patterns

Fluid flow that is subject to chaotic changes in velocity and pressure. The opposite of laminar flow.

Natural and artificial arrangements of physical features of an area.

The spreading out of a solute in a stream of fluid.

The process of fabricating a structure on a micrometer or smaller scale.

A device that uses small amounts of liquid on a microscopic scale

Steady viscous (thick) fluid flow driven by an effective pressure gradient established between the two ends of a long straight pipe of uniform circular cross-section

A microfabrication technique that uses photosensitive resin and ultraviolet light to create microscale features and devices.

Chemical analysis technique involving the separation of components in a mixture by passing it through a material in which the components move at different rates.

[Chromatography basics video] https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XfSopnqrHOs)

Pertaining to the flow of fluid caused by an applied voltage across a membrane, microchannel, or porous material.

Possessing a different property depending on the direction of the material.

Pertaining to a single direction.

Characterized by flow in which fluid moves smoothly along a path.

A ratio of the internal forces to the viscous forces in a fluid. A low Reynolds number indicates stronger viscous force and smoother (laminar) flow, whereas a high Reynolds number indicates greater internal forces and irregular (turbulent) flow.

the measurement of the total magnetic field which passes through a specified area

A therapy that uses low-voltage electrical current for pain relief, also known as TENS.

Nerve signals that occur when a neuron sends information away from the cell body. The action potential itself is a burst of electrical energy.

A circuit containing both an inductor (L) and capacitor (C) that oscillates by shifting the energy between the electric and magnetic fields.

An external magnetic field causing a large variation in the electrical impedance of the material.

signal or input that evokes a specific functional reaction in an organ or tissue.

Describes any large system of integrated circuits that mimic the nervous system.

A pain receptor that responds to damaging stimuli by sending the "threat" signals to the spinal cord and brain.

Inorganic nano-structured two-dimensional material.

A three-terminal active organic semiconductor device where the output current is controlled by an electric field generated by the input voltage. These are compact and have lower power consumption.

A device that exhibits a change in resistance when it is strained.

the standard unit of pressure or stress in the International System of Units (SI), equal to one newton per square meter.

connected with the sense of touch

having artificial body parts, especially electromechanical ones.

an artificial body part

A soft, highly stretchable plastic, which most plastic bottles are made of.

A pressure sensitive substance that can change shape in order to seal gaps in materials.

A polymeric material that has high piezoelectric coefficient, good stability and flexibility. This material is commonly used in soft actuators.

Polymers are materials made of long, repeating chains of subunits called monomers. Examples include plastics, proteins and DNA.

The ability to withstand rigorous testing and maintain its original condition.

A subset of the robotics field that primarily aims to mimic body motion of living organisms using soft materials.

A machine that causes motion or power (i.e. pushes, pulls, or rotates).

A classification of the animal kingdom that encompasses organisms that have an exoskeleton, a segmented body, and jointed appendages (i.e. insects, crustaceans, arachnids, centipedes).

The ability to move freely and easily

A variety of methods that animals use to move from one place to another.

Reverse transcription quantitative real-time fluorescence polymerase chain reaction, or qRT-PCR, is a widely used molecular technique to measure RNA levels.

RNA is first reverse transcribed into complimentary DNA. This complimentary DNA is then used as a template for a fluorescence-tagged amplification reaction to calculate the relative amount of a specific starting transcript.

The transcript levels are compared between genes of interest, which are all compared to a "housekeeping gene" or a transcript that has the same levels of expression across conditions. This comparison standardizes the levels of overall transcription across samples.

Thermo Fisher provides an extensive introduction to gene expression measuring technologies here: https://www.thermofisher.com/us/en/home/life-science/pcr/real-time-pcr/real-time-pcr-learning-center/gene-expression-analysis-real-time-pcr-information/introduction-gene-expression.html

The periventricular nucleus is a thin sheet of neurons located in the hypothalamus. For the purpose of this paper, PeVN can be defined as the part of the hypothalamus that is a major source of dopamine and somatostatin expression.

The paraventricular nucleus is a region of the hypothalamus, considered to be the body's most important autonomic control center. The neurons of the PaVN are involved in controlling stress, metabolism, growth, reproduction, immune, gastrointestinal, renal, and cardiovascular functions. For the purpose of this paper, PaVN can be defined as the part of the hypothalamus that is a major source of dopamine and somatostatin expression.

The polar cap is the region of each pole that is covered in ice.

Interannual events take place in different years.

Here, it refers to variations that occur from year to year.

Forcings refer to factors that drive changes in the climate.

Light absorption occurs when light transfers energy to an object.

Here, sunlight's energy is transferred to ozone in the form of heat.

High latitudes are approximately 60 degrees from the equator and higher. This includes the polar regions.

Dynamical variability refers to naturally occurring changes in the climate from year to year.

Halogen-induced changes become more apparent when naturally occurring changes are removed from the analysis.

The low latitudes are approximately between 0 degrees (equator) and 30 degrees.

Halocarbons are chemicals that contain bonds between carbon and halogen atoms.

Halogens are a group of elements that includes fluorine, chlorine, bromine, iodine, astatine, and tennessine.

Halocarbons are highly reactive in the Earth's atmosphere and lead to ozone depletion.

Anthropogenic means caused by human activity.

In this context, humans released chemicals into the atmosphere, and these chemicals produced the hole in the ozone layer.

Latitude is the coordinate that specifies the north-south location on the surface of the Earth and ranges from 0 degrees at the equator to 90 degrees at the North and South Poles.

Mid(or middle)-latitudes are approximately between 30 degrees and 60 degrees.

The integrated column is a way to quantify how much of a particular gas is found in the Earth's atmosphere.

For a vertical path, or column, that extends through the atmosphere, the number of gas molecules is measured at each point along the path. Then, the sum total is calculated for the entire path.

In this case, it is used to measure the amount of ozone in the atmosphere.

Ozone is a gaseous molecule composed of 3 oxygen atoms with the chemical formula O\(_{3}\).

Here, the authors are referring to the layer of ozone in the Earth's atmosphere that filters harmful ultraviolet radiation from the sun.

The altithermal, also known as the Holocene climatic optimum, was a warm period which occurred from around 9,000 to 5,000 years ago.

The mean radiating level is the average altitude at which radiation is emitted from Earth out to space.

In 1980, the United States experienced an intense heat wave that remains among the most destructive natural disasters in American history.

Paleoclimatology is the study of climate before direct measurements were taken. Analysis of samples from rock, ice, and trees can allow scientists to reconstruct climate patterns from hundreds to thousands of years ago.

Here, σ refers to standard deviation, a measure of the amount of variation in a dataset.

Smoothed datasets use approximations that combine points with their surrounding values in order to capture the largest patterns without small variations.

A posteriori means based on empirical evidence, rather than by theoretical deduction.

The correlation coefficient is a measure of how closely the variation in one quantity is related to the variation in another quantity. This value ranges from 0 to 1, with 0 indicating no correlation and 1 indicating perfect correlation.

A radiative forcing is a change in the energy flows in the atmosphere.

Solar insolation refers to the power per unit area received from the sun.

Mount Agung is an active volcano in Bali, Indonesia. Its eruption in 1963 sent debris 10 km into the air and killed over 1,000 people. The volcano experienced several smaller eruptions between 2017 and 2019.

Heterogeneous distributions are unevely spread out.

The stratosphere is the layer of the atmosphere above the troposphere. The stratosphere extends to around 50 km above sea level.

Optical thickness, or optical depth, is a measure of how much light can be transmitted through a material. The higher the optical thickness, the less light will make it through the substance.

The thermocline is the horizontal layer in a body of water where the change in temperature with depth is greater than the layers above or below. Most sunlight is absorbed by the ocean above the thermocline, and this is also where most of the turbulent mixing by waves occurs.

e-Folding time is the time interval in which a quantity increases by a factor of e, or about 2.72.

The Wisconsin ice age, also known as the Wisconsin glaciation, was a period of colder temperatures and glacier advance in North America. This glaciation occurred between 75,000 and 11,000 years ago.

The moist adiabatic lapse rate is the rate at which the temperature of a moist air parcel changes as it rises adiabatically (zero heat transfer).

Unlike the dry adiabatic lapse rate, the moist rate depends strongly on temperature. This is because cold air can hold less water than warm air, so as the parcel rises, water begins to condense and release heat to the air around it. This means that the moist rate is generally lower than the dry rate.

Absolute humidity is the ratio of the mass of water in a parcel of air to the volume of that parcel.

Relative humidity is the ratio of how much water is in the air to how much water the air can hold at the temperature of measurement.

The model sensitivity refers to how much the output changes for a given change in input. Here, we are interested in the amount of warming predicted for a doubling in carbon dioxide concentration.

Mie scattering theory is a model of light scattering that assumes that the particles scattering the light are spherical. This theory applies best when the particles have similar diameter to the wavelength of the incident light. Scattering in the lower 4,500 m of the atmosphere is well described by these equations.

The absorption coefficient of a substance is how efficiently it absorbs radiation at a given frequency.

The radiative transfer equation mathematically describes how a beam of radiation responds to absorption, emission, and scattering processes.

The divergence of a flux is a measure of how much some process flows in or out through a surface. If something is a source of the flow, its divergence will be positive, and if it is a sink, its divergence will be negative.

Heat capacity is the energy it takes to raise the temperature of a substance by a given amount (e.g., 1 degree). It usually has units of joules per mole per kelvin.

Convective stability is the ability of a mass of air to resist vertical motion (convection). When an atmosphere is unstable, air masses have larger vertical movements. In the extreme, this can create turbulence and sometimes severe weather.

Latent heat is heat transfer that is not accompanied by a change in temperature. This occurs when water condenses (releasing heat) or evaporates (absorbing heat).

This is the mechanism by which sweat cools our bodies, even though the temperature of the water remains the same before and immediately after evaporation.

An adiabatic process is one that occurs with no heat transfer between a system and its surroundings.

As an air mass rises or falls adiabatically, its temperature changes with altitude due to the change in pressure. The rate of this change for a dry air mass is the dry adiabatic lapse rate.

The troposphere is the lowest layer of Earth's atmosphere, extending from the surface to 13 km above ground on average. This layer contains most of the mass of the atmosphere and is where most weather phenomena take place.

The lapse rate is the rate at which temperature changes with altitude in the atmosphere.

Radiant flux refers to light emitted through a surface and has units of watts per square meter. A spherical object emitting radiation will have a radiant flux that gets smaller as one gets further from the source's center.

The Stefan-Boltzmann constant is a number used in the Stefan-Boltzmann law. This equation relates an object's temperature to the wavelengths of light it emits.

The constant's value is about 5.67 W / (m^2 K^4).

Albedo is the proportion of incoming light that is reflected back into space. This reflected light is in the visible and ultraviolet range, rather than the light emitted by Earth itself which is in the infrared.

Clouds and snow are responsible for much of the planet's albedo.

The greenhouse effect is the warming of Earth's surface due to the behavior of certain atmospheric gases, called greenhouse gases.

Greenhouse gases absorb and emit the same wavelengths of light (infrared) that are emitted by the planet's surface. This slows down the loss of heat energy to space.

An order of magnitude generally refers to a factor of ten. If two results disagree by an order magnitude or more, they are quite different from each other.

Radiative perturbations are changes to the balance of light energy exchanged between Earth and space.

The atmospheric window refers to the range of wavelengths of light that are emitted from Earth to space with little absorption by atmospheric gases.

Radiation in this range allows the Earth to get rid of excess heat energy from the Sun and maintain a constant temperature.

Anthropogenic pollutants are harmful substances released into the environment from human activities.

Carbon dioxide is one such pollutant, and is released from the burning of fossil fuels, such as coal and gasoline.

If a gas has a concentration in a mixture of one part per million (ppm), there is one particle of that gas for every million particles in the mixture.

The Northwest Passage is the sea route that connects the Atlantic and Pacific Oceans along the northern coast of North America.

Early European explorers believed the Northwest Passage could allow easy access to Asia, but the waters were too shallow and icy to be navigable.

The noise level in a dataset refers to the amount of natural variation that is present.

Solar luminosity is a measure of how much energy the Sun emits as light every second.

Aerosols are small particles of solid and liquid that are suspended in air.

When volcanoes erupt, they release a large quantity of aerosols. These aerosols can reflect sunlight back into space, cooling the ground below.

RNA transcripts have two major components - exons and introns. Exons stay in the transcript that gets made into a protein, whereas introns are cut out, and this is known as splicing.

Intron retention refers to a transcription event where an intron is kept in the RNA instead of being removed. This process can allow for more diversity of transcripts from the same gene.

You can visualize the splicing process here: https://www.biointeractive.org/classroom-resources/rna-splicing

Lentivirus is a type of virus that contains reverse transcriptase - a molecule that transcribes RNA into DNA to integrate into the genome and infect host cells.

Lentivirus can be used to deliver desired DNA into cells. This lentiviral transduction allows for gene expression of desired sequences in organisms of interest.

You can watch more about cloning to make the DNA for transduction here: https://www.biointeractive.org/classroom-resources/dna-cloning-plasmids, and you visualize the workflow of lentiviral transduction here: https://www.mirusbio.com/applications/high-titer-virus-production/lentivirus-production#figure1303

RNAi describes the process in which small RNA molecules target and degrade RNA molecules to block protein expression.

shRNAs are one type of RNA that is used for RNAi.

This tutorial provides further exploration of RNAi: https://www.biointeractive.org/classroom-resources/rna-interference

The creation of an RNA molecule from DNA.

The RNA that is transcribed from DNA is commonly referred to as a "transcript".

Canonically, this RNA is later translated to make protein, as described by gene "expression".

You can visualize and learn more about transcription here: https://www.biointeractive.org/classroom-resources/dna-transcription-advanced-detail

Histones are a family of proteins that help organize and compact DNA in the eukaryotic genome. DNA wraps around histones to fit inside the nucleus, like yarn around a spool.

Here is an illustration of this organization: https://www.genome.gov/sites/default/files/tg/en/illustration/histones.jpg and a video that walks through DNA compaction: https://www.biointeractive.org/classroom-resources/how-dna-packaged

The histone proteins have exposed "tails" of peptides that can be modified with additional chemical groups, such as methyl or acetyl molecules. These molecules can alter how the histone interacts with its associated DNA.

These chemical modifications can be added or removed by specific proteins, such as KDM6B, which removes histone subunit 3 lysine residue 27 methylations.

You can learn more about histone modifications here: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OqRt723t33o

Meiotic is the adjective for meiosis, which is the cell division that gives rise to sex cells.

You can learn more about meiosis here: https://www.biointeractive.org/classroom-resources/meiosis

RNA sequencing (RNA-seq) is a high performance technique that measures which and how many transcript sequences are present in a given biological sample.

You can learn more about the technique and its analysis here: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tlf6wYJrwKY

Chromatin immunoprecipitation, or ChIP, identifies the DNA regions were a protein binds across the genome.

First, an antibody recognizes and binds a protein of interest in the nucleus. Then the antibody holding onto the protein is isolated and any DNA bound the protein is captured for analyses.

This article describes ChIP and it's application, with some example data analysis, here: https://www.sigmaaldrich.com/US/en/technical-documents/technical-article/genomics/gene-expression-and-silencing/chromatin-immunoprecipitation-chip

A common technique to visualize nucleotide (DNA or RNA) in cells.

A chemical or radioactive label is added to a nucleotide sequence that is complimentary to the sequence of interest. When added to the cells, this complimentary nucleotide sequence will bind to and tag the sequence of interest, allowing scientists to visualize the DNA or RNA of interest within the cell.

You can read more about in situ hybridization methods here: https://www.nature.com/scitable/topicpage/fluorescence-in-situ-hybridization-fish-327/

Quantitative polymerase chain reaction (qPCR) measures RNA or DNA levels for comparison among samples.

This technique is very similar to qRT-PCR (described in above annotations), but does not always require reverse transcription.

The authors are hoping to reveal the molecular biology underlying Kdm6b-depletion sex reversal. They will test for the genes that KDM6B can directly bind and activate expression for in developing T.scripta gonads.

Ectopic describes events occurring in locations that do not naturally have such events.

For example, expression of a brain-specific gene in a toenail would be considered ectopic gene expression.

Here ectopic describes the presence of aromatase in Kdm6b-depleted gonads at MPT, which produces female sex hormones.

A mutation is a change to the structure or sequence of a gene compared to a reference.

Loss of function mutations cause a gene not to make functional amounts or forms of its protein.

Here, the shRNA is blocking Kdm6b expression, meaning that there is not enough KDM6B to function normally in the Kdm6b-RNAi embryos.

A master regulator often refers to a protein that initiates the cascade of expression for all genes involved in a specific pathway, such as cell fate and development pathways.

Germ cells are an organism's reproductive cells, or the cells that go on to make gametes, like sperm and eggs.

Every organism is comprised of somatic cells and germ cells.

Seminiferous cords are one of the earliest male-specific tissues formed as the gonad develops. These cords ultimately develop into tubules which hold sperm.

Expression refers to the active process of making a protein from a gene.

Epigenetic describes heritable changes in gene expression, or transcription, that do not alter an organism's DNA sequence.

The region of DNA that is required for transcription initiation.

Gonad refers the organ that produces an organism's reproductive cells.

The gonad is the testis in males and is the ovary in females.

A phenotype describes the physical properties of an organism that can be observed.

A genotype defines the genetic composition of an organism, including chromosomes and DNA sequences.

Together, phenotypic plasticity is the ability of one genotype to produce multiple different phenotypes in an organism.

Now that authors have seen that Kdm6b regulates Dmrt1 activation, they are interested in how the molecules interact in the male sex development pathway.

The opposite of knock-down or RNAi, overexpression describes a technique were an RNA transcript for a particular gene is increased above it's normal biological level.

Public health interventions are everyday actions that the public can take to stop the spread of an infectious disease. As indicated by the word in the parentheses, taking medication or vaccination is not considered a public health intervention.

Using bacteria to leach metals from electronics.

Electronic waste: discarded or no longer used electronic devices.

http://web.ceu.hu/medstud/manual/MMM/glossary.html

Present from birth

Cause of a disease

Specialized cells in the outermost regions of the brain that give rise to most of the cells in the central nervous system

Limited cell growth and division

placebo

The dopamine receptor antagonist sulpiride functions by binding to the D2 dopamine receptor to block dopamine from binding.

SCH23390 functions by binding to the D1 dopamine receptor to block dopamine from binding.

a neurotoxic synthetic organic compound used by researchers to selectively destroy the brain's dopaminergic as well as noradrenergic neurons. In this paper, it was used to ablate dopaminergic neurons, so as to stop dopamine synthesis.

a control treatment that is similar to the experimental treatment, but omits the key therapeutic element being tested.

this technique enables measurement of gene expression in single cells by detecting and counting individual RNA molecules.

places along the length of an axon, other than the axon terminal, that join with other neurons.

In a review article on reserve pool neuron transmitter respecification, Dulcis et al. provide a helpful analogy for understanding reserve pools. In this analogy, the role of reserve pools is compared to having two jobs, and following certain physiological stimuli, one of those jobs is relinquished. Dulcis et al. defines reserve pool neurons as "cells that share inputs and outputs with adjacent core pools of neurons but express different neurotransmitters." In one situation, the neurons from both pools could be expressing the same transmitters, but the core neurons also express a secondary transmitter; following the change in circuit activity, the neurons of the reserve pool will stop expressing the transmitter that it has in common with the core pool of neurons. In an alternative scenario, these two pools of neurons could be expressing different neurotransmitters, and the change in circuit activity results in the neurons of the reserve pool acquiring the expression of the transmitter that is already expressed by the core neurons (23).

active during the day; opposite of nocturnal.

BrdU is an analog of the nucleoside thymidine, and would be incorporated into newly synthesized DNA. Since the fundamental requirement for cell proliferation is DNA synthesis, quantifying the incorporation of BrdU following application of anti-BrdU antibodies will therefore enable measurements of cell proliferation.

The A13 group or A13 dopaminergic cell group consists of dopaminergic neurons residing in a region of the brain called the subthalamic nucleus.

our body's "internal clock" that regulates the sleep–wake cycle and repeats every 24 hours.

VMAT2 is the CNS vesicular transporter that packages monoamines, such as dopamine, from the cytosol into synaptic vesicles for their release from the neuron.

anxious

Neuroplastic changes refers to the adjustments that neurons make in response to changes in their environment.

Neurons that produce the neurotransmitter dopamine. For mammals, this is the main source of dopamine in the CNS.

Metaphorically, nestedness can be compared to a Russian doll, where the diet of specialist species (smaller dolls) fits within the diet of the more generalist species (larger dolls).

A recording of a bird's native calls is played to lure the species into an area.

A weighted network assigns some form of quantitative value to each connection between two partners (an example is shown below in figure 4). In this case, the value assigned was the frequency of interaction.

Non-living parts of an ecosystem, such as elevation or rainfall

The authors measured the overall dissimilarity between different locations by two factors:

species turnover when — two  locations do not share similar interaction patterns because they are inhabited by different species,

and linkage turnover — when species found in both locations develop different interactions specific to their site

A species' fundamental niche encompasses all of the possible roles it has in its environment, whereas the realized niches are the actual roles that a species plays in its environment, taking into account competition, predation, and other interactions with neighboring species.

The video below further explains this: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-6COob_bymw. 

A species that interacts with a wide number of species in ecological network. 

ability to establish new interactions with partner species present in the ecosystem

The replacement rate of 1 means that one case in a completely susceptible population can lead to one secondary case. Assuming that the initial case can be cured and reach full recovery — which is what all of us hope — a rate equal to 1 means that one is infected when another gets well, leading to an unchanged number of cases.

The Mann-Whitney U statistic can be seen as the cumulative result of comparing the randomly drawn values from two populations. z is the standardized value and is dependent on the sizes of the two populations. P is the probability for a null hypothesis to be true.

The Mann-Whitney U test is a test for a null hypothesis that it is equally possible for a value drawn from a population to be greater or smaller than another from a different population. This test is useful when the distributions of values are unspecified. In this study, one population comprises cities that took action earlier, and the other is for cities that responded later.

P is the probability that the null hypothesis is true. The null hypothesis, in this case, is that the total number of cases reported from each province shows no significant linear correlation with the total number of travelers from Wuhan.

r is the correlation coefficient for an association between two factors. It can take values between -1 and 1. A correlation coefficient equal to -1 indicates a perfectly inverse linear correlation, meaning that one variable decreases in its value in response to the increase of the other linearly. In contrast, an r equal to 1 indicates a perfect linear positive correlation. An r of zero signifies the nonexistence of an association.

A cordon sanitaire is a movement restriction of people into or out of a specific region. This measure is taken to stop the rapid spread of an infectious disease.

A pathogen is any tiny organism that causes disease.

The first number in the parentheses is the mean for the number of reported cases, and the range after the semicolon is the 95%CI.

Agents are the causes of diseases and injuries, but they are not the sole determinant for the occurrence of a disease. The other two factors are the host (the human who can get the disease) and the environment that brings the agents and the host together.

Modal refers to the mode, or most frequently occurring value in a distribution.

Here, modal describes the distribution of particle sizes.

Stratospheric overturning circulation refers to the atmospheric "conveyor belt" that moves air from the Earth's equator toward the poles.

This system carries chemicals and ozone throughout the Earth's atmosphere.

Read more here: https://news.mit.edu/2017/strength-global-stratospheric-circulation-measured-first-time-0828

Greenhouse gases are gases which trap heat in the atmosphere and are responsible for human-caused global warming.

The Montreal Protocol is an international agreement to phase out the use and production of substances that deplete the ozone layer. The agreement was finalized in 1987.

Read more here: https://www.epa.gov/ozone-layer-protection/international-actions-montreal-protocol-substances-deplete-ozone-layer

Inline refers to the insertion of a smaller computer program into a larger, main code.

The inline code performs a specific function.

Here, the inline code generates the aerosol properties needed for the ozone calculation.

Suborbital refers to a path that is less than one full revolution around a body.

Here, it refers to data that was not obtained by satellite.

Austral means southern. Here, it relates to the Southern Hemisphere of the Earth.

bioleaching is a term used.

The amino acid, histidine

Natural variant of cytochrome c protein from the natural variant Rhodothermus marinus.

The sequence of nucleotides that is translated into proteins

Elements that have the same number of electrons in the outermost shell (also known as valence shell) and have similar electronic properties. For example, carbon and silicon are isosteres as they both have four valence electrons.

The turnover number of an enzyme, is the number of substrate molecules converted into product by an enzyme molecule in a unit time when the enzyme is fully saturated with substrate.

IA method of engineering proteins towards a defined property. Process of directed evolution: Directed evolution mimics "real" evolution and is accelerated in the laboratory by focusing on individual genes expressed in fast‐growing microorganisms such as E. coli. Enzyme chosen (known as wild-type) must show at least a minimal desired reactivity. Mutations are randomly or site specifically introduced to the gene of the wild type protein. Then, the library of protein variants is screened for the ones with enhanced reactivity. The improved enzymes are used as parents for the next round of mutation and screening. Additional beneficial mutations are introduced if needed. This can continue for several cycles until a desired and new property of the enzyme is attained.

Carbene is a neutral reactive intermediate; a carbene insertion reaction is the insertion of a carbene into a chemical bond.

conditions that occur in the natural host organism in contrast to laboratory conditions

exhibiting a phenotype (a set of features/behaviors) that does not correspond to one's own genotype, but rather is environmentally induced.

A photoperiod is the daily duration that an organism receives light exposure, i.e., length of day.

Interneurons connect sensory neurons, the nerve cells that convert environmental stimuli into internal electrical impulses, and motor neurons, which transmit signals from the brain to control muscle movements. Therefore, interneurons act as a "middle-man", passing signals from sensory neurons to motor neurons.

Commonly called the "feel-good" chemical because of its role in the brain's reward system, dopamine is a neurotransmitter associated with feelings of pleasure, learning, memory, and motor system functions.

Also known as growth hormone-inhibiting hormone, somatostatin is a peptide hormone that primarily functions to prevent the unnatural rapid proliferation of cells, the hallmark of tumors. Somatostatin also plays a role in the gastrointestinal system.

Neurotransmitters are signaling molecules used by the nervous system to transmit messages between neurons.

Local scales (specific sites) and regional scales (entire regions, like an island or an archipelago)

process of assisting the recovery of an ecosystem that has been degraded, damaged or destroyed