Oxidative Stress and Hormesis in Evolutionary Ecology and Physiology

Chapter 1: Historical and Contemporary Issues of Oxidative Stress, Hormesis and Life History Evolution

1.1 The Great Oxidation Event: From a Reducing to an Oxidising World

1.2 Reactive Species, Antioxidants and Oxidative Stress

1.2.1 On the Nature of Free Radicals and of Other Reactive Species

1.2.2 Antioxidant Mechanisms

1.2.3 Oxidative Stress

1.2.4 Biochemical Integration and Modularity of Redox Systems

1.3 Hormesis

1.3.1 Historical Scenario: on the Birth, Death and Resurgence of Hormesis

1.3.2 Types of Hormesis

1.3.3 Quantitative Features of Hormesis and Problems with its Detection

1.3.4 Hormesis and Evolutionary Fitness

1.4 Life History Evolution

References

Chapter 2: Early Life Hormesis and Oxidative Experiences Fine-Tune the Adult Phenotype

2.1 Early Environment and Phenotypic Development

2.2 Pre-Natal Maternal Effects: How Mothers Use Hormones to Shape their Offspring

2.2.1 Organisational Effects of Androgens: Examples from Birds

2.2.2 Stress Hormones and the Developmental Programming Hypothesis

2.3 Epigenetic and Transgenerational Hormetic Effects

2.4 Post-Natal Hormetic Priming of Organism to Withstand Stress Later in Life

2.4.1 Plants

2.4.2 Invertebrates

2.4.3 Birds

2.4.4 Mammals

2.5 The Compensatory Growth Paradigm

2.6 Conclusions

References

Chapter 3: Variation in Oxidative Stress Threats and Hormesis Across Environments

3.1 The Struggle of Living in Oxidising Environments

3.2 Coping with Thermal Challenges

3.2.1 Thermal Relations of Organisms with their Environments

3.2.2 The Good and the Bad of Cold and Heat Stress

3.2.3 Thermal Stress and Body Colourations

3.3 Solar Radiation: the Threat Comes from Above

3.4 Partial Pressure of Oxygen

3.4.1 Coping with Drastic Changes in Oxygen Concentration

3.4.2 The Curious Case of Symbiotic Species

3.5 Partial Pressure of Carbon Dioxide

3.6 Coping with Multiple Environmental Stressors

3.7 Environmentally Induced Variation in Redox State Regulation Within and Among Species

3.7.1 Invertebrates

3.7.2 Fish

3.7.3 Birds

3.8 Conclusions

References

Chapter 4: Nutritional Ecology, Foraging Strategies and Food Selection

4.1 The Pervasive Nature of Food in Life

4.2 The Oxidative Costs of Foraging

4.3 Food Selection: Looking for Antioxidant Rewards

4.4 Effects of Diet on Oxidant and Antioxidant Status

4.4.1 Food Quality

4.4.2 Food Restriction

4.5 Antioxidants and Nutrients as Maternal Programming Tools of Offspring Oxidative Balance

4.5.1 Dietary Antioxidants

4.5.2 Nutrients

4.6 On Nutrients, Toxins, Nutritional Hormesis, Essentiality and the Bertrand's Rule

4.7 Conclusions

References

Chapter 5: Coping with Physical Activity and Inactivity

5.1 Redox Biology of Physical Activity

5.2 Physical Effort, Oxidative Stress and Hormesis

5.3 Costs of Migration and Strategies to Mitigate Them

5.3.1 Long-Distance Migrations

5.3.2 Vertical Migration

5.4 Quarrelsome Families: Competition Among Siblings

5.5 Oxidative Stress Risks Through the Transitions From Dormancy to Arousal and Back

5.6 Conclusions

References

Chapter 6: The Costs of Makeup in Sexual Selection and Social Signalling

6.1 Visual Sexual Signalling in Males

6.1.1 Carotenoid-Dependent Secondary Sexual Traits

6.1.2 Melanin-Dependent Secondary Sexual Traits

6.1.3 Testosterone and Ornaments

6.1.4 Achromatic Morphological Sexual Signals

6.2 Visual Sexual Signalling in Females

6.2.1 Body Colourations

6.2.2 Egg Pigmentation and the Extended Phenotype

6.3 Beyond Sex: Signalling in Social Contexts

6.3.1 Signalling in Females

6.3.2 Signalling in Young

6.4 Warning Signals

6.5 Conclusions

References

Chapter 7: The Role of Oxidative Stress and Hormesis in Shaping Reproductive Strategies from Mating Systems to Parental Care

7.1 Reproduction is a Time of Tradeoffs

7.2 Mating Systems, Reproductive Tactics and Social Stress

7.2.1 Courtship Displays

7.2.2 The Waiting Male and The Fighting Female

7.2.3 Cooperative Breeding

7.2.4 Hierarchical Societies

7.2.5 Two Sexes, but Many Morphs

7.2.6 Polyandry and Sperm Competition

7.2.7 Socially Monogamous, but Genetically Polygamous

7.3 Male Fertility

7.4 Egg Production

7.5 Colostrum and Milk Production

7.6 Offspring Rearing Effort

7.7 Hormesis and Reproduction

7.8 Conclusions

References

Chapter 8: Combating Parasites: Immune Response and Inflammation

8.1 Ecoimmunology and the Arms Race

8.2 Oxidative Stress and Immune Response

8.2.1 Immune Cells as Generators of Reactive Species

8.2.2 Immune Response and Oxidative Stress In Vivo

8.2.3 Inflammation from the Parasite's Viewpoint

8.3 Environmental Stress, Viruses Outbreaks and Oxidative Stress

8.4 Hormesis and Immunology

8.5 Glucocorticoids and Inflammation

References

Chapter 9: Variation Within and Among Species in Resistance to Oxidative Stress and Hormetic Responses

9.1 The Essence of Biology: Variation

9.2 Early Life Experiences

9.3 Styles of Coping with Stressful Situations

9.4 Population Differentiation in Oxidative Stress Physiology

9.5 Oxidative Profiles in Specific Ecological Circumstances

9.5.1 Predation Risk

9.5.2 Habitat Quality

9.5.3 Daily and Seasonal Variation

9.6 Environmental, Maternal and Genetic Contributions to Oxidative Balance

9.7 Among Species Variation in Oxidative Damage and Antioxidant Defences

9.8 Among Species Variation in Hormetic Responses

9.9 Is Hormesis a Target of Natural Selection?

9.10 Conclusions

References

Chapter 10: Integrating Oxidative Stress and Hormesis into Research on Senescence and Survival Perspectives

10.1 The Secret Nature of Longevity

10.2 Mechanistic Hypotheses of Ageing

10.2.1 From the Rate of Living to the Oxidative Stress Hypothesis of Ageing

10.2.2 The Homeoviscous-Longevity Adaptation and the Membrane-Pacemaker Hypotheses of Ageing

10.2.3 The Uncoupling to Survive Hypothesis of Ageing

10.2.4 The Cell Senescence-Telomere Hypothesis of Ageing

10.2.5 The Redox Stress Hypothesis of Ageing

10.3 Evolutionary Hypotheses of Ageing: Antagonistic Pleiotropy and Disposable Soma

10.4 Antioxidant Mechanisms and Longevity in a Comparative Framework

10.4.1 Correlative Evidence

10.4.2 In Vitro Evidence

10.5 Does Oxidative Stress Level Predict Survival in Wild Animals?

10.6 Hormesis Promotes Longevity

10.7 Sex Differences in Lifespan, Ageing and Hormesis

10.8 Univariate and Multivariate Systems in the Study of Ageing

10.9 Conclusions

Index