Environmental Physiology • Cardiovascular Physiology
Katja Anttila
Professor
Group Leader
University of Turku, Department of Biology
PhD - University of Oulu 2009
MSc - University of Oulu 2004
contact: katant"at"utu.fi
Post-docs
Anna Papadopoulou
Postdoctoral student
As member of the Anttila’s lab, Anna is interested in studying the beneficial effects of functional foods on the cardiovascular and immune system of rainbow trout, the most farmed species in the Baltic region, under climate change conditions. Additionally, she wants to test a combination of nutritional supplement with a selective exercise-training program on rainbow trout fry experimentally infected with pathogens. For this research program, the lab team works closely with partners as a Finnish Fish Feed Company, Fisheries Research and Aquaculture Institute, and Åbo Akademi University.
contact: annpap"at"utu.fi
Giovanna Mottola
Visiting Post-Doc
Giovanna comes from Italy where she graduated in Ecotoxicology at the University of Siena. Her research is focused on phenotypic plasticity at physiological and biochemical level in fish. Specifically, she investigates how thermal stress and presence of trace metals affect the thermal tolerance of three-spined sticklebacks and how this response can be transferred to next generations. She also studies cardiocirculatory capacity and heat-shock proteins expression pattern on migrating fish.
contact: giomot“at”utu.fi
https://www.researchgate.net/profile/Giovanna_Mottola2
PhD students
Tytti Uurasmaa
PhD researcher
Co advised by Ilkka Heinonen & Anu Autio
Tytti did her Master's degree programme in University of Turku in animal physiology and genetics. She is currently working on her PhD thesis that is about the effects of exercise on heart function and tumor growth in mice with breast cancer. More specifically she is interested in the underlying alterations in heart and tumor metabolism, vasculature, blood flow and the possible related changes in oxidative stress. One of the main aims of her thesis is to investigate whether exercise can prevent the possible negative effects of breast cancer or chemotherapy on heart function, and wheher exercise can also enhance the effect of chemotherapy on tumor growth.
email: tmeuur(at)utu.fi
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Nina Cossin-Sevrin
PhD researcher
Principal supervisor Suvi Ruuskanen
Nina graduated her MSc degree in the University of Strasbourg (France) in Ecophysiology, Ecology and Ethology. The purposes of her PhD research project are to establish the sources of variation observed in mitochondrial traits between individuals, but also to investigate how this variation could affect growth and survival in avian species. For answering these questions, she studies 2 distinct wild species with their own ecology and environment: Great tit and King penguin. Nina tests different factors, such as the non-genetic inheritance (e.g., maternal effects), the relative contribution of genetic vs. environmental factors in the variation of mitochondrial function, the environmental differences experienced by the offspring among the breeding season (e.g., brood size, early vs. late chicks) and the conditions experienced by the parents during the breeding season (e.g., parental effort, fasting in king penguins).
Ludovic Toisoul
PhD researcher
Principal Supervisor Amélie Crespel
Ludovic comes from Belgium and did his MSc in Marine Biology at the University Côte d'Azur (Nice, France). He is currently working on his PhD about the impact of hypoxia on freshwater fish. The goal of his research project is to decipher the plastic and evolutionary responses of the three-spined stickleback facing intermittent freshwater hypoxia under different time scales. He will investigate the responses at the individual level by looking at a different set of parameters (e.g, swimming performance, metabolic rate, hypoxia tolerance, behavior) as well as the impact of developmental plasticity on later phenotype through early exposure experiment. The transgenerational effect and inheritance of phenotype will be investigated using a multigenerational experiment. Finally, phenotypic evolution will be studied by comparing genomes of two wild populations exposed naturally to two different hypoxia levels. Ludovic hopes that his research could help understand the upcoming challenge faced by aquatic organisms through climate change.
Thuy Le
PhD researcher
Thuy did her MSc in National Chung Hsing University in Taiwan in Prof. Tsung-Han Lee's laboratory about how fasting affects fish endocrine status. In the PhD project she will study how exercise training affects the cardiovascular function of fish and the capacity of fish to respond environmental stressors. Studies are from molecular & histological level all the way measuring the cardiac performance of the fish using heart rate loggers and analysing whole animal performance.
Alycia Valvandrin
PhD researcher
Principal Supervisor Amélie Crespel
Alycia completed her MSc at the European University Institute of the Sea in Brest, France, focusing on marine biological sciences and conducted her M2 thesis at the Anttila Lab. She is currently delving deeper into the questions raised during her M2 thesis by pursuing a PhD on the impact of hypoxia within and across generations on the behaviour of three-spined stickleback. Her PhD aims to uncover the effects of plasticity and adaptation to fluctuating hypoxia on three different aspects of behaviour: the potential to evolve of behavioural traits, cognitive abilities such as problem-solving and learning/memorizing, and the brain volume and neurogenesis - the central element in the development of behaviour. The main purpose of her research is to gain a better understanding of how environmental changes, such as hypoxia, impact aquatic species in a context of current global changes and anthropogenic pressures, and determine if aquatic species will be able to cope to these changes over different time scales.
Aliisa Wahlsten
MSc student
Aliisa is doing her Master thesis about how the environment in fishes rearing tanks affect the physiology of fishes. She is interested especially about fishes stress-levels and histology of the heart and the muscles. Aliisa is doing her Master’s degree programme in the University of Turku in animal physiology and genetics. She is interested in ecophysiology, biodiversity and environmental changes and effects.
Heini Rintanen
MSc student
Heini is a master's student at the University of Turku in the program of Animal Physiology and Genetics. In her master’s thesis, she is looking into how anthropogenic chemical emissions can impact the reproduction and liver energy storage of fish through the endocrine system. The research investigates the reproduction issues, specifically issues in gonadal maturation, observed on burbots living downstream of pulp and paper mills in Kemi, Northern Finland.
Salla Lahdentausta
MSc student
I am studying pharmacy at Åbo Akademi University and doing my master’s thesis on per- and polyfluoroalkyl substances (PFAS) identified in wild waterbirds. I am studying the oxidative stress response on farmed mallard embryos to an in ovo injection of one regulated and two emerging PFAS.
Amélie Crespel
Senior Researcher
https://www.researchgate.net/profile/Amelie-Crespel
Tomi Streng
Adjunct Professor of Animal Physiology, Senior Researcher
My main interest fields are related to investigating cardiovascular functions, i.e. the role of alpha 2-adrenoceptors and hypoxia. The in vitro methods to test cardiac and vascular functions include the Langendorff perfused heart preparation and the Radnoti working heart model. In addition, I am interested in pharmacokinetics of alpha 2-adrenoceptor-related drugs, also receptor subtype-selective ones, including urodynamical studies in animal models.
contact: tostren (at) utu.fi
Eeva-Riikka Vehniäinen
PhD, Senior Researcher
Eeva’s research field is aquatic ecotoxicology, especially the mechanisms of toxicity. She has studied the mechanisms of developmental toxicity of polycyclic aromatic hydrocarbons (PAHs) and ultraviolet radiation in fish, and she is also interested in endocrine disruption in aquatic organisms. You can read more about her research at
https://www.researchgate.net/profile/Eeva-Riikka-Vehniaeinen-2
Luca Pettinau
PhD Researcher
Luca is passionate in the ecophysiology and behavior of fish.
His doctoral project is focus on studying the effects of swimming exercise training program on salmonids heart function to help them face an unstable environment (i.e heat waves and hypoxia conditions) and in this way increase aquaculture production.
email: lupet(at)utu.fi
Pauline Bourdin
Project researcher
After doing a Master in marine fisheries and ecology in France, I was especially interested on how global warming can impact ecosystem. I am studying this subject through the study of different species of invertebrates coming from different parts of the world e.g. California coast and Svalbard archipelago. The aim of those projects is to get, through the measurement of the energy metabolism, energy content and oxidative stress of the individual, an overview of how their environment can affect their physiology.
Jenni Prokkola
Post-Doc, Visiting Researcher
Jenni is visiting the Anttila lab as part of her postdoctoral research conducted at the University of Liverpool. She studies the flexibility of oxygen supply system in fish: specifically, how zebrafish cope without myoglobin, which is a central oxygen binding protein and enzyme, and expressed widely across fish tissues. Jenni combines a molecular approach to physiological and whole organism functions, such as the swimming performance of fish.
See more on her website.
Shiva Latifi
MSc student
I'm a master student in Åbo Academi University in Biomedical imaging program. I am interested in cancer and histology. Especially about how breast cancer, chemotherapy and exercise influence the cardiac histology of mice.
Elli Keituri
MSc student
Elli is interested about how environmental stressors and their combination are influencing the physiology of fish. She has special interest on transgenerational effects of environmental stressors. Her thesis is about how parental co-exposure to copper and heat wave influence the offspring thermal tolerance and heat shock protein responses in zebrafish (Danio rerio).
Alexander Pape
Erasmus Researcher
Alex is currently working in our group as Erasmus researcher from Germany. His project is about developmental plasticity of zebrafish. He is interested about the influence of environmental stressors and their combination (copper and heat wave) on developmental disorders but also physiology of fish including thermal tolerance and cardiac function.
Joni Eklund
MSc student
Joni is doing a Master thesis about how crude oil exposure and environmental warming are influencing the metabolic rate of D. magna. He is especially interested about transgerational effects of these stressors and whether or not they have interacting effects on D. magna.
Ulla Saarinen
MSc student
Ulla is currently working on her Master thesis on how heatwaves can affect the critical heat tolerance and swimming capacity of trout (Salmo trutta). The thesis also includes comparison between the offspring of different family lines, where the parents of the trout under study have been exposed to different swimming excercises.
She is interested in climate change and unstable weather conditions, ecophysiology and aquaculture.
Milla Alkio
MSc and MD student
Milla is interested on how the mammal heart responds in pathological situations to exercise training. Specifically, she is interested in the molecular mechanisms that are behind adaptation and if exercise training can reduce the pathophysiological features of the diabetic heart in Göttingen minipigs.
contact: miemal"at"utu.fi
Emilie Suominen
MSc student
Emilie is doing Master thesis to Åbo Academi. She has been studing the influence of crude oil on metabolic rate of D. magna in three generations. She is especially interested about how the crude oil influences the individual variation of metabolic rate of animals and how change in variance in parental animals influences the metabolic rate of animals in next generations.
MSc students
Associated Senior Researchers
Previous Lab Members
Katri Heikkilä
MSc student
MSc
Katri did her Master's thesis about how endurance training affects calcium channels of the right and left ventricle of diabetic swine. Currently she is writing manuscript about her results.
Johanna Yliportimo
PhD Researcher
Principal supervisor Kai Lindström
Johanna is working on an eco-evolutionary doctoral thesis at Environmental and Marine Biology, Åbo Akademi University, where her principal supervisor is Professor Kai Lindström. Her research focuses on spatial variation in mating success and sexual selection, using sand goby as a model species. She is especially interested in how the structural habitat and resource distribution influences female reproduction from molecular to population level. In our lab, Johanna is analyzing carotenoid concentrations in egg and gonad samples.