The School of Biological Sciences Spring 2025 MBM Seminar Series presents Dr. James Liao

Astract: Fishes exhibit remarkable adaptability, navigating complex aquatic habitats while balancing competing demands that influence their locomotion mechanics and energetics. This extraordinary ability to sense and maneuver through fluid environments offers valuable insights for advancing autonomous underwater vehicle technology. However, our understanding of how fishes detect and navigate their surroundings, especially during dynamic behaviors, remains limited. In this presentation, I will discuss advances made by my laboratory in elucidating the diversity, energetics, and underlying mechanisms of fish locomotion. I will demonstrate how the environment shapes the costs of swimming through the ability of fishes to recapture energy from turbulence, causes the convergence of body kinematics during acceleration, and impacts the collective behavior of fish schools. Additionally, I will highlight our progress using zebrafish and cavefish model systems to elucidate the response properties and evolution of the lateral line system in fishes, a sensory modality required for swimming, schooling, and predator-prey interactions. Finally, I will outline our innovative approaches to studying behavior in naturalistic mesocosms and field settings, aiming to translate fundamental scientific discoveries into practical applications for conservation, ecological management, and the development of cutting-edge, bio-inspired technologies.