Grant: Research Tools and Instruments - Category 1 (<$150,000)

The equipment to be purchased with this grant is an elemental analyzer. This is an indispensable ecological research tool and will form the nucleus of Dr. Bertram's research laboratory. The elemental analyzer will allow Dr. Bertram and her students to determine how food quality (nitrogen richness) influences insect body nutrient composition, growth rate, development time, adult body size, and lifetime reproductive success. Determining how food quality affects body composition is important because the insects' ability to locate, eat, and retain essential and limited nutrients such as nitrogen is thought to profoundly affect their growth rate, reproduction, and survival. The elemental analyzer will also enable Dr. Bertram and her students to determine whether the ability to retain nitrogen is heritable, and ascertain any possible interplay between genetics and the environment (whether the insect's heritage affects their ability to locate, eat, and retain nitrogen from plants). Ascertaining how much carbon and nitrogen a plant or insect contains is not possible without an elemental analyzer. Unfortunately, Carleton University does not have one. While the University of Ottawa has elemental analyzers in the G.G. Hatch Stable Isotope Laboratory, the cost of running each sample is so high ($18/sample) that it is much more cost effective to purchase an elemental analyzer. The requested elemental analyzer will be housed in Dr. Bertram's laboratory which is designed for the analysis of insect fitness and body composition. It will be accessible to multiple users (colleagues from chemistry have already expressed interest) and used on a daily basis in research and in the training of undergraduate and graduate students.