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Transcript

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0:01Who are the characters behind science? This is Science Behind the Glass, Illuminating the Human Side. In this podcast, we unveil the human side of laboratories and science. Scientists share personal experiences and will discuss their meanings from different perspectives and fields of research. Welcome to another exciting episode of Science Behind the Glass, Illuminating the Human Side.

0:28This time, we embark on a journey of wonder and discovery with a passionate arm. magnificent Dr. Alfredo Peretti, who has dedicated his life to the study of behavioral reproductive biology of arachnids, and also includes other arthropods that are insects, scorpions, and he has a particular interest in offering an integrative view of sexual selection perspectives, both theoretically and experimentally. Alfredo, thank you for accepting the invitation and for being here. Thank you very much for the invitation. Well, to begin with… What initially brought you to this fascinating world of studying the sexual behaviours of spiders and other animals? What particular experience sparked your interest? Well, for me, I have to go back to my childhood. I liked everything that had to do with seeing animals in action. Unlike others who like to collect animals, I liked to observe the animals and how they behaved. In that contact, I was often struck by the colour variations of some insects, birds and even…

1:26fish. In my adolescence, when I went to the river, I would see male dragonflies fighting for their territories. I remember I saw a light blue male, another red one, and another one that was greyish in colour. The colourful dragonflies were chasing the greyish one, which was the female. Well, when you’re a child and you see this, you don’t understand what’s going on. But I started wondering what was happening. These kind of behaviours left a mark on me. I was interested in something. I didn’t know what it was called at the time, but this was behavior. But at the time, I knew I wanted to study biology. I always dreamt of being a chemist or a doctor. But when one day my mother gave me a set, which she saved hard for, this set was called biology. And it contained a magnifying glass and a small microscope. I said, what is this biology? I was 11 years old.

2:09I started to read encyclopedias that had come from Spain. They were reprints. I started to read them. I started to get an understanding of what the meaning of what behavior is. Now, I’m going to look like a nerd, but when I was in high school, my dad, who was an autodidact and had not obtained a university degree, but he knew a lot about history, philosophy, and was a polyglot. He gave me a copy of The Origin of Species by Charles Starwood. I remember that whilst I was in an accounting class, I used to read The Origin of Species. Until one day, the professor took it away from me. When the class was over, he gave it back to me and told me, never again come to the classroom with novels.

2:43At this time, I was 17 years old. I told him. This is not a novel. This is science. This professor just said to me, well, whatever, go away. Well, that’s amazing. 70 years old and reading the origin of the species. That’s amazing. Well, in my case, I have a biology teacher who inspired me to study biology. He left breadcrumbs for me, but he didn’t help me to study anything specific. Instead, he gave me videos of cosmos. He recorded the programs on cassettes. For me, my dad was my mentor in science. My mum, being a nurse, helped me develop my curiosity. And I think the common denominator in all of this is curiosity.

3:21When you grow old, when you lose that curiosity, not when you turn 80 or 90, it’s when you stop being curious. That’s when you start to age. I agree. Well, now imagine that you have a group of high school students. How would you convey the excitement and relevance of your work in an accessible language? We are interested in studying all aspects of reproductive biology, and we use scorpions and arachnids as models. These animals are attractive for various reasons.

3:48The first is on a social level. Some have medical importance. Even though they are dangerous, potentially dangerous because they have venom. Arachnids, most or many of them, are predators and play a very important role in the ecosystem as they control other insect populations. We are interested in studying as many spider species as possible to understand how they live, behave, interact with other species in the ecosystem and reproduce. This also answers evolutionary questions more related to pure knowledge, but at the same time, it addresses more applied questions. For example, after many years of studying how spiders reproduce and how males transfer sperm to females, we now have projects that study the spiders living near water sources. We investigate how water contamination with heavy metals and various pollutants affect reproduction of these spiders and other animals that feed on these spiders, such as… birds or fish this information allows us to use these animals as indicators of pollution and demonstrate how the pollutants transfer through the ecosystem we can make a report show it to politicians or governors telling them look at what is happening to such a simple straightforward animal like a spider surely this is what is also happening to a human being living in that area you might consume water from that river or indirectly use the water to irrigate crops we could hardly have asked this question if we didn’t the reproductive biology of the spider. Without that basic knowledge, it would be hard to do applied science. Super interesting. And also, could you share with us an anecdote or a discovery you made during your

5:18research that challenged your preconceived ideas? What strikes me is that sometimes you start a research project predicting or expecting certain outcomes, but often animals behave in ways that are completely opposite to what you expected. This makes you rethink whether you’ve asked the wrong research question. will design the experiment poorly, but no, what the animals exhibit is called variability. That is, it has something that many experimental designs in biology can’t fully model.

5:46This variability continues to inspire me and often allows us to see these little creatures differently, not as robots. Another experience I had many years ago while studying spiders in Costa Rica involves communication between sexes. By accident, I discovered a very curious mating behavior. During mating, Females emitted a sound transmitted through web vibrations, allowing the male to feel it. These females would express or moderate the population’s behavior through these sounds. The males would change their movements in response. This surprised me a lot because these spiders had been extensively studied. No one had observed this behavior. The study opened the door to future research on behavior and made us realize that not everything is known or understood about an animal just because it has been studied.

6:30That’s great. Can you tell us about a species that has helped you to understand the mechanisms of sexual selection in biology besides spiders? Well, when we talk about arachnids, you’re actually talking about a class called arachnida. But this actually includes scorpions, solifuges and others. Each of them is completely different. I also have had the opportunity to work on guppies, fish that have a lot of colour variation, as well as dragonflies and flies. Big dichotomy when you start to study diversity. is that moving between extremely different groups is like starting from scratch because you have to relearn the biology of each of one, pose these questions.

7:07That’s quite complicated. I agree. Interesting and different, each one of those. And also, what challenges have you faced as a researcher in your field? Well, the first challenge was trying to find an identity as a researcher, understanding what I wanted to do, where I needed to decide who I ideally wanted to work for. I’ve chosen to stay in my country to give back what it had given to me. I also didn’t want to be completely isolated in a laboratory, so I became a lecturer.

7:33I wanted to contribute to the training of researchers where there is freedom to work and respect for individuality. That’s inspiring. And changing the topic a bit, how do you think the study of sexual selection differs in Latin American countries compared to other regions of the world? Are there cultural or specific challenges related to research in your country? Well, in Latin America. I believe we can study and test different theories of sexual selection due to our biodiversity. However, for many years, researchers from Europe and the United States would come, collect samples, and leave after completing their research, leaving nothing behind. Many Latin American scientists decided to leave for other countries because there wasn’t much local study of biodiversity due to the economic problems, and they being a lack of priority.

8:18Imagine if there are already difficulties doing basic taxonomy studies. and then wanting to study behaviour in ecology faces even more challenges. And that has been changing. There is still a lot of underfunding, but research groups have been growing. Now, if you compare behavioural studies in other countries, in Latin America, researchers don’t focus on a single animal model to understand the evolutionary theories, as often happens in Europe. Instead… There are various research groups studying many animals because we have so much biodiversity. This is an advantage, but unfortunately science depends on the current politicians for funding. When there is no money to understand the biology and the ecology of the animal, many end up endangered. This happens because the ecology and the reproductive matrix is also destroyed. For example, if the forest or vegetation associated with the species’ life is cut down, their reproduction is directly affected, leading to extinction. So, when we say a species is endangered, that is also the last point. we see. Many times we cannot prevent extinction unless we establish nature reserves. This occurs because basic biology, behavioural studies and ecology were neglected. Often, People say there is no money for this kind of science, but in reality, everything is interconnected. Without basic studies of these animals, its reproductive biology, and its role in the ecosystem, we won’t understand or be able to protect what we don’t know. Also, a good foundation in basic science is necessary for the functionality of an ecosystem, not just seeing the final product, which, as you say, is at the end of the tunnel, witnessing the extinction of the species. And what’s interesting is that today’s science is a team effort. We’re all part of a large network. For example, If

9:49you have a species like the puma, there will be a team of taxonomists to help classify it, ecologists and ethologists who study its behaviour. Then you might have an environmental manager. Finally, you have the person who gathers all the knowledge and can talk to the government or to others to protect and conserve the species. This is a scientific ecosystem. We had a Nobel Prize winner here, the founder of Conocet, who said, investing in knowledge is not expensive, ignorance is. True, and these type of spaces hopefully allow us to reach out more to the public and also to connect science more closely with public policy. We’re in a particular situation here in Argentina, very delicate, with issues that perhaps stem from years past. One aspect is that the public education at the university level needs better funding. The salaries have been precarious for years. Now it’s worsened by budget cuts. All sectors are in crisis, so we need to be empathetic and supportive because some of the people are living below the poverty line. On the other hand, in the scientific system, there is an ongoing debate about the value of public science. CONACYT, the National Scientific and Technical Research Council, has neglected the technical part and needs to promote that aspect. But not at the expense of the scientific part. CONACYT is the important institution in Latin America and worldwide. There is a lack of communication between the government authorities, researchers, and vice versa. I believe that reconciling this dialogue and communicating is the first step from there. We can see what can be improved, what can’t be changed without collapsing everything and what must not be defunded because it is essential, like not paying for electricity in your house.

11:20Wow, that’s super important. And continuing with what you were mentioning, how do you think the audience can contribute or participate in scientific research even if they are not scientists? For example, you work on behavior. How can we involve people or how can they participate in this? Well, there are several online platforms. they can engage with. For example, there is iNaturalist. This site involves behavior because it allows people to take photos, make records, and sometimes add notes about their observation. This is an option accessible to everyone. Globalization has helped improve communication between public and scientists. I go back to what I said. Curiosity is needed. It’s hard to tell someone to get involved in behavioral studies if they’re not interested.

12:02That’s where science fairs and museums come in. Recently, a doctorate student in biomedical engineering. who already has a degree in chemistry, approached our lab to volunteer and learn basic aspects of arachnids and how to feed them, simply because he enjoys them. This shows that it doesn’t matter if you already have a career, what’s important is curiosity. If this person can do it, so can everyone else. Very interesting interview. Among all the topics we discussed, Dr. Peretti made an interesting point about the possibility of working with our own biodiversity in our own country. In topics such as the one we work on, we often… come up against huge funding barriers and wars based on what the science policies of each country consider to be priority research or research that deserves to be financed to a greater extent. But what happens when research that perhaps has been going on for many years is not funded because the government of the day changes its policies? Researchers are forced to juggle to get resources or have to go to other countries where they are interested in that type of research. And note that everything must be funded with public resources. But definitely, science policies do define to a greater extent the possibility of scientific personnel working on one or another topic. I think that in Latin America, the budgets allocated to science are at its greatest. And little or much that is decided to finance often comes from a political representation that is very ignorant on these issues. We have

13:34ministries and institutions destined to advance these issues in each country. But how many of our legislators or representatives really know about science and technology issues? I agree. One of the issues, for example, is the conservation of the biodiversity. And this is important or fundamental to understand how to maintain the viability of the population. Waiting for a species to become critically endangered before taking action can be fatal. as it might be too late.

14:02The dilemma arises from the letting each country manage its own diversity. When animals don’t know about borders and have the right to exist, just as we do. That’s right. Political barriers are meaningless to nature or a particular population of a species. For example… If species are endangered in a country like Japan, it doesn’t matter because it will continue to be hunted, which makes any effort elsewhere futile. In my opinion, there should be some kind of United Nations for diversity, where countries don’t have control over diversity, but are governed by an international convention that transcends individual interests. As Alfredo says, we are all part of a scientific ecosystem.

14:47And this doesn’t work if knowledge or specialties are fragmented. We should work as a matrix, a united network. Knowledge can be costly, but more costly is ignorant. This episode was inspired by the book Cryptid Female Choice in Arthropods by Alfredo Peretti and Anita Eiseper. We have included references to this material and our guest book in the episode description. Listen to our episode in our YouTube channel, Spotify, and our official website. Follow us on our social media on X, Facebook, and Instagram. Original music by our colleague and friend, Rado Arte.

15:25The technical support from our promotions is thanks to Rafael Giordano. On this episode, we have a special guest. That is Andrew Lageslan, who volunteered for the reinterpretation.