Tia Tripodi
Period 4
12-4-13
Harming Amphibians
What was the biology class looking for/doing and what did they find?
What were the causes of abnormalities and how did it affect the surrounding environment?
How did they come up with and prepare for the experiment?
How they conducted the experiment
What they discovered from the experiment.
When Blaustein's class took the trip in Minnesota in 1995, they were not expecting to discover what they did. While looking to collect frogs for their biology class, the class discovered a bunch of deformed amphibians. A large portion of the frogs they collected had extra limbs, not enough limbs, or no eyes. Not knowing what to do with their findings, the class turned to the internet to see what the underlying cause of the deformations was.
The class soon uncovered some of the possibilities of the abnormalities. Environmental scientists suggested that the cause of the deformations were chemical pollutants.
Photo of a RBC Visa taken under a UV light to show...
English: Entomologist Carlos Aguilar collecting be...
UV damaged polypropylene rope (left) and new rope ...While other scientists believe the abnormalities had a different cause, the believed that the frogs might have been transformed by parasitic infections. What the scientists thought was only affecting a small area in Minnesota, turned out to be affecting other places in the world such as, neighboring states and Canada. The scientists believe that this is just the beginning of what is to come including future problems with other species, as well as humans. Another cause can be from a global environmental change, like water contamination. Water can be contaminated from acid rain, which increases ionizing radiation (UV-B) which then can deplete the ozone layer, and can change the patterns of the weather. These problems have brought up the potential of the amphibian population levels greatly declining.
Since only some species of amphibians show abnormalities, the class wanted to find out what was causing the...