Ken Jeffries

JeffriesPic.jpg

CONTACT INFORMATION

Mail:Anatomy, Physiology, & Cell Biology, 1089 Veterinary Medicine Drive, University of California, Davis 95616.

Phone: 1-530-752-3141

Email: kenmjeffries(at)gmail.com

Twitter: @kenmjeffries

EDUCATION

Current           -          Delta Science Postdoctoral Fellow, University of California, Davis.

2012              -           Postdoctoral Researcher, University of British Columbia.

2012              -           Ph.D., University of British Columbia.

2007              -           M.Sc., University of Calgary.

2004              -           B.Sc. (First Class Honors), University of Calgary.

BIG NEWS!

I will be moving to the University of Manitoba in July 2016 to start as an Assistant Professor in the Department of Biological Sciences (http://umanitoba.ca/Biology/). There is a funded PhD position available for a student to use genomics tools for the conservation of Lake Sturgeon with Gary Anderson (http://umanitoba.ca/Biology/people/ganderson/) and myself. Details are available here. Stay tuned for more updates and exciting opportunities!

RESEARCH INTERESTS

Environmental and anthropogenic stressors can disrupt homeostasis and negatively affect aquatic organisms, potentially leading to impacts on growth, reproduction and survival over time. The focus of my research is to investigate how various environmental and contaminant stressors can affect an individual's fitness through examination of responses at cellular, tissue and whole organism levels of biological organization, and how these responses can potentially scale up to population level consequences. I use genomics techniques to characterize the cellular responses of fishes to abiotic (e.g., temperature, salinity), biotic (e.g., pathogens) and anthropogenic (e.g., wastewater, endocrine disrupting compounds, pesticides, pharmaceuticals) stressors relevant to aquatic ecosystems. I integrate these cellular level responses with tissue or whole organism level performance indices to gain a more comprehensive understanding of the effects of exposure to environmental stressors and to address whether populations and species can persist in changing or disturbed aquatic environments. This work has focused on non-model fishes that are economically important, invasive or of conservation concern and combines approaches used in the fields of Physiology, Ecological Genomics, Fish Ecology and Ecotoxicology. I have recently begun examining how exposure to environmental stressors affects the expression of immune response genes and potentially increases the susceptibility of stressed individuals to pathogen infections, a potentially significant and undetected cause of fish mortality in disturbed ecosystems. I am moving towards using next generation sequencing approaches to examine how genome variation leads to different phenotypic responses to aid in predicting which populations and species will be able to tolerate future changes in environmental conditions. Because of the widespread influence of climate change, environmental disturbances and the impacts of human activity on ecosystems, much of this research is applicable for studying aquatic systems throughout North America.

PEER REVIEWED PUBLICATIONS

  1. Jeffries, KM, Connon, RE, Bjelde, BE, Komoroske, LM, Britton, MT, Sommer, T, Todgham, AE, Fangue, NA. Effects of high temperatures on threatened estuarine fishes during periods of extreme drought. Journal of Experimental Biology, in press.
  2. Komoroske, LM, Jeffries, KM, Connon, RE,Dexter, J, Hasenbein, M, Verhille, C, Fangue, NA. Sublethal salinity stress contributes to habitat limitation in an endangered estuarine fish. Evolutionary Applications, in press.
  3. Cole, BJ, Brander, SM, Jeffries, KM, Hasenbein, S, He, G, Dennison, MS, Fangue, NA, Connon, RE. Changes in Menidia beryllina gene expression and in vitro hormone receptor activation caused by exposure to estuarine waters near treated wastewater outfalls. Archives of Environmental Contamination and Toxicology, in press.
  4. Clark, TD, Furey, NB, Rechisky, EL, Gale, MK, Jeffries, KM, Porter, AD, Casselman, MT, Lotto, AG, Patterson, DA, Cooke, SJ, Farrell, AP, Welch, DW, Hinch, SG. Tracking the migration of wild sockeye salmon smolts to the ocean reveals distinct regions of nocturnal movement and high mortality. Ecological Applications, in press.
  5. Brander, SM, Jeffries, KM, Cole, BJ, DeCourten, BM, White, JW, Hasenbein, S, Fangue, NA, Connon, RE. 2016. Transcriptomic changes underlie altered egg protein production and reduced fecundity in an estuarine model fish exposed to bifenthrin. Aquatic Toxicology 174: 247-260.
  6. Jeffries, KM, Brander, SM, Britton, MT, Fangue, NA, Connon, RE. 2015. Chronic exposure to low and high concentrations of ibuprofen elicit different gene expression response patterns in a euryhaline fish. Environmental Science and Pollution Research 22: 17397-17413. *Invited contribution to a special issue entitled "Molecular and cellular effects of contamination in aquatic ecosystems."
  7. Raby, GD, Donaldson, MR, Hinch, SG, Clark, TD, Eliason, EJ, Jeffries, KM, Cook, KV, Teffer, A, Bass, AL, Miller, KM, Patterson, DA, Farrell, AP, Cooke, SJ. 2015. Fishing for effective conservation: context and biotic variation are key to understanding the survival of Pacific salmon after catch-and-release. Integrative and Comparative Biology 55: 554-576.
  8. Komoroske, LM, Connon, RE, Jeffries, KM, Fangue, NA. 2015. Linking transcriptional responses to organismal tolerance reveals mechanisms of thermal sensitivity in a mesothermal endangered fish. Molecular Ecology 24: 4960-4981. 
  9. Jeffries, KM, Komoroske, LM, Truong, J, Werner, I, Hasenbein, M, Hasenbein, S, Fangue, NA, Connon, RE. 2015. The transcriptome-wide effects of exposure to a pyrethroid pesticide on the critically endangered delta smelt Hypomesus transpacificus. Endangered Species Research 28: 43-60.
  10. Jeffries, KM, Hinch, SG, Gale, MK, Clark, TD, Lotto, AG, Casselman, MT, Li, S, Rechisky, EL, Porter, AD, Welch, DW, Miller, KM. 2014. Immune response genes and pathogen presence predict migration survival in wild salmon smolts. Molecular Ecology 23: 5803-5815.
  11. Gale, MK, Hinch, SG, Cooke, SJ, Donaldson, MR, Eliason, EJ, Jeffries, KM, Martins, EG, Patterson, DA. 2014. Observable impairments predict mortality of captured and released sockeye salmon at various temperatures. Conservation Physiology 2: 10.1093/conphys/cou029.
  12. Donaldson, MR, Hinch, SG, Jeffries, KM, Patterson, DA, Cooke, SJ, Farrell, AP, Miller, KM. 2014. Species- and sex-specific responses and recovery of wild, mature Pacific salmon to an exhaustive exercise and air exposure stressor. Comparative Biochemistry and Physiology Part A: Molecular & Integrative Physiology 173: 7-16.
  13. Jeffries, KM, Hinch, SG, Sierocinski, T, Pavlidis, P, Miller, KM. 2014. Transcriptomic responses to high water temperature in Pacific salmon. Evolutionary Applications 7: 286-300.
  14. Jeffries, KM, Hinch, SG, Sierocinski, T, Clark, TD, Eliason, EJ, Donaldson, MR, Li, S, Pavlidis, P, Miller, KM. 2012. Consequences of high temperatures and premature mortality on the transcriptome and blood physiology of wild adult sockeye salmon (Oncorhynchus nerka). Ecology and Evolution 2: 1747-1764.
  15. Cooke, SJ, Hinch, SG, Donaldson, MR, Clark, TD, Eliason, EJ, Crossin, GT, Raby, GD, Jeffries, KM, Lapointe, M, Miller, K, Patterson, DA, Farrell, AP. 2012. Conservation physiology in practice: How physiological knowledge has improved our ability to sustainably manage Pacific salmon during up-river migration. Philosophical Transactions of the Royal Society of London B 367: 1757-1769.
  16. Jeffries, KM,Hinch, SG, Martins, EG, Clark, TD, Lotto, AG, Patterson, DA, Cooke, SJ, Farrell, AP, Miller, KM. 2012. Sex and proximity to reproductive maturity influence the survival, final maturation, and blood physiology of Pacific salmon when exposed to high temperature during a simulated migration. Physiological and Biochemical Zoology 85: 62-73.
  17. Clark, TD, Jeffries, KM, Hinch, SG, Farrell, AP. 2011. Exceptional aerobic scope and cardiovascular  performance of pink salmon (Oncorhynchus gorbuscha) may underlie resilience in a warming climate. Journal of Experimental Biology 214: 3074-3081.
  18. Jeffries, KM, Hinch, SG, Donaldson, MR, Gale, MK, Burt, JM, Thompson, LA, Farrell, AP, Patterson, DA, Miller, KM. 2011. Temporal changes in blood variables during final maturation and senescence in male sockeye salmon Oncorhynchus nerka: reduced osmoregulatory ability can predict mortality. Journal of Fish Biology 79: 449-465.
  19. Eliason, EJ, Clark, TD, Hague, MJ, Hanson, LM, Gallagher, ZS, Jeffries, KM, Gale, MK, Patterson, DA, Hinch, SG, Farrell, AP. 2011. Differences in thermal tolerance among sockeye salmon populations. Science 332: 109-112. *Was featured on the cover.
  20. Jeffries, KM, Jackson, LJ, Ikonomou, MG, Habibi, HR. 2010. Presence of natural and anthropogenic organic contaminants and potential fish health impacts along two river gradients in Alberta, Canada. Environmental Toxicology and Chemistry 29: 2379-2387.
  21. Jeffries, KM, Nelson, ER, Jackson, LJ, Habibi, HR. 2008. Basin-wide impacts of compounds with estrogen-like activity on longnose dace (Rhinichthys cataractae) in two prairie rivers of Alberta, Canada. Environmental Toxicology and Chemistry 27: 2042-2052.
  22. Jeffries, KM, Jackson, LJ, Peters, LE, Munkittrick, KR. 2008. Changes in population, growth and physiological indices of longnose dace (Rhinichthys cataractae) associated with land-use in the Red Deer River, Alberta, Canada. Archives of Environmental Contamination and Toxicology 55: 639-651.

View my Google Scholar profile here!