Capacity of fish to respond environmental stressors. The aim of these studies is to evaluate how fish can respond to different environmental stressors like climate warming, hypoxia, environmental toxins, brownification, OA and their interactions. Studies are done from molecular level responses to functional responses evaluating also the transgenerational and evolutionary potential of fish to respond stressors. For the studies we are using e.g. threespined sticklebacks from nuclear power plant areas or hypoxic lakes analysing how decades of warming/hypoxia has influenced their capacity to respond environmental challenges. We are also evaluating thermal tolerances and cardiac capacities of different salmonids and performing studies in laboratory environment with zebrafish.

Increasing cardiovascular capacities and wellfare of farmed fish. Our aim is to increase the wellfare of farmed of fish in aquaculture. We are especially interested how exercise training and environmental enrichement affect the fish wellfare and their cardiovascular capacities. We are also interested how changing the farming conditions affects the growth, disease resistance, deformities and microbiome of fish as well as their resistance against heat waves and hypoxia episodes. The studies are urgent since heat waves are becoming more and more frequent which will also effect farmed fish that are not able to escape the high temperatures.

Endurance training influencing the capacity of animals to deal with diseases. We are collaborating with researchers from PET-center and Biocity Turku about the capacity of the animals to respond to cancer and diabetes. Our aim is to study both at molecular and functional level how these diseases are influencing the cardiovascular function of the animals. Furthermore, we are interested to evaluate if endurance training could be used as a way to prevent the possible negative effects of diseases on cardiovascular function.