Surgeon helps save victim in car crash
— In 2008, Courtney Dunn was volunteering with a sanctuary when she started noticing the different sounds tigers would make with one another as well as the sounds they made when she talked to them.
Dunn started thinking about the tigers’ communication and began recording them.
Today, her research work has been nationally recognized and Dunn is at the forefront of a movement to save the tiger population for generations to come.
Even in high school, Dunn always knew she wanted to go into biology, although she was unsure of which specific area she wanted to study.
While in school, Dunn volunteered several years at the Bald Knob Veterinary Clinic and became interested in veterinary medicine, but it was not until she was in her last year of studying for her bachelor’s degree that she decided to switch from becoming a zoo veterinarian to a conservation biologist.
“I had been gaining experience at various animal facilities throughout college, including an internship at the Memphis Zoo with their African penguins, African elephants, white rhino and various species of tropical birds,” she said.
But when she began an internship at the National Tiger Sanctuary in Chestnutridge, Missouri — and met a Bengal tiger named Tina — Dunn’s focus changed from veterinary medicine to the conservation research she now does.
Through her “unique personality and vocalizations,” Tina sparked Dunn’s interest in tiger conservation, and in turn led her to pursuing a master’s degree as well as eventually founding The Prusten Project.
As Dunn worked with Tina, she started noticing the different sounds Tina would make with other tigers versus with her. Dunn thought there might be a way of studying how the animals communicate with each other, so she started recording them and analyzing their sounds.
“One of the most interesting Arkansas native Courtney Dunn traveled to India in April to locate tigers like this Bengal family seen at the Tadoba National Park. sounds tigers make is a greeting noise, called chuffing, which tigers use to say hello. There is really no easy way to describe the sound, but the tiger produces it by keeping its mouth closed and blowing through its nostrils, producing a breathy snort.
“Another friendly sound tigers make sounds very close to a cow mooing. In reality, it is probably the closest thing a tiger has to a meow but just sounds very deep as they are obviously a much larger animal,” Dunn said.
The sound Dunn specifically studies, however, is something known as “a long call,” which can travel upwards of three miles. It is a very deep, resonating call that tigers use to communicate with other tigers they cannot necessarily see.
The Prusten Project (www. theprustenproject.org) started as a research project in August 2012 but became a nonprofit organization in January 2016. Dunn said it began as a way to “define what makes an individual tiger’s call unique in hopes of developing non-invasive acoustic monitoring.”
The monitoring would entail analyzing the social vocal communications of tigers by using microphones strategically over the tiger’s home ranges, not only as a tool for conservation censusing but also anti-poaching efforts.
“I wanted to find a way to improve current protection methods for wild tiger populations while providing an easier tool to study and monitor forests as a whole. Not only would acoustic monitoring provide information about tigers but, since it is recording every sound in the forest, it can also provide information about other vocal mammals like bats, birds, amphibians and even human activity in the area. This is a method known as soundscape monitoring, which has shown great promise in other areas of the world,” she said.
Dunn sent her research on The Prusten Project to a contest called Think for Tigers sponsored by Oxford University’s Wild Conservation Research Unit in England.
Dunn won the contest, and she and researchers from the University of Oxford’s WildCRU and staff members from World Animal Protection went to India for 10 days in April and May this year to locate tigers.
Dunn said the group is planning to go back to India in December to explain their findings and present their plan.
A Vanderbilt University trauma surgeon sprang into action after witnessing a woman’s car crash at a Nashville intersection.
The Tennessean newspaper reports that Dr. Rick Miller and others got Ruth Root out of her car after she suffered a heart attack and crashed into a light pole Friday.
Root met Miller in her hospital room Monday at Vanderbilt University Medical Center. Miller told Root that she “might not have survived” if Miller and others weren’t there. The team administered CPR and used a cardiac defibrillator.
Root had been having heart problems since February and was driving to her cardiologist when the crash occurred. The 73-year-old Root suffered 12 cracked ribs.
She granted Miller’s request for a hug at the hospital, adding, “just not a tight one.”
SNAPSHOT
Minor quake reported: A minor, early-morning earthquake was reported near the Mississippi-Alabama state line on Monday. The U.S. Geological Survey’s website indicates a 2.6-magnitude earthquake centered near Aliceville in west Alabama. It was reported around 3:30 a.m. Associated Press