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Brian "Layton" Cardall (07 December 1976 – 06 June 2009) was an American  Biologist who focused on molecular genetics and community genetics. He was a Science Foundation Arizona Fellow who began to study how genetic variation within one species may influence the distribution, abundance and reproduction of other species. The new discipline links molecular and evolutionary genetics to population, community, and ecosystem processes.

Education and Research
Cardall was educated at Utah State University in the Department of Biology. In 2002 he worked for a year as an undergraduate research assistant in the Department of Biology while pursuing a bachelors degree in biology. Prior to that position he worked as a lab technician for the University’s National Aquatic Monitoring Lab. In 2003 Cardall returned to the Department of Biology as an Undergraduate Research Assistant. He published an abstract in the United States National Library of Medicine. Published 15 December 2004 Cardall, co-authored by Edmund D. Brodie Jr., Edmund D Brodie 3rd, and Charles T Hanifin, the abstract concluded rough-skin newts (Taricha granulosa) released tetrodotoxin (TTX) in their skin secretions in response to mild electric stimulation. This release resulted in a large (21% to almost 90% of the pre-stimulation levels) reduction in the amount of TTX present in the dorsal skin of individual newts. Over the next 9 months newts significantly regenerated the levels of TTX in their skin. These data, in combination with previously published results, are consistent with the hypothesis that these newts produce their own TTX.

July 15, 2006 Cardall published his second abstract, Rangewide molecular structuring in the Utah sucker (Catostomus ardens), co-Authored by K.E. Mock, R.P. Evans, M. Crawford, S.U. Janecke, and M.P. Miller. Cardall’s research concluded the Utah sucker (Catostomus ardens) is endemic to the Bonneville Basin and the upper Snake River drainage in western North America, and is thought to hybridize with the federally endangered June sucker (Chasmistes liorus mictus) in Utah Lake ( Bonneville Basin ). The abstract described the discovery of a major subdivision in Utah suckers (4.5% mitochondrial sequence divergence) between the ancient Snake River drainage and the Bonneville Basin. This boundary had not previously been recognized in Utah suckers based on morphologic variation, but has been recently described in two endemic cyprinids in the region. Populations in valleys east of the Wasatch Range in Utah clustered with the Snake River populations, suggesting that these valleys may have had an ancient hydrologic connection to the Snake River. Cardall also found evidence of population isolation within the Bonneville basin, corresponding to two Pleistocene sub-basins of the ancient Lake Bonneville. In contrast, he found no molecular evidence for deep divergence between Utah suckers and June suckers in Utah Lake or for a history of hybridization between divergent lineages in that population, although he recognized that demographic events may have obscured this signal. These findings suggested that the morphological differences between Utah and June suckers in Utah Lake may be the result of strong, and relatively recent, ecological selection. In summary, morphological and molecular characters seem to vary along different axes in different portions of the range of this taxon, providing an interesting system for studying the contributions of neutral and adaptive variation to species diversity.

Microsatellite Markers for the June Sucker (Chasmistes liorus mictus), Utah Sucker (Catostomus ardens), and Five other Catostomidae Fishes of Western North America was the title and subject of Cardall’s third abstract published by Wiley-Blackwell in Molecular Ecology Notes, Volume 7, issue 3, 2007. Co-authored by Lee S.M. Bjerregaard and Karen E. Mock, Cardall developed and optimized five new microsatellite markers for the genetic management of the endangered June sucker. They reported the cross-amplification of these markers, and seven microsatellites previously developed for Klamath Basin suckers, in seven catostomid species of western North America. No linkage disequilibrium was detected between pairs of loci. Since most of these loci exhibited conserved priming sites, they may be useful for landscape-scale studies of speciation and patterns of gene flow among multiple sucker lineages.

Cardall’s fourth abstract Morphological and genetic structuring in the Utah Lake sucker complex was published 17 December 2008. Co-authored with D.D. Cole and K.E. Mock their research concluded Population decline in the federally endangered June sucker(Chasmistes liorus), a lakesucker unique to Utah Lake, Utah, had been attributed in part to hybridization with the more widespread Utah sucker (Catostomus ardens). As a group, suckers in Utah Lake exhibit considerable external morphological variation. Meristic and morphological ambiguities, presumably the result of hybridization, create a continuum of intermediate forms between Chasmistes and Catostomus extremes and prevent definitive identification to species. They described and evaluated the morphological and genetic variation in suckers in Utah Lake by comparing a morphological analysis with amplified fragment length polymorphism and microsatellite analyses. Suckers were morphologically differentiated using mouth characters associated with different feeding strategies: planktivory (June sucker) and benthivory (Utah sucker). Although Cardall found no genetic evidence for a deep divergence between June and Utah morphs, significant, but slight population structuring accompanied the substantial morphological variation. Bayesian model-based genetic clustering analyses detected two sucker populations in Utah Lake; however, these clusters were not strongly concordant with morphological groupings or between marker systems. The suckers in Utah Lake present an interesting dilemma regarding conservation: should one conserve (breed and stock) a subset of the morphotypic variation in the Utah Lake sucker complex, focusing on the endangered June sucker morphotype, or should one conserve both June sucker and Utah sucker morphotypes in this complex, possibly maximizing evolutionary potential? They explored this question in the context of current genetic and morphological variation in the Utah Lake sucker complex as well as historical information on this complex and other lakesuckers.

After Utah State University awarded Cardall a Masters Degree in Ecology he earned a prestigious fellowship to conduct research for a doctorate in biological sciences at Northern Arizona University in Flagstaff

The genetic diversity of cottonwood (Populus sp.), before, during and after establishment of the Tamarix was the subject of Cardall’s final abstract.

Personal Life
Cardall was born in Salt Lake City in Utah, United States, in 1976. He was born in Salt Lake City on December 7, 1976, the sixth child of Duane and Margaret Cardall. He worked for two years in Bilbao, Spain as a missionary for The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints. Cardall is the younger brother of American Pianist Paul Cardall. While attending Utah State University he met and married Anna Marie Schmidt. 10 October 2003. He had two daughters, Ava and Bella. He was a mountain climber, painter, and played guitar. Cardall was a songwriter and user the alias Jonahs self-published 11 original songs on an album titled Vagabond.

Death
Cardall was given a bipolar diagnosis during his education ad Utah State University. 9 June 2009, Cardall left St. George, Utah with his daughter Ava and wife Anna who was pregnant with their daughter Bella. Hurricane, Utah police officer deployed a Taser on Cardall as he experienced a bipolar episode. Anna called 911 to report her husband behaving erratically, and told dispatchers her husband was unarmed, had bipolar disorder and had taken Seroquel, a medicine used to treat manic episodes associated with the disorder. On the side of a southern Utah highway Hurricane, Utah police officer deployed a Taser on Cardall as he experienced a bipolar episode. Anna watched as police instead used a stun gun on her confused husband who died on the scene. Hurricane city paid $2 million to settle a wrongful death lawsuit brought by the family of a man who died in 2009 after being shocked with a Taser by police. The settlement agreement, provided to The Salt Lake Tribune was in response to a records request, which limited what the parties can say about the resolution of the case. But it allowed the family of Cardall to continue their advocacy work with National Alliance on Mental Illness (NAMI) Utah and police departments on how to improve interactions with people who have mental illness. Cardall's death on June 9, 2009, sparked a statewide discussion over the use of Tasers and the police response to the mentally ill. The Utah Legislature passed a resolution encouraging police departments to provide officers with better training on mental illness, which was signed by Gov. Gary Herbert in May 2011 during a ceremony attended by Cardall's family. A small study published in the American Heart Association's journal earlier this year found that Tasers can cause an irregular rapid heartbeat, sudden cardiac arrest and death in clinically healthy people when aimed at a person's chest. The study looked at cases of eight men shocked with a Taser near the heart, all but one of whom died. In October 2009, Taser International issued a "training advisory" for law enforcement officers that recommended against shooting people in the chest with the 50,000-volt stun gun to avoid an extremely low risk of an "adverse cardiac event." The advisory said research has not shown that the weapons cause cardiac arrest and noted thousands of people have been hit by Taser probes in the chest with no adverse effects. But the company said avoiding the chest would defuse "controversy about whether or not the [electronic control devices] could have caused a cardiac event." Northern Arizona University, with support from Cardall's family, set up a scholarship fund in his name to aid science students.