Cuticular hydrocarbons (CHCs) play an essential role in mate recognition in insects but the form and intensity of sexual selection on CHCs has only been evaluated in a handful of studies, and never in a natural population. We quantified sexual selection operating on CHCs in a wild population of sagebrush crickets, a species in which nuptial feeding by females imposes an unambiguous phenotypic marker on males. Multivariate selection analysis revealed a saddle-shaped fitness surface, suggesting...

Floral nectar composition has been explained as an adaptation to factors that are either directly or indirectly related to pollinator attraction. However, it is often unclear whether the sugar composition is a direct adaptation to pollinator preferences. Firstly, the lower osmolality of sucrose solutions means that they evaporate more rapidly than hexose solutions, which might be one reason why sucrose-rich nectar is typically found in flowers with long tubes (adapted to long-tongued pollinators), where it...

Indirect genetic benefits derived from female mate choice comprise additive (good genes) and non-additive genetic benefits (genetic compatibility). Although good genes can be revealed by condition-dependent display traits, the mechanism by which compatibility alleles are detected is unclear because evaluation of the genetic similarity of a prospective mate requires the female to assess the genotype of the male and compare it to her own. Cuticular hydrocarbons (CHCs), lipids coating the exoskeleton of most insects, influence...

Monitoring global biodiversity is critical for understanding responses to anthropogenic change, but biodiversity monitoring is often biased away from tropical, megadiverse areas that are experiencing more rapid environmental change. Acoustic surveys are increasingly used to monitor biodiversity change, especially for bats as they are important indicator species and most use sound to detect, localise and classify objects. However, using bat acoustic surveys for monitoring poses several challenges, particularly in megadiverse regions. Many species lack reference...

Background: Given the unprecedented number of traumatized refugee minors in Europe and the increased prevalence of mental disorders such as PTSD in this vulnerable population, new methodologies that help us to better understand their symptomatology are crucial. Network analysis might help clinicians to both understand which symptoms might trigger other symptoms, and to identify relevant targets for treatment. However, to date only two studies have applied the network analysis approach to an (adult) refugee population...

The investigation of wildlife gastrointestinal microbiomes by next-generation sequencing approaches is a growing field in microbial ecology and conservation. Such studies often face difficulties in sample preservation if neither freezing facilities nor liquid nitrogen (LQN) are readily available. Thus, in order to prevent microbial community changes because of bacterial growth after sampling, preservation buffers need to be applied to samples. However, the amount of microbial community variation attributable to the different preservation treatments and potentially...

In animal species in which parents provide food to their dependent young, offspring often display conspicuous begging signals. These solicitation behaviors are important components of parent–offspring communication, but it is currently unclear how they and the parental response covary with offspring dependency on parental food provisioning across species. Burying beetles (Nicrophorus) are well known for providing elaborate biparental care, including provisioning of begging larvae. By using a multispecies approach, we show that larval begging intensity,...

There is a broad evidence-base for the effectiveness of Trauma-Focused Cognitive-Behavioral Therapy (TF-CBT) in treating children and adolescents with posttraumatic stress disorder (PTSD). The effect of therapist characteristics on patient symptoms has been neglected in psychotraumatology research and necessitates further investigation. This study aims to investigate the impact of therapist characteristics (gender, clinical experience and theoretical background) on posttraumatic stress symptoms (PTSS) in a heterogeneous and international sample of traumatized children and adolescents. Data from...

Cdc42 is a small RhoGTPase regulating multiple functions in eukaryotic cells. The activity of Cdc42 is significantly elevated in several tissues of aged mice, while the Cdc42 gain-of-activity mouse model presents with a pre-mature aging-like phenotype and with decreased lifespan. These data suggest a causal connection between elevated activity of Cdc42, aging and reduced lifespan. Here, we demonstrate that systemic treatment of aged (75-week old) female C57BL/6 mice with a Cdc42 activity specific inhibitor (CASIN)...

European rabbits (Oryctolagus cuniculus) have been exposed to rabbit haemorrhagic disease virus (RHDV) and myxoma virus (MYXV) in their native and invasive ranges for decades. Yet, the long‐term effects of these viruses on rabbit population dynamics remain poorly understood. In this context, we analysed 17 years of detailed capture–mark–recapture data (2000–2016) from Turretfield, South Australia, using a probabilistic state‐space hierarchical modelling framework to estimate rabbit survival and epidemiological dynamics. While RHDV infection and disease‐induced death...

Einleitung. Die Mehrzahl der Studien, die die Mortalität nach Hüftfraktur analysieren, konzentrieren sich auf die Untersuchungsebene der Patienten und weniger auf die von Krankenhäusern oder Regionen. Ein tiefgreifendes Verständnis der beeinflussenden Faktoren aller Ebenen könnte jedoch dabei helfen, relevante Ungleichheiten aufzudecken, um Präventionsmaßnahmen zu motivieren und Verbesserungen in der Versorgung anzuregen. Daher untersuchte diese Studie die Variation der Mortalität nach Hüftfraktur auf Individual-, Krankenhaus- und regionaler Ebene in Deutschland. Methodik. Diese retrospektive Kohortenstudie basiert auf...

The effect of environmental stresses on microorganisms is well studied and cellular response to stresses such as heat, cold, acids, and salts was extensively discussed. Although high pressure processing (HPP) as a preservation method is becoming more popular in the food industry, the characteristics of the cellular damage caused by high pressure are unclear, and the microbial response to this stress is not well explored yet. We exposed the pathogen Listeria monocytogenes to HPP (400...

Transcription is a vital process activated by transcription factor (TF) binding. The active gene releases a burst of transcripts before turning inactive again. While the basic course of transcription is well understood, it is unclear how binding of a TF affects the frequency, duration and size of a transcriptional burst. We systematically varied the residence time and concentration of a synthetic TF and characterized the transcription of a synthetic reporter gene by combining single molecule...

Human habitat disturbance affects both species diversity and intraspecific genetic diversity, leading to correlations between these two components of biodiversity (termed species - genetic diversity correlation, SGDC). However, whether SGDC predictions extend to host-associated communities, such as the intestinal parasite and gut microbial diversity, remains largely unexplored. Additionally, the role of dominant generalist species is often neglected despite their importance in shaping the environment experienced by other members of the ecological community, and their role...

Supplemental material, sj-docx-1-jic-10.1177_08850666221132246 for Comparison of Different Ultrasound Methods to Assess Changes in Muscle Mass in Critically ill Patients by Kristina E. Fuest, Hugo Lanz, Jana Schulz, Bernhard Ulm, Victoria A. Bennett, Julius J. Grunow, Björn Weiss, Manfred Blobner and Stefan J. Schaller in Journal of Intensive Care Medicine

The study examined the psychometric properties of the Child and Adolescent Trauma Screen 2 (CATS-2) as a measure of posttraumatic stress disorder (PTSD) according to DSM-5 and (Complex) PTSD following the ICD-11 criteria in children and adolescents (7–17 years). Psychometric properties were investigated in an international sample of traumatized children and adolescents (N = 283) and their caregivers (N = 255). We examined the internal consistency (α), convergent and discriminant validity, the factor structure of...

Additional file 2: Figure S2. Blunting neuronal nuclear calcium signaling did not alter IBA1+/TMEM119+ cell density and percentage in the perilesional area post-TBI. A) Depiction of the regions of interest: the core area of the injury and the perilesional areas 200µm away from the injury axis. Scale bar 200µm. B) No significant difference in IBA1+ and IBA1+/CD169+ cell density in the perilesional area 24h post injury (IBA1+: CS= 4.10 ± 0.47, CT = 6.73 ±...

Additional file 2: Figure S2. Blunting neuronal nuclear calcium signaling did not alter IBA1+/TMEM119+ cell density and percentage in the perilesional area post-TBI. A) Depiction of the regions of interest: the core area of the injury and the perilesional areas 200µm away from the injury axis. Scale bar 200µm. B) No significant difference in IBA1+ and IBA1+/CD169+ cell density in the perilesional area 24h post injury (IBA1+: CS= 4.10 ± 0.47, CT = 6.73 ±...

Additional file 4: Figure S4. Neuronal expression of osteoprotegerin is upregulated by nuclear calcium signaling and neuronal activity in TBI. A) Negative Control, baseline OPG (TNFRSF11B) signal and a positive Control of the in situ hybridization 24h post injury. B) OPG (TNFRSF11B) in situ signal is mainly found in neuronal sources (neuronal vs non-neuronal 75.38 ± 1.83% vs 24.62% ± 1.83%). N=5. C)-D) Significant increase of OPG (TNFRSF11b) mRNA density 24h post-TBI compared to sham...

Additional file 6: Table S1. Neurological Severity Score. All results of the Neurological Severity Score (NSS) are listed for each experimental cohort as total scores per mice in each treatment. Mice killed at either 3h or 24h had their NSS scored at 3h. Mice killed at 7d had their NSS scored at 3h, 2d, 5d and 7d.

Additional file 6: Table S1. Neurological Severity Score. All results of the Neurological Severity Score (NSS) are listed for each experimental cohort as total scores per mice in each treatment. Mice killed at either 3h or 24h had their NSS scored at 3h. Mice killed at 7d had their NSS scored at 3h, 2d, 5d and 7d.

Additional file 9: Table S4. Statistical Summary. Full information on statistical analysis for each experiment has been listed.

Additional file 9: Table S4. Statistical Summary. Full information on statistical analysis for each experiment has been listed.

Abstract Background Traumatic brain injury (TBI) is characterized by massive changes in neuronal excitation, from acute excitotoxicity to chronic hyper- or hypoexcitability. Nuclear calcium signaling pathways are involved in translating changes in synaptic inputs and neuronal activity into discrete transcriptional programs which not only affect neuronal survival and synaptic integrity, but also the crosstalk between neurons and glial cells. Here, we report the effects of blunting neuronal nuclear calcium signals in the context of TBI....

Additional file 10: Fig. S6. Expression correlation between BCL11B & C14ORF64 (LINC01550). Expression correlation between BCL11B & C14ORF64 (LINC01550) in 426 human datasets with 42563 samples from R2: Genomics analysis and visualization platform (https://hgserver1.amc.nl/cgi-bin/r2/main.cgi).