Evolutionarily stable strategy analysis and its links to demography and genetics through invasion fitness.

Evolutionarily stable strategy (ESS) analysis pioneered by Maynard Smith and Price took off in part because it often does not require explicit assumptions about the genetics and demography of a population in contrast to population genetic models. Though this simplicity is useful, it obscures the degree to which ESS analysis applies to populations with more realistic genetics and demography: for example, how does ESS analysis handle complexities such as kin selection, group selection and variable environments when phenotypes are affected by multiple genes? In this paper, I review the history of the ESS concept and show how early uncertainty about the method lead to important mathematical theory linking ESS analysis to general population genetic models. I use this theory to emphasize the link between ESS analysis and the concept of .

Bet-hedging in innate and adaptive immune systems.

Immune system evolution is shaped by the fitness costs and trade-offs associated with mounting an immune response. Costs that arise mainly as a function of the magnitude of investment, including energetic and immunopathological costs, are well-represented in studies of immune system evolution. Less well considered, however, are the costs of immune cell plasticity and specialization.

Evolutionary bedfellows: Reconstructing the ancestral state of autotomy and regeneration.

Some form of regeneration occurs in all lifeforms and extends from single-cell organisms to humans. The degree to which regenerative ability is distributed across different taxa, however, is harder to ascertain given the potential for phylogenetic constraint or inertia, and adaptive processes to shape this pattern. Here, we examine the phylogenetic history of regeneration in two groups where the trait has been well-studied: arthropods and reptiles.

There is no fitness but fitness, and the lineage is its bearer.

Inclusive fitness has been the cornerstone of social evolution theory for more than a half-century and has matured as a mathematical theory in the past 20 years. Yet surprisingly for a theory so central to an entire field, some of its connections to evolutionary theory more broadly remain contentious or underappreciated. In this paper, we aim to emphasize the connection between inclusive fitness and modern evolutionary theory through the following fact: inclusive fitness is simply classical Darwinian fitness, averaged over social, environmental and demographic states that members of a gene lineage experience.

KOI-126: a triply eclipsing hierarchical triple with two low-mass stars.

The Kepler spacecraft has been monitoring the light from 150,000 stars in its primary quest to detect transiting exoplanets. Here, we report on the detection of an eclipsing stellar hierarchical triple, identified in the Kepler photometry. KOI-126 [A, (B, C)], is composed of a low-mass binary [masses M(B) = 0.

A case-control study on the relationship between HDL2b and non-alcoholic fatty liver disease in Chinese type 2 diabetic patients.

Background: It has been shown that low concentrations of high-density lipoprotein cholesterol (HDL-C) are associated with non-alcoholic fatty liver disease (NAFLD) in patients with type 2 diabetes mellitus (T2DM). HDL2b, a major subfraction of high-density lipoprotein (HDL), is more significantly correlated with coronary heart disease (CHD) compared with total HDL. In this study, we analysed HDL2b in a cohort of Chinese T2DM subjects with or without NAFLD.

Diagnostic utility of B-type natriuretic peptide in critically ill patients with pulmonary edema: a prospective cohort study.

Introduction: Distinguishing pulmonary edema due to acute lung injury (ALI) or the acute respiratory distress syndrome (ARDS) from hydrostatic or cardiogenic edema is challenging in critically ill patients. B-type natriuretic peptide (BNP) can effectively identify congestive heart failure in the emergency room setting but, despite increasing use, its diagnostic utility has not been validated in the intensive care unit (ICU).

Methods: We performed a prospective, blinded cohort study in the medical and surgical ICUs at the University of Chicago Hospitals.

Regulation of etioplast pigment-protein complexes, inner membrane architecture, and protochlorophyllide a chemical heterogeneity by light-dependent NADPH:protochlorophyllide oxidoreductases A and B.

The etioplast of dark-grown angiosperms is characterized by the prolamellar body (PLB) inner membrane, the absence of chlorophyll, and the accumulation of divinyl and monovinyl derivatives of protochlorophyll(ide) a [Pchl(ide) a]. Either of two structurally related, but differentially expressed light-dependent NADPH:Pchlide oxidoreductases (PORs), PORA and PORB, can assemble the PLB and form dark-stable ternary complexes containing enzymatically photoactive Pchlide-F655. Here we have examined in detail whether these polypeptides play redundant roles in etioplast differentiation by manipulating the total POR content and the PORA-to-PORB ratio of etiolated Arabidopsis seedlings using antisense and overexpression approaches.

Chlorophyll Synthesis in a Deetiolated (det340) Mutant of Arabidopsis without NADPH-Protochlorophyllide (PChlide) Oxidoreductase (POR) A and Photoactive PChlide-F655.

Chlorophyll (Chl) synthesis in Arabidopsis is controlled by two light-dependent NADPH-protochlorophyllide (PChlide) oxidoreductases (PORs), one (POR A) that is active transiently in etiolated seedlings at the beginning of illumination and another (POR B) that also operates in green plants. The function of these two enzymes during the light-induced greening of dark-grown seedlings has been studied in the wild type and a deetiolated (det340) mutant of Arabidopsis. One of the consequences of the det mutation is that POR A is constitutively down-regulated, and therefore, synthesis of the POR A enzyme is shut off.