Conservation futures 2050: Developing future scenarios to explore potential socio-economic developments and their impact on biodiversity.

Large scale changes in biodiversity and conservation management require long-term goals and planning across multiple sectors in the face of increasing global change. Major trends in land use and management interventions, species additions or losses, and climate are well recognized, but responses are still often short-term and fragmented across agencies and sectors. Scenario-building can be a powerful tool to imagine possible futures, integrating across sectors and disciplines and promoting long-term thinking and planning.

Comparing the Above and Below-Ground Chemical Defences of Three Rumex Species Between Their Native and Introduced Provenances.

Compared to their native range, non-native plants often experience reduced levels of herbivory in the introduced range. This may result in reduced pressure to produce chemical defences that act against herbivores. We measured the most abundant secondary metabolites found in Rumex spp.

Food Allergy Characteristics Associated With Coexisting Eosinophilic Esophagitis in FARE Registry Participants.

Background: Eosinophilic esophagitis (EoE) can coexist in individuals with food allergy.

Objective: To evaluate the characteristics of food-allergic patients with and without coexisting EoE using a large food allergy patient registry.

Methods: Data were derived from 2 Food Allergy Research & Education, Inc, Patient Registry surveys.

A network perspective for sustainable agroecosystems.

Nature-based management aims to improve sustainable agroecosystem production, but its efficacy has been variable. We argue that nature-based agroecosystem management could be significantly improved by explicitly considering and manipulating the underlying networks of species interactions. A network perspective can link species interactions to ecosystem functioning and stability, identify influential species and interactions, and suggest optimal management approaches.

Detection of the Entomopathogenic Fungus in the Rhizosphere of Wound-Stressed Plants.

Entomopathogenic fungi from the genus (Vuillemin) play an important role in controlling insect populations and have been increasingly utilized for the biological control of insect pests. Various studies have reported that (Bals.), Vuill.

Import volumes and biosecurity interventions shape the arrival rate of fungal pathogens.

Global trade and the movement of people accelerate biological invasions by spreading species worldwide. Biosecurity measures seek to allow trade and passenger movements while preventing incursions that could lead to the establishment of unwanted pests, pathogens, and weeds. However, few data exist to evaluate whether changes in trade volumes, passenger arrivals, and biosecurity measures have altered rates of establishment of nonnative species over time.

The emerging science of linked plant-fungal invasions.

Contents 1314 I. 1315 II. 1316 III.

Loss of functional diversity and network modularity in introduced plant-fungal symbioses.

The introduction of alien plants into a new range can result in the loss of co-evolved symbiotic organisms, such as mycorrhizal fungi, that are essential for normal plant physiological functions. Prior studies of mycorrhizal associations in alien plants have tended to focus on individual plant species on a case-by-case basis. This approach limits broad scale understanding of functional shifts and changes in interaction network structure that may occur following introduction.

Taxonomic similarity, more than contact opportunity, explains novel plant-pathogen associations between native and alien taxa.

Novel associations between plants and pathogens can have serious impacts on managed and natural ecosystems world-wide. The introduction of alien plants increases the potential for biogeographically novel plant-pathogen associations to arise when pathogens are transmitted from native to alien plant species and vice versa. We quantified biogeographically novel associations recorded in New Zealand over the last 150 yr between plant pathogens (fungi, oomycetes and plasmodiophorids) and vascular plants.

Defoliation by pastoralists affects savanna tree seedling dynamics by limiting the facilitative role of canopy cover.

Recurrent tree defoliation by pastoralists, akin to herbivory, can negatively affect plant reproduction and population dynamics. However, our understanding of the indirect role of defoliation in seedling recruitment and tree-grass dynamics in tropical savanna is limited. In West African savanna, Fulani pastoralists frequently defoliate several fodder tree species to feed livestock in the dry season.

Heat reduces nitric oxide production required for auxin-mediated gene expression and fate determination in tree tobacco guard cell protoplasts.

Tree tobacco (Nicotiana glauca) is an equatorial perennial with a high basal thermotolerance. Cultured tree tobacco guard cell protoplasts (GCPs) are useful for studying the effects of heat stress on fate-determining hormonal signaling. At lower temperatures (32°C or less), exogenous auxin (1-naphthalene acetic acid) and cytokinin (6-benzylaminopurine) cause GCPs to expand 20- to 30-fold, regenerate cell walls, dedifferentiate, reenter the cell cycle, and divide.

Effects of dog ownership in early childhood on immune development and atopic diseases.

Background: Exposure to pets in childhood has been associated with a reduced risk of wheezing and atopy.

Objective: Our objective was to determine whether the effects of pet exposure on immune development and atopy in early childhood can be explained by alterations in exposure to innate immune stimuli in settled dust.

Methods: Two hundred and seventy-five children at increased risk of developing allergic diseases were evaluated to age 3 years for pet ownership, blood cell cytokine responses, and atopy.

Classroom aeroallergen exposure in Arkansas head start centers.

Background: The impact of preschool environmental conditions on classroom aeroallergen concentrations is not fully understood.

Objective: To examine the relationship between school environmental conditions and classroom aeroallergen concentrations in the Pulaski County Head Start (HS) Program.

Methods: Thirty-three HS centers in Pulaski County, Arkansas, underwent a detailed environmental evaluation.

Heat suppresses activation of an auxin-responsive promoter in cultured guard cell protoplasts of tree tobacco.

Cultured guard cell protoplasts (GCP) of tree tobacco (Nicotiana glauca) comprise a novel system for investigating the cell signaling mechanisms that lead to acquired thermotolerance and thermoinhibition. At 32 degrees C in a medium containing an auxin (1-naphthaleneacetic acid [NAA]) and a cytokinin (6-benzylaminopurine), GCP expand, regenerate cell walls, dedifferentiate, and divide. At 38 degrees C, GCP acquire thermotolerance within 24 h, but their expansion is limited and they neither regenerate walls nor reenter the cell cycle.

Early exposure to pets: good or bad?

Although pet exposure is known to trigger or worsen allergy symptoms and asthma in patients sensitized to pets, data from recent years has shown that pet exposure in early childhood may actually prevent the development of allergic sensitization and allergic diseases including allergic rhinitis, asthma, and atopic dermatitis. The concept of a protective pet effect remains controversial because these findings have not been duplicated in all studies. Moreover, some studies suggest that pet exposure promotes allergic disease.

The hygiene hypothesis revisited.

The original hygiene hypothesis proposed that reductions in family size and exposure to childhood infections were responsible for the rise in atopic diseases. Numerous epidemiologic and longitudinal studies have been performed to test this hypothesis, which has evolved in response to these findings and emerging concepts related to the innate immune response and immunoregulatory mechanisms. Collectively, these advances raise hope that the concepts espoused in original hygiene hypothesis may soon lead to new preventive approaches to atopic diseases.