A toolkit for the dynamic study of air sacs in siamang and other elastic circular structures.

Biological structures are defined by rigid elements, such as bones, and elastic elements, like muscles and membranes. Computer vision advances have enabled automatic tracking of moving animal skeletal poses. Such developments provide insights into complex time-varying dynamics of biological motion.

Isochrony in barks of Cape fur seal () pups and adults.

Animal vocal communication often relies on call sequences. The temporal patterns of such sequences can be adjusted to other callers, follow complex rhythmic structures or exhibit a metronome-like pattern (i.e.

Rhythmic properties of Sciaena umbra calls across space and time in the Mediterranean Sea.

In animals, the rhythmical properties of calls are known to be shaped by physical constraints and the necessity of conveying information. As a consequence, investigating rhythmical properties in relation to different environmental conditions can help to shed light on the relationship between environment and species behavior from an evolutionary perspective. Sciaena umbra (fam.

The soundscape of swarming: Proof of concept for a noninvasive acoustic species identification of swarming bats.

Bats emit echolocation calls to orientate in their predominantly dark environment. Recording of species-specific calls can facilitate species identification, especially when mist netting is not feasible. However, some taxa, such as bats can be hard to distinguish acoustically.

Novel ideas to further expand the applicability of rhythm analysis.

The temporal structure of animals' acoustic signals can inform about context, urgency, species, individual identity, or geographical origin. We present three independent ideas to further expand the applicability of rhythm analysis for isochronous, that is, metronome-like, rhythms. A description of a rhythm or beat needs to include a description of its goodness of fit, meaning how well the rhythm describes a sequence.

A primer on rhythm quantification for fish sounds: a Mediterranean case study.

We have used a lately established workflow to quantify rhythms of three fish sound types recorded in different areas of the Mediterranean Sea. So far, the temporal structure of fish sound sequences has only been described qualitatively. Here, we propose a standardized approach to quantify them, opening the path for assessment and comparison of an often underestimated but potentially critical aspect of fish sounds.

Babbling in a vocal learning bat resembles human infant babbling.

Babbling is a production milestone in infant speech development. Evidence for babbling in nonhuman mammals is scarce, which has prevented cross-species comparisons. In this study, we investigated the conspicuous babbling behavior of , a bat capable of vocal production learning.

Assessing acoustic competition between sibling frog species using rhythm analysis.

Male frog advertisement calls are species-specific vocalizations used to attract females for breeding. However, it is possible for environmental or biological sounds to overlap these calls in both frequency and duration resulting in signal confusion, influencing female decision and/or location abilities. It is therefore important for vocal species competing for the same acoustic space to partition their calls either spatially or temporally (via call alternation or suppression).

The expression of miRNA encoded by C19MC and miR-371-3 strongly varies among individual placentas but does not differ between spontaneous and induced abortions.

miRNAs of the largest human miRNA gene cluster at all, i.e., C19MC, are almost exclusively expressed in the placenta.

Comparison of methods for rhythm analysis of complex animals' acoustic signals.

Analyzing the rhythm of animals' acoustic signals is of interest to a growing number of researchers: evolutionary biologists want to disentangle how these structures evolved and what patterns can be found, and ecologists and conservation biologists aim to discriminate cryptic species on the basis of parameters of acoustic signals such as temporal structures. Temporal structures are also relevant for research on vocal production learning, a part of which is for the animal to learn a temporal structure. These structures, in other words, these rhythms, are the topic of this paper.

General isochronous rhythm in echolocation calls and social vocalizations of the bat .

Rhythm is an essential component of human speech and music but very little is known about its evolutionary origin and its distribution in animal vocalizations. We found a regular rhythm in three multisyllabic vocalization types (echolocation call sequences, male territorial songs and pup isolation calls) of the neotropical bat . The intervals between element onsets were used to fit the rhythm for each individual.

Live Observation of Two Parallel Membrane Degradation Pathways at Axon Terminals.

Neurons are highly polarized cells that require continuous turnover of membrane proteins at axon terminals to develop, function, and survive. Yet, it is still unclear whether membrane protein degradation requires transport back to the cell body or whether degradation also occurs locally at the axon terminal, where live observation of sorting and degradation has remained a challenge. Here, we report direct observation of two cargo-specific membrane protein degradation mechanisms at axon terminals based on a live-imaging approach in intact Drosophila brains.

Assessment of stress responses in rhesus macaques (Macaca mulatta) to daily routine procedures in system neuroscience based on salivary cortisol concentrations.

Non-human primates participating in neurophysiological research are exposed to potentially stressful experimental procedures, such as dietary control protocols, surgical implants and their maintenance, or social separation during training and experimental session. Here, we investigated the effect of controlled access to fluid, surgical implants, implant-related cleaning of skin margins, and behavioral training sessions on salivary cortisol levels of adult male rhesus macaques participating in neurophysiological research. The animals were trained to chew flavored cotton swabs to non-invasively collect saliva samples.

Standardized automated training of rhesus monkeys for neuroscience research in their housing environment.

Teaching nonhuman primates the complex cognitive behavioral tasks that are central to cognitive neuroscience research is an essential and challenging endeavor. It is crucial for the scientific success that the animals learn to interpret the often complex task rules and reliably and enduringly act accordingly. To achieve consistent behavior and comparable learning histories across animals, it is desirable to standardize training protocols.

Sensory integration and neuromodulatory feedback facilitate Drosophila mechanonociceptive behavior.

Nociception is an evolutionarily conserved mechanism to encode and process harmful environmental stimuli. Like most animals, Drosophila melanogaster larvae respond to a variety of nociceptive stimuli, including noxious touch and temperature, with stereotyped escape responses through activation of multimodal nociceptors. How behavioral responses to these different modalities are processed and integrated by the downstream network remains poorly understood.

Assessment and significance of phytoplankton species composition within Chesapeake Bay and Virginia tributaries through a long-term monitoring program.

Phytoplankton and water quality long term trends are presented from a 20-year monitoring program of Chesapeake Bay and several of its major tributaries. Increasing phytoplankton biomass and abundance are ongoing within this estuarine complex, with diatoms the dominant component, along with chlorophytes and cyanobacteria as sub-dominant contributors in the tidal freshwater and oligohaline regions. Diatoms, dinoflagellates, and cryptomonads are among the major flora downstream in the tributaries and within the Chesapeake Bay.

[Patient with hypertension and bilateral renal artery stenosis].

A patient story regarding a young man with hypertension and bilateral renal artery stenosis is presented. The value of renography/captopril renography in connection with selective renal vein renin sampling is discussed.