The Epidemiological Investigation of , , and Arenavirus Infections in Small Mammals in Northwestern Iran.

The control and prevention of rodent-borne diseases are mainly based on our knowledge of ecology and the infectious status of their reservoir hosts. This study aimed to evaluate the prevalence of , , and arenavirus infections in small mammals and to assess the potential of disease occurrence in East Azerbaijan, northwest of Iran, in 2017 and 2018. Spleen and lung samples were obtained from all trapped small mammals.

The bii4africa dataset of faunal and floral population intactness estimates across Africa's major land uses.

Sub-Saharan Africa is under-represented in global biodiversity datasets, particularly regarding the impact of land use on species' population abundances. Drawing on recent advances in expert elicitation to ensure data consistency, 200 experts were convened using a modified-Delphi process to estimate 'intactness scores': the remaining proportion of an 'intact' reference population of a species group in a particular land use, on a scale from 0 (no remaining individuals) to 1 (same abundance as the reference) and, in rare cases, to 2 (populations that thrive in human-modified landscapes). The resulting bii4africa dataset contains intactness scores representing terrestrial vertebrates (tetrapods: ±5,400 amphibians, reptiles, birds, mammals) and vascular plants (±45,000 forbs, graminoids, trees, shrubs) in sub-Saharan Africa across the region's major land uses (urban, cropland, rangeland, plantation, protected, etc.

Adaptation in brain structure and respiratory and olfactory structures across environmental gradients in African and North American muroid rodents.

Morphometric studies of 3D micro CT-scanned images can provide insights into the evolution of the brain and sensory structures but such data are still scarce for the most diverse mammalian order of rodents. From reviewed and new data, we tested for convergence to extreme aridity and high elevation in the sensory and brain morphology of rodents, from morphometric data from micro-CT X-ray scans of 174 crania of 16 species of three distantly related African murid (soft-furred mice, Praomyini, laminate-toothed rats, Otomyini, and gerbils, Gerbillinae) clades and one North American cricetid (deer mice and white-footed mice, Peromyscus) clade. Recent studies demonstrated convergent evolution acting on the oval window area of the cochlea (enlarged in extremely arid-adapted species of Otomyini and Gerbillinae) and on endocranial volume (reduced in high elevation taxa of Otomyini and Peromyscus).

Quaternary rodents of South Africa: A companion guide for cranio-dental identification.

Rodentia is the most species-rich order among mammals. The Republic of South Africa harbours a high rodent diversity whose taxonomy and phylogeny have been extensively studied using genetic tools. Such advances have led to the establishment of new faunal lists for the country.

Counter-gradient variation and the expensive tissue hypothesis explain parallel brain size reductions at high elevation in cricetid and murid rodents.

To better understand functional morphological adaptations to high elevation (> 3000 m above sea level) life in both North American and African mountain-associated rodents, we used microCT scanning to acquire 3D images and a 3D morphometric approach to calculate endocranial volumes and skull lengths. This was done on 113 crania of low-elevation and high-elevation populations in species of North American cricetid mice (two Peromyscus species, n = 53), and African murid rodents of two tribes, Otomyini (five species, n = 49) and Praomyini (four species, n = 11). We tested two distinct hypotheses for how endocranial volume might vary in high-elevation populations: the expensive tissue hypothesis, which predicts that brain and endocranial volumes will be reduced to lessen the costs of growing and maintaining a large brain; and the brain-swelling hypothesis, which predicts that endocranial volumes will be increased either as a direct phenotypic effect or as an adaptation to accommodate brain swelling and thus minimize pathological symptoms of altitude sickness.

Incongruences between morphology and molecular phylogeny provide an insight into the diversification of the Crocidura poensis species complex.

Untangling the factors of morphological evolution has long held a central role in the study of evolutionary biology. Extant speciose clades that have only recently diverged are ideal study subjects, as they allow the examination of rapid morphological variation in a phylogenetic context, providing insights into a clade's evolution. Here, we focus on skull morphological variability in a widely distributed shrew species complex, the Crocidura poensis species complex.

Expert range maps of global mammal distributions harmonised to three taxonomic authorities.

Aim: Comprehensive, global information on species' occurrences is an essential biodiversity variable and central to a range of applications in ecology, evolution, biogeography and conservation. Expert range maps often represent a species' only available distributional information and play an increasing role in conservation assessments and macroecology. We provide global range maps for the native ranges of all extant mammal species harmonised to the taxonomy of the Mammal Diversity Database (MDD) mobilised from two sources, the (HMW) and the (CMW).

Skull morphological evolution in Malagasy endemic Nesomyinae rodents.

Madagascar is a large island to the south-east of Africa and in many ways continental in size and ecological complexity. Here we aim to define how skull morphology of an endemic and monophyletic clade of rodents (sub-family Nesomyinae), that show considerable morphological variation, have evolved and how their disparity is characterized in context of the geographical and ecological complexity of the island. We performed a two-dimensional geometric morphometric analysis on 370 dorsal and 399 ventral skull images of 19 species (comprising all nine extant endemic genera) and tested the influence of three ecological parameters (climate, locomotor habitat and nychthemeral cycle) in a phylogenetic context on size and shape.

The Thorny Issue of African Porcupines: a New Mandible of from Olduvai Gorge (Tanzania) and Rediagnosis of the Species.

Unlabelled: Several porcupine taxa are reported from the middle Miocene to the early Holocene in the Old World. Among these, five species of the subfamily Hystricinae occurred in Africa approximately in the last 6 Ma: the extinct , , and and the still living and . The large-sized is reported from numerous sites in East and South Africa between the early Pliocene and Early Pleistocene.

Nuclear phylogenomics, but not mitogenomics, resolves the most successful Late Miocene radiation of African mammals (Rodentia: Muridae: Arvicanthini).

The tribe Arvicanthini (Muridae: Murinae) is a highly diversified group of rodents (ca. 100 species) and with 18 African genera (plus one Asiatic) represents probably the most successful adaptive radiation of extant mammals in Africa. They colonized a broad spectrum of habitats (from rainforests to semi-deserts) in whole sub-Saharan Africa and their members often belong to most abundant parts of mammal communities.

Multilocus phylogeny of African striped grass mice (Lemniscomys): Stripe pattern only partly reflects evolutionary relationships.

Murine rodents are one of the most evolutionary successful groups of extant mammals. They are also important for human as vectors and reservoirs of zoonoses and agricultural pests. Unfortunately, their fast and relatively recent diversification impedes our understanding of phylogenetic relationships and species limits of many murine taxa, including those with very conspicuous phenotype that has been frequently used for taxonomic purposes.

Life history and habitat do not mediate temporal changes in body size due to climate warming in rodents.

Temporal changes in body size have been documented in a number of vertebrate species, with different contested drivers being suggested to explain these changes. Among these are climate warming, resource availability, competition, predation risk, human population density, island effects and others. Both life history traits (intrinsic factors such as lifespan and reproductive rate) and habitat (extrinsic factors such as vegetation type, latitude and elevation) are expected to mediate the existence of a significant temporal response of body size to climate warming but neither have been widely investigated.

Tracking the Near Eastern origins and European dispersal of the western house mouse.

The house mouse (Mus musculus) represents the extreme of globalization of invasive mammals. However, the timing and basis of its origin and early phases of dispersal remain poorly documented. To track its synanthropisation and subsequent invasive spread during the develoment of complex human societies, we analyzed 829 Mus specimens from 43 archaeological contexts in Southwestern Asia and Southeastern Europe, between 40,000 and 3,000 cal.

Dating the skull from Broken Hill, Zambia, and its position in human evolution.

The cranium from Broken Hill (Kabwe) was recovered from cave deposits in 1921, during metal ore mining in what is now Zambia. It is one of the best-preserved skulls of a fossil hominin, and was initially designated as the type specimen of Homo rhodesiensis, but recently it has often been included in the taxon Homo heidelbergensis. However, the original site has since been completely quarried away, and-although the cranium is often estimated to be around 500 thousand years old-its unsystematic recovery impedes its accurate dating and placement in human evolution.

The phylogeny of the African wood mice (Muridae, Hylomyscus) based on complete mitochondrial genomes and five nuclear genes reveals their evolutionary history and undescribed diversity.

Wood mice of the genus Hylomyscus, are small-sized rodents widely distributed in lowland and montane rainforests in tropical Africa, where they can be locally abundant. Recent morphological and molecular studies have increased the number of recognized species from 8 to 18 during the last 15 years. We used complete mitochondrial genomes and five nuclear genes to infer the number of candidate species within this genus and depict its evolutionary history.

Associated tympanic bullar and cochlear hypertrophy define adaptations to true deserts in African gerbils and laminate-toothed rats (Muridae: Gerbillinae and Murinae).

Hearing capabilities in desert rodents such as gerbils and heteromyids have been inferred from both anatomical and ecological aspects and tested with experiments and theoretical models. However, very few studies have focused on other desert-adapted species. In this study, a refined three-dimensional morphometric approach was used on three African rodent tribes (Otomyini, Taterillini and Gerbillini) to describe the cochlear and tympanic bullar morphology, and to explore the role of phylogeny, allometry and ecology to better understand the underlying mechanism of any observed trends of hypertrophy in the bulla and associated changes in the cochlea.

Notes on the distribution and phylogeography of two rare small Gerbillinae (Rodentia, Muridae) in Morocco: Gerbillus simoni and Gerbillus henleyi.

Even though Gerbillinae rodents represent an important part of the mammalian fauna in North Africa, many gaps remain in our understanding of the distribution, ecology, evolution, and systematics of some lesser known species in this family. We present in this study the most recent findings on two of these species. The first species, Gerbillus simoni Lataste, 1881, is a short-tailed, small gerbil, endemic to North Africa.

Out of Africa: demographic and colonization history of the Algerian mouse (Mus spretus Lataste).

North Africa is now recognized as a major area for the emergence and dispersal of anatomically modern humans from at least 315 kya. The Mediterranean Basin is thus particularly suited to study the role of climate versus human-mediated changes on the evolutionary history of species. The Algerian mouse (Mus spretus Lataste) is an endemic species from this basin, with its distribution restricted to North Africa (from Libya to Morocco), Iberian Peninsula and South of France.

[Craniometrical study of the species complex of Meriones shawii-grandis (Mammalia: Rodentia) in Morocco, in Algeria and in Tunisia].

In North Africa, the rodents of the species complex Meriones shawii-grandis have a considerable ecological, economic and epidemiological importance. Until now, the systematics of these species was subject to discussion due to the presence of populations displaying high morphological variability. By means of an approach of traditional morphometrics based on cranial distances and by using the method of the log shape-ratio, we attempt to characterize morphologically these two taxa.

Reconstructing Asian faunal introductions to eastern Africa from multi-proxy biomolecular and archaeological datasets.

Human-mediated biological exchange has had global social and ecological impacts. In sub-Saharan Africa, several domestic and commensal animals were introduced from Asia in the pre-modern period; however, the timing and nature of these introductions remain contentious. One model supports introduction to the eastern African coast after the mid-first millennium CE, while another posits introduction dating back to 3000 BCE.

Host evolution in Mastomys natalensis (Rodentia: Muridae): An integrative approach using geometric morphometrics and genetics.

The commensal rodent Mastomys natalensis is the natural reservoir of Lassa arenavirus (LASV), which causes hemorrhagic fever in West Africa. To study a possible effect of the virus on phenotypic and genotypic variation of its persistently infected host, we compared LASV-positive and non-infected wild-caught M. natalensis.

Phylogeography and evolutionary history of the Crocidura olivieri complex (Mammalia, Soricomorpha): from a forest origin to broad ecological expansion across Africa.

Background: This study aims to reconstruct the evolutionary history of African shrews referred to the Crocidura olivieri complex. We tested the respective role of forest retraction/expansion during the Pleistocene, rivers (allopatric models), ecological gradients (parapatric model) and anthropogenic factors in explaining the distribution and diversification within this species complex. We sequenced three mitochondrial and four nuclear markers from 565 specimens encompassing the known distribution of the complex, i.

[Importance of Shaw's Jird Meriones shawii within the trophic components of the Barn Owl Tyto alba in steppic areas of Algeria].

The study of the diet of the Barn Owl in two steppic regions (M'Sila and Djelfa) located in the Algerian highlands is based on the analysis of the pellets of rejections collected in six stations. The analysis of 706 pellets resulting from the various stations made it possible to count 1380 individuals, represented by seven classes, 12 orders, 32 families, and 76 species of preys. The mammals are consumed with variable abundance rates between 59.

Molecular phylogeny of hantaviruses harbored by insectivorous bats in Côte d'Ivoire and Vietnam.

The recent discovery of genetically distinct hantaviruses in multiple species of shrews and moles prompted a further exploration of their host diversification by analyzing frozen, ethanol-fixed and RNAlater®-preserved archival tissues and fecal samples from 533 bats (representing seven families, 28 genera and 53 species in the order Chiroptera), captured in Asia, Africa and the Americas in 1981-2012, using RT-PCR. Hantavirus RNA was detected in Pomona roundleaf bats (Hipposideros pomona) (family Hipposideridae), captured in Vietnam in 1997 and 1999, and in banana pipistrelles (Neoromicia nanus) (family Vespertilionidae), captured in Côte d'Ivoire in 2011. Phylogenetic analysis, based on the full-length S- and partial M- and L-segment sequences using maximum likelihood and Bayesian methods, demonstrated that the newfound hantaviruses formed highly divergent lineages, comprising other recently recognized bat-borne hantaviruses in Sierra Leone and China.

Nonlinear projection methods for visualizing Barcode data and application on two data sets.

Developing tools for visualizing DNA sequences is an important issue in the Barcoding context. Visualizing Barcode data can be put in a purely statistical context, unsupervised learning. Clustering methods combined with projection methods have two closely linked objectives, visualizing and finding structure in the data.