Commonly used two-sex discrete-time population projection models rely on mating functions developed for continuous-time frameworks that overestimate the number of unions between reproductive individuals. This has important consequences for our understanding of the evolution and demography of two-sex populations and consequently for management and conservation. Here, we propose a novel mating function that is robust by obeying all properties necessary to be ecologically valid and flexible by accommodating all mating systems and efficiency in mating encounters.
View Article and Find Full Text PDFClimate change is projected to increase the frequency and intensity of extreme heat events, and may increase humidity levels, leading to coupled thermal and hydric stress. However, how humidity modulates the impacts of heat stress on species and their interactions is currently unknown. Using an insect host-parasitoid interaction: the Indian meal moth, , and its endoparasitoid wasp, , we investigated how humidity interacted with heat stress duration, applied at different host developmental stages, to affect life history traits.
View Article and Find Full Text PDFThe possibility of an autoparametric resonance in an isolated many-particle system induces a specific behavior of the particles in the presence of thermal noise. In particular, the variance associated with a resonant mode, and consequently that of the associated particles, is strongly increased compared to what it would have in the absence of parametric resonance. In this paper we consider a dimer submitted to a periodic potential for which there are only two modes, the center of mass motion and the internal vibration mode.
View Article and Find Full Text PDFIntroduction: The mental health of residents is a growing significant concern, particularly with respect to hospital and university training conditions. Our goal was to assess the professional, academic, and psychological determinants of the mental health status of all residents of the academy of Lyon, France.
Materials And Methods: The Health Barometer of Lyon Subdivision Residents (BASIL) is an initiative which consists in proposing a recurrent online survey to all residents in medicine, pharmacy, and dentistry, belonging to the Lyon subdivision.
Peste des petits ruminants virus (PPRV) causes a highly infectious disease affecting mainly goats and sheep in large parts of Africa, Asia, and the Middle East and has an important impact on the global economy and food security. Full genome sequencing of PPRV strains has proved to be critical to increasing our understanding of PPR epidemiology and to inform the ongoing global efforts for its eradication. However, the number of full PPRV genomes published is still limited and with a heavy bias towards recent samples and genetic Lineage IV (LIV), which is only one of the four existing PPRV lineages.
View Article and Find Full Text PDFA dimer on a periodic potential is a simple system that exhibits a surprisingly rich dynamics. This system is conservative, but it is nonlinear and nonintegrable. In a previous work, we evidenced the autoparametric excitation of the relative motion by the center of mass in two limiting cases (very small or very large initial energy, compared to the external potential depth).
View Article and Find Full Text PDFIndividuals with complete cervical spinal cord injury suffer from a permanent paralysis of upper limbs which prevents them from achieving most of the activities of daily living. We developed a neuroprosthetic solution to restore hand motor function. Electrical stimulation of the radial and median nerves by means of two epineural electrodes enabled functional movements of paralyzed hands.
View Article and Find Full Text PDFWe study a dimer in a periodic potential well, which is a conservative but nonintegrable system. This seemingly simple system exhibits a surprisingly rich dynamics. Using a systematic asymptotic analysis, we demonstrate that the translation mode of the dimer (center of mass motion) may induce a parametric resonance of the oscillatory mode.
View Article and Find Full Text PDFBackground: FES-Cycling is an exciting recreational activity, which allows certain individuals after spinal cord injury or stroke to exercise their paralyzed muscles. The key for a successful application is to activate the right muscles at the right time.
Methods: While a stimulation pattern is usually determined empirically, we propose an approach using the torque feedback provided by a commercially available crank power-meter installed on a standard trike modified for FES-Cycling.
Rift Valley fever (RVF) is a mosquito-borne disease mostly affecting wild and domestic ruminants. It is widespread in Africa, with spillovers in the Arab Peninsula and the southwestern Indian Ocean. Although RVF has been circulating in West Africa for more than 30 years, its epidemiology is still not clearly understood.
View Article and Find Full Text PDFThe familial structure of a population and the relatedness of its individuals are determined by its demography. There is, however, no general method to infer kinship directly from the life cycle of a structured population. Yet, this question is central to fields such as ecology, evolution and conservation, especially in contexts where there is a strong interdependence between familial structure and population dynamics.
View Article and Find Full Text PDFAbstractHere, we propose a theory for the structure of communities of competing species. We include ecologically realistic assumptions, such as density dependence and stochastic fluctuations in the environment, and analyze how evolution caused by - and -selection will affect the packing of species in the phenotypic space as well as the species abundance distribution. Species-specific traits have the same matrix of additive genetic variances and covariances, and evolution of mean traits is affected by fluctuations in population size of all species.
View Article and Find Full Text PDFThe persistence of wildlife populations is under threat as a consequence of human activities, which are degrading natural ecosystems. Commercial forestry is the greatest threat to biodiversity in boreal forests. Forestry practices have degraded most available habitat, threatening the persistence of natural populations.
View Article and Find Full Text PDFThe World Organisation for Animal Health advocates the zoning approach for the surveillance and monitoring of foot and mouth disease (FMD), a highly contagious animal disease. Our purpose is to implement the zoning approach in Tunisia by identifying existing natural and artificial barriers to the movement of live animals. A Geographic Information System (GIS)-based MultiCriteria Evaluation approach was developed.
View Article and Find Full Text PDFPeste des petits ruminants (PPR) is a deadly viral disease that mainly affects small domestic ruminants. This disease threaten global food security and rural economy but its control is complicated notably because of extensive, poorly monitored animal movements in infected regions. Here we combined the largest PPR virus genetic and animal mobility network data ever collected in a single region to improve our understanding of PPR endemic transmission dynamics in West African countries.
View Article and Find Full Text PDFAssessing the role played by purifying selection on a susceptibility allele to late-onset disease (SALOD) is crucial to understanding the puzzling allelic spectrum of a disease, because most alleles are recent and rare. This fact is surprising because it suggests that alleles are under purifying selection while those that are involved in post-menopause mortality are often considered neutral in the genetic literature. The aim of this article is to use an evolutionary demography model to assess the magnitude of selection on SALODs while accounting for epidemiological and sociocultural factors.
View Article and Find Full Text PDFThis article presents a participative and iterative qualitative risk assessment framework that can be used to evaluate the spatial variation of the risk of infectious animal disease introduction and spread on a national scale. The framework was developed through regional training action workshops and field activities. The active involvement of national animal health services enabled the identification, collection and hierarchization of risk factors.
View Article and Find Full Text PDFThe place of families in intensive care is still too often underestimated. However, the involvement of family members would have multiple benefits for patients, but also for those around them. Family participation is a promising concept that needs to be studied on the ground and on a large scale, in order to prove itself and guide health professionals in their daily practice.
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