Effects of harmful algal blooms and associated water-quality on endangered Lost River and shortnose suckers.

Anthropogenic eutrophication contributes to harmful blooms of cyanobacteria in freshwater ecosystems worldwide. In Upper Klamath Lake, Oregon, massive blooms of Aphanizomenon flos-aquae and smaller blooms of other cyanobacteria are associated with cyanotoxins, hypoxia, high pH, high concentrations of ammonia, and potentially hypercapnia. Recovery of the endangered Lost River sucker Deltistes luxatus and shortnose sucker Chasmistes brevirostris in Upper Klamath Lake is obstructed by low survival in the juvenile life stage.

Infection from Outdoor Sporting Events-More Risk than We Think?

Competitive sports that involve extensive contact with mud are commonly held events and growing in popularity. However, the natural environment contributes to infection risks, and these events have been implicated in multiple infectious disease outbreaks. Soils and mud contain rich microbial communities and can include pathogens (including viruses, bacteria, and parasites), thereby offering risk of infection; there is also a risk of disease due to shedding, by participants, of pathogens directly into the environment.

Growing Canopy on a College Campus: Understanding Urban Forest Change through Archival Records and Aerial Photography.

Many municipalities are setting ambitious tree canopy cover goals to increase the extent of their urban forests. A historical perspective on urban forest development can help cities strategize how to establish and achieve appropriate tree cover targets. To understand how long-term urban forest change occurs, we examined the history of trees on an urban college campus: the University of Pennsylvania in Philadelphia, PA.

Gene expression differences among three Neurospora species reveal genes required for sexual reproduction in Neurospora crassa.

Many fungi form complex three-dimensional fruiting bodies, within which the meiotic machinery for sexual spore production has been considered to be largely conserved over evolutionary time. Indeed, much of what we know about meiosis in plant and animal taxa has been deeply informed by studies of meiosis in Saccharomyces and Neurospora. Nevertheless, the genetic basis of fruiting body development and its regulation in relation to meiosis in fungi is barely known, even within the best studied multicellular fungal model Neurospora crassa.

Functional and phylogenetic implications of septal pore ultrastructure in the ascoma of Neolecta vitellina.

Neolecta represents the earliest derived extant ascomycete lineage (Taphrinomycotina) to produce ascomata. For this reason the genus has been of interest with regard to ascoma evolution in ascomycetes. However, the evidence is equivocal regarding whether the Neolecta ascoma is homologous or analogous to ascomata produced in the later derived ascomycete lineages (Pezizomycotina).