Publications by authors named "Mozafar Sharifi"

Inter-annual variation in weather conditions has been shown to affect the reproductive phenological patterns of many organisms. Because of their relatively small body size and dependence on ectothermic prey, temperate-zone insectivorous bats are particularly sensitive to adverse spring environmental conditions that affect the duration of gestation and timing of parturition in these animals. This study aimed to compare phenological recruitment, birth seasonality and synchrony and morphological changes during postnatal growth in Rhinolophus euryale, Rhinolophus ferrumequinum and Myotis emarginatus in two consecutive years representing a typical dry (2015) and an extremely wet climatic event (2016) in a nursing colony in Kerend cave, western Iran.

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Postnatal development of vocalization has been studied in a small number of bats, not including the Geoffroy's bat, . In the present study, we investigated vocalization development at a maternity roost of in Kerend Cave in western Iran by sequential measurement of acoustic parameters in known-age neonates using mark-recapture sampling. Newborn pups of produced both short and isolation calls.

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Phylogeography is often used to investigate the effects of glacial cycles on current genetic structure of various plant and animal species. This approach can also identify the number and location of glacial refugia as well as the recolonization routes from those refugia to the current locations. To identify the location of glacial refugia of the Yellow-spotted mountain newt, we employed phylogeography patterns and genetic variability of this species by analyzing partial ND4 sequences (867 bp) of 67 specimens from 15 sampling localities from the whole species range in Iran and Iraq.

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In this paper, we investigate the genetic structure and phylogeography of , using the mitochondrial cytochrome b gene (1017 bp) in Iran and adjacent regions. The total haplotype and nucleotide diversity are 0.63 ± 0.

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This study investigates the population genetic structure of Miniopterus pallidus using the D-loop region of mitochondrial DNA (331 bp) from 13 localities in Iran. We found a high number of haplotypes (N = 43) and high nucleotide diversity (π = 0.02).

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We simultaneously monitored postnatal growth and vocalization development in a free living population of the long-fingered bat, , in a maternity colony in the Mahidasht cave, western Iran. Length of forearm and body mass of 1-day-old neonates averaged 19.59 ± 1.

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Molecular phylogeography and species distribution modelling (SDM) suggest that late Quaternary glacial cycles have portrayed a significant role in structuring current population genetic structure and diversity. Based on phylogenetic relationships using Bayesian inference and maximum likelihood of 535 bp mtDNA (D-loop) and 745 bp mtDNA (Cytb) in 62 individuals of the Mediterranean Horseshoe Bat, Rhinolophus euryale, from 13 different localities in Iran we identified two subspecific populations with differing population genetic structure distributed in southern Zagros Mts. and northern Elburz Mts.

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To examine the level of genetic differentiation in the sequences of the mitochondrial D-loop gene of Rhinolophus ferrumequinum, and to evaluate the current taxonomic status of this species, 50 tissue samples of greater horseshoe bats were collected in 2011-2015 from 21 different localities in northwest, northeast, west, central, and south regions of Iran. Twenty-two published D-loop sequences from Europe (Switzerland, United Kingdom, Bulgaria, and Tunisia), and Anatolia (south, west, and east Turkey) were downloaded from GenBank. Molecular genetic analyses revealed remarkable variation among populations of R.

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In this study, we examined cannibalistic behavior, growth, metamorphosis, and survival in larval and post-metamorph endangered yellow spotted mountain newts Neurergus microspilotus hatched and reared in a captive breeding facility. We designed a 2 × 2 factorial experiment, crossing two levels of food with two levels of density including high food/high density, high food/low density, low food/high density, and low food/low density. The level of cannibalistic behavior (including the loss of fore and hind limbs, missing toes, tail, gills, body damage, and whole body consumption) changed as the larvae grew, from a low level during the first 4 weeks, peaking from weeks 7 to 12, and then dropped during weeks 14-52.

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Species often exhibit different levels of genetic structuring correlated to their environment. However, understanding how environmental heterogeneity influences genetic variation is difficult because the effects of gene flow, drift and selection are confounded. We investigated the genetic variation and its ecological correlates in an endemic and critically endangered stream breeding mountain newt, Neurergus kaiseri, within its entire range in southwestern Iran.

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A complex wide-range study on the haemoproteid parasites of chelonians was carried out for the first time. Altogether, 811 samples from four tortoise species from an extensive area between western Morocco and eastern Afghanistan and between Romania and southern Syria were studied by a combination of microscopic and molecular-genetic methods. Altogether 160 Haemoproteus-positive samples were gathered in the area between central Anatolia and eastern Afghanistan.

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In the present study, a protocol was optimized for establishment of callus and cell suspension culture of Scrophularia striata Boiss. as a strategy to obtain an in vitro acteoside producing cell line for the first time. The effects of growth regulators were analyzed to optimize the biomass growth and acteoside production.

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We studied variation of ectoparasite load in a free ranging populations of Mehely's horseshoe bat (Rhinolophus mehelyi) on five successive occasions in a nursery roost in western Iran. In total, 87 Rhinolophus mehelyi were captured. The patterns of abundance differed greatly among parasite species but total parasite load was markedly higher in pregnant females in spring and early summer and lower in solitary males.

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Carvacrol is a major component of Satureja khuzistanica Jamzad (≤90%) that has significant antimicrobial and antioxidant properties. Considering the specific capabilities of S. khuzistanica to produce highly pure carvacrol, this plant is an important potential source of carvacrol that could address the abundant consumption and increasing demand for this monoterpene in current world markets.

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Background: Many members of the genus Satureja have aromatic and medicinal characteristics. Objectives.

Objectives: The purpose of the present work was to determine cytotoxic activity of the essential oil of S.

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The effects of Piriformospora indica and Glomus mosseae on some growth and physiological parameters, and cadmium (Cd) amounts in Triticum aestivum cv. Sardari39 plants under the toxic levels of Cd were investigated. The experiment was carried out including four treatments (P.

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Podophyllotoxin (PTOX) is a naturally occurring phenolic compound isolated as an active anti-tumor agent. The stimulatory influence of light on the formation of phenolic compounds has been reported, but the molecular mechanism underlying the effect of light on the expression of genes involved in phenolic biosynthesis, especially of lignans, is still not fully understood. A series of experiments was carried out using ordinary fluorescent lamps to study the influence of light irradiation on growth and PTOX accumulation in Linum album cell cultures by varying the type of light and periods of exposure.

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Hyoscyamine and scopolamine tropane alkaloids found in several solanaceous plants are anticholinergic drugs. Hyoscyamine 6β-hydroxylase (H6H) catalyzes two consecutive oxidation reactions. The first reaction is the hydroxylation of hyoscyamine to 6β-hydroxyhyoscyamine and the second is epoxidation of 6β-hydroxyhyoscyamine yielding scopolamine that is the final metabolite in the tropane alkaloid biosynthetic pathway.

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Linum album has been shown to accumulate anti-tumor podophyllotoxin (PTOX) and its related lignans. In the present study, we examined the effects of five fungal extracts on the production of lignans in L. album cell cultures.

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Context: Suspension cultures of Linum album Kotschy ex Boiss. (Linaceae) accumulate podophyllotoxin (an anticancer agent) and could therefore serve as an alternative source of this important aryltetralin lactone lignan.

Objective: The present work compared four podophyllotoxin extraction methods and optimization of the best one by using single factor experiments.

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Plants are a potential source of a large number of valuable secondary metabolites. In vitro cultures are being considered as an alternative to agricultural processes for studying valuable secondary metabolites. In this way, nutritive factors are important parameters influencing the production of these compounds in plants.

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Treatment of Linum album cell cultures with 10 μM salicylic acid (SA) for 3 days improved podophyllotoxin (PTOX) production up to 333 μg/g dry weight (DW): over three times that of the control cultures. qPCR analyses showed that in SA-treated cells, the expression of the genes coding for phenylalanine ammonia-lyase (PAL), cinnamoyl-CoA reductase (CCR) and cinnamyl-alcohol dehydrogenase (CAD), all involved in the first steps of PTOX biosynthesis, also increased reaching a peak 8-12 h after the treatment. Expression of the pinoresinol-lariciresinol reductase gene (PLR), which is involved in one of the last biosynthetic steps, was not affected by SA.

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The evaluation of a hazardous waste disposal site is a complicated process because it requires data from diverse social and environmental fields. These data often involve processing of a significant amount of spatial information which can be used by GIS as an important tool for land use suitability analysis. This paper presents a multi-criteria decision analysis alongside with a geospatial analysis for the selection of hazardous waste landfill sites in Kurdistan Province, western Iran.

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Phylogeographical studies are typically based on haplotype data, occasionally on nuclear markers such as microsatellites, but rarely combine both. This is unfortunate because the use of markers with contrasting modes of inheritance and rates of evolution might provide a more accurate and comprehensive understanding of a species' history. Here we present a detailed study of the phylogeography of the greater horseshoe bat, Rhinolophus ferrumequinum, using 1098 bp of the mitochondrial ND2 gene from 45 localities from across its Palaearctic range to infer population history.

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