It has recently been recognised that populations are rarely in demographic equilibrium, but rather in a 'transient' state. To examine how transient dynamics influence our empirical understanding of the links between changes in demographic rates and population growth, we conducted a 32-year study of Columbian ground squirrels. The population increased rapidly for 10 years, followed by a 2-year crash, and a gradual 19-year recovery.
View Article and Find Full Text PDFObjective: The methodology employed in this research was designed to identify and characterize the infectious bursal disease virus (IBDV) at the molecular level, originating from recent outbreaks in Bangladesh.
Materials And Methods: The IBDV outbreak farm was investigated, and bursa of fabricius (BF) specimens were acquired from infected chickens. Initially, viruses in the processed samples were detected in chicken embryo fibroblast (CEF) cells, and the RT-PCR method was used to confirm IBDV.
Introduction: Dodecafluoropentane emulsion (DDFPe) administration has previously demonstrated improved gas exchange in single-organ perfusion models. This could translate to prevention of brain injury in cardiac arrest.
Methods: We induced cardiac arrest in 12 pigs, performing CPR after 5-minute downtime.
Genetic rescue-an increase in population fitness following the introduction of new alleles-has been proven to ameliorate inbreeding depression in small, isolated populations, yet is rarely applied as a conservation tool. A lingering question regarding genetic rescue in wildlife conservation is how long beneficial effects persist in admixed populations. Using data collected over 40 years from 1192 endangered Florida panthers (Puma concolor coryi) across nine generations, we show that the experimental genetic rescue implemented in 1995-via the release of eight female pumas from Texas-alleviated morphological, genetic, and demographic correlates of inbreeding depression, subsequently preventing extirpation of the population.
View Article and Find Full Text PDFIntroduction: Health-facility data serves as a primary source for monitoring service provision and guiding the attainment of health targets. District Health Information Software (DHIS2) is a free open software predominantly used in low and middle-income countries to manage the facility-based data and monitor program wise service delivery. Evidence suggests the lack of quality in the routine maternal and child health information, however there is no robust analysis to evaluate the extent of its inaccuracy.
View Article and Find Full Text PDFIntroduction: Chronic obstructive pulmonary disease is a prevalent respiratory condition with permanent and progressively decreasing airflow limitation. Chronic obstructive pulmonary disease causes more than 3 million deaths per year globally, making it the third leading cause of death globally. The aim of this study was to find out the prevalence of chronic obstructive pulmonary disease among patients admitted to the Department of Medicine in a tertiary care centre.
View Article and Find Full Text PDFThe richness and composition of a small mammal community inhabiting semiarid California oak woodland may be changing in response to climate change, but we know little about the causes or consequence of these changes. We applied a capture-mark-recapture model to 17 years (1997-2013) of live trapping data to estimate species-specific abundances. The big-eared woodrat was the most frequently captured species in the area, contributing 58% of total captures.
View Article and Find Full Text PDFPopulations of some fish- and meat-eating birds suffered dramatic declines globally following the introduction of organochlorine pesticides during the late 1940s and 1950s. It has been hypothesised that these population declines during the 1950s-1970s were largely driven by a combination of reproductive failure due to eggshell-thinning, egg breakage and embryonic death attributable to DDT and its metabolites, and to enhanced mortality attributable to the more toxic cyclodiene compounds such as aldrin and dieldrin. Using 75 years (1946-2021) of Peregrine falcon (Falco peregrinus) monitoring data (315 unique nest-sites monitored for 6110 nest-years), we studied the breeding performance of a resident Peregrine population in southern Scotland relative to the spatiotemporal pattern of organochlorine pesticide use.
View Article and Find Full Text PDFIntroduction: Community-acquired pneumonia is an acute infection of lung tissue in an immunocompetent patient who have not recently been hospitalized or has been hospitalized for less than 48 hours and acquired it in the community. It continues to have a substantial effect on the elderly, who are impacted more often and severely than younger groups. It is the third most common hospital diagnosis in adults over the age of 65 years, and the sixth major cause of mortality in developed nations.
View Article and Find Full Text PDFHuman activities can influence behaviors of predators and prey, as well as predator-prey interactions. Using camera trap data, we investigated whether or to what extent human activities influenced behaviors of predators (tigers and leopards) and prey (sambar deer, spotted deer, wild boar, and barking deer), and predator-prey interactions in the Barandabhar Corridor Forest (BCF), Chitwan District, Nepal. A multispecies occupancy model revealed that the presence of humans altered the conditional occupancy of both prey and predator species.
View Article and Find Full Text PDFIntroduction: Diabetic ketoacidosis is one of the most severe acute complications of diabetes mellitus characterised by hyperglycemia, hyperketonemia, and metabolic acidosis. Prompt diagnosis and treatment of diabetic ketoacidosis can decrease severity, hospital stay, and possible mortality. This study aimed to find out the prevalence of diabetic ketoacidosis among diabetic patients admitted to the department of medicine of a tertiary care centre.
View Article and Find Full Text PDFProc Natl Acad Sci U S A
May 2023
Although over 50 y have passed since W. D. Hamilton articulated kin selection and inclusive fitness as evolutionary explanations for altruistic behavior, quantifying inclusive fitness continues to be challenging.
View Article and Find Full Text PDFAntimicrobial resistance is a global public health problem and is primarily driven by the widespread overuse of antibiotics. However, antimicrobial use data in animals are not readily available due to the absence of a national database in many developing countries, including Nepal. This study was conducted to estimate the quantities of antimicrobials available in Nepal as an indicator of their use in food-producing animals between 2018 and 2020.
View Article and Find Full Text PDFSome mammal species inhabiting high-latitude biomes have evolved a seasonal moulting pattern that improves camouflage via white coats in winter and brown coats in summer. In many high-latitude and high-altitude areas, the duration and depth of snow cover has been substantially reduced in the last five decades. This reduction in depth and duration of snow cover may create a mismatch between coat colour and colour of the background environment, and potentially reduce the survival rate of species that depend on crypsis.
View Article and Find Full Text PDFWild mammal populations exhibit a variety of dynamics, ranging from fairly stable with little change in population size over time to high-amplitude cyclic or erratic fluctuations. A persistent question in population ecology is why populations fluctuate as they do. Answering this seemingly simple question has proven to be challenging.
View Article and Find Full Text PDFThe fate of natural populations is mediated by complex interactions among vital rates, which can vary within and among years. Although the effects of random, among-year variation in vital rates have been studied extensively, relatively little is known about how periodic, nonrandom variation in vital rates affects populations. This knowledge gap is potentially alarming as global environmental change is projected to alter common periodic variations, such as seasonality.
View Article and Find Full Text PDFIteroparous species may reproduce at many different ages, resulting in a reproductive dispersion that affects the damping of population perturbations, and varies among life histories. Since generation time ( ) is known to capture aspects of life-history variation, such as life-history speed, does also determine reproductive dispersion ( ) or damping time ( )? Using phylogenetically corrected analyses on 633 species of animals and plants, we find, firstly, that reproductive dispersion scales isometrically with . Secondly, and unexpectedly, we find that the damping time ( ) does not scale isometrically with generation time, but instead changes only as with (also, there is a similar scaling with ).
View Article and Find Full Text PDFOptimal reproductive strategies evolve from the interplay between an individual's intrinsic state and extrinsic environment, both factors that are rarely fixed over its lifetime. Conditional breeding tactics might be one evolutionary trajectory allowing individuals to maximize fitness. We apply multi-state capture-mark-recapture analysis to a detailed 8-year data set of free-ranging house mice in a growing population to discern causes and fitness consequences of two alternative reproductive tactics in females, communal and solitary breeding.
View Article and Find Full Text PDFBackground: Lumbosacral transforaminal epidural steroid injection (LTFESI) is a commonly performed intervention for treating radicular pain. While factors that predict pain improvement after LTFESI have been evaluated, minimal literature exists regarding predictors of functional improvement.
Purpose: To identify factors that are associated with functional improvement at short-term follow-up after LTFESI.
In semi-arid environments, aperiodic rainfall pulses determine plant production and resource availability for higher trophic levels, creating strong bottom-up regulation. The influence of climatic factors on population vital rates often shapes the dynamics of small mammal populations in such resource-restricted environments. Using a 21-year biannual capture-recapture dataset (1993 to 2014), we examined the impacts of climatic factors on the population dynamics of the brush mouse () in semi-arid oak woodland of coastal-central California.
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