Impacts of Selective Predation on Infection Prevalence and Host Susceptibility.

Predation can alter diverse ecological processes, including host-parasite interactions. Selective predation, whereby predators preferentially feed on certain prey types, can affect prey density and selective pressures. Studies on selective predation in infected populations have primarily focused on predators preferentially feeding on infected prey.

Large-scale evaluation of outcomes after a genetic diagnosis in children with severe developmental disorders.

Purpose: We sought to evaluate outcomes for clinical management after a genetic diagnosis from the Deciphering Developmental Disorders study.

Methods: Individuals in the Deciphering Developmental Disorders study who had a pathogenic/likely pathogenic genotype in the DECIPHER database were selected for inclusion ( = 5010). Clinical notes from regional clinical genetics services notes were reviewed to assess predefined clinical outcomes relating to interventions, prenatal choices, and information provision.

New record of strawberry leopard () in Selous Game Reserve, Tanzania.

Strawberry or red leopards are a rare colour morph of leopard () characterised by spot markings that are red or brown instead of black, thought to be a result of a mutation in the tyrosinase-related protein (TYRP1) gene. We report the first record of this phenotype on the African continent outside of South Africa, from Selous Game Reserve in southern Tanzania. One female leopard with strawberry colouration was documented out of 373 individual leopards (0.

Understanding chemical pathways of brown centre formation in laboratory induced and conventionally dried nut-in-shell macadamia kernels.

World tree nut production has increased rapidly by around 50 % in the past decade; however, nut defects cause losses. For example, we know that brown centres are a major internal discolouration defect in macadamia nuts and are linked to the storage of nut-in-shell under improper conditions at high temperature and humidity. However, key chemical changes in brown centre kernels have not been described.

Microplastics impact simple aquatic food web dynamics through reduced zooplankton feeding and potentially releasing algae from consumer control.

Concentrations of microplastics in aquatic environments continue to rise due to industrial production and pollution. While there are various concerns regarding potential deleterious effects of microplastics on ecosystems, several knowledge gaps remain, including the potential for microplastics to directly and indirectly affect biotic interactions and food web dynamics. We explored the effects of environmentally relevant microplastic concentrations on two co-exposed species of herbaceous freshwater crustaceous zooplankton, filter feeding Daphnia dentifera and selective phytoplankton grazers Arctodiaptomus dorsalis.

Epidemics in native species influence the outcome of a species invasion.

Invasive species can have large effects on native communities. When native and invasive species share parasites, an epidemic in a native species could facilitate or inhibit the invasion. We sought to understand how the incidence and timing of epidemics in native species caused by a generalist parasite influenced the success and impact of an invasive species.

Viewing the global health system as a complex adaptive system - implications for research and practice.

The global health system (GHS) is ill-equipped to deal with the increasing number of transnational challenges. The GHS needs reform to enhance global resilience to future risks to health. In this article we argue that the starting point for any reform must be conceptualizing and studying the GHS as a complex adaptive system (CAS) with a large and escalating number of interconnected global health actors that learn and adapt their behaviours in response to each other and changes in their environment.

Voluntary medical male circumcision in selected provinces in South Africa: Outcomes from a programmatic setting.

Introduction: Voluntary medical male circumcision (VMMC) remains an effective biomedical intervention for HIV prevention in high HIV prevalence countries. In South Africa, United States Agency for International Development VMMC partners provide technical assistance to the Department of Health, at national and provincial levels in support of the establishment of VMMC sites as well as in providing direct VMMC services at site level since April 2012. We describe the outcomes of the Right to Care (RTC) VMMC program implemented in South Africa from 2012 to 2017.

Habitat use of and threats to African large carnivores in a mixed-use landscape.

Large carnivores increasingly inhabit human-affected landscapes, which exhibit heterogeneity in biotic resources, anthropogenic pressures, and management strategies. Understanding large carnivore habitat use in these systems is critical for their conservation, as is the evaluation of competing management approaches and the impacts of significant land-use changes. We used occupancy modeling to investigate habitat use of an intact eastern African large carnivore guild across the 45,000 km Ruaha-Rungwa landscape in south-central Tanzania.

Current water quality guidelines across North America and Europe do not protect lakes from salinization.

Human-induced salinization caused by the use of road deicing salts, agricultural practices, mining operations, and climate change is a major threat to the biodiversity and functioning of freshwater ecosystems. Yet, it is unclear if freshwater ecosystems are protected from salinization by current water quality guidelines. Leveraging an experimental network of land-based and in-lake mesocosms across North America and Europe, we tested how salinization-indicated as elevated chloride (Cl) concentration-will affect lake food webs and if two of the lowest Cl thresholds found globally are sufficient to protect these food webs.

Temporal partitioning and spatiotemporal avoidance among large carnivores in a human-impacted African landscape.

Africa is home to some of the world's most functionally diverse guilds of large carnivores. However, they are increasingly under threat from anthropogenic pressures that may exacerbate already intense intra-guild competition. Understanding the coexistence mechanisms employed by these species in human-impacted landscapes could help shed light on some of the more subtle ways in which humans may impact wildlife populations, and inform multi-species conservation planning.

Toward Quantifying Trust Dynamics: How People Adjust Their Trust After Moment-to-Moment Interaction With Automation.

Objective: We examine how human operators adjust their trust in automation as a result of their moment-to-moment interaction with automation.

Background: Most existing studies measured trust by administering questionnaires at the end of an experiment. Only a limited number of studies viewed trust as a dynamic variable that can strengthen or decay over time.

Exposure to a fungal pathogen increases the critical thermal minimum of two frog species.

The ability of an organism to tolerate seasonal temperature changes, such as extremely cold temperatures during the winter, can be influenced by their pathogens. We tested how exposure to a virulent fungal pathogen, , affected the critical thermal minimum (CT) of two frog species, (gray treefrog) and (pickerel frog). The CT is the minimum thermal performance point of an organism, which we estimated via righting response trials.

Niche Contraction of an Endangered Frog Driven by the Amphibian Chytrid Fungus.

Introduced pathogens can alter the geographic distribution of susceptible host species. For example, Batrachochytrium dendrobatidis (Bd) is a fungal pathogen that has been linked to the global decline and extinction of numerous amphibian species during the last four decades. A growing number of studies have described the distribution of Bd and susceptible hosts across the globe; however, knowledge on how Bd may shape the climatic niche of susceptible species is still missing.

Delineating the Smith-Kingsmore syndrome phenotype: Investigation of 16 patients with the MTOR c.5395G > A p.(Glu1799Lys) missense variant.

Smith-Kingsmore Syndrome (SKS) is a rare genetic syndrome associated with megalencephaly, a variable intellectual disability, autism spectrum disorder, and MTOR gain of function variants. Only 30 patients with MTOR missense variants are published, including 14 (47%) with the MTOR c.5395G>A p.

Evolutionary rescue in host-pathogen systems.

Natural populations encounter a variety of threats that can increase their risk of extinction. Populations can avoid extinction through evolutionary rescue (ER), which occurs when an adaptive, genetic response to selection allows a population to recover from an environmental change that would otherwise cause extinction. While the traditional framework for ER was developed with abiotic risk factors in mind, ER may also occur in response to a biotic source of demographic change, such as the introduction of a novel pathogen.

HIGHER INFECTION PREVALENCE IN AMPHIBIANS INHABITING HUMAN-MADE COMPARED TO NATURAL WETLANDS.

It is unclear how suitable human-made wetlands are for supporting wildlife and how they impact wildlife disease risk. Natural wetlands (those that were created without human actions) can support more diverse and resilient communities that are at lower risk of disease outbreaks. We compared frog community composition and infection with the pathogenic fungus Batrachochytrium dendrobatidis (Bd) between human-made and natural wetlands in Tippecanoe County, Indiana, US.

Clinical spectrum of POLR3-related leukodystrophy caused by biallelic pathogenic variants.

Objective: To determine the clinical, radiologic, and molecular characteristics of RNA polymerase III-related leukodystrophy (POLR3-HLD) caused by biallelic pathogenic variants.

Methods: A cross-sectional observational study involving 25 centers worldwide was conducted. Clinical and molecular information was collected on 23 unreported and previously reported patients with POLR3-HLD and biallelic pathogenic variants in .

Infection with is common in tropical lowland habitats: Implications for amphibian conservation.

Numerous species of amphibians declined in Central America during the 1980s and 1990s. These declines mostly affected highland stream amphibians and have been primarily linked to chytridiomycosis, a deadly disease caused by the chytrid fungus (Bd). Since then, the majority of field studies on Bd in the Tropics have been conducted in midland and highland environments (>800 m) mainly because the environmental conditions of mountain ranges match the range of ideal abiotic conditions for Bd in the laboratory.