Diversification of the shell shape and size in Baikal Candonidae ostracods inferred from molecular phylogeny.

Ostracod shells are used extensively in paleontology, but we know little about their evolution, especially in ancient lakes. Lake Baikal (LB) is the world's most important stronghold of Candonidae diversity. These crustaceans radiated here rapidly (12-5 Ma) and with an unprecedented morphological diversity.

Holotypes for three Caspian gastropods of the family Hydrobiidae tracked down: description and taxonomic interpretations.

Type series of three nominal taxa of the hydrobiid gastropods inhabiting the Caspian Sea were traced recently in the uncatalogued part of the malacological collection of the Zoological Institute of Russian Academy of Sciences, Saint-Petersburg. Images of the holotypes and some paratypes of Pyrgula isseli Logvinenko Starobogatov, 1969, P. sowinskyi Logvinenko Starobogatov, 1969 and P.

Amazing Discoveries of Benthic Fauna from the Abyssal Zone of Lake Baikal.

Lake Baikal is a natural laboratory for the study of species diversity and evolution, as a unique freshwater ecosystem meeting the all of the main criteria of the World Heritage Convention. However, despite many years of research, the true biodiversity of the lake is clearly insufficiently studied, especially that of deep-water benthic sessile organisms. For the first time, plastic waste was raised from depths of 110 to 190 m of Lake Baikal.

Pilot Study on Dose-Dependent Effects of Transcranial Photobiomodulation on Brain Electrical Oscillations: A Potential Therapeutic Target in Alzheimer's Disease.

Background: Transcranial photobiomodulation (tPBM) has recently emerged as a potential cognitive enhancement technique and clinical treatment for various neuropsychiatric and neurodegenerative disorders by delivering invisible near-infrared light to the scalp and increasing energy metabolism in the brain.

Objective: We assessed whether transcranial photobiomodulation with near-infrared light modulates cerebral electrical activity through electroencephalogram (EEG) and cerebral blood flow (CBF).

Methods: We conducted a single-blind, sham-controlled pilot study to test the effect of continuous (c-tPBM), pulse (p-tPBM), and sham (s-tPBM) transcranial photobiomodulation on EEG oscillations and CBF using diffuse correlation spectroscopy (DCS) in a sample of ten healthy subjects [6F/4 M; mean age 28.

Phylogeography of freshwater planorbid snails reveals diversification patterns in Eurasian continental islands.

Background: Islands have traditionally been the centre of evolutionary biological research, but the dynamics of immigration and differentiation at continental islands have not been well studied. Therefore, we focused on the Japanese archipelago, the continental islands located at the eastern end of the Eurasian continent. While the Japanese archipelago is characterised by high biodiversity and rich freshwater habitats, the origin and formation mechanisms of its freshwater organisms are not clear.

Event-related potentials during sustained attention and memory tasks: Utility as biomarkers for mild cognitive impairment.

Introduction: The objective of the study is to validate attention and memory tasks that elicit event-related potentials (ERPs) for utility as sensitive biomarkers for early dementia.

Methods: A 3-choice vigilance task designed to evaluate sustained attention and standard image recognition memory task designed to evaluate attention, encoding, and image recognition memory were administered with concurrent electroencephalography acquisition to elicit ERPs in mild cognitive impairment (MCI) and healthy cohorts. ERPs were averaged, and mean or maximum amplitude of components was measured and compared between and within cohorts.

Short timescale abnormalities in the states of spontaneous synchrony in the functional neural networks in Alzheimer's disease.

Alzheimer's disease (AD) is a prevalent neurodegenerative condition that can lead to severe cognitive and functional deterioration. Functional magnetic resonance imaging (fMRI) revealed abnormalities in AD in intrinsic synchronization between spatially separate regions in the so-called default mode network (DMN) of the brain. To understand the relationship between this disruption in large-scale synchrony and the cognitive impairment in AD, it is critical to determine whether and how the deficit in the low frequency hemodynamic fluctuations recorded by fMRI translates to much faster timescales of memory and other cognitive processes.

Description of a new species (Pulmonata: Planorbidae) from the land thermal spring Khakusy of Lake Baikal.

A new species of the family Planorbidae is described from the land thermal spring Khakusy, on the north-eastern shore of Lake Baikal. The description of includes morphological characters and gene sequences (COI of mtDNA) for the species separation from sister taxon (A. Férussac, 1807) collected from the small Krestovka River in-flowing into the south-western part of the Lake.

Phylogenetic position and age of Lake Baikal candonids (Crustacea, Ostracoda) inferred from multigene sequence analyzes and molecular dating.

With 104 endemic species family Candonidae is one of the most diverse crustacean groups in Lake Baikal, yet their phylogenetic relationships and position in the family have not been addressed so far. Here, we study the phylogenetic position of Baikal candonids within the family and their evolutionary history using molecular markers for the first time since their original description. We choose 10 Baikal and 28 species from around the world, and three ribosomal RNA-s (18S, 28S, and 16S), and analyze individual and concatenated datasets using Bayesian Inference in MrBayes and BEAST.

Morphological and molecular diversity of Lake Baikal candonid ostracods, with description of a new genus.

Uncoupling between molecular and morphological evolution is common in many animal and plant lineages. This is especially frequent among groups living in ancient deep lakes, because these ecosystems promote rapid morphological diversification, and has already been demonstrated for Tanganyika cychlid fishes and Baikal amphipods. Ostracods are also very diverse in these ecosystems, with 107 candonid species described so far from Baikal, majority of them in the genera Baird, 1845 and Kaufmann, 1900.

A new, genetically divergent species of Pseudobaikalia Lindholm, 1909 (Caenogastropoda, Baicaliidae).

A new gastropod species, Pseudobaikalia michelae Sitnikoiva & Kovalenkova, sp. n., (family Baicaliidae) is described from Lake Baikal.

Conquest of the deep, old and cold: an exceptional limpet radiation in Lake Baikal.

Lake Baikal is the deepest, oldest and most speciose ancient lake in the world. The lake is characterized by high levels of molluscan species richness and endemicity, including the limpet family Acroloxidae with 25 endemic species. Members of this group generally inhabit the littoral zone, but have been recently found in the abyssal zone at hydrothermal vents and oil-seeps.

Understanding human original actions directed at real-world goals: the role of the lateral prefrontal cortex.

Adaptive, original actions, which can succeed in multiple contextual situations, require understanding of what is relevant to a goal. Recognizing what is relevant may also help in predicting kinematics of observed, original actions. During action observation, comparisons between sensory input and expected action kinematics have been argued critical to accurate goal inference.

[New records of bacteria-spirochetes in crystalline style of fresh water gastropods].

Freshwater mollusks belonging to 17 species, in 7 families are examined purposely to search for spirochete bacteria in their crystalline style of the digestive system. As result of this study spirochetes are recorded in gastropod families Amnicolidae, Bithyniidae, Baicaliidae and Benedictiidae, represented by 12 species, occupying different habitats. Gastropods belonging to Valvatidae, Lymnaeidae and Planorbidae, characterized by lack of crystalline style did not include spirochetes in their stomachs.

[New data on the Irkutsk focus of opisthorchiasis and on the need for its investigation].

The paper gives data on an opisthorchiasis focus in the Taishetsky district, Irkutsk Region. The species affiliation of Bithynia from the Biryusa River basin was established. These mollusks are morphologically close to Opisthorchophorus hispanica (= Bithynia inflata).

Neurocognitive abnormalities during comprehension of real-world goal-directed behaviors in schizophrenia.

Origins of impaired adaptive functioning in schizophrenia remain poorly understood. Behavioral disorganization may arise from an abnormal reliance on common combinations between concepts stored in semantic memory. Avolition-apathy may be related to deficits in using goal-related requirements to flexibly plan behavior.

Biomembrane sensitivity to structural changes in bound polymers.

Anionic liposomes containing a 4:1 molar ratio of neutral to anionic phospholipids were treated with an excess of five zwitterionic polymers differing only in the spacer length separating their cationic and anionic moieties. Although the polymers do not disrupt the structural integrity of the liposomes, they can induce spacer-dependent molecular rearrangements within the liposomes. Thus, the following were observed: spacer length = 1, no binding to the liposomes; spacer length = 2, adsorption to the liposomes, but no molecular rearrangement; spacer length = 3, lateral lipid segregation but little or no flip-flop; spacer length = 4 or 5, lateral lipid segregation and flip-flop.

[Genetic differentiation of the endemic Baikalian mollusk Baicalia carinata (Mollusca: Caenogastropoda)].

In gastropod mollusk Baicalia carinata Dybowski, 1875, sampled in different sites of the Lake Baikal, comparison of 81 sequences of internal transcribed spacer 1 (ITS1) located between the genes for 18S rRNA and 5.8S rRNA, and of 100 sequences of the fragment of mitochondrial cytochrome-c-oxidase subunit 1 gene (CO1) was performed. Molecular phylogenetic analysis showed that the endemic mollusk species studied formed at least two distinct populations, Southwestern and Eastern.

Two neurocognitive mechanisms of semantic integration during the comprehension of visual real-world events.

How do comprehenders build up overall meaning representations of visual real-world events? This question was examined by recording event-related potentials (ERPs) while participants viewed short, silent movie clips depicting everyday events. In two experiments, it was demonstrated that presentation of the contextually inappropriate information in the movie endings evoked an anterior negativity. This effect was similar to the N400 component whose amplitude has been previously reported to inversely correlate with the strength of semantic relationship between the context and the eliciting stimulus in word and static picture paradigms.

Genetic flows in a structured one-dimensional population: simulation and real data on Baikalian polychaetes M. godlewskii.

In this work, we apply population dynamic approach enhanced with simulation of the fate of neutrally evolving "DNA sequences" included into each individual in the computer experiment to the case of the Baikalian endemic polychaetes Manavunkia. These animals inhabit a narrow littoral zone around whole the lake perimeter and are of very limited mobility. Accordingly, the general model was modified by addition of a "geographic barrier" of different isolating power and length of existence.

Neuroanatomical distinctions within the semantic system during sentence comprehension: evidence from functional magnetic resonance imaging.

To make sense of a sentence, we must compute morphosyntactic and semantic-thematic relationships between its verbs and arguments and evaluate the resulting propositional meaning against any preceding context and our real-world knowledge. Recent electrophysiological studies suggest that, in comparison with non-violated verbs (e.g.

Contrasting behavior of zwitterionic and cationic polymers bound to anionic liposomes.

Zwitterionic polymers were prepared by quaternizing polyvinylpyridine (DP = 1100) with bromoacids (Br(CH2)nCOOH, where n = 1, 2, 3, and 5). The resulting polymers were then added to unilamellar liposomes composed of egg lecithin or dipalmitoylphosphatidylcholine admixed with 20 mol % of cardiolipin (a phospholipid with two negative charges). These systems were compared (along with polyethylvinylpyridinium chloride, a polycation) by light scattering, electrophoretic mobility, fluorescence, and high-sensitivity differential scanning calorimetry.