Complex tissue regeneration in reveals a phylogenetic signal for enhanced regenerative ability in deomyine rodents.

Identifying why complex tissue regeneration is present or absent in specific vertebrate lineages has remained elusive. One also wonders whether the isolated examples where regeneration is observed represent cases of convergent evolution or are instead the product of phylogenetic inertia from a common ancestral program. Testing alternative hypotheses to identify genetic regulation, cell states, and tissue physiology that explain how regenerative healing emerges in some species requires sampling multiple species among which there is variation in regenerative ability across a phylogenetic framework.

Anthelmintic Treatment Reveals Sex-Dependent Worm-Gut Microbiota Interactions.

Gastrointestinal helminths interact with the gut microbiota in ways that shape microbiota structure and function, but these effects are highly inconsistent across studies. One factor that may help explain variation in parasite-microbiota interactions is host sex since helminths can induce sex-specific changes in feeding behaviour and diet that might cascade to shape gut microbial communities. We tested this idea using an anthelmintic treatment experiment in wild Grant's gazelles (Nanger granti).

Improve animal health to reduce livestock emissions: quantifying an open goal.

Greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions from livestock production must be urgently tackled to substantially reduce their contribution to global warming. Simply reducing livestock numbers to this end risks impacting negatively on food security, rural livelihoods and climate change adaptation. We argue that significant mitigation of livestock emissions can be delivered immediately by improving animal health and hence production efficiency, but this route is not prioritized because its benefits, although intuitive, are poorly quantified.

Extracellular vesicles: an emerging tool for wild immunology.

The immune system is crucial for defending organisms against pathogens and maintaining health. Traditionally, research in immunology has relied on laboratory animals to understand how the immune system works. However, there is increasing recognition that wild animals, due to their greater genetic diversity, lifespan, and environmental exposures, have much to contribute to basic and translational immunology.

Effects of migratory animals on resident parasite dynamics.

Migratory animals can bring parasites into resident animal (i.e., non-migratory) home ranges (transport effects) and exert trophic effects that either promote or reduce parasite exposure to resident hosts.

Helminth-associated changes in host immune phenotype connect top-down and bottom-up interactions during co-infection.

1. Within-host parasite interactions can be mediated by the host and changes in host phenotypes often serve as indicators of the presence or intensity of parasite interactions. 2.

A multi-species evaluation of digital wildlife monitoring using the Sigfox IoT network.

Bio-telemetry from small tags attached to animals is one of the principal methods for studying the ecology and behaviour of wildlife. The field has constantly evolved over the last 80 years as technological improvement enabled a diversity of sensors to be integrated into the tags (e.g.

Within-host and external environments differentially shape β-diversity across parasite life stages.

Uncovering drivers of community assembly is a key aspect of learning how biological communities function. Drivers of community similarity can be especially useful in this task as they affect assemblage-level changes that lead to differences in species diversity between habitats. Concepts of β-diversity originally developed for use in free-living communities have been widely applied to parasite communities to gain insight into how infection risk changes with local conditions by comparing parasite communities across abiotic and biotic gradients.

Bovine tuberculosis in African buffalo (Syncerus caffer): Progression of pathology during infection.

Background: Bovine tuberculosis (BTB) is a zoonotic disease of global importance endemic in African buffalo (Syncerus caffer) in sub-Saharan Africa. Zoonotic tuberculosis is a disease of global importance, accounting for over 12,000 deaths annually. Cattle affected with BTB have been proposed as a model for the study of human tuberculosis, more closely resembling the localization and progression of lesions in controlled studies than murine models.

Sublethal effects of parasitism on ruminants can have cascading consequences for ecosystems.

Parasitic infections are common, but how they shape ecosystem-level processes is understudied. Using a mathematical model and meta-analysis, we explored the potential for helminth parasites to trigger trophic cascades through lethal and sublethal effects imposed on herbivorous ruminant hosts after infection. First, using the model, we linked negative effects of parasitic infection on host survival, fecundity, and feeding rate to host and producer biomass.

Do predators keep prey healthy or make them sicker? A meta-analysis.

Ecological theory suggests that predators can either keep prey populations healthy by reducing parasite burdens or alternatively, increase parasitism in prey. To quantify the overall magnitude and direction of the effect of predation on parasitism in prey observed in practice, we conducted a meta-analysis of 47 empirical studies. We also examined how study attributes, including parasite type and life cycle, habitat type, study design, and whether predators were able to directly consume prey contributed to variation in the predator-prey-parasite interaction.

Alternative transmission pathways for guinea worm in dogs: implications for outbreak risk and control.

Guinea worm (Dracunculus medinensis) has exerted a high human health burden in parts of Africa. Complete eradication of Guinea worm disease (dracunculiasis) may be delayed by the circulation of the parasite in domestic dogs. As with humans, dogs acquire the parasite by directly ingesting infected copepods, and recent evidence suggests that consuming frogs that ingested infected copepods as tadpoles may be a viable transmission route (paratenic route).

Natural resistance to worms exacerbates bovine tuberculosis severity independently of worm coinfection.

Pathogen interactions arising during coinfection can exacerbate disease severity, for example when the immune response mounted against one pathogen negatively affects defense of another. It is also possible that host immune responses to a pathogen, shaped by historical evolutionary interactions between host and pathogen, may modify host immune defenses in ways that have repercussions for other pathogens. In this case, negative interactions between two pathogens could emerge even in the absence of concurrent infection.

Coinfection and infection duration shape how pathogens affect the African buffalo gut microbiota.

Changes in the gut microbiota during pathogen infection are often predicted to influence disease outcomes. However, studies exploring whether pathogens induce microbiota shifts have yielded inconsistent results. This suggests that variation in infection, rather than the presence of infection alone, might shape pathogen-microbiota relationships.

Co-infection best predicts respiratory viral infection in a wild host.

The dynamics of directly transmitted pathogens in natural populations are likely to result from the combined effects of host traits, pathogen biology, and interactions among pathogens within a host. Discovering how these factors work in concert to shape variation in pathogen dynamics in natural host-multi-pathogen systems is fundamental to understanding population health. Here, we describe temporal variation in incidence and then elucidate the effect of hosts trait, season and pathogen co-occurrence on host infection risk using one of the most comprehensive studies of co-infection in a wild population: a suite of seven directly transmitted viral and bacterial respiratory infections from a 4-year study of 200 free-ranging African buffalo Syncerus caffer.

Large herbivore loss has complex effects on mosquito ecology and vector-borne disease risk.

Loss of biodiversity can affect transmission of infectious diseases in at least two ways: by altering host and vector abundance or by influencing host and vector behaviour. We used a large herbivore exclusion experiment to investigate the effects of wildlife loss on the abundance and feeding behaviour of mosquito vectors and to explore consequences for vector-borne disease transmission. Large herbivore loss affected both mosquito abundance and blood-feeding behaviour.

Infectious Diseases, Livestock, and Climate: A Vicious Cycle?

Ruminant livestock are a significant contributor to global methane emissions. Infectious diseases have the potential to exacerbate these contributions by elevating methane outputs associated with animal production. With the increasing spread of many infectious diseases, the emergence of a vicious climate-livestock-disease cycle is a looming threat.

Identifying correlates of Guinea worm (Dracunculus medinensis) infection in domestic dog populations.

Few human infectious diseases have been driven as close to eradication as dracunculiasis, caused by the Guinea worm parasite (Dracunculus medinensis). The number of human cases of Guinea worm decreased from an estimated 3.5 million in 1986 to mere hundreds by the 2010s.

Complex Tissue Regeneration in Mammals Is Associated With Reduced Inflammatory Cytokines and an Influx of T Cells.

While mammals tend to repair injuries, other adult vertebrates like salamanders and fish regenerate damaged tissue. One prominent hypothesis offered to explain an inability to regenerate complex tissue in mammals is a bias during healing toward strong adaptive immunity and inflammatory responses. Here we directly test this hypothesis by characterizing part of the immune response during regeneration in spiny mice ( and ) vs.

Rainfall as a driver of seasonality in parasitism.

Parasite burdens are known to vary seasonally in wildlife, and rainfall is one key aspect of seasonality that has been linked to parasitism in a range of systems. Rainfall can have immediate effects on parasitism rates by affecting parasite survival and movement in the environment, or it can have delayed effects by affecting host susceptibility to parasites through changes in host body condition or immune function. In this study, we examined how helminth infection in a wild ungulate (Grant's gazelle, ) is impacted by seasonal changes in rainfall.