Delayed post-juvenile moult in malaria-infected Eurasian blackcaps.

Parasites have their strongest impact on fitness when host defences deplete resources needed for other critical life-history stages, such as development, breeding or migration. Among birds, one greatly neglected stage that could be altered by parasites is post-juvenile moult (PJM), through which yearling juvenile birds replace their fast-generated, low-quality juvenile feathers with adult-like feathers after leaving the nest. The earlier the birds complete PJM, the earlier they will be prepared to withstand forthcoming challenges, such as adverse winter conditions or migration.

Cophylogeny, narrow host breadth and local conditions drive highly specialized bird-haemosporidian associations in West-Central African sky islands.

The parasite island syndrome denotes shifts in parasite life histories on islands, which affect parasite diversity, prevalence and specificity. However, current evidence of parasite island syndromes mainly stems from oceanic islands, while sky islands (i.e.

Whence the birds: 200 years of dinosaurs, avian antecedents.

Among the most revolutionary insights emerging from 200 years of research on dinosaurs is that the clade Dinosauria is represented by approximately 11 000 living species of birds. Although the origin of birds among dinosaurs has been reviewed extensively, recent years have witnessed tremendous progress in our understanding of the deep evolutionary origins of numerous distinctive avian anatomical systems. These advances have been enabled by exciting new fossil discoveries, leading to an ever-expanding phylogenetic framework with which to pinpoint the origins of characteristic avian features.

Sweating the small stuff: microclimatic exposure and species habitat associations inform climate vulnerability in a grassland songbird community.

Assessment of species' vulnerability to climate change has been limited by mismatch between coarse macroclimate data and the fine scales at which species select habitat. Habitat mediates climate conditions, and fine-scale habitat features may permit species to exploit favourable microclimates, but habitat preferences can also constrain their ability to do so. We leveraged fine-resolution models of near-surface temperature and humidity in grasslands to understand how microclimates affect climatic exposure and demographics in a grassland bird community.

Tracking individual seed fate confirms mainly antagonistic interactions between rodents and European beech.

Food-hoarding granivores act as both predators and dispersers of plant seeds, resulting in facultative species interactions along a mutualism-antagonism continuum. The position along this continuum is determined by the positive and negative interactions that vary with the ratio between seed availability and animal abundance, particularly for mast-seeding species with interannual variation and spatial synchrony of seed production. Empirical data on the entire fate of seeds up to germination and the influence of rodents on seed survival is rare, resulting in a lack of consensus on their position along the mutualism-antagonism continuum.

Immune response accelerated telomere shortening during early life stage of a passerine bird, the blue tit ().

Dealing with infections is a daily challenge for wild animals. Empirical data show an increase in reactive oxygen species (ROS) production during immune response. This could have consequences on telomere length, the end parts of linear chromosomes, commonly used as proxy for good health and ageing.

Avian telencephalon and cerebellum volumes can be accurately estimated from digital brain endocasts.

For studies of the evolution of vertebrate brain anatomy and potentially associated behaviours, reconstructions of digital brain endocasts from computed tomography scans have revolutionized our capacity to collect neuroanatomical data. However, measurements from digital endocasts must be validated as reflecting actual brain anatomy, which is difficult because the collection of soft tissue information through histology is laborious and time-consuming. In birds, the reliability of digital endocast measurements as volume proxies for the two largest brain regions-the telencephalon and cerebellum-remains to be validated despite their use as proxies, e.

Phylogenetic and lipid metabolic differences between migratory and Egyptian-domesticated Mallard ducks (Anas platyrhynchos).

Although a giant Egyptian domestic non-migratory duck breed is phenotypically identical to the migratory Mallard, yet it is three times larger. The current study sought to determine the genetic and metabolic differences between this duck and Mallard, which arrives in Egypt in September for wintering and departs in March. Mitochondrial DNA control region (D-loop) was extracted, amplified, sequenced, and analyzed in both ducks.

Emily Shepard.

Interview with Emily Shepard, who studies the effects of the aerial environment on bird behaviour, energetics and space use at Swansea University.

The 2025 Motile Active Matter Roadmap.

Activity and autonomous motion are fundamental aspects of many living and engineering systems. Here, the scale of biological agents covers a wide range, from nanomotors, cytoskeleton, and cells, to insects, fish, birds, and people. Inspired by biological active systems, various types of autonomous synthetic nano- and micromachines have been designed, which provide the basis for multifunctional, highly responsive, intelligent active materials.

Emergence of West Nile virus infection in Kerala, South India: A case of concern.

West Nile virus (WNV) infection is emerging as a disease of public health concern in Kerala, India with recurring outbreaks since 2011. With its tropical climate, biodiversity hot spots of Western ghats, forest cover, plenty of water bodies and bird sanctuaries, Kerala provides an ideal ecological niche for vector breeding and transmission of WNV. In this article, we reflect on the peculiar features of the outbreaks of WNV fever in Kerala and highlight the knowledge gaps, the research priorities and the need for effective control measures.

A Case Report of Infective Endocarditis Complicated With Pneumonia.

Psittacosis is a zoonotic disease caused by and is commonly found in birds and poultry. Human infection is uncommon, and most cases are sporadic. Infection of extrapulmonary organs by is extremely rare.

What 'unexplored' means: mapping regions with digitized natural history records to look for 'biodiversity blindspots'.

We examined global records of accessible natural history voucher collections (with publicly available data and reliable locality data) for terrestrial and freshwater vascular plants, fungi, freshwater fishes, birds, mammals, and herpetofauna (amphibians and reptiles) and highlight areas of the world that would be considered undersampled and sometimes called 'unexplored' (., have relatively low, or no evidence of, past sampling efforts) under typical Western-scientific descriptions. We also question what 'unexplored' may mean in these contexts and explain how replacing the term in favor of more nuanced phrasing (.

Understanding the limitations of substrate degradation in bioelectrochemical systems.

Microbial Fuel Cells (MFCs) are innovative environmental engineering systems that harness the metabolic activities of microbial communities to convert chemical energy in waste into electrical energy. However, MFC performance optimization remains challenging due to limited understanding of microbial metabolic mechanisms, particularly with complex substrates under realistic environmental conditions. This study investigated the effects of substrate complexity (acetate vs.

Variation in faecal testosterone levels in male gray whales on a foraging ground relative to maturity and timing.

Understanding wildlife reproductive seasonality is crucial for effective management and long-term monitoring of species. This study investigates the seasonal variability of testosterone in male Pacific Coast Feeding Group (PCFG) gray whales, using an eight-year dataset (2016-2023) of individual sightings, drone-based photogrammetry and endocrine analysis of faecal samples. We analyzed the relationship between faecal testosterone levels and total body length (TL), body condition (body area index, BAI), sexual maturity and day of the year using generalized additive mixed models.

Decoding the chicken gastrointestinal microbiome.

Metataxonomic studies have underpinned a vast understanding of microbial communities residing within livestock gastrointestinal tracts, albeit studies have often not been combined to provide a global census. Consequently, in this study we characterised the overall and common 'core' chicken microbiota associated with the gastrointestinal tract (GIT), whilst assessing the effects of GIT site, bird breed, age and geographical location on the GIT resident microbes using metataxonomic data compiled from studies completed across the world. Specifically, bacterial 16S ribosomal DNA sequences from GIT samples associated with various breeds, differing in age, GIT sites (caecum, faeces, ileum and jejunum) and geographical location were obtained from the Sequence Read Archive and analysed using the MGnify pipeline.

A compendium of 8,176 bat RNA viral metagenomes reveals ecological drivers and circulation dynamics.

Bats are natural hosts for many emerging viruses for which spillover to humans is a major risk, but the diversity and ecology of bat viruses is poorly understood. Here we generated 8,176 RNA viral metagenomes by metatranscriptomic sequencing of organ and swab samples from 4,143 bats representing 40 species across 52 locations in China. The resulting database, the BtCN-Virome, expands bat RNA virus diversity by over 3.

Long term study on blood glucose levels in wintering great tits Parus major in sites differing in artificial food availability.

Blood glucose concentration is one of the fundamental biochemical indices in the physiology of birds and other vertebrates. Since glucose serves as the main fuel for metabolic energy, its proper level in the blood serum is crucial to the individual in terms of physiological health, which leads to applying it as an ecophysiological indicator. Such an indicator may be especially useful during energetically demanding periods, such as winter at northern latitudes.

Lung function and onset of cardiometabolic diseases in the longitudinal Burden of Obstructive Lung Disease study.

Introduction: Previous population-based studies, mainly from high-income countries, have shown that a higher forced vital capacity (FVC) is associated with a lower risk of developing cardiometabolic diseases. The aim of this study was to assess the longitudinal association between spirometry measures and the onset of cardiometabolic diseases across sites in low-income, middle-income and high-income countries.

Methods: The study population comprised 5916 individuals from 15 countries participating in the Burden of Obstructive Lung Disease baseline and follow-up assessments.

Quaternized and boronic acid dual-functional CoAg nanozymes for label-free, stable, sensitive, and rapid quantitation detection of the bacterial total concentration.

Background: Foodborne pathogenic bacteria lead to a significant increase in illnesses and fatalities annually. In the early stage of a pathogenic bacterial infection, the concentration of bacteria in food is lower than the detection limit of most technology which enhances the difficulty in diagnosis. It is a serious challenge for researchers to develop a rapid, sensitive, accurate, and stable pathogenic bacterial determination method without costly equipment and highly skilled operators.

Critical reproductive behaviors in Scaled Quail and Northern Bobwhite are affected by thermal variability and mean temperature.

Animals can respond differently to shifting thermal variability versus thermal averages, both of which are changing due to climate warming. How these thermal variables affect parental care behaviors can reveal the ability of parents to modify their behaviors to meet the competing demands of their offspring's thermal needs and self-maintenance, which becomes critical in suboptimal thermal conditions. Further, the time frame used to examine the interplay between temperature and behavioral shifts (e.

Avian haemosporidian parasites affecting non-descript village chickens in Africa.

Smallholder farmers in most of the rural areas in African countries rear non-descript village chickens for petty cash, food provision and for performing rituals. Village chicken production systems are regarded as low input- low output because the chickens receive minimum care and produce average to less eggs and meat. The chickens receive minimal biosecurity and are often left to scavenge for feed and thus exposes them to potential vector parasites that can transmit parasites such as haemoparasites.

Automatic segmentation of MRI images for brain radiotherapy planning using deep ensemble learning.

This study aimed to develop and evaluate an efficient method to automatically segment T1- and T2-weighted brain magnetic resonance imaging (MRI) images. We specifically compared the segmentation performance of individual convolutional neural network (CNN) models against an ensemble approach to advance the accuracy of MRI-guided radiotherapy (RT) planning..

Prenatal Corticosterone Impacts Nestling Condition and Immunity in Eastern Bluebirds.

Exposure of avian mothers to stressful conditions permanently alters offspring behavior and physiology. Yet, the effects of maternal stress on the development of offspring immunity in birds remain unclear, particularly in wild species. We injected Eastern bluebird (Sialia sialis) eggs with either a corticosterone or control solution, then measured the impacts on nestling morphology and two measures of immunity, bactericidal capacity and swelling responses to phytohemagglutinin.

Based on the MaxEnt model the analysis of influencing factors and simulation of potential risk areas of human infection with avian influenza A (H7N9) in China.

Exposure to infected animals and their contaminated environments may be the primary cause of human infection with the H7N9 avian influenza virus. However, the transmission characteristics and specific role of various influencing factors in the spread of the epidemic are not clearly understood. Therefore, it is of great significance for scientific research and practical application to explore the influencing factors related to the epidemic.