Network analysis to reveal the most commonly detected compounds in predator-prey pairs in freshwater and marine mammals and fish in Europe.

Marine and freshwater mammalian predators and fish samples, retrieved from environmental specimen banks (ESBs), natural history museum (NHMs) and other scientific collections, were analysed by LIFE APEX partners for a wide range of legacy and emerging contaminants (2545 in total). Network analysis was used to visualize the chemical occurrence data and reveal the predominant chemical mixtures for the freshwater and marine environments. For this purpose, a web tool was created to explore these chemical mixtures in predator-prey pairs.

Resolution of the (Herrich-Schäffer, 1838)-aggregate in the western Palaearctic (Hymenoptera, Braconidae, Rogadinae), with description of a new species.

Two European species are recognised and characterised within the traditional species concept, based initially on DNA barcoding but with supporting, although slight and sometimes unreliable, morphological differences. is described and a neotype is designated for Herrich-Schäffer, 1838. Specimens from the Russian Far East were also DNA barcoded and were found to belong to a new species distinct from the two European taxa.

Bird song comparison using deep learning trained from avian perceptual judgments.

Our understanding of bird song, a model system for animal communication and the neurobiology of learning, depends critically on making reliable, validated comparisons between the complex multidimensional syllables that are used in songs. However, most assessments of song similarity are based on human inspection of spectrograms, or computational methods developed from human intuitions. Using a novel automated operant conditioning system, we collected a large corpus of zebra finches' (Taeniopygia guttata) decisions about song syllable similarity.

Revision of the Oriental species of the hoverfly genus Brunetti, 1923 (Diptera, Syrphidae, Microdontinae).

The species of the hoverfly genus Brunetti, 1923 from the Oriental Region are revised. The resulting number of valid species is 15, of which the following four are described as new: Reemer, , Reemer, , Sankararaman & Reemer, , and Reemer, Three new synonymies are established: de Meijere, 1917, is a junior synonym of de Meijere, 1908; Keiser, 1964, is a junior synonym of Doleschall, 1857; Thompson, 2020, is a junior synonym of Brunetti, 1923. Reemer, is introduced as a replacement name for Huo & Zhao, 2022, which is a primary homonym of Ssymank & Reemer, 2016.

Sampling data of macro-invertebrates collected in grasslands under restoration succession in a lowland stream-valley system.

Background: Publication of data from past field studies on invertebrate populations is of high importance, as there is much added value for them to be used as baselines to study spatiotemporal population and community dynamics in these groups. Therefore, a dataset consisting of occurrence data on epigaeic invertebrates collected in 1996 was standardised into the Darwin core format and cross-checked in order to make it publicly available following FAIR data principles. With publication, it can contribute to the biodiversity assessment of terrestrial invertebrates, thereby improving the availability and accessibility of much-needed historical datasets on macro-invertebrates.

Early warning of trends in commercial wildlife trade through novel machine-learning analysis of patent filing.

Unsustainable wildlife trade imperils thousands of species, but efforts to identify and reduce these threats are hampered by rapidly evolving commercial markets. Businesses trading wildlife-derived products innovate to remain competitive, and the patents they file to protect their innovations also provide an early-warning of market shifts. Here, we develop a novel machine-learning approach to analyse patent-filing trends and apply it to patents filed from 1970-2020 related to six traded taxa that vary in trade legality, threat level, and use type: rhinoceroses, pangolins, bears, sturgeon, horseshoe crabs, and caterpillar fungus.

Enhancing metabarcoding efficiency and ecological insights through integrated taxonomy and DNA reference barcoding: A case study on beach meiofauna.

Molecular techniques like metabarcoding, while promising for exploring diversity of communities, are often impeded by the lack of reference DNA sequences available for taxonomic annotation. Our study explores the benefits of combining targeted DNA barcoding and morphological taxonomy to improve metabarcoding efficiency, using beach meiofauna as a case study. Beaches are globally important ecosystems and are inhabited by meiofauna, microscopic animals living in the interstitial space between the sand grains, which play a key role in coastal biodiversity and ecosystem dynamics.

Transitions between colour mechanisms affect speciation dynamics and range distributions of birds.

Several ecogeographical 'rules' have been proposed to explain colour variation at broad spatial and phylogenetic scales but these rarely consider whether colours are based on pigments or structural colours. However, mechanism can have profound effects on the function and evolution of colours. Here, we combine geographic information, climate data and colour mechanism at broad phylogenetic (9,409 species) and spatial scales (global) to determine how transitions between pigmentary and structural colours influence speciation dynamics and range distributions in birds.

Quantitative assessment of reef foraminifera community from metabarcoding data.

Describing living community compositions is essential to monitor ecosystems in a rapidly changing world, but it is challenging to produce fast and accurate depiction of ecosystems due to methodological limitations. Morphological methods provide absolute abundances with limited throughput, whereas metabarcoding provides relative abundances of genes that may not correctly represent living communities from environmental DNA assessed with morphological methods. However, it has the potential to deliver fast descriptions of living communities provided that it is interpreted with validated species-specific calibrations and reference databases.

Four genera of the subfamily Opiinae Blanchard (Hymenoptera, Braconidae) new for Japan, with the description of two new species.

Four genera are reported for the first time from Japan ( van Achterberg & Li, 2013, Fischer, 1966, Gahan, 1917 and Fischer, 1965), and keys are provided for the species of these genera. Two new species are described and illustrated: and

Nature portrayed in images in Dutch Brazil: Tracing the sources of the plant woodcuts in the Historia Naturalis Brasiliae (1648).

By the mid-seventeenth century, images of natural elements that originated in Dutch Brazil circulated in Europe. These were often included in art collections (the Libri Picturati) and natural history treatises (the Historia Naturalis Brasiliae and the India Utriesque re Naturale et Medica, 1658). The plant woodcut images in these books constituted (icono) type specimens and played a significant role in disseminating scientific botanical knowledge.

Long-term biotic homogenization in the East African Rift System over the last 6 million years of hominin evolution.

Eastern Africa preserves the most complete record of human evolution anywhere in the world but we have little knowledge of how long-term biogeographic dynamics in the region influenced hominin diversity and distributions. Here, we use spatial beta diversity analyses of mammal fossil records from the East African Rift System to reveal long-term biotic homogenization (increasing compositional similarity of faunas) over the last 6 Myr. Late Miocene and Pliocene faunas (~6-3 million years ago (Ma)) were largely composed of endemic species, with the shift towards biotic homogenization after ~3 Ma being driven by the loss of endemic species across functional groups and a growing number of shared grazing species.

The Central Paratethys Sea-rise and demise of a Miocene European marine biodiversity hotspot.

The Miocene Climate Optimum (MCO, ~ 17-14 Ma) was a time of extraordinary marine biodiversity in the Circum-Mediterranean Region. This boom is best recorded in the deposits of the vanished Central Paratethys Sea, which covered large parts of central to southeastern Europe. This sea harbored an extraordinary tropical to subtropical biotic diversity.

Muscle-Driven Predictive Physics Simulations of Quadrupedal Locomotion in the Horse.

Musculoskeletal simulations can provide insights into the underlying mechanisms that govern animal locomotion. In this study, we describe the development of a new musculoskeletal model of the horse, and to our knowledge present the first fully muscle-driven, predictive simulations of equine locomotion. Our goal was to simulate a model that captures only the gross musculoskeletal structure of a horse, without specialized morphological features.

Sound evidence for biodiversity monitoring.

Bioacoustics and artificial intelligence facilitate ecological studies of animal populations.

The published complete mitochondrial genome of Blue-fronted Redstart () is a chimera and includes DNA from Pink-rumped Rosefinch (Aves: Passeriformes).

The complete mitochondrial genome of Blue-fronted Redstart (), GenBank accession number MT360379 (NC_053917), was published by Li and colleages in 2020. Here we show that this mitogenome is actually a chimera containing DNA fragments of both (15,518 bp, 92.5%) and Pink-rumped Rosefinch (, 1258 bp, 7.