Worldwide insect declines: An important message, but interpret with caution.

A recent paper claiming evidence of global insect declines achieved huge media attention, including claims of "insectaggedon" and a "collapse of nature." Here, we argue that while many insects are declining in many places around the world, the study has important limitations that should be highlighted. We emphasise the robust evidence of large and rapid insect declines present in the literature, while also highlighting the limitations of the original study.

Experimentally reduced insulin/IGF-1 signaling in adulthood extends lifespan of parents and improves Darwinian fitness of their offspring.

Classical theory maintains that ageing evolves via energy trade-offs between reproduction and survival leading to accumulation of unrepaired cellular damage with age. In contrast, the emerging new theory postulates that ageing evolves because of deleterious late-life hyper-function of reproduction-promoting genes leading to excessive biosynthesis in late-life. The hyper-function theory uniquely predicts that optimizing nutrient-sensing molecular signaling in adulthood can simultaneously postpone ageing and increase Darwinian fitness.

Improving wheat as a source of iron and zinc for global nutrition.

Wheat is the staple food crop in temperate countries and increasingly consumed in developing countries, displacing traditional foods. However, wheat products are typically low in bioavailable iron and zinc, contributing to deficiencies in these micronutrients in countries where wheat is consumed as a staple food. Two factors contribute to the low contents of bioavailable iron and zinc in wheat: the low concentrations of these minerals in white flour, which is most widely consumed, and the presence of phytates in mineral-rich bran fractions.

Compensatory and additive helper effects in the cooperatively breeding Seychelles warbler ().

In cooperatively breeding species, care provided by helpers may affect the dominant breeders' investment trade-offs between current and future reproduction. By negatively compensating for such additional care, breeders can reduce costs of reproduction and improve their own chances of survival. Alternatively, helper care can be additive to that of dominants, increasing the fledging fitness of the current brood.

Linking warming effects on phenology, demography, and range expansion in a migratory bird population.

Phenological changes in response to climate change have been recorded in many taxa, but the population-level consequences of these changes are largely unknown. If phenological change influences demography, it may underpin the changes in range size and distribution that have been associated with climate change in many species. Over the last century, Icelandic black-tailed godwits () have increased 10-fold in numbers, and their breeding range has expanded throughout lowland Iceland, but the environmental and demographic drivers of this expansion remain unknown.

Spatial ecology of a range-expanding bumble bee pollinator.

Molecular methods have greatly increased our understanding of the previously cryptic spatial ecology of bumble bees ( spp.), with knowledge of the spatial ecology of these bees being central to conserving their essential pollination services. the Tree Bumble Bee, is unusual in that it has recently rapidly expanded its range, having colonized much of the UK mainland since 2001.

Lineages evolved under stronger sexual selection show superior ability to invade conspecific competitor populations.

Despite limitations on offspring production, almost all multicellular species use sex to reproduce. Sex gives rise to sexual selection, a widespread force operating through competition and choice within reproduction, however, it remains unclear whether sexual selection is beneficial for total lineage fitness, or if it acts as a constraint. Sexual selection could be a positive force because of selection on improved individual condition and purging of mutation load, summing into lineages with superior fitness.

Is saltmarsh restoration success constrained by matching natural environments or altered succession? A test using niche models.

Restored habitats, such as saltmarsh created through managed realignment, sometimes fail to meet targets for biological equivalence with natural reference sites. Understanding why this happens is important in order to improve restoration outcomes.Elevation in the tidal frame and sediment redox potential are major controls on the distribution of saltmarsh plants.

Resource diversity and provenance underpin spatial patterns in functional diversity across native and exotic species.

Functional diversity metrics are increasingly used to augment or replace taxonomic diversity metrics to deliver more mechanistic insights into community structure and function. Metrics used to describe landscape structure and characteristics share many of the same limitations as taxonomy-based metrics, particularly their reliance on anthropogenically defined typologies with little consideration of structure, management, or function. However, the development of alternative metrics to describe landscape characteristics has been limited.

Implementing the sterile insect technique with RNA interference - a review.

We review RNA interference (RNAi) of insect pests and its potential for implementing sterile insect technique (SIT)-related control. The molecular mechanisms that support RNAi in pest species are reviewed in detail, drawing on literature from a range of species including Meigen and L. The underlying genes that enable RNAi are generally conserved across taxa, although variance exists in both their form and function.

The role of species-specific sensory cues in male responses to mating rivals in fruitflies.

Complex sets of cues can be important in recognizing and responding to conspecific mating competitors and avoiding potentially costly heterospecific competitive interactions. Within r, males can detect sensory inputs from conspecifics to assess the level of competition. They respond to rivals by significantly extending mating duration and gain significant fitness benefits from doing so.

Exploring Step-by-Step Assembly of Nanoparticle:Cytochrome Biohybrid Photoanodes.

Coupling light-harvesting semiconducting nanoparticles (NPs) with redox enzymes has been shown to create artificial photosynthetic systems that hold promise for the synthesis of solar fuels. High quantum yields require efficient electron transfer from the nanoparticle to the redox protein, a property that can be difficult to control. Here, we have compared binding and electron transfer between dye-sensitized TiO nanocrystals or CdS quantum dots and two decaheme cytochromes on photoanodes.

Nest trampling and ground nesting birds: Quantifying temporal and spatial overlap between cattle activity and breeding redshank.

Conservation grazing for breeding birds needs to balance the positive effects on vegetation structure and negative effects of nest trampling. In the UK, populations of Common redshank breeding on saltmarshes declined by >50% between 1985 and 2011. These declines have been linked to changes in grazing management.

No evidence that kin selection increases the honesty of begging signals in birds.

Providing plausible mechanisms to explain variation in the honesty of information communicated through offspring begging signals is fundamental to our understanding of parent-offspring conflict and the evolution of family life. A recently published research article used comparative analyses to investigate two long-standing hypotheses that may explain the evolution of begging behavior. The results suggested that direct competition between offspring for parental resources decreases begging honesty, whereas indirect, kin-selected benefits gained through saving parental resources for the production of future siblings increase begging honesty.

Experimental evolution reveals that sperm competition intensity selects for longer, more costly sperm.

It is the differences between sperm and eggs that fundamentally underpin the differences between the sexes within reproduction. For males, it is theorized that widespread sperm competition leads to selection for investment in sperm numbers, achieved by minimizing sperm size within limited resources for spermatogenesis in the testis. Here, we empirically examine how sperm competition shapes sperm size, after more than 77 generations of experimental selection of replicate lines under either high or low sperm competition intensities in the promiscuous flour beetle .

The database of the PREDICTS (Projecting Responses of Ecological Diversity In Changing Terrestrial Systems) project.

The PREDICTS project-Projecting Responses of Ecological Diversity In Changing Terrestrial Systems (www.predicts.org.

Impact of disease on diversity and productivity of plant populations.

Experiments were conducted on the role of intra- and inter-genotypic competition in ecological processes operating at the population scale in diseased plant populations.Combinations of genotypes showing variation for phenotypic traits relating to competitive ability and pathogen compatibility were infected with the oomycete and in separate experiments. Plant fitness and competitive ability were estimated from phenotypic measurements.

Evolutionary biology and genetic techniques for insect control.

The requirement to develop new techniques for insect control that minimize negative environmental impacts has never been more pressing. Here we discuss population suppression and population replacement technologies. These include sterile insect technique, genetic elimination methods such as the release of insects carrying a dominant lethal (RIDL), and gene driving mechanisms offered by intracellular bacteria and homing endonucleases.

A common garden design reveals population-specific variability in potential impacts of hybridization between populations of farmed and wild Atlantic salmon, Salmo salar L.

Released individuals can have negative impacts on native populations through various mechanisms, including competition, disease transfer and introduction of maladapted gene complexes. Previous studies indicate that the level of farmed Atlantic salmon introgression in native populations is population specific. However, few studies have explored the potential role of population diversity or river characteristics, such as temperature, on the consequences of hybridization.

Ku80 Counters Oxidative Stress-Induced DNA Damage and Cataract Formation in the Human Lens.

Purpose: Oxidative stress in the human lens leads to a wide range of damage including DNA strand breaks, which are likely to contribute to cataract formation. The protein Ku80 is a fundamental component of the nonhomologous end-joining pathway that repairs DNA double strand breaks. This study investigates the putative impact of Ku80 in cataract prevention in the human lens.

High-throughput monitoring of wild bee diversity and abundance via mitogenomics.

Bee populations and other pollinators face multiple, synergistically acting threats, which have led to population declines, loss of local species richness and pollination services, and extinctions. However, our understanding of the degree, distribution and causes of declines is patchy, in part due to inadequate monitoring systems, with the challenge of taxonomic identification posing a major logistical barrier. Pollinator conservation would benefit from a high-throughput identification pipeline.

Coupling Optical and Electrical Measurements in Artificial Membranes: Lateral Diffusion of Lipids and Channel Forming Peptides in Planar Bilayers.

Planar lipid bilayers (PLB) were prepared by the Montal-Mueller technique in a FRAP system designed to simultaneously measure conductivity across, and lateral diffusion of, the bilayer. In the first stage of the project the FRAP system was used to characterise the lateral dynamics of bilayer lipids with regards to phospholipid composition (headgroup, chain unsaturation etc.), presence of cholesterol and the effect of divalent cations on negatively-charged bilayers.

Proteolysis and cell migration: creating a path?

Both serine and metalloproteinases have been implicated in the complex integrated events underlying cell migration but no definitive single mechanism has emerged. Work over the past two years linking both membrane and soluble proteinases with integrins and other adhesion proteins and with intracellular signalling systems could herald the beginnings of a potential expansion of our understanding of the role and regulation of proteolysis in cell migration.