Is mating failure caused by cryptic male choice in the seed bug ?

One yet unresolved question in the study of mating system evolution is the occurrence of mating failure, when individuals go through their lives without successfully mating. This includes the failure to produce offspring even following copulation, for instance due to insemination or fertilisation failure. Copulations are costly in a variety of ways, but also a fundamental route to fitness in sexual species, and so we should expect that engaging in copulations that generate no offspring should be strongly selected against.

Seed dormancy types and germination response of 15 plant species in temperate montane peatlands.

Despite their crucial role in determining the fate of seeds, the type and breaking mode of seed dormancy in peatland plants in temperate Asia with a continental monsoon climate are rarely known. Fifteen common peatland plant species were used to test their seed germination response to various dormancy-breaking treatments, including dry storage (D), gibberellin acid soaking (GA), cold stratification (CS), warm followed cold stratification (WCS), GA soaking + cold stratification (GA + CS) and GA soaking + warm followed cold stratification (GA + WCS). Germination experiment, viability and imbibition test, and morphological observation of embryos were conducted.

Frontal alpha asymmetry is associated with chronic stress and depression, but not with somatoform disorders.

Cardinal characteristics of somatoform disorders (SFDs) are worry of illness, and impaired affective processing. We used relative frontal alpha asymmetry (FAA), a method to measure functional lateralization of affective processing, to investigate psychobiological correlates of SFDs. With alpha activity being inversely related to cortical network activity, relative FAA refers to alpha activity on the right frontal lobe minus alpha activity on the left frontal lobe.

Molecular evidence and differences in gonopod morphology lead to the recognition of a new species of the freshwater crab genus Bott, 1967 (Crustacea, Brachyura, Potamidae) from eastern Taiwan.

A new freshwater crab of the potamid genus Bott, 1967, is described from eastern Taiwan. sp. nov.

Nano-Strainer: A workflow for the identification of single-copy nuclear loci for plant systematic studies, using target capture kits and Oxford Nanopore long reads.

In modern plant systematics, target enrichment enables simultaneous analysis of hundreds of genes. However, when dealing with reticulate or polyploidization histories, few markers may suffice, but often are required to be single-copy, a condition that is not necessarily met with commercial capture kits. Also, large genome sizes can render target capture ineffective, so that amplicon sequencing would be preferable; however, knowledge about suitable loci is often missing.

Which demographic processes control competitive equilibria? Bayesian calibration of a size-structured forest population model.

In forest communities, light competition is a key process for community assembly. Species' differences in seedling and sapling tolerance to shade cast by overstory trees is thought to determine species composition at late-successional stages. Most forests are distant from these late-successional equilibria, impeding a formal evaluation of their potential species composition.

Pet cat personality linked to owner-reported predation frequency.

The domestic cat, , is one of the most popular and widespread domestic animals. Because domestic cats can reach high population densities and retain at least some tendency to hunt, their overall impact on wildlife can be severe. Domestic cats have highly variable predation rates depending on the availability of prey in their environment, their owners' practices, and individual cat characteristics.

Fixed or random? On the reliability of mixed-effects models for a small number of levels in grouping variables.

Biological data are often intrinsically hierarchical (e.g., species from different genera, plants within different mountain regions), which made mixed-effects models a common analysis tool in ecology and evolution because they can account for the non-independence.

Determination of individual bile acids in acute respiratory distress syndrome reveals a specific pattern of primary and secondary bile acids and a shift to the acidic pathway as an adaptive response to the critical condition.

Objectives: Cholestasis and elevated serum bile acid levels are common in critically ill patients. This study aims to define the specific pattern of bile acids associated with acute respiratory distress syndrome (ARDS) and the changes in pattern over time.

Methods: Prospective observational study.

Equilibria between conformational states of the Ras oncogene protein revealed by high pressure crystallography.

In this work, we experimentally investigate the allosteric transitions between conformational states on the Ras oncogene protein using high pressure crystallography. Ras protein is a small GTPase involved in central regulatory processes occurring in multiple conformational states. Ras acts as a molecular switch between active GTP-bound, and inactive GDP-bound states, controlling essential signal transduction pathways.

Lung-borne systemic inflammation in mechanically ventilated infant rats due to high PEEP, oxygen, and hypocapnia.

Background: Intensive care practice calls for ventilator adjustments due to fast-changing clinical conditions in ventilated critically ill children. These adaptations include positive end-expiratory pressure (PEEP), fraction of inspired oxygen (FiO), and respiratory rate (RR). It is unclear which alterations in ventilator settings trigger a significant systemic inflammatory response.

Sympathectomy aggravates subchondral bone changes during osteoarthritis progression in mice without affecting cartilage degeneration or synovial inflammation.

Objective: Osteoarthritis (OA) pathogenesis involves the interaction of articular cartilage with surrounding tissues, which are innervated by tyrosine hydroxylase-positive (TH+) sympathetic nerve fibers suggesting a role of the sympathetic nervous system (SNS) during OA progression. We analyzed the effects of sympathectomy (Syx) in a murine OA model.

Methods: Peripheral Syx was generated by 6-hydroxydopamine (6-OHDA) injections in male C57BL/6 mice.

Restoration of species-rich grasslands by transfer of local plant material and its impact on species diversity and genetic variation-Findings of a practical restoration project in southeastern Germany.

Restoration of species-rich grasslands is a key issue of conservation. The transfer of seed-containing local plant material is a proven technique to restore species-rich grassland, since it potentially allows to establish genetically variable and locally adapted populations. In our study, we tested how the transfer of local plant material affected the species diversity and composition of restored grasslands and the genetic variation of the typical grassland plant species and .

The importance of small natural features in forests-How the overgrowth of forest gaps affects indigenous flower supply and flower-visiting insects and seed sets of six species.

The abandonment of historical land-use forms within forests, such as grazing or coppicing, and atmospheric nitrogen deposition, has led to an increasing overgrowth of forest gaps and canopy closure in forest ecosystems of Central Europe. From 1945 to 2015, 81% of the forest gaps greater than 150 m within the study area transitioned into a closed forest.This study investigated how the overgrowth process affects flower supply, flower visitors, and reproduction of species.

Queen execution in a monogynous ant.

Workers in many species of social insects are capable of laying unfertilized eggs, which can develop into haploid males. This causes a conflict about male parentage between queens and workers. In a few species, this may result in matricide, that is, workers kill the colony's queen.

Uncommon finding of a "black node" in a patient with malignant melanoma and arthroplasty: A case report.

Postarthroplasty lymphadenopathy should be kept in mind particularly in patients with tumor (eg, melanoma) with a long-term history of total joint replacement therapy. Microscopy is mandatory in establishing diagnosis and is thus helpful for therapy.

Habitat matters - Strong genetic and epigenetic differentiation in from dry and wet grasslands.

Plant species differ in their ecological amplitude, with some species occurring in very different habitats under strongly differentiated environmental conditions. We were interested in to what extent the occurrence of in dry calcareous grasslands (Bromion) and wet litter meadows (Molinion), two habitats on opposing ends concerning, for example, moisture level, is reflected on the genetic and epigenetic level. Using AFLP (amplified fragment length polymorphisms) and MSAP (methylation sensitive amplification polymorphisms) analyses, we studied the genetic and epigenetic variation of from calcareous grasslands and litter meadows.

Coronavirus disease 2019 induces multi-lineage, morphologic changes in peripheral blood cells.

The clinical course of coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) varies from mild symptoms to acute respiratory distress syndrome, hyperinflammation, and coagulation disorder. The hematopoietic system plays a critical role in the observed hyperinflammation, particularly in severely ill patients. We conducted a prospective diagnostic study performing a blood differential analyzing morphologic changes in peripheral blood of COVID-19 patients.

Nanoparticles Mimicking Viral Cell Recognition Strategies Are Superior Transporters into Mesangial Cells.

Poor drug availability in the tissue of interest is a frequent cause of therapy failure. While nanotechnology has developed a plethora of nanocarriers for drug transport, their ability to unequivocally identify cells of interest remains moderate. Viruses are the ideal nanosized carriers as they are able to address their embedded nucleic acids with high specificity to their host cells.

Comparative analyses of caste, sex, and developmental stage-specific transcriptomes in two ants.

Social insects dominate arthropod communities worldwide due to cooperation and division of labor in their societies. This, however, makes them vulnerable to exploitation by social parasites, such as slave-making ants. Slave-making ant workers pillage brood from neighboring nests of related host ant species.

Effects of polyploidy on the coordination of gene expression between organellar and nuclear genomes in Mill. (Compositae, Anthemideae).

Whole-genome duplications (WGD) through polyploid speciation are associated with disruptions of well-tuned relationships among the three plant cell genomes. Key metabolic processes comprising multi-subunit enzyme complexes, for which partner proteins are both nuclear- and plastid-encoded, are dependent on maintenance of stoichiometric ratios among the subunits to avoid cytonuclear imbalances after WGDs. By using qPCR for gene copy and transcript number quantification, we have studied the relationship of subunit expression in the two gene pairs / (the two subunits of RuBisCO) and / (two members of photosystem II) in closely related members of (Compositae, Anthemideae), comprising a diploid, a tetraploid, and a hexaploid species.

Phylogeography of (Brachyura: Potamidae) identifies Quaternary glacial refugia within the Caucasus biodiversity hot spot.

Refugia are critical for the maintenance of biodiversity during the periods of Quaternary climatic oscillations. The long-term persistence of refugial populations in a large continuous refugium has resulted in a homogenous pattern of genetic structure among populations, while highly structured evolutionary lineages characterize the restriction of refugial populations to smaller subrefugia. These mechanisms have resulted in the identification of hot spots of biodiversity within putative glacial refugia.

A journey on plate tectonics sheds light on European crayfish phylogeography.

Crayfish can be used as model organisms in phylogeographic and divergence time studies if reliable calibrations are available. This study presents a comprehensive investigation into the phylogeography of the European stone crayfish () and includes samples from previously unstudied sites. Two mitochondrial markers were used to reveal evolutionary relationships among haplogroups throughout the species' distributional range and to estimate the divergence time by employing both substitution rates and geological calibration methods.