Leaf phenology mediates provenance differences in herbivore populations on valley oaks in a common garden

1. Plants from different populations often display a variation in herbivore resistance. However, it is rarely understood what plant traits mediate such differences. 2. It was tested how leaf phenology affects herbivore populations in a 15‐year‐old common garden of valley oaks (Quercus lobata Née) with different populations and maternal parents from throughout the Q. lobata range. 3. The abundance of leaf miners (Stigmella sp. Shrank) and leaf phenology of oaks in the common garden was measured. 4. Leaf miner abundance varied among provenance locations (population), but not among maternal parents within populations. Leaf phenology varied by provenance location and maternal parent, and trees that leafed out earlier accrued higher leaf‐miner abundance. Path analysis indicated that leaf phenology was the likely driver of provenance and parental differences in resistance to leaf miners. 5. Understanding population differences is particularly important when considering transport of genotypes for ornamental or restoration purposes. The present study suggests that similarity in leaf phenology may be one factor that could be used to find genotypes with a similar herbivore resistance to local genotypes.     

Switching between forest and trees: Opposite relationship of progesterone and testosterone to global–local processing

Sex differences in attentional selection of global and local components of stimuli have been hypothesized to underlie sex differences in cognitive strategy choice. A Navon figure paradigm was employed in 32 men, 41 naturally cycling women (22 follicular, 19 luteal) and 19 users of oral contraceptives (OCs) containing first to third generation progestins in their active pill phase. Participants were first asked to detect targets at any level (divided attention) and then at either the global or the local level only (focused attention). In the focused attention condition, luteal women showed reduced global advantage (i.e. faster responses to global vs. local targets) compared to men, follicular women and OC users. Accordingly, global advantage during the focused attention condition related significantly positively to testosterone levels and significantly negatively to progesterone, but not estradiol levels in a multiple regression model including all naturally cycling women and men. Interference (i.e. delayed rejection of stimuli displaying targets at the non-attended level) was significantly enhanced in OC users as compared to naturally cycling women and related positively to testosterone levels in all naturally cycling women and men. Remarkably, when analyzed separately for each group, the relationship of testosterone to global advantage and interference was reversed in women during their luteal phase as opposed to men and women during their follicular phase. As global processing is lateralized to the right and local processing to the left hemisphere, we speculate that these effects stem from a testosterone-mediated enhancement of right-hemisphere functioning as well as progesterone-mediated inter-hemispheric decoupling.     

中药联合微生态制剂防治呼吸、消化系统病毒病

本文阐述了中药防治病毒病的历史及其应用概况,中药联合微生态制剂防治呼吸、消化系统病毒病的理论依据、临床应用和发展前景。     

A novel potent metal-binding NDM-1 inhibitor was identified by fragment virtual,SPR and NMR screening

NDM-1 can hydrolyze nearly all available β-lactam antibiotics, including carbapenems. NDM-1 producing bacterial strains are worldwide threats. It is still very challenging to find a potent NDM-1 inhibitor for clinical use. In our study, we used a metal-binding pharmacophore (MBP) enriched virtual fragment library to screen NDM-1 hits. SPR screening helped to verify the MBP virtual hits and identified a new NDM-1 binder and weak inhibitor A1. A solution NMR study of ¹⁵N-labeled NDM-1 showed that A1 disturbed all three residues coordinating the second zinc ion (Zn2) in the active pocket of NDM-1. The perturbation only happened in the presence of zinc ion, indicating that A1 bound to Zn2. Based on the scaffold of A1, we designed and synthesized a series of NDM-1 inhibitors. Several compounds showed synergistic antibacterial activity with meropenem against NDM-1 producing K. pneumoniae.     

Unravelling the Leishmania genome

The past few years have seen significant advances in our understanding of eukaryotic genomes. In the field of parasitology, this is best exemplified by the application of genome mapping techniques to the study of genome structure and function in the protozoan parasite, Leishmania. Although much is known about the organism and the diseases it causes, molecular genetics has only recently begun to play a major part in elucidating some of the unusual characteristics of this interesting parasite. Mapping of the small (35 Mb) genome and determination of the functional role of genes by the application of in vitro homologous gene targeting techniques are revealing novel avenues for the development of prophylactic measures.     

A multiscale analysis of ecosystem services supply in the NW Iberian Peninsula from a functional perspective

In recent years, the assessment of ecosystem services (ES) supply has been based on the use of Land Use/Land Cover (LULC) data as proxies for spatial representation of ecosystems. Nevertheless, some shortcomings of this method, such as uncertainties derived from generalization of the ecosystem types and assumptions of invariance across spatial scales, indicate the need for new approaches. Such approaches could be aimed at improving knowledge of the relationships between ecosystem services and landscape structure and the spatial characteristics of ES patterns. In this study, we propose an integrative approach that involves the generation and analysis of continuous maps representing the supply of five ES potentially related to the amount of biomass. Five remote sensing images of the Northwestern Iberian Peninsula, obtained with Landsat-5 TM, were used to generate a proxy for net primary production by combining the normalized difference vegetation index (NDVI) of each image to calculate a ΣNDVI index that could act as a potential indicator of some ecosystem services. This information was combined with three variables – terrain slope, population density and occurrence of protected areas – to produce spatial models for the five ES and eventually a series of five supply maps. Food, materials and energy provision services showed a clustered pattern, with high supply values in flat zones and areas with high population densities. In contrast, mass flow and climate regulation services were more widely distributed throughout the study area. The five ecosystem service patterns were analyzed at different scales by two methods: lacunarity and four term local quadrat variance (4TLQV) analysis. These methods revealed differences in the spatial pattern: lacunarity analysis was useful for detection of scale thresholds at the local level, whereas 4TLQV was more sensitive to scale thresholds at larger spatial levels. Thus, the variance analysis yielded higher values for larger windows sizes, particularly for provisioning services. The results demonstrated the suitability of the proposed approach for the spatially explicit modeling of ecosystem services, avoiding the uncertainty of other assessments such as those based on LULC data, and for the exploratory analysis of ES supply from a spatial point of view.