Light and competition gradients fail to explain the coexistence of shade-tolerant Fagus sylvatica and shade-intermediate Quercus petraea seedlings

Background and Aims

The coexistence of forest tree species has often been linked to differences among species in terms of their response to light availability during the regeneration stage. From this perspective, species coexistence results from growth–growth or mortality–growth trade-offs along spatial light gradients. Experimental evidence of growth–growth trade-offs in natural conditions is sparse due to various confounding factors that potentially hinder the relationship. This study examined growth hierarchies along light gradients between two tree species with contrasting shade tolerance by controlling potential confounding factors such as seedling size, seedling status, seedling density and species composition.

Methods

Natural regenerated shade-tolerant Fagus sylvatica and shade-intermediate Quercus petraea seedlings were used, and growth rankings over a 4-year period were compared in 8- to 10-year-old tree seedlings.

Key results

No rank reversal occurs between the two species along the light gradient, or along the density, mixture or seedling size gradients. The shade-tolerant species was always the more competitive of the two. Pronounced effects of initial size on seedling growth were observed, whereas the effects of light and competition by neighbours were of secondary importance. The paramount effect of size, which results from the asymmetric nature of interseedling competition, gives a strong advantage to tall seedlings over the long term.

Conclusions

This study extends previous efforts to identify potential drivers of rank reversals in young tree mixtures. It does not support the classical assumption that spatial heterogeneity in canopy opening explains the coexistence of the two species studied. It suggests that spatial variation in local size hierarchies among seedlings that may be caused by seedling emergence time or seedling initial performance is the main driver of the dynamics of these mixed stands.     

基于生物多样性保护的兴安落叶松与白桦最佳混交比例——以阿尔山林区为例

选取内蒙古阿尔山林区7种不同混交比例的松桦混交林,包括落叶松纯林、白桦纯林及5种不同比例的混交林为研究对象。对植物和昆虫种群丰富度、多样性进行了研究,并对种群在乔木层混交状况梯度下的分布进行了分析。结果表明:植物和昆虫种群分布受乔木层混交状况影响显著。同时,郁闭度能改变其分布状况及决定于松桦比例。兴安落叶松和白桦混交比例介于5∶5和7∶3之间时最有利于森林多样性,是进行林分疏伐的理想模式。     

Sensitivity of growth and biomass allocation patterns to increasing nitrogen: a comparison between ephemerals and annuals in the Gurbantunggut Desert,north-western China

Background and Aims

Biomass accumulation and allocation patterns are critical to quantifying ecosystem dynamics. However, these patterns differ among species, and they can change in response to nutrient availability even among genetically related individuals. In order to understand this complexity further, this study examined three ephemeral species (with very short vegetative growth periods) and three annual species (with significantly longer vegetative growth periods) in the Gurbantunggut Desert, north-western China, to determine their responses to different nitrogen (N) supplements under natural conditions.

Methods

Nitrogen was added to the soil at rates of 0, 0·5, 1·0, 3·0, 6·0 and 24·0 g N m⁻² year⁻¹. Plants were sampled at various intervals to measure relative growth rate and shoot and root dry mass.

Key Results

Compared with annuals, ephemerals grew more rapidly, increased shoot and root biomass with increasing N application rates and significantly decreased root/shoot ratios. Nevertheless, changes in the biomass allocation of some species (i.e. Erodium oxyrrhynchum) in response to the N treatment were largely a consequence of changes in overall plant size, which was inconsistent with an optimal partitioning model. An isometric log shoot vs. log root scaling relationship for the final biomass harvest was observed for each species and all annuals, while pooled data of three ephemerals showed an allometric scaling relationship.

Conclusions

These results indicate that ephemerals and annuals differ observably in their biomass allocation patterns in response to soil N supplements, although an isometric log shoot vs. log root scaling relationship was maintained across all species. These findings highlight that different life history strategies behave differently in response to N application even when interspecific scaling relationships remain nearly isometric.     

Seeing the forest through the trees: comprehensive inference on individual mating patterns in a mixed stand of Quercus robur and Q. petraea

Background and Aims

Sexual reproduction is one of the most important moments in a life cycle, determining the genetic composition of individual offspring. Controlled pollination experiments often show high variation in the mating system at the individual level, suggesting a persistence of individual variation in natural populations. Individual variation in mating patterns may have significant adaptive implications for a population and for the entire species. Nevertheless, field data rarely address individual differences in mating patterns, focusing rather on averages. This study aimed to quantify individual variation in the different components of mating patterns.

Methods

Microsatellite data were used from 421 adult trees and 1911 seeds, structured in 72 half-sib families collected in a single mixed stand of Quercus robur and Q. petraea in northern Poland. Using a Bayesian approach, mating patterns were investigated, taking into account pollen dispersal, male fecundity, possible hybridization and heterogeneity in immigrant pollen pools.

Key Results

Pollen dispersal followed a heavy-tailed distribution (283 m on average). In spite of high pollen mobility, immigrant pollen pools showed strong genetic structuring among mothers. At the individual level, immigrant pollen pools showed highly variable divergence rates, revealing that sources of immigrant pollen can vary greatly among particular trees. Within the stand, the distribution of male fecundity appeared highly skewed, with a small number of dominant males, resulting in a ratio of census to effective density of pollen donors of 5·3. Male fecundity was not correlated with tree diameter but showed strong cline-like spatial variation. This pattern can be attributed to environmental variation. Quercus petraea revealed a greater preference (74 %) towards intraspecific mating than Q. robur (36 %), although mating preferences varied among trees.

Conclusions

Mating patterns can reveal great variation among individuals, even within a single even-age stand. The results show that trees can mate assortatively, with little respect for spatial proximity. Such selective mating may be a result of variable combining compatibility among trees due to genetic and/or environmental factors.     

Intramolecular hydrogen bonding in articaine can be related to superior bone tissue penetration: a molecular dynamics study

Local anesthetics (LAs) are drugs that cause reversible loss of nociception during surgical procedures. Articaine is a commonly used LA in dentistry that has proven to be exceptionally effective in penetrating bone tissue and induce anesthesia on posterior teeth in maxilla and mandibula. In the present study, our aim was to gain a deeper understanding of the penetration of articaine through biological membranes by studying the interactions of articaine with a phospholipid membrane. Our approach involves Langmuir monolayer experiments combined with molecular dynamics simulations. Membrane permeability of LAs can be modulated by pH due to a titratable amine group with a pKa value close to physiological pH. A change in protonation state is thus known to act as a lipophilicity switch in LAs. Our study shows that articaine has an additional unique lipophilicity switch in its ability to form an intramolecular hydrogen bond. We suggest this intramolecular hydrogen bond as a novel and additional solvent-dependent mechanism for modulation of lipophilicity of articaine which may enhance its diffusion through membranes and connective tissue.     

Clonal growth is enhanced in the absence of a mating morph: a comparative study of fertile stylar polymorphic and sterile monomorphic populations of Nymphoides montana (Menyanthaceae)

Background and Aims

Many aquatic species with stylar polymorphisms have the capacity for clonal and sexual reproduction and are sensitive to the balance of the two reproductive modes when there are a limited number of mating morphs within a population. This study asked how the clonal and sexual reproductive modes perform in populations that contain only a single morph and where fitness gain through sexual reproduction is rare. In clonal aquatic Nymphoides montana, polymorphic populations normally contain two mating morphs in equal frequencies. Populations are sexually fertile and appear to be maintained by pollen transfer between the two partners. However, in a monomorphic population of N. montana where mating opportunities are unavailable, female and male function is impaired and clonality maintains the population. Here, the consequences of intraspecific variation in sexuality were explored between monomorphic and polymorphic N. montana populations in eastern Australia.

Methods

Comparative measurements of male and female fertility, total dry mass and genotypic diversity using ISSR markers were made between populations with variable sexuality.

Key Results and Conclusions

Very few seeds were produced in the monomorphic population under natural and glasshouse conditions due to dysfunctional pollen and ovules. Stigma–anther separation was minimal in the monomorphic population, which may be a consequence of the relaxed selective pressures that regulate the maintenance of sexual function. However, clonal reproduction was favoured at the expense of sexual reproduction in the monomorphic population; this may facilitate the establishment of sterility throughout the population via resource reallocation or pleiotropic effects. The ISSR results showed that the monomorphic population was one large, single genotype, unlike the multi-genotypic fertile polymorphic populations. Evolutionary loss of sex in a clonal population in which a mating morph is absent was evident; under these conditions clonal growth may assure reproduction and expand the population via spreading stolons.     

No divergence in Cassiope tetragona: persistence of growth response along a latitudinal temperature gradient and under multi-year experimental warming

Background and Aims

The dwarf shrub Cassiope tetragona (Arctic bell-heather) is increasingly used for arctic climate reconstructions, the reliability of which depends on the existence of a linear climate–growth relationship. This relationship was examined over a high-arctic to sub-arctic temperature gradient and under multi-year artificial warming at a high-arctic site.

Methods

Growth chronologies of annual shoot length, as well as total leaf length, number of leaves and average leaf length per year, were constructed for three sites. Cassiope tetragona was sampled near its cold tolerance limit at Ny-Ålesund, Svalbard, at its assumed climatic optimum in Endalen, Svalbard, and near its European southern limit at Abisko, Sweden. Together these sites represent the entire temperature gradient of this species. Leaf life span was also determined. Each growing season from 2004 to 2010, 17 open top chambers (OTCs) were placed near Ny-Ålesund, thus increasing the daily mean temperatures by 1·23°C. At the end of the 2010 growing season, shoots were harvested from OTCs and control plots, and growth parameters were measured.

Key Results

All growth parameters, except average leaf length, exhibited a linear positive response (R² between 0·63 and 0·91) to mean July temperature over the temperature gradient. Average leaf life span was 1·4 years shorter in sub-arctic Sweden compared with arctic Svalbard. All growth parameters increased in response to the experimental warming; the leaf life span was, however, not significantly affected by OTC warming.

Conclusions

The linear July temperature–growth relationships, as well as the 7 year effect of experimental warming, confirm that the growth parameters annual shoot length, total leaf length and number of leaves per year can reliably be used for monitoring and reconstructing temperature changes. Furthermore, reconstructing July temperature from these parameters is not hampered by divergence.     

Photosynthetic response of clusterbean chloroplasts to UV-B radiation: Energy imbalance and loss in redox homeostasis between QA and QB of photosystem II

The effects of ultraviolet-B (UV-B: 280-320 nm) radiation on the photosynthetic pigments, primary photochemical reactions of thylakoids and the rate of carbon assimilation (P_n) in the cotyledons of clusterbean (Cyamopsis tetragonoloba) seedlings have been examined. The radiation induces an imbalance between the energy absorbed through the photophysical process of photosystem (PS) II and the energy consumed for carbon assimilation. Decline in the primary photochemistry of PS II induced by UV-B in the background of relatively stable P_n, has been implicated in the creation of the energy imbalance_. The radiation induced damage of PS II hinders the flow of electron from Q_A to Q_B resulting in a loss in the redox homeostasis between the Q_A to Q_B leading to an accumulation of Q_A⁻. The accumulation of Q_A⁻ generates an excitation pressure that diminishes the PS II-mediated O₂ evolution, maximal photochemical potential (F_v/F_m) and PS II quantum yield (Φ_{PS II}). While UV-B radiation inactivates the carotenoid-mediated protective mechanisms, the accumulation of flavonoids seems to have a small role in protecting the photosynthetic apparatus from UV-B onslaught. The failure of protective mechanisms makes PS II further vulnerable to the radiation and facilitates the accumulation of malondialdehyde (MDA) indicating the involvement of reactive oxygen species (ROS) metabolism in UV-B-induced damage of photosynthetic apparatus of clusterbean cotyledons.     

Effects of clonal variation on growth, metabolism, and productivity in response to trophic factor stimulation: a study of Chinese hamster ovary cells producing a recombinant monoclonal antibody

The growth, metabolism, and productivity of five Chinese hamster ovary (CHO) clones were explored in response to stimulation with insulin (5 mg/L) and LONG^®R³IGF-I (20 μg/L or 100 μg/L). All five clones were derived from the same parental CHO cell line (DG44) and produced the same recombinant monoclonal antibody, with varying specific productivities. There was no uniform response among the clones to stimulation with the different trophic factors. One of the high productivity clones (clone D) exhibited significantly better growth in response to LONG^®R³IGF-I; whereas the other clones showed equivalent or slightly better growth in the presence of insulin. Three out of the five clones had higher specific productivities in the presence of insulin (although not statistically significant); one was invariant, and the final clone exhibited slightly higher specific productivity in the presence of LONG^®R³IGF-I. Total product titers exhibited moderate variation between culture conditions, again with neither trophic factor being clearly superior. Overall product titers were affected by variations in both integrated viable cell density and specific productivity. Nutrient uptake and metabolite generation patterns varied strongly between clones and much less with culture conditions. These results point to the need for careful clonal analysis when selecting clones, particularly for platform processes where media and culture conditions are predetermined.

Electronic supplementary material

The online version of this article (doi:10.1007/s10616-011-9388-z) contains supplementary material, which is available to authorized users.     

Assembly of non-natural electron transfer conduits in the cytochrome P450 system: a critical assessment and update of artificial redox constructs amenable to exploitation in biotechnological areas

The high plasticity of the active-site cavity of cytochromes P450, permitting reactivity toward a vast array of compounds, makes these enzymes attractive targets for biotechnological application. Escalating attention in this area is driven by remarkable progress in the rational design by DNA shuffling of self-sufficient, multi-domain P450/electron donor constructs simplifying the composition of biocatalytic systems. Moreover, versatile approaches were undertaken to supersede the well-established, NAD(P)H-steered proteinaceous redox chains by cost-effective alternative electron transfer conduits constituted of organometallic mediators or photoactivatable redox triggers. Electrochemical techniques have proven particularly useful: employing different types of carbon- and metal-based electrodes for the fabrication of biosensors, the continuing challenge was to optimize the conductive properties of these devices by creating biocompatible interfaces for transferring electrons between sensor surfaces and redox proteins. The present review provides a critical update of the most significant breakthroughs in innovative manipulation of the redox machinery, giving an impulse to exploitation of P450s in fields such as the production of fine chemicals, drug processing, medicinal diagnostics and remediation of biotopes contaminated with harmful environmental pollutants.