Individual variability of behavioural responses by Wandering Albatrosses (Diomedea exulans) to human disturbance

Sub-Antarctic Marion Island has had a permanent research station for 50 years and the islands Wandering Albatrosses have been intensively studied for 20 years. The reactions of breeding birds to approaches by a human on foot were recorded. Three response variables were calculated: intensity of vocal reaction (IVR), intensity of non-vocal reaction (INR) and overall response index (ORI). At 5 m from the nest, twice as many birds stood and/or vocalised as at 15 m. Nearest neighbour distance, age and gender did not explain individual variability of responses. Study colony birds had higher IVR scores than non-study colony birds; birds at colonies closest to the station had the highest ORI scores. A better breeding record was associated with lower IVR and ORI scores, but a causative relationship remains to be demonstrated. A minimum viewing distance of 25 m is recommended for breeding Wandering Albatrosses.

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Influence of groundwater on the evaporative evolution of saline lakes in the Wimmera of south-eastern Australia

A hydrogeochemical study conducted in the southern Wimmera of western Victoria, south-eastern Australia reveals a small group of lakes that possess a range of chemical character so diverse that it compares to that recorded for lakes from the entire region of western Victoria and south-eastern South Australia. Principal Components Analysis and reaction path modelling using PHRQPITZ confirm that the chemical diversity of the lakes is largely inherited from the groundwater system. Three end-members (in the Eugster–Jones–Hardie framework) were identified: (i) Path 1B groundwaters transmitted via the fractures of a sandstone monolith; (ii) Path 2A-1A groundwaters derived, in part, from a limestone aquifer; and (iii) groundwaters that carry an essentially meteoric, Path 2A signature. The relative contribution of these path 1B and/or path 2A end-members largely determines the evaporative pathway (1B or 2A) that is subsequently followed, and creates a broad spread in the data. Sulphate reduction, ion exchange, silicate hydrolysis and carbonate mineral solubility also play important roles locally, in some cases displacing lake waters from one evaporation field to another. The chemical processes identified likely contribute to aquatic biodiversity in the region, due to the strong control on the ionic composition of the lakes.

Personal adaptive clusters as containers for scientific jobs

We describe a system for creating personal clusters in user-space to support the submission and management of thousands of compute-intensive serial jobs to the network-connected compute resources on the NSF TeraGrid. The system implements a robust infrastructure that submits and manages job proxies across a distributed computing environment. These job proxies contribute resources to personal clusters created dynamically for a user on-demand. The personal clusters then adapt to the prevailing job load conditions at the distributed sites by migrating job proxies to sites expected to provide resources more quickly. Furthermore, the system allows multiple instances of these personal clusters to be created as containers for individual scientific experiments, allowing the submission environment to be customized for each instance. The version of the system described in this paper allows users to build large personal Condor and Sun Grid Engine clusters on the TeraGrid. Users then manage their scientific jobs, within each personal cluster, with a single uniform interface using the feature-rich functionality found in these job management environments.

Leitlinien zur molekulargenetischen Diagnostik: Fragiles-X und Fragiles-X assoziiertes Tremor/Ataxie Syndrom

Ohne Zusammenfassung

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The Behavioral Ecology of Shellfish Gathering in Western Kiribati,Micronesia 1: Prey Choice

Focusing on contemporary shellfish exploitation among several atoll communities in Kiribati, Micronesia, this paper examines the relationship between human foragers and their invertebrate prey via the prey choice or diet breadth model derived from optimal foraging theory. Shellfish, like many other reef organisms, are relatively sedentary and predictable, but these characteristics make them susceptible to over-harvesting. The research reveals that shellfish gatherers are foraging in a manner that matches the predictions of optimal foraging theory. The work adds to our understanding of optimal foraging decisions in atoll settings by critically evaluating the depiction of atoll dwellers as conservationists.

Hennigian Phylogenetic Systematics and the ‘Groundplan’ vs. ‘Post-Groundplan’ Approaches: A Reply to Kukalová-Peck

The recent contribution by Jarmila Kukalová-Peck on Hennigian phylogenetics and hexapod limb evolution is critically evaluated.

How development changes evolution: conceptual and historical issues in evolutionary developmental biology

Evolutionary developmental biology (Evo-Devo) is a new and rapidly developing field of biology which focuses on questions in the intersection of evolution and development and has been seen by many as a potential synthesis of these two fields. This synthesis is the topic of the books reviewed here. Integrating Evolution and Development (edited by Roger Sansom and Robert Brandon), is a collection of papers on conceptual issues in Evo-Devo, while From Embryology to Evo-Devo (edited by Manfred Laubichler and Jane Maienschein) is a history of the problem of the relations between ontogeny and phylogeny.

Is it a revolution?

Jablonka and Lamb's claim that evolutionary biology is undergoing a ‘revolution’ is queried. But the very concept of revolutionary change has uncertain application to a field organized in the manner of contemporary biology. The explanatory primacy of sequence properties is also discussed.

Gridcast—a next generation broadcast infrastructure?

Gridcast is an R&D project investigating grid ideas and technologies in the broadcasting technical infrastructure. In this paper I discuss the business and technical issues in building infrastructures to support broadcasters and outline the structure of the Gridcast grid-based service oriented architecture for broadcasting playout support.

Hierarchical analysis of piecewise affine models of gene regulatory networks

A key point in the analysis of dynamical models of biological systems is to handle systems of relatively high dimensions. In the present paper we propose a method to hierarchically organize a certain type of piecewise affine (PWA) differential systems. This specific class of systems has been extensively studied for the past few years, as it provides a good framework to model gene regulatory networks. The method, shown on several examples, allows a qualitative analysis of the asymptotic behavior of a PWA system, decomposing it into several smaller subsystems. This technique, based on the well-known strongly connected components decomposition, is not new. However, its adaptation to the non-smooth PWA differential equations turns out to be quite relevant because of the strong discrete structure underlying these equations. Its biological relevance is shown on a 7-dimensional PWA system modeling the gene network responsible for the carbon starvation response in Escherichia coli.

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Life at the extreme: meiofauna from three unexplored lakes in the caldera of the Cerro Azul volcano,Galápagos Islands,Ecuador

On Isla Isabela, Galápagos Archipelago, three so far unexplored lakes were investigated in the caldera of Cerro Azul, one of the most active volcanoes in the world. The lakes face recurrent desiccation and eruption events and showed distinct differences in their water chemistry. Thirty cores from the upper 15 cm of sediment indicate distinct differences in the composition of meiobenthic communities between the lakes. In total, 27 different aquatic metazoan species could be distinguished. Numerically, rotifers dominated in two of the lakes, with mean densities up to 4.56 × 10⁶ individuals m⁻² while the third lake was dominated by a gastrotrich of the genus Chaetonotus (0.67 × 10⁶ individuals m⁻²). The largest lake harboured up to 14.4 × 10⁶ nematodes m⁻², which is the highest nematode density thus far reported for a freshwater habitat. The lakes yielded few nematode species (S = 7, N = 887) and calculation of the Shannon–Wiener index (H′) indicated an exceptionally low nematode diversity. The nematode community of one lake was clearly dominated by an undescribed suction-feeding Mesodorylaimus (59.6%), the community of the other lake by the epistrate feeder Achromadora pseudomicoletzkyi (89.3%), whereas the third lake surprisingly contained no nematodes. The benthic nematode biomasses for the two nematode-containing lakes differed by a factor 50. The food webs of the three lakes are presumed to have an exceptionable simply structure.

The nature of developmental constraints and the difference-maker argument for externalism

One current version of the internalism/externalism debate in evolutionary theory focuses on the relative importance of developmental constraints in evolutionary explanation. The received view of developmental constraints sees them as an internalist concept that tend to be shared across related species as opposed to selective pressures that are not. Thus, to the extent that constraints can explain anything, they can better explain similarity across species, while natural selection is better able to explain their differences. I challenge both of these aspects of the received view and propose a hierarchical view of constraints.

Intelligent design and mathematical statistics: a troubled alliance

The explanatory filter is a proposed method to detect design in nature with the aim of refuting Darwinian evolution. The explanatory filter borrows its logical structure from the theory of statistical hypothesis testing but we argue that, when viewed within this context, the filter runs into serious trouble in any interesting biological application. Although the explanatory filter has been extensively criticized from many angles, we present the first rigorous criticism based on the theory of mathematical statistics.

The Semantic Morphology of Adolf Portmann: A Starting Point for the Biosemiotics of Organic Form?

This paper develops the ideas of the Swiss zoologist Adolf Portmann or, more precisely, his concept of organic self-representation, wherein Portmann considered the outer surface of living organisms as a specific organ that serves in a self-representational role. This idea is taken as a starting point from which to elaborate Portman’s ideas, so as to make them compatible with the theoretical framework of biosemiotics. Today, despite the many theories that help us understand aposematism, camouflage, deception and other phenomena related to the category of mimicry, there still is a need for a general theory of self-representation that would re-synthesize evolutionary, morphogenetic and semiotic aspects of the surface of organisms. Here, Adolf Portmann’s concept of self-representation is considered as an important step towards the biosemiotics of animal form.

The connectionist framework for gene regulation

I show that gene regulation networks are qualitatively consistent and therefore sufficiently similar to linearly seperable connectionist networks to warrant that the connectionist framework be applied to gene regulation. On this view, natural selection designs gene regulation networks to overcome the difficulty of development. I offer some general lessons about their evolvability that can be learned by examining the generic features of connectionist networks.

Towards dynamical system models of language-related brain potentials

Event-related brain potentials (ERP) are important neural correlates of cognitive processes. In the domain of language processing, the N400 and P600 reflect lexical-semantic integration and syntactic processing problems, respectively. We suggest an interpretation of these markers in terms of dynamical system theory and present two nonlinear dynamical models for syntactic computations where different processing strategies correspond to functionally different regions in the system’s phase space.