Space use,habitat selection and activity patterns of female Sardinian mouflon (<Emphasis Type="Italic">Ovis orientalis musimon</Emphasis>) during the lambing season

We analysed space use, habitat selection and activity patterns in female mouflons using radio tracking during lambing. During the birth period, mothers increased their home ranges to reach birth places suitably covered by Mediterranean scrubland. During lactation, mothers used Mediterranean scrubland more than non-mothers. Mothers decreased the use of meadows precisely when, according to a grass quality index, productivity of meadows was highest; this was likely due to the lack of concealment for lambs that would, thus, be vulnerable to eagle attacks. Accordingly, females are argued to adopt anti-predator tactics during lactation, trading high-quality foraging meadows for safer scrubland that provides good concealment for lambs. Despite the high temperatures recorded during the day in this period, lactating females showed greater activity levels, due to their need to meet greater energetic demands for lactation. This effort by mouflon mothers in such a poor environment as the Sardinian accounted for their lower productive success than in other European populations.     

Occurrence of black wolves in the Northern Apennines,Italy

The occurrence of black-coated individuals in wolfCanis lupus Linnaeus, 1758 populations is not surprising itself, but their presence in populations recovering from a severe numerical decline has been considered a possible sign of crossbreeding with the domestic dog. In the northern Apennines (Italy), black wolves occur at a non-negligible frequency. In a 3300 km² area, 22% of wolves observed and 23% of all dead wolves found were represented by animals with a completely black coat. One ‘black’ wolf belonging to the studied population was analysed by a set of microsatellite loci, and no trace of hybridization was found in its ancestry. This result induced us to consider the occurrence of a black phenotype in this area possibly derived from a natural combination of wolf alleles in coat colour determining genes, and not necessarily as the result of crossbreeding with the domestic form.     

Species inflation and taxonomic artefacts—A critical comment on recent trends in mammalian classification

Recently, many new (extant) mammal species have been named, mostly by raising subspecies to species rank. This is primarily a consequence of the phylogenetic species concept (PSC) that has become very popular over the last few decades. We highlight several cases of splitting and argue that much of this taxonomic inflation is artificial due to shortcomings of the PSC and unjustified reliance on insufficient morphological and/or genetic data. We particularly discourage species splitting based on gene trees inferred from mitochondrial DNA only and phenetic analyses aimed at diagnosability. Uncritical acceptance of new species creates an unnecessary burden on the conservation of biodiversity.     

Efficient stem cell isolation from under vacuum preserved tissue samples

Different approaches for the isolation of stem/progenitor cells have been reported, including stem cell selection in stringent culture conditions. We evaluated the possibility of isolating human progenitor cells from surgical specimens preserved by under vacuum sealing and cooling, a clinical practice approached by several hospitals as alternative to formalin. Renal tissue samples (n = 20) maintained under vacuum from 6 to 48 h at 4°C were used to isolate human renal CD133⁺ progenitor cells. We obtained CD133⁺ progenitors from unsorted cells derived from disaggregated tissues from each sample. Phenotypic characterization as well as in vitro and in vivo differentiation of the obtained CD133⁺ lines showed results comparable with sorted CD133⁺ cells obtained from fresh tissue. These results indicate that the process of sealing under vacuum and cooling appears as a suitable tissue treatment to isolate hypoxia resistant cells, such as human stem/progenitor cells, and that this procedure can be exploited to render the extraction of stem cells from human samples more practical and feasible.     

The role of geological substrate for horn growth in ungulates: a case study on Alpine chamois

Ecological factors such as environmental and climatic conditions affect the growth of ornaments in ungulates. Studies about their influence can reveal key information on individual life histories and detect the events that can have important evolutionary consequences. Among the ecological factors commonly thought to play a role in such ecological processes, researches have so far neglected the possible influence of the geological feature which may either promote or restrain the early investment in horn growth. This study takes into consideration a broad range of ecological factors that are expected to affect horn growth and analyses how the substrate (calcareous versus siliceous) could modify the horn size in 1,685 yearling Alpine chamois (Rupicapra rupicapra) which were legally shot during 5 consecutive years in Central-Eastern Italian Alps. Interestingly, we found shorter horns in chamois shot on siliceous than on calcareous substrate, irrespective of the sex, showing how the substrate (and related ecological conditions) may affect horn growth. The substrate interacted with two ecological factors in shaping the horn size, i.e. aspect and snow cover. Differences between horn lengths recorded for chamois shot on these two substrates were less pronounced where South-facing slopes prevailed. During an average winter (about 100 days with more than 10 cm of snow on the ground) chamois horns were longer in individuals using calcareous areas, although the increase of number of days with more than 10 cm of snow on the ground had a stronger impact in reducing horn length in calcareous environment. We demonstrated that substrate, and related ecological conditions, influence horn growth. In ungulate species where ornament size is related to reproductive success, environmental factors, such as geological feature, can thus cause evolutionary consequences in the expression of ornaments and individual fitness.     

Microdosimetric Study for Nanosecond Pulsed Electric Fields on a Cell Circuit Model with Nucleus

Recently, scientific interest in electric pulses, always more intense and shorter and able to induce biological effects on both plasma and nuclear membranes, has greatly increased. Hence, microdosimetric models that include internal organelles like the nucleus have assumed increasing importance. In this work, a circuit model of the cell including the nucleus is proposed, which accounts for the dielectric dispersion of all cell compartments. The setup of the dielectric model of the nucleus is of fundamental importance in determining the transmembrane potential (TMP) induced on the nuclear membrane; here, this is demonstrated by comparing results for three different sets of nuclear dielectric properties present in the literature. The results have been compared, even including or disregarding the dielectric dispersion of the nucleus. The main differences have been found when using pulses shorter than 10 ns. This is due to the fact that the high spectral components of the shortest pulses are differently taken into account by the nuclear membrane transfer functions computed with and without nuclear dielectric dispersion. The shortest pulses are also the most effective in porating the intracellular structures, as confirmed by the time courses of the TMP calculated across the plasma and nuclear membranes. We show how dispersive nucleus models are unavoidable when dealing with pulses shorter than 10 ns because of the large spectral contents arriving above 100 MHz, i.e., over the typical relaxation frequencies of the dipolar mechanism of the molecules constituting the nuclear membrane and the subcellular cell compartments.     

Electrophoretic polymorphism of erythrocyte leucine aminopeptidase in the wild boar, Sus scrofa

An erythrocyte leucine aminopeptidase (Rbc LAP) electrophoretic polymorphism was detected in Italian wild boars, Sus scrofa. Such a polymorphism has not previously been reported in the domestic pig. It is suggested that this locus could be a marker for genetic differences between the domestic and the wild forms of Sus scrofa.