Experimental stress in inflammatory rheumatic diseases: a review of psychophysiological stress responses

Introduction  

Stressful events are thought to contribute to the aetiology, maintenance and exacerbation of rheumatic diseases. Given the growing interest in acute stress responses and disease, this review investigates the impact of real-life experimental psychosocial, cognitive, exercise and sensory stressors on autonomic, neuroendocrine and immune function in patients with inflammatory rheumatic diseases.     

Isolation and characterization of highly polymorphic microsatellite loci for the garden tiger moth Arctia caja (Lepidoptera: Arctiidae)

A set of microsatellite markers was isolated from Arctia caja, a species that has been declining in UK for several decades. As has been found with other Lepidoptera species, this proved to be a difficult task. Eight enriched libraries identified 103 positive clones, and these yielded only seven polymorphic microsatellites. Allelic diversity ranged from 10 to 23 alleles per locus in a population of 30 individuals. Significant heterozygosity deficits were shown by three of these loci, presumably due to null alleles. The remaining four loci were in Hardy–Weinberg equilibrium and will be used to investigate the population genetic structure of A. caja.     

Interactions with Great Skuas Stercorarius skua as a factor in the long‐term decline of an Arctic Skua Stercorarius parasiticus population

Many of the UK’s seabird species have displayed high variation in breeding success since the 1980s, largely due to changes in the availability of Lesser Sandeels Ammodytes marinus, their main prey. During this time, Arctic Skuas Stercorarius parasiticus experienced a rapid decline in the UK and the species has subsequently been placed on the Red List of birds of conservation concern. Although shortage of Lesser Sandeels is likely to be an influential factor, the Arctic Skua’s breeding range overlaps with that of the Great Skua Stercorarius skua, a larger bird with a more varied diet, and interspecific interactions for nesting habitat may exert an additional pressure on Arctic Skua breeding populations. Results from four censuses, spanning 21 years, were used to model habitat use and analyse distributional change in nesting Arctic Skuas at a major colony located on Fetlar, Shetland, Scotland. The decline in Arctic Skuas was not uniform across the island and competition with Great Skuas for nest‐sites appears to have influenced localized breeding distribution. By 2006, Arctic Skuas had been almost entirely excluded from shrub heath, blanket bog and coastal heath habitats, which were identified as preferred habitat in 1986. In 2006, Arctic Skua breeding territories were mainly restricted to one core area of preferred habitat where over 90% nested in high density as this habitat became increasingly occupied by Great Skuas. The more generalist foraging habit of the Great Skua allowed the population to grow rapidly as numbers of the more specialist Arctic Skua decreased during times of low sandeel availability. Our model suggests that both interspecific competition for territories with Great Skuas and food limitation have played important roles in the decline of Arctic Skuas on Fetlar.     

The origin, composition and downstream transport of plant material in a small chalk stream

SUMMARY. This study was a large-scale comparative in situ experiment on the fragmentation and breakdown of typical aquatic and terrestrial inputs of a chalk stream. Two similar lengths of stream were separated by screens of 5-mm mesh across the entire stream width at their upper and lower limits. The material transported downstream was collected continuously for 3 years. The order of breakdown was: <2 weeks for the emergent herbaceous macrophyte Rorippa nasturtium-aquaticum ; 2–3 months for the dominant submerged macrophyte Ranunculus calcareus and 4–6 months for the terrestrial material, mainly leaves of Salix viminalis and Fraxinus excelsior . The degree of fragmentation of material varied with its structure, composition and time of availability relative to the seasonal changes of discharge. In general, fragmentation of material increased with its time of retention at or near its sites of origin, but this could be greatly modified by the date of the major autumnal increase in discharge. Thus, in a year of early rain, terrestrial leaf material was mainly whole when transported downstream but in a year with late rain, fragments predominated. The breakdown order coincided with an increasing ratio of carbon/nitrogen in the materials. The total annual movement of plant material was between 231 and 426 kg dry weight for both sites but there was considerable variation in the quantities of the individual species present. On an areal basis, with equal inputs of aquatic and terrestrial material, aquatic material was fragmented more than terrestrial material and therefore more of the latter was transported downstream. The aquatic macrophytes in the open section of the stream retarded the progress of terrestrial allochthonous material and resulted in a substantial increase in fragmentation of this material which would have been lost to this part of the stream.     

Fourteen polymorphic microsatellite loci characterized in the house sparrow Passer domesticus (Passeridae,Aves)

We characterized 14 polymorphic microsatellite loci in the house sparrow Passer domesticus. Four loci were isolated from house sparrow genomic libraries and 10 loci were identified by testing 100 loci that had been originally isolated in other passerine species. Loci were characterized in 37–54 unrelated sparrows from British and Norwegian populations. Each locus displayed between two and 31 alleles, with the observed heterozygosity ranging between 0.30 and 0.91.