Protistan plankton communities in the Galápagos Archipelago respond to changes in deep water masses resulting from the 2015/16 El Niño

The Galápagos Archipelago lies within the Eastern Equatorial Pacific Ocean at the convergence of major ocean currents that are subject to changes in circulation. The nutrient-rich Equatorial Undercurrent upwells from the west onto the Galápagos platform, stimulating primary production, but this source of deep water weakens during El Niño events. Based on measurements from repeat cruises, the 2015/16 El Niño was associated with declines in phytoplankton biomass at most sites throughout the archipelago and reduced utilization of nitrate, particularly in large-sized phytoplankton in the western region. Protistan assemblages were identified by sequencing the V4 region of the 18S rRNA gene. Dinoflagellates, chlorophytes and diatoms dominated most sites. Shifts in dinoflagellate communities were most apparent between the years; parasitic dinoflagellates, Syndiniales, were highly detected during the El Niño (2015) while the dinoflagellate genus, Gyrodinium, increased at many sites during the neutral period (2016). Variations in protistan communities were most strongly correlated with changes in subthermocline water density. These findings indicate that marine protistan communities in this region are regimented by deep water mass sources and thus could be profoundly affected by altered ocean circulation.     

Evolutionary dynamics of hybridization and introgression following the recent colonization of Glossy Ibis (Aves: Plegadis falcinellus) into the New World

Geographic range shifts can cause secondary contact and hybridization between closely related species, revealing mechanisms of species formation and integrity. These dynamics typically play out in restricted geographic regions, but highly vagile species may experience major distributional changes resulting in broad areas of contact. The Glossy Ibis (Plegadis falcinellus) is a dispersive waterbird of the Old World and Australia that colonized eastern North America in the early 19th century and came into contact with the native White‐faced Ibis (P. chihi). Putative hybrids between the two species have been observed across North America. To examine the population genomic consequences of this natural invasion, we sequenced 4,616 ultraconserved elements from 66 individuals sampled across the distributions of falcinellus, chihi, and the Puna Ibis (P. ridgwayi) of South America. We found genomic differentiation among the three species. Loci with high sequence divergence were often shared across all pairwise species comparisons, were associated with regions of high nucleotide diversity, and were concentrated on the Z chromosome. We detected signals of genetic admixture between chihi and falcinellus in individuals both near and far from their core area of sympatry. Genomic cline analyses revealed evidence of greater introgression into falcinellus from chihi, but we found little evidence for selection against hybrids. We also found signals of admixture between ridgwayi and South American populations of chihi. Our results indicate vagile species can experience pervasive introgression upon secondary contact, although we suggest these dynamics may be more ephemeral than the stable hybrid zones often observed in less dispersive organisms.     

Environmental and economic impact of using new-generation wide-base tires

Purpose

New-generation wide-base tire (NG-WBT) is known for improving fuel economy and at the same time for potentially causing a greater damage to pavement. No study has been conducted to evaluate the net environmental saving of the combined system of pavements and NG-WBT. This study adopted a holistic approach (life cycle assessment [LCA] and life cycle costing [LCC]) to quantitatively evaluate the environmental and economic impact of using NG-WBT.

Methods

The net effect of different levels of market penetration of NG-WBT on energy consumption, global warming potential (GWP), and cost based on the fatigue cracking and rutting performance of two different asphalt concrete (AC) pavement structures was evaluated. The performance of pavements was determined based on pavement design lives; pavement surface characteristics, and pavement critical strain responses obtained from the artificial neural network (ANN) based on finite element (FE) simulations were used to calculate design lives of pavements. Based on the calculated design lives, life cycle inventory (LCI) and cost databases, and rolling resistance (RR) models previously developed by the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign (UIUC) were used to calculate the environmental and economic impact of the combined system.

Results and discussion

The fuel economy improvement using NG-WBT is 1.5% per axle. Scenario-based case studies were conducted. Considering 0% NG-WBT market penetration (or 100% standard dual tire assembly [DTA]) as a baseline, scenario 1 assumed the same fatigue and rutting potential between NG-WBT and DTA; therefore, the only difference came from fuel economy improvement of using NG-WBT. In scenario 2, pavement fatigue cracking potential determined the pavement design life; both thick and thin AC overlay sections experienced positive net environmental savings, but mixed net economic savings. In scenario 3, pavement rutting potential determined the pavement design life; the thick AC overlay section experienced positive net environmental savings, but mixed net economic savings. The thin section experienced negative net environmental and economic savings.

Conclusions

The outcomes of scenario-based case studies indicated that NG-WBT can result in significant savings in life cycle energy consumption and cost, and GWP; however, these benefits were sensitive to the method used to determine the pavement performance; especially, a small change in pavement strain can result in significant change in pavement life. In addition, the effect of fuel price/economy improvement, discount rate, and International Roughness Index (IRI) threshold values was studied in the sensitivity analyses.

     

Scalable Geometrically Designed Protein Cages Assembled via Genetically Encoded Split Inteins

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Ketamine esters and amides as short-acting anaesthetics: Structure-activity relationships for the side-chain

N-Aliphatic ester analogues of the non-opioid ketamine (1) retain effective anaesthetic/analgesic properties while minimising ketamine’s psychomimetic side-effects. We show that the anaesthetic/analgesic properties of these ester analogues depend critically on the length (from 2 to 4 carbons), polarity and steric cross-section of the aliphatic linker chain. More stable amide and ethylsulfone analogues generally showed weaker anaesthetic/analgesic activity. There was no correlation between the anaesthetic/analgesic properties of the compounds and their binding affinities for the N-methyl-d-aspartate (NMDA) receptor.     

Cardiovascular regenerative medicine: digging in for the long haul

Cardiovascular cell-based regenerative medicine has enjoyed a brief but exciting history. In little over a decade, multiple hypotheses have risen and fallen, and this work has now triggered a critical reconsideration of several long-held cardiovascular paradigms. These and other issues were the focus of the second Symposium on Cardiovascular Regenerative Medicine, recently held at the NIH-NHLBI in Bethesda, MD, USA. The meeting served to showcase some of the highlights of the past decade but, at the same time, sharply underlined the enormity of the task ahead. Collectively, a sense emerged that researchers in this field are "digging in for the long haul."