Sources of Mortality in Bald Eagles in Michigan, 1986–2017

As bald eagle populations recover, defining major sources of mortality provides managers important information to develop management plans and mitigation efforts. We obtained data from necropsies on 1,490 dead bald eagles (Haliaeetus leucocephalus) collected in Michigan, USA, conducted from 1986 to 2017 to determine causes of death (COD). Trauma and poisoning were the most common primary COD categories, followed by disease. Within trauma and poisoning, vehicular trauma (n = 532) and lead poisoning (n = 176) were the leading COD subcategories, respectively. Females comprised a greater number of carcasses for most COD diagnoses. The proportion of trauma and poisoning CODs significantly increased in the last few years of the study in comparison to a select few years at the beginning. Trauma CODs were greater in autumn months during whitetail deer (Odocoileus virginianus) breeding and hunting seasons and in February, when aquatic foraging is unavailable and eagles are likely forced to scavenge along roadsides. Poisoning CODs were greatest in late winter and early spring months, when deer carcasses containing lead ammunition, which are preserved by the cold weather, also become a supplemental food source. The major infectious disease CODs, West Nile virus and botulism (Clostridium botulinum type E), were more prevalent during summer months. We recommend moving road-killed carcasses, especially white-tailed deer, from the main thoroughfare to the back of the right-of-way, and the transition from lead ammunition and fishing tackle to non-toxic alternatives to decrease these main anthropogenic sources of mortality for bald eagles, and other scavenger species. © 2020 The Wildlife Society.     

Disulfide reduction abolishes tissue factor cofactor function

Background

Tissue factor (TF), an in vivo initiator of blood coagulation, is a transmembrane protein and has two disulfides in the extracellular domain. The integrity of one cysteine pair, Cys186–Cys209, has been hypothesized to be essential for an allosteric “decryption” phenomenon, presumably regulating TF procoagulant function, which has been the subject of a lengthy debate. The conclusions of published studies on this subject are based on indirect evidences obtained by the use of reagents with potentially oxidizing/reducing properties.

Methods

The status of disulfides in recombinant TF_1–263 and natural placental TF in their non-reduced native and reduced forms was determined by mass-spectrometry. Functional assays were performed to assess TF cofactor function.

Results

In native proteins, all four cysteines of the extracellular domain of TF are oxidized. Reduced TF retains factor VIIa binding capacity but completely loses the cofactor function.

Conclusion

The reduction of TF disulfides (with or without alkylation) eliminates TF regulation of factor VIIa catalytic function in both membrane dependent FX activation and membrane independent synthetic substrate hydrolysis.

General significance

Results of this study advance our knowledge on TF structure/function relationships.     

Sequence verification of synthetic DNA by assembly of sequencing reads

Gene synthesis attempts to assemble user-defined DNA sequences with base-level precision. Verifying the sequences of construction intermediates and the final product of a gene synthesis project is a critical part of the workflow, yet one that has received the least attention. Sequence validation is equally important for other kinds of curated clone collections. Ensuring that the physical sequence of a clone matches its published sequence is a common quality control step performed at least once over the course of a research project. GenoREAD is a web-based application that breaks the sequence verification process into two steps: the assembly of sequencing reads and the alignment of the resulting contig with a reference sequence. GenoREAD can determine if a clone matches its reference sequence. Its sophisticated reporting features help identify and troubleshoot problems that arise during the sequence verification process. GenoREAD has been experimentally validated on thousands of gene-sized constructs from an ORFeome project, and on longer sequences including whole plasmids and synthetic chromosomes. Comparing GenoREAD results with those from manual analysis of the sequencing data demonstrates that GenoREAD tends to be conservative in its diagnostic. GenoREAD is available at www.genoread.org.     

Topography and biological noise determine acoustic detectability on coral reefs

Acoustic telemetry is an increasingly common tool for studying the movement patterns, behavior and site fidelity of marine organisms, but to accurately interpret acoustic data, the variability, periodicity and range of detectability between acoustic tags and receivers must be understood. The relative and interactive effects of topography with biological and environmental noise have not been quantified on coral reefs. We conduct two long-term range tests (1- and 4-month duration) on two different reef types in the central Red Sea to determine the relative effect of distance, depth, topography, time of day, wind, lunar phase, sea surface temperature and thermocline on detection probability. Detectability, as expected, declines with increasing distance between tags and receivers, and we find average detection ranges of 530 and 120 m, using V16 and V13 tags, respectively, but the topography of the reef can significantly modify this relationship, reducing the range by ~70 %, even when tags and receivers are in line-of-sight. Analyses that assume a relationship between distance and detections must therefore be used with care. Nighttime detection range was consistently reduced in both locations, and detections varied by lunar phase in the 4-month test, suggesting a strong influence of biological noise (reducing detection probability up to 30 %), notably more influential than other environmental noises, including wind-driven noise, which is normally considered important in open-water environments. Analysis of detections should be corrected in consideration of the diel patterns we find, and range tests or sentinel tags should be used for more than 1 month to quantify potential changes due to lunar phase. Some studies assume that the most usual factor limiting detection range is weather-related noise; this cannot be extrapolated to coral reefs.     

Food resource effects on diel movements and body size of cisco in north-temperate lakes

The movement patterns and body size of fishes are influenced by a host of physical and biological conditions, including temperature and oxygen, prey densities and foraging potential, growth optimization, and predation risk. Our objectives were to (1) investigate variability in vertical movement patterns of cisco (Coregonus artedi) in a variety of inland lakes using hydroacoustics, (2) explore the causal mechanisms influencing movements through the use of temperature/oxygen, foraging, growth, and predation risk models, and (3) examine factors that may contribute to variations in cisco body size by considering all available information. Our results show that cisco vertical movements vary substantially, with different populations performing normal diel vertical migrations (DVM), no DVM, and reverse DVM in lakes throughout Minnesota and northern Wisconsin, USA. Cisco populations with the smallest body size were found in lakes with lower zooplankton densities. These smaller fish showed movements to areas of highest foraging or growth potential during the day and night, despite moving out of preferred temperature and oxygen conditions and into areas of highest predation risk. In lakes with higher zooplankton densities, cisco grew larger and had movements more consistent with behavioral thermoregulation and predator avoidance, while remaining in areas with less than maximum foraging and growth potential. Furthermore, the composition of potential prey items present in each lake was also important. Cisco that performed reverse DVM consumed mostly copepods and cladocerans, while cisco that exhibited normal DVM or no migration consumed proportionally more macro-zooplankton species. Overall, our results show previously undocumented variation in migration patterns of a fish species, the mechanisms underlying those movements, and the potential impact on their growth potential.     

Reflexivity,tradition and racism in a former mining town

In this article I examine the formation of white working-class racialized discourses in a former coal-mining town in Leicestershire. I draw upon my ethnographic research in the area to explore the conditions in which young white adults confront, challenge and question what they perceive to be others’ conventional racist attitudes and beliefs, for example, the racist attitudes of members of their nuclear and extended families, friends and acquaintances. I argue that it is vital to examine these “moments of questioning” if white hegemony in predominantly working-class areas is to be understood.     

Are Primates Ecosystem Engineers?

Animals can play important roles in structuring the plant communities in which they live. Some species are particularly influential in that they modify the physical environment by changing, maintaining, and/or creating new habitats; the term ecosystem engineer has been used to describe such species. We here assess the two major foraging strategies of primates, frugivory and folivory, in terms of the potential for primates to function as ecosystem engineers. We argue that whereas the role of primates as seed dispersers has received a great deal of attention, the potential role that folivorous primates play in structuring their environment through herbivory has received much less attention. Further, while quantifying if frugivorous primates are ecosystem engineers through their seed dispersal has proved very difficult, it is not as difficult to ascertain whether folivorous primates are ecosystem engineers. We document situations in which folivorous primates act as ecosystem engineers by 1) eating the leaves and/or bark of trees to the extent that they kill trees, 2) feeding on trees to the degree that they slow their growth relative to nonpreferred tree species, 3) eating the flowers of species to the extent that it does not set fruit, or 4) feeding on plants in such a way as to increase their productivity and abundance. Because evidence from the literature is very limited, where possible we present new evidence of these processes from the colobus monkeys at our long-term field site in Kibale National Park, Uganda. We conclude by discussing promising research programs that could be established to refine our understanding of the role primates play in shaping the structure of plant communities, especially tropical forests.