Fine‐scale variation within urban landscapes affects marking patterns and gastrointestinal parasite diversity in red foxes

1. Urban areas are often considered to be a hostile environment for wildlife as they are highly fragmented and frequently disturbed. However, these same habitats can contain abundant resources, while lacking many common competitors and predators. The urban environment can have a direct impact on the species living there but can also have indirect effects on their parasites and pathogens. To date, relatively few studies have measured how fine‐scale spatial heterogeneity within urban landscapes can affect parasite transmission and persistence.
2. Here, we surveyed 237 greenspaces across the urban environment of Edinburgh (UK) to investigate how fine‐scale variation in socio‐economic and ecological variables can affect red fox (Vulpes vulpes) marking behavior, gastrointestinal (GI) parasite prevalence, and parasite community diversity.
3. We found that the presence and abundance of red fox fecal markings were nonuniformly distributed across greenspaces and instead were dependent on the ecological characteristics of a site. Specifically, common foraging areas were left largely unmarked, which indicates that suitable resting and denning sites may be limiting factor in urban environments. In addition, the amount of greenspace around each site was positively correlated with overall GI parasite prevalence, species richness, and diversity, highlighting the importance of greenspace (a commonly used measure of landscape connectivity) in determining the composition of the parasite community in urban areas.
4. Our results suggest that fine‐scale variation within urban environments can be important for understanding the ecology of infectious diseases in urban wildlife and could have wider implication for the management of urban carnivores.

     

Interaction of some polyhexamethylene biguanides and membrane phospholipids in Escherichia coli

The interaction between some polyhexamethylene biguanides and the cell envelope of Escherichia coli has been investigated. An amine-ended dimer, (AED, n = 2), a polydisperse mixture (ICI plc) available as the active ingredient of Vantocil IB, (PHMB, n = 5.5), and a high molecular weight fraction, (HMW, n = greater than or equal to 10) of PHMB were used. The sensitivity of batch cultures depleted of magnesium (M-dep), phosphorus (P-dep) or glycerol (C-dep) towards the biocides was assessed by monitoring the rate and extent of potassium ion leakage. P-dep suspensions were particularly resistant to all these agents and possessed less than half the quantity of phospholipid of other cell types. This was compensated for by a proportionate increase in fatty acid and neutral lipid content of the cells. The reduction in phospholipid content was accounted for by decreases in phosphatidylglycerol (PG) and phosphatidylethanolamine (PE). Diphosphatidylglycerol (DPG) and phosphatidylserine (PS) content of the cultures remained unaffected by the depleting nutrient. Fourier-transform n.m.r. spectroscopy was used to study proton nuclei during the interaction of HMW, AED and PHMB with various phospholipid-vesicle preparations. The results strongly suggest that the biocides acted preferentially on the acidic phospholipids PG and DPG, rather than towards PE or PS. Resistance of P-dep cultures therefore reflected reductions in PG content. A molecular basis for the interaction of these compounds and membranes is proposed.     

Cloning and expression of the Erwinia chrysanthemi asparaginase gene in Escherichia coli and Erwinia carotovora

A genomic library of Erwinia chrysanthemi DNA was constructed in bacteriophage lambda 1059 and recombinants expressing Er. chrysanthemi asparaginase detected using purified anti-asparaginase IgG. The gene was subcloned on a 4.7 kb EcoRI DNA restriction fragment into pUC9 to generate the recombinant plasmid pASN30. The position and orientation of the asparaginase structural gene was determined by subcloning. The enzyme was produced at high levels in Escherichia coli (5% of soluble protein) and was shown to be exported to the periplasmic space. Purified asparaginase from E. coli cells carrying pASN30 was indistinguishable from the Erwinia enzyme on the basis of specific activity [660-700 units (mg protein)-1], pI value (8.5), and subunit molecular weight (32 X 10(3]. Expression of the cloned gene was subject to glucose repression in E. coli but was not significantly repressed by glycerol. Recombinant plasmids, containing the asparaginase gene, when introduced into Erwinia carotovora, caused increased synthesis of the enzyme (2-4 fold higher than the current production strain).     

Involvement of glutathione in the inhibition of sea urchin egg mitosis by phenyl glyoxal

Cell division in fertilized sea urchin eggs was reversibly inhibited when the ketoaldehyde phenyl glyoxal (PG) at a concentration of 0.1 mM was added to eggs for ten minutes prior to the formation of the mitotic spindle. We investigated whether inhibition of mitosis was due to PG binding to the cell surface (as previously suggested by Stein and Berestecky, '74) or to some intracellular effect. When 14C-PG was added to eggs, label was readily taken up into the egg cytoplasm; very little label was associated with the egg surface. In the cytoplasm PG combined with equimolar amounts of reduced glutathione (GSH), decreasing the levels of cellular GSH to less than 15% of normal and accounting for at least 50% of the PG taken up by eggs. The concentrations of oxidized and protein-bound glutathione were unaffected by PG treatment. We showed that glyoxalase enzymes were present in sea urchin eggs and were capable of metabolizing the PG-GSH complex, thereby restoring GSH to normal levels after PG was removed from the sea water. Though some other effect of PG cannot be ruled out, the major fate of PG in eggs was to combine with GSH, and the transient decrease in GSH which resulted could lead to inhibition of mitosis. While other reports (Nath and Rebhun, '76; Oliver et al., '76) have shown that reagents which oxidize GSH disrupt microtubule-related events, our results showed that such inhibition could be caused by decreased GSH levels alone.     

Fibrinogen and fibrin in strong magnetic fields. Complementary results and discussion

When fibrin polymerizes in a strong magnetic field, it can be highly oriented. The structural diffraction study of the oriented polymer becomes thus possible. The magnetic birefringence can also be used to study the development of the polymer Fibrinogen in solution is weakly oriented in high magnetic fields. In this work we present complementary results and discussion. The validity of the comparison of the orientation parameters of fibrinogen and fibrin with those of other orientable known biological structures is discussed. The orientation of fibrin formed from fibrin monomer solution is compared to that of fibrin formed by the action of thrombin on fibrinogen. The conditions to obtain highly oriented fibrin gels suitable for three dimensional structure studies are also briefly discussed.     

Composition and stability of the vervet monkey milk microbiome

The human milk microbiome is vertically transmitted to offspring during the postnatal period and has emerged as a critical driver of infant immune and metabolic development. Despite this importance in humans, the milk microbiome of nonhuman primates remains largely unexplored. This dearth of comparative work precludes our ability to understand how species‐specific differences in the milk microbiome may differentially drive maternal effects and limits how translational models can be used to understand the role of vertically transmitted milk microbes in human development. Here, we present the first culture‐independent data on the milk microbiome of a nonhuman primate. We collected milk and matched fecal microbiome samples at early and late lactation from a cohort of captive lactating vervet monkeys (N = 15). We found that, similar to humans, the vervet monkey milk microbiome comprises a shared community of taxa that are universally present across individuals. However, unlike in humans, this shared community is dominated by the genera Lactobacillus, Bacteroides, and Prevotella. We also found that, in contrast to previous culture‐dependent studies in humans, the vervet milk microbiome exhibits greater alpha‐diversity than the gut microbiome across lactation. Finally, we did not find support for the translocation of microbes from the gut to the mammary gland within females (i.e., “entero‐mammary pathway”). Taken together, our results show that the vervet monkey milk microbiome is taxonomically diverse, distinct from the gut microbiome, and largely stable. These findings demonstrate that the milk microbiome is a unique substrate that may selectively favor the establishment and persistence of particular microbes across lactation and highlights the need for future experimental studies on the origin of microbes in milk.     

Alterations in high-affinity binding characteristics and levels of opioids in invertebrate ganglia during aging: Evidence for an opioid compensatory mechanism

In Mytilus and Leucophaea the high-affinity binding site density is significantly lower in old animals than in young animals, whereas the low-affinity site density remains unchanged. In Mytilus the estimated met-enkephalin and met-enkephalin-Arg6-Phe7 levels are significantly higher in old than in young animals. In Leucophaea only the met-enkephalin level can be determined, and it is also higher in old animals. The decrease in the high-affinity binding site density and the corresponding increase in endogenous enkephalin levels suggest the existence of an opioid compensatory mechanism associated with the aging process. In Mytilus there is a demonstrated decrease with age in intraganglionic dopamine levels in response to applied opiates. In addition, the inhibition of dopamine-stimulated adenylate cyclase activity by opiates also decreases in older animals. In Leucophaea the sex difference in opioid binding densities diminishes with age.