Urban environments pose many challenges to wildlife, not least for insectivorous passerines. Numerous studies have reported on the negative effects of urbanization on reproduction in these species. ...However, depending on the taxa and cities studied, no particular or positive effects have been reported. This may be related to the different levels of urban environmental stressors. As unfavorable weather can have deleterious effects on birds (e.g. lower prey availability and higher costs of pollutants), annual variations in the differences observed between sites could be related to synergetic effects between the urban environment and weather conditions. In this context, we studied the reproduction of great tit (
Parus major
) at two sites (urban and forest) over four years. First, we quantified pollution, prey availability, and vegetal cover at each site to characterize each environment. Second, we measured the effects of site and weather conditions on tit reproductive success to determine if the influence of weather is higher in the city. Except for the fledging rate, reproductive parameters were lower in the city than in the forest whatever the year probably because of poorer food availability and a predominance of non-vegetated areas in cities. The fledging rate and the nestling number in the urban environment were positively correlated to temperatures during rearing whereas there was no significant correlations in the forest. These results support the hypothesis of additive effects of urban constraints and weather that limit bird productivity in cities.
Urbanization is characterized by rapid environmental changes such as an increase in building surface, in pollution, or a decrease in invertebrate abundance. For many bird species, morphological and ...physiological differences have been observed between urban and rural individuals that seem to reflect a negative impact of urban life on the health and fitness of individuals. Studies on passerine birds also showed important differences between populations and species in their responses to the urban environment. We propose to test physiological differences between urban and forest individuals over 3 years to understand whether the observed patterns are constant or subject to variations across years. For this purpose, we assessed the health parameters of adults and fledgling of great tits, Parus major, living in an urban and in a forest site in the Eurometropole of Strasbourg, for three years. Bird health was estimated with morphological parameters (body condition and size) and also with physiological parameters (oxidative status and telomere length). Our results showed lower body condition of urban fledglings regardless of the year, but no site effects on telomere length. On the contrary, for adult breeders, urban individuals had longer telomeres than forest ones except for one year which coincide with bad weather conditions during reproduction where no difference was detected. Urban birds also had higher antioxidant capacity whatever the years. These results suggest that cities act as a filter in which only good quality individuals survive and achieve successful reproduction regardless of year, whereas in the forest the selection occurs only during harsh weather years.
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•Urban breeders were always smaller than forest breeders but not fledglings.•Urban breeders have higher plasmatic antioxidant capacity than forest breeders.•Urban fledglings have lower body condition than forest fledglings.•Urban breeders have longer telomeres than forest ones which is not true for fledglings.
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IJS, IMTLJ, KILJ, KISLJ, NLZOH, NUK, OILJ, SAZU, SBCE, UILJ, UL, UM, UPCLJ, UPUK, ZAGLJ, ZRSKP
The exceptionally long (c. 11 months) growth period of king penguin chicks (Aptenodytes patagonicus) is interrupted by the Austral winter. As a consequence, penguin chicks born late in the breeding ...season have little time to build‐up their energy reserves before the drastic energy bottleneck they experience during winter and face greater risks of mortality than early‐born chicks. Whereas it is well known that breeding adults alternate between early‐ and late‐breeding attempts, little is known on the phenotype of early‐ and late‐chicks, and on the potential existence of specific adaptive phenotypic responses in late‐born individuals. We investigated phenotypic differences between early‐ and late‐chicks and tested their survival correlates both before the winter and at fledgling. Chicks were sampled 10 days after hatching to measure body mass, plasma corticosterone levels, oxidative stress parameters and telomere length. Late‐chicks were heavier than early‐chicks at day 10. Late‐chicks also had higher corticosterone and oxidative stress levels, shorter telomere lengths and suffered from higher mortality rates than early‐chicks. For both early‐ and late‐chicks, high body mass close to hatching was a strong predictor of survival up to, and over, the winter period. In late but not early‐chicks, high corticosterone levels and long telomeres were significant predictors of survival up to winter and fledging, respectively. Our study provides evidence that late‐ and early‐king penguin chicks showed marked phenotypic differences 10 days after hatching. We provide an integrative discussion on whether these differences may be adaptive or not, and to what extent they may be driven by active maternal effects, indirectly induced by environmental effects, or stem from individual differences in parental quality.
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BFBNIB, FZAB, GIS, IJS, KILJ, NLZOH, NMLJ, NUK, OILJ, PNG, SAZU, SBCE, SBMB, UL, UM, UPUK
How the spatial expansion of a species changes at a human time scale is a process difficult to determine. We studied the dispersal pattern of the French white stork population, using a 21-year ...ringing/resighting dataset. We used the graph-theory to investigate the strength of links between 5 populations (North-East, North-West, Centre, West, and South) and to determine factors important for the birds' movements. Two clusters of populations were identified within the metapopulation, with most frequent movements of individuals between North-Eastern and Centre populations, and between North-Western and Western populations. Exchanges of individuals between populations were asymmetrical, where North-Eastern and North-Western populations provided more emigrants than they received immigrants. Neither the geographical distance between populations, nor the difference in densities influenced the number of individuals exchanging between populations. The graph-theory approach provides a dynamic view of individual movements within a metapopulation and might be useful for future population studies in the context of conservation.
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DOBA, IZUM, KILJ, NUK, PILJ, PNG, SAZU, SIK, UILJ, UKNU, UL, UM, UPUK
During tissue repair, myofibroblasts produce extracellular matrix (ECM) molecules for tissue resilience and strength. Altered ECM deposition can lead to tissue dysfunction and disease. Identification ...of distinct myofibroblast subsets is necessary to develop treatments for these disorders. We analyzed profibrotic cells during mouse skin wound healing, fibrosis, and aging and identified distinct subpopulations of myofibroblasts, including adipocyte precursors (APs). Multiple mouse models and transplantation assays demonstrate that proliferation of APs but not other myofibroblasts is activated by CD301b-expressing macrophages through insulin-like growth factor 1 and platelet-derived growth factor C. With age, wound bed APs and differential gene expression between myofibroblast subsets are reduced. Our findings identify multiple fibrotic cell populations and suggest that the environment dictates functional myofibroblast heterogeneity, which is driven by fibroblast-immune interactions after wounding.
South American (SA) societies are highly vulnerable to droughts and pluvials, but lack of long-term climate observations severely limits our understanding of the global processes driving climatic ...variability in the region. The number and quality of SA climatesensitive tree ring chronologies have significantly increased in recent decades, now providing a robust network of 286 records for characterizing hydroclimate variability since 1400 CE. We combine this network with a self-calibrated Palmer Drought Severity Index (scPDSI) dataset to derive the South American Drought Atlas (SADA) over the continent south of 12°S. The gridded annual reconstruction of austral summer scPDSI is the most spatially complete estimate of SA hydroclimate to date, and well matches past historical dry/wet events. Relating the SADA to the Australia–New Zealand Drought Atlas, sea surface temperatures and atmospheric pressure fields, we determine that the El Niño–Southern Oscillation (ENSO) and the Southern Annular Mode (SAM) are strongly associated with spatially extended droughts and pluvials over the SADA domain during the past several centuries. SADA also exhibits more extended severe droughts and extreme pluvials since the mid-20th century. Extensive droughts are consistent with the observed 20th-century trend toward positive SAM anomalies concomitant with the weakening of midlatitude Westerlies, while low-level moisture transport intensified by global warming has favored extreme rainfall across the subtropics. The SADA thus provides a long-term context for observed hydroclimatic changes and for 21st-century Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) projections that suggest SA will experience more frequent/ severe droughts and rainfall events as a consequence of increasing greenhouse gas emissions.
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BFBNIB, NMLJ, NUK, PNG, SAZU, UL, UM, UPUK
Telomeres are emerging as a biomarker for ageing and survival, and are likely important in shaping life-history trade-offs. In particular, telomere length with which one starts in life has been ...linked to lifelong survival, suggesting that early telomere dynamics are somehow related to life-history trajectories. This result highlights the importance of determining the extent to which telomere length is inherited, as a crucial factor determining early life telomere length. Given the scarcity of species for which telomere length inheritance has been studied, it is pressing to assess the generality of telomere length inheritance patterns. Further, information on how this pattern changes over the course of growth in individuals living under natural conditions should provide some insight on the extent to which environmental constraints also shape telomere dynamics. To fill this gap partly, we followed telomere inheritance in a population of king penguins (Aptenodytes patagonicus). We tested for paternal and maternal influence on chick initial telomere length (10 days old after hatching), and how these relationships changed with chick age (at 70, 200 and 300 days old). Based on a correlative approach, offspring telomere length was positively associated with maternal telomere length early in life (at 10 days old). However, this relationship was not significant at older ages. These data suggest that telomere length in birds is maternally inherited. Nonetheless, the influence of environmental conditions during growth remained an important factor shaping telomere length, as the maternal link disappeared with chicks' age.
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DOBA, EMUNI, FIS, FZAB, GEOZS, GIS, IJS, IMTLJ, IZUM, KILJ, KISLJ, MFDPS, NLZOH, NUK, OILJ, PILJ, PNG, SAZU, SBCE, SBJE, SBMB, SBNM, UILJ, UKNU, UL, UM, UPUK, VKSCE, ZAGLJ
La diverticulitis apendicular es una enfermedad poco frecuente con una incidencia aproximada de 1%. Se define por la presencia de divertículos verdaderos o falsos en la pared del apéndice ...cecal.Durante la fase aguda posee una clínica indistinguible a la apendicitis, sin embargo en ocasiones presenta características clínicas particulares que la distinguen de la apendicitis aguda tales como la presencia de dolor abdominal insidioso o intermitente y/o ausencia de sintomatología gastrointestinal (náuseas, vómitos o anorexia).En la diverticulitis apendicular las técnicas imagenológicas son de utilidad limitada al otorgar información inespecífica, por lo que el diagnóstico tiende a realizarse mediante el estudio anatomopatológico del apéndice posterior a una intervención quirúrgica en paciente con cuadro clínico compatible con apendicitis aguda.El tratamiento de elección corresponde a la apendicectomía, lo que permite evitar complicaciones futuras como por ejemplo perforación apendicular, neoplasias, entre otros.
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IZUM, KILJ, NUK, PILJ, PNG, SAZU, UL, UM, UPUK
We present results from three world-wide campaigns that resulted in the detections of two single-chord and one multi-chord stellar occultations by the plutino object (84922) 2003 VS2. From the ...single-chord occultations in 2013 and 2014 we obtained accurate astrometric positions for the object, while from the multi-chord occultation on 2014 November 7, we obtained the parameters of the best-fitting ellipse to the limb of the body at the time of occultation. We also obtained short-term photometry data for the body in order to derive its rotational phase during the occultation. The rotational light curve present a peak-to-peak amplitude of 0.141 0.009 mag. This allows us to reconstruct the 3D shape of the body, with principal semi-axes of a = 313.8 7.1 km, km, and km, which is not consistent with a Jacobi triaxial equilibrium figure. The derived spherical volume equivalent diameter of km is about 5% larger than the radiometric diameter of 2003 VS2 derived from Herschel data of 523 35 km, but still compatible with it within error bars. From those results we can also derive the geometric albedo ( ) and, under the assumption that the object is a Maclaurin spheroid, the density for the plutino. The disappearances and reappearances of the star during the occultations do not show any compelling evidence for a global atmosphere considering a pressure upper limit of about 1 microbar for a pure nitrogen atmosphere, nor secondary features (e.g., rings or satellite) around the main body.
The global burden of cancer is on the rise, with varying national patterns. To gain a better understanding and control of cancer, it is essential to provide national estimates. Therefore, we present ...a comparative description of cancer incidence and mortality rates in Mexico from 1990 to 2019, by age and sex for 29 different cancer groups. Based on public data from the Global Burden of Disease Study 2019, we evaluated the national burden of cancer by analyzing counts and crude and age-standardized rates per 100,000 people with 95% uncertainty intervals for 2019 and trends using the annual percentage change from 1990 to 2019. In 2019, cancer resulted in 222,060 incident cases and 105,591 deaths. In 2019, the highest incidence of cancer was observed in non-melanoma skin cancer, prostate cancer, and breast cancer. Additionally, 53% of deaths were attributed to six cancer groups (lung, colorectal, stomach, prostate, breast, and pancreatic). From 1990 to 2019, there was an increasing trend in incidence and mortality rates, which varied by 10-436% among cancer groups. Furthermore, there were cancer-specific sex differences in crude and age-standardized rates. The results show an increase in the national cancer burden with sex-specific patterns of change. These findings can guide national efforts to reduce health loss due to cancer.
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IZUM, KILJ, NUK, PILJ, PNG, SAZU, UL, UM, UPUK
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