Characterization of shifts of koala (Phascolarctos cinereus) intestinal microbial communities associated with antibiotic treatment.

Koalas (Phascolarctos cinereus) are arboreal marsupials native to Australia that eat a specialized diet of almost exclusively eucalyptus leaves. Microbes in koala intestines are known to break down otherwise toxic compounds, such as tannins, in eucalyptus leaves. Infections by Chlamydia, obligate intracellular bacterial pathogens, are highly prevalent in koala populations. If animals with Chlamydia infections are received by wildlife hospitals, a range of antibiotics can be used to treat them. However, previous studies suggested that koalas can suffer adverse side effects during antibiotic treatment. This study aimed to use 16S rRNA gene sequences derived from koala feces to characterize the intestinal microbiome of koalas throughout antibiotic treatment and identify specific taxa associated with koala health after treatment. Although differences in the alpha diversity were observed in the intestinal flora between treated and untreated koalas and between koalas treated with different antibiotics, these differences were not statistically significant. The alpha diversity of microbial communities from koalas that lived through antibiotic treatment versus those who did not was significantly greater, however. Beta diversity analysis largely confirmed the latter observation, revealing that the overall communities were different between koalas on antibiotics that died versus those that survived or never received antibiotics. Using both machine learning and OTU (operational taxonomic unit) co-occurrence network analyses, we found that OTUs that are very closely related to Lonepinella koalarum, a known tannin degrader found by culture-based methods to be present in koala intestines, was correlated with a koala's health status. This is the first study to characterize the time course of effects of antibiotics on koala intestinal microbiomes. Our results suggest it may be useful to pursue alternative treatments for Chlamydia infections without the use of antibiotics or the development of Chlamydia-specific antimicrobial compounds that do not broadly affect microbial communities

Shape modeling technique KOALA validated by ESA Rosetta at (21) Lutetia

We present a comparison of our results from ground-based observations of asteroid (21) Lutetia with imaging data acquired during the flyby of the asteroid by the ESA Rosetta mission. This flyby provided a unique opportunity to evaluate and calibrate our method of determination of size, 3-D shape, and spin of an asteroid from ground-based observations. We present our 3-D shape-modeling technique KOALA which is based on multi-dataset inversion. We compare the results we obtained with KOALA, prior to the flyby, on asteroid (21) Lutetia with the high-spatial resolution images of the asteroid taken with the OSIRIS camera on-board the ESA Rosetta spacecraft, during its encounter with Lutetia. The spin axis determined with KOALA was found to be accurate to within two degrees, while the KOALA diameter determinations were within 2% of the Rosetta-derived values. The 3-D shape of the KOALA model is also confirmed by the spectacular visual agreement between both 3-D shape models (KOALA pre- and OSIRIS post-flyby). We found a typical deviation of only 2 km at local scales between the profiles from KOALA predictions and OSIRIS images, resulting in a volume uncertainty provided by KOALA better than 10%. Radiometric techniques for the interpretation of thermal infrared data also benefit greatly from the KOALA shape model: the absolute size and geometric albedo can be derived with high accuracy, and thermal properties, for example the thermal inertia, can be determined unambiguously. We consider this to be a validation of the KOALA method. Because space exploration will remain limited to only a few objects, KOALA stands as a powerful technique to study a much larger set of small bodies using Earth-based observations.Comment: 15 pages, 8 figures, 2 tables, accepted for publication in P&S

KOALA:A program for the processing and decomposition of transient spectra

Extracting meaningful kinetic traces from time-resolved absorption spectra is a non-trivial task, particularly for solution phase spectra where solvent interactions can substantially broaden and shift the transition frequencies. Typically, each spectrum is composed of signal from a number of molecular species (e. g., excited states, intermediate complexes, product species) with overlapping spectral features. Additionally, the profiles of these spectral features may evolve in time (i.e., signal nonlinearity), further complicating the decomposition process. Here, we present a new program for decomposing mixed transient spectra into their individual component spectra and extracting the corresponding kinetic traces: KOALA (Kinetics Observed After Light Absorption). The software combines spectral target analysis with brute-force linear least squares fitting, which is computationally efficient because of the small nonlinear parameter space of most spectral features. Within, we demonstrate the application of KOALA to two sets of experimental transient absorption spectra with multiple mixed spectral components. Although designed for decomposing solution-phase transient absorption data, KOALA may in principle be applied to any time-evolving spectra with multiple components. (C) 2014 AIP Publishing LLC.</p

Effects of Audible Human Disturbances on Koala (Phascolarctos Cinereus) Behavior in Queensland, Australia and Implications for Management

Koala populations are declining, and a contributing factor is stress, which can lead to greater susceptibility to disease. Koalas need about twenty hours of rest daily to remain healthy and unstressed. During the summer of 2014 I spent thirteen weeks with the Koala Research Center observing koalas’ responses to audible disturbances, principally those caused by humans. My two observation sites were Mt. Byron, a “disturbed” site with farm lands and pastures; and St. Bee’s Island, a protected national park, my “undisturbed” site. Using radio tracking equipment, I found and observed wild koalas, noting audible disturbances and the koalas’ reactions to the noise. My observations showed that koalas in the disturbed site responded more frequently to noise than did those in the undisturbed site. This information will help in management and protection of the remaining populations of koalas

Estimating the active space of male koala bellows: propagation of cues to size and identity in a Eucalyptus forest

Examining how increasing distance affects the information content of vocal signals is fundamental for determining the active space of a given species’ vocal communication system. In the current study we played back male koala bellows in a Eucalyptus forest to determine the extent that individual classification of male koala bellows becomes less accurate over distance, and also to quantify how individually distinctive acoustic features of bellows and size-related information degrade over distance. Our results show that the formant frequencies of bellows derived from Linear Predictive Coding can be used to classify calls to male koalas over distances of 1–50 m. Further analysis revealed that the upper formant frequencies and formant frequency spacing were the most stable acoustic features of male bellows as they propagated through the Eucalyptus canopy. Taken together these findings suggest that koalas could recognise known individuals at distances of up to 50 m and indicate that they should attend to variation in the upper formant frequencies and formant frequency spacing when assessing the identity of callers. Furthermore, since the formant frequency spacing is also a cue to male body size in this species and its variation over distance remained very low compared to documented inter-individual variation, we suggest that male koalas would still be reliably classified as small, medium or large by receivers at distances of up to 150 m

The triaxial ellipsoid dimensions, rotational pole, and bulk density of ESA Rosetta target asteroid (21) Lutetia

We seek the best size estimates of the asteroid (21) Lutetia, the direction of its spin axis, and its bulk density, assuming its shape is well described by a smooth featureless triaxial ellipsoid, and to evaluate the deviations from this assumption. Methods. We derive these quantities from the outlines of the asteroid in 307 images of its resolved apparent disk obtained with adaptive optics (AO) at Keck II and VLT, and combine these with recent mass determinations to estimate a bulk density. Our best triaxial ellipsoid diameters for Lutetia, based on our AO images alone, are a x b x c = 132 x 101 x 93 km, with uncertainties of 4 x 3 x 13 km including estimated systematics, with a rotational pole within 5 deg. of ECJ2000 [long,lat] = [45, -7], or EQJ2000 [RA, DEC] = [44, +9]. The AO model fit itself has internal precisions of 1 x 1 x 8 km, but it is evident, both from this model derived from limited viewing aspects and the radius vector model given in a companion paper, that Lutetia has significant departures from an idealized ellipsoid. In particular, the long axis may be overestimated from the AO images alone by about 10 km. Therefore, we combine the best aspects of the radius vector and ellipsoid model into a hybrid ellipsoid model, as our final result, of 124 +/- 5 x 101 +/- 4 x 93 +/- 13 km that can be used to estimate volumes, sizes, and projected areas. The adopted pole position is within 5 deg. of [long, lat] = [52, -6] or[RA DEC] = [52, +12]. Using two separately determined masses and the volume of our hybrid model, we estimate a density of 3.5 +/- 1.1 or 4.3 +/- 0.8 g cm-3 . From the density evidence alone, we argue that this favors an enstatite-chondrite composition, although other compositions are formally allowed at the extremes (low-porosity CV/CO carbonaceous chondrite or high-porosity metallic). We discuss this in the context of other evidence.Comment: 9 pages, 8 figures, 5 tables, submitted to Astronomy and Astrophysic

The Role of Local Government in Crime Prevention: An Overview

In Australia local government has played a key role in pro-active crime reduction, with it since 1980s partnering with different organisations at both state and local levels to address causes of offending. Crime prevention policies developed by state and federal governments have relied heavily on local government to resource and implement local partnerships and crime prevention plans. Policies implemented in Victoria, NSW and Queensland have relied upon some level of local government participatio

Programming Safety Tips: Why You Should Use Immutable Objects or How to create programs with bugs that can never be found or fixed.

Program safety deals with how to make programs as error free as possible. The hardest errors in a program for a programmer to find are often errors in using memory. There are two reasons for this. The first is that errors in accessing memory almost never show problems in the proximate area of the program where the error is made. The error has no apparent impact when it is made, but often causes catastrophic results to occur much later in the program, in areas of the program unrelated to memory error that caused it. The second reason memory errors are so difficult to find is that the working of memory is often poorly understood by most novice, and many professional, programmers. This makes it difficult for many programmers to even understand why an action causes the error. This article will show an example of a program error that can easily occur when memory access is poorly understood. This leads to program errors that are very easy to fix when they are found, but extremely difficult to find. The article will then explain how many memory errors can be easily avoided by following the very simple rule, “Make all object immutable unless there is a good reason to make them mutable”, and why immutable objects are an essential tool in good, safe programming practice