Captivity-induced behaviour and spatial learning abilities in an enigmatic, aquifer-dwelling blind eel, Rakthamichthys digressus

We investigated the impact of captive life on behaviour and learning abilities in an enigmatic, aquifer-dwelling blind eel, Rakthamichthys digressus. Of eight major behavioural traits related to exploration and activity in a novel arena, four were significantly altered by life in captivity. While the startle response upon introduction into the arena and overall swimming away from the walls increased after captivity, inactivity exhibited immediately after the startle and the reaction to an external disturbance decreased. We also observed behavioural syndromes between ‘startle responses’ and ‘horizontal wall following’, and between ‘overall activity’ and ‘vertical wall following’; however, these behavioural syndromes were not altered by maintenance in captivity. Interestingly, this blind-eel failed to learn a simple spatial task in a Y-maze apparatus. Captive-associated behavioural changes in R. digressus may influence their survival after reintroduction into natural habitats, and such changes must be taken into account while developing protocols for ex-situ conservation and subsequent release

The 10th Biennial Hatter Cardiovascular Institute workshop: cellular protection—evaluating new directions in the setting of myocardial infarction, ischaemic stroke, and cardio-oncology

Due to its poor capacity for regeneration, the heart is particularly sensitive to the loss of contractile cardiomyocytes. The onslaught of damage caused by ischaemia and reperfusion, occurring during an acute myocardial infarction and the subsequent reperfusion therapy, can wipe out upwards of a billion cardiomyocytes. A similar program of cell death can cause the irreversible loss of neurons in ischaemic stroke. Similar pathways of lethal cell injury can contribute to other pathologies such as left ventricular dysfunction and heart failure caused by cancer therapy. Consequently, strategies designed to protect the heart from lethal cell injury have the potential to be applicable across all three pathologies. The investigators meeting at the 10th Hatter Cardiovascular Institute workshop examined the parallels between ST-segment elevation myocardial infarction (STEMI), ischaemic stroke, and other pathologies that cause the loss of cardiomyocytes including cancer therapeutic cardiotoxicity. They examined the prospects for protection by remote ischaemic conditioning (RIC) in each scenario, and evaluated impasses and novel opportunities for cellular protection, with the future landscape for RIC in the clinical setting to be determined by the outcome of the large ERIC-PPCI/CONDI2 study. It was agreed that the way forward must include measures to improve experimental methodologies, such that they better reflect the clinical scenario and to judiciously select combinations of therapies targeting specific pathways of cellular death and injury

The discovery of Euryrhynchidae (Crustacea: Decapoda) in India, with the description of a new genus and species

A new genus and species of Euryrhynchidae is described from Kerala, India. This freshwater shrimp family was previously only known from northern South America and West Africa. Although the inclusion of the genus in Euryrhynchidae is unequivocal (e.g. shape of the accessory ramus of the antennular flagellum, frontal margin of the carapace, telson ornamentation), the presence of a number of unique characters makes the relative placement of the genus within the family unclear, but likely basal to the other genera. The new genus can be easily distinguished from all others within the family by these characters, e.g. the upper antennular flagellum and its accessory ramus being joined over three divisions, the presence of a reduced carpo-propodal brush and a well-developed branchiostegal groove