Pervasive gaps in Amazonian ecological research

Biodiversity loss is one of the main challenges of our time,1,2 and attempts to address it require a clear un derstanding of how ecological communities respond to environmental change across time and space.3,4 While the increasing availability of global databases on ecological communities has advanced our knowledge of biodiversity sensitivity to environmental changes,5–7 vast areas of the tropics remain understudied.8–11 In the American tropics, Amazonia stands out as the world’s most diverse rainforest and the primary source of Neotropical biodiversity,12 but it remains among the least known forests in America and is often underrepre sented in biodiversity databases.13–15 To worsen this situation, human-induced modifications16,17 may elim inate pieces of the Amazon’s biodiversity puzzle before we can use them to understand how ecological com munities are responding. To increase generalization and applicability of biodiversity knowledge,18,19 it is thus crucial to reduce biases in ecological research, particularly in regions projected to face the most pronounced environmental changes. We integrate ecological community metadata of 7,694 sampling sites for multiple or ganism groups in a machine learning model framework to map the research probability across the Brazilian Amazonia, while identifying the region’s vulnerability to environmental change. 15%–18% of the most ne glected areas in ecological research are expected to experience severe climate or land use changes by 2050. This means that unless we take immediate action, we will not be able to establish their current status, much less monitor how it is changing and what is being lostinfo:eu-repo/semantics/publishedVersio

Pervasive gaps in Amazonian ecological research

Biodiversity loss is one of the main challenges of our time,1,2 and attempts to address it require a clear understanding of how ecological communities respond to environmental change across time and space.3,4 While the increasing availability of global databases on ecological communities has advanced our knowledge of biodiversity sensitivity to environmental changes,5,6,7 vast areas of the tropics remain understudied.8,9,10,11 In the American tropics, Amazonia stands out as the world's most diverse rainforest and the primary source of Neotropical biodiversity,12 but it remains among the least known forests in America and is often underrepresented in biodiversity databases.13,14,15 To worsen this situation, human-induced modifications16,17 may eliminate pieces of the Amazon's biodiversity puzzle before we can use them to understand how ecological communities are responding. To increase generalization and applicability of biodiversity knowledge,18,19 it is thus crucial to reduce biases in ecological research, particularly in regions projected to face the most pronounced environmental changes. We integrate ecological community metadata of 7,694 sampling sites for multiple organism groups in a machine learning model framework to map the research probability across the Brazilian Amazonia, while identifying the region's vulnerability to environmental change. 15%–18% of the most neglected areas in ecological research are expected to experience severe climate or land use changes by 2050. This means that unless we take immediate action, we will not be able to establish their current status, much less monitor how it is changing and what is being lost

Morphologic study of the effect of iron on pseudocyst formation in Trichomonas vaginalis and its interaction with human epithelial cells

Submitted by Sandra Infurna ([email protected]) on 2017-11-09T11:11:13Z No. of bitstreams: 1 geovane_lopes_etal_IOC_2017.pdf: 2178070 bytes, checksum: a46da62a76d42d8f194ab2e1ec37016c (MD5)Approved for entry into archive by Sandra Infurna ([email protected]) on 2017-11-09T11:22:04Z (GMT) No. of bitstreams: 1 geovane_lopes_etal_IOC_2017.pdf: 2178070 bytes, checksum: a46da62a76d42d8f194ab2e1ec37016c (MD5)Made available in DSpace on 2017-11-09T11:22:04Z (GMT). No. of bitstreams: 1 geovane_lopes_etal_IOC_2017.pdf: 2178070 bytes, checksum: a46da62a76d42d8f194ab2e1ec37016c (MD5) Previous issue date: 2017Fundação Oswaldo Cruz. Instituto Oswaldo Cruz. Laboratório de Biologia Molecular e Doenças Endêmicas. Rio de Janeiro, RJ, Brasil.Fundação Oswaldo Cruz. Instituto Oswaldo Cruz. Laboratório de Pesquisa em Leishmanioses. Rio de Janeiro, RJ, Brasil.Universidade Federal de São João Del Rei. Faculdade de Medicina. Departamento de Medicina. São João Del Rei, MG, Brasil.Universidade Federal de São João Del Rei. Faculdade de Medicina. Departamento de Medicina. São João Del Rei, MG, Brasil.Instituto de Ensino Superior Presidente Tancredo de Almeida Neves. São João Del Rei, MG, Brasil.Fundação Oswaldo Cruz. Instituto Oswaldo Cruz. Laboratório de Ultraestrutura Celular. Rio de Janeiro, RJ, Brasil.Fundação Oswaldo Cruz. Instituto Oswaldo Cruz. Laboratório de Biologia Molecular e Doenças Endêmicas. Rio de Janeiro, RJ, Brasil.Fundação Oswaldo Cruz. Instituto Oswaldo Cruz. Laboratório de Biologia Molecular e Doenças Endêmicas. Rio de Janeiro, RJ, Brasil.Universidade Estadual do Norte Fluminense Darcy Ribeiro. Centro de Biociências e Biotecnologia. Laboratório de Biologia Celular e Tecidual. Rio de Janeiro, RJ, Brasil.Fundação Oswaldo Cruz. Instituto Oswaldo Cruz. Laboratório de Pesquisa em Leishmanioses. Rio de Janeiro, RJ, Brasil.Fundação Oswaldo Cruz. Instituto Oswaldo Cruz. Laboratório de Biologia Molecular e Doenças Endêmicas. Rio de Janeiro, RJ, Brasil / Universidade Federal de São João Del Rei. Faculdade de Medicina. Departamento de Medicina. São João Del Rei, MG, Brasil.Trichomonas vaginalis is the aetiological agent of human trichomoniasis, which is one of the most prevalent sexually transmitted diseases in humans. Iron is an important element for the survival of this parasite and the colonisation of the host urogenital tract

Morphologic study of the effect of iron on pseudocyst formation in Trichomonas vaginalis and its interaction with human epithelial cells

BACKGROUND Trichomonas vaginalis is the aetiological agent of human trichomoniasis, which is one of the most prevalent sexually transmitted diseases in humans. Iron is an important element for the survival of this parasite and the colonisation of the host urogenital tract. OBJECTIVES In this study, we investigated the effects of iron on parasite proliferation in the dynamics of pseudocyst formation and morphologically characterised iron depletion-induced pseudocysts. METHODS We performed structural and ultrastructural analyses using light microscopy, scanning electron microscopy and transmission electron microscopy. FINDINGS It was observed that iron depletion (i) interrupts the proliferation of T. vaginalis, (ii) induces morphological changes in typical multiplicative trophozoites to spherical non-proliferative, non-motile pseudocysts, and (iii) induces the arrest of cell division at different stages of the cell cycle; (iv) iron is the fundamental element for the maintenance of typical trophozoite morphology; (v) pseudocysts induced by iron depletion are viable and reversible forms; and, finally, (vi) we demonstrated that pseudocysts induced by iron depletion are able to interact with human epithelial cells maintaining their spherical forms. MAIN CONCLUSIONS Together, these data suggest that pseudocysts could be induced as a response to iron nutritional stress and could have a potential role in the transmission and infection of T. vaginalis