Victor Ponta’s surprise defeat in Romania’s presidential elections could add more volatility to the country’s turbulent party system

Romania held presidential elections on 2 and 16 November, with the country’s Prime Minister, Victor Ponta, being defeated in the second round by Klaus Iohannis. Daniel Brett and Ellie Knott write that while the result came as a surprise for many observers, it reflected wider dissatisfaction with Ponta’s Social Democratic Party among the electorate. They note that Romanian politics is likely to remain highly volatile in the short-term if the anti-corruption and reform efforts advocated by Iohannis come into conflict with the country’s vested interests

The Moldovan Elections of 2014 are more than about Putin or the EU: Corruption, Poverty and Parties

The most shocking result of the Moldovan elections has been the rise of the Socialist Party, closely associated with Russia. “It would be incorrect to see them as Russian stooges, opportunists, or as old faces under a new banner. Instead, their support has come from those concerned about corruption, poverty, Europeanisation and a growing dissatisfaction with Moldova’s Communist Party’s leadership”, argue Daniel Brett and Eleanor Knott

2014 Presidential Romanian elections: Where do we go from here?

The outcome of the Romanian presidential elections has been nothing short of surprising: underdog candidate Klaus Iohannis beat the incumbent prime minister and favourite, Victor Ponta, with a very convincing result. Daniel Brett and Eleanor Knott take us through the whole story and get ready to discuss Where does Romania go from here at our event on 1 December

The ‘billion dollar protests’ in Moldova are threatening the survival of the country’s political elite

Thousands of people have taken part in a series of protests in Moldova’s capital, Chisinau, with protesters demanding the government’s resignation and early elections over a $1 billion bank fraud case. Daniel Brett, Ellie Knott and Mihai Popșoi outline why the protests are taking place, who the protesters are, and the likely impact on Moldovan politics. They write that while early elections may be the only option to reset the country’s politics, there are no certainties over what the long-term consequences will be for Moldova moving forward

Soil Microbial Functional Diversity under the Single-Season Influence of Traditional Forest Management in a Sessile Oak Forest of Central Europe

This one-year study focuses on the responses of a soil environment to the implementation of traditional forest management practices in oak-hornbeam stands with the following treatments: cut (C), cut + litter raking (CR), cut + grazing (CG), cut + litter raking + grazing (CRG) and control (Ctrl). The cut was conducted in 2018 through extremely heavy thinning. In autumn of 2017 and 2018, we sampled the soils, focusing on microbial functional diversity (FD) assessments using BIOLOG EcoplateTM. After one season, the FD was the highest in the Ctrl stand and the lowest in the CRG stand. Furthermore, we detected significant seasonal differences in soil reaction, nitrate nitrogen content, phosphatase activity and microbial biomass among the treatments. In particular, the Ctrl stand was defined via FD indices and biochemical and biological soil properties that contrasted mainly with those of the CRG stand defined by the content of mineral nitrogen forms. The soil properties did not differ substantially in the remaining treatments. Of the 31 carbon sources defining FD, 6 were treatment-specific (putrescine, L-arginine, L-serine, L-threonine, D-cellobiose and glycogen), while the remaining carbon sources mainly displayed either uniform high or low activity across the treatments.O

Egg activation events are regulated by the duration of a sustained [Ca2+]cyt signal in the mouse

AbstractAlthough the dynamics of oscillations of cytosolic Ca2+ concentration ([Ca2+]cyt) play important roles in early mammalian development, the impact of the duration when [Ca2+]cyt is elevated is not known. To determine the sensitivity of fertilization-associated responses [i.e., cortical granule exocytosis, resumption of the cell cycle, Ca2+/calmodulin-dependent protein kinase II (CaMKII) activity, recruitment of maternal mRNAs] and developmental competence of the parthenotes to the duration of a [Ca2+]cyt transient, unfertilized mouse eggs were subjected to a prolonged [Ca2+]cyt change for 15, 25, or 50 min by means of repetitive Ca2+ electropermeabilization at 2-min intervals. The initiation and completion of fertilization-associated responses are correlated with the duration of time in which the [Ca2+]cyt is elevated, with the exception that autonomous CaMKII activity is down-regulated with prolonged elevated [Ca2+]cyt. Activated eggs from 25- or 50-min treatments readily develop to the blastocyst stage with no sign of apoptosis or necrosis and some implant. Ca2+ influx into unfertilized eggs causes neither Ca2+ release from intracellular stores nor rapid removal of cytosolic Ca2+. Thus, the total Ca2+ signal input appears to be an important regulatory parameter that ensures completion of fertilization-associated events and oocytes have a surprising degree of tolerance for a prolonged change in [Ca2+]cyt

Precambrian olistoliths masquerading as sills from Death Valley, California

Olistolith production and magmatism are processes commonly associated with extensional tectonic settings, such as rift basins. We present a cautionary exemplar from one such Precambrian basin, in which we reinterpret metabasite bodies, previously documented as sills, to be olistoliths. We nevertheless demonstrate that, on the basis of field observation alone, the previous but erroneous sill interpretation is parsimonious. Indeed, it is only by using isotopic age and compositional analysis that the true identities of these metabasite olistoliths are revealed. We present new data from metabasites and metasedimentary strata of the Kingston Peak Formation (Cryogenian) and Crystal Spring Formation (Mesoproterozoic) of Death Valley, USA. These include field observations, U?Pb apatite ages, U?Pb zircon ages (detrital and igneous) and whole-rock geochemistry. These data also provide a new maximum age for the base of the Pahrump Group and suggest that the Crystal Spring Diabase was more tholeiitic than previously thought. Similar sill/olistolith misinterpretations may have occurred elsewhere, potentially producing erroneous age and tectonic-setting interpretations of surrounding strata. This is particularly relevant in Precambrian rocks, where fossil age constraints are rare. This is illustrated herein using a potential example from the Neoproterozoic literature of the Lufilian belt, Africa. We caution others against Precambrian olistoliths masquerading as sills.publishersversionPeer reviewe