Temporal Gene Expression Variation Associated with Eyespot Size Plasticity in Bicyclus anynana

Seasonal polyphenism demonstrates an organism\u27s ability to respond to predictable environmental variation with alternative phenotypes, each presumably better suited to its respective environment. However, the molecular mechanisms linking environmental variation to alternative phenotypes via shifts in development remain relatively unknown. Here we investigate temporal gene expression variation in the seasonally polyphenic butterfly Bicyclus anynana. This species shows drastic changes in eyespot size depending on the temperature experienced during larval development. The wet season form (larvae reared over 24°C) has large ventral wing eyespots while the dry season form (larvae reared under 19°C) has much smaller eyespots. We compared the expression of three proteins, Notch, Engrailed, and Distal-less, in the future eyespot centers of the two forms to determine if eyespot size variation is associated with heterochronic shifts in the onset of their expression. For two of these proteins, Notch and Engrailed, expression in eyespot centers occurred earlier in dry season than in wet season larvae, while Distal-less showed no temporal difference between the two forms. These results suggest that differences between dry and wet season adult wings could be due to a delay in the onset of expression of these eyespot-associated genes. Early in eyespot development, Notch and Engrailed may be functioning as repressors rather than activators of the eyespot gene network. Alternatively, temporal variation in the onset of early expressed genes between forms may have no functional consequences to eyespot size regulation and may indicate the presence of an \u27hourglass\u27 model of development in butterfly eyespots. © 2013 Oliver et al

Comparative insights into questions of lepidopteran wing pattern homology

BACKGROUND: Butterfly and moth eyespots can share a similar appearance, involving multiple concentric rings of colored scales, but usually occuring in non-homologous positions on the wing. Within the butterflies, on the other hand, spots that share the same homologous position may not share the concentric ring structure; and, in butterfly species that have eyespots with concentric rings, ectopic eyespots with a similar ring structure can be induced by means of a simple epidermal wound. The extent to which all these eyespots, natural or induced, share similar genes and developmental mechanisms is investigated here by means of protein in-situ localizations in selected butterfly and moth species. In addition to looking at some of the transcription factors previously identified as being involved in eyespot formation, we also tested the involvement of candidate genes from the Wingless and TGF-β signaling pathways as putative morphogens for eyespot development. RESULTS: Saturniid moth and nymphalid butterfly eyespots with concentric rings of color express at least two transcription factors, Distal-less and Engrailed, in the center of the future pattern. Nymphalid eyespots centers also express the ligand Wingless and an activated signal transducer, a phosphorylated Smad protein, but neither these proteins nor the previous two proteins are found in pierid spot centers, which consist of a single patch of color. Both butterfly wing patterns, however, express a third transcription factor, Spalt, a portion of whose expression domain maps to the black scales on the adult wing. Wounding a nymphalid wing, on the other hand, leads to upregulation of Distal-less, engrailed and spalt in subsets of cells around the wounding site, mimicking concentric eyespot development. CONCLUSION: Wingless and TGF-β ligands are both candidate morphogens involved in nymphalid butterfly eyespot formation. These eyespots, as well as saturniid moth eyespots with concentric circles, share two genes that are associated with the differentiation of the signaling cells in nymphalid eyespots. This commonality suggests that they may be produced via the same developmental mechanism despite their non-homologous location. By contrast, pierid butterfly spots of a single color share some of the same genes but appear to be produced by a different mechanism. Eyespots with concentric rings may have co-opted a wound healing genetic network during their evolution

Evidence of Sustainability Communication in Major League Baseball: A Website Analysis

Based on a review of Major League baseball team websites, this study provides insight into team communication of sustainability principles and practices through an analysis of self-presented sustainability content. Websites for thirty-one (31) teams were examined for content. Elkington’s (1997) triple bottom line dimensions and Global Reporting Initiative (GRI) indicator codes and definitions were constructs for the model and aligned to social, environmental, and economic principles for categories of sustainability practices. Researchers found that while teams are including sustainability information to some extent, the majority highlight social issues on their home pages and subsequent pages; communication about environmental factors varies by league and tends to reflect league-wide initiatives, and economic issues are largely not communicated

Tomorrow’s Champions Of Sustainability: How Everyday Leaders Can Harness Grass Roots Momentum to Advance Adoption of Ecologically Sound Practices in Sport and Event Management

For more than a decade, we have appealed to corporations to consider sustainability. Leading companies have enjoyed positive media attention, improved bottom line profits and enhanced competitiveness through environmental management and social initiatives. Sustainability in the broader sense has become everyone’s job, and the momentum crosses age groups and economic strata. This paper focuses on the event organizer as ordinary leader, inspiring an engaged, accessible audience toward sustainability, and offers rationale for promoting socially and environmentally responsible event management. With a captive audience, ordinary leaders have an opportunity to model socially and environmentally responsible practices through effective education, communication, metrics and follow-up

Temporal and spatial control of transgene expression using laser induction of the hsp70 promoter

BACKGROUND: Precise temporal and spatial regulation of transgene expression is a critical tool to investigate gene function in developing organisms. The most commonly used technique to achieve tight control of transgene expression, however, requires the use of specific DNA enhancers that are difficult to characterize in non-model organisms. Here, we sought to eliminate the need for this type of sequence-based gene regulation and to open the field of functional genetics to a broader range of organisms. RESULTS: We have developed a new laser mediated method to heat shock groups of cells that provides precise spatio-temporal control of gene expression without requiring knowledge of specific enhancer sequences. We tested our laser-system in a transgenic line of Bicyclus anynana butterflies containing the EGFP reporter gene attached to the heat sensitive hsp70 promoter of Drosophila melanogaster. Whole organismal heat shocks demonstrated that this Drosophila promoter can drive gene expression in butterflies, and the subsequent laser heat shocks showed that it was possible to activate cell-specific gene expression in very precise patterns on developing pupal wings. CONCLUSION: This laser-mediated gene expression system will enable functional genetic investigations, i.e., the ectopic expression of genes and their knock-down in targeted groups of cells in model and non-model organisms with little or no available regulatory data, as long as a compatible heat-shock promoter is used and the target tissue is accessible to a laser beam. This technique will also be useful in evolutionary developmental biology as it will enable the study of the evolution of gene function across a variety of organisms

O efeito do suporte e as estratégias leitoras do texto poético na leitura poemática infantil

Ler pela primeira vez a mesma poesia escrita em livro, em computador e em caderno escolar produz o mesmo efeito no leitor? Acreditamos que não porque o suporte é um dos aspectos que devem ser considerados na leitura (CHARTIER, 2001). Desse modo, o objetivo deste estudo é analisar a repercussão de dois suportes para a leitura poemática infantil: a internet - uma ferramenta tecnológica avançada que congrega uma rede mundial de computadores - e o livro - um dos mais conhecidos e tradicionais suportes do texto. O gênero textual eleito para este estudo contrastivo é a poesia, texto representativo pela riqueza verbal, no campo lexical, semântico, sintático e pragmático, sendo potencializador da “inteligência linguística” (GARDNER, 1994) e, portanto, adequado para o desenvolvimento das capacidades e habilidades cognitivas infantis. Sendo assim, os objetos de estudo escolhidos para essa investigação são os ciberpiratas “Chá”, “Zigue-zague” e “Flechas”, integrantes do site www.ciberpoesia.com.br (desenvolvido a partir da obra Poesia Visual de Sérgio Caparelli e Ana Cláudia Gruszynski) e os poemas “A mulher gigante”, “O quartinho dos fundos” e “Príncipe Herculano: o chato” do livro A mulher gigante (2000), obra escrita por Gustavo Finkler e Jackson Zambelli e ilustrada por Laura Castilhos

An electrochemical and structural investigation of silicon nanowires as negative electrode for Li-ion batteries

International audienceThe electrochemical and structural responses of silicon nanowires deposited by chemical vapor deposition are investigated. Transmission electron microscopy and X-ray diffraction experiments show the electrochemical lithiation of SiNWs is not a quantitative process in good agreement with cycling experiments performed as a function of cycling limits. The SiNWs are not deeply lithiated as revealed by TEM micrographs. Our results suggest the existence of two well-defined lithiation steps, first at ∼0.2 V into amorphous silicon and then into crystalline silicon at ∼0.1 V. Cycling SiNWs above 100 mV avoid the lithiation of c-Si which preserves the silicon 3-D architecture and results in good cycling performances. A stable capacity value of ∼500 mAh g−1 is achieved over at least 50 cycles

Expression of Multiple engrailed Family Genes in Eyespots of Bicyclus anynana Butterflies Does Not Implicate the Duplication Events in the Evolution of This Morphological Novelty

Gene duplication events often create genetic redundancy that can either lead to the appearance of pseudogenes or, instead, create opportunities for the evolution of novel proteins that can take on new functions. One of the genes which has been widely studied with respect to gene duplication is engrailed (en). En-family proteins are expressed in a morphological novelty, eyespots (in the center and in the outer gold ring), in the African squinting bush brown butterfly Bicyclus anynana, as well as in a more conserved pattern, the posterior compartment of a wing. In the present study, we used whole-genome sequencing and transcriptome data to show the presence of three en-family genes and their differential expression on the pupal wings of B. anynana using in situ hybridization. The results suggest two duplication events of en-family genes, the first evidence of a two-fold duplication in the Lepidoptera. We propose that all copies initially had posterior wing compartment expression and all copies subsequently gained a novel expression domain associated with eyespot centers. Two copies secondarily lost the posterior compartment expression, and one copy alone gained the outer ring expression domain. By dating the origin of both duplication events, however, we conclude that they predate the origin of eyespots by at least 60 mya, and hence our data does not support the retention of the multiple en gene duplicates in the genome via their involvement with the novel eyespot evolutionary innovation

Excesiva prisión preventiva y afectación del derecho a la libertad en el Penal de Chanchamayo – 2022

La tesis tuvo como problema general: ¿Qué relación existe entre la excesiva prisión preventiva y la afectación del derecho a la libertad en el penal de Chanchamayo, 2022?, siendo el objetivo general: Determinar la relación existe entre la excesiva prisión preventiva y la afectación del derecho a la libertad en el penal de Chanchamayo, 2022. Como hipótesis general se planteó: Existe relación significativa entre la excesiva prisión preventiva y la afectación del derecho a la libertad en el penal de Chanchamayo, 2022. El estudio fue de enfoque cuantitativo de tipo básica, con un nivel descriptivo correlacional, con el método científico y los métodos específicos hipotético deductivo, estadístico y experimental, con un diseño no experimental. La muestra pertenece a los 50 abogados del distrito de Chanchamayo, con un tipo de muestreo probabilístico de tipo intencional. Con la técnica de encuesta cuyo instrumento es el cuestionario, teniendo como conclusión: Que si existe relación entre Excesiva prisión preventiva y la afectación al derecho de la libertad desde la perspectiva de los operadores de la Corte Superior de Justicia de Chanchamayo, 202, lo cual demuestra con un nivel de significación de α=0,05 se demuestra que: Si existe correlación significativa entre los puntajes de las los puntajes del cuestionario de Excesiva prisión preventiva y la afectación al derecho de la libertad desde la perspectiva de los operadores de la Corte Superior de Justicia de Chanchamayo, 2022, ya que se aprecia que el coeficiente de correlación de Spearman entre las variables es significativo (rho=0,647) y el p-valor (0,000) es menor a la significancia α=0,050