Plant functional and taxonomic diversity in European grasslands along climatic gradients

Aim: European grassland communities are highly diverse, but patterns and drivers of their continental-scale diversity remain elusive. This study analyses taxonomic and functional richness in European grasslands along continental-scale temperature and precipitation gradients. Location: Europe. Methods: We quantified functional and taxonomic richness of 55,748 vegetation plots. Six plant traits, related to resource acquisition and conservation, were analysed to describe plant community functional composition. Using a null-model approach we derived functional richness effect sizes that indicate higher or lower diversity than expected given the taxonomic richness. We assessed the variation in absolute functional and taxonomic richness and in functional richness effect sizes along gradients of minimum temperature, temperature range, annual precipitation, and precipitation seasonality using a multiple general additive modelling approach. Results: Functional and taxonomic richness was high at intermediate minimum temperatures and wide temperature ranges. Functional and taxonomic richness was low in correspondence with low minimum temperatures or narrow temperature ranges. Functional richness increased and taxonomic richness decreased at higher minimum temperatures and wide annual temperature ranges. Both functional and taxonomic richness decreased with increasing precipitation seasonality and showed a small increase at intermediate annual precipitation. Overall, effect sizes of functional richness were small. However, effect sizes indicated trait divergence at extremely low minimum temperatures and at low annual precipitation with extreme precipitation seasonality. Conclusions: Functional and taxonomic richness of European grassland communities vary considerably over temperature and precipitation gradients. Overall, they follow similar patterns over the climate gradients, except at high minimum temperatures and wide temperature ranges, where functional richness increases and taxonomic richness decreases. This contrasting pattern may trigger new ideas for studies that target specific hypotheses focused on community assembly processes. And though effect sizes were small, they indicate that it may be important to consider climate seasonality in plant diversity studies

African swine fever virus : cellular and molecular aspects

ABSTRACT - Over the last years, African swine fever virus (ASFV) has spread to several European and Asian countries, presently showing an unprecedented geographic distribution. The present chapter focuses on current knowledge and advances in the cellular/molecular features of ASFV, highlighting the gaps and future perspectives. The first half of the chapter addresses the general features of ASFV, its phylogeny and evolution, together with an overview of the viral transcription mechanisms and transcriptomics and the proteomics of ASFV-infected cells. The second half of the chapter summarises the structure and composition of the infectious ASFV particle, the mechanisms that lead to the infection and replication of the virus at the cellular level, and the viral-pig interactions. The last part of the chapter presents an overview of the currently described antiviral agents against ASFV.info:eu-repo/semantics/publishedVersio

Quantales and temporal logics

We propose an algebraic semantics for the temporal logic CTL∗ and simplify it for its sublogics CTL and LTL. We abstractly represent state and path formulas over transition systems in Boolean left quantales. These are complete lattices with a multiplication that preserves arbitrary joins in its left argument and is isotone in its right argument. Over these quantales, the semantics of CTL∗ formulas can be encoded via finite and infinite iteration operators; the CTL and LTL operators can be related to domain operators. This yields interesting new connections between representations as known from the modal µ-calculus and Kleene/ω-algebra

Tumor infiltrating lymphocytes (TIL) therapy in metastatic melanoma: boosting of neoantigen-specific T cell reactivity and long-term follow-up

Treatment of metastatic melanoma with autologous tumor infiltrating lymphocytes (TILs) is currently applied in several centers. Robust and remarkably consistent overall response rates, of around 50% of treated patients, have been observed across hospitals, including a substantial fraction of durable, complete responses. Purpose Execute a phase I/II feasibility study with TIL therapy in metastatic melanoma at the Netherlands Cancer Institute, with the goal to assess feasibility and potential value of a randomized phase III trial. Experimental Ten patients were treated with TIL therapy. Infusion products and peripheral blood samples were phenotypically characterized and neoantigen reactivity was assessed. Here, we present long-term clinical outcome and translational data on neoantigen reactivity of the T cell products. Results Five out of 10 patients, who were all anti-PD-1 naive at time of treatment, showed an objective clinical response, including two patients with a complete response that are both ongoing for more than 7 years. Immune monitoring demonstrated that neoantigen-specific T cells were detectable in TIL infusion products from three out of three patients analyzed. For six out of the nine neoantigen-specific T cell responses detected in these TIL products, T cell response magnitude increased significantly in the peripheral blood compartment after therapy, and neoantigen-specific T cells were detectable for up to 3 years after TIL infusion. Conclusion The clinical results from this study confirm the robustness of TIL therapy in metastatic melanoma and the potential role of neoantigen-specific T cell reactivity. In addition, the data from this study supported the rationale to initiate an ongoing multicenter phase III TIL trial.Surgical oncolog