Two new charismatic Pristimantis species (Anura: Craugastoridae) from the tepuis of “The Lost World” (Pantepui region, South America)

Two new colourful species of direct-developing frogs of the genus Pristimantis are described from the summit of two isolated tepuis (sandstone table mountains) in the Eastern Pantepui District of the Guiana Shield highlands. Pristimantis jamescameroni sp. nov. is described from the summit of Aprada-tepui from 2557-2571 m elevation, and P. imthurni sp. nov. is described from the summit of Ptaritepui at 2471 m elevation. Both species share the absence of a differentiated tympanic membrane and external tympanic annulus (but presence of tiny pharyngeal ostia), the presence of nuptial pads in males, and the presence of lateral fringes on fingers and toes, a combination of characters that immediately distinguishes them from all other known Pantepui congeners. The two new species are morphologically similar to each other and are phylogenetically closely related, but they can be distinguished based on colour pattern and morphological characters such as head proportions, dorsal skin texture, and condition of the supratympanic fold. The IUCN conservation status of the new species is considered as Endangered (EN) owing to their apparent very restricted ranges. The number of described Pristimantis species occurring exclusively on tepui (and faunistically related granitic mountains) summits and upper slopes now reaches eleven

A new species of Anadia (Reptilia, Squamata) from the Venezuelan 'Lost World', northern South America

A new gymnophthalmid lizard of the genus Anadia Gray, 1845 is described from the summit of Abakapá-tepui, Bolívar State, Venezuela, between 2200-2242 m elevation. The new species, Anadia mcdiarmidi sp. nov., is endemic to the Chimantá Massif and seemingly also occurs on Amurí-tepui and Murei-tepui. The new taxon is mainly distinguished from all known congeners by the following combination of characters: body fairly robust, dorsal scales small and quadrangular, middorsal scales 53-57, suboculars large, subequal in size, with sometimes one scale slightly protruding downward between 4th and 5th supralabial, nasal entire, without sub-nostril groove, body uniform beige or greyish to bluish brown in life, devoid of any conspicuous pattern in males, venter immaculate golden grey in life, femoral pores 9-10 on each side in males, preanal pores absent, hemipenis globose, weakly bilobed, bordered by numerous fl ounces (>20) bearing comblike rows of minute weakly mineralized spinules. The presence of a species of Anadia, a primarily Andean genus, on the top of tepuis is of considerable interest to the understanding of the Pantepui biogeography

Learning and Evaluating Response Prediction Models using Parallel Listener Consensus

Traditionally listener response prediction models are learned from pre-recorded dyadic interactions. Because of individual differences in behavior, these recordings do not capture the complete ground truth. Where the recorded listener did not respond to an opportunity provided by the speaker, another listener would have responded or vice versa. In this paper, we introduce the concept of parallel listener consensus where the listener responses from multiple parallel interactions are combined to better capture differences and similarities between individuals. We show how parallel listener consensus can be used for both learning and evaluating probabilistic prediction models of listener responses. To improve the learning performance, the parallel consensus helps identifying better negative samples and reduces outliers in the positive samples. We propose a new error measurement called Fconsensus which exploits the parallel consensus to better define the concepts of exactness (mislabels) and completeness (missed labels) for prediction models. We present a series of experiments using the MultiLis Corpus where three listeners were tricked into believing that they had a one-on-one conversation with a speaker, while in fact they were recorded in parallel in interaction with the same speaker. In this paper we show that using parallel listener consensus can improve learning performance and represent better evaluation criteria for predictive models

Morphological variation in Leptodactylus lutzi (Anura, Leptodactylidae) with description of its advertisement call and notes on its courtship behavior

Prior to this study, Leptodactylus lutzi was known only from three localities in west-central Guyana. We refer here to a series of 60 additional specimens of L. lutzi collected in Kaieteur National Park, Mount Ayanganna, Mount Wokomung and the Merume Mountains in the Pakaraima Mountains region, substantially extending the known distribution of the species. We provide a revised diagnosis and an expanded description of L. lutzi discussing the extent of color-pattern variation in the species. Additionally, we describe its advertisement call and provide data on its reproductive biology

A new species of Colostethus (Anura, Dendrobatidae) from French Guiana with a redescription of Colostethus beebei (Noble, 1923) from its type locality

A new species of Colostethus, long mistaken for Colostethus beebei, is described from French Guiana. The new species can be distinguished from congeners by absence of median lingual process, first finger longer than second, third finger not distinctly swollen in males, differences in tadpole morphology, coloration and pattern (e.g. absence of dorsolateral stripe), bioacoustics, and reproductive behavior. A complete redescription of Colostethus beebei plus description of its tadpole and call is provided on the basis of recently collected topotypic specimens. The range of C. beebei is restricted to the Kaieteur plateau, Pakaraima Mountains, Guyana

A new genus of Cophomantini, with comments on the taxonomic status of Boana liliae (Anura: Hylidae)

© 2018 The Linnean Society of London The non-monophyly of both the genus Myersiohyla and the Boana punctata group has been recovered in a number of published phylogenetic analyses. In this paper we report on the analysis of sequences of Boana liliae, a species originally assigned to the B. punctata group, in a dataset of Cophomantini that recovered novel phylogenetic relationships for this hylid tribe. Our results reveal Myersiohyla to be paraphyletic with respect to B. liliae. Support for the placement of Myersiohyla kanaima is poor, but this taxon is recovered as the sister taxon of the other Cophomantini genera (excluding Myersiohyla) or as the sister taxon of the remaining species of Myersiohyla (including B. liliae). These results lead us to propose two taxonomic changes in order to remedy the paraphyly of Myersiohyla: (1) a new genus is described for M. kanaima, and (2) Boana liliae is transferred to Myersiohyla. We further provide notes on the natural history and vocalizations of the new monotypic genus, a new diagnosis of the former B. liliae in the context of Myersiohyla, and discuss the evolution of tadpole morphology and biogeography of the earlier diverging clades of Cophomantini

A novel HLA-B18 restricted CD8+ T cell epitope is efficiently cross-presented by dendritic cells from soluble tumor antigen

NY-ESO-1 has been a major target of many immunotherapy trials because it is expressed by various cancers and is highly immunogenic. In this study, we have identified a novel HLA-B*1801-restricted CD8<sup>+</sup>T cell epitope, NY-ESO-1<sub>88–96</sub> (LEFYLAMPF) and compared its direct- and cross-presentation to that of the reported NY-ESO-1<sub>157–165</sub> epitope restricted to HLA-A*0201. Although both epitopes were readily cross-presented by DCs exposed to various forms of full-length NY-ESO-1 antigen, remarkably NY-ESO-1<sub>88–96</sub> is much more efficiently cross-presented from the soluble form, than NY-ESO-1<sub>157–165</sub>. On the other hand, NY-ESO-1<sub>157–165</sub> is efficiently presented by NY-ESO-1-expressing tumor cells and its presentation was not enhanced by IFN-γ treatment, which induced immunoproteasome as demonstrated by Western blots and functionally a decreased presentation of Melan A<sub>26–35</sub>; whereas NY-ESO-1<sub>88–96</sub> was very inefficiently presented by the same tumor cell lines, except for one that expressed high level of immunoproteasome. It was only presented when the tumor cells were first IFN-γ treated, followed by infection with recombinant vaccinia virus encoding NY-ESO-1, which dramatically increased NY-ESO-1 expression. These data indicate that the presentation of NY-ESO-1<sub>88–96</sub> is immunoproteasome dependent. Furthermore, a survey was conducted on multiple samples collected from HLA-B18+ melanoma patients. Surprisingly, all the detectable responses to NY-ESO-1<sub>88–96</sub> from patients, including those who received NY-ESO-1 ISCOMATRIX™ vaccine were induced spontaneously. Taken together, these results imply that some epitopes can be inefficiently presented by tumor cells although the corresponding CD8<sup>+</sup>T cell responses are efficiently primed in vivo by DCs cross-presenting these epitopes. The potential implications for cancer vaccine strategies are further discussed

Coping with the extremes : comparative osteology of the tepui-associated toad Oreophrynella and its bearing on the evolution of osteological novelties in the genus

The only study of the osteology of the toad genus Oreophrynella dates back to 1971 and was based on a single species. Here, we use high-resolution X-ray microcomputed tomography to analyse the osteology of all nine described Oreophrynella species, which are compared with representatives of other bufonid lineages. Oreophrynella is unique among bufonids in having opposable digits. Osteological synapomorphies confirmed for the genus are as follows: presence of parietal fontanelles and exposed frontoparietal fontanelle, absence of quadratojugal, five presacral vertebrae, distally enlarged terminal phalanges and urostyle greatly expanded into flanges. Ancestral character reconstruction indicates that arboreal habits in some Oreophrynella species are likely to have evolved after the evolution of opposable digits. Opposable digits, in combination with an extension of the interdigital integument and the relative length/orientation of the digits, are likely to be adaptations to facilitate life on rocky tepui summits and an exaptation to arboreality. Cranial simplification in Oreophrynella, in the form of cranial fontanelles and absence of the quadratojugal, is possibly driven by a reduction of developmental costs, increase in flexibility and reduction of body weight. Cranial simplification combined with the shortening of the vertebral column and the shift towards a partly firmisternal girdle might be adaptations to the peculiar tumbling behaviour displayed by Oreophrynella

Morphological variation in Leptodactylus lutzi (Anura, Leptodactylidae) with description of its advertisement call and notes on its courtship behavior

Prior to this study, Leptodactylus lutzi was known only from three localities in west-central Guyana. We refer here to a series of 60 additional specimens of L. lutzi collected in Kaieteur National Park, Mount Ayanganna, Mount Wokomung and the Merume Mountains in the Pakaraima Mountains region, substantially extending the known distribution of the species. We provide a revised diagnosis and an expanded description of L. lutzi discussing the extent of color-pattern variation in the species. Additionally, we describe its advertisement call and provide data on its reproductive biology