Comparative Genomic Insights Into the Biosynthesis and Regulation of Mycobacterial Siderophores

Iron is essential for nearly all biological events. Siderophores are indispensable for most organisms to obtain iron from iron-limiting milieus. This holds particularly true for pathogens such as the causative agent of tuberculosis – Mycobacterium tuberculosis. The categories of mycobacterial siderophores, their biosynthesis and regulation are summarized here. The siderophore biosynthesis and regulation differences between the pathogenic and non-pathogenic mycobacteria are highlighted from comparative genomic perspective, with an aim to find clues for drug or drug target within siderophore metabolism

Improving collaboration between ecosystem service communities and the IPBES science-policy platform

The end of the first working program of the Intergovernmental Science-Policy Platform on Biodiversity and Ecosystem Services (IPBES) provided an opportunity to draw lessons from its work. This perspective paper captures insights from ecosystem services (ES) researchers and practitioners, largely drawing from the Europeancontext (referred to herein as ‘ES community’), on this key science–policy interface. We synthesize reflections from a workshop on how (i) IPBES can engage the ES community; (ii) the ES community can engage with IPBES; and (iii) individual scientists can contribute. We note that IPBES constitutes a great advancement towards multidisciplinarity and inclusivity in ES research and practice. Key reflections for IPBES are that funding and visibility at ES research events could be improved, the contribution and selection processes could be more transparent, and communication with experts improved. Key reflections for the ES community include a need to improvepolicy-relevance by integrating more social scientists, researchers from developing countries, early-career scientists and policy-makers. Key reflections directed towards individual scientists include contributing (pro)actively to science–policy inter-face initiatives such as IPBES and increasing transdisciplinary research. These reflections intend to contribute to the awareness of challenges and opportunities for institutions, groups and individuals working on ES

Incorporating Ecosystem Functional Diversity into Geographic Conservation Priorities Using Remotely Sensed Ecosystem Functional Types

Conservation biology must set geographic conservation priorities not only based on the compositional or structural but also on the functional dimensions of biodiversity. However, assessing functional diversity is challenging at the regional scale. We propose the use of satellite-derived Ecosystem Functional Types (EFTs), defined here as patches of land surface that share similar primary production dynamics, to incorporate such aspects of ecosystem functional diversity into the selection of protected areas. We applied the EFT approach to the Baja California Peninsula, Mexico, to characterize the regional heterogeneity of primary production dynamics in terms of EFTs; to set conservation priorities based on EFT richness and rarity; and to explore whether such EFT-based conservation priorities were consistent with and/or complementary to previous assessments focused on biodiversity composition and structure. EFTs were identified based on three ecosystem functional attributes derived from seasonal dynamics of the Enhanced Vegetation Index: the annual mean (proxy of primary production), the seasonal coefficient of variation (descriptor of seasonality), and the date of maximum (indicator of phenology). EFT-based priorities identified 26% of the peninsula as being of extreme or high priority and reinforced the value of the ecosystem functional diversity of areas already prioritized by traditional conservation assessments. In addition, our study revealed that biodiversity composition- and structure-based assessments had not identified the full range of important areas for EFT diversity and tended to better capture areas of high EFT rarity than those of high EFT richness. Our EFT-based assessment demonstrates how remotely sensed regional heterogeneity in ecosystem functions could reinforce and complement traditional conservation priority setting.European Union (EU)Spanish MINECO CGL2014-61610-EXPUniversity of Almeria (PhD contract: research training program)European Union (EU) 641762NASA 2016 GEOBON Work Programme Grant 80NSSC18K044