Leveraging natural history biorepositories as a global, decentralized, pathogen surveillance network

The Severe Acute Respiratory Syndrome Coronavirus 2 (SARS-CoV-2) pandemic reveals a major gap in global biosecurity infrastructure: a lack of publicly available biological samples representative across space, time, and taxonomic diversity. The shortfall, in this case for vertebrates, prevents accurate and rapid identification and monitoring of emerging pathogens and their reservoir host(s) and precludes extended investigation of ecological, evolutionary, and environmental associations that lead to human infection or spillover. Natural history museum biorepositories form the backbone of a critically needed, decentralized, global network for zoonotic pathogen surveillance, yet this infrastructure remains marginally developed, underutilized, underfunded, and disconnected from public health initiatives. Proactive detection and mitigation for emerging infectious diseases (EIDs) requires expanded biodiversity infrastructure and training (particularly in biodiverse and lower income countries) and new communication pipelines that connect biorepositories and biomedical communities. To this end, we highlight a novel adaptation of Project ECHO’s virtual community of practice model: Museums and Emerging Pathogens in the Americas (MEPA). MEPA is a virtual network aimed at fostering communication, coordination, and collaborative problem-solving among pathogen researchers, public health officials, and biorepositories in the Americas. MEPA now acts as a model of effective international, interdisciplinary collaboration that can and should be replicated in other biodiversity hotspots. We encourage deposition of wildlife specimens and associated data with public biorepositories, regardless of original collection purpose, and urge biorepositories to embrace new specimen sources, types, and uses to maximize strategic growth and utility for EID research. Taxonomically, geographically, and temporally deep biorepository archives serve as the foundation of a proactive and increasingly predictive approach to zoonotic spillover, risk assessment, and threat mitigation

Nucleotide sequence and results of test of adaptive evolution in the α-globin gene of octodontoid rodents

The data presented in this article are related to the research article entitled âMolecular adaptive convergence in the α-globin gene in subterranean octodontid rodentsâ (Tomasco et al., 2017) [1]. This article shows the nucleotide sequences of α-globin subunit gene of hemoglobin of several South American caviomorph rodents, including subterranean and fossorial species. These sequences are deposited in Genbank, with accession numbers ranging from MF169881 to MF169898. Of a total of 429 nucleotides analyzed (143 codons), 100 variable sites and 43 amino acid replacements were reported. In this article we also show the results of TreeSaap (Woolley et al., 2003) [2] and MEME (Murrell et al., 2012) [3], that identified some replacement changes as interesting for future studies of adaptive evolution in this large rodent radiation

Agronomic And Molecular Characterization Of Diploid Improved Banana Genotypes [caracterização Agronômica E Molecular De Genótipos Diplóides Melhorados De Bananeira]

An investigation about the genetical diversity among eleven banana diploid genotypes using nine agronomical characteristics and sixteen microsatellite markers was implanted at Embrapa Cassava and Tropical Fruits, Cruz das Almas (BA), Brazil. The generalized distance of Mahalanobis indicated the presence of genetic diversity. The genotypes were grouped into tree clusters. Among the investigated characteristics, the plant height, number of bunch's, number of fruits per bunch and pseudostem exhibited high contribution towards genetic divergence. The average number of alleles per primer was 7.51, with a total of 120 alleles identified. The average similarity among the all diploid was 0.44, range from 0.29 up to 0.60. New parental combinations can be identified with base of the divergence between these diploids, contributing for development of new improved diploids preventing the narrow genetic base and creating new genetic variability for selection.311154161Creste, S., (2002) Avaliação da variabilidade genética em Musa spp, , utilizando marcadores microssatélites. 2002, 86 f. Tese (Doutorado em Agronomia) - Escola Superio9r de Agricultura "Luiz de Queiroz", Universidade de São Paulo, PiracicabaCreste, S., Benatti, T., Orsi, M.R., Risterucci, A.M., Figueira, A., Isolation and characterization of microsatellite loci from a commercial cultivar of Musa acuminata (2006) Molecular Ecology Notes, Oxford, 6 (2), pp. 303-306Creste, S., Neto, A.T., Vencovsky, R., Silva, S.O., Figueira, A., Genetic diversity of Musa diploid and triploid accessions from the Brazilian banana breeding program estimated by microsatellite markers (2004) Genetic Resources and Crop Evolution, Dordrecht, 51 (7), pp. 723-733Creste, S., Tulmann Neto, A., Figueira, A., Detection of single sequence repeats polymorphisms in denaturing polyacrylamide sequencing gel by silver staining (2001) Plant Molecular Biology Reporter, Athens, 19 (4), pp. 299-306Creste, S., Tulmann Neto, A., Silva, S.O., Figueira, A., Genetic characterization of banana cultivars (Musa spp.) from Brazil using microsatellite markers (2003) Euphytica, Wageningen, 132 (3), pp. 259-268Crouch, H.K., Crouch, J.H., Jarret, R.L., Segregation at microsatellite loci in haploid and diploid gametes of Musa (1998) Crop Science, Madison, 38 (1), pp. 211-217Cruz, C.D., (2006) Programa genes: análise multivariada e simulação, p. 175. , Viçosa: UFVDoyle, J.J., Doyle, J.L., Isolation of plant DNA from fresh tissue (1990) Focus, Rockville, 12 (1), pp. 13-15Kaemmer, D., Fischer, D., Jarret, R.L., Baurens, F.C., Grapin, A., Dambier, D., Noyer, J.L., Lagoda, P.J.L., Molecular breeding in genus Musa: A strong case for STMS marker technology (1997) Euphytica, Wageningen, 96 (1), pp. 49-63Dornelles, A.L.C., Freitas, L.B., Characterization of mandarin citrus germplasm from Southern Brazil by morphological and molecular analyses (2003) Pesquisa Agropecuária Brasileira, Brasília, 38 (7), pp. 747-806Lagoda, P.J.L., Noyer, J.L., Dambier, D., Baurens, F.C., Grapin, A., Lanaud, C., Sequence tagged microsatellite site (STMS) markers in the Musaceae (1998) Molecular Ecology, Oxford, 7 (5), pp. 657-666Leite, J.B.V., Silva, S.O., Alves, E.J., Lins, R.D., Jesus, O.N., Caracteres da planta e do cacho de genótipos de bananeira, em quatro ciclos de produção, em Belmonte, Bahia (2003) Revista Brasileira de Fruticultura, Jaboticabal, 25 (3), pp. 443-447Mantel, N., The detection of disease clustering and a generalized regression approach (1967) Cancer Research, Baltimore, 27 (2), pp. 209-220Mascarenhas, G., Análise do mercado brasileiro de banana (1997) Preços Agrícolas, Piracicaba, (134), pp. 4-12Ning, S.P., Xu, L.B., Lu, Y., Huang, B.Z., Ge, X.J., Genome composition and genetic diversity of Musa germplasm from China revealed by PCR-RFLP and SSR markers (2007) Scientia Horticulturae, Amsterdam, 114 (4), pp. 281-288Nsabimana, A., Staden, J.V., Assessment of genetic diversity of Highland bananas from the National Banana Germplasm Collection at Rubona, Rwanda using RAPD markers (2007) Scientia Horticulturae, Amsterdam, 113 (4), pp. 293-299Oliveira, M.S.P., Caracterização molecular e morfoagronômica de germoplasma de Açaizeiro. 2005, p. 2005. , 171 f. Tese (Doutorado em Genética e Melhoramento de Plantas) - Universidade Federal de Lavras, LavrasOriero, C.E., Odunola, O.A., Lokko, Y., Ingelbrecht, I., Analysis of B-genome derived simple sequence repeat (SSR) markers in Musa spp (2006) African Journal of Biotechnology, Joanesburgo, 5 (2), pp. 126-128Rohlf, F.J., (2000) Numerical Taxonomy and Multivariate Analysis System, p. 38. , New York: Exeter Software, Version 2.1Scott, A.J., Knott, M.A., A cluster analysis method for grouping means in the analysis of variance (1974) Biometrics, Washington, 30 (3), pp. 507-512Silva, S.O., Alves, E.J., Lima, M.B., Silveira, J.R.S., Bananeira (2002) Melhoramento de fruteiras tropicais. Viçosa-MG, 1, pp. 101-157. , In: BRUCKNER, C.H. (Org.)Silva, S.O., Morais, L.S., Melhoramento genético de bananeira para resistência a doenças (2005) Recursos genéticos vegetais no Estado da Bahia, pp. 49-67. , In: ROMÃO, R.L.RAMOS, S.R.R. (Ed.)., Feira de Santana: UEFS, pSingh, D., The relative importance of characters affecting genetic divergence (1981) The Indian Journal of Genetics and Plant Breeding, New Delhi, 41 (1), pp. 237-245Soto Ballestero, M., (1992) Banana: cultivo e comercialización. San José, pp. 170-204. , Litografia y ImprensaSouza, E., Sorrells, M.E., Relationships among 70 North American oat germplasms. II. 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Modelling the extinction of Steller's sea cow

Steller's sea cow, a giant sirenian discovered in 1741 and extinct by 1768, is one of the few megafaunal mammal species to have died out during the historical period. The species is traditionally considered to have been exterminated by ‘blitzkrieg’-style direct overharvesting for food, but it has also been proposed that its extinction resulted from a sea urchin population explosion triggered by extirpation of local sea otter populations that eliminated the shallow-water kelps on which sea cows fed. Hunting records from eighteenth century Russian expeditions to the Commander Islands, in conjunction with life-history data extrapolated from dugongs, permit modelling of sea cow extinction dynamics. Sea cows were massively and wastefully overexploited, being hunted at over seven times the sustainable limit, and suggesting that the initial Bering Island sea cow population must have been higher than suggested by previous researchers to allow the species to survive even until 1768. Environmental changes caused by sea otter declines are unlikely to have contributed to this extinction event. This indicates that megafaunal extinctions can be effected by small bands of hunters using pre-industrial technologies, and highlights the catastrophic impact of wastefulness when overexploiting resources mistakenly perceived as ‘infinite’