Sex-Specific Growth and Reproductive Dynamics of Red Drum in the Northern Gulf of Mexico

The Red Drum Sciaenops ocellatus stock is heavily targeted in the Gulf of Mexico (GOM) by recreational fishers and supports a small commercial fishery in Mississippi. Despite their popularity, little recent work has been done to describe their life history. In this work, we describe sex‐specific growth and reproductive dynamics of Red Drum collected from the northern GOM from September 2016 through October 2017. We evaluated seven candidate growth models and found that the three‐parameter von Bertalanffy growth function (VBGF) was the best candidate length‐at‐age model. No significant difference in growth between sexes was observed with the three‐parameter VBGF, despite the female‐specific curve having a larger mean asymptotic length than the male‐specific curve. All seven candidate growth models predicted similar mean length‐at‐age estimates, and four of them exhibited significant differences in sex‐specific mean length at age, with females reaching a larger length at age than males after age 5. There was no significant difference between the sex‐specific weight‐at‐length relationships. Red Drum are batch spawners that spawn in northern GOM coastal waters during August and September. We estimated 3.7 d between spawns and 10.5 spawning events per female in 2017. Nearly 20% of fish collected during the spawning season were sexually mature but reproductively inactive, indicating the possibility of skipped spawning. The age at 50% maturity was around 3 years (length at 50% maturity = 670 mm TL) in both sexes, but fish were not spawning capable until age 4.5 (703 mm TL) in males and age 5.8 (840 mm TL) in females. Furthermore, elevated gonadosomatic indices were not observed until around age 5–6. The updated life history information presented in this work helps to address current data limitations and provides critical information for future assessments of Red Drum stocks in the northern GOM

Sensing of Dietary Lipids by Enterocytes: A New Role for SR-BI/CLA-1

BACKGROUND: The intestine is responsible for absorbing dietary lipids and delivering them to the organism as triglyceride-rich lipoproteins (TRL). It is important to determine how this process is regulated in enterocytes, the absorptive cells of the intestine, as prolonged postprandial hypertriglyceridemia is a known risk factor for atherosclerosis. During the postprandial period, dietary lipids, mostly triglycerides (TG) hydrolyzed by pancreatic enzymes, are combined with bile products and reach the apical membrane of enterocytes as postprandial micelles (PPM). Our aim was to determine whether these micelles induce, in enterocytes, specific early cell signaling events that could control the processes leading to TRL secretion. METHODOLOGY/PRINCIPAL FINDINGS: The effects of supplying PPM to the apex of Caco-2/TC7 enterocytes were analyzed. Micelles devoid of TG hydrolysis products, like those present in the intestinal lumen in the interprandial period, were used as controls. The apical delivery of PPM specifically induced a number of cellular events that are not induced by interprandial micelles. These early events included the trafficking of apolipoprotein B, a structural component of TRL, from apical towards secretory domains, and the rapid, dose-dependent activation of ERK and p38MAPK. PPM supply induced the scavenger receptor SR-BI/CLA-1 to cluster at the apical brush border membrane and to move from non-raft to raft domains. Competition, inhibition or knockdown of SR-BI/CLA-1 impaired the PPM-dependent apoB trafficking and ERK activation. CONCLUSIONS/SIGNIFICANCE: These results are the first evidence that enterocytes specifically sense postprandial dietary lipid-containing micelles. SR-BI/CLA-1 is involved in this process and could be a target for further study with a view to modifying intestinal TRL secretion early in the control pathway

Structural determinants of opioid activity in derivatives of 14-aminomorphinones: Effect of substitution in the aromatic ring of cinnamoylaminomorphinones and codeinones

In recent years there has been substantial interest in the 14-aminodihydromorphinone derivatives methoclocinnamox (MC-CAM) and clocinnamox (C-CAM). In order to investigate the importance of the cinnamoyl ring substituent a series of analogues have been prepared with chloro, methyl and nitro-substituents in the 2’- and 4’-positions. Despite some discrepancies between the in vitro and in vivo data, a clear SAR could be observed where the 2’-chloro and 2’-methyl ligands consistently displayed higher efficacy than their 4’-substituted analogues. The new series also followed the well established SAR that 17-methyl ligands have greater efficacy at the mu opioid receptor than their 17-cyclopropylmethyl counterparts

Betere én goedkopere dienstverlening op basis van het gebruikersperspectief

Het streven van dit kabinet is om de dienstverlening te verbeteren. Daarnaast streeft de overheid er naar dat in 2017 burgers hun zaken digitaal met de overheid kunnen afhandelen. Eenvoudig digitaliseren van papier leidt niet direct tot lagere kosten, er zal tegelijkertijd een slag naar gebruiksvriendelijkheid moeten worden gemaakt. Wanneer het gebruikersperspectief centraal staat, neemt de gebruikersvriendelijkheid toe, daardoor de efficiëntie en dalen dus de kosten. Gebruikersperspectief: hét vertrekpunt voor betere en goedkopere overheidsdienstverlening is nog onvoldoende gemeengoed De overtuiging dat ‘beter voor de gebruiker en goedkoper voor de organisatie’ samen gaan wanneer het gebruikersperspectief centraal staat, is nog onvoldoende gemeengoed voor zowel veel professionals in het veld als voor bestuurders. Doel onderzoek: het vernieuwde vertrekpunt feitelijk onderbouwen Het ministerie van Binnenlandse Zaken en Koninkrijksrelaties (BZK) heeft onderzoek laten doen om dit vernieuwde vertrekpunt feitelijk en breed te onderbouwen. GBBO heeft 11 cases van publieke organisaties verzameld en bestudeerd. Kenmerk van deze cases is dat vanuit het gebruikersperspectief verbeteringen zijn doorgevoerd in de dienstverleningsprocessen. Nagegaan is of deze aanpassingen hebben geleid tot een positief (of negatief) resultaat. Positieve resultaten zijn een grotere waardering van de dienstverlening door de gebruikers (beter) én lagere kosten voor de betreffende publieke organisatie (goedkoper). Daarnaast is het effect op de medewerkerstevredenheid bestudeerd

The contribution of aquatic ecosystems and fisheries to food security and livelihoods: a research agenda. Challenge Program on Water and Food background paper 3

In CGIAR Challenge Program on Water and Food. Challenge Program on Water and Food: background papers to the full proposal. Colombo, Sri Lanka: CGIAR Challenge Program on Water and Food