Using drones and sirens to elicit avoidance behaviour in white rhinoceros as an anti-poaching tactic.

Poaching fuelled by international trade in horn caused the deaths of over 1000 African rhinoceros (Ceratotherium simum and Diceros bicornis) per year between 2013 and 2017. Deterrents, which act to establish avoidance behaviours in animals, have the potential to aid anti-poaching efforts by moving at-risk rhinos away from areas of danger (e.g. near perimeter fences). To evaluate the efficacy of deterrents, we exposed a population of southern white rhinos (C. simum simum) to acoustic- (honeybee, siren, turtle dove), olfactory- (chilli, sunflower), and drone-based stimuli on a game reserve in South Africa. We exposed rhinos to each stimulus up to four times. Stimuli were considered effective deterrents if they repeatedly elicited avoidance behaviour (locomotion away from the deterrent). Rhinos travelled significantly further in response to the siren than to the honeybee or turtle dove stimulus, and to low-altitude drone flights than to higher altitude flights. We found the drone to be superior at manipulating rhino movement than the siren owing to its longer transmission range and capability of pursuit. By contrast, the scent stimuli were ineffective at inciting avoidance behaviour. Our findings indicate that deterrents are a prospective low-cost and in situ method to manage rhino movement in game reserves

Negligible hormonal response following dehorning in free-ranging white rhinoceros (Ceratotherium simum)

The white rhinoceros (Ceratotherium simum) is experiencing unsustainable poaching losses fuelled by a demand for horn. Increasingly, private and state reserves are dehorning their rhinoceros populations in an attempt to reduce poaching pressure. Rhinoceroses use their horns in social interactions as well as during resource access and so its partial removal as part of reserve management practices may adversely influence these behaviours. Physiological stress can correlate with animal welfare, reproductive state and health and thus acts as a useful indicator of these parameters. To establish whether dehorning causes a physiological stress response, glucocorticoid and gonadal steroid profiles of free-ranging white rhinoceroses were determined through the collection and analysis of faecal steroid metabolites before and after dehorning. Faecal corticoid profiles were not influenced by the number of occasions a rhinoceros had been dehorned or by the number of days that had elapsed since dehorning. Furthermore, there was no apparent suppression in the concentrations of testosterone or progesterone metabolites in males and females, respectively, after exposure to multiple dehorning procedures. These findings should increase wildlife managers' confidence that dehorning does not negatively impact white rhinoceros physiology as measured hormonally

Deficiency in origin licensing proteins impairs cilia formation: implications for the aetiology of meier-gorlin syndrome

Mutations in ORC1, ORC4, ORC6, CDT1, and CDC6, which encode proteins required for DNA replication origin licensing, cause Meier-Gorlin syndrome (MGS), a disorder conferring microcephaly, primordial dwarfism, underdeveloped ears, and skeletal abnormalities. Mutations in ATR, which also functions during replication, can cause Seckel syndrome, a clinically related disorder. These findings suggest that impaired DNA replication could underlie the developmental defects characteristic of these disorders. Here, we show that although origin licensing capacity is impaired in all patient cells with mutations in origin licensing component proteins, this does not correlate with the rate of progression through S phase. Thus, the replicative capacity in MGS patient cells does not correlate with clinical manifestation. However, ORC1-deficient cells from MGS patients and siRNA-mediated depletion of origin licensing proteins also have impaired centrosome and centriole copy number. As a novel and unexpected finding, we show that they also display a striking defect in the rate of formation of primary cilia. We demonstrate that this impacts sonic hedgehog signalling in ORC1-deficient primary fibroblasts. Additionally, reduced growth factor-dependent signaling via primary cilia affects the kinetics of cell cycle progression following cell cycle exit and re-entry, highlighting an unexpected mechanism whereby origin licensing components can influence cell cycle progression. Finally, using a cell-based model, we show that defects in cilia function impair chondroinduction. Our findings raise the possibility that a reduced efficiency in forming cilia could contribute to the clinical features of MGS, particularly the bone development abnormalities, and could provide a new dimension for considering developmental impacts of licensing deficiency

Applying refinement to the use of mice and rats in rheumatoid arthritis research

Rheumatoid arthritis (RA) is a painful, chronic disorder and there is currently an unmet need for effective therapies that will benefit a wide range of patients. The research and development process for therapies and treatments currently involves in vivo studies, which have the potential to cause discomfort, pain or distress. This Working Group report focuses on identifying causes of suffering within commonly used mouse and rat ‘models’ of RA, describing practical refinements to help reduce suffering and improve welfare without compromising the scientific objectives. The report also discusses other, relevant topics including identifying and minimising sources of variation within in vivo RA studies, the potential to provide pain relief including analgesia, welfare assessment, humane endpoints, reporting standards and the potential to replace animals in RA research

Sharing brain mapping statistical results with the neuroimaging data model

Only a tiny fraction of the data and metadata produced by an fMRI study is finally conveyed to the community. This lack of transparency not only hinders the reproducibility of neuroimaging results but also impairs future meta-analyses. In this work we introduce NIDM-Results, a format specification providing a machine-readable description of neuroimaging statistical results along with key image data summarising the experiment. NIDM-Results provides a unified representation of mass univariate analyses including a level of detail consistent with available best practices. This standardized representation allows authors to relay methods and results in a platform-independent regularized format that is not tied to a particular neuroimaging software package. Tools are available to export NIDM-Result graphs and associated files from the widely used SPM and FSL software packages, and the NeuroVault repository can import NIDM-Results archives. The specification is publically available at: http://nidm.nidash.org/specs/nidm-results.html

Biomarker-indicated extent of oxidation of plant-derived organic carbon (OC) in relation to geomorphology in an arsenic contaminated Holocene aquifer, Cambodia

The poisoning of rural populations in South and Southeast Asia due to high groundwater arsenic concentrations is one of the world’s largest ongoing natural disasters. It is important to consider environmental processes related to the release of geogenic arsenic, including geomorphological and organic geochemical processes. Arsenic is released from sediments when iron-oxide minerals, onto which arsenic is adsorbed or incorporated, react with organic carbon (OC) and the OC is oxidised. In this study we build a new geomorphological framework for Kandal Province, a highly studied arsenic affected region of Cambodia, and tie this into wider regional environmental change throughout the Holocene. Analyses shows that the concentration of OC in the sediments is strongly inversely correlated to grainsize. Furthermore, the type of OC is also related to grain size with the clay containing mostly (immature) plant derived OC and sand containing mostly thermally mature derived OC. Finally, analyses indicate that within the plant derived OC relative oxidation is strongly grouped by stratigraphy with the older bound OC more oxidised than younger OC

Advances in reconstructing the AMOC using sea surface observations of salinity

The Atlantic meridional overturning circulation (AMOC) is one of the main drivers of climate variability at decadal and longer time scales. As there are no direct multi-decadal observations of this key circulation, the reconstruction of past AMOC variations is essential. This work presents a step forward in reconstructing the AMOC using climate models and time-varying surface nudging of salinity and temperature data, for which independent multi-decadal observed series are available. A number of nudging protocols are explored in a perfect model framework to best reproduce the AMOC variability accommodating to the characteristics of SST and SSS available products. As reference SST products with sufficient space and time coverage are available, we here choose to focus on the limitations associated to SSS products with the goal of providing protocols using independent salinity products. We consider a global gridded dataset and, additionally, a coarser SSS dataset restricted to the Atlantic and with a quite low spatial resolution (order of 10 degrees vs. 2 for the model grid). We show how, using the latter, we can improve the efficiency of the nudging on the AMOC reconstruction by adding a high-resolution annual cycle to the coarse resolution SSS product as well as a spatial downscaling to account for SSS gradient. The final protocol retained for the coarse SSS data is able to reconstruct a 100-year long AMOC period (average of 10.18 Sv and a standard deviation of 1.39 Sv), with a correlation of 0.76 to the target and a RMSE of 0.99 Sv. These values can be respectively compared to 0.85 and 0.75 Sv when using the global salinity surface observations. This work provides a first step towards understanding the limitations and prospects of historical AMOC reconstructions using different sea surface salinity datasets for the surface nudging

Variation analysis and gene annotation of eight MHC haplotypes: The MHC Haplotype Project

The human major histocompatibility complex (MHC) is contained within about 4 Mb on the short arm of chromosome 6 and is recognised as the most variable region in the human genome. The primary aim of the MHC Haplotype Project was to provide a comprehensively annotated reference sequence of a single, human leukocyte antigen-homozygous MHC haplotype and to use it as a basis against which variations could be assessed from seven other similarly homozygous cell lines, representative of the most common MHC haplotypes in the European population. Comparison of the haplotype sequences, including four haplotypes not previously analysed, resulted in the identification of >44,000 variations, both substitutions and indels (insertions and deletions), which have been submitted to the dbSNP database. The gene annotation uncovered haplotype-specific differences and confirmed the presence of more than 300 loci, including over 160 protein-coding genes. Combined analysis of the variation and annotation datasets revealed 122 gene loci with coding substitutions of which 97 were non-synonymous. The haplotype (A3-B7-DR15; PGF cell line) designated as the new MHC reference sequence, has been incorporated into the human genome assembly (NCBI35 and subsequent builds), and constitutes the largest single-haplotype sequence of the human genome to date. The extensive variation and annotation data derived from the analysis of seven further haplotypes have been made publicly available and provide a framework and resource for future association studies of all MHC-associated diseases and transplant medicine

What zinc supplementation does and does not achieve in diarrhea prevention: a systematic review and meta-analysis

<p>Abstract</p> <p>Background</p> <p>Prevention of diarrhea has presented indomitable challenges. A preventive strategy that has received significant interest is zinc supplementation. Existing literature including quantitative meta-analyses and systematic reviews tend to show that zinc supplementation is beneficial however evidence to the contrary is augmenting. We therefore conducted an updated and comprehensive meta-analytical synthesis of the existing literature on the effect of zinc supplementation in prevention of diarrhea.</p> <p>Methods</p> <p>EMBASE^®, MEDLINE ^®and CINAHL^®databases were searched for published reviews and meta-analyses on the use of zinc supplementation for the prevention childhood diarrhea. Additional RCTs published following the meta-analyses were also sought. Effect of zinc supplementation on the following five outcomes was studied: incidence of diarrhea, prevalence of diarrhea, incidence of persistent diarrhea, incidence of dysentery and incidence of mortality. The published RCTs were combined using random-effects meta-analyses, subgroup meta-analyses, meta-regression, cumulative meta-analyses and restricted meta-analyses to quantify and characterize the role of zinc supplementation with the afore stated outcomes.</p> <p>Results</p> <p>We found that zinc supplementation has a modest beneficial association (9% reduction) with incidence of diarrhea, a stronger beneficial association (19% reduction) with prevalence of diarrhea and occurrence of multiple diarrheal episodes (28% reduction) but there was significant unexplained heterogeneity across the studies for these associations. Age, continent of study origin, zinc salt and risk of bias contributed significantly to between studies heterogeneity. Zinc supplementation did not show statistically significant benefit in reducing the incidence of persistent diarrhea, dysentery or mortality. In most instances, the 95% prediction intervals for summary relative risk estimates straddled unity.</p> <p>Conclusions</p> <p>Demonstrable benefit of preventive zinc supplementation was observed against two of the five diarrhea-related outcomes but the prediction intervals straddled unity. Thus the evidence for a preventive benefit of zinc against diarrhea is inconclusive. Continued efforts are needed to better understand the sources of heterogeneity. The outcomes of zinc supplementation may be improved by identifying subgroups that need zinc supplementation.</p