Global legume diversity assessment : concepts, key indicators, and strategies

While many plant species are considered threatened under anthropogenic pressure, it remains uncertain how rapidly we are losing plant species diversity. To fill this gap, we propose a Global Legume Diversity Assessment (GLDA) as the first step of a global plant diversity assessment. Here we describe the concept of GLDA and its feasibility by reviewing relevant approaches and data availability. We conclude that Fabaceae is a good proxy for overall angiosperm diversity in many habitats and that much relevant data for GLDA are available. As indicators of states, we propose comparison of species richness with phylogenetic and functional diversity to obtain an integrated picture of diversity. As indicators of trends, species loss rate and extinction risks should be assessed. Specimen records and plot data provide key resources for assessing legume diversity at a global scale, and distribution modeling based on these records provide key methods for assessing states and trends of legume diversity. GLDA has started in Asia, and we call for a truly global legume diversity assessment by wider geographic collaborations among various scientists.This paper is an outcome of the workshop on the global legume diversity assessment held from 19 to 22 August 2011 in Kyushu University, Japan.The Environment Research and Technology Development Fund (S9) of the Ministry of the Environment, Japan and the JSPS fund for Global Center of Excellence Program “Asian Conservation Ecology”.http://www.botanik.univie.ac.at/iapt/s_taxon.phpam201

Intraspecific interference between native parasitoids modified by a non-native parasitoid and its consequence on population dynamics

International audience1. The number of natural enemies that should be introduced to control a pest is a controversial subject in biocontrol. A previous semi-mechanistic model parameterised using a laboratory system consisting of two parasitoid wasps, Anisopteromalus calandrae and Heterospilus prosopidis, parasitising a pest beetle, Callosobruchus chinensis, indicated that the introduction of the non-native parasitoid H. prosopidis decreases the level of intraspecific interference between native A. calandrae females.The model also suggested that this decrease was the main factor destabilising the population dynamics of the host–parasitoid system, resulting in chaos.2. To test this population-level decrease and host density independence in the interference of A. calandrae, we observed individual behaviours to quantify the level of intraspecific interference between two A. calandrae females in the presence or absence of H. prosopidis at two different host densities.3. When H. prosopidis was present, the number of direct antagonistic interference events between A. calandrae females, sting duration, host feeding events (but not stinging events), and patch residence time were reduced. However, the presence of H. prosopidis decreased the patch residence time and the proportion of hosts parasitisedby A. calandrae only when the host density was low.4. The reduction in intraspecific interference between A. calandrae females by H. prosopidis and its host density independence support the population-level prediction, whereas the observed reduction in host-feeding behaviours in A. calandrae by H. prosopidis was not predicted. Overall pest control by the native parasitoid was unaffected by the non-native parasitoid as host density increased

ヤマトタマムシ(コウチュウ目, タマムシ科)の短距離での配偶者探索における嗅覚の重要性

The Japanese jewel beetle, Chrysochroa fulgidissima (Buprestidae), is one of the most beautiful Japanese beetles with glossy iridescent colors on the elytra. Although the iridescent colors of jewel beetles have been thought to play a part in mate finding, the use of olfactory senses has also been suggested in the mate-finding behavior of buprestid Agrilus planipennis. In this study, the relative importance of olfactory versus visual clues in the mate-finding behavior of C. fulgidissima was clarified. A set of three treatments was conducted where beetles were deprived of their olfactory or visual senses by transparent or black polyvinyl chloride (PVC) sheets and black nylon mesh sheet. At short range, olfaction is considered to be more important than vision, because the number of males attracted to females in the olfaction treatment was significantly higher than in the others.ヤマトタマムシ(Chrysochroa fulgidissima)は鞘翅に美しい金属光沢をもつ昆虫で, その色は短距離における配偶者探索に用いられることが知られていた. しかし, 近年タマムシ科の他種では視覚よりも嗅覚が重要であることが示された. そこで, 本研究では, 大型美麗種であるヤマトタマムシでも同様に嗅覚が配偶者探索において重要であるかを調査した. 嗅覚あるいは視覚が遮断される装置において, オスがどのような行動をするかを実験した. その結果, 臭いを通すが見ることのできない黒色の網で囲ったメスに対して有意にオスが接近したことから, 本種においても配偶者探索に嗅覚が重要であることが示された

Social Science and Segregation Before \u3cem\u3eBrown\u3c/em\u3e

A wide variety of scholarship has addressed the law of race relations during the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries. Much of that scholarship has presented the judicial record in the Gilded Age and Progressive Era cases as reactionary and somehow in violation of the basic principles of equality implicit in the American Constitution, particularly in the thirteenth, fourteenth, and fifteenth amendments. Professor Hovenkamp calls this view into question by examining the science and social science of that period and the use of scientific information in race relations cases. He concludes that late nineteenth and early twentieth century courts used prevailing scientific theories in much the same way that the Supreme Court used such theories in Brown v. Board of Education - that judicial decisions of the time were very much a product of the prevailing scientific views concerning the wisdom of separation of the races. Thus, the significant difference between the, Progressive Era and the Warren Court lay not in the use of social science, but rather in the content of the science itself

Global Genetic Differentiation in a Cosmopolitan Pest of Stored Beans : Effects of Geography, Host-Plant Usage and Anthropogenic Factors

Genetic differentiation can be promoted allopatrically by geographic isolation of populations due to limited dispersal ability and diversification over time or sympatrically through, for example, host-race formation. In crop pests, the trading of crops across the world can lead to intermixing of genetically distinct pest populations. However, our understanding of the importance of allopatric and sympatric genetic differentiation in the face of anthropogenic genetic intermixing is limited. Here, we examined global sequence variation in two mitochondrial and one nuclear genes in the seed beetle Callosobruchus maculatus that uses different legumes as hosts. We analyzed 180 samples from 42 populations of this stored bean pest from tropical and subtropical continents and archipelagos: Africa, the Middle East, South and Southeast Asia, Oceania and South America. For the mitochondrial genes, there was weak but significant genetic differentiation across continents/archipelagos. Further, we found pronounced differentiation among subregions within continents/archipelagos both globally and within Africa but not within Asia. We suggest that multiple introductions into Asia and subsequent intermixing within Asia have generated this pattern. The isolation by distance hypothesis was supported globally (with or without continents controlled) but not when host species was restricted to cowpeas Vigna unguiculata, the ancestral host of C. maculatus. We also document significant among-host differentiation both globally and within Asia, but not within Africa. We failed to reject a scenario of a constant population size in the recent past combined with selective neutrality for the mitochondrial genes. We conclude that mitochondrial DNA differentiation is primarily due to geographic isolation within Africa and to multiple invasions by different alleles, followed by host shifts, within Asia. The weak inter-continental differentiation is most likely due to frequent inter-continental gene flow mediated by human crop trade