Decrease Stress; Train Your Animals: The Effect of Handling Methods on Cortisol Levels in Harbour Porpoises (Phocoena phocoena) Under Human Care

Circulating cortisol levels are accepted as a sensitive indicator of acute stress in marine mammals, particularly in relation with capture and handling. The present study provides the first long-term monitoring of cortisol levels in four harbour porpoises held in human care—an adult male and adult female and two juvenile females. It also compares levels in blood obtained after removing the animal from the water (OWR sampling) with levels in blood obtained at poolside under voluntary husbandry behaviours (VHB sampling). Cortisol levels differed significantly between the four porpoises, although they all exhibited quite high variations in cortisol levels, with averages of 64.9 and 70.5 μg/l in the adult male and female, respectively, and 90.7 and 51.4 μg/l in the juvenile females. OWR sampling induced significantly higher cortisol levels than VHB sampling, with a dramatic threefold decrease in circulating cortisol levels obtained under VHB sampling compared to levels obtained under OWR sampling (16.6 and 20.2 μg/l compared with 64.9 and 70.5 μg/l in the adult male and female respectively). Even if the porpoises showed some habituation to handling, regular and frequent handling over several years did not suppress a significant stress response in the porpoises when they were removed from the water, pointing to the advantage of using VHB for limiting stress in husbandry practices

The Belle II Physics Book

We present the physics program of the Belle II experiment, located on the intensity frontier SuperKEKB $e^+e^-$ collider. Belle II collected its first collisions in 2018, and is expected to operate for the next decade. It is anticipated to collect 50/ab of collision data over its lifetime. This book is the outcome of a joint effort of Belle II collaborators and theorists through the Belle II theory interface platform (B2TiP), an effort that commenced in 2014. The aim of B2TiP was to elucidate the potential impacts of the Belle II program, which includes a wide scope of physics topics: B physics, charm, tau, quarkonium, electroweak precision measurements and dark sector searches. It is composed of nine working groups (WGs), which are coordinated by teams of theorist and experimentalists conveners: Semileptonic and leptonic B decays, Radiative and Electroweak penguins, phi_1 and phi_2 (time-dependent CP violation) measurements, phi_3 measurements, Charmless hadronic B decay, Charm, Quarkonium(like), tau and low-multiplicity processes, new physics and global fit analyses. This book highlights "golden- and silver-channels", i.e. those that would have the highest potential impact in the field. Theorists scrutinised the role of those measurements and estimated the respective theoretical uncertainties, achievable now as well as prospects for the future. Experimentalists investigated the expected improvements with the large dataset expected from Belle II, taking into account improved performance from the upgraded detector.Comment: 689 page

Die Kiessandwirtschaft im Raum Koeln Ein Beitrag zur Rohstoffproblematik

TIB: RA 529 (30) / FIZ - Fachinformationszzentrum Karlsruhe / TIB - Technische InformationsbibliothekSIGLEDEGerman

Interfollicular fibrosis in the thyroid of the harbour porpoise: An endocrine disruption?

Previous studies have described high levels of polychlorobiphenyls (PCB), polybrominated diphenylether (PBDE), toxaphene, ,p0-dichlorodiphenyltrichloroethane (DDT), and ,p0-dichlorodiphenyldichloroethylene (DDE) in the blubber of the harbour porpoise from the North Sea raising the question of a potential endocrine disruption in this species. In the present study, the thyroids of 57 harbour porpoises from the German and Danish (North and Baltic Seas), Norwegian, and Icelandic coasts have been collected for histological and immunohistological investigations. The number of follicles and the relative distribution of follicles, connective, and solid tissues (%) were quantified in the thyroid of each individual. Then, the potential relationship between the thyroid morphometry data and previously described organic compounds (namely, PCB, PBDE, toxaphene, DDT, and DDE) was investigated using factor analysis and multiple regressions. Thyroid morphology differed strongly between ampling sites. Porpoises from the German (North and Baltic Seas) and Norwegian coasts displayed a high percentage of connective tissues between 30 and 38% revealing severe interfollicular fibrosis and a high number of large follicles (diameter >200 lm). A correlation-based principal component analysis (PCA) revealed two principal components explaining 85.9% of the total variance. The variables PCB, PBDE, DDT, and DDE compounds loaded highest on PC1 whereas toxaphene compound loaded most on PC2. Our results pointed out a relationship between PC1 (PCBs, PBDE, DDE, and DDT compounds) and interfollicular fibrosis in the harbour porpoise thyroids. Such an association is not alone sufficient for a cause–effect relationship but supports the hypothesis of a contaminant-induced thyroid fibrosis in harbour porpoises raising the question of the longterm viability in highly polluted areas

The Belle II Physics Book (Dec, 10.1093/ptep/ptz106, 2019)

In the original version of this manuscript, an error was introduced on pp352. '2.7nb:1.6nb' has been corrected to '2.4nb:1.3nb' in the current online and printed version. doi:10.1093/ptep/ptz106