A Study of the Biology of the Species of Protocalliphora in the Northern Wasatch Range

A total of 733 bird nests, representing 55 species from 23 habitats, was examined. Forty-nine percent of the nests of 39 bird species were infested with 16 species of Protocalliphora. Infestation of bird nests by Protocalliphora is believed to be related to a number of factors, which are discussed. Loosely constructed nests, nests heavily saturated with feces, and nests occupied early in the season had low rates of infestation. Nests of colonial birds were more frequently infested than those of solitary birds. Nests of some birds were rarely or never infested. Sixteen species of Protocalliphora are differentiated and their host and habitat preferences discussed. Some species appeared to be either host or habitat specific, but infestation by many species appeared to be controlled by a combination of host and habitat specificity. Aspects of the life history of the species of Protocalliphora are discussed. An aggregation of adult Protocalliphora at a Bank Swallow colony was noted. Mortality in nestling birds from the feeding of Protocalliphora was rarely observed, except in nests of Yellow-headed Blackbirds and Cliff Swallows, where other factors may have contributed to high mortality

Host and Habitat Preferences, Life History, Pathogenicity and Population Regulation in Species of Protocalliphora Hough (Diptera: Calliphoridae)

The host, habitat preferences, and life histories of species of Protocalliphora were investigated in northern Utah. The effect of species of Protocalliphora on blood levels (hematocrit and hemoglobin) and weight gains of nestling birds also was studied. A total of 1,819 bird nests were examined, representing 68 bird species from 10 habitats. Forty-eight percent (869) of the nests of 51 bird species found were infested. Eighteen species of Protocalliphora, including 11 undescribed, were collected. Birds experiencing a high rate of infestation included most colonial nesters (such as bank swallows and yellow-headed blackbirds), cavity nesters (such as starlings and tree swallows, excluding woodpeckers), and some solitary open nesters, such as magpies, warblers, and flycatchers. Many solitary open nesters (such as sparrows and robins) and one colonial nester (red-winged blackbirds) experienced lower rates of infestation. Two species, f. chrysorrhoea and f. hirundo, appeared to be specific to their hosts, bank swallows and cliff swallows, respectively. Several undescribed species had narrow host or habitat preferences, including the dominant species infesting warblers and flycatchers, and a species infesting only marsh birds. One rare species (undescribed) was found primarily in the nests of Falconiformes. f. asiovora infested many bird species, but was the dominant species infesting Corvidae (magpies, ravens and crows). f. sialia occurred in the nests of many species, but favored cavities. Multiple infestations, involving more than one species of Protocalliphora in a nest, were found in 7.1% of the infested nests examined. Brewer\u27s blackbirds and five species of swallows commonly experienced mixed infestations, especially those nesting in peripheral habitats. Only r. hirudo was regularly involved in mixed infestations. Life history studies were conducted and developmental periods were determined for larvae and pupae of five species of Protocalliphora. Behavioral observations were made on larvae and adults in the field and laboratory. The effect of larval blood-sucking on nestling magpies and bank swallows was determined by comparing rates of weight gain (only in magpies) and blood levels (hemoglobin and hematocrit) between infested and uninfested nestings. Although the number of fledged nestlings was not reduced substantially in heavily infested nestlings, they did experience significantly lower rates of weight gain and blood levels. Blood levels also were examined in infested and uninfested starlings, kestrels, and yellow-headed blackbirds. Of these, only starlings experienced infestations large enough to cause significant reductions in blood levels. Factors regulating larval populations of P. asiovora in magpie nests also were investigated. The relative importance of predation and interspecific and intraspecific competition in regulating larval populations was considered. Although several factors appeared to be interacting, intraspecific competition appeared to be the most important regulatory factor

Population densities and diversity of Calliphoridae (Diptera) around a nickel-copper smelter at Monchegorsk, Northwestern Russia

In the summer of 2000, we collected blowflies (Calliphoridae) in ten sites around the Severonikel smelter on the Kola Peninsula. Meat-baited funnel traps (three per site), operated from June 10 to August 30, yielding 973 specimens of ten blowfly species; eight species are reported from the Kola Peninsula for the first time. The maximum catch (495 individuals), obtained at the site located 1 km from the smelter, was due to the synanthropic preferences of the two most common species, Protophormia terraenovae and Cynomya mortuorum. Neither total abundance nor diversity of blowflies attracted by meat baits changed along the pollution gradient

Team Learning: A Pilot Study

Teachers must put effort, creativity, and ingenuity into the science classroom and curriculum in order to ensure the material will remain fresh and interesting for the students and for themselves. In one case an organic chemistry teacher used a “Team Learning” method in order to keep the material stimulating for his students and to overcome some of the difficulties teachers face (Dinan & Frydrychowski, 1995). This experiment in new curriculum involved using teams over the course of a semester to teach the required material. Dinan and Frydrychowski (1995) found that this method seemed to increase the effectiveness of learning and student interest in the subject. Other results showed students were arriving earlier for classes, and that students were missing fewer classes over all. While Dinan and Frydrychowski’s (1995) study shows the team learning method to work well at the college level, there is no research to show if it would work well at the high school level. As a result the researcher chose to do a pilot study in this area to determine if the use of this method would have any positive effects at the high school level and if further research was warranted

Remarkable fly (Diptera) diversity in a patch of Costa Rican cloud forest : Why inventory is a vital science

Study of all flies (Diptera) collected for one year from a four-hectare (150 x 266 meter) patch of cloud forest at 1,600 meters above sea level at Zurqui de Moravia, San Jose Province, Costa Rica (hereafter referred to as Zurqui), revealed an astounding 4,332 species. This amounts to more than half the number of named species of flies for all of Central America. Specimens were collected with two Malaise traps running continuously and with a wide array of supplementary collecting methods for three days of each month. All morphospecies from all 73 families recorded were fully curated by technicians before submission to an international team of 59 taxonomic experts for identification. Overall, a Malaise trap on the forest edge captured 1,988 species or 51% of all collected dipteran taxa (other than of Phoridae, subsampled only from this and one other Malaise trap). A Malaise trap in the forest sampled 906 species. Of other sampling methods, the combination of four other Malaise traps and an intercept trap, aerial/hand collecting, 10 emergence traps, and four CDC light traps added the greatest number of species to our inventory. This complement of sampling methods was an effective combination for retrieving substantial numbers of species of Diptera. Comparison of select sampling methods (considering 3,487 species of non-phorid Diptera) provided further details regarding how many species were sampled by various methods. Comparison of species numbers from each of two permanent Malaise traps from Zurqui with those of single Malaise traps at each of Tapanti and Las Alturas, 40 and 180 km distant from Zurqui respectively, suggested significant species turnover. Comparison of the greater number of species collected in all traps from Zurqui did not markedly change the degree of similarity between the three sites, although the actual number of species shared did increase. Comparisons of the total number of named and unnamed species of Diptera from four hectares at Zurqui is equivalent to 51% of all flies named from Central America, greater than all the named fly fauna of Colombia, equivalent to 14% of named Neotropical species and equal to about 2.7% of all named Diptera worldwide. Clearly the number of species of Diptera in tropical regions has been severely underestimated and the actual number may surpass the number of species of Coleoptera. Various published extrapolations from limited data to estimate total numbers of species of larger taxonomic categories (e.g., Hexapoda, Arthropoda, Eukaryota, etc.) are highly questionable, and certainly will remain uncertain until we have more exhaustive surveys of all and diverse taxa (like Diptera) from multiple tropical sites. Morphological characterization of species in inventories provides identifications placed in the context of taxonomy, phylogeny, form, and ecology. DNA barcoding species is a valuable tool to estimate species numbers but used alone fails to provide a broader context for the species identified.Peer reviewe

Comprehensive inventory of true flies (Diptera) at a tropical site

Peer reviewe

Telomerecat: A ploidy-agnostic method for estimating telomere length from whole genome sequencing data.

Telomere length is a risk factor in disease and the dynamics of telomere length are crucial to our understanding of cell replication and vitality. The proliferation of whole genome sequencing represents an unprecedented opportunity to glean new insights into telomere biology on a previously unimaginable scale. To this end, a number of approaches for estimating telomere length from whole-genome sequencing data have been proposed. Here we present Telomerecat, a novel approach to the estimation of telomere length. Previous methods have been dependent on the number of telomeres present in a cell being known, which may be problematic when analysing aneuploid cancer data and non-human samples. Telomerecat is designed to be agnostic to the number of telomeres present, making it suited for the purpose of estimating telomere length in cancer studies. Telomerecat also accounts for interstitial telomeric reads and presents a novel approach to dealing with sequencing errors. We show that Telomerecat performs well at telomere length estimation when compared to leading experimental and computational methods. Furthermore, we show that it detects expected patterns in longitudinal data, repeated measurements, and cross-species comparisons. We also apply the method to a cancer cell data, uncovering an interesting relationship with the underlying telomerase genotype

Comprehensive inventory of true flies (Diptera) at a tropical site

Estimations of tropical insect diversity generally suffer from lack of known groups or faunas against which extrapolations can be made, and have seriously underestimated the diversity of some taxa. Here we report the intensive inventory of a four-hectare tropical cloud forest in Costa Rica for one year, which yielded 4332 species of Diptera, providing the first verifiable basis for diversity of a major group of insects at a single site in the tropics. In total 73 families were present, all of which were studied to the species level, providing potentially complete coverage of all families of the order likely to be present at the site. Even so, extrapolations based on our data indicate that with further sampling, the actual total for the site could be closer to 8000 species. Efforts to completely sample a site, although resource-intensive and time-consuming, are needed to better ground estimations of world biodiversity based on limited sampling

Determinants of recovery from post-COVID-19 dyspnoea: analysis of UK prospective cohorts of hospitalised COVID-19 patients and community-based controls

Background The risk factors for recovery from COVID-19 dyspnoea are poorly understood. We investigated determinants of recovery from dyspnoea in adults with COVID-19 and compared these to determinants of recovery from non-COVID-19 dyspnoea. Methods We used data from two prospective cohort studies: PHOSP-COVID (patients hospitalised between March 2020 and April 2021 with COVID-19) and COVIDENCE UK (community cohort studied over the same time period). PHOSP-COVID data were collected during hospitalisation and at 5-month and 1-year follow-up visits. COVIDENCE UK data were obtained through baseline and monthly online questionnaires. Dyspnoea was measured in both cohorts with the Medical Research Council Dyspnoea Scale. We used multivariable logistic regression to identify determinants associated with a reduction in dyspnoea between 5-month and 1-year follow-up. Findings We included 990 PHOSP-COVID and 3309 COVIDENCE UK participants. We observed higher odds of improvement between 5-month and 1-year follow-up among PHOSP-COVID participants who were younger (odds ratio 1.02 per year, 95% CI 1.01–1.03), male (1.54, 1.16–2.04), neither obese nor severely obese (1.82, 1.06–3.13 and 4.19, 2.14–8.19, respectively), had no pre-existing anxiety or depression (1.56, 1.09–2.22) or cardiovascular disease (1.33, 1.00–1.79), and shorter hospital admission (1.01 per day, 1.00–1.02). Similar associations were found in those recovering from non-COVID-19 dyspnoea, excluding age (and length of hospital admission). Interpretation Factors associated with dyspnoea recovery at 1-year post-discharge among patients hospitalised with COVID-19 were similar to those among community controls without COVID-19. Funding PHOSP-COVID is supported by a grant from the MRC-UK Research and Innovation and the Department of Health and Social Care through the National Institute for Health Research (NIHR) rapid response panel to tackle COVID-19. The views expressed in the publication are those of the author(s) and not necessarily those of the National Health Service (NHS), the NIHR or the Department of Health and Social Care. COVIDENCE UK is supported by the UK Research and Innovation, the National Institute for Health Research, and Barts Charity. The views expressed are those of the authors and not necessarily those of the funders