Insights from regional and short-term biodiversity monitoring datasets are valuable: a reply to Daskalova et al. 2021

Reports of major losses in insect biodiversity have stimulated an increasing interest in temporal population changes. Existing datasets are often limited to a small number of study sites, few points in time, a narrow range of land-use intensities and only some taxonomic groups, or they lack standardised sampling. While new monitoring programs have been initiated, they still cover rather short time periods. Daskalova et al. 2021 (Insect Conservation and Diversity, 14, 1-18) argue that temporal trends of insect populations derived from short time series are biased towards extreme trends, while their own analysis of an assembly of shorter- and longer-term time series does not support an overall insect decline. With respect to the results of Seibold et al. 2019 (Nature, 574, 671–674) based on a 10-year multi-site time series, they claim that the analysis suffers from not accounting for temporal pseudoreplication. Here, we explain why the criticism of missing statistical rigour in the analysis of Seibold et al. (2019) is not warranted. Models that include ‘year’ as random effect, as suggested by Daskalova et al. (2021), fail to detect non-linear trends and assume that consecutive years are independent samples which is questionable for insect time-series data. We agree with Daskalova et al. (2021) that the assembly and analysis of larger datasets is urgently needed, but it will take time until such datasets are available. Thus, short-term datasets are highly valuable, should be extended and analysed continually to provide a more detailed understanding of insect population changes under the influence of global change, and to trigger immediate conservation actions

Chassis organism from Corynebacterium glutamicum – a top-down approach to identify and delete irrelevant gene clusters

Unthan S, Baumgart M, Radek A, et al. Chassis organism from Corynebacterium glutamicum – a top-down approach to identify and delete irrelevant gene clusters. Biotechnology Journal. 2015;10(2):290-301

Evaluation at the Federal University of Applied Adminstrative Sciences

Dulisch, Linssen und Reiter (2001) legten ein umfassendes Evaluationskonzept für die FH Bund vor. In den zehn Fachbereichen und im Zentralbereich der FH Bund erfolgt/e eine Diskussion, Modifikation und konkrete Anpassung an die Belange vor Ort. Dieser Prozess wurde in einer Evaluationtagung an der FH Bund im Juni 2003 gebündelt. Die Tagung zeigte, dass alle Fachbereiche und der Zentralbereich Fortschritte machen, wenn auch in unterschiedlichem Tempo. Dieser Band dokumentiert den Status Quo der Evaluation in den Fachbereichen und dem Zentralbereich und folgt damit § 6 Hochschulrahmengesetz (HRG), wonach die Arbeit der Hochschulen bewertet und das Ergebnis der Bewertung veröffentlicht werden soll. Inhaltsübersicht: - Evaluation an Fachhochschulen - Überblick - Empfehlungen des Benchmarking Clubs - Evaluationstagung der FH Bund 2003 - Zentralbereich - Allgemeine und Innere Verwaltung - Arbeitsverwaltung - Auswärtige Angelegenheiten - Bundesgrenzschutz - Bundeswehrverwaltung - Finanzen - Landwirtschaftliche Sozialversicherung - Öffentliche Sicherheit - Gesamtkonzept - Öffentliche Sicherheit - Abteilung Kriminalpolizei - Sozialversicherung - Wetterdiens

Dispersal ability, trophic position and body size mediate species turnover processes: Insights from a multi‐taxa and multi‐scale approach

Aim: Despite increasing interest in β-diversity, that is the spatial and temporal turno-ver of species, the mechanisms underlying species turnover at different spatial scales are not fully understood, although they likely differ among different functional groups. We investigated the relative importance of dispersal limitations and the en-vironmental filtering caused by vegetation for local, multi-taxa forest communities differing in their dispersal ability, trophic position and body size.Location: Temperate forests in five regions across Germany.Methods: In the inter-region analysis, the independent and shared effects of the re-gional spatial structure (regional species pool), landscape spatial structure (dispersal limitation) and environmental factors on species turnover were quantified with a 1-ha grain across 11 functional groups in up to 495 plots by variation partitioning. In the intra-region analysis, the relative importance of three environmental factors related to vegetation (herb and tree layer composition and forest physiognomy) and spatial structure for species turnover was determined.Results: In the inter-region analysis, over half of the explained variation in community composition (23% of the total explained 35%) was explained by the shared effects of several factors, indicative of spatially structured environmental filtering. Among the independent effects, environmental factors were the strongest on average over 11 groups, but the importance of landscape spatial structure increased for less disper-sive functional groups. In the intra-region analysis, the independent effect of plant species composition had a stronger influence on species turnover than forest physi-ognomy, but the relative importance of the latter increased with increasing trophic position and body size.Main conclusions: Our study revealed that the mechanisms structuring assemblage composition are associated with the traits of functional groups. Hence, conserva-tion frameworks targeting biodiversity of multiple groups should cover both envi-ronmental and biogeographical gradients. Within regions, forest management can enhance β-diversity particularly by diversifying tree species composition and forest physiognomy

Ambient and substrate energy influence decomposer diversity differentially across trophic levels

The species-energy hypothesis predicts increasing biodiversity with increasing energy in ecosystems. Proxies for energy availability are often grouped into ambient energy (i.e., solar radiation) and substrate energy (i.e., non-structural carbohydrates or nutritional content). The relative importance of substrate energy is thought to decrease with increasing trophic level from primary consumers to predators, with reciprocal effects of ambient energy. Yet, empirical tests are lacking. We compiled data on 332,557 deadwood-inhabiting beetles of 901 species reared from wood of 49 tree species across Europe. Using host-phylogeny-controlled models, we show that the relative importance of substrate energy versus ambient energy decreases with increasing trophic levels: the diversity of zoophagous and mycetophagous beetles was determined by ambient energy, while non-structural carbohydrate content in woody tissues determined that of xylophagous beetles. Our study thus overall supports the species-energy hypothesis and specifies that the relative importance of ambient temperature increases with increasing trophic level with opposite effects for substrate energy

Ambient and substrate energy influence decomposer diversity differentially across trophic levels.

The species-energy hypothesis predicts increasing biodiversity with increasing energy in ecosystems. Proxies for energy availability are often grouped into ambient energy (i.e., solar radiation) and substrate energy (i.e., non-structural carbohydrates or nutritional content). The relative importance of substrate energy is thought to decrease with increasing trophic level from primary consumers to predators, with reciprocal effects of ambient energy. Yet, empirical tests are lacking. We compiled data on 332,557 deadwood-inhabiting beetles of 901 species reared from wood of 49 tree species across Europe. Using host-phylogeny-controlled models, we show that the relative importance of substrate energy versus ambient energy decreases with increasing trophic levels: the diversity of zoophagous and mycetophagous beetles was determined by ambient energy, while non-structural carbohydrate content in woody tissues determined that of xylophagous beetles. Our study thus overall supports the species-energy hypothesis and specifies that the relative importance of ambient temperature increases with increasing trophic level with opposite effects for substrate energy

The SNP rs6500843 in 16p13.3 is associated with survival specifically among chemotherapy-treated breast cancer patients

We have utilized a two-stage study design to search for SNPs associated with the survival of breast cancer patients treated with adjuvant chemotherapy. Our initial GWS data set consisted of 805 Finnish breast cancer cases (360 treated with adjuvant chemotherapy). The top 39 SNPs from this stage were analyzed in three independent data sets: iCOGS (n=6720 chemotherapy-treated cases), SUCCESS-A (n=3596), and POSH (n=518). Two SNPs were successfully validated: rs6500843 (any chemotherapy; per-allele HR 1.16, 95% C.I. 1.08-1.26, p=0.0001, p((adjusted))=0.0091), and rs11155012 (anthracycline therapy; per-allele HR 1.21, 95% C.I. 1.08-1.35, p=0.0010, p((adjusted))=0.0270). The SNP rs6500843 was found to specifically interact with adjuvant chemotherapy, independently of standard prognostic markers (p((interaction))=0.0009), with the rs6500843-GG genotype corresponding to the highest hazard among chemotherapy-treated cases (HR 1.47, 95% C.I. 1.20-1.80). Upon trans-eQTL analysis of public microarray data, the rs6500843 locus was found to associate with the expression of a group of genes involved in cell cycle control, notably AURKA, the expression of which also exhibited differential prognostic value between chemotherapy-treated and untreated cases in our analysis of microarray data. Based on previously published information, we propose that the eQTL genes may be connected to the rs6500843 locus via a RBFOX1-FOXM1 -mediated regulatory pathway.Peer reviewe

The contribution of insects to global forest deadwood decomposition

The amount of carbon stored in deadwood is equivalent to about 8 per cent of the global forest carbon stocks. The decomposition of deadwood is largely governed by climate with decomposer groups—such as microorganisms and insects—contributing to variations in the decomposition rates. At the global scale, the contribution of insects to the decomposition of deadwood and carbon release remains poorly understood. Here we present a field experiment of wood decomposition across 55 forest sites and 6 continents. We find that the deadwood decomposition rates increase with temperature, and the strongest temperature effect is found at high precipitation levels. Precipitation affects the decomposition rates negatively at low temperatures and positively at high temperatures. As a net effect—including the direct consumption by insects and indirect effects through interactions with microorganisms—insects accelerate the decomposition in tropical forests (3.9% median mass loss per year). In temperate and boreal forests, we find weak positive and negative effects with a median mass loss of 0.9 per cent and −0.1 per cent per year, respectively. Furthermore, we apply the experimentally derived decomposition function to a global map of deadwood carbon synthesized from empirical and remote-sensing data, obtaining an estimate of 10.9 ± 3.2 petagram of carbon per year released from deadwood globally, with 93 per cent originating from tropical forests. Globally, the net effect of insects may account for 29 per cent of the carbon flux from deadwood, which suggests a functional importance of insects in the decomposition of deadwood and the carbon cycle