Reproductive biology of the Golden grey mullet Liza aurata, in the Gulf of Gabes (central Mediterranean, Tunisia) in the Gulf of Gabes (central Mediterranean, Tunisia)

In spite of its high commercial value, very few information are available on the biological feature of the Golden grey mullet in Tunisian waters (central Mediterranean). These data would be of great help in identifying the current stock state. In this study, Gonado Somatic Index (GSI), Hepato Somatic Index (HSI), condition factor (K), Length at first sexual maturity TL50 was calculated and the fecundity was estimated using the volumetric method. The Gonado Somatic Index (GSI) indicated that the spawning season of the Golden grey mullet extends from October to December. The monthly variation of Hepato-Somatic Index (HSI) indicates that L. aurata saves lipid reserves in liver. The species is sexually mature at 23.73, 23.84 and 23.79 cm TL respectively for female, male and combined sexes. In the present study the sex-ratio was unbalanced, with females dominating among large size individuals (TL > 24 cm). Absolute fecundity with a mean value of 286564 varied from a minimum of 210400 eggs for age 4 and a maximum of 533600 for age 7+

Reproductive cycle of Bolinus brandaris (Gastropoda: Muricidae) in the Gulf of Gabes (southern Tunisia)

The reproductive cycle of the purple dye murex (Bolinus brandaris) from the Gulf of Gabes was studied through gonad histology and calculation of bio-physiological indices (general condition index - K and gonadosomatic index - GSI). The shell length at first sexual maturity (SL50) of B. brandaris was also investigated using a macroscopic maturation scale. The population's sex ratio was statistically skewed (M:F = 1:1.5), with a significant dominance of females over males. Monthly variations in the maturation stages of gonads, K and GSI showed that B. brandaris has an annual reproductive cycle, a long period of gonadal activity and a slight asynchronicity between the sexes. The spawning season comprised the period between April and July, with a clear spawning peak from May to June. The SL50 was reached at 56.4 mm in females and 54.6 mm in males. Although at present B. brandaris has no commercial value in Tunisia, it is predictable to become a fishery-exploited species in the near future. The present data, particularly the timing and duration of the spawning season and the size of individuals of both sexes at first sexual maturity, provide baseline information to propose the early adoption of fishery management measures, aimed at ensuring sustainable exploitation and long-term preservation of this alternative fishing resource, once commercial exploitation of this species commences.We are grateful to the technical staff of INSTM (Centre of Sfax) for their assistance during field surveys and laboratory procedures. Thanks are also due to Mr. Tarek Rebai (Medicine University, Sfax) and Mr. Mohamed Salah Romtdane (National Agronomic Institute, Tunis) for their valuable help during histological analyses. Paulo Vasconcelos is funded by a post-doctoral grant (SFRH/BPD/ 26348/2006) awarded by the Fundação para a Ciência e Tecnologia (FCT - Portugal). Finally, the authors acknowledge the valuable comments and suggestions provided by two anonymous reviewers and by the Editor-in-Chief of Mediterranean Marine Science.publishe

Delegation of Obligations and Responsibility

Part 6: Policy Compliance and ObligationsInternational audienceIn this paper, we discuss the issue of responsibilities related to the fulfillment and the violation of obligations. We propose to formally define the different aspects of responsibility, namely causal responsibility, functional responsibility, liability as well as sanctions, and to examine how delegation influences these concepts. Our main aim is to identify the responsibility of each agent that is involved in the delegation of obligations. More precisely, we try to answer to the following questions: who is responsible for the obligation fulfillment? When a violation occurs, which agents are causally responsible for this violation? Who is liable for this violation and to whom? And finally, who must be sanctioned

Budd-Chiari syndrome in a 25-year-old woman with Behçet's disease: a case report and review of the literature

<p>Abstract</p> <p>Introduction</p> <p>The risk that patients with Behçet's disease will develop thrombotic complications has been previously described. Although it is distributed worldwide, Behçet's disease is rare in the Americas and Europe. Even though the pathogenic mechanisms of vascular complications of Budd-Chiari syndrome in patients with Behçet's disease are unknown, severe vascular complications of Budd-Chiari syndrome associated with Behçet's disease seem to affect mainly young men.</p> <p>Case presentation</p> <p>We report a case of Budd-Chiari syndrome, a severe vascular complication that developed in a 25-year-old Afro-Brazilian woman with Behçet's disease.</p> <p>Conclusion</p> <p>Severe vascular complications of Budd-Chiari syndrome in patients with Behçet's disease are much more common in young adult male patients; we present a rare case of Budd-Chiari syndrome in a young Afro-Brazilian woman with Behçet's disease.</p

Errors in RNA-Seq quantification affect genes of relevance to human disease

BACKGROUND: RNA-Seq has emerged as the standard for measuring gene expression and is an important technique often used in studies of human disease. Gene expression quantification involves comparison of the sequenced reads to a known genomic or transcriptomic reference. The accuracy of that quantification relies on there being enough unique information in the reads to enable bioinformatics tools to accurately assign the reads to the correct gene. RESULTS: We apply 12 common methods to estimate gene expression from RNA-Seq data and show that there are hundreds of genes whose expression is underestimated by one or more of those methods. Many of these genes have been implicated in human disease, and we describe their roles. We go on to propose a two-stage analysis of RNA-Seq data in which multi-mapped or ambiguous reads can instead be uniquely assigned to groups of genes. We apply this method to a recently published mouse cancer study, and demonstrate that we can extract relevant biological signal from data that would otherwise have been discarded. CONCLUSIONS: For hundreds of genes in the human genome, RNA-Seq is unable to measure expression accurately. These genes are enriched for gene families, and many of them have been implicated in human disease. We show that it is possible to use data that may otherwise have been discarded to measure group-level expression, and that such data contains biologically relevant information. ELECTRONIC SUPPLEMENTARY MATERIAL: The online version of this article (doi:10.1186/s13059-015-0734-x) contains supplementary material, which is available to authorized users