Play and optimal welfare : does play behaviour indicate the presence of positive affective states?

Play is commonly used to assess affective states in both humans and non-human animals. Play appears to be most common when animals are well-fed and not under any direct threats to fitness. Could play and playfulness therefore indicate pre-existing positive emotions, and thence optimal animal welfare? We examine this question by surveying the internal and external conditions that promote or suppress play in a variety of species, starting with humans. We find that negative affective states and poor welfare usually do suppress play (although there are notable exceptions where the opposite occurs). Furthermore, research in children suggests that beyond the frequency or total duration of play, poor welfare may additionally be reflected in qualitative aspects of this heterogeneous behaviour (e.g. display of solitary over social play; and the ‘fragmentation’ of play bouts) that are often overlooked in animals. There are surprisingly few studies of play in subjects with pre-existing optimal welfare or in unambiguously highly positive affective states, making it currently impossible to determine whether play can distinguish optimal or good welfare from merely neutral welfare. This therefore represents an important and exciting area for future research

Lightweight Radiator System for a Spacecraft

Three documents describe various aspects of a proposed lightweight, deployable radiator system for dissipating excess heat from the life-support system of a habitable spacecraft. The first document focuses on a radiator tube that would include a thin metal liner surrounded and supported by a thicker carbon-fiber-reinforced composite tubular structure that, in turn, would be formed as part of a unitary composite radiator-fin structure consisting mostly of a sheet of reticulated vitreous carbon laminated between carbon-fiber-reinforced face sheets. The thermal and mechanical properties, including the anisotropies, of the component materials are taken into account in the design. The second document describes thermo-structural bumpers, in the form of exterior multiple-ply carbon-fiber sheets enclosing hollows on opposite sides of a radiator fin, which would protect the radiator tube against impinging micrometeors and orbital debris. The third document describes a radiator system that would include multiple panels containing the aforementioned components, among others. The system would also include mechanisms for deploying the panels from compact stowage. Deployment would not involve breaking and remaking of fluid connections to the radiator panels

Frustrations of fur-farmed mink

Captive animals may suffer if strongly motivated to perform activities that their housing does not allow. We investigated this experimentally for caged mink, and found that they would pay high costs to perform a range of natural behaviours, and release cortisol if their most preferred activity, swimming, was prevented. Investigates the effect of limitations on caged mink. Popularity of fur farming; Research into the possible deprivation of mink, which result in their frustration; Details of the experiment; Impact of an access to water; Results which indicate that fur-farmed mink are still motivated to perform the same activities as their wild counterpart

What Do Population-Level Welfare Indices Suggest About the Well-Being of Zoo Elephants?

To assess zoo elephants' welfare using objective population-level indices, we sought data from zoos and other protected populations (potential ''benchmarks'') on variables affected by poor well-being. Such data were available on fecundity, potential fertility, stillbirths, infant mortality, adult survivorship, and stereotypic behavior. Most of these can also be affected by factors unrelated to well-being; therefore, for each, we analyzed the potential role of these other factors. Population-level comparisons generally indicate poor reproduction, and poor infant and adult survivorship in zoos compared with benchmark populations (with some differences between zoo regions and over time). Stereotypic behavior also occurs in c. 60% of zoo elephants; as the population-level welfare index least open to alternative interpretations, this represents the strongest evidence that well-being is/has been widely compromised. Poor well-being is a parsimonious explanation for the diverse range of population-level effects seen, but to test this hypothesis properly, data are now needed on, for example, potential confounds that can affect these indices (to partition out effects of factors unrelated to well-being), and causes of the observed temporal effects, and differences between species and zoo regions. Regardless of whether such additional data implicate poor well-being, our findings suggest that elephant management has generally been sub-optimal. We also discuss the selection and utilization of benchmark data, as a useful future approach for evaluating such issues. Zoo Biol 29: 256-273, 2010

A New Biophysical Metric for Interrogating the Information Content in Human Genome Sequence Variation: Proof of Concept

Various studies have shown an association between single nucleotide polymorphisms (SNPs) and common disease. We hypothesize that information encoded in the structure of SNP haploblock variation illumines molecular pathways and cellular mechanisms involved in the regulation of host adaptation to the environment. We developed and utilized the normalized information content (NIC), a novel metric based on SNP haploblock variation. We found that all SNP haploblocks with statistically low information content contained putative transcription factor binding sites and microRNA motifs. We were able to translate a biophysical, mathematical measure of common variants into a deeper understanding of the life sciences through analysis of biochemical patterns associated with SNP haploblock variation. We submit that this new metric, NIC, may be useful in decoding the functional significance of common variation in the human genome and in analyzing the regulation of molecular pathways involved in host adaptation to environmental pathogens.Comment: 13 page

Compromised survivorship in zoo elephants

Keeping elephants in zoos is extremely costly, yet does not yield self-sustaining 16 populations. In Europe, which holds c. half the global zoo elephant population, a long17 term decline of c.10% per year is expected in both species, if reliant on zoo-bred animals 18 under historically prevailing conditions. Fitness in zoos is compromised in several ways. 19 Compared with protected in situ populations (Burmese working Asians; Kenyan free20 living Africans), zoo elephants show premature reproductive senescence and -- despite 21 improving adult survivorship for Africans -- die earlier in adulthood than expected. In 22 Asian elephants, infant survivorship in zoos is also greatly reduced relative to Burmese 23 elephants, and furthermore, zoo-born animals die earlier in adulthood than wild-caught 24 conspecifics kept in zoos, via effects ‘programmed’ peri-natally. In this species, being 25 transferred between zoos also increases mortality rates. Both survival and fecundity 26 would need to improve to attain self-sustaining zoo populations. Our findings 27 demonstrate deficits in zoo elephant management, particularly for Asians, and implicate 28 stress and obesity as likely problems