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Of all terrestrial ecosystems, peatlands store carbon most effectively in long-term scales of millennia. However, many peatlands have been drained for peat extraction or agricultural use. This converts peatlands from sinks to sources of carbon, causing approx. 5% of the anthropogenic greenhouse effect and additional negative effects on other ecosystem services. Rewetting peatlands can mitigate climate change and may be combined with management in the form of paludiculture. Rewetted peatlands, however, do not equal their pristine ancestors and their ecological functioning is not understood. This holds true especially for groundwater-fed fens. Their functioning results from manifold interactions and can only be understood following an integrative approach of many relevant fields of science, which we merge in the interdisciplinary project WETSCAPES. Here, we address interactions among water transport and chemistry, primary production, peat formation, matter transformation and transport, microbial community, and greenhouse gas exchange using state of the art methods. We record data on six study sites spread across three common fen types (Alder forest, percolation fen, and coastal fen), each in drained and rewetted states. First results revealed that indicators reflecting more long-term effects like vegetation and soil chemistry showed a stronger differentiation between drained and rewetted states than variables with a more immediate reaction to environmental change, like greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions. Variations in microbial community composition explained differences in soil chemical data as well as vegetation composition and GHG exchange. We show the importance of developing an integrative understanding of managed fen peatlands and their ecosystem functioning.

We collected data on mass mortality in Sandwich terns (Thalasseus sandvicensis) during the 2022 breeding season in the Netherlands. Mortality was associated with at least 2 variants of highly pathogenic avian influenza A(H5N1) virus clade 2.3.4.4b. We report on carcass removal efforts relative to survival in colonies. Mitigation strategies urgently require structured research.

Meningeal inflammation strongly associates with demyelination and neuronal loss in the underlying cortex of progressive MS patients, thereby contributing significantly to clinical disability. However, the pathological mechanisms of meningeal inflammation-induced cortical pathology are still largely elusive. By extensive analysis of cortical microglia in post-mortem progressive MS tissue, we identified cortical areas with two MS-specific microglial populations, termed MS1 and MS2 cortex. The microglial population in MS1 cortex was characterized by a higher density and increased expression of the activation markers HLA class II and CD68, whereas microglia in MS2 cortex showed increased morphological complexity and loss of P2Y12 and TMEM119 expression. Interestingly, both populations associated with inflammation of the overlying meninges and were time-dependently replicated in an in vivo rat model for progressive MS-like chronic meningeal inflammation. In this recently developed animal model, cortical microglia at 1-month post-induction of experimental meningeal inflammation resembled microglia in MS1 cortex, and microglia at 2 months post-induction acquired a MS2-like phenotype. Furthermore, we observed that MS1 microglia in both MS cortex and the animal model were found closely apposing neuronal cell bodies and to mediate pre-synaptic displacement and phagocytosis, which coincided with a relative sparing of neurons. In contrast, microglia in MS2 cortex were not involved in these synaptic alterations, but instead associated with substantial neuronal loss. Taken together, our results show that in response to meningeal inflammation, microglia acquire two distinct phenotypes that differentially associate with neurodegeneration in the progressive MS cortex. Furthermore, our in vivo data suggests that microglia initially protect neurons from meningeal inflammation-induced cell death by removing pre-synapses from the neuronal soma, but eventually lose these protective properties contributing to neuronal loss.

Bipolar disorder (BD) is a highly heritable neuropsychiatric disease characterized by recurrent episodes of mania and depression. BD shows substantial clinical and genetic overlap with other psychiatric disorders, in particular schizophrenia (SCZ). The genes underlying this etiological overlap remain largely unknown. A recent SCZ genome wide association study (GWAS) by the Psychiatric Genomics Consortium identified 128 independent genome-wide significant single nucleotide polymorphisms (SNPs). The present study investigated whether these SCZ-associated SNPs also contribute to BD development through the performance of association testing in a large BD GWAS dataset (9747 patients, 14278 controls). After re-imputation and correction for sample overlap, 22 of 107 investigated SCZ SNPs showed nominal association with BD. The number of shared SCZ-BD SNPs was significantly higher than expected (p = 1.46x10-8). This provides further evidence that SCZ-associated loci contribute to the development of BD. Two SNPs remained significant after Bonferroni correction. The most strongly associated SNP was located near TRANK1, which is a reported genome-wide significant risk gene for BD. Pathway analyses for all shared SCZ-BD SNPs revealed 25 nominally enriched gene-sets, which showed partial overlap in terms of the underlying genes. The enriched gene-sets included calcium- and glutamate signaling, neuropathic pain signaling in dorsal horn neurons, and calmodulin binding. The present data provide further insights into shared risk loci and disease-associated pathways for BD and SCZ. This may suggest new research directions for the treatment and prevention of these two major psychiatric disorders.

The impact of local biodiversity loss on ecosystem functioning is well established, but the role of larger-scale biodiversity dynamics in the delivery of ecosystem services remains poorly understood. Here we address this gap using a comprehensive dataset describing the supply of 16 cultural, regulating and provisioning ecosystem services in 150 European agricultural grassland plots, and detailed multi-scale data on land use and plant diversity. After controlling for land-use and abiotic factors, we show that both plot-level and surrounding plant diversity play an important role in the supply of cultural and aboveground regulating ecosystem services. In contrast, provisioning and belowground regulating ecosystem services are more strongly driven by field-level management and abiotic factors. Structural equation models revealed that surrounding plant diversity promotes ecosystem services both directly, probably by fostering the spill-over of ecosystem service providers from surrounding areas, and indirectly, by maintaining plot-level diversity. By influencing the ecosystem services that local stakeholders prioritized, biodiversity at different scales was also shown to positively influence a wide range of stakeholder groups. These results provide a comprehensive picture of which ecosystem services rely most strongly on biodiversity, and the respective scales of biodiversity that drive these services. This key information is required for the upscaling of biodiversity–ecosystem service relationships, and the informed management of biodiversity within agricultural landscapes. The authors test whether spatial scale (plot, local and landscape) affects the supply of various ecosystem services in grasslands, finding that some services are predicted by plot-level properties while others depend more on landscape-level management.

A unique isotonic sports drink (ISD) was created in this study using a pilot-scale short-wave ultraviolet light (UV-C, 892 mJ/cm2, 20 °C) assisted by mild heat (UV-C/H, 534 mJ/cm2, 50 °C), which was followed by the addition of yerba mate (Ilex paraguariensis) extract (YME). Consumer perception and microbiological and physicochemical stability during refrigerated storage (4 °C/23 d) were assessed for the ISD. Alicyclobacillus acidoterrestris (AA) spores and cocktails of yeasts and Escherichia coli were considerably inactivated by UV-C/H. The TEM and SEM micrographs showed that AA evidenced sustained severe structural damage. Furthermore, UV-C/H completely inactivated the native microbiota, while YME incorporation increased the initial aerobic mesophilic and mold-and-yeast populations by 0.48 and 0.70 log cycles, remaining stable during storage. YME addition enhanced total polyphenols, flavonoids and antioxidant activity by 2.7–3.7, 16.5–16.7 and 6.6–24.0 times compared to the untreated ISD and ISD-UVC/H samples. Except for sedimentation and turbidity, the other physical characteristics mostly did not change (going from 1494 ± 382 to 2151 ± 106 NTU). The initial 5-HMF value in the ISD was raised by UV-C/H treatment and YME addition. Notwithstanding, it stayed below the allowed threshold throughout storage. ISD-UVC/H+YME had a high overall acceptability score; 60% of panelists gave the drink a score of seven or higher. Additionally, the herbal taste of YME was well liked, and its bitterness was perceived as mild. These findings suggest that including YME and the UV-C/H treatment can produce an ISD of superior quality with distinct sensory attributes.

Epilepsy is a common neurological disorder affecting 0.6–0.75% of dogs in veterinary practice. Treatment is frequently complicated by the occurrence of drug-resistant epilepsy and cluster seizures in dogs with idiopathic epilepsy. Only few studies are available to guide treatment choices beyond licensed veterinary drugs. The aim of the study was to compare antiseizure efficacy and tolerability of two add-on treatment strategies in dogs with drug-resistant idiopathic epilepsy. The study design was a prospective, open-label, non-blinded, comparative treatment trial. Treatment success was defined as a 3-fold extension of the longest baseline interseizure interval and to a minimum of 3 months. To avoid prolonged adherence to a presumably ineffective treatment strategy, dog owners could leave the study after the third day with generalized seizures if the interseizure interval failed to show a relevant increase. Twenty-six dogs (mean age 5.5 years, mean seizure frequency 4/month) with drug-resistant idiopathic epilepsy and a history of cluster seizures were included. Dogs received either add-on treatment with pregabalin (PGB) 4 mg/kg twice daily (14 dogs) or a dose increase in levetiracetam (LEV) add-on treatment (12 dogs). Thirteen dogs in the PGB group had drug levels within the therapeutic range for humans. Two dogs in the PGB group (14.3%; 2/14) and one dog in the LEV group (8.3%; 1/12) achieved treatment success with long seizure-free intervals from 122 to 219 days but then relapsed to their early seizure frequency 10 months after the study inclusion. The overall low success rates with both treatment strategies likely reflect a real-life situation in canine drug-resistant idiopathic epilepsy in everyday veterinary practice. These results delineate the need for research on better pharmacologic and non-pharmacologic treatment strategies in dogs with drug-resistant epilepsy.

Fil: Schenk, Marcela Liliana. Universidad de Buenos Aires. Facultad de Ciencias Exactas y Naturales. Departamento de Industrias. Instituto de Tecnología de Alimentos y Procesos Quimicos. Consejo Nacional de Investigaciones Científicas y Técnicas. Oficina de Coordinación Administrativa Ciudad Universitaria. Instituto de Tecnología de Alimentos y Procesos Quimicos.; Argentina

The susceptibility of Escherichia coli , Salmonella enteritidis , Saccharomyces cerevisiae , and Zygosaccharomyces bailii to binary and ternary mixtures of potassium sorbate (KS), vanillin (V), and citral (C) was evaluated according to the Berenbaum experimental design, in laboratory media. For some V/C combinations, KS inhibitory concentrations were determined in agarized melon and mango purées by the spiral gradient endpoint (SGE) method. In laboratory media, inhibitory antimicrobial combinations were generally additives. For the yeasts, some synergistic effects were observed. All Berenbaum mixtures which resulted inhibitory in laboratory media were confirmed in the fruit purées. When the SGE method was used, several inhibitory ternary mixtures were found. The lowest inhibitory KS concentrations, estimated for a given V/C combination, corresponded to the bacteria assayed in melon purée. Z. bailii was not inhibited at any condition. Some synergistic antimicrobial combinations (595 ppm V + 251 ppm C + 8 ppm KS in melon and 280 ppm V + 123 ppm C + 8 ppm KS in mango purées) could be useful to achieve a desired inhibitory effect in fruit purées while reducing their concentrations.

Evenness is an essential indicator of road quality. Accelerometer sensors in smartphones offer an accessible and cost-efficient solution for monitoring road evenness. However, the accelerometer signal from smartphones is influenced by various internal and external factors beyond the road’s actual evenness. External factors, in particular, can introduce systematic bias due to differences in vehicle suspension or smartphone mounting methods. In this study, we investigate specific external factors affecting windshield-mounted smartphones and propose a method to automatically adapt accelerometer processing pipelines, improving robustness against such external influences.