Article
Biodiversity Conservation
Tim Burton, Irja Ida Ratikainen, Sigurd Einum
Summary: This article examines the rate at which reversible phenotypic plasticity (RPP) occurs and its potential impact on how organisms overcome environmental challenges. The study suggests that current theoretical models do not consider the evolutionary potential of RPP rates. If the rate of plasticity itself can evolve, it may alter the organism's perception of environmental predictability and influence the slope of the evolved reaction norm. The optimization of phenotypic plasticity rates, their evolutionary dynamics in different environments, and the costs associated with them warrant further exploration in future research.
GLOBAL CHANGE BIOLOGY
(2022)
Article
Multidisciplinary Sciences
Andrzej Mikulski, Danuta Mazurczak
Summary: We experimentally tested the hypothesis that genetically different individuals from the same species exposed to the same chemical stress factor can exhibit opposite life history strategies. Our results confirmed that individuals under stress invest more in current reproduction and produce offspring poorly adapted to the environment, while non-stressed individuals invest in their own safety and future reproduction, producing better-prepared offspring.
Article
Biochemical Research Methods
Trevor J. Chan, Xingjian Zhang, Michael Mak
Summary: In this study, we propose an analytical method to quantify both single-cell morphologies and cell network topologies of tumor cell populations and predict 3D cell behavior. We utilized a supervised deep learning approach for instance segmentation and identified six distinct morphological subclasses. Differences in tumor growth and invasion dynamics were observed across subclasses in an in vitro 3D spheroid model. Compared to existing methods, our analytical method is more efficient, requires no specialized equipment, and is suitable for high-throughput applications such as drug screening and clinical diagnosis.
Article
Biochemistry & Molecular Biology
Melisandre A. Tefit, Tifanny Budiman, Adrianna Dupriest, Joanne Y. Yew
Summary: The microbiome has been proposed as a key factor in driving phenotypic variation in host organisms, affecting metabolic processes, development, and novel functions necessary for survival. A study inoculating germ-free fruit flies with microbes from different environmental sites shows that these microbes induce significant variation in reproduction, fatty acid levels, stress tolerance, and sleep behavior. Removal of microbes eliminates these phenotypic differences, supporting the causal role of environmental microbes in driving host phenotypic plasticity and potentially rapid adaptation and evolution.
Article
Ecology
Arianne Marty, Timea Boeriis, Gerard Martinez-De Leon, Martin Holmstrup, Madhav P. Thakur
Summary: This study investigated the effects of temperature on reproductive investment in two Collembola species. The results showed that temperature had species-specific effects on egg size and egg numbers, and there was a trade-off between the two in colder temperature for F. candida. No such trade-offs were found in P. minuta. This highlights the importance of considering temperature effects on maternal investments in species-specific contexts.
EUROPEAN JOURNAL OF SOIL BIOLOGY
(2022)
Review
Microbiology
Madison R. Spratt, Keara Lane
Summary: The ability of bacteria to respond to changes in their environment is crucial for their survival. Phenotypic heterogeneity, a remarkable feature of many bacterial responses, enables bacteria to survive fluctuating conditions and implement bet-hedging or division of labor strategies. Recent studies have found that this form of heterogeneity is prevalent in bacterial responses to environmental transitions.
Article
Oncology
Maalavika Pillai, Gouri Rajaram, Pradipti Thakur, Nilay Agarwal, Srinath Muralidharan, Ankita Ray, Dev Barbhaya, Jason A. A. Somarelli, Mohit Kumar Jolly
Summary: Dedifferentiation in melanoma is accompanied by upregulation of mesenchymal genes, but does not necessarily involve loss of epithelial program. As melanoma cells progress along the invasive axis, the mesenchymal signature shows a biphasic response, mirroring the dynamics of melanocyte development.
FRONTIERS IN ONCOLOGY
(2022)
Article
Multidisciplinary Sciences
Sakshi Sharda, Tobias Zuest, Matthias Erb, Barbara Taborsky
Summary: Research has shown that exposure of mothers to cues of their most dangerous natural predator during egg production can lead to offspring developing faster escape reflexes and exhibiting more risk averse behavior. This effect is mediated by differences in egg composition.
PROCEEDINGS OF THE NATIONAL ACADEMY OF SCIENCES OF THE UNITED STATES OF AMERICA
(2021)
Article
Cell Biology
Antara Biswas, Subhajyoti De
Summary: Cancer is a clonal disease with intratumor heterogeneity, where tumor cells have genetic and nongenetic variations contributing to cell state transition and phenotypic heterogeneity. Dynamic heterogeneity and phenotypic plasticity can lead to resistance to treatment, metastasis, and evolvability in cancer.
AMERICAN JOURNAL OF PHYSIOLOGY-CELL PHYSIOLOGY
(2021)
Article
Endocrinology & Metabolism
Jennifer J. Heppner, Jesse S. Krause, Jenny Q. Ouyang
Summary: The phenotypes observed in urban and rural environments are often distinct, but it is unclear how these urban phenotypes arise. Hormone-mediated maternal effects play a key role in shaping the development of offspring in different environments. In this study, we found that corticosterone concentrations were higher in urban house wrens compared to rural ones across all life stages. Additionally, urban nestlings had higher corticosterone concentrations correlated with urban density scores. Our study highlights the importance of maternal endocrine programming in shaping offspring phenotypes in urban environments.
GENERAL AND COMPARATIVE ENDOCRINOLOGY
(2023)
Article
Oncology
Ellis Michiels, Hediel Madhloum, Silke Van Lint, Nouredin Messaoudi, Rastislav Kunda, Sandrina Martens, Philippe Giron, Catharina Olsen, Pierre Lefesvre, Nelson Dusetti, Leila EL Mohajer, Richard Tomasini, Lukas J. A. C. Hawinkels, Farah Ahsayni, Remy Nicolle, Tatjana Arsenijevic, Christelle Bouchart, Jean-Luc Van Laethem, Ilse Rooman
Summary: This study identifies two subtypes of pancreatic cancer and reveals spatial phenotypes within tumors through analysis of mRNA panels. These findings are important for understanding tumor heterogeneity and guiding therapeutic approaches.
JOURNAL OF PATHOLOGY
(2023)
Article
Plant Sciences
Hanna Sjulgard, Daniel Iseskog, Norbert Kirchgessner, A. Glyn Bengough, Thomas Keller, Tino Colombi
Summary: The study revealed that pea roots exhibit reversible responses to short-term soil physical stress, while wheat roots show irreversible responses, indicating different root phenotypic plasticity between the two species. This suggests that strategies to cope with periodic soil physical stress may vary among species.
ENVIRONMENTAL AND EXPERIMENTAL BOTANY
(2021)
Article
Business
Weiping Li, Sihan Chen, Zhuxin Gao, Xiaoqi Chen
Summary: Environmental, social, and governance (ESG) factors are important for both employees and companies, and integrating ESG considerations into labor investment decisions is crucial. This study examines the impact of ESG performance on firms' labor investment efficiency. Using data from A-share listed firms from 2015 to 2020, the findings show that ESG performance improves labor investment efficiency. This positive effect is robust across different measures, regression specifications, and endogeneity tests. Mechanism tests suggest that a strong ESG record can reduce financial constraints and improve the information environment, thereby enhancing labor investment efficiency. The study provides insights for management, regulatory authorities, and environmental activists on improving labor investment efficiency.
BUSINESS STRATEGY AND THE ENVIRONMENT
(2023)
Article
Green & Sustainable Science & Technology
Zhice Cheng, Xinyuan Chen, Huwei Wen
Summary: This study investigates the relationship between environmental protection tax and corporate environmental investment in China using a quasi-natural experiment and the difference-in-difference method. The empirical results show that environmental protection tax significantly reduces corporate environmental investment. The mechanism behind this is that environmental protection tax inhibits corporate environmental investment through financing constraints and substitution effect of innovation investment. The inhibitory effect of environmental protection tax on environmental investment is significant for large firms, state-owned firms, and firms located in cities with strict regulations and economic developments.
Article
Ecology
Abigail Hudak, Mark Dybdahl
Summary: Studies have shown that organisms exposed to multiple environmental variables face phenotypically plastic responses that are influenced by different environmental factors. Evaluating the plasticity of traits in multivariate environments provides new insights into the fate of populations amidst environmental changes. This study revealed unexpected outcomes in plastic trait responses among multivariate environments, attributed to nonadditive effects of environmental variables and varying genetic correlations among fitness-related traits. Considering multivariate environments contributes to a better understanding of trait evolution and uncovers trait patterns that may be missed in univariate studies.
Article
Ecology
Kazutaka Kawatsu, Takehiko Yamanaka, Jan Patoeka, Andrew M. Liebhold
POPULATION ECOLOGY
(2020)
Article
Ecology
Arash Rasekh, Naoya Osawa
ECOLOGY AND EVOLUTION
(2020)
Article
Ecology
Kazutaka Kawatsu, Masayuki Ushio, F. J. Frank van Veen, Michio Kondoh
Summary: Research using a 10-year dataset on insect communities found that dynamic interactions between species reflect resource-consumer relationships, however not all trophic interactions result in detectable dynamic interactions, especially for top-down effects. Additionally, a considerable proportion of dynamic interactions are attributed to non-trophic and indirect interactions, highlighting their significant role as co-drivers of community dynamics.
Article
Ecology
Ryosuke Iritani, Suzuki Noriyuki
Summary: Negative interspecific mating interactions can impede species coexistence, while conspecific sperm precedence (CSP) may help mitigate the costs of interspecific mating and hybridization. Experimental and mathematical modeling studies suggest that species exhibiting CSP may struggle to coexist in a local environment in the presence of reproductive interference.
ECOLOGY AND EVOLUTION
(2021)
Article
Entomology
Severin Hatt, Naoya Osawa
Summary: The type of diet readily available after adult eclosion does not significantly affect the future fecundity of adult ladybird beetles, as long as they find prey within a few days. High variability in pre-oviposition time was observed among females, and significant negative relationships were found between pre-oviposition time and both the number of eggs oviposited daily and the viability of egg batches.
Article
Entomology
Hiroki Ito, Naoya Osawa
Summary: The wood-feeding cockroach Panesthia angustipennis spadica displays gregarious behavior in decayed logs, with individuals aggregating regardless of kin relatedness. Laboratory experiments showed that both first- and second-instar nymphs exhibit gregariousness, suggesting that non-kin-based aggregation may help maintain colonies of this species containing individuals derived from multiple families in the wild.
ENTOMOLOGICAL SCIENCE
(2021)
Article
Entomology
Wataru Mukaimine, Kazutaka Kawatsu, Yukihiko Toquenaga
Summary: The study on the emergence timing of herbivorous insects found that the emergence of individuals of the opposite sex is a major driver of the number of individuals emerging per day, and that air temperature, precipitation, and humidity also play a role in the timing of emergence.
ECOLOGICAL ENTOMOLOGY
(2022)
Article
Biochemistry & Molecular Biology
Jun Ying Lim, Jairo Patino, Suzuki Noriyuki, Luis Cayetano, Rosemary G. Gillespie, Henrik Krehenwinkel
Summary: The study investigates arthropod community-level diversity patterns along elevational transects on two different volcanoes of Hawai'i, finding that arthropod communities become increasingly distinct compositionally at higher elevations between the two transects. The results suggest that climatic differences play a crucial role in shaping beta-diversity patterns, with varying importance across taxonomic groups. Additionally, the correlation of climatic niche position between transects indicates that climatic filters influence colonization between adjacent volcanoes.
Article
Biodiversity Conservation
Scott A. Schneider, Hannah J. Broadley, Jeremy C. Andersen, Joseph S. Elkinton, Shaw-Yhi Hwang, Chenxi Liu, Suzuki Noriyuki, Jong-Seok Park, Hang Thi Dao, Matthew L. Lewis, Juli R. Gould, Kim A. Hoelmer, Rodrigo Diaz
Summary: The damage caused by non-native roseau cane scales has led to the decline of Phragmites australis stands in the Mississippi River Delta. Identifying the origin of the invasive population and finding potential biological control agents through genetic and environmental data is crucial. This research also discovered two cryptic species of scale insects on Phragmites, providing new insights into population structure.
BIOLOGICAL INVASIONS
(2022)
Article
Entomology
Naoya Osawa
Summary: Many aphidophagous ladybird beetles lay clusters of eggs and sibling cannibalism occurs at hatching. The study found that developing eggs were larger than undeveloped sterile ones, and the hatchability of eggs was also associated with their size. This suggests that the production of relatively small sterile eggs serves as a circumstance-dependent maternal investment in improving the survival of first instar larvae.
EUROPEAN JOURNAL OF ENTOMOLOGY
(2022)
Article
Entomology
Suzuki Noriyuki, Kazutaka Kawatsu, Shuji Kaneko
Summary: This study used a nonlinear time series analysis to investigate the top-down and bottom-up effects between the citrus whitefly and the whitefly-specialist ladybird. The results showed a delayed positive effect of citrus whitefly abundance on ladybird abundance, but no significant causal effect of ladybird abundance on citrus whitefly abundance. Additionally, weather variables had minimal impact on the population dynamics of the two species. The findings suggest that bottom-up effects predominate in the weekly dynamics of this predator-prey system.
JOURNAL OF APPLIED ENTOMOLOGY
(2022)
Article
Microbiology
Dailin Yang, Hiromi Kato, Kazutaka Kawatsu, Yutaka Osada, Toyohiro Azuma, Yuji Nagata, Michio Kondoh
Summary: By combining amplicon-based diversity survey with recently developed nonlinear analytical tools, the interaction networks of more than 150 natural soil microbial genera were determined under different temperature stress conditions. The study explored the applicability of the stress gradient hypothesis to soil microbiota and shed new light on this well-known hypothesis.
MICROBIOLOGY SPECTRUM
(2022)
Article
Plant Sciences
Midzuho Tatsuno, Masahiro Sueyoshi, Naoya Osawa
Summary: While most angiosperm plants have hermaphrodite flowers, a small percentage of dioecious angiosperms, including zoophilous species, require pollen transport from male plants to females. This study focuses on Eurya japonica, a dioecious, zoophilous plant that blooms in low-temperature seasons. The research finds that a diverse range of insects, particularly Diptera and Hymenoptera, play a crucial role in pollination and reproductive ecology of E. japonica, even at low temperatures. The presence of dipteran visitors positively correlates with higher fruiting rates and seed numbers.
Article
Ecology
Suzuki Noriyuki, Izumi Matsumoto, Tetsuro Yoshikawa, Shuji Kaneko, Hannah J. J. Broadley
Summary: The invasion of Roseau cane scale, native to East Asia, is causing dieback of common reed stands in the Mississippi River Delta, Louisiana. Previous research suggested that Common Reed Buntings and parasitoid wasps play a role in controlling the abundance of Roseau cane scale in its native range. However, little is known about other bird species that may prey on Roseau cane scale or their feeding patterns. This study used web search and citizen science data to identify bird predators and their feeding patterns in Japan.