Search results for "AGRICULTURAL AND BIOLOGICAL SCIENCES"

Anti-Inflammatory and Cytoprotective Effect of Plant Sterol and Galactooligosaccharides-Enriched Beverages in Caco-2 Cells

2019

Plant sterol (PS) (1 g/100 mL) enriched milk-based fruit beverages with or without galactooligosaccharides (GOS) (1.8 g/100 mL) were used in differentiated Caco-2 cells. Their potential cytopreventive effect against oxidative stress induced by cholesterol oxidation products (COPs) and their anti-inflammatory properties were evaluated. Preincubation (24 h) with bioaccessible fractions from beverages without and with GOS (MfB and MfB-G) completely prevented the COPs (60 μM/4 h) induced oxidative stress independent to GOS presence with exception to calcium influx and GSH content, where a partial protective effect was observed. Besides, MfB produced a significant (p < 0.05) reduction of IL-8 (4…

Decline in coccolithophore diversity and impact on coccolith morphogenesis along a natural CO2 gradient

2014

A natural pH gradient caused by marine CO2 seeps off Vulcano Island (Italy) was used to assess the effects of ocean acidification on coccolithophores, which are abundant planktonic unicellular calcifiers. Such seeps are used as natural laboratories to study the effects of ocean acidification on marine ecosystems, since they cause long-term changes in seawater carbonate chemistry and pH, exposing the organisms to elevated CO2 concentrations and therefore mimicking future scenarios. Previous work at CO2 seeps has focused exclusively on benthic organisms. Here we show progressive depletion of 27 coccolithophore species, in terms of cell concentrations and diversity, along a calcite saturation …

Ecotype-Level Genetic Biodiversity of Five Italian Traditional Crops

2019

Italy displays a high level of agrobiodiversity due to its diversified pedoclimatic zones. The Administrative Region of Campania includes several and divergent biomes, occurring close to each other. In fact, the distance between a sea level environment and that of high mountains can be less than 20 km. These environmental conditions allow the cultivation of many different crops and vegetables, represented by diverse ecotypes and varieties that are well adapted to the distribution range where they have been selected and grown. Efforts to maintain and further increase biodiversity in farming systems require a better understanding of the existing diversity created by traditional farming practi…

An integrated analysis of micro- and macro-habitat features as a tool to detect weather-driven constraints: A case study with cavity nesters.

2017

The effects of climate change on animal populations may be shaped by habitat characteristics at both micro- and macro-habitat level, however, empirical studies integrating these two scales of observation are lacking. As analyses of the effects of climate change commonly rely on data from a much larger scale than the microhabitat level organisms are affected at, this mismatch risks hampering progress in developing understanding of the details of the ecological and evolutionary responses of organisms and, ultimately, effective actions to preserve their populations. Cavity nesters, often with a conservation status of concern, are an ideal model because the cavity is a microenvironment potentia…

The worldwide variation in avian clutch size across species and space.

2008

Traits such as clutch size vary markedly across species and environmental gradients but have usually been investigated from either a comparative or a geographic perspective, respectively. We analyzed the global variation in clutch size across 5,290 bird species, excluding brood parasites and pelagic species. We integrated intrinsic (morphological, behavioural), extrinsic (environmental), and phylogenetic effects in a combined model that predicts up to 68% of the interspecific variation in clutch size. We then applied the same species-level model to predict mean clutch size across 2,521 assemblages worldwide and found that it explains the observed eco-geographic pattern very well. Clutches a…

Octopamine and dopamine mediate waggle dance following and information use in honeybees.

2020

Honeybees can be directed to profitable food sources by following waggle dances performed by other bees. Followers can often choose between using this social information or relying on memories about food sources they have visited in the past, so-called private information. While the circumstances that favour the use of either social or private information have received considerable attention, still little is known about the neurophysiological basis of information use. We hypothesized that octopamine and dopamine, two biogenic amines with important functions in reward signalling and learning, affect dance use in honeybees. We orally administered octopamine and dopamine when bees collected fo…

Worldwide Scientific Research on Nanotechnology: A Bibliometric Analysis of Tendencies, Funding, and Challenges

2020

[EN] The main objective of this investigation was to analyze the scientific production in global research on nanotechnology, integrating scientific production, funding of studies, collaborations between countries, and the most cited publications. The source for obtaining the research papers for our analysis was the Science Citation Index Expanded from the Web of Science. A total of 3546 documents were extracted during the period of 1997-2018. Food science & technology, chemistry (applied and analytical), spectroscopy, and agriculture appeared as the main areas where the articles were published. Most prolific and cited journals were Analytical Methods, Journal of Agricultural and Food Chemis…

Phycological Herbaria as a Useful Tool to Monitor Long-Term Changes of Macroalgae Diversity: Some Case Studies from the Mediterranean Sea

2020

The Mediterranean Sea is currently experiencing a decline in the abundance of several key species, as a consequence of anthropogenic pressures (e.g., increase in human population, habitat modification and loss, pollution, coastal urbanization, overexploitation, introduction of non-indigenous species and climate change). Herbaria and natural history collections are certainly fundamental for taxonomic studies, but they are also an invaluable, if currently underestimated, resource for understanding ecological and evolutionary responses of species to environmental changes. Macroalgae herbarium collections, which are really consistent (ranging from 200,000 to approximately 500,000 specimens) in …

2021

Fisheries exploitation can cause genetic changes in heritable traits of targeted stocks. The direction of selective pressure forced by harvest acts typically in reverse to natural selection and selects for explicit life histories, usually for younger and smaller spawners with deprived spawning potential. While the consequences that such selection might have on the population dynamics of a single species are well emphasized, we are just beginning to perceive the variety and severity of its propagating effects within the entire marine food webs and ecosystems. Here, we highlight the potential pathways in which fisheries-induced evolution, driven by size-selective fishing, might resonate throu…

A niche perspective on the range expansion of symbionts.

2020

Range expansion results from complex eco-evolutionary processes where range dynamics and niche shifts interact in a novel physical space and/or environment, with scale playing a major role. Obligate symbionts (i.e. organisms permanently living on hosts) differ from free-living organisms in that they depend on strong biotic interactions with their hosts which alter their niche and spatial dynamics. A symbiotic lifestyle modifies organism–environment relationships across levels of organisation, from individuals to geographical ranges. These changes influence how symbionts experience colonisation and, by extension, range expansion. Here, we investigate the potential implications of a symbiotic…