Search results for "Complex"
showing 10 items of 5889 documents
Maternal effects and the stability of population dynamics in noisy environments
2001
Summary 1. It is widely appreciated that complex population dynamics are more likely in systems where there is a lag in the density dependence. The transmission of maternal environmental conditions to offspring phenotype is a potential cause of such a lag. Maternal effects are increasingly found to be common in a wide range of organisms, and might thus be a frequent cause of nonequilibrium population dynamics. 2. We show that a maternal effects’ lag generally increases population variability. This may result from the lag inducing cycles (or more complex dynamics) in a deterministic environment or, in a stochastic environment, from the lag interacting with environmental noise to produce more…
Exploring phylogeography and species limits in the Altai vole (Rodentia: Cricetidae)
2013
Natural hybridization between species is not a rare event. In arvicoline rodents, hybridization is known to occur in the wild and/or in captivity. In the Microtus arvalis group, cytogenetic studies revealed that there were two distinct chromosomal forms (2n = 46 but a different fundamental number of autosomes). These forms have been attributed to two cryptic species: the common (arvalis) and Altai (obscurus) voles. Recently, individuals with intermediate karyotypes (F1 and backcrosses) were discovered in central European Russia, and, for this reason, other studies have regarded obscurus and arvalis as conspecific. In the present study, to address the question of the species limits in the Al…
Monitoring of transglutaminase crosslinking reaction by 1H NMR spectroscopy on model substrates
2015
International audience; A new method based on 1H NMR spectroscopy was developed for monitoring transglutaminase crosslinking reaction with model molecules (CBZ-Gln-Gly and N-α-acetyl-lysine). The transglutaminase reaction led to the appearance of new resonances on NMR spectrum as well as significant decrease in others. The new observed resonances, originated from newly formed ɛ-(γ-glutamyl)lysine isopeptide bonds, evidence the enzymatic reaction and allow to quantify the ɛ-(γ-glutamyl)lysine fragment. Moreover, the decrease in resonance intensity, originated from lysine, permit to determine the crosslinking degree. These results obtained by 1H NMR spectroscopy can be used as an alternative …
Net ammonification as influenced by plant diversity in experimental grasslands
2012
Abstract Previous plant diversity experiments have mainly reported positive correlations between diversity and N mineralization. We tested whether this relationship can be explained by plant diversity-induced changes i) in the quantity or quality of organic matter or ii) in microclimatic conditions of central European grassland mixtures. We measured ex-situ net ammonification in a laboratory incubation of aboveground plant material and soil sampled in differently diverse plant mixtures. Secondly, in-situ net ammonification was assessed in a field incubation with mineralization cores containing standardized material in four treatments: soil only (control), and soil mixed with field-fresh pla…
Soil feedback on plant growth in a sub-arctic grassland as a result of repeated defoliation
2008
In the long term, defoliation of plants can be hypothesized to decrease plant carbon supply to soil decomposers and thus decrease decomposer abundance and nutrient mineralization in the soil. To test whether defoliation creates changes in soil that can feedback to plant growth, we collected soil from sub-arctic grassland plots that had been either defoliated or non-defoliated for three years and followed the growth of different plant species combinations in these soils in greenhouse conditions. Plant N acquisition and plant growth were lower in the soil collected from the defoliated field plots than in the soil collected from the non-defoliated plots. This response did not depend on the spe…
Olfactory response of two aphid parasitoids, Lysiphlebus testaceipes and Aphidius colemani, to aphid-infested plants from a distance
2004
The role of volatile stimuli in the host-searching behaviour of the two parasitoid species Lysiphlebus testaceipes Cresson and Aphidius colemani Viereck (Hymenoptera: Braconidae) was studied in relation to the host Aphis gossypii Glover (Homoptera: Aphididae) on cucumber plants, Cucumis sativa L. (Cucurbitaceae). Experiments were carried out in the laboratory in a wind tunnel, exposing individual parasitoids to signals from three sources simultaneously: (1) a complex of cucumber plants, Cucumis sativa , and A. gossypii ; (2) uninfested cucumber plants; and (3) dummy cardboard plants. The flight response of the female parasitoids was considered oriented when they landed on plants and non-ori…
Plant diversity effects on aboveground and belowground N pools in temperate grassland ecosystems: Development in the first 5 years after establishment
2011
[1] Biodiversity is expected to improve ecosystem services, e.g., productivity or seepage water quality. The current view of plant diversity effects on element cycling is based on short-term grassland studies that discount possibly slow belowground feedbacks to aboveground diversity. Furthermore, these grasslands were established on formerly arable land associated with changes in soil properties, e.g., accumulation of organic matter. We hypothesize that the plant diversity-N cycle relationship changes with time since establishment. We assessed the relationship between plant diversity and (1) aboveground and soil N storage and (2) NO3-N and NH4-N availability in soil between 2003 and 2007 in…
Stability Studies of Bioactive Compounds from Birch Outer Bark Ethanolic Extracts
2018
The literature survey summarizes information about birch outer bark phytochemical composition and details major components: betulin, betulinic acid, lupeol and ursolic acid. In the practical part of research birch outer bark major component stability against chemical and physical degradation was tested; total phenolic content and the antiradical activity of the degraded and nondegraded ethanolic extracts was studied using UV/VIS spectroscopy; the phytochemical composition of the birch outer bark ethanolic extract was investigated by HPLC-TOF/MS. The study of stability experiments has been carried out, which found that birch outer bark ethanolic extract compounds can be exposed to thermal an…
Does plant diversity influence phosphorus cycling in experimental grasslands?
2011
Plant diversity was shown to influence the N cycle, but plant diversity effects on other nutrients remain unclear. We tested whether plant species richness or the presence/absence of particular functional plant groups influences P partitioning among differently extractable pools in soil, P concentrations in soil solution, and exploitation of P resources (i.e. the proportion of total bioavailable P in plants and soil that was stored in aboveground biomass) by the plant community in a 5-year biodiversity experiment in grassland.The experimental grassland site established in 2002 had 82 plots with different combinations of numbers of species (1, 2, 4, 8, 16, 60) and functional groups (grasses,…
Meiofauna associated with vermetid reefs: the role of macroalgae in increasing habitat size and complexity
2018
We present the first dataset of meiofauna associated with vermetid reefs (biogenic constructions of Mediterranean intertidal habitat) in two areas along the northern coast of Sicily, Italy. The vermetid reefs are characterized by a horizontal extension from the shore towards the open sea and can be divided into three zones (the inner margin, the cuvette zone and the outer margin) which differ in hydrodynamic features. We studied the spatial distribution of meiofauna along the horizontal axis of the vermetid reefs, investigating the communities inhabiting the sediment inside cuvettes (shallow pools inside the “cuvette zone”) located between the inner and the outer margins of the reefs. We ob…