Search results for "MAMMALS"

Studio sull’origine e l’evoluzione del cromosoma 4 dell’uomo mediante la citogenetica molecolare comparata

2011

A new small mammal assemblage from the Pirro 12 “Terre Rosse” fissure filling (Gargano, Southeastern Italy).

2011

The Pirro 12 fissure filling has been discovered and sampled by a team of the University of Torino during the 2005 field survey in the Dell’Erba Quarry (Apricena, Foggia). The occurrence of a very small Deinogalerix and of a very simple Mikrotia supported, at a first glance, the very old position of Pirro 12 in the biochronological succession of endemic faunal settlements of Gargano (Villier, 2011). In this communication the preliminary result of taxonomic studies of the small mammal assemblage of the Pirro 12 filling is presented. The Gliridae is by far the most common family in this site. Two species of the endemic genus Stertomys have been identified: the small-sized Stertomys cf simplex…

Extinction of selected micromammal taxa during the Middle Pleistocene of Europe.

2014

The small mammals (insectivores, bats and rodents) from the Holocene site of Vallone Inferno (Scillato, Sicily)

2013

The Vallone Inferno rock-shelter is an archeological site located at 770 m a.s.l. in the Madonie massif in Sicily. This massif is modeled into the Triassic and Oligocene sedimentary rocks of the Imerese Basin. Thearchaeological excavations conducted since 2008 have provided a long prehistoric and historic sequence from the Neolithic to the medieval period. From the four sedimentary complexes identified, only levels 3.4 to 3.1 from complex 3 and 4.2 from complex 4 have yielded small-mammal material. Level 4.2 is poor in remains and as yet without cultural ascription, though it has a radiocarbon age of 9450±50 years BP. Level 3.4 has yielded fragments of ceramic characteristic of the Middle N…

The nucleotide and deduced amino acid structures of sheep and pig fetuin. Common structural features of the mammalian fetuin family

1992

This study was initiated to gain further insight into the structural features of the mammalian fetuin family. The cDNA structures of sheep and pig fetuin were determined. The cDNA insert encoding sheep (pig) fetuin comprised 1550 (1470) nucleotides, including 54 (46) nucleotides encoding a signal peptide of 18 (15) residues and 1038 (1041) nucleotides encoding the 346 (347) amino acids of the mature plasma protein. The predicted amino-terminal sequence of the mature pig fetuin was confirmed by the amino-terminal sequence of the purified protein. However, two alternative sheep amino-terminal sequences were found in fetuin purified from the plasma of a single sheep fetus; the minor product wa…

A preliminary quantitative taxonomic evaluation of the Pliocene and Pleistocene small mammal record in the Italian Peninsula.

2004

Novel approach to study the perception of animacy in dogs.

2017

Humans tend to perceive inanimate objects as animate based on simple motion cues. So far this perceptual bias has been studied mostly in humans by utilizing two-dimensional video and interactive displays. Considering its importance for survival, the perception of animacy is probably also widespread among animals, however two-dimensional displays are not necessarily the best approach to study the phenomenon in non-human species. Here we applied a novel method to study whether dogs recognize a dependent (chasing-like) movement pattern performed by inanimate agents in live demonstration. We found that dogs showed more interest toward the agents that demonstrated the chasing-like motion, compar…

Reservoir computing model of prefrontal cortex creates novel combinations of previous navigation sequences from hippocampal place-cell replay with sp…

2019

As rats learn to search for multiple sources of food or water in a complex environment, they generate increasingly efficient trajectories between reward sites. Such spatial navigation capacity involves the replay of hippocampal place-cells during awake states, generating small sequences of spatially related place-cell activity that we call “snippets”. These snippets occur primarily during sharp-wave-ripples (SWRs). Here we focus on the role of such replay events, as the animal is learning a traveling salesperson task (TSP) across multiple trials. We hypothesize that snippet replay generates synthetic data that can substantially expand and restructure the experience available and make learni…

Where Does Nε-Trimethyllysine for the Carnitine Biosynthesis in Mammals Come from?

2014

N(ε)-trimethyllysine (TML) is a non-protein amino acid which takes part in the biosynthesis of carnitine. In mammals, the breakdown of endogenous proteins containing TML residues is recognized as starting point for the carnitine biosynthesis. Here, we document that one of the main sources of TML could be the vegetables which represent an important part of daily alimentation for most mammals. A HPLC-ESI-MS/MS method, which we previously developed for the analysis of N(G)-methylarginines, was utilized to quantitate TML in numerous vegetables. We report that TML, believed to be rather rare in plants as free amino acid, is, instead, ubiquitous in them and at not negligible levels. The occurrenc…

La utilización de marfil de cachalote en el Calcolítico de Portugal

2013

Scientific analysis were undertaken within a research project concerning ivory objects from the Chalcolithic to Early Bronze Age of the Iberian Peninsula. In several of the analyses of objects from Portuguese Estremadura, especially V-perforated buttons, we could detect for the first time the presence of sperm whale ivory. This highlights the advantage and necessity of scientific analysis of ivory. It also clearly demonstrates that not all ivory used was ivory from African or Asian elephants, but we also did find ivory from the extinct Elephas antiquus, the hippopotamus and in this case sperm-whale. Thus, already in the Chalcolithic the raw material provenience was highly diverse, which in …