A comparison of the gross gastrointestinal morphology of genetically-similar tammar wallabies (Macropus eugenii) from different nutritional environments

2004 ◽  
Vol 52 (4) ◽  
pp. 437 ◽  
Author(s):  
R. G. Lentle ◽  
K. J. Stafford ◽  
I. D. Hume

The gross morphology of the body and gastrointestinal tract of genetically-similar tammar wallabies (Macropus eugenii) that had been introduced into two different nutritional environments on the North Island of New Zealand were compared using multivariate analysis. Tammar wallabies from Kawau Island had significantly lower body mass per unit body length than those from the Rotorua district where food was more abundant. Furthermore, wallabies from Kawau Island had longer small intestines and caecae relative to other gut regions than did those from the Rotorua district. This suggests that poor-quality food might reduce the efficiency of primary fermentation in the forestomach; similarly, the efficiency of digestion and absorption in the small intestine might be reduced. In addition, poor-quality food might promote secondary fermentation in the hindgut of grazing tammar wallabies.

2006 ◽  
Vol 54 (4) ◽  
pp. 287 ◽  
Author(s):  
Adam J. Munn ◽  
Peter Banks ◽  
Ian D. Hume

We investigated the effects of a ground, pelleted diet versus natural forage on the gross morphology of the gastrointestinal tract of a medium-sized (5–7 kg body mass) macropodid marsupial, the tammar wallaby (Macropus eugenii). The empty wet mass (g) of the small intestine of tammar wallabies maintained on a pelleted diet for 6 weeks was 22% greater than that of animals maintained on natural forage, once body mass was taken into account by ANCOVA. Similarly, the body-mass-adjusted length of the tammar wallaby caecum and proximal colon combined was 25% longer in animals maintained on the pelleted diet compared with those maintained on forage. Our data suggest that food particle size may be directly involved in controlling the size of the post-gastric alimentary tract in tammar wallabies, and thus in their diet choice and nutritional ecology. Notably, this is the first study that links phenotypic plasticity of the gut directly to diet in a marsupial and we conclude that the tammar wallaby is an excellent model for exploring the causes and consequences of digestive plasticity in macropodid marsupials.


1984 ◽  
Vol 16 (3-4) ◽  
pp. 477-484
Author(s):  
H L Wakeling

The paper reviews various methods of flood control in the lower Yare Basin which has been subject to serious flooding caused by storm surges in the North Sea and by fluvial floods. This area is known as the Broads and is an area of scenic beauty, includes many sites of scientific interest and is a popular tourist area. The effects of the different flood control options on the environment are discussed. The primary economic justification for flood prevention was found to arise from the conversion of poor quality marsh grazing land to arable or improved pasture once the risk of saline flooding was removed. The consequences of this change in land use on the flora and fauna have aroused much concern among environmentalists.


Pathogens ◽  
2021 ◽  
Vol 10 (7) ◽  
pp. 853
Author(s):  
Jacek Karamon ◽  
Małgorzata Samorek-Pieróg ◽  
Jacek Sroka ◽  
Ewa Bilska-Zając ◽  
Joanna Dąbrowska ◽  
...  

The aim of this study is to confirm the presence and molecular identification of Echinococcus tapeworms in wolves from south-eastern Poland. An investigation was carried out on the intestines of 13 wolves from south-eastern Poland. The small intestines were divided into three equal segments. Each segment was separately examined using the sedimentation and counting technique (SCT). The detected Echinococcus tapeworms were isolated and identified by PCRs and sequencing (nad1 and cox1 genes). Additionally, DNA isolated from the feces of wolves positive for Echinococcus tapeworms was examined with two diagnostic PCRs. The intestines of one wolf were positive for E. granulosus s.l. when assessed by SCT; the intestine was from a six-year-old male wolf killed in a communication accident. We detected 61 adult tapeworms: 42 in the anterior, 14 in the middle, and 5 in the posterior parts of the small intestine. The PCRs conducted for cox1 and nad1 produced specific products. A sequence comparison with the GenBank database showed similarity to the deposited E. ortleppi (G5) sequences. An analysis of the available phylogenetic sequences showed very little variation within the species of E. ortleppi (G5), and identity ranged from 99.10% to 100.00% in the case of cox1 and from 99.04 to 100.00% in the case of nad1. One of the two diagnostic PCRs used and performed on the feces of Echinococcus-positive animals showed product specific for E. granulosus. This study showed the presence of adult E. ortleppi tapeworms in wolves for the first time.


Nutrients ◽  
2019 ◽  
Vol 11 (9) ◽  
pp. 2147 ◽  
Author(s):  
Michele Dei Cas ◽  
Riccardo Ghidoni

The yellow pigment curcumin, extracted from turmeric, is a renowned polyphenol with a broad spectrum of health properties such as antioxidant, anti-inflammatory, anti-cancer, antidiabetic, hepatoprotective, anti-allergic, anti-dermatophyte, and neuroprotective. However, these properties are followed by a poor pharmacokinetic profile which compromises its therapeutic potential. The association of low absorption by the small intestine and the extensive reductive and conjugative metabolism in the liver dramatically weakens the oral bioavailability. Several strategies such as inhibition of curcumin metabolism with adjuvants as well as novel solid and liquid oral delivery systems have been tried to counteract curcumin poor absorption and rapid elimination from the body. Some of these drug deliveries can successfully enhance the solubility, extending the residence in plasma, improving the pharmacokinetic profile and the cellular uptake.


2021 ◽  
pp. 1-9
Author(s):  
Jie Zhang ◽  
Ping Ye ◽  
Lizheng Zhang ◽  
Hongliu Wu ◽  
Tianxi Chi ◽  
...  

BACKGROUND: The treatment of adolescent patients with distal femoral cancer has always been a concern. The limb-salvage, regarded as a mainstream treatment, had been developed in recent years, but its application in children still remains challenging. This is because it can lead to potential limb-length discrepancy from the continued normal growth of the contralateral lower body. The extendable prosthesis could solve this problem. The principle is that it can artificially control the length of the prosthesis, making it consistent with the length of the side of the lower limbs. However, this prosthesis has some complications. The extendable prosthesis is classified into invasive and minimally invasive, which extends the prosthesis with each operation. OBJECTIVE: We designed a new non-invasive prosthesis that can be extended in the body. Based on the non-invasive and extendable characteristics, we need to verify the supporting performance of this prosthesis. METHODS: We carried out a mechanical testing method and finite element analysis simulation. CONCLUSION: The support performance and non-invasively extension of this prosthesis were verified.


Author(s):  
G. Tita ◽  
M. Vincx ◽  
G. Desrosiers

Nematode species from three intertidal assemblages (St Lawrence Estuary, Quebec, Canada) were studied in order to form an ecological interpretation of three allometric attributes: body width, size spectra, and morphotypes. The three assemblages were characterized by a very similar sediment grain median (Md) but different silt–clay proportions: A1 (upper-tidal level; Md=122 μm; silt=34.8%), A3 (mid-tidal level; Md=182 μm; silt=12.8%), and A5 (lower-tidal level; Md=122 μm; silt=6.8%). Silt–clay proportions were an influential factor in determining the mean nematode body width, used as a morphological discriminant between burrowing and interstitial organisms. A plot of the number of species vs the body width-classes showed two peaks: between 19.3 and 22.6 μm (interstitial), and between 32.0 and 45.5 μm (burrowers). As for the size spectra, in sandy sediments the mean nematode individual biomass was smaller than in muddy sediments. As a consequence, the estimated mean individual respiration rate was greater in muddy (A1=2.26 nl O2 h−1) than sandy sediments (A3=1.25 nl O2 h−1; A5=1.12 nl O2 h−1). In contrast, estimated metabolic ratios were lower in A1 (2.78 nl O2 h−1 μg−1 dry weight, DW) than in A3 (2.95 nl O2 h−1 μg−1 DW) and A5 (3.01 nl O2 h−1 μg−1 DW) suggesting different productivity and/or physiological adaptations to different lifestyles (burrowing vs interstitial) between species inhabiting muddy or sandy sediments. Morphotypes (body width/body length ratio=w/l ratio) were found to be associated with feeding groups. Small w/l ratios were typical of microvores, while greater ratios were typical of epigrowth feeders and predators. Ciliate-feeders, deposit-feeders and facultative predators had intermediate ratios. A morphotype food-related hypothesis is proposed: the species morphotype reflects the quality of exploited food; a small w/l ratio (i.e. long gut) would favour digestive efficiency and would be an adaptation to low quality food (microvores); inversely, a greater w/l ratio (i.e. short gut) would be an adaptation to high quality food (epigrowth-feeders and predators).


1987 ◽  
Vol 24 (6) ◽  
pp. 1086-1097 ◽  
Author(s):  
Mel R. Stauffer ◽  
Don J. Gendzwill

Fractures in Late Cretaceous to Late Pleistocene sediments in Saskatchewan, eastern Montana, and western North Dakota form two vertical, orthogonal sets trending northeast–southwest and northwest–southeast. The pattern is consistent, regardless of rock type or age (except for concretionary sandstone). Both sets appear to be extensional in origin and are similar in character to joints in Alberta. Modem stream valleys also trend in the same two dominant directions and may be controlled by the underlying fractures.Elevation variations on the sub-Mannville (Early Cretaceous) unconformity form a rectilinear pattern also parallel to the fracture sets, suggesting that fracturing was initiated at least as early as Late Jurassic. It may have begun earlier, but there are insufficient data at present to extend the time of initiation.We interpret the fractures as the result of vertical uplift together with plate motion: the westward drift of North America. The northeast–southwest-directed maximum principal horizontal stress of the midcontinent stress field is generated by viscous drag effects between the North American plate and the mantle. Vertical uplift, erosion, or both together produce a horizontal tensile state in near-surface materials, and with the addition of a directed horizontal stress through plate motion, vertical tension cracks are generated parallel to that horizontal stress (northeast–southwest). Nearly instantaneous elastic rebound results in the production of second-order joints (northwest–southeast) perpendicular to the first. In this manner, the body of rock is being subjected with time to complex alternation of northeast–southwest and northwest–southeast horizontal stresses, resulting in the continuous and contemporaneous production of two perpendicular extensional joint sets.


1972 ◽  
Vol 21 (3) ◽  
pp. 204-210 ◽  
Author(s):  
Ch. Susanne

SummaryThe results are presented of a method of generalized distances calculated by a noncentral χ2 test and applied to compare 63 twin pairs and 196 sib pairs. The advantage of this method in biometrical analysis lies in the fact that several measurements can be utilised simultaneously. Besides, it takes into account the distance of each relative to the centre of the population and also has the advantage of permitting the comparison of distances between pairs of relatives whatever their age or sex.Generalized distances were calculated for four measurements of the head, five of the body and eleven of the face. For all three sets of measurements the influence of genetical factors was demonstrated. The body seems less influenced by environmental factors and more conditioned by genetic ones.


1971 ◽  
Vol 36 (2) ◽  
pp. 170-182 ◽  
Author(s):  
David A. Breternitz ◽  
Alan C. Swedlund ◽  
Duane C. Anderson

AbstractAn isolated burial was excavated from the bank of a tributary of Gordon Creek, Roosevelt National Forest, northern Colorado. A preliminary report was prepared (D. Anderson 1966, 1967) but further analysis of the skeletal material and newly obtained cultural information add significantly to the documentation of the burial.The body of a woman, aged 25-30 years, was given primary interment in a pit coated with red ocher. The body was placed on its left side with the head to the north, was tightly flexed, and was also coated with red ocher. Burial accompaniments include a large precussion flaked biface or preform, a small biface used as a scraping tool, a hammerstone, an end scraper, a preform with fire pocks, cut and incised animal ribs, and a perforated elk incisor. A radiocarbon assay of bone material from the left ilium produced an age of 9700± 250 radiocarbon years: 7750 B.C. (GX-0530).No indications of habitation which might be associated with the burial were located in its immediate vicinity.A reconstruction of the burial ritual is attempted, and the skeletal remains are compared to other early human remains from North America.A summary of this paper was given at the 34th Annual Meeting of the Society for American Archaeology, May 3, 1969, in Milwaukee, Wisconsin.


2021 ◽  
Author(s):  
◽  
Evgeniya Kryssova

<p>The press was at the centre of the reform of the meaning of insanity, during its evolution from an equivocal eighteenth-century concept of melancholia to a medicalised Victorian notion of ‘lunacy’. During the late Georgian era newspapers provided a public forum for the opinion of newly emerging psychiatric practitioners and fostered the fears and concerns about mental illness and its supposed increase. The press was also the main source of news on crime, providing readers with reports on criminal insanity and suicide. In the first half of the nineteenth century, newspaper contents included official legal reports, as well as editorial commentary and excerpts from other publications, and newspaper articles can rarely be traced to one single author. Historians of British insanity avoid consulting periodical literature, choosing to use asylum records and coroners’ reports, as these sources are more straightforward than newspapers. However, Rab Houston’s recent study of the coverage of suicide in the north of Britain shows that the provincial press has been unjustly overlooked and can offer the material for a unique social analysis. Asylum records and coroners’ records do not contain the same detail provided in the press. Newspaper commentary can arguably reveal contemporary attitudes towards insanity and, moreover, sources such as asylum records only deal with the lower-class patients, as the middle- and upper-class insane were usually privately detained.  This thesis examines the press coverage of insanity in Leeds newspapers, and expands on previous research by looking at the way insanity was portrayed in the two most popular publications in the industrial region of Yorkshire: the Leeds Intelligencer and the Leeds Mercury. Chapter one focuses on legal cases that featured a verdict of insanity and explores the language used by the press in the reports of, mainly, violent domestic crime. Chapter two looks at reports of suicide and considers how contemporary views on financial and moral despondency influenced the portrayal of self-murder. Chapter three considers editorial articles that cannot be described as either crime or suicide reports. This chapter uncovers the presence of surprisingly humorous and entertaining articles on insanity found in editorials and the ‘Miscellany’ sections of the newspapers. Ultimately, this thesis argues that the reportage of insanity in the Leeds press was sensational, moralistic and selectively sympathetic; furthermore, such portrayal of insanity was reinforced throughout the body of the paper. Leeds newspapers segregated the insane by adopting a moralising tone and by choosing to use class-specific language towards the insane of different social ranks.</p>


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