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Butterfly gardens are green spaces designed as places where butterflies can feed, mate, and rest. Here, we present some perspectives on the possible use of botanical gardens in natural areas as butterfly gardens to promote insect conservation through science dissemination and citizen science activities. We explored this possibility with a project developed in the Botanical Garden of the Gran Sasso and Monti della Laga National Park (Italy). We found an extremely high butterfly richness as a result of favorable conditions which can be common in botanical gardens. To promote awareness of insect conservation in the general public and citizen science activities, we have installed within the garden several posters illustrating the butterfly fauna of the park, the species that visitors can easily observe, and the importance of butterfly conservation. Using this case study, we provided reflections and guidelines for the realization and management of butterfly gardens in already existing botanical gardens, especially in natural areas. The realization of butterfly gardens in protected areas to promote awareness of insect conservation, as well as to perform scientific research (namely insect monitoring), may help to ensure that insects will exert a pivotal role in expanding the global network of protected areas under the Post-2020 Global Biodiversity Framework.

The collection of liquid biological matrices onto paper cards (dried matrix spots [DMS]) is becoming an alternative sampling strategy. The stability over time of molecules of interest for therapeutic, sport drug monitoring, and forensic toxicology on DMS has been recently investigated representing a reliable alternative to conventional analytical techniques. When a tampering of a urine sample in drug monitoring or doping control cases is suspected, it could be relevant to know whether genetic profiles useful for individual identification could be generated from urine samples spotted onto paper (dried urine spot [DUS]). To understand the influence of sex, storage conditions, and time on the quality and quantity of the DNA, five female and ten male urine samples were dispensed onto Whatman 903 paper and sampled after different storage conditions over time, from 1 to 12 weeks. Direct PCR was performed starting from 2-mm punches collected from each spot amplifying a panel of markers useful for individual identification. The female DUS stored in different conditions produced genetic profiles fully matching the reference samples. The same result was obtained for the male DUS but using urine 30X concentrated by centrifugation instead of the original samples. Our data show that this approach is valid for genetic individual identification of urine samples spotted onto paper cards up to 12 weeks after deposition and could be easily incorporated in anti-doping or drug screening protocols to help on the suspicion of evidence tampering or to solve questions on the reliability of samples collection.

Aim The aim of this study was to measure the prevalence of inadequate health literacy (HL) in a sample of family caregivers of older adults with dementia, and to assess the relationship of HL with characteristics of caregiver and persons with dementia. Methods The study followed a cross-sectional design. Persons with dementia and their family caregivers were enrolled in an outpatients’ geriatric memory clinic. For the caregivers, the following information was collected: socio-demographic data, level of HL, cognitive impairment (using the Mini-Cog). For persons with dementia, the following data were collected: socio-demographic data, functional status (using the Basic and Instrumental Activities of Daily Living), cognitive impairment (using the Mini Mental State Evaluation, and the Global Deterioration Scale) behavioral and psychological symptoms associated with dementia (assessed using the Neuropsychiatric Inventory). Results A total of 174 person with dementia/caregiver dyads were enrolled. About 45% of the caregivers presented a possibility or a high likelihood of inadequate HL. The percentage of caregivers with inadequate HL was higher among spousal caregivers than in offspring. Female gender, higher age and lower education were independent predictors of low HL. On multiple logistic regression analysis, persons with dementia assisted by caregivers with a high likelihood of limited HL presented higher risk of a more severe disease. Conclusion The results of this study suggest that the HL of dementia caregivers has to be included in the comprehensive geriatric assessment, to develop an appropriate individualized care plan. Moreover, public health interventions are needed to increase the HL of dementia caregivers.

BACKGROUND: TB caused by rifampicin-resistant (RR) and multidrug-resistant (MDR) Mycobacterium tuberculosis strains is a major concern to TB control globally. However, in the European Union, MDR-TB notifications among all bacteriologically confirmed TB cases with available drug susceptibility testing (DST) results decreased over the last years.METHODS: We conducted a retrospective analysis on DST results reported from 2011 to 2020 by 46 laboratories in 19 out of 20 regions in Italy in order to evaluate resistance trends to first- and second-line drugs in MDR/RR-TB strains isolated from Italian-born persons (IBPs) and foreign-born persons (FBPs).RESULTS: Of 23,972 M. tuberculosis strains examined (15,519 from FBPs and 8,453 from IBPs), MDR-TB decreased from 3.2% in 2011 to 2.2% in 2020. High MDR/RR-TB rates occurred mostly in FBPs from former Soviet Union countries. In 2017, a MDR/RR-TB increase was detected in FBPs from sub-Saharan Africa. MDR-TB strains showed consistent increase in resistance to pyrazinamide (PZA), slight increase in resistance to fluoroquinolones and a decrease in resistance to other drugs.CONCLUSION: While MDR/RR-TB cases slightly decreased, a worrisome increase of resistance to PZA and fluoroquinolones among MDR/RR-TB patients was seen. This implies that a fast and efficient diagnosis aligned with therapy is crucial for TB control.

Background: Fat Embolism Syndrome (FES) is a clinical condition characterized by neurological, respiratory, hematological and cutaneous manifestations. Fatal FES has been described as a rare complication during or after spinal elective surgery. The investigation of the cause of death in fatalities related with spine surgery should be mandatory to exclude or confirm fat embolism; a detailed methodological approach to the body in these cases suggests to provide a cautious dissection of surgical site and collection of samples to detect embolized fat globules in vessels. Methods: Two fatal cases of fat embolism syndrome after posterior spinal fusion are presented. Conclusions: A complete post mortem examination by means of histochemical and immunohistochemical analysis explained the cause of death and prevented medical malpractice litigation.

PCR-MPS is an emerging tool for the analysis of low-quality DNA samples. In this study, we used PCR-MPS to analyse 32 challenging bone DNA samples from three Second World War victims, which previously yielded no results in conventional STR PCR-CE typing. The Identity Panel was used with 27 cycles of PCR. Despite that we only had an average of 6.8 pg of degraded DNA as template, 30 out of 32 libraries (93.8%) produced sequencing data for about 63/90 autosomal markers per sample. Out of the 30 libraries, 14 (46.7%) yielded single source genetic profiles in agreement with the biological identity of the donor, whereas 12 cases (40.0%) resulted in SNP profiles that did not match or were mixed. The misleading outcomes for those 12 cases were likely due to hidden exogenous human contamination, as shown by the higher frequencies of allelic imbalance, unusual high frequencies of allelic drop-ins, high heterozygosity levels in the consensus profiles generated from challenging samples, and traces of amplified molecular products in four out of eight extraction negative controls. Even if the source and the time of the contamination were not identified, it is likely that it occurred along the multi-step bone processing workflow. Our results suggest that only positive identification by statistical tools (e.g. likelihood ratio) should be accepted as reliable; oppositely, the results leading to exclusion should be treated as inconclusive because of potential contamination issues. Finally, strategies are discussed for monitoring the workflow of extremely challenging bone samples in PCR-MPS experiments with an increased number of PCR cycles.

Understanding how individuals redistribute after migration assists in the conservation and management of mobile species, yet the eco-evolutionary drivers of migratory connectivity remain unclear. Taking advantage of an exceptionally large (~150,000 individuals, 83 species) and more-than-a-century long dataset of bird ringing encounters, we investigated determinants of avian migratory connectivity on both short- and long-distance migrants. Most species exhibited significant connectivity likely due to the large intraspecific variability in migration strategies, which often led to the identification of distinct migratory populations. Migratory connectivity was strongly predicted by geography, especially migration distance, but it was evolutionary labile and weakly influenced by biological traits due to flexibility in migratory behaviour. By unravelling determinants of migratory connectivity we improve knowledge about the resilience of migrants to ecological perturbations. Also, our population-level analysis provides a critical tool to inform transboundary conservation and management strategies by explicitly considering the large intraspecific variability of avian migration.

A native nested configuration of the ROMS model is implemented on the marine area between the Ligurian and Tyrrhenian basins, which includes the Tuscany Archipelago. Initial and boundary conditions are provided by the CMEMS Mediterranean Sea Physical Reanalysis product (1/16°), feeding the parent ROMS model (BLUE, 1/72°), in which a high-resolution grid is nested (PURPLE, 1/216°). Atmospheric forcing comes from a downscaled version of ERA5 reanalysis. Temperature and salinity profiles from gliders and floats, and HF-radar-derived surface currents, are compared to model outputs within the high-resolution area for the whole year 2017. Results show the downscaling procedure is able to reduce model errors for temperature profiles, whereas errors in salinity profiles remain comparable. However, the downscaled model cannot recover large errors inherited from the parent one. The mean bias largest values found in both temperature and salinity profiles may be explained by a model underestimation of the depth of stable stratification limit with respect to field data. Errors in surface currents are reduced for the downscaled dynamics and appear to be uncorrelated to the original CMEMS product, being surface dynamics less affected by initial condition than by atmospheric forcing. A simple scalar metric, to quantify the error in the surface current vector fields from observations and models, is proposed. The novel metric allows to better quantify the improvement gained by the downscaling procedure.

The lungs of tuberculosis (TB) patients contain a spectrum of granulomatous lesions ranging from solid and well vascularized cellular granulomas, to avascular caseous granulomas. In solid granulomas, current therapy kills actively replicating (AR) intracellular bacilli, while in low vascularized caseous granulomas the low oxygen tension stimulates aerobic and microaerophilic AR bacilli to transit into non-replicating (NR), drug-tolerant, extracellular stages. These stages, which do not have genetic mutations and are often referred to as persisters, are difficult to eradicate due to low drug penetration inside caseum and mycobacterial cell walls. The sputum of TB patients contains also viable bacilli called differentially detectable (DD) cells that, unlike persisters, grow in liquid, but not in solid media. This review provides a comprehensive update on drug combinations killing in vitro AR and drug-tolerant bacilli (persisters and DD cells), and sterilizing Mycobacterium tuberculosis-infected BALB/c and caseum-forming C3HeB/FeJ mice. These observations have been important for testing new drug combinations in noninferiority clinical trials, in order to shorten duration of current regimens against TB. In 2022, the World Health Organization, based on one of this trial, supported the use of a 4-month regimen for treatment of drug-susceptible TB as a possible alternative to the current 6-month regimen.

ATP-dependent chromatin remodeling complexes are involved in nucleosomes sliding, eviction and/or histone variants incorporation into chromatin to facilitate several cellular and biological processes, including DNA transcription, replication and repair. The DOM/TIP60 chromatin remodeling complex of Drosophila melanogaster contains 18 subunits, including the DOMINO (DOM), an ATPase that catalyzes the ex-change of the canonical H2A with its variant (H2A.V); and TIP60, a lysine-acetyltransferase that acetylates H4, H2A and H2A.V histones. In the last decade, different experimental evidence showed that ATP-dependent chromatin remodeling factors, in addition to their role in chromatin organization, have a functional relevance in cell division. In particular, emerging studies suggested direct roles of ATP-dependent chromatin remodeling complex subunits in controlling mitosis and cytokinesis in both humans and D. melanogaster. However, little is known about their possible involvement during meiosis Meiotic chromosomes non-disjunction led to aneuploid offspring, which are often inviable/poorly viable or sterile due to gene dosage imbalance. Therefore, studying the role of DOM/TIP60 complex in D. melanogaster meiosis can provide new insights on our understanding of the molecular mechanisms underlying cell division control in gametogenesis.

We analyze the effect of the assimilation of surface velocities from two HF-Radars (HFR) and satellite SST in an ocean circulation model covering the northwestern Mediterranean Sea.One HFR observes the area in front of Toulon (France), the other covers the area adjacent to the coast near La Spezia (Italy).The ROMS 4D-Var DA package is used to analyze a three-month period, from September to November 2020.The DA is implemented to have a sequence of 3-day assimilation windows, each followed by a 3-day forecast cycle in which the model evolves without adjustments.Boundary conditions are from the CMEMS Analysis-Forecast product and atmospheric forcing from ECMWF high resolution model (1/10 degree).The impact of the DA is quantified by comparing the analysis and forecast runs with a freerun that is unaffected by any assimilation procedure.The results show that both the analysis and the forecast perform better than the freerun considering the HFR and SST observations used in the assimilation procedure.Moreover, eulerian velocities derived from surface drifters are used as an independent dataset to further validate the quality of the DA output.Within the area covered by the HFRs, both the analysis and forecast surface velocities show greater agreement with the drifter data than the surface velocities from the freerun.However, in the rest of the domain, surface circulation improvements and deteriorations tend to balance out, and mean squared error and correlation values are comparable for analysis, forecast, and freerun.We also analyzed the impact of the observation typology and of the control vector on coastal transport for the upper 50 m at three transects.Two of them are located at the HFR areas and the other in between.Both HFR and SST data have a significant effect on surface transport increment.The HFR observations contribute to the change in the transport magnitude while the SST tends to change the velocity distribution along the transect, leaving the transport magnitude unchanged.Coastal transport is, in general, mostly affected by corrections to initial conditions in all three transects. The changes to the boundary conditions and atmospheric forcings have different importance depending on the transects analysed.

SummaryGorteria diffusahas elaborate petal spots that attract male bee-fly pollinators through sexual deception but the genetic basis ofG. diffusapetal spot development is currently unknown. Here we investigate the regulation of pigmentation during spot formation.We used UHPLC-MS/MS to determine the anthocyanin composition of spots and background pigmentation inG. diffusa. Combining gene expression analysis with protein interaction assays we characterised three R2R3-MYB genes regulating anthocyanin production inG. diffusaspots.We found that cyanidin 3-glucoside pigmentsG. diffusaray floret petals. Unlike other petal regions, spots contain a high proportion of malonylated anthocyanin. We identified three paralogous subgroup 6 R2R3-MYB transcription factors that activate the production of petal spot pigmentation. The corresponding genes are upregulated in developing spots and induce ectopic anthocyanin production upon heterologous expression in tobacco. EMSAs and dual luciferase assays suggest that these transcription factors regulate genes encoding three anthocyanin synthesis enzymes: anthocyanidin synthase (GdANS), dihydroflavonol reductase (GdDFR) and malonyl transferase (GdMAT1), accounting for the spot-specific production of malonylated pigments.Here we provide the first molecular characterisation ofG. diffusaspot development, showing that the elaboration of complex spots begins with accumulation of malonylated pigments at the base of ray floret petals, positively regulated by three subgroup 6 R2R3-MYB transcription factors.

ATP-dependent chromatin remodeling complexes are involved in nucleosomes sliding, eviction and/or histone variants incorporation into chromatin to facilitate several cellular and biological processes, including DNA transcription, replication and repair. The DOM/TIP60 chromatin remodeling complex of Drosophila melanogaster contains 18 subunits, including the DOMINO (DOM), an ATPase that catalyzes the ex-change of the canonical H2A with its variant (H2A.V); and TIP60, a lysine-acetyltransferase that acetylates H4, H2A and H2A.V histones. In the last decade, different experimental evidence showed that ATP-dependent chromatin remodeling factors, in addition to their role in chromatin organization, have a functional relevance in cell division. In particular, emerging studies suggested direct roles of ATP-dependent chromatin remodeling complex subunits in controlling mitosis and cytokinesis in both humans and D. melanogaster. However, little is known about their possible involvement during meiosis Meiotic chromosomes non-disjunction led to aneuploid offspring, which are often inviable/poorly viable or sterile due to gene dosage imbalance. Therefore, studying the role of DOM/TIP60 complex in D. melanogaster meiosis can provide new insights on our understanding of the molecular mechanisms underlying cell division control in gametogenesis.

The subsurface is among Earth’s largest biomes, but the extent to which microbial communities vary across tectonic plate boundaries or interact with subduction-scale geological processes remains unknown. Here we compare bacterial community composition with deep-subsurface geochemistry from 21 hot springs across the Costa Rican convergent margin. We find that cation and anion compositions of the springs reflect the dip angle and position of the underlying tectonic structure and also correlate with the bacterial community. Co-occurring microbial cliques related to cultured chemolithoautotrophs that use the reverse tricarboxylic acid cycle (rTCA) as well as abundances of metagenomic rTCA genes correlate with concentrations of slab-volatilized carbon. This, combined with carbon isotope evidence, suggests that fixation of slab-derived CO2 into biomass may support a chemolithoautotrophy-based subsurface ecosystem. We calculate that this forearc subsurface biosphere could sequester 1.4 × 109 to 1.4 × 1010 mol of carbon per year, which would decrease estimates of the total carbon delivered to the mantle by 2 to 22%. Based on the observed correlations, we suggest that distribution and composition of the subsurface bacterial community are probably affected by deep tectonic processes across the Costa Rican convergent margin and that, by sequestering carbon volatilized during subduction, these chemolithoautotrophic communities could in turn impact the geosphere. The subsurface biosphere across a convergent margin may reflect tectonic processes and reduce carbon transfer to the mantle, according to bacterial and geochemical correlations from hot springs across the Costa Rican margin.

New psychoactive substances (NPS) constitute a group of psychotropic substances, designed to mimic the effects of traditional substances like cannabis, cocaine, MDMA, khat, which was not regulated by the 1961 United Nations Convention on Narcotics or the 1971 United Nations Convention on Psychotropic Substances. Illegal laboratories responsible for their production regularly developed new substances and placed them on the market to replace the ones that have been banned; for this reason, during the last decade this class of substances has represented a great challenge for the public health and forensic toxicologists. The spectrum of side effects caused by the intake of these drugs of abuse is very wide since they act on different systems with various mechanisms of action. To date most studies have focused on the neurotoxic effects, very few works focus on cardiotoxicity. Specifically, both synthetic cannabinoids and synthetic cathinones appear to be involved in different cardiac events, including myocardial infarction and sudden cardiac death due to fatal arrhythmias. Synthetic cannabinoids and cathinones cardiotoxicity are mainly mediated through activation of the CB1 receptor present on cardiomyocyte and involved with reactive oxygen species production, ATP depletion and cell death. Concerns with the adrenergic over-stimulation induced by this class of substances and increasing oxidative stress are mainly reported. In this systematic review we aim to summarize the data from all the works analyzing the possible mechanisms through which synthetic cannabinoids and synthetic cathinones damage the myocardial tissue.

InArabidopsis thaliana, stomata are composed of two guard cells that control the aperture of a central pore to facilitate gas exchange between the plant and its environment, which is particularly important during photosynthesis. Although leaves are the primary photosynthetic organs of higher plants, floral organs are also photosynthetically active. In the Brassicaceae, evidence suggests that silique photosynthesis is important for optimal seed oil content. A group of transcription factors containing MADS DNA binding domains is necessary and sufficient to confer floral organ identity. Elegant models, such as the ABCE model of flower development and the floral quartet model, have been instrumental in describing the molecular mechanisms by which these floral organ identity proteins govern flower development. However, we lack a complete understanding of how the floral organ identity genes interact with the underlying leaf development program. Here, we show that the MADS domain transcription factor AGAMOUS (AG) represses stomatal development on the gynoecial valves, so that maturation of stomatal complexes coincides with fertilization. We present evidence that this regulation by AG is mediated by direct transcriptional repression of the master regulator of the stomatal lineage,MUTE, and that this interaction is conserved among the Brassicaceae. This work extends on our understanding of the mechanisms underlying floral organ formation and provides a framework to decipher the mechanisms that control floral organ photosynthesis.

Additional file 1: Table S1. Texture and chemical composition of the sand without the supplementation with Ca3(PO4)2. (DW = dry weight). Table S2. Sequence of forward and reverse primers used in Real-time RT-PCR experiments. Table S3. Mean values for ionomic analysis of root and leaf tissues of cucumber grown in the Leonard jars system under different treatments with the organic acids produced by Enterobacter 15S. Differences between means were determined by Tukey’s HSD test. Different letters within the rows indicate statistically different values (p < 0.05). Fig. S1. pH values of the growth substrate after 21 days of treatment. Values are means ± SE; n = 3. Equal letters correspond to average values that do not differ according to Tukey’s HSD test (p < 0.05).

Context. The BL Lac object 1ES 0647+250 is one of the few distant γ-ray emitting blazars detected at very high energies (VHEs; ≳100 GeV) during a non-flaring state. It was detected with the MAGIC telescopes during a period of low activity in the years 2009−2011 as well as during three flaring activities in the years 2014, 2019, and 2020, with the highest VHE flux in the last epoch. An extensive multi-instrument data set was collected as part of several coordinated observing campaigns over these years. Aims. We aim to characterise the long-term multi-band flux variability of 1ES 0647+250, as well as its broadband spectral energy distribution (SED) during four distinct activity states selected in four different epochs, in order to constrain the physical parameters of the blazar emission region under certain assumptions. Methods. We evaluated the variability and correlation of the emission in the different energy bands with the fractional variability and the Z-transformed discrete correlation function, as well as its spectral evolution in X-rays and γ rays. Owing to the controversy in the redshift measurements of 1ES 0647+250 reported in the literature, we also estimated its distance in an indirect manner through a comparison of the GeV and TeV spectra from simultaneous observations with Fermi-LAT and MAGIC during the strongest flaring activity detected to date. Moreover, we interpret the SEDs from the four distinct activity states within the framework of one-component and two-component leptonic models, proposing specific scenarios that are able to reproduce the available multi-instrument data. Results. We find significant long-term variability, especially in X-rays and VHE γ rays. Furthermore, significant (3−4σ) correlations were found between the radio, optical, and high-energy (HE) γ-ray fluxes, with the radio emission delayed by about ∼400 days with respect to the optical and γ-ray bands. The spectral analysis reveals a harder-when-brighter trend during the non-flaring state in the X-ray domain. However, no clear patterns were observed for either the enhanced states or the HE (30 MeV < E < 100 GeV) and VHE γ-ray emission of the source. The indirect estimation of the redshift yielded a value of z = 0.45 ± 0.05, which is compatible with some of the values reported in the literature. The SEDs related to the low-activity state and the three flaring states of 1ES 0647+250 can be described reasonably well with the both one-component and two-component leptonic scenarios. However, the long-term correlations indicate the need for an additional radio-producing region located about 3.6 pc downstream from the gamma-ray producing region., Astronomy & Astrophysics, 670, ISSN:0004-6361, ISSN:1432-0746

This article comments on: Ye S, Hua S, Ma T, Ma X, Chen Y, Wu L, Zhao L, Yi B, Ma C, Tu J, Shen J, Fu T, Wen J. 2022. Genetic and multi-omics analyses reveal BnaA07.PAP2In-184-317 as the key gene conferring anthocyanin-based color in Brassica napus flowers. Journal of Experimental Botany 73,6630–6645.

Several works have investigated the impact of urbanisation on carabid activity density using urban-rural gradients. Such works compared activity density recorded from green spaces located in different parts of a city and assigned to categories of increasing urban intensity, which poses two problems: (1) since the gradient is divided into categories, it is impossible to model continuous variations in biotic responses, and (2) sites representative of different urbanisation levels are not true segments of the same ecological continuum. To surpass these problems, we modelled variations in carabid activity density along an urban-rural transect within a single green space extending from the city centre of Rome to rural environments. Carabids were sampled by pitfall traps from sites distributed along the entire gradient. We used breakpoint regressions to model how (1) carabid activity density, (2) carabids/beetles ratio, (3) carabids/insects ratio and (3) carabids/arthropods ratio varied along the gradient. As already observed for various organisms in urban environments, we found that activity density of carabids and their contribution to the abundance of beetles, insects and arthropods, peaked in the middle of the gradient. This supports the intermediate disturbance hypothesis, according to which moderate urbanisation may favour diversity by increasing habitat heterogeneity.

Mountains are strongly seasonal habitats, which require special adaptations in wildlife species living on them. Population dynamics of mountain ungulates are largely determined by the availability of rich food resources to sustain lactation and weaning during summer. Increases of temperature affect plant phenology and nutritional quality. Cold-adapted plants occurring at lower elevations will shift to higher ones, if available. We predicted what could happen to populations of mountain ungulates based on how climate change could alter the distribution pattern and quality of high-elevation vegetation, using the “clover community-Apennine chamoisRupicapra pyrenaica ornata” system. From 1970 to 2014, increasing spring temperatures (2 °C) in our study area led to an earlier (25 days) onset of green-up in Alpine grasslands between 1700 and 2000 m, but not higher up. For 1970–2070, we have projected trends of juvenile winter survival of chamois, by simulating trajectories of spring temperatures and occurrence of clover, through models depicting four different scenarios. All scenarios have suggested a decline of Apennine chamois in its historical core range, during the next 50 years, from about 28% to near-extinction at about 95%. The negative consequences of climate changes presently occurring at lower elevations will shift to higher ones in the future. Their effects will vary with the species-specific ecological and behavioural flexibility of mountain ungulates, as well as with availability of climate refugia. However, global shifts in distributional ranges and local decreases or extinctions should be expected, calling for farsighted measures of adaptive management of mountain-dwelling herbivores.

1. Climate change is causing shifts in the distribution of many species and populations inhabiting mountain tops are particularly vulnerable to these threats because they are constrained in altitudinal shifts. Apennines are a relatively narrow and low mountain chain located in Southern Europe, which hosts many isolated populations of mountain species. The butterfly Erebia pandrose was recorded for the last time in the Apennines in 1977, on the top of a single massif (Monti della Laga). 2. We confirmed the presence of a small, isolated population of E. pandrose in the Apennines, at a distance of more than 400¿km to any other known populations. Then, we examined the cytochrome c oxidase subunit 1 mitochondrial DNA marker of this species across the Palaearctic area and estimated the potential decline over the Alps and the Apennines due to future climatic changes. 3. The Apennine population represents an endemic lineage characterised by eight mutations over the 658¿bp analysed (1.2%). In the Alps and Apennines, this species has shifted uphill more than 3 m per year since the end of the 19th century and more than 22 m per year since 1995. Species distribution models suggested that these mountain populations will experience a generalised loss of climatic suitability, which, according to our projections, could lead to the extinction of the Apennine population in a few decades. 4. Erebia pandrose has the potential to become a flagship species for advertising the risk of losing unique fractions of genetic diversity for mountain species., funded by the project: ‘Ricerca e conservazione sui lepidotteri diurni di sei Parchi Nazionali dell'Appennino centro-settentrionale’. Support for this research was also provided by ‘La Caixa’ Foundation (ID 100010434) to M.M. (grant LCF/BQ/DR20/11790020), by the Academy of Finland to V.D. (Academy Research Fellow, decision no. 328895) and by project PID2019-107078GB-I00/AEI/10.13039/501100011033 to R.V., 1 Introduction 2 Materials and methods 2.1 Data collection 2.2 COI analyses 2.3 Species distribution modelling 2.4 Elevational shifts of E. pandrose records through time 3 Results 3.1 COI structure 3.2 Climate change effects 4 Discussion 4.1 The population of Monte Gorzano 4.2 What is the future for E. pandrose on the Apennines? 4.3 Erebia pandrose in the context of preserving Apennine butterflies 5 Conclusions Acknowledgements Conflict of interest

The best evaluation for the proportion of defective units in a batch of fruits and vegetables can be achieved by an exhaustive checking of all the boxes in the batch, that is prohibitive to perform in most cases. Usually, only a sample of boxes is checked. In EU countries, EU regulations establish to estimate the proportion of defective units in a batch by the proportion of defective units in the sample, without giving any rule for selecting boxes. Therefore, results are highly dependent on the subjective choice of boxes. In the present study, an objective design-based approach is considered to select boxes from batches, adopting balanced spatial schemes with equal inclusion probabilities. The schemes are able to select samples of boxes evenly spread throughout the batch also ensuring good statistical properties for the proportion of defective units in the sample as estimator of the proportion of defective units in the batch. The performance of these strategies is evaluated by means of a simulation study performed on real and artificial batches of apples, peppers and strawberries. A case study is considered to estimate the proportion of defective units in a batch of courgettes stored in a distribution center of a supermarket chain in Central Italy.

The frustule of diatoms has an exceptional structure composed of inorganic and organic molecules. In the organic fraction, protein families were identified whose members are expected to have a complex cellular targeting to their final location within the frustule. Here we investigated for frustule-targeting signals two representatives of the cingulin family, the proteins CinY2 and CinW2; beside an already known, classical signal peptide, we have identified further regions involved in cellular targeting. By using these regions as a search criteria we were able to identify two new frustule proteins. In addition, we showed that the temporal regulation of the gene expression determines the final location of one cingulin. Our results therefore point to a sophisticated cellular and extracellular targeting of frustule components to build the fascinating frustule structure of a diatom.

With the regional law n. 26 of December 30, 2020, the Friuli Venezia Giulia Region wanted to promote the establishment of the Regional Register of Sudden Cardiac Death, with the aim of favoring the study of all those deaths that occurred suddenly and unexpectedly under the age of 50 years in which it is not possible to trace the cause of death with certainty. Such dramatic events, difficult to quantify considering the complexity of data collection, are often accepted with resignation without any further investigation of the possible causes. The Regional Register of Sudden Cardiac Deaths of Friuli Venezia Giulia was born from this premise and from the awareness of the importance of going back with a rigorous scientific methodology and through a multidisciplinary approach, to the diagnosis of hereditary heart diseases which, when determined, allow the enrollment of relatives in a cardiological screening process and, therefore, primary prevention of potentially fatal events. The authors describe the operating procedures feeding the Regional Register and present the results of the first year of activity on 26 cases.

In the last century, many Mediterranean coastal areas have been subjected to anthropogenic disturbances from industrial activities, uncontrolled landfills, shipyards, and high maritime traffic. The Augusta Bay (eastern Sicily, Italy) represents an example of a strongly impacted coastal environment with an elevated level of sediments contamination due to the presence of one of the largest European petrochemical plants, combined with an extensive commercial and military harbor. The most significant contaminants were represented by mercury (Hg) and hexachlorobenzene (HCB), derived from a former chlor-alkali plant, and other organic compounds like polycyclic aromatic hydrocarbons (PAHs) and polychlorobiphenyls (PCBs). Since the 1970s, Augusta Bay has become internationally recognized as a contaminated marine environment, although very little information is available regarding the temporal trend of contaminants bioavailability and biological impacts on aquatic organisms. In this study, the Hg and HCB concentrations were investigated over 10 years (from 2003 to 2013) in sediments and invertebrate and vertebrate organisms; these two contaminants' ecotoxicity was further evaluated at a biochemical and cellular level by analyzing the induction of organic biotransformation processes and DNA damages. The results showed high concentrations of Hg and HCB in sediments and their strong bioaccumulation in different species with significantly higher values than those measured in reference sites. This trend was paralleled by increased micronuclei frequency (DNA damage biomarker) and activity of the biotransformation system. While levels of chemicals in sediments remained elevated during the time course, their bioavailability and biological effects showed a gradual decrease after 2003, when the chlor-alkali plant was closed. Environmental persistence of Hg and HCB availability facilitates their bioaccumulation and affects the health status of marine organisms, with possible implications for environmental risk, pollutants transfer, and human health.

Wildfires represent an important factor in the disturbance in Mediterranean ecosystems, although the effects of wildfires on the insect communities of mountain environments remain largely unknown. This research investigated the effect of fire on dung beetles in a Mediterranean high-altitude area, located in Central Italy (1500 m elevation). Sampling in each of the three main vegetation types of the study area (conifer plantation, beechwood forest and grassland) used pitfall traps during Spring to Autumn. For each habitat, three burnt and three unburnt sites were sampled. We considered the following community structure parameters: abundance, richness, Shannon diversity and Simpson diversity. Effects of fire, habitat and sampling period were investigated using generalised mixed-effects models. Abundance, species richness and diversity were higher in the grassland than in the two forest habitats and June was the month with the lowest values because of the late emergence of insects at high altitudes. Fire negatively affected dung beetle abundance, but not diversity. Forest habitats were less favourable to dung beetle recolonisation than the secondary grassland. Thus, dung beetles are sensitive to vegetation type, but not to fire, possibly because of their high recolonisation capabilities and preference for open habitats.

In April 2015, a fishing boat that departed from Libya with about 1,000 migrants on board sank in the Mediterranean Sea. Most of the migrants were packed in the hull of the boat and drowned in the shipwreck. After fifteen months, the ship was recovered from the seabed and brought to a Sicilian naval area for forensic investigations. Skeletal remains belonging to more than 700 people were retrieved. A selected sample composed of 80 victims was considered in order to evaluate the possibility of achieving genetic profiles useful for a positive identification from these challenging specimens. The molecular features of the DNA recovered from a significant number of real casework samples exposed to seawater for long periods of time were described for the first time. Three different DNA extraction protocols and three different commercial kits were employed in order to generate genetic profiles based on the characterization of 21 autosomal STR loci. The combination of multiple DNA extractions and the cross-checking of multiple PCR amplifications with different kits allowed to obtain reliable genetic profiles characterized by at least 16 STR markers in more than 70% of the samples. The factors that could have affected the different quality of the genetic profiles were investigated and the bone preservation was examined through microscopic and macroscopic analyses. The approach presented in this study could be useful in the management of the genetic analysis of bone samples collected in other similar DVI scenarios. The genetic profiles recovered from the bone samples will be compared in kinship analysis to putative relatives of the victims collected in Africa in order to obtain positive identifications.

The peculiar morphology of the discotelic larvae of three species of Pachyteles (Coleoptera, Carabidae, Paussinae, ozaenini) collected in an Andean cloud forest in Ecuador (otonga nature Reserve, Cotopaxi) is here analyzed. All instars of Pachyteles vignai Deuve, 1999, 2nd and 3rd instars of P. digiulioi Deuve, 1999, and the 3rd instar of another undetermined Pachyteles species are described. A particular emphasis on the illustration of the aberrant larval morphology is given by using both traditional drawing techniques and macro multifocal image acquisition, combined with scanning electron microscopy (SEM) for analyzing the details. The diagnostic characters of these larvae are compared to those of the other known larvae of ozaenini.

Psoriatic arthritis is a systemic autoimmune disease, in which a characteristic heterogeneous inflammatory involvement of entheses and both peripheral and axial joints tends to be associated with different clinical features, in particular skin or nail psoriasis, but also inflammatory bowel diseases, or acute anterior uveitis. Patients with PsA are at higher risk of developing comorbidities, in particular metabolic syndrome, with a significant impact on their quality of life. Although the advanced knowledge in the pathogenetic mechanisms of PsA helped in developing an abundant therapeutical armamentarium, the available drugs might still show a suboptimal efficacy. However, the frontier of "personalised medicine" could promote further future improvement in the quality of care of patients. In this paper we reviewed the literature on PsA of 2020 and 2021 (Medline search of articles published from 1st January 2020 to 31th December 2021).

The frustule of diatoms has an exceptional structure composed of inorganic and organic molecules. In the organic fraction, protein families were identified whose members are expected to have a complex cellular targeting to their final location within the frustule. Here we investigated for frustule-targeting signals two representatives of the cingulin family, the proteins CinY2 and CinW2; beside an already known, classical signal peptide, we have identified further regions involved in cellular targeting. By using these regions as a search criteria we were able to identify two new frustule proteins. In addition, we showed that the temporal regulation of the gene expression determines the final location of one cingulin. Our results therefore point to a sophisticated cellular and extracellular targeting of frustule components to build the fascinating frustule structure of a diatom.

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The morphological, structural, and electrical properties of as-grown and annealed Ge

Carbon and other volatiles in the form of gases, fluids or mineral phases are transported from Earth's surface into the mantle at convergent margins, where the oceanic crust subducts beneath the continental crust. The efficiency of this transfer has profound implications for the nature and scale of geochemical heterogeneities in Earth's deep mantle and shallow crustal reservoirs, as well as Earth's oxidation state. However, the proportions of volatiles released from the forearc and backarc are not well constrained compared to fluxes from the volcanic arc front. Here we use helium and carbon isotope data from deeply sourced springs along two cross-arc transects to show that about 91 per cent of carbon released from the slab and mantle beneath the Costa Rican forearc is sequestered within the crust by calcite deposition. Around an additional three per cent is incorporated into the biomass through microbial chemolithoautotrophy, whereby microbes assimilate inorganic carbon into biomass. We estimate that between 1.2 × 108 and 1.3 × 1010 moles of carbon dioxide per year are released from the slab beneath the forearc, and thus up to about 19 per cent less carbon is being transferred into Earth's deep mantle than previously estimated.