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Human development has been studied for over a century, but the molecular mechanisms underlying human embryogenesis remain largely unknown due to technical difficulties and ethical issues. Accordingly, mice have been used as a model for mammalian development and studied extensively to infer human biology based on the conservation of fundamental processes between the two species. As research has progressed, however, species-specific differences in characteristics between rodents and primates have become apparent. Non-human primates (NHPs) have also been used for biomedical research, and are now attracting attention as a model for human development. Here, we summarize primate species from the evolutionary and genomic points of view. Then we review the current issues and progress in gene modification technology for NHPs. Finally, we discuss recent studies on the early embryogenesis of primates and future perspectives., In this article, Nakamura, Tsukiyama, and colleagues summarize primate species from an evolutionary and genomic point of view, and review the current issues and progress in gene modification technology for non-human primates. They also discuss recent studies of the early embryogenesis of primates and future perspectives.

Several animal species have demonstrated same/different concept learning. In the case of the pigeon, that concept has been investigated through multiple distinct methodologies. These approaches to same/different learning have each been evaluated thoroughly for their support of concept transfer and the nature of their controlling features. This now extensive literature has the distinct limitation that the breadth of same/different concept learning has not been compared by looking at transfer between these methodologies. Towards this end of examining the general abstractness of same/different concepts, we discuss several methods for exploring relationships between the same/different concepts from these diverse paradigms and the possible existence of modality-independent same/different representations.

Humans and great apes are highly social species, and encounter conspecifics throughout their daily lives. During social interactions, they exchange information about their emotional states via expressions through different modalities including the face, body and voice. In this regard, their capacity to express emotions, intentionally or unintentionally, is crucial for them to successfully navigate their social worlds and to bond with group members. Darwin (1872) stressed similarities in how humans and other animals express their emotions, particularly with the great apes. Here, we show that emotional expressions have many conserved, yet also a number of divergent features. Some theorists consider emotional expressions as direct expressions of internal states, implying that they are involuntary, cannot be controlled and are inherently honest. Others see them as more intentional and/ or as indicators of the actor's future behavior. After reviewing the human and ape literature, we establish an integrative, evolutionary perspective and provide evidence showing that these different viewpoints are not mutually exclusive. Recent insights indicate that, in both apes and humans, some emotional expressions can be controlled or regulated voluntarily, including in the presence of audiences, suggesting modulation by cognitive processes. However, even non-intentional expressions such as pupil dilation can nevertheless inform others and influence future behavior. In sum, while showing deep evolutionary homologies across closely related species, emotional expressions show relevant species variation.

Over two decades of research have produced compelling evidence that non-human primates understand some psychological states in other individuals but are unable to represent others' beliefs. Recently, three studies employing anticipatory looking (AL) paradigms reported that non-human primates do show hints of implicitly understanding the beliefs of others. However, measures of AL have been increasingly scrutinized in the human literature owing to extensive replication problems. We argue that new reports of belief representation in non-human primates using AL should be interpreted cautiously because of methodological and theoretical challenges paralleling trends in the human literature. We explore how future work can address these challenges, and conclude by identifying new evolutionary questions raised by the prospect that non-human primates implicitly represent others' beliefs without an explicit belief representation system that guides fitness-relevant behavior.

Parasites in the genus Cryptosporidium, phylum Apicomplexa, are found worldwide in the intestinal tract of many vertebrate species and in the environment. Driven by sensitive PCR methods, and the availability of abundant sequence data and reference genomes, the taxonomic complexity of the genus has steadily increased; 38 species have been named to date. Due to its public health importance, Cryptosporidium hominis has long attracted the interest of the research community. This species was initially described as infectious to humans only. This perception has persisted in spite of an increasing number of observations of natural and experimental infections of animals with this species. Here we summarize and discuss this literature published since 2000 and conclude that the host range of C. hominis is broader than originally described. The evolving definition of the C. hominis host range raises interesting questions about host specificity and the evolution of Cryptosporidium parasites. Except as noted, this research was not supported by any specific grant from funding agencies in the public, commercial, or not-for-profit sectors. G.W.acknowledges financial support from the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases, USA (grant R21 5R21AI125891 Sí

International audience; We review and analyze evidence for an evolutionary rooting of human economic behaviors and organization in non-human primates. Rather than focusing on the direct application of economic models that a priori account for animal decision behavior, we adopt an inductive definition of economic behavior in terms of the contribution of individual cognitive capacities to the provision of resources within an exchange structure. We spell out to what extent non-human primates’ individual and strategic decision behaviors are shared with humans. We focus on the ability to trade, through barter or token-mediated exchanges, as a landmark of an economic system among members of the same species. It is an open question why only humans have reached a high level of economic sophistication. While primates have many of the necessary cognitive abilities (symbolic and computational) in isolation, one plausible issue we identify is the limits in exerting cognitive control to combine several sources of information. The difference between human and non-human primates’ economies might well then be in degree rather than kind.

Reciprocity is a ubiquitous and important human trait. Still, the evolutionary origin is largely unclear, partly because it is believed that our closest living relatives, other primates, do not reciprocate help. Consequently, reciprocity is suggested to have evolved in the human linage only. However, our systematic review of studies investigating reciprocity in non-human primates revealed that, contrary to common perception, there are more positive than negative findings in both experimental and observational studies. Furthermore, we argue that negative findings can provide important insights. We found that reciprocity is not confined to unrelated individuals. In addition, reciprocity can be influenced by the choice of experimental design, relationship quality, social services and temporal scales. Thus, negative findings should not be used as evidence of no reciprocity but as the building blocks for a more comprehensive theory. Based on our review, we conclude that reciprocity in primates is present but underestimated. We close by suggesting further steps that could pave the way for future research aimed at understanding the evolutionary origins of reciprocity.

This paper presents the content analysis of 123 tourism policies, from 73 countries, at the national and sub-national level. Specifically, we examined the policies for evidence of growing awareness of and concern for the impacts of tourism development and activities on non-human animals. The analysis reveals that tourism policy has been evolving over time, particularly as it relates to the depth and breadth of issues addressed. Policies that were mostly focused on economics in the 1990s have evolved to now include a broader range of topics related to the welfare of social and natural environments, including concern for the welfare of animals. However, we temper this positive finding by suggesting that until animals are considered a stakeholder in the tourism industry, their rights to exist and thrive will be considered only as it relates to their ability to enhance the attractiveness of and economic potential of a destination.

Non-human beings need to be protected under special provinces. Their right to life, dignity and freedom should be fundamentally provided to them. The trend in India and predominantly in the world can be seen that the concept of non-human revolves around very few certain animals. A clear and broad distinction between non-human beings and other animals needs to be instilled. Recognition of non-humans without set procedure will result in friction between judiciary and law making. As non-humans contain intrinsic value, there is a need for recognition and protection of them. Since they cannot represent themselves or their rights, it is our duty to recognize and protect their rights, and provide them with appropriate compensation in cases of abuse.

Although mice have been the most frequently used experimental animals in many research fields due to well-established gene manipulation techniques, recent evidence has revealed that rodent models do not always recapitulate pathophysiology of human neurological and psychiatric diseases due to the differences between humans and rodents. The recent developments in gene manipulation of non-human primate have been attracting much attention in the biomedical research field, because non-human primates have more applicable brain structure and function than rodents. In this review, we summarize recent progress on genetically-modified non-human primates including transgenic and knockout animals using genome editing technology.

I discuss overflows of several introduced vertebrate species in Australia and critically explore their construction as national pests – overflows - appropriate for management by lethal control. I outline the thanato-politics and thanato-economics of managing selected non-human animals by toxic baiting and/or viral infection in ecologies of toxicity and the trophic cascades which may ensue. Drawing on Foucault and Deleuze, I explore creative potentialities for conservation managers of thinking in terms of milieu and environnementalite; exploration of the conditions of possibility for non-human animals to live in their milieus, considering relationalities with elements such as habitat fragmentation, fire regimes, pesticide use and so on. This could form a biopolitics which relocates biopower to within the subject rather than a thanato-politics of overflow, surplus and death.

We review the literature surrounding the phylogenetic and developmental emergence of goal-oriented behavior, among human and non-human primates. We define goal-oriented awareness as the ability to perceive goals and perceptions in others. We examine empirical literature involving gaze-following, shared attention, distinguishing between actions and intentions, and the ability to generate and understand communicative cues. We conclude that at least a rudimentary awareness of goal-oriented behavior is present from birth in humans, and in adult great apes. The evidence in other primate species shows phylogenetic differences as well as gaps in the empirical literature.

Non-human primates (NHPs) are included within safety testing programmes for potential new medicines when justified as the relevant species for use. Although the NHP is often the only relevant species for the testing of large molecule biotherapeutics, a proportion of small molecule compounds may also require testing in NHPs, when other non-rodent species are unsuitable. Whilst the toxicology studies continue to be required for regulatory submissions, there are opportunities to both reduce the number of animals and refine procedures used within the studies, by implementation of best practice study designs and processes identified by NC3Rs-industry data sharing projects. With the rapid expansion of biotherapeutics within the industry expected to continue or increase, the number of compounds within company pipelines, and hence the number of NHPs used for testing, are likewise anticipated to grow. A wider acceptance and adoption of established 3Rs approaches should continue to minimise the use of NHPs whilst maximising the potential these new therapies bring to improve human health.

Summary We can now track the position of every fly's leg or immerse a tiny fish inside a virtual world by monitoring its gaze in real time. Yet capturing animals' posture or gaze is not like understanding their behavior. Instead, behaviors are still often interpreted by human observers in an anthropomorphic manner. Even newer tools that automatically classify behaviors rely on human observers for the choice of behaviors. In this perspective, we suggest a roadmap toward a "human-free" interpretation of behavior. We present several recent advances, including our recent work on animal personalities. Personality both underlies behavioral differences among individuals and is consistent over time. A mathematical formulation of this idea has allowed us to measure mouse traits objectively, map behaviors across species (humans included), and explore the biological basis of behavior. Our goal is to enable “machine translation” of raw movement data into intelligible human concepts en route to improving our understanding of animals and people., The bigger picture Being able to track the intricate movements of a spider, a cat, or any other animal does not mean we understand its behavior. Behaviors should be studied from the animal's perspective, yet for now, we can offer only our own anthropocentric interpretations. Trying to understand animals is like trying to do machine translation of a new language when we do not even know what letters make up the words; however, we do have some clues. For example, adjacent movements or movement patterns with similar outcomes are probably more related than others. A different approach is to focus on animal personalities. Personality drives behavior, and it was recently shown to be a property that can be automatically and objectively measured. Moreover, as a mediator between genes and behavior, personality is more straightforward to translate between species. New ways of interpreting behavior will improve our ability to understand animals, but potentially also change how we study and practice human psychology., The Babel fish is a small yellow thing that, once stuck in your ear, can instantly translate anything said to you in any form of language (according to Douglas Adams). But what if we could translate animals' movements, postures, and signals into intelligible concepts? By better tracking and new computational approaches, we are getting there. We started with animal personality as underlying behavior. Still, we expect to improve our understanding of animal behavior, but also change how we understand our own species.

Indigenous peoples of the Andes have shared their territories with a variety of animated and sacred non-human entities, with whom they have maintained complex interactions. Because these entities are providers of the vital elements that human communities need to guarantee their survival and reproduction, people must treat them with respect and affection. This entails reattributing with rituals, offerings, and attention, the goods and materials these entities supply them. Denial and neglect make these entities sad and angry, and willing to harm people in different ways. In this paper, we discuss how Diaguita-Kallchaki communities from the North Calchaqui Valley (Argentina) interacted with the sacred high-altitude territory of Nevado de Cachi during pre-Hispanic times, with the wak’as that dwelled in it, and how this interaction was completely transformed once the Inkas conquered and settled in the region around CE 1400/1450. We show that the Inkas not only reorganized pilgrimage and ritual activities in this area, but they also intentionally marked their presence in order to represent themselves as superior entities capable of dealing, without risk, with non-human forces.

Non-human primates demonstrate food preferences much like humans. We have little insight, however, into how those preferences impact oral processing in primates. To begin describing this relationship, we conducted a preliminary analysis measuring food preference in two tufted capuchins (Cebus apella) and comparing ranked preference to physiological variables during chewing of these foods. Food preference was assessed for each monkey across 12 foods, including monkey biscuits and 11 foods consumed by humans (e.g., various fruits and nuts). Animals chose from randomized pairs of foods to generate a ranked scale across the 12 foods. Contemporaneous with preference testing, electromyographic (EMG) activity was measured for the jaw-closing muscles to assess oral physiology during chewing of these foods. As expected, these capuchins exhibited clear preferences among these 12 foods. Based on their preferences, we identified sets of preferred and non-preferred brittle (i.e., almond versus monkey chow) and ductile (i.e., dates and prunes versus apricots) foods for physiological comparisons that broadly control variation in food mechanical properties (FMPs). As expected, oral physiology varied with FMPs in each animal. Within brittle and ductile groupings, we observed several significant differences in chewing cycle length and relative muscle activation levels that are likely related to food preference. These differences tended to be complex and individual specific. The two capuchins chewed non-preferred apricots significantly faster than preferred dates and prunes. Effect sizes for preference were smaller than those for FMPs, supporting the previous focus on FMPs in primate dietary research. Although preliminary, these results suggest that food preference may influence oral physiology in non-human primates. The prospect that this relationship exists in monkeys raises the possibility that a link between food preference and oral processing in humans may be based on shared tendencies with non-human primates, such as aversion to bitter items or preference for sweet foods.

We argue there is nothing inherent to political ecology that exceptionalizes humans over non-humans, as argued by Srinivasan and Kasturirangan in Geoforum recently. Political ecology’s main aim is to critique the discourses and practices of development and conservation, be it in relation to humans or non-humans, by examining the workings of political economy and power. It is, in other words, an analytical approach – not an ideology. If indeed political ecology has been guilty of inadequate attention to the non-human world it is because of its anthropocentrism and not human exceptionalism. We argue that prioritizing the non-human world is a normative choice and that retrieving its voice, however sensitive political ecology might be to doing so, will always be done within the social and political worlds that shape the lives of the non-human world.

Mounting evidence has shown that general anesthetic agents commonly used clinically can cause anesthetic-related neurotoxicity in the developing brains of mammals, potentially causing long-term neurological impairment. This results in growing interest and concern among the public. Here, we present an overview of the relevant findings from non-human primates, arguably the very best model for studies of developmental neurotoxicity. These studies have shown that varying degrees of neurodegeneration occur as a result of anesthesia type, duration/dose of exposure, the timing of exposure, and brain region of interest, combined with subsequent alterations in cognitive assessments. Specifically, the rapid advancement of minimally or non-invasive neuroimaging methodologies and availability provided more sophisticated techniques for investigating brain structure and function. Neuroimaging methodologies have shown some of their most significant promise in studies of anesthetic-induced developmental neurotoxicity.

The constructs of ‘territory’ and ‘terrain’ are the subject of increasing scrutiny within political geography. While momentum builds in their interrogation as both diverse and lively practices, and complex political technologies, this article takes pause. Drawing on a rich and diverse range of feminist scholarship, it seeks to reflect upon existing trajectories and provide provocation for further accounting. Inspired throughout by, and seeking to bring to bear, a feminist perspective on territory and terrain, this article follows a tripartite structure. First, it critically explores the bodies of knowledge historically underpinning the concepts of territory and terrain. Developing a call for a feminist historiography of territory and terrain, we reflect upon both the gendered evolution of the concepts, and their ongoing reproduction in conceptual debates. Second, it seeks to both highlight and diversify embodied accounts and accountings of these concepts. Here, thinking with and beyond the body, we turn to the non-human and spiritual to explore territory and terrain in expanded and extended ways. Lastly, we examine bodies of expertise, reflecting on academic territories and terrains, and highlighting potential concepts and methodologies seeking to (re-)sculpt and (re-)articulate understandings of territory and terrain. The paper, whilst not all-encompassing, serves as an important provocation that seeks more equitable accounts of political geography's messy, muddy, and lively territories and terrains.

We are in the Anthropocene. Humanity’s collective impact has become the dominant influence on the biosphere, leading to conditions destroying the ecosystems upon which we depend. For the jurist, the Anthropocene involves a conflict of laws between those human laws governing our economic behaviour, and the non-human laws governing biogeophysical outcomes. This conflict produces an antinomical burden. The human laws having greatest determinacy and persistence – the laws of supply and demand – cannot be sustained under the operation of non-human laws. Thus, growing energy demand, being met by increasing supply, is now in an antinomical relationship with the biosphere’s regulatory response. This conflict of laws cannot be resolved. However, it can be addressed though the reflexive reconfiguration of human norms as they produce outcomes under non-human laws. This excludes the conventional choice of laws methodology, which would seek to identify the narrow set of conditions under which we should apply non-human laws. Non-human laws cannot be suspended. Nor can we embrace more than human law as a supervening source of legitimacy with which we should simply learn to identify. Human laws persist, and we live with the antinomy to which they give rise.

In the third millennium where ethical, ethological and cultural evolution seem to be leading more and more towards an inter-species society, the issue of animal experimentation is a moral dilemma. Speaking from a self-interested human perspective, avoiding all animal testing where human disease and therapy are concerned may be very difficult or even impossible; such testing may not be so easily justifiable when suffering-or killing-of non human animals is inflicted for forensic research. In order to verify how forensic scientists are evolving in this ethical issue, we undertook a systematic review of the current literature. We investigated the frequency of animal experimentation in forensic studies in the past 15 years and trends in publication in the main forensic science journals. Types of species, lesions inflicted, manner of sedation or anesthesia and euthanasia were examined in a total of 404 articles reviewed, among which 279 (69.1%) concerned studies involving animals sacrificed exclusively for the sake of the experiment. Killing still frequently includes painful methods such as blunt trauma, electrocution, mechanical asphyxia, hypothermia, and even exsanguination; of all these animals, apparently only 60.8% were anesthetized. The most recent call for a severe reduction if not a total halt to the use of animals in forensic sciences was made by Bernard Knight in 1992. In fact the principle of reduction and replacement, frequently respected in clinical research, must be considered the basis for forensic science research needing animals.

Maternal interactions with young occupy most of the reproductive period for female mammals and are absolutely essential for offspring survival and development. The hormonal, sensory, reward-related, emotional, cognitive and neurobiological regulators of maternal caregiving behaviors have been well studied in numerous subprimate mammalian species, and some of the importance of this body of work is thought to be its relevance for understanding similar controls in humans. We here review many of the important biopsychological influences on maternal behaviors in the two best studied non-human animals, laboratory rats and sheep, and directly examine how the conceptual framework established by some of the major discoveries in these animal "models" do or do not hold for our understanding of human mothering. We also explore some of the limits for extrapolating from non-human animals to humans. We conclude that there are many similarities between non-human and human mothers in the biological and psychological factors influencing their early maternal behavior and that many of the differences are due to species-characteristic features related to the role of hormones, the relative importance of each sensory system, flexibility in what behaviors are exhibited, the presence or absence of language, and the complexity of cortical function influencing caregiving behaviors.

In step with the evolution of molecular genetics, the application of non-human biological traces is an intensively researched field in forensic sciences [1]. Recently it has been widely acknowledged that this extended possibility – with associated abilities and pitfalls – for forensic DNA examination can provide innovative results in criminal and civil casework as well as in connection with associative evidence. Depending on the specific species or types of traces, the final results can have very different criminalistics value (e.g., plants, dogs or microbiome of soil traces), but it is unquestionable that non-human DNA has an increasing role in forensic biological evidence [2–4]. However, in contrast to the investigation of human DNA-traces, there currently exist no restrictions concerning DNA loci and privacy of genetic information, and a wide spectrum of genetic information and technologies may be applied. The field is developing with animal rights, international (e.g. CITES) conventions, national regulations and professional recommendations [5–7]. The Hungarian forensic practice on animal DNA examination has been developing since 2000 [8]. The range of cases is sufficiently broad, and includes fatal accidents and animal attacks (case #1) as well as illegal trade cases (case #2). In case of degraded animal hair samples we used two sets of Canine STR markers with shortened amplicons, and species specific primers ( Ursus sp.) for mitochondrial DNA analysis of mixed samples (case #2), respectively. The results supported the evaluation of individualization (case #1), confirming the species identification (case #2).

The traditional implied assumption of Intellectual Property systems has always put the humankind at the exact center of the creative universe. Given the latest breakthroughs of computer science, in particular the development of Artificial Intelligence, the question if entities other than humans can produce works worthy to be protected by copyright is gaining momentum. Considering that only a few studies have until now tackled the issue, this paper aims to move a first step in a still unexplored world.

In recent decades, animal behaviorists have been using the term culture in relation to non-human animals, starting a controversy with social scientists that is still far from cooling down. I investigated the meanings of the term culture as used by social and cultural anthropologists, and also its recent use by ethologists, in order to better understand this controversy and identify possible paths that might lead to a consensus. I argue that disagreements in the level of theories involve definitions of culture and theories of behavioral development, while disagreements in the level of worldviews include the acceptance or rejection of the idea of a radical distinction between humans and other animals. Reaching a synthetic approach to (human and non-human) animal behavior depends on constructing a consensus in both levels. It is also necessary to discuss how to include symbolic communication in a comparative perspective. I conclude that this might lead to the abandonment or reconstruction of the related dichotomies of nature–culture, innate–acquired and gene–environment. This article is part of a Special Issue entitled: Neotropical Behaviour.

Models of collective movement have been developed for both human crowds and animal herds and other aggregations but these models have not been used to test whether panicked crowds display generic features of dynamical behaviour regardless of species, and in particular whether a single model can explain panic behaviour in organisms of vastly different body size. We use a single modelling framework to examine crowd behaviour in ants and humans, which differ by 8 orders of magnitude in body mass. We assess whether simple allometric scaling of model parameter values, based only on the body mass difference, allows the model to describe the collective behaviour of the two species under panic conditions. We verified the model against experimental data from panicking Argentine ants (Linepithema humile) and then rescaled the parameter values to human body size. The predictions of rescaled model correspond to the quantitative data available for crowd panics, suggesting that the same kinds of interactions among individuals and with the physical environment govern crowd behaviour. We tested the effects of partial obstruction and the homogeneity of body sizes on the escape rate and found that appropriate selection of size and location of obstruction and homogeneity of body sizes can increase the outflow of pedestrians by more than double. Broader comparisons of crowd behaviour among species with different forms of locomotion and body size can enhance our theoretical understanding of crowd panics and potentially has applications in handling of agricultural animals as well as human public safety.

The role of invertebrates in the evolution of human diet has been under-studied by comparison with vertebrates and plants. This persists despite substantial knowledge of the importance of the 'other faunivory', especially insect-eating, in the daily lives of non-human primates and traditional human societies, especially hunters and gatherers. Most primates concentrate on two phyla, Mollusca and Arthropoda, but of the latter's classes, insects (especially five orders: Coleoptera, Hymenoptera, Isoptera, Lepidoptera, Orthoptera) are paramount. An insect product, bees' honey, is particularly important, and its collection shows a reversal of the usual sexual division of labor. Human entomophagy involves advanced technology (fire, containers) and sometimes domestication. Insectivory provides comparable calorific and nutritional benefits to carnivory, but with different costs. Much insectivory in hominoids entails elementary technology used in extractive foraging, such as termite fishing by chimpanzees. Elucidating insectivory in the fossil and paleontological record is challenging, but at least nine avenues are available: remains, lithics, residues, DNA, coprolites, dental microwear, stable isotopes, osteology, and depictions. All are in play, but some have been more successful so far than others.

The ability to navigate through our environment, explore with our senses, track the passage of time, and integrate these various components to form the experiences which make up our lives is shared among humans and animals. The use of animal models to study memory, coupled with electrophysiological techniques that permit the direct measurement of neural activity as memories are formed and retrieved, has provided a wealth of knowledge about these mechanisms. Here, we discuss current knowledge regarding the specific role of neural oscillations in memory, with particular emphasis on findings derived from non-human primates. Some of these findings provide evidence for the existence in the primate brain of mechanisms previously identified only in rodents and other lower mammals, while other findings suggest parallels between memory-related activity and processes observed in other cognitive modalities, including attention and sensory perception. Taken together, these results provide insight into how network activity may be organized to promote memory formation, and suggest that key aspects of this activity are similar across species, providing important information about the organization of human memory.

Post-disaster reportage frequently focusses on catastrophic and harrowing human impacts together with heroic acts of mercy: aid agencies benefit from the subsequent mobilisation of donors. In the aftermath analytical reviews evaluate both success and failure to reflexively improve relief outcomes in future aid deployments. Both activities tend to concentrate on the experiences of key individuals in major organisations associated with disaster recovery and reconstruction. Little consideration is given to the influence of the non-human aid they deploy beyond the recognition that they are vital and necessary. Similarly, government and NGO policies and procedures are regarded as the mechanisms by which aid is distributed. None of this is counterintuitive or surprising, yet there may be another dimension. Actor Network Theory (ANT) was conceived as a problem-solving action research tool predicated upon the notion that non-human actants can play an equal role in problems, and while ANT has previously been utilised in monthly to consider the challenges faced when integrating high-level technology systems with humans this paper speculates that the technique could also reveal useful insights during disaster recovery and reconstruction. This paper uses a detailed case study to suggest that a) nonhuman actants in disaster contexts may exert influences that were not foreseen when they were deployed, and that b) human actants may exert unintended influences: critically these actants include researchers and reporters. The research concludes that ANT principles have the potential to surface new perspectives in complex post-disaster contexts, but that the conduct of a purist ANT investigation would be highly problematic and potentially disruptive to the reconstruction process.

Humans and several non-human primates possess cortical regions that are most sensitive to vocalizations produced by their own kind (conspecifics). However, the use of speech and other broadly defined categories of behaviorally relevant natural sounds has led to many discrepancies regarding where voice-sensitivity occurs, and more generally the identification of cortical networks, "proto-networks" or protolanguage networks, and pathways that may be sensitive or selective for certain aspects of vocalization processing. In this prospective review we examine different approaches for exploring vocal communication processing, including pathways that may be, or become, specialized for conspecific utterances. In particular, we address the use of naturally produced non-stereotypical vocalizations (mimicry of other animal calls) as another category of vocalization for use with human and non-human primate auditory systems. We focus this review on two main themes, including progress and future ideas for studying vocalization processing in great apes (chimpanzees) and in very early stages of human development, including infants and fetuses. Advancing our understanding of the fundamental principles that govern the evolution and early development of cortical pathways for processing non-verbal communication utterances is expected to lead to better diagnoses and early intervention strategies in children with communication disorders, improve rehabilitation of communication disorders resulting from brain injury, and develop new strategies for intelligent hearing aid and implant design that can better enhance speech signals in noisy environments. This article is part of a Special Issue entitled "Communication Sounds and the Brain: New Directions and Perspectives".

Mycobacterium tuberculosis is a successful pathogen responsible for the vast majority of deadly tuberculosis cases in humans. It rests in a dormant form in contaminated people who constitute the reservoir with airborne interhuman transmission during pulmonary tuberculosis. M. tuberculosis is therefore regarded majoritary as a human pathogen. Here, we review the evidence for anthroponotic M. tuberculosis infection in non-human primates, other mammals and psittacines. Some infected animals may be sources for zoonotic tuberculosis caused by M. tuberculosis, with wild life trade and zoos being amplifying factors. Moreover, living animals and cadavers can scatter M. tuberculosis in the environment where it could survive for extended periods of time in soil where amoebae could play a role. Although marginal in the epidemiology of human tuberculosis, these data indicate that M. tuberculosis is not uniquely adapted to humans.

This paper develops literatures on affective atmospheres to rethink the status of technical objects in human geographical analysis. Suggesting that narratives of affect and affordance have difficulty accounting for objects when they are not directly encountering one another, the paper draws upon Levi Bryant’s discussion of allopoietic objects and Graham Harman’s analysis of space and time to advance the concept of perturbation. In doing so, the paper argues that technical objects are not lifeless mechanisms but actively produce spatio-temporal atmospheres, which shape the humans who are immersed in these atmospheres. Using the iPhone 4 as a thought experiment to think through the different types of atmosphere that can be generated by technical objects, the paper suggests that geographers should attune themselves to these atmospheres and recognize the role they play in the organization and experience of space and time for humans.

The study and protection of animal welfare are based on the assumption that animals are sentient beings, capable of experiencing emotions. Still, our understanding of animal emotions is limited. In this review we focus on the potential of cerebral-lateralization research to provide new insights into animal emotional processing. Thereby, our aims were, first, to find a universal lateralization pattern in emotional processing across vertebrates and, second, to discuss how knowledge of emotional-lateralization patterns can be used in science and practice to contribute to improve farm-animal welfare. A literature review suggests evidence of lateralized functioning during emotional contexts across the vertebrate classes, from early vertebrates such as fish and amphibians to non-human primates. With the possible exception of fish, all vertebrate classes seem to show a similar lateralization pattern for emotional processing, with a right-hemisphere dominance for processing rather negatively connotated emotions, such as fear and aggression, and a left-hemisphere dominance for processing positively connotated emotions, such as those elicited by a food reward. Thus, both hemispheres are involved in emotional processing and hemispheric dominance may be used as an indicator of emotional valence (negative-positive). Although only a few domestic animal species (e.g. chicken, sheep, dog and horse) have been extensively studied with regard to emotional lateralization, evidence gathered so far suggests that the right-hemisphere dominance for fear and aggression and left-hemisphere dominance in responses to food rewards also applies to these species. Such patterns could be exploited in animal welfare studies to gain insight into how an animal experiences a potentially emotional situation and to improve farm-animal management. Further research should focus on rarely-studied species and on rarely-studied emotional contexts, such as sex and positive social situations, to improve our understanding of animal emotional lateralization.

The changing environment of monoclonal antibody (mAb) development is impacting on the cost of drug development and the use of experimental animals, particularly non-human primates (NHPs). The drive to reduce these costs is huge and involves rethinking and improving nonclinical studies to make them more efficient and more predictive of man. While NHP use might be unavoidable in many cases because of the exquisite specificity and consequent species selectivity of mAbs, our increasing knowledge base can be used to improve drug development and maximise the output of experimental data. Data on GLP regulatory toxicology studies for 58mAbs were obtained from 10 companies across a wide range of therapeutic indications. These data have been used to investigate current practice and identify study designs that minimise NHP use. Our analysis shows that there is variation in the number of animals used for similar studies. This information has been used to develop practical guidance and make recommendations on the use of science-based rationale to design studies using fewer animals taking into account the current regulatory guidance. There are eight recommendations intended to highlight areas for consideration. They include guidance on the main group size, the inclusion of recovery groups and the number of dose groups used in short and long term chronic toxicology studies.

This co-authored intervention discusses themes on the thinking and doing of visceral research. 'Visceral' is taken here as that relating to, and emerging from, bodily, emotional and affective interactions with the material and discursive environment. There has recently been a distinct and necessary turn within the social sciences, particularly in human geography, towards the need for more viscerally-aware research practices. Building on such work, this collective intervention by leading visceral scholars offers two key contributions: first, it critically examines visceral geography approaches by considering their methodological contributions, and suggests improvements and future research pathways; and second, the authors extend recent visceral geography debates by examining how to conduct this type of research, providing reflections from their own experiences on the practicalities and challenges of implementing visceral methods. These observations are taken from a diverse range of research contexts - for example, from gender violence and community spaces, to the politics of 'good eating' in schools and social movements (e.g. Slow Food) - and involve a similarly diverse set of methods, including body-map storytelling, cooking and sharing meals, and using music to 'attune' researchers' bodies to nonhuman objects. In short, this collective intervention makes important and original contributions to the recent visceral turn in human geography, and offers critical insights for researchers across disciplines who are interested in conceptually and/or practically engaging with visceral methods.

An emphasis on visceral methodologies might seem to suggest that human bodies are the key site or organiser of experience. In this short reflection I argue that human bodies are also a medium that can be used to bring background or previously undetected non-human objects and forces to the forefront and so enable them to be studied and analysed.

Current clinical classifications, and many psychologists, do not distinguish categorically between anxiety and fear. Likewise, the normal language use of these and related terms suggests considerable overlap. However, ethology, behavioural pharmacology and neural analysis all suggest that anxiety and fear are fundamentally distinct at the functional and neural levels – while co-occurring and interacting with each other in many situations. As states with distinct and coherent neural control, anxiety and fear should give rise to distinct personality factors of fear-proneness and anxiety-proneness. However, additional factors are suggested by neural, epidemiological, pharmacological and genetic data, which suggest that a higher order factor of emotionality (potentially equivalent to neuroticism) will contribute to trait variance in both fear and anxiety, and a lower order factor of panic-proneness will contribute to fear, in addition to factors specific to fear or anxiety, per se.

Until now, there have been no ideal alternatives to replace non-human primates (NHPs) in biomedical research, yet the debate on whether it is appropriate to sacrifice NHPs for research never stops. With recent advances in genomics and the appearance of new technologies, the time is right to return to the problem of finding solutions to balance the welfare of both humans and NHPs.

The experience with artificial insemination (AI) and the more invasive ARTs (assisted reproductive technologies) in the propagation of non-human primates (NHPs), although limited, has included representation from the Great Apes and both Old World and New World Macaques. The application of these technologies in NHPs is impacted by high cost, substantial technical requirements and the limited captive populations of available animals. A major incentive for their use would be to propagate endangered, underrepresented individuals or valuable founder animals. Detailed protocols and a substantial experience base for the ARTs are available for rhesus and cynomolgus macaques and form the basis of this review, including sperm recovery, processing and long-term storage at low temperatures, insemination techniques and timing. Controlled ovarian stimulation and subsequent oocyte recovery required for the invasive ARTs such as intracytoplasmic sperm injection (ICSI), is also described. Three recent AI reports in Old World Macaques are reviewed, along with examples of the use of the ARTs in the propagation of valuable founder animals, in the preservation of endangered macaques, and finally in the creation of neurodegenerative disease models for biomedical research purposes.

The aim of this paper is to offer an ethical perspective on the use of non-human primates in neurobiological studies, using the Parkinson's disease (PD) as an important case study. We refer, as theoretical framework, to the 3R principle, originally proposed by Russell and Burch [Russell, W.M.S., Burch, R.L., 1959. The Principles of Humane Experimental Technique. Universities Federation for Animal Welfare Wheathampstead, England (reprinted in 1992)]. Then, the use of non-human primates in the study of PD will be discussed in relation to the concepts of Replacement, Reduction, and Refinement. Replacement and Reduction result to be the more problematic concept to be applied, whereas Refinement offers relatively more opportunities of improvement. However, although in some cases the 3R principle shows its applicative limits, its value, as conceptual and inspirational tool remains extremely valuable. It suggests to the researchers a series of questions, both theoretical and methodological, which can have the results of improving the quality of life on the experimental models, the quality of the scientific data, and the public perception from the non-scientist community.

The skilled use of the hand for grasping and manipulation of objects is a fundamental feature of the primate motor system. Grasping movements involve transforming the visual information about an object into a motor command appropriate for the coordinated activation of hand and finger muscles. The cerebral cortex and its descending projections to the spinal cord are known to play a crucial role for the control of grasp. Recent studies in non-human primates have provided some striking new insights into the respective contribution of the parietal and frontal motor cortical areas to the control of grasp. Also, new approaches allowed investigating the coupling of grasp-related activity in different cortical areas for the control of the descending motor command.

Do non-human entities have agency in politics? Can they be part of the political? In recent years, scholars such as Jane Bennett and Bruno Latour have challenged traditional binaries between nature-culture, subject-object to articulate the complex relations between humans and the non-human world, granting in turn the agency of the later. In this paper, we reconsider the relationship between human and non-human entities and their respective and interrelated agencies by interrogating the agency of the non-human to engage with the above questions. We situate our interrogation within two recent cases surrounding the agency of the non-human in the context of Latin American politics. The first case surrounds anti-feminicide protests emerging Ciudad Juarez and Chihuahua, Mexico. The second case concerns recent protests against petroleum extraction in one of the most biologically sensitive areas in the world: Yasuni Biosphere Reserve in Ecuador. In the first case, mothering organizations led by the mothers of feminicide victims in these cities deployed a unique repertoire of protests, wherein objects become not simply vehicles for the protests but contained an agency which exceeded the human one that originally brought it into being, transforming the landscape of the city through a potent funeralization that challenged state inaction and the impunity of perpetrators. In the second case, protests by indigenous activists and their allies sought to challenge the state’s abandoning of a moratorium on petroleum extraction in this Amazonian reserve by not only taking to the streets, but also continuing to advance the rights of Nature, or Pachamama, as not only a subject but an agent of rights. Bringing to bear the insights of Bennett and Latour, into conversation with those of Marisol de la Cadena, Judith Butler, and Isabelle Stengers, we argue for the rethinking the agency of the non-human not simply as externalities to the human, or in their thingness or as use objects, but as beings in themselves, existing according to non-instrumental logics that exceed human agency and can indeed contain it to constitute politics and new political forms.