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Colombia is the country with the highest bird diversity in the world. Despite active research in ornithology, compelling morphological information of most bird species is still sparse. However, morphological information is the baseline to understand how species respond to environmental variation and how ecosystems respond to species loss. As part of a national initiative, the Instituto Alexander von Humboldt in collaboration with 12 Colombian institutions and seven biological collections, measured up to 15 morphological traits of 9,892 individuals corresponding to 606 species: 3,492 from individuals captured in field and 6,400 from museum specimens. Species measured are mainly distributed in high Andean forest, páramo, and wetland ecosystems. Seven ornithological collections in Colombia and 18 páramo complexes throughout Colombia were visited from 2013 to 2015. The morphological traits involved measurements from bill (total and exposed culmen, bill width and depth), wing (length, area, wingspan, and the distance between longest primary and longest secondary), tail (length and shape), tarsus (length), hallux (length and claw hallux), and mass. The number of measured specimens per species was variable, ranging from 1 to 321 individuals with a median of four individuals per species. Overall, this database gathered morphological information for30% of Colombian bird diversity. No copyright, proprietary, or cost restrictions apply; the data should be cited appropriately when used.

There is limited information on the impacts of present-day solar ultraviolet-B radiation (UV-B) on biomass and grain yield of field crops and on the mechanisms that confer tolerance to UV-B radiation under field conditions. We investigated the effects of solar UV-B on aspects of the biochemistry, growth and yield of barley crops using replicated field plots and two barley strains, a catalase (CAT)-deficient mutant (RPr 79/4) and its wild-type mother line (Maris Mink). Solar UV-B reduced biomass accumulation and grain yield in both strains. The effects on crop biomass accumulation tended to be more severe in RPr 79/4 (≈ 32% reduction) than in the mother line (≈ 20% reduction). Solar UV-B caused measurable DNA damage in leaf tissue, in spite of inducing a significant increase in UV-absorbing sunscreens in the two lines. Maris Mink responded to solar UV-B with increased CAT and ascorbate peroxidase (APx) activity. No effects of UV-B on total superoxide dismutase (SOD) activity were detected. Compared with the wild type, RPr 79/4 had lower CAT activity, as expected, but higher APx activity. Neither of these activities increased in response to UV-B in RPr 79/4. These results suggest that growth inhibition by solar UV-B involves DNA damage and oxidative stress, and that constitutive and UV-B-induced antioxidant capacity may play an important role in UV-B tolerance.

Cloned catalase probes from barley (Hordeum vulgare L.) and maize (Zea mays L.) were used to examine catalase gene expression in greened and etiolated leaves of several barley lines. Etiolated leaves had greater levels of an mRNA detected by barley Cat1, compared with greened leaves, in all lines. In contrast, a Cat2-like mRNA (homologous to Cat2 of maize) was induced by light and accumulated to high levels in greened leaves, compared to the negligible levels detected in etiolated leaves. This suggests that barley contains light-inducible and light-repressible catalase genes. In the catalase-deficient barley mutant RPr 79/4, no hybridization signal was detected when RNA from greened or etiolated leaves was probed with maize Cat2, indicating that this mutant is deficient for the light-induced Cat mRNA. In etiolated seedlings of both RPr 79/4 and its motherline, the level of the Cat1 mRNA increased coordinately with a steady increase in catalase activity. Even though the mutant RPr 79/4 was able to grow to maturity in normal air, it sustained chlorosis and significant head sterility, probably due to the lack of a light-inducible catalase. Although the mutant RPr 79/4 is not completely lacking catalase (EC 1.11.1.6), the loss of the CAT-1 isozyme is evidently harmful. This observation underscores the protective role of catalases in plants.

The temporal and spatial patterns of expression of the Cat and Sod genes encoding the multiple catalases and superoxide dismutases in maize have been examined throughout stem development. Three stages of stem development have been defined based upon catalase activity profiles and stem internode elongation. At stage 1, catalase activity is low and internodes remain short; at stage 2, catalase activity dramatically increases and internodes rapidly elongate; and at stage 3, catalase activity decreases to levels intermediate to stage 1 and 2, and internode elongation ceases. Zymogram analysis and immunoassays show that only the CAT-3 catalase isozyme is present in the stem, even though both Cat1 and Cat3 mRNAs accumulate throughout stem development. Cat2 mRNA is not detectable in the developing stem. In full-grown stems catalase is localized primarily in the sclerenchyma beneath the epidermis and around the vascular bundles and may possibly play a role in lignification. Unlike catalase, all the superoxide dismutase (SOD) isozymes and transcripts are present in the developing stem. Thus, these two major antioxidant gene-enzyme systems show differential patterns of expression during stem development in maize. © 1992 Wiley-Liss, Inc.

A lesion-mimic mutant was obtained from a mutagenic treatment performed with ethyl methanesulfonate on the Argentine bread wheat (Triticum aestivum) cultivar Sinvalocho M.A. The HLP (hypersensitive-like phenotype) mutant exhibited tiny, discrete, white lesions in the absence of any pathogen, resembling the typical hypersensitive response (HR). The lesions only became evident once the fifth or sixth leaf emerged, and spread at random along the leaf blades and leaf sheaths of the developing plant, including tissues of the spike. Because the lesion-mimic mutant showed no lesions at the seedling stage, the phenotypes of both the mutant and its mother line were identical at this point. Histochemical studies showed that spontaneous hypersensitive-like lesions in the HLP mutant corresponded to cell death. In leaf-rust (Puccinia triticina) infection experiments performed at seedling and adult-plant stages, adult HLP plants showed enhanced resistance to leaf-rust attack compared with plants of Sinvalocho M.A. of comparable developmental stage, suggesting that the HLP mutation may confer increased resistance to the fungus. Because enhanced resistance coincided with the presence of spontaneous HR lesions, activation of HLP plant defence responses appeared to be tightly linked to this phenomenon. Final plant height and yield components in the lesion-mimic mutant did not differ from those of the mother line, indicating that the HLP mutation caused no detrimental pleiotropic effects that significantly affected agronomic performance. These data support the direct use of mutations in disease-resistance breeding.

Recent studies have proposed that the personality pathology in alcoholics is probably a result, not a cause, of alcohol intake. Thus, 19 male alcoholic veterans were assessed to determine whether there was a positive correlation between personality pathology and lifetime amount of absolute alcohol consumed. A multiple regression analysis of the data showed that there was no evidence for a statistically significant positive correlation between the lifetime amount of absolute alcohol consumed and personality pathology. The only statistically significant correlation found was a negative correlation between personality pathology and age, a finding consistent with some other recent studies.