Large Cretaceous sphenodontian from Patagonia provides insight into lepidosaur evolution in Gondwana

Sphenodontian reptiles successfully radiated during Triassic and Jurassic times, but were driven almost to extinction during the Cretaceous period. The sparse Early Cretaceous record of sphenodontians has been interpreted as reflecting the decline of the group in favour of lizards, their suspected ecological successors. However, recent discoveries in Late Cretaceous beds in Patagonia partially modify this interpretation. Numerous skeletons of a new sphenodontian, Priosphenodon avelasi gen. et sp. nov., were collected from a single locality in the Cenomanian-Turonian Candeleros Formation, where it is more abundant than any other tetrapod group recorded in the quarry (for example, Crocodyliformes, Serpentes, Dinosauria and Mammalia). Adult specimens of Priosphenodon reached one metre in length, larger than any previously known terrestrial sphenodontian. Here we propose, using available evidence, that sphenodontians were not a minor component of the Cretaceous terrestrial ecosystems of South America, and that their ecological replacement by squamates was delayed until the early Tertiary. The new discovery helps to bridge the considerable gap in the fossil record (around 120 million years) that separates the Early Cretaceous sphenodontians from their living relatives (Sphenodon).     

Global tests of biodiversity concordance and the importance of endemism

Understanding patterns of biodiversity distribution is essential to conservation strategies, but severe data constraints make surrogate measures necessary. For this reason, many studies have tested the performance of terrestrial vertebrates as surrogates for overall species diversity, but these tests have typically been limited to a single taxon or region. Here we show that global patterns of richness are highly correlated among amphibians, reptiles, birds and mammals, as are endemism patterns. Furthermore, we demonstrate that although the correlation between global richness and endemism is low, aggregate regions selected for high levels of endemism capture significantly more species than expected by chance. Although areas high in endemism have long been targeted for the protection of narrow-ranging species, our findings provide evidence that endemism is also a useful surrogate for the conservation of all terrestrial vertebrates.     

湖北省后河自然保护区陆生脊椎动物物种多样性调查

地处鄂西南五峰县的湖北省后河自然保护区，由于其人口密度低，地势起伏高差大，植被封闭良好，特别是地处湘、鄂边界的特殊地理环境，其动植物群落的边缘效应非常突出，物种多样性的丰富度和重要物种的高密度在湖北省十分罕见．由湖北省林业厅下达的《湖北省后河自然保护...     

血气分析深入图像在新生儿肺炎病人中的应用（附40例报告）

为了提高对低氧血症状态的分析和动脉血供氧能力的判断，对４０例出生后１ｈ至１５ｄ住院的新生儿肺炎病人的血气分析数据进行了深入图像分析．均采取股动脉或桡动脉血，检测用丹麦产ＡＢＬ６２０型血气分析仪，试剂及计算机软件全部由丹麦雷度公司提供．４０例中，ＣｔＯ２（动脉血氧含量）下降２９例（７２．５％），ＳＯ２（血氧饱和度）下降２０例（５０．０％），ｐＯ２ａ（动脉血氧分压）下降２５例（６２．５％）．在ｐＯ２ａ正常的１５例中经深入图像分析有８例Ｐｘ（氧张力）均低于正常，这表明低血氧症的实际例数应为３３例，占总数的８２．５％．４０例中ｃｔＨｂ（总血红蛋白）下降１９例（４７．５％），ｃｅＨｂ（有效血红蛋白）下降２２例（５５．０％），Ｏ２Ｈｂ（氧合血红蛋白）正常仅１１例（２７．５％）．４０例中３５例（８７．５％）Ｐ５０下降，氧离曲线左移，表明血红蛋白释氧能力下降，３３例（８２．５％）Ｐｘ低于正常，表明有动脉血释氧能力下降，在临床上需要给氧．     

广东南岭自然保护区陆栖脊椎动物物种多样性调查

调查和统计得出:广东南岭国家级自然保护区共有陆栖脊椎动物486种,隶属27目86科287属,占全国陆栖脊椎动物种数(2 638种)的18.42%.其中,兽类有89种;鸟类有259种;爬行类有94种;两栖类有44种.区内脊椎动物多样性的基本特征是:(1)该保护区属于具有世界意义的物种丰富区域;(2)具有华南区成分占优势,南、北方动物交错分布的区系特征.     

Energetic constraints on the diet of terrestrial carnivores

Species in the mammalian order Carnivora exhibit a huge diversity of life histories with body sizes spanning more than three orders of magnitude. Despite this diversity, most terrestrial carnivores can be classified as either feeding on invertebrates and small vertebrates or on large vertebrates. Small carnivores feed predominantly on invertebrates probably because they are a superabundant resource (sometimes 90% of animal biomass); however, intake rates of invertebrate feeders are low, about one tenth of those of vertebrate feeders. Although small carnivores can subsist on this diet because of low absolute energy requirements, invertebrate feeding appears to be unsustainable for larger carnivores. Here we show, by reviewing the most common live prey in carnivore diets, that there is a striking transition from feeding on small prey (less than half of predator mass) to large prey (near predator mass), occurring at predator masses of 21.5-25 kg. We test the hypothesis that this dichotomy is the consequence of mass-related energetic requirements and we determine the predicted maximum mass that an invertebrate diet can sustain. Using a simple energetic model and known invertebrate intake rates, we predict a maximum sustainable mass of 21.5 kg, which matches the point where predators shift from small to large prey.     

The genome of the green anole lizard and a comparative analysis with birds and mammals

The evolution of the amniotic egg was one of the great evolutionary innovations in the history of life, freeing vertebrates from an obligatory connection to water and thus permitting the conquest of terrestrial environments. Among amniotes, genome sequences are available for mammals and birds, but not for non-avian reptiles. Here we report the genome sequence of the North American green anole lizard, Anolis carolinensis. We find that A. carolinensis microchromosomes are highly syntenic with chicken microchromosomes, yet do not exhibit the high GC and low repeat content that are characteristic of avian microchromosomes. Also, A. carolinensis mobile elements are very young and diverse-more so than in any other sequenced amniote genome. The GC content of this lizard genome is also unusual in its homogeneity, unlike the regionally variable GC content found in mammals and birds. We describe and assign sequence to the previously unknown A. carolinensis X chromosome. Comparative gene analysis shows that amniote egg proteins have evolved significantly more rapidly than other proteins. An anole phylogeny resolves basal branches to illuminate the history of their repeated adaptive radiations.     

Running energetics in the pronghorn antelope

The pronghorn antelope (Antilocapra americana) has an alleged top speed of 100 km h-1, second only to the cheetah (Acionyx jubatus) among land vertebrates, a possible response to predation in the exposed habitat of the North American prairie. Unlike cheetahs, however, pronghorn antelope are distance runners rather than sprinters, and can run 11 km in 10 min, an average speed of 65 km h-1. We measured maximum oxygen uptake in pronghorn antelope to distinguish between two potential explanations for this ability: either they have evolved a uniquely high muscular efficiency (low cost of transport) or they can supply oxygen to the muscles at unusually high levels. Because the cost of transport (energy per unit distance covered per unit body mass) varies as a predictable function of body mass among terrestrial vertebrates, we can calculate the predicted cost to maintain speeds of 65 and 100 km h-1 in an average 32-kg animal. The resulting range of predicted values, 3.2-5.1 ml O2 kg-1 s-1, far surpasses the predicted maximum aerobic capacity of a 32-kg mammal (1.5 ml O2 kg-1 s-1). We conclude that their performance is achieved by an extraordinary capacity to consume and process enough oxygen to support a predicted running speed greater than 20 ms-1 (70 km h-1), attained without unique respiratory-system structures.     

Urea excretion as a strategy for survival in a fish living in a very alkaline environment

Ammonia is toxic to all vertebrates. It can be converted to the less toxic urea, but this is a metabolically expensive process found only in terrestrial vertebrates that cannot readily excrete ammonia and marine fish that use urea as an osmotic filler. Freshwater fish mostly excrete ammonia with only a small quantity of urea. It seems the ornithine cycle for urea production has been suppressed in all freshwater teleosts except for some airbreathers which, when exposed to air, increase urea synthesis via the cycle. Here we show that the tilapia fish Oreochromis alcalicus grahami, the only fish living in Lake Magadi, an alkaline soda lake (pH = 9.6-10) in the Kenyan Rift Valley, excretes exclusively urea and has ornithine-urea cycle enzymes in its liver. A closely related species that lives in water at pH 7.1 lacks these enzymes and excretes mainly ammonia with small amounts of urea produced via uricolysis. It dies within 60 min when placed in water from Lake Magadi. We suggest that urea production via the ornithine-urea cycle permits O. a. grahami to survive the very alkaline conditions in Lake Magadi.     

广东省高校人才培养与区域经济协同发展研究

结合广东省高校人才培养的现状,通过对广东省高校人才培养和区域经济增长进行协整分析、误差修正模型和格兰杰因果检验,结果表明,广东高校人才培养与经济增长存在长期、短期均衡关系,经济增长是高校人才培养的Granger原因.     

鳄鱼资源开发和生物活性物质研究进展

鳄鱼是两亿多年前与恐龙同时代的最原始脊椎类两栖爬行动物，有强盛的生长、繁殖、抗病和抗逆境能力，是生物医学与生态环保等研究的重要物种.近年研究表明，鳄鱼血有强的抗菌、抗病毒和抗癌活性，特别是对抗药性病源菌和人类艾滋病毒有较强抗性，鳄鱼血的抗菌作用可能通过血清中的补体蛋白诱导机体自身免疫系统和产生多种直接作用于细菌细胞膜的抗菌肽而起作用；鳄鱼胆汁提取物显著抑制胆管癌细胞和肝癌细胞的生长，可能通过破坏线粒体膜电位和提高活性氧含量来诱导癌细胞凋亡；鳄鱼油有显著的抗菌、抗炎、防皮肤冻伤和促进皮肤烧伤愈合等作用.鳄鱼的工业利用价值和医药与功能食品开发价值，使其成为经济价值高的养殖动物，在广东、海南和江苏等东南沿海地区大量养殖.该文综述了近年来鳄鱼驯养繁殖和生物活性成分等方面研究进展.     

A human recombinant haemoglobin designed for use as a blood substitute.

The need to develop a blood substitute is now urgent because of the increasing concern over blood-transmitted viral and bacterial pathogens. Cell-free haemoglobin solutions and human haemoglobin synthesized in Escherichia coli and Saccharomyces cerevisiae have been investigated as potential oxygen-carrying substitutes for red blood cells. But these haemoglobins cannot be used as a blood substitute because (1) the oxygen affinity in the absence of 2,3-bisphosphoglycerate is too high to allow unloading of enough oxygen in the tissues, and (2) they dissociate into alpha beta dimers that are cleared rapidly by renal filtration, which can result in long-term kidney damage. We have produced a human haemoglobin using an expression vector containing one gene encoding a mutant beta-globin with decreased oxygen affinity and one duplicated, tandemly fused alpha-globin gene. Fusion of the two alpha-globin subunits increases the half-life of this haemoglobin molecule in vivo by preventing its dissociation into alpha beta dimers and therefore also eliminates renal toxicity.     

冶勒水电站水库对陆生脊椎动物的影响

本文对冶勒乡进行了陆生脊椎动物调查,有两栖类12种,爬行类6种,鸟类149种,兽类52种.按其分类及资源类型、区系组成、分布特点,结合自然条件、水库形态、库容、运行特点等,分析了水库修建期间及蓄水后对陆生脊椎动物的影响,预测其演变趋势,并提出相应的对策.     

Lowland-upland migration of sauropod dinosaurs during the Late Jurassic epoch

Sauropod dinosaurs were the largest vertebrates ever to walk the Earth, and as mega-herbivores they were important parts of terrestrial ecosystems. In the Late Jurassic-aged Morrison depositional basin of western North America, these animals occupied lowland river-floodplain settings characterized by a seasonally dry climate. Massive herbivores with high nutritional and water needs could periodically experience nutritional and water stress under these conditions, and thus the common occurrence of sauropods in this basin has remained a paradox. Energetic arguments and mammalian analogues have been used to suggest that migration allowed sauropods access to food and water resources over a wide region or during times of drought or both, but there has been no direct support for these hypotheses. Here we compare oxygen isotope ratios (δ(18)O) of tooth-enamel carbonate from the sauropod Camarasaurus with those of ancient soil, lake and wetland (that is, 'authigenic') carbonates that formed in lowland settings. We demonstrate that certain populations of these animals did in fact undertake seasonal migrations of several hundred kilometres from lowland to upland environments. This ability to describe patterns of sauropod movement will help to elucidate the role that migration played in the ecology and evolution of gigantism of these and associated dinosaurs.     

广西药用陆生脊椎动物资源简介

介绍广西药用陆生脊椎动物的资源概况，根据目前资源贫乏情况，认为采用人工饲养鳘宵步替代野外捕杀，秀人工繁养的动物代替猎杀野生动物取得最大经济利益是合理利用药用动物资源的方法。     

Ecosystem remodelling among vertebrates at the Permian-Triassic boundary in Russia

The mass extinction at the Permian-Triassic boundary, 251 million years (Myr) ago, is accepted as the most profound loss of life on record. Global data compilations indicate a loss of 50% of families or more, both in the sea and on land, and these figures scale to a loss of 80-96% of species, based on rarefaction analyses. This level of loss is confirmed by local and regional-scale studies of marine sections, but the terrestrial record has been harder to analyse in such close detail. Here we document the nature of the event in Russia in a comprehensive survey of 675 specimens of amphibians and reptiles from 289 localities spanning 13 successive geological time zones in the South Urals basin. These changes in diversity and turnover cannot be explained simply by sampling effects. There was a profound loss of genera and families, and simplification of ecosystems, with the loss of small fish-eaters and insect-eaters, medium and large herbivores and large carnivores. Faunal dynamics also changed, from high rates of turnover through the Late Permian period to greater stability at low diversity through the Early Triassic period. Even after 15 Myr of ecosystem rebuilding, some guilds were apparently still absent-small fish-eaters, small insect-eaters, large herbivores and top carnivores.     

Earliest evidence for efficient oral processing in a terrestrial herbivore

Herbivores can increase their digestion rate by mechanically reducing particle size through oral trituration. Groups of terrestrial vertebrates with the greatest capacity to reduce tough plant foods orally are also the most abundant and diverse, as exemplified by ornithopod dinosaurs during the Mesozoic and extant artiodactyl and perissodactyl mammals. Thus, the effective oral processing of high-fibre plant material seems to represent an evolutionary innovation of both functional and macroevolutionary significance. However, evidence for oral processing is poorly documented in the fossil record, especially during the initial stages of terrestrial vertebrate diversification. Here we report on the basal anomodont Suminia getmanovi, the only known Palaeozoic vertebrate in which unequivocal specializations in its cranium and teeth for high-fibre herbivory are well preserved. We propose that the capacity to comminute tough plant foods was critical to the diversification of anomodonts, the most diverse, widely dispersed and abundant group of Palaeozoic terrestrial vertebrates, and to the onset of modern terrestrial ecosystems.     

脊椎动物呼吸调控机制的比较

本文对脊椎动物各类群的呼吸调控机制从呼吸的中枢控制、呼吸的化学控制和喘息与热调节三个方面进行了比较。结果是:1)脊椎动物各类群呼吸的基本中枢均位于延髓;2)哺乳类脑桥呼吸调整中枢可能与鸟类中脑喘息中枢同源;3)小脑对呼吸的调控可能是反射性的;4)丘脑下部参与呼吸调控可能与体温调节有关;5)脊椎动物各类群均具有中枢化学感受器;6)鸟类和爬行类肺内具有二氧化碳感受器,但哺乳类和两栖类无。     

地塞米松对大鼠再生肝鸟氨酸脱羧酶活性及其基因表达的影响

采用高效液相色谱和原位杂交技术研究了地塞米松对大鼠再生肝鸟氨酸脱羧酶(ODC)及ODCmRNA表达的影响.结果显示,大鼠完整肝脏中ODC水平较低,部分肝切除(PH)后2 h,不同处理组ODC活性开始升高,5 h达到最高值,其中:去肾上腺+NaCl组的酶活性高于对照组(去肾上腺假手术组),而去肾上腺+地塞米松处理组的酶活性低于对照组;24 h恢复到肝切除前水平.完整肝脏的ODC mRNA水平极低,PH后表达量迅速增加,5 h达到最大值,不同处理组mRNA水平的高低顺序与酶活性一致,12 h降至肝切除前水平.以上结果表明,在PH诱导的再生肝中,ODC mRNA表达量的增加或减少是造成ODC活性改变的原因之一,地塞米松对ODC活性及其mRNA的表达具有抑制作用,且主要表现在肝再生的早期.