ABSTRACT
Understanding how differences in intensity and frequency of hydrological disturbances affect the resistance and resilience of aquatic organisms is key to manage aquatic systems in a fast-changing world. Some aquatic insects have strategies that improve the permanence (resistance), while others use strategies that favor recolonization (resilience). Therefore, we carried out a manipulative experiment to understand the influence of functional characteristics of aquatic insects in their permanence and recolonization against hydrological disturbances in streams in the biodiversity hotspot of the Cerrado of Brazil. We placed 200 artificial substrates in five streams and submitted them to changing water flow regimes that differed both in frequency and intensity, and we observed the response of the aquatic community for 39 days. We used a hierarchical Bayesian approach to estimate the probabilities of permanence and recolonization of each life strategy group (nine groups). We observed that the most intense changes in the water flow tended to affect the permanence of almost all groups, but the intensity of this effect reduced over time. On the other hand, less frequent disturbances, regardless of intensity, tended to reduce the permanence of most groups of aquatic insects over time. The different effects of disturbance intensity may have been related to a greater recolonization capacity of some groups. The results we present are worrisome in a scenario of reduced riparian vegetation around streams and with the expectation of precipitation becoming more concentrated in shorter periods of time due to climate change in the Cerrado hotspot, reducing the occurrence of many groups of aquatic insects in their habitat, particularly those with traits associated with resistance against hydrological disturbance.
ABSTRACT
During the period called "transition", from the ceasing of milk production to the reestablishment of full milk production, it is postulated that the microbiota of cows undergo changes in composition driven by the fluxes in systemic energetics and that these changes appear to impact the health of cows. The primary objective of this study was to document the make-up of the microbiota in the mammary gland compared with those in the vagina and in feces in an attempt to determine any correlations between the composition of the microbiota, the impact of blood indicators of energetic metabolites and the health of the mammary gland at the time of calving. Samples were collected from 20 Holstein dairy cows immediately following calving to assess their general health and measure the microbiomes associated with each cow using 16S rRNA sequencing. The results indicated that the microbiomes found within each maternal niche were different. A set of significant negative associations between the blood energetic biomarkers (NEFAs, BHB, triglycerides and cholesterol) and the taxa Pseudomonas, Christensenellaceae and Methanobrevibacter were observed in this study. In contrast, Escherichia and Romboutsia were positively correlated with the same energetic metabolites. Therefore, it was concluded that there appears to be a set of relationships between the microorganisms that colonize several niches of cows and the sufficiency of systemic energy metabolism. Furthermore, both the microbiome and energy dynamics impact the health of the mammary gland of the host.
ABSTRACT
Podcasts - online distributed audio files - are easy access and production media, which can be used for Scientific Communication (SC) but few are presented in Portuguese. The objective of this work is to perform a case study with data from a survey for two Brazilian SC podcasts (Dragões de Garagem and Fronteiras da Ciência) to evaluate the increase of science podcast media in Brazil, the involved potential, their advantages, shortcomings, and perspectives. We noted an increase of listeners over the years, probably due to the internet popularization and the massive increase of mobile phones. Scientific content is underexplored, despite the great interest of the public. Humorous and informal podcasts are the most appealing to the public and they usually listen to them on informal educational sites. The majority of the public is from the South and Southeast regions, they are young male adults with undergraduate or graduate degrees. SC podcasts, despite their potential to communicate science, still have shortcomings to overcome. Nevertheless, independent initiatives can solve this difficulty, making possible for the media to reach a varied audience, affecting different groups that would not have interest in a specific content before, or even the access itself to the scientific knowledge.
