Dietary partitioning by five sympatric species of stingray (Dasyatidae) on coral reefs.

Dietary characteristics and the degree of dietary partitioning by five species of sympatric stingray were assessed using stomach content and sediment analyses within a coral reef lagoon at Ningaloo Reef, Western Australia (the cowtail Pastinachus atrus, blue-spotted fantail Taeniura lymma, blue-spotted mask Neotrygon kuhlii, porcupine Urogymnus asperrimus rays and the reticulate whipray Himantura uarnak). A total of 2804 items were recovered from the stomachs of 170 rays and 3215 individual taxa from the environment, which were used in selectivity analyses. Twenty-four prey taxa were identified from stomach contents and pooled into 10 taxonomic categories for analysis, of which annelids, prawns, brachyurans and bivalves were the most abundant, together accounting for 96% of the diet. Himantura uarnak had the greatest interspecific dissimilarity in diet, consuming a larger proportion of crustaceans, notably penaeids (41% of total diet) than the other four species of rays, all of which had diets dominated by annelids (71-82% of total diet). Crustacean specialization by H. uarnak may exist to maximize resources and reduce competition among sympatric species. The remaining species may partition resources on the basis of space, rather than diet.

Molecular characterization of vancomycin-resistant enterococci from hospitalized patients and poultry products in The Netherlands.

Vancomycin-resistant enterococci (VRE) pose an emerging health risk, but little is known about the precise epidemiology of the genes coding for vancomycin resistance. To determine whether the bacterial flora of consumer poultry serves as a gene reservoir, the level of contamination of poultry products with VRE was determined. VRE were genotyped by pulsed-field gel electrophoresis (PFGE), and transposon structure mapping was done by PCR. The vanX-vanY intergenic regions of several strains were further analyzed by sequencing. A total of 242 of 305 (79%) poultry products were found to be contaminated with VRE. Of these VRE, 142 (59%) were high-level-vancomycin-resistant Enterococcus faecium strains (VREF). PFGE revealed extensive VREF heterogeneity. Two genotypes were found nationwide on multiple occasions: type A (22 of 142 VREF [15%]) and type B (14 of 142 VREF [10%]). No PFGE-deduced genetic overlap was found when VREF from humans were compared with VREF from poultry. Two vanA transposon types were identified among poultry strains. In 59 of 142 (42%) of the poultry VREF, the size of the intergenic region between vanX and vanY was approximately 1,300 bp. This transposon type was not found in human VREF. In contrast, all human strains and 83 of 142 (58%) of the poultry VREF contained an intergenic region 543 bp in size. Sequencing of this 543-bp intergenic vanX-vanY region demonstrated full sequence conservation. Though preliminary, these data suggest that dissemination of the resistance genes carried on transposable elements may be of greater importance than clonal dissemination of resistant strains. This observation is important for developing strategies to control the spread of glycopeptide resistance.

Antimycin binds to a small subunit of the ubiquinol: cytochrome c oxidoreductase.

Bovine heart ubiquinol: cytochrome c oxidoreductase in Triton X-100 is split with guanidine into a number of fractions. A new method for measuring antimycin binding is developed using extraction with pentanol of the reversibly bound antimycin. By this method and the normal titration method, antimycin-binding capacity is found in a fraction containing a small subunit with a molecular mass of about 12000. This polypeptide was associated with cytochrome c1 but is probably not the 'hinge protein'. Fractions that contain cytochrome b did not show binding by the pentanol-extraction method.