Eurasian beavers in Central Italy: perceptions in the local community.

According to the IUCN guidelines, wildlife reintroduction should consider any impacts on humans within feasibility assessments. Eurasian beavers Castor fiber are recovering across their native range, due to protection laws and reintroductions. In Central Italy, a self-sustaining, naturalised population of Eurasian beavers has been identified in the last five years. A questionnaire to measure whether and how citizens in the local area perceive the presence of the beaver was administered to 1114 respondents. We observed a comprehensive awareness of the presence of the beaver in Italy and a high ability to distinguish it from non-native coypus Myocastor coypus (92.3%). We also recorded a general high knowledge of issues related to the presence of the beaver (i.e., potential effects on indigenous biodiversity). The majority (65.5%) of the surveyed population was in favour of reintroducing the beaver in Central Italy, and only 1.2% was firmly against it. The majority of interviewed people was against the removal of beavers from Central Italy (65.8%), whereas only 3.7% was in favor, citing fears of perceived impacts on the river, crops, and fish populations.

Temporal Activity Patterns of the Eurasian Beaver and Coexisting Species in a Mediterranean Ecosystem.

Analyses of temporal partitioning and overlaps in activity rhythms are pivotal to shed light on interspecific coexistence between similar species or prey and predators. In this work, we assessed the overlap of activity rhythms between the Eurasian beaver Castor fiber and its potential competitors and predators through camera trapping in an area in Central Italy. Interspecific overlaps of temporal activity patterns were estimated for the beavers, potential predators (the red fox Vulpes vulpes and the grey wolf Canis lupus), and a potential competitor, the coypu Myocastor coypus. The beavers showed a mostly crepuscular behaviour. Although high temporal overlap was observed between the Eurasian beavers and the red foxes and grey wolves, the activity of the beavers did not overlap with that of the predators. Accordingly, the beavers were more active on the darkest nights, i.e., avoiding bright moonlight.

Biological meaning of ubiquitination and DNA fragmentation in human spermatozoa.

The ubiquitin-proteasome is an ubiquitous system mainly devoted to protein degradation. The presence of ubiquitinated proteins in male gametes suggests a role for this system also in reproduction. Available evidence indicate that ubiquitin in spermatozoa may have a role in semen quality control, as ubiquitinated defective spermatozoa in the epididymis are subsequently phagocytosed by epididymal epithelial cells. Moreover, a role both in the regulation of mitochondrial inheritance in mammals (paternal mitochondria are eliminated and their ubiquitination appears to be important for this process) and in sperm-oocyte interaction at fertilization (which is inhibited by an inhibitor of proteasome) have been also suggested. We found that both morphologically normal and abnormal human spermatozoa in semen may be ubiquitinated and that the percentage of ubiquitinated sperm in the ejaculate positively correlates with normal morphology and motility, suggesting that sperm ubiquitination may have a positive role in sperm functions. It remains to be defined if and which patterns of ubiquitination of spermatozoa may distinguish between the different biological functions of this system. In an attempt to answer this question, we set up a method to detect simultaneously ubiquitination and DNA fragmentation by FACScan since the latter parameter is related to a poor quality of semen; in particular, abnormal morphology. We found that DNA fragmented human spermatozoa are also ubiquitinated. Studies are in progress to determine the correlation between the fraction of ubiquitinated-non DNA fragmented spermatozoa and parameters of semen analysis.