环境对阿尔茨海默病病因影响

阿尔茨海默病是一种发生于老年人群的原发生退行性脑病。目前，关于ＡＤ病研究中的中心问题是弄清楚其发病的病理，如果可以抑制的一步和几步，将减缓或防止其发病，因此搞清ＡＤ病的发病机理对预防和治疗ＡＤ病相当重要。     

Biodiversity and biotechnology

The maintenance of biodiversity is urged from many quarters and on grounds ranging from aesthetic considerations to its usefulness, particularly for biotechnology. But regardless of the grounds for preserving biodiversity, writers are generally in agreement that it should be preserved. But, in examining the various references biodiversity, such as species diversity, genetic diversity, and habitat diversity, it is apparent that we cannot aim to preserve biodiversityas such, since there are a number of conflicts in any such undertaking. In preserving one aspect of biodiversity, we damage another aspect. Five arguments which attempt to ground our moral concern for biodiversity are reviewed and critiqued, not only for their consistency but also for their power to move us to action. The final section of the paper shows how conflicts in the values of personal and environmental health can impair ethical action and especially policy formation.An earlier version of this paper was read at the conference on Agriculture, Food, and Human Values: Tradition and Change, Orlando, Florida, October 7–9, 1987.     

Effects of Weighting Schemes on the Identification of Wildlife Corridors Generated with Least‐Cost Methods

The importance of movement corridors for maintaining connectivity within metapopulations of wild animals is a cornerstone of conservation. One common approach for determining corridor locations is least‐cost corridor (LCC) modeling, which uses algorithms within a geographic information system to search for routes with the lowest cumulative resistance between target locations on a landscape. However, the presentation of multiple LCCs that connect multiple locations generally assumes all corridors contribute equally to connectivity, regardless of the likelihood that animals will use them. Thus, LCCs may overemphasize seldom‐used longer routes and underemphasize more frequently used shorter routes. We hypothesize that, depending on conservation objectives and available biological information, weighting individual corridors on the basis of species‐specific movement, dispersal, or gene flow data may better identify effective corridors. We tested whether locations of key connectivity areas, defined as the highest 75th and 90th percentile cumulative weighted value of approximately 155,000 corridors, shift under different weighting scenarios. In addition, we quantified the amount and location of private land that intersect key connectivity areas under each weighting scheme. Some areas that appeared well connected when analyzed with unweighted corridors exhibited much less connectivity compared with weighting schemes that discount corridors with large effective distances. Furthermore, the amount and location of key connectivity areas that intersected private land varied among weighting schemes. We believe biological assumptions and conservation objectives should be explicitly incorporated to weight corridors when assessing landscape connectivity. These results are highly relevant to conservation planning because on the basis of recent interest by government agencies and nongovernmental organizations in maintaining and enhancing wildlife corridors, connectivity will likely be an important criterion for prioritization of land purchases and swaps. Efectos de los Esquemas de Ponderación sobre la Identificación de Corredores para Vida Silvestre Generados con Métodos Menos Costosos     

锌对果蝇寿命及生殖力的影响及其可遗传性

为了分析微量元素锌对动物体寿命和生殖力的影响及这种影响是否具有可遗传性,以黑腹果蝇(Drosophila melanogaster)Canton S品系为材料,应用生存试验及统计分析方法检测不同质量浓度锌处理亲代果蝇后,亲代果蝇及其未受处理F1代果蝇寿命和生殖力变化。结果表明,培养基中添加质量浓度为0.026 g/L、0.052 g/L、0.104 g/L的锌均可延长亲代及未受处理F1代果蝇平均寿命、中间寿命、最高寿命及90%死亡时间,并增强其生殖力,其中0.052g/L质量浓度影响最为明显。添加高质量浓度(0.260g/L)锌可使亲代果蝇缩短寿命、丧失生殖能力。表明适当质量浓度的锌可以延长果蝇寿命,增强其生殖力,并且这种影响可遗传到子一代。     

微卫星标记技术在淡水腹足类种群遗传学研究中的应用

综述了淡水腹足类微卫星位点的获取方法、微卫星重复序列的特点以及微卫星标记技术在其种群遗传学研究中的应用,着重分析了微卫星多态性在淡水腹足类种群遗传多样性、种群遗传结构、遗传分化、交配系统、种群关系研究中的应用.淡水腹足类普遍表现为杂合体缺失,种群遗传多样性降低.淡水腹足类近交和自体受精现象比较频繁以及地理隔离导致种群间遗传分化.利用微卫星标记研究遗传杂合度,结合群体近交系数和基因分化系数在一定程度上反映了淡水腹足类的交配系统.根据不同种群的遗传距离和相似性进行聚类分析在判别种群间的亲缘关系上起到了很大作用.针对淡水腹足类自身的特性,微卫星分子标记技术在淡水腹足类入侵生物学、分类阶元,寄生虫的分子流行病学等研究领域有广泛的应用前景.     

It is also in our nature: Genetic influences on work characteristics and in explaining their relationships with well‐being

Work design research typically views employee work characteristics as being primarily determined by the work environment and has thus paid less attention to the possibility that the person may also influence employee work characteristics and in turn accounts for the work characteristics–well‐being relationships through selection. Challenging this conventional view, we investigated the role of a fundamental individual difference variable—people's genetic makeup—in affecting work characteristics (i.e., job demands, job control, social support at work, and job complexity) and in explaining why work characteristics relate to subjective and physical well‐being. Our findings based on a national US twin sample show sizable genetic influences on job demands, job control, and job complexity, but not on social support at work. Such genetic influences were partly attributed to genetic factors associated with core self‐evaluations. Both genetic and environmental influences accounted for the relationships between work characteristics and well‐being, but to varying degrees. The results underscore the importance of the person, in addition to the work environment, in influencing employee work characteristics and explaining the underlying nature of the relationships between employee work characteristics and their well‐being. Copyright © 2016 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.     

Complex effects of habitat amount and fragmentation on functional connectivity and inbreeding in a giant panda population

The relationships between habitat amount and fragmentation level and functional connectivity and inbreeding remain unclear. Thus, we used genetic algorithms to optimize the transformation of habitat area and fragmentation variables into resistance surfaces to predict genetic structure and examined habitat area and fragmentation effects on inbreeding through a moving window and spatial autoregressive modeling approach. We applied these approaches to a wild giant panda population. The amount of habitat and its level of fragmentation had nonlinear effects on functional connectivity (gene flow) and inbreeding. Functional connectivity was highest when approximately 80% of the surrounding landscape was habitat. Although the relationship between habitat amount and inbreeding was also nonlinear, inbreeding increased as habitat increased until about 20% of the local landscape contained habitat, after which inbreeding decreased as habitat increased. Because habitat fragmentation also had nonlinear relationships with functional connectivity and inbreeding, we suggest these important responses cannot be effectively managed by minimizing or maximizing habitat or fragmentation. Our work offers insights for prioritization of protected areas.     

The immediate costs and long-term benefits of assisted gene flow in large populations

With the genetic health of many plant and animal populations deteriorating due to climate change outpacing adaptation, interventions, such as assisted gene flow (AGF), may provide genetic variation necessary for populations to adapt to climate change. We ran genetic simulations to mimic different AGF scenarios in large populations and measured their outcomes on population-level fitness to determine circumstances in which it is worthwhile to perform AGF. In the absence of inbreeding depression, AGF was beneficial within a few generations only when introduced genotypes had much higher fitness than local individuals and traits affecting fitness were controlled by a few genes of large effect. AGF was harmful over short periods (e.g., first ∼10–20 generations) if there was strong outbreeding depression or introduced deleterious genetic variation. When the adaptive trait was controlled by many loci of small effect, the benefits of AGF took over 10 generations to realize—potentially too long for most climate-related management scenarios. The genomic integrity of the recipient population typically remained intact following AGF; the amount of genetic material from the donor population usually constituted no more of the recipient population's genome than the fraction of the population introduced. Significant genomic turnover (e.g., >50% replacement) only occurred when the selective advantage of the adaptive trait and translocation fraction were extremely high. Our results will be useful when adaptive management is used to maintain the genetic health and productivity of large populations under climate change.     

The wild ancestors of domestic animals as a neglected and threatened component of biodiversity

Domestic animals have immense economic, cultural, and practical value and have played pivotal roles in the development of human civilization. Many domesticates have, among their wild relatives, undomesticated forms representative of their ancestors. Resurgent interest in these ancestral forms has highlighted the unclear genetic status of many, and some are threatened with extinction by hybridization with domestic conspecifics. We considered the contemporary status of these ancestral forms relative to their scientific, practical, and ecological importance; the varied impacts of wild–domestic hybridization; and the challenges and potential resolutions involved in conservation efforts. Identifying and conserving ancestral forms, particularly with respect to disentangling patterns of gene flow from domesticates, is complex because of the lack of available genomic and phenotypic baselines. Comparative behavioral, ecological, and genetic studies of ancestral-type, feral, and domestic animals should be prioritized to establish the contemporary status of the former. Such baseline information will be fundamental in ensuring successful conservation efforts.