Issues

Summary: This Review highlights our understanding of postnatal neurogenesis in reptiles in comparison to mammals. Research in reptiles will help to address the mechanisms of postnatal neurogenesis and place it within a functional and evolutionary context.

Summary: Thermogenic UCP1 was pseudogenized much earlier than previously thought, in a common ancestor of peccaries and pigs, providing the molecular rationale for cold sensitivity and current tropical biogeography among extant peccaries.

Summary: Honey bees can learn arbitrary relationships between shapes and colours, but not between shapes and durations of light, indicating a lower efficiency of temporal information as a cueing stimulus.

Summary: Bank voles from lines selected in distinct directions do not differ in corticosterone response to stress, but the maximum response and the rate of recovery differ to some extent.

Summary: Intertidal sea urchins adhere to avoid dislodgement by intense hydrodynamic forces; this adhesion is plastic and varies as a function of rock type and native population.

Highlighted Article: The threatened seabird the Atlantic puffin has a comparatively sensitive audiogram, indicating it has fully functioning aerial hearing despite the constraints of its deep-diving, amphibious lifestyle.

Summary: We unveil an exciting new facet of the integration between the immune and circulatory systems of insects, whereby hemocyte-produced nitric oxide drives the infection-induced reduction of mosquito heart rate.

Summary: The addition and subtraction of serial sarcomeres induced by downhill and uphill running, respectively, does not influence the magnitude of lengthening-induced residual force enhancement and shortening-induced residual force depression.

Editor's choice: Enabled by its highly flexible wings, the swimming pteropod Cuvierina atlantica generates thrust by using a novel cylindrical ‘overlap-and-fling’ maneuver twice during each wingstroke.

Highlighted Article: CO₂ was thought to act as an anaesthetic producing elevated bioluminescence in Arachnocampa; however, results show that it acts directly on the light organ and does not act as an anaesthetic.

Summary: The gills of rainbow trout as a key organ in solute exchange harbor a diversity of functional ABC transporters.

Summary: Survival of Caenorhabditis elegans worms is associated with pharyngeal pump function that cannot be lost at high viscosity, which may contribute to their ability to survive in highly viscous environments.

Summary: Jaw dysfunctions are generally deleterious, but zebrafish mutants lacking jaw joints survive and dramatically alter their skull shape and feeding, developing superficial resemblance to distantly related jawless vertebrates.

Summary: Relative brain size affects differences in advanced learning ability in small- and large-brained female guppies; however, regardless of brain size, they do not learn a generalized rule from earlier experience.

Summary: Counter to previous proposals, a block of memory retrieval does occur for a non-declarative memory in invertebrates and can be relieved through an injection of propranolol.

Summary: Experimental simulation of natural stressful developmental conditions reveals that glucocorticoid hormones induce telomere shortening by decreasing mitochondrial efficiency without altering oxidative stress, suggesting that telomeres are costly to maintain.

Highlighted Article: The crayfish tail creates a vortex during the escape response. Momentum is added by the ventral pleopod appendages.

Summary: High agility and body condition are advantageous for survival in female endangered northern quolls; development of predictive models that incorporate both predator and prey locomotor performance will give greater understanding on the vulnerability of native species to introduced predators.

Summary: Antlions construct pitfall traps in fine sand to catch their prey. Three-dimensional laser scanning was used for the first time to analyse the shape of an unusual antlion pit.