Botulism is a human and animal neurological disease caused by the action of bacterial neurotoxins (botulinum toxins) produced by bacteria from the genus Clostridium. This disease induces flaccid paralysis that can result in respiratory paralysis and heart failure. Due to its serious potential impact on public health, botulism is a closely monitored notifiable disease in France through a case-based passive surveillance system. In humans, this disease is rare, with an average of 10 outbreaks reported each year, mainly due to the consumption of contaminated foods. Type B and to a lesser extend type A are responsible for the majority of cases of foodborne botulism. Each year, an average of 30 outbreaks are recorded on poultry farms, about 20 cases in wild birds and about 10 outbreaks in cattle, involving a large number of animals. Mosaic forms C/D and D/C in birds and cattle, respectively, are the predominant types in animals in France. Types C and D have also been observed to a lesser extent in animals. With the exception of botulinum toxin E, which was exceptionally detected throughout the period in wild birds, the types of botulism found in animal outbreaks are different from those identified in human outbreaks over the last ten years in France and no human botulism outbreaks investigated have been linked to animal botulism. In line with the One Health concept, we present the first integrative approach to the routine surveillance of botulism in humans and animals in France.
The pace-of-life syndrome (POLS) hypothesis is an extended concept of the life-history theory that includes behavioural traits. The studies challenging the POLS hypothesis often focus on the relationships between a single personality trait and a physiological and/or life-history trait. While pathogens represent a major selective pressure, few studies have been interested in testing relationships between behavioural syndrome, and several fitness components including immunity. The aim of this study was to address this question in the mealworm beetle, Tenebrio molitor, a model species in immunity studies. The personality score was estimated from a multidimensional syndrome based of four repeatable behavioural traits. In a first experiment, we investigated its relationship with two measures of fitness (reproduction and survival) and three components of the innate immunity (haemocyte concentration, and levels of activity of the phenoloxidase including the total proenzyme and the naturally activated one) to challenge the POLS hypothesis in T. molitor. Overall, we found a relationship between behavioural syndrome and reproductive success in this species, thus supporting the POLS hypothesis. We also showed a sex-specific relationship between behavioural syndrome and basal immune parameters. In a second experiment, we tested whether this observed relationship with innate immunity could be confirmed in term of differential survival after challenging by entomopathogenic bacteria, Bacillus thuringiensis. In this case, no significant relationship was evidenced. We recommend that future researchers on the POLS should control for differences in evolutionary trajectory between sexes and to pay attention to the choice of the proxy used, especially when looking at immune traits.
The phenology of plants is a major driver of agro-ecosystem processes and biosphere feedbacks to the climate system. Phenology models are classically used in ecology and agronomy to project future phenological changes. With our increasing understanding of the environmental cues affecting bud development, phenology models also increase in complexity. But, we expect these cues, and the underlying physiological processes, to have varying influence on bud break date predictions depending on the specific weather patterns in winter and spring. Here, we evaluated the parameter sensitivity of state-of-the-art process-based phenology models that have been widely used to predict forest tree species phenology. We used sensitivity analysis to compare the behavior of models with increasing complexity under specific climatic conditions. We thus assessed whether the influence of the parameters and modeled processes on predictions varies with winter and spring temperatures. We found that the prediction of the bud break date was mainly affected by the response to forcing temperature under current climatic conditions. However, the impact of the parameters driving the response to chilling temperatures and to photoperiod on the prediction of the models increased with warmer winter and spring temperatures. Interaction effects between parameters played an important role on the prediction of models, especially for the most complex models, but did not affect the relative influence of parameters on bud break dates. Our results highlighted that a stronger focus should be given to the characterization of the reaction norms to both forcing and chilling temperature to predict accurately bud break dates in a larger range of climatic conditions and evaluate the evolutionary potential of phenological traits with climate change.
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