Re: [ECOLOG-L] Change in linear dimensions of soft tissues in larval insect when fixed

[James Bess]

Hi All,

Ethanol definitely causes shrinkage in invert specimens, particularly 
soft-bodied immatures.  KAAD is a “larval fixative” that causes the body to 
expand (somewhat beyond normal parameters), making them appear “inflated”.  I 
do not know if there is a standard for the percentage of shrinkage/inflation.

Jim

From: Malcolm McCallum 
Sent: Sunday, September 18, 2016 9:38 PM
To: ECOLOG-L@LISTSERV.UMD.EDU 
Subject: Re: [ECOLOG-L] Change in linear dimensions of soft tissues in larval 
insect when fixed

Soft body parts will have signficant shrinkage.  This has been demonstrated 
conclusively with vertebrates, specifically with larval and juvenile fishes.  
With vertebrates, as they get larger, the signficance of this shrinkage tends 
to be less.  I would expect similar results with inverts, except that there is 
actually a lot more softbody exoskeleton in most inverts than we typically 
consider.  THere should be papers demonstrating shrinkage in invertebrates, 
however, I would be pretty surprised if you find much information on 
larviformes.  My expectation is that larvae are going to have huge amounts of 
shrinkage.   

I would expect adult coleoptera, particularly Scarabidae, Cuculionidae, 
Carabidae, Erotylidae, Coccinelidae, and other typical beetle forms to have 
minimal shrinkage 
Stapholyindae  probably show much more as adults. 
Orthoptera undoubtedly shrink in body length, I would not be surprised if some 
shrink more than 10%.  
Related Mantoidea (I think it is now an Order rather than family), and other 
orthopteran like families will behave similarly. 
Odonates may shrink a ton, Hemiptera are probably variable like Coleoptera, 
ditto for the leafhoppers and cicadas
Hymenoptera and Diptera probably shrink a bit as adults, but some families more 
so than others.  
Larvae and nymphs will probably shrink pretty bad for all groups. 

Crustaceans may not shrink much at all thanks to the calciferous exoskeleton, 
but again this will depend as something like a hermit crab sill show a lot of 
abdominal shrinkage. 

I am sure the invertebrate biologists will know a lot more about this than me.  
These are largely wha

On Fri, Sep 16, 2016 at 2:43 PM, Jorge A. Santiago-Blay  
wrote:

  Change in linear dimensions of soft tissues in larval insect when fixed 


  Dear Ecolog-Listers: 


  I have nearly ca. 200 museum specimens of aquatic larval insects (1-3 cm 
long) that I assume were killed by dumping them in (at the minimum) 70% 
ethanol. In the only one case that the label states anything about preservation 
method, it reads "KAAD --> 95%". I assume that several changes in ethanol 70% 
have taken place to refill vials, as needed, in the 48-77 years since the 
specimens have been dead. 




  Question: While the hard body parts will barely change in dimension with 
time, does anyone know how does the softer body parts change in size? Is there 
any variation in size change whether the preservation took place early or late 
in the instar?




  If you have any constructive suggestions, please email me directly at 


  blayjo...@gmail.com



  Apologies for potential duplicate emails.


  Gratefully,


  Jorge

  Jorge A. Santiago-Blay, PhD
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Aquaculture and Water Quality Research Scientist
School of Agriculture and Applied Sciences

Langston University
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[ECOLOG-L] Plant Info

[James Bess]

Hi All,

My go to plant info site is the USDA Plants Database:
http://plants.usda.gov/java/

always check the “related links” folder for additional info/sites.

For most wildflowers, the Lady Bird Johnson Wildflower Center Native Plant 
Information Network” has a lot of info on plants, propagation and sources for 
livestock, see:
http://www.wildflower.org/explore.php

Using Jason’s example of Achlys, the following sources for seed were found:
http://www.nativeseednetwork.org/viewtaxon?taxon_code=ACTR

While there may not be published papers on seed germination/propagation, these 
native seed sources usually have very helpful information regarding propagation 
of native species.

For those of you on the Pacific Coast, the Jepson Online Interchange of 
California Floristics at the University of California: Berkley has extensive 
info on native west coast plants:
http://ucjeps.berkeley.edu/interchange/index.html

Again, using Jason’s example, here is info. on Achlys triphylla:
http://ucjeps.berkeley.edu/cgi-bin/get_cpn.pl?ACTR

There is also the Flora of North America:
http://www.efloras.org/flora_page.aspx?flora_id=1

and plants of California at CalFlora:
http://www.calflora.org/

here is an example from CalFlora for info on nursery sources (and likely 
propagation info.) for Achlys triphylla:
http://www.cnplx.info/nplx/species?taxon=Achlys+triphylla

Best of luck with your book!

Jim

[ECOLOG-L] Bad Pubs

[James Bess]

Hello Lui (and everyone else),
Recently, there have also been the following pubs that made it through review 
to publication but were later retracted or highly criticized/found to be 
fraudulent.  The Obokata, Hwang and Chapela papers have received a lot of 
review/conversation on-line and elsewhere:
Stem Cell Research
Haruko Obokata, Teruhiko Wakayama, Yoshiki Sasai, Koji Kojima, Martin P. 
Vacanti, Hitoshi Niwa,  Masayuki Yamato  Charles A. Vacanti.  2014.  
Stimulus-triggered fate conversion of somatic cells into pluripotency.  Nature  
505, 641–647 (30 January 2014) doi:10.1038/nature12968 Received  10 March 2013  
Accepted  20 December 2013  Published online  29 January 2014.



[see write-up HERE]



Hwang WS1, Roh SI, Lee BC, Kang SK, Kwon DK, Kim S, Kim SJ, Park SW, Kwon HS, 
Lee CK, Lee JB, Kim JM, Ahn C, Paek SH, Chang SS, Koo JJ, Yoon HS, Hwang JH, 
Hwang YY, Park YS, Oh SK, Kim HS, Park JH, Moon SY, Schatten G.  2005.  
Patient-specific embryonic stem cells derived from human SCNT blastocysts.  
Science. 2005 Jun 17; 308(5729): 1777-83. Epub 2005 May 19.



[see write-up on gross misconduct, etc HERE]

Tachibana M, Amato P, Sparman M, Gutierrez NM, Tippner-Hedges R, Ma H, Kang E, 
Fulati A, Lee HS, Sritanaudomchai H, Masterson K, Larson J, Eaton D, 
Sadler-Fredd K, Battaglia D, Lee D, Wu D, Jensen J, Patton P, Gokhale S, 
Stouffer RL, Wolf D, Mitalipov S. Human embryonic stem cells derived by somatic 
cell nuclear transfer. Cell. 2013 Jun 6;153(6):1228-38. PMID: 23683578

[see editorial in nature HERE]


Transgenic Corn
Judy A. Carman, Howard R. Vlieger, Larry J. Ver Steeg, Verlyn E. Sneller, Garth 
W. Robinson, Catherine A. Clinch-Jones, Julie I. Haynes, John W. Edwards.  
2013.  A long-term toxicology study on pigs fed a combined genetically modified 
(GM) soy and GM maize diet.  Journal of Organic Systems vol. 8.  No. 1.



[see editorial on this and other bad GMO science HERE]





Quist D, Chapela I.  2001. Transgenic DNA introgressed into traditional maize 
landraces in Oaxaca, Mexico.  Nature 414 (6863): 541–3. doi:10.1038/35107068. 
PMID 11734853.



see rebuttals in:


Kaplinsky N, Braun D, Lisch D, Hay A, Hake S, Freeling M (April 2002). 
Biodiversity (Communications Arising): maize transgene results in Mexico are 
artefacts. Nature 416 (6881): 601–2; discussion 600, 602. 
Bibcode:2002Natur.416..601K. doi:10.1038/nature739. PMID 11935145


Ortiz-Garcia, S. 2005. Absence of detectable transgenes in local landraces of 
maize in Oaxaca, Mexico (2003-2004). Proceedings of the National Academy of 
Sciences 102 (35): 12338-12343.  Bibcode: 2005PNAS. 10212338O. 
doi:10.1073/pnas.0503356102. PMC 1184035. PMID 16093316.





Best of luck with your class!



Jim