53 search results for “evolution biodiversity” in the Public website
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Snake genomes and toxin evolution
How did toxin genes evolve from harmless physiological genes?
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Why not sing? Reconstructing the evolution of female and male bird song
Female and male songbirds sing equally elaborate songs in some species, but in others, females do not sing like males or not at all. How did such pronounced differences in male and female communication evolve?
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Clock disruption in diurnal versus nocturnal migrating fish
Does Artifical Light at Night (ALAN) disrupt seasonal physiological and behavioral patterns in migrating freshwater fish?
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Invasive plant species, models for evolutionary change
Which traits did change due to the invasion process of plants and how do these traits contribute to the invasiveness of such species. What is the role of carbohydrate accumulation? What is the function of carbohydrate accumulation in plants? Is genetic variation depleted in invasive species under se…
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Sociaal gedrag als onderdeel van coping styles in zebravis
Zijn sociale aspecten van anxiety-like gedrag bij zeer jonge zebravissen al aanwezig? Zijn deze afhankelijk van de coping style (persoonlijkheid) van het individu? Zijn deze gedragingen endocrien te moduleren, bv door oxytocine?
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Bird behaviour and environmental health in the context of anthropogenic threats to wildlife and nature in China
We study the link between the acoustic, behavioral and physiological health of birds and prominent pollution factors. We aim to explore causation through experimental studies on detrimental factors like traffic noise, particulate matter and chemical toxins. Our primary target is scientific progress…
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Combination, variation and reproductive cues in vocalisations of the common marmoset (Callithrix jacchus)
How do common marmosets combine their calls into sequences and how are their vocalisations influenced by reproductive state?
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APELAFICO: Acoustic ecology of PELAgic FIsh COmmunities: A study into the effects of construction and operation of wind farms
Do offshore windfarms affect the local biodiversity of the pelagic fish community and are fish deterred or attracted by sounds?
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SATURN: Developing Solutions for Underwater Radiated Noise – Sound impact on migratory fishes
Do natural soundscapes affect migratory decisions of fishes moving up and down rivers and is this process disturbed by vessel sounds?
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The evolution of the diversity of secondary metabolites
Why do plants produces always produced so many slightly differing metabolites within a particular chemical class?
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Evolution and development of bitterling fish
How has early development in R. ocellatus been modified as a result of its parasitic embryonic lifestyle?
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The comparative biology of language learning
A theoretical project on the insights gained by human (including infant), nonhuman animal and computational studies on artificial grammar learning; identifying the critical questions for future research by developing novel experimental and computational approaches to address these issues.
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Perception of multidimensional speech sounds in humans and songbirds
Do humans and zebra finches share cognitive mechanisms that are important for speech perception?
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Neurogenomics of vocal learning
How does FoxP1 affect auditory perception on a behavioural and genomic level?
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DEEPSEA SOUND: pioneer explorations into biological relevance and anthropogenic disturbance
Are there acoustic cues for settlement stage larvae in deep-sea soundscapes around hydrothermal vents?
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Segments and rules: a comparative study on linguistic rule learning mechanisms
A central and much debated topic in the study of language acquisition concerns the nature of the learning mechanisms that are required. Are the computational and learning mechanisms that guide learning about language structure special and specific to language or humans?
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Regulation of vegetative development and life history strategy in plants
How is vegetative development regulated in plants and how does this affect a plant’s life history strategy?
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Urban ecology and avian acoustics: Function and evolution of birdsong in a changing world
Birds sing to be heard, but how do they cope with increasing noise levels? Which species persist in cities and why? And do they thrive or suffer in the urban soundscape?
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Cities have a direct influence on evolution
A global biological study has provided the most direct evidence to date that humans, and specifically cities, are the drivers of evolutionary change on Earth. Leiden University, Naturalis and the Municipality of Leiden worked on and helped fund the study.
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Cryptic species discovery
Do understudied animals contain hidden species?
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Resolving rapid radiations
What are the phylogenetic relationships among the members of speciation bursts?
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Microbial hitchhiking
How do nonmotile microbes leverage communal motility?
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Metabolic Characterization of Marine Sponge
Which metabolites of sponge are influenced by individual environmental or biological factors?
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Polar auxin transport: translating environmental signals into plant developmental responses
1. What is the exact role of PIN proteins in PAT? 2. How is PIN polarity established, and how is it modulated by AGC kinase-mediated phosphorylation? 3. What is the role of the AGC kinase, as modulators of PAT, in translating environmental signals, such as gravity, light or mechanical stress, to plant…
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Evolutionary traps – Balanced lethal systems
How do balanced lethal systems originate and persist in nature?
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The eel, a swimming paradox
Why is the swimming efficiency of the European eel higher than predicted?
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Dynamic biogeography – Hybrid zone movement
Does a moving hybrid zone leave a genomic footprint?
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Hybrid zones: a quick guide by Ben Wielstra
Ben Wielstra studies hybrid zones, regions in which distinct populations of organisms meet, mate and produce genetically admixed offspring. In the journal Current Biology, he introduces hybrid zones in an accessible way.
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The complicated conservation problem of genetic pollution
How does invasive hybridization affect threatened native species?
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Balanced lethal systems: a quick guide by Ben Wielstra
Ben Wielstra studies balanced lethal systems, in which half of the offspring die before birth. In the journal Current Biology, he explains in an accessible way how such a disadvantage can originate in nature.
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The serosa: an evolutionary novelty in insect eggs
What is the function of the insect serosa?
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‘Seeing voices’: the role of multimodal cues in vocal learning
Can birds - like people- ‘see’ voices and learn how to sing by listening and watching?
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Weathering the Ice Age
Where did species survive the cold cycles of the current Ice Age?
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Noise pollution affects marine life worldwide
Man-made sounds in and around the oceans stress marine life and have an impact on marine species and ecosystems by changing the underwater acoustic climate. Hans Slabbekoorn from the Institute of Biology Leiden pleads for technical solutions to mitigate problems of noise pollution. Science review paper…
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Collaborating bacteria sacrifice themselves for the greater good
Like ants, termites and bees, some bacteria work together as a multicellular group. There is a strict division of labour in such colonies, to make the group more resilient to the outside world. Now researchers have found that some parts of the bacterial colony can take ‘for the greater good’ to a whole…
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Ten thousand types of plant outgrowths bundled
For nine years he worked on the three-volume standard work Plant Galls of Europe. It yielded 2300 pages about 10,000 species of European galls, abnormal outgrowths in plants caused by parasites. Hans Roskam from the Institute of Biology Leiden: ‘The abundance of galls says something about the natural…
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Hans Slabbekoorn receives NWA grant to study fish around wind farms in the North Sea
The Dutch Research Council (NWO) awarded behavioural biologist Hans Slabbekoorn (Institute of Biology Leiden) a grant of 750,000 euros to study fish and sounds around wind farms in the North Sea.
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Evolution of bacterial movement revealed
An international team with researchers from Leiden revealed how a bacterium repurposed an internal system to control its movements. Movement control is very important in host invasion, which can lead to disease. Publication on 27 April in Nature Communications.
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Silva Nova – Restoring soil biology and soil functions to gain multiple benefits in new forests
We will study how inoculation of former arable land with soil (including the microbiome, soil fauna and seeds/rhizomes of ground flora) from old forests along with planting targeted tree species mixtures will improve productivity and more rapidly restore forest-adapted communities and ulttimately result…
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Plant ageing, rejuvenation and life history strategy
What are key regulators of plant ageing that can reverse ageing in plants (rejuvenation), and how can we use this knowledge to improve crop plants?
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Is it possible to avoid dehydration? Gene promotes wood formation
‘It was a discovery we did not expect,’ says Remko Offringa, professor of Plant developmental genetics. Today he publishes a new trait of a versatile gene in Current Biology: it makes the difference in plants between herbaceous and woody stem growth. A useful feature to prevent dehydration.
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Student hauls in NWO grant for research into 'rejuvenating gene'
Master's student Thalia Luden receives an NWO grant for her research proposal about a gene that brings flowering plants back into a growth phase. Companies in floriculture and vegetable seed breeding also contribute to the research.
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MIGRADROME: new study on the impact of vessel sound pollution on fish behaviour
Fishes rely heavily on sound to find their way during migration or dispersal. Many species are affected by noise pollution. Hans Slabbekoorn from the Institute of Biology Leiden received a HORIZON2020 grant of 500,000 euros to study the impact of sound conditions on movement decisions of fishes.
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A PCAD-model for fish to study the impact of airgun sound exposure on free-ranging cod
We are developing the conceptual framework, which is new to this taxonomic group, and evaluate the current state of the art with respect to all critical parameters and transfer functions for a fully developed Population Consequences of Acoustic Disturbance (PCAD) model.
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Unravelling the genes responsible for life history traits in the giant woody cabbage (Brassica oleracea)
Which genes are involved in woodiness and associated traits such as drought tolerance, flowering time, stem elongation, life span, and plant herbivory, and how do these gene regulatory pathways overlap?
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Snake venom glands grown in lab
For the first time, researchers were able to grow organoids from snake venom glands. The lab-grown 3-D structures can produce snake venom molecules. This is a major step in finding treatments to tackle snakebite, which causes over 100,000 deaths each year. Publication in top journal Cell.
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Longevity gene discovered in plants
Harvesting rice from the same field, without planting new rice plants? A discovery may bring this scenario closer. Leiden scientists have discovered a gene that allows annual plants to grow after flowering, instead of dying. Publication on 13 April in Nature Plants.
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Producing new plants without sowing
Producing offspring of a crop without sowing and that is even bigger than the parent plant. According to Leiden researchers this can be achieved by overstimulating a single gene that rejuvenates cells, including bringing them back to the embryonic phase.
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‘Unimportant’ plant gene turns out to be essential
Leiden biologists have shown that a gene present in plants, animals and yeasts does play an important role in plants, although for years the gene was considered unimportant. It turns out the gene plays a crucial role in the development of vascular tissue in plants. Publication in Nature Plants on 11…
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Altruism in bacteria: colonies divide the work
Bacteria found in soil specialise in the colony by division of labour. Some of the bacteria produce antibiotics, even when it comes at the expense of their individual reproduction success, to defend their colony against competitors. Publication in Science Advances.