Western Ireland, located adjacent to the North Atlantic, and with a strongly oceanic climate, is potentially sensitive to rapid and extreme climate change. We present the first highresolution chironomid-inferred mean July temperature reconstruction for Ireland, spanning the lateglacial and early Holocene (LGIT, 15–10 ka BP). The reconstruction suggests an initial rapid warming followed by a sho...

Freshwater molluscs are hosts for diverse metazoan symbionts. However, apart from the digenean helminths, symbionts of underreported worldwide. Therefore, this study focused on diversity oligochaetes, leeches, mites, insect larvae and nematodes associated with gastropods bivalves Lake Victoria, East Africa. Overall, 1,633 mollusc specimens representing 14 species were sampled Kenyan part lake. ...

Abstract. Previous studies have shown that microbially produced methane can be a dominant carbon source of lacustrine sedimentary macrofauna in eutrophic lakes, most likely through grazing on methane-oxidizing bacteria. Here we investigate the contributions different sources to macrofaunal biomass across five lakes central Switzerland range from oligotrophic highly eutrophic. Macrofaunal commun...

Effects of gizzard shad Dorosoma cepedianum on benthic communities in a large southern reservoir (Lake Texoma, U.S.A.) were examined during two field enclosure and exclosure experiments in which enclosures were stocked at high and low densities in 1998 and 1999, respectively. In both years, chironomid abundance significantly increased in treatments that excluded large fishes from foraging on se...

Cholera, a life-threatening diarrhoeal disease, has afflicted human beings and shaped human history for over two millennia. The disease still kills thousands of people annually. Vibrio cholerae, the etiologic agent of cholera, is endemic to aquatic environments [1], but despite intensive research efforts its ecology remains an enigma. The fatal effects of cholera are mainly due to the toxin pro...

Macroinvertebrates are widespread in lake sediments and alter sedimentary properties through their activity (bioturbation). Understanding the interactions between bioturbation sediment is important given that lakes sinks sources of carbon nutrients. We studied biogeochemical impact macrofauna on surface 3-month-long mesocosm experiments conducted using cores from a hypoxic, macrofauna-free basi...

The locomotory kinematics of Chironomus plumosus larvae and pupae were investigated in order to determine how different locomotory techniques may be related to (a) possible underlying patterns of muscle activation and (b) the particular lifestyles and behaviours of these juvenile stages. Larvae display three independent modes of motile activity: swimming, crawling and whole-body respiratory und...