1 Section of Infectious Diseases, Yale University School of Medicine, New Haven, CT 06512, USA 2Department of Biological Sciences, University of Southern Mississippi, Hattiesburg, MS 39406, USA 3Department of Basic Medical Sciences, School of Medicine, Tsinghua University, Beijing 100084, China 4 Institute of Biology and Medical Sciences, Jiangsu Key Laboratory of Infection and Immunity, Soocho...

Scrub typhus is an infectious disease caused by Orientia tsutsugamushi, which has significant prevalence in eastern and Southeast Asia, such as Japan, Taiwan, Korea, and China. Scrub typhus is a public health issue in Asia, where one billion people may be at risk from the disease. In Guangzhou, the biggest city in south China, located in the southern subtropical region, scrub typhus is becoming...

H. S. Fung, H. H. Wu, T. S. Yih, T. K. Fang, and T. N. Chang Department of Physics, National Central University, Chung-Li, Taiwan, Republic of China 32054 Institute of Atomic and Molecular Sciences, Academia Sinica, P.O. Box 23-166, Taipei, Taiwan, Republic of China 10764 Department of Physics and Astronomy, University of Southern California, Los Angeles, California 90089-0484 ~Received 11 May ...

Megabatrus caviceps Löbl, originally described from Kuatun, Fou-kien (= Guadun, Fujian), eastern China, is recorded from the Nanling Nature Reserve, Guangdong, southern China, ca. 550 km SW from the type locality. The female of this species is discovered and described for the first time. For comparative purposes, male diagnostic characters of M. caviceps are figured and supplementary descriptio...

Two new species of the ant-like stone beetle genus Syndicus Motschulsky (Scydmaeninae: Cyrtoscydmini) from the Hainan Island, southern China are described: S. (Semisyndicus) grossepunctatus sp. n. and S. (Semisyndicus) hainanicus sp. n. The previously unknown female of S. (Semisyndicus) schuelkei is discovered, and its spermatheca is illustrated. Syndicus (s. str.) jaloszynskii is newly recorde...

A new species of the insect order Zoraptera, Zorotypus hainanensis sp. n., is described from southern China based on apterous adults, which represents a fourth species of the genus in China. Additional collection data for Z. medoensis Hwang in Xizang (= Tibet) is provided. Illustrations of the major diagnostic features of both the new species and Z. medoensis are provided, and their taxonomic p...

This study reports four sporadic cases of H3N2 canine influenza in Southern China, which were identified from sick dogs from May 2006 to October 2007. The evolutionary analysis showed that all eight segments of these four viruses are avian-origin and phylogenetically close to the H3N2 canine influenza viruses reported earlier in South Korea. Systematic surveillance is required to monitor the di...

The non-marine trigonioidid bivalves show five phases of radiation in the Cretaceous of Pal-Asia: pre-Aptian (?Valanginian/Hauterivian-Barremian), Aptian, Albian, Cenomanian and Turonian-Maastrichtian. Their distribution patterns show two distinct palaeo-river systems feeding trigonioidids. Before the Cenomanian, the river system occupied the southwestern-southern-southeastern Pal-Asian contine...

The larvae of the diamondback moth, Plutella xylostella, cause major economic losses to cruciferous crops, including cabbage, which is an important vegetable crop in China. In this study, we used the mitochondrial COI gene and 11 ISSR markers to characterize the genetic structure and seasonal migration routes of 23 P. xylostella populations in China. Both the mitochondrial and nuclear markers r...

Genital herpes caused by herpes simplex virus (HSV) infection is one of the most prevalent sexually transmitted infections (STIs) and the most common cause of genital ulcer disease (GUD) in developed and developing countries. The monitoring of HSV-2 seroprevalence in pregnant women can identify women at a higher risk of HIV and of neonatal HSV transmission. Very few data are available on type s...