We investigated the feeding habits of the teiid lizard Cnemidophorus littoralis in the markedly seasonal habitat of Restinga da Barra de Maricá (22 degrees 57'S, 43 degrees 50'W), Rio de Janeiro State, Brazil, to evaluate to what extent its diet is ontogenetically, sexually, and/or seasonally conservative. Lizard stomach contents were analyzed, identified, counted, estimated for volume (in mm3)...

BACKGROUND Biotic stress induced by various herbivores and pathogens invokes plant responses involving different defense mechanisms. However, we do not know whether different biotic stresses share a common response or which signaling pathways are involved in responses to different biotic stresses. We investigated the common and specific responses of Arabidopsis thaliana to three biotic stress a...

Although animal-borne accelerometers are effective tools for quantifying the kinematics of animal behaviors, quantifying the burst movements of small and agile aquatic animals remains challenging. To capture the details of burst movements, accelerometers need to sample at a very high frequency, which will inevitably shorten the recording duration or increase the device size. To overcome this pr...

Hybridization between the introduced arborescent Opuntia ficus-indica and the native shrubby O. littoralis has led to populations, referred to as O. "occidentalis," which form thickets that can dominate hillsides of chaparral and that can survive fires. Because the thickets apparently develop via vegetative reproduction, O. "occidentalis" was hypothesized to have a greater ability than its pare...

Phytoremediation is an eco-friendly and low cost potential strategy for cleaning up of heavy metals from contaminated soils. Selection of promising plant is an important approach for successful phytoremediation. In two separate pot culture experiments, five levels of soil cadmium (Cd) concentrations as 15, 30, 60, 120 and 240 mg Cd kg soil and five levels of lead (Pb) including 500, 1000, 2000,...

The coastal herbs Glehnia littoralis have been domesticated as traditional medicines for many centuries. The domestication may have caused changes or declines of cultivated G. littoralis (CGL) relative to wild G. littoralis (WGL). By comparing fruit properties of CGL and WGL, we tested the hypothesis that domesticated G. littoralis have suffered major declines, and human cultivation cannot be s...

Juvenile hormone analog (JHA) insecticides are biological and structural mimics of JH, a key insect developmental hormone. Toxic and anti-developmental effects of the JHA insecticides methoprene, fenoxycarb, and pyriproxyfen were investigated on the larval and pupal stages of Spodoptera littoralis and Spodoptera frugiperda. Bioassays showed that fenoxycarb has the highest toxicity and fastest s...

The insect antifeedant and toxic activity of hydroxyperezone (1), its derivatives 2-9, along with 3-hydroxy- (10) and 6-hydroxythymoquinone (11) were studied against Spodoptera littoralis, Leptinotarsa decemlineata, and Myzus persicae. The antifeedant tests showed that L. decemlineata was the most sensitive insect, followed by M. persicae, while S. littoralis was not deterred by compounds 1-11....

Citation: Chen B, Sun C, Liang X, Lu X, Gao Q, Alonso-Pernas P, Teh B-S, Novoselov AL, Boland W and Shao Y (2016) Draft Genome Sequence of Enterococcus mundtii SL 16, an Indigenous Gut Bacterium of the Polyphagous Pest Spodoptera littoralis. Front. Microbiol. 7:1676. doi: 10.3389/fmicb.2016.01676 Draft Genome Sequence of Enterococcus mundtii SL 16, an Indigenous Gut Bacterium of the Polyphagous...

Genetic differentiation was studied among populations of the salt marsh beetle Pogonus littoralis (Coleoptera: Carabidae), comparing Atlantic and Mediterranean populations over a large part of its range. The genetic structure of this highly mobile beetle was investigated by studying allozyme polymorphism at nine enzyme loci in 13 populations. Mediterranean P. littoralis were highly significantl...