Understanding dispersal and habitat selection behaviours is central to many problems in ecology, evolution and conservation. One factor often hypothesized to influence habitat selection by dispersers is the natal environment experienced by juveniles. Nonetheless, evidence for the effect of natal environment on dispersing, wild vertebrates remains limited. Using 18 years of nesting and mark-resi...

During natal dispersal, young animals leave their natal area and search for a new area to live. In species in which individuals inhabit different types of habitat, experience with a natal habitat may increase the probability that a disperser will select the same type of habitat post-dispersal (natal habitat preference induction or NHPI). Despite considerable interest in the ecological and the e...

The functions of the TAF subunits of mammalian TFIID in physiological processes remain poorly characterised. In this study, we describe a novel function of TAFs in directing genomic occupancy of a transcriptional activator. Using liver-specific inactivation in mice, we show that the TAF4 subunit of TFIID is required for post-natal hepatocyte maturation. TAF4 promotes pre-initiation complex (PIC...

1. Hargreaves K. Rediscovery of An funestus in KwaZulu-Natal. Minutes of the KwaZulu-Natal Malaria Meeting, Richard’s Bay, 18-20 September 2000. 2. Barnes K. Malaria Advisory Group. Malaria in KwaZulu-Natal. Guidelines for the Diagnosis and Treatment of Uncomplicated Falciparum Malaria in KwaZulu. Falcon Press, 2001. 3. Bredenkamp BLF, Sharp BL, Mthembu SD, Durrheim DN, Barnes KI. Failure of su...

Background: To determine the association between pre-conception obesity and screening results of pre-natal and post-natal anxiety in women referred to the health centers of Tabriz, Iran. Methods: 62 obese (class 2-3) and 245 normal-weight women were enrolled in the first trimester of pregnancy through the cohort study and followed up 1 year after childbirth from December 2012 to January 2016. ...

BACKGROUND Most studies of the associations between pre-natal or post-natal growth and cognitive ability have been based on children with pathologically slow growth measured between two time points only, rather than children with normal growth trajectories estimated from multiple measures of growth. METHODS We investigated the associations of pre-natal and post-natal trajectories in both weig...

The distances that individuals disperse, from their natal site to the site of first breeding and between breeding sites, have important consequences for the dynamics and genetic structure of a population. Nearly all previous studies on dispersal have the problem that, because the study area encompassed only a part of the population, emigration may have been confounded with mortality. As a resul...

Optimal functioning of the hypothalamo-pituitary-adrenal (HPA) axis is paramount to maximizing fitness in vertebrates. Research in laboratory mammals has suggested that maternally-induced stress can cause significant variation in the responsiveness of an offspring's HPA axis involving both pre- and post-natal developmental mechanisms. However, very little is known regarding effects of maternal ...

Postgraduate student in Agricultural Economics, School of Agricultural, Earth and Environmental Sciences, University of KwaZulu-Natal, Private Bag X01, Scottsville 3209, Pietermaritzburg, South Africa. [email protected] 2 Professor of Agricultural Economics, School of Agricultural, Earth and Environmental Sciences, University of KwaZulu-Natal, Private Bag X01, Scottsville 3209, Pietermaritzbu...

Although female common marmosets typically do not breed while housed with their natal families, up to half ovulate at least once while housed with the intact natal family, and a similar proportion conceive if an unrelated adult male is present in the group. In this study, we investigated the behavioral and social correlates of escape from suppression of ovulation by daughters housed in intact n...