Urban grasslands, landscapes dominated by turfgrasses for aesthetic or recreational groundcovers, are rapidly expanding in the United States and globally. These managed ecosystems are often less diverse than the natural or agricultural lands they replace, leading to potential losses in ecosystem functioning. Research in non-urban systems has provided evidence for increases in multiple ecosystem...

In the first few years of life children spend a good proportion of time sleeping as well as acquiring the meanings of hundreds of words. There is now ample evidence of the effects of sleep on memory in adults and the number of studies demonstrating the effects of napping and nocturnal sleep in children is also mounting. In particular, sleep appears to benefit children's memory for recently-enco...

The seminal fluid that is transferred along with sperm during mating acts in many ways to maximize a male's reproductive success. Here, we use transgenic Drosophila melanogaster males deficient in the seminal fluid proteins derived from the accessory gland (Acps) to investigate the role of these proteins in the fate of sperm transferred to females during mating. Competitive PCR assays were used...

The purpose of writing this review on gastroretentive drug delivery systems was to compile the recent literature with special focus on various gastroretentive approaches that have recently become leading methodologies in the field of site-specific orally administered controlled release drug delivery. In order to understand various physiological difficulties to achieve gastric retention, we have...

INTRODUCTION In 2008, the Canadian Medical Association (CMA) conducted a survey of rural practitioners. The survey covered incentives to choose rural medicine, current satisfaction, plans for future migration and strategies for retention. METHODS The CMA Canadian Collaborative Centre for Physician Resources, in collaboration with the Society of Rural Physicians of Canada, surveyed 1960 rural ...

Did you know there are numerous species of bat, 963 in all, making them second behind the rodents as the mammalian Order with the most number of species. The question addressed in this study was to focus on the ecology of bat reproduction and the many reproductive strategies that bats have evolved throughout time, such as: delayed ovulation, delayed implantation and sperm storage. Every bat spe...

As evidenced by the articles in this volume, a recent increase in interest in the mating systems of poikilothermic vertebrates has focused primarily on fishes, a few amphibians, and squamate reptiles. Turtles by contrast have received relatively little attention, yet they display a wide variety of mating behaviors and life-history characteristics that make them excellent candidates for addressi...

This article provides an overview of acute urinary retention (AUR), which can cause patients severe pain and distress. It examines potential causes and risk factors. The main strategies for the treatment and clinical management of patients are discussed. Nurses have a key role in identifying patients at risk of AUR. Therefore, the nursing role in assessment and management is explored.

The speed and the minimum carrying capacity needed for a successful population expansion into new territory are addressed using a reaction-diffusion model. The model is able to encapsulate a rich collection of ecological behaviours, including the Allee effect, resource depletion due to consumption, dispersal adaptation due to population pressure, biological control agents, and a range of breedi...

Gamete production for both males and females can be energetically expensive such that selection should maximize fertilization opportunities while minimizing fertilization costs. In laboratory studies of Drosophila reproduction, however, the failure of eggs to yield adult progeny can be quite high, suggesting that female control over gamete utilization is surprisingly inefficient. We examined ga...