On October 26, 2021 at 12.30 a press conference will be held at the B.M. Kustodiev Astrakhan International Airport, dedicated to the launch of the ecological project for the study and conservation of the Caspian seal "Soul of the Caspian Sea". The project was developed by the Clean Seas Foundation in cooperation with leading experts on marine mammals from the A.N. Severtsov Institute of Ecology and Evolution of Russian Academy of Sciences with the support of the Ministry of Natural Resources and Ecology of the Russian Federation. The first expedition begins this autumn. On the La-8 amphibious aircraft, the scientific and film crew will fly along the Russian coast of the Caspian Sea along preset routes. At the helm is the main pilot of all air expeditions of the Clean Seas Foundation - Hero of Russia Valery Tokarev, cosmonaut, 1st class test pilot. At the second stage, the expedition team, together with the inspectors of the Astrakhan State Nature Reserve, will go out to sea in speedboats to the island of Maliy Zhemchuzhny to install satellite transmitters on animals and take bio-samples. All these are just the first steps of the Soul of the Caspian project. There is still a lot of work ahead to study the current state of the Caspian seal population and develop a strategy for its conservation. The Caspian seal (Pusa Caspica) is one of the smallest seals on the planet. It is not only the only mammalian inhabitant of the salt lake called the Caspian Sea, but also an indicator of its ecosystem.

The classical theory of gender conflict says that in animals with sexual reproduction and traditional sex roles, males compete for females, and in females, competition for partners is weak, since males are always in abundance. This inference follows from the fact that one male can fertilize many females. Accordingly, males are in abundance in the population, and their reproductive success (the number of offspring) increases with the number of partners. For females, this should not be the case: the number of partners does not increase their reproductive success, so they are not chasing the number of partners, but their quality. However, in recent years, both theory and practice show that not only males, but also females can compete for partners, especially in situations where there are many females and few males. Daphnia alternate parthenogenesis with sexual reproduction. During the period of sexual reproduction, the sex ratio in natural populations can be strongly shifted towards females. Accordingly, questions arise about how many females a male can fertilize and whether females experience a shortage of males, which can lead to reproductive failure and competition of females for males.

In the scientific literature, as well as in the media, there are more and more reports of the appearance in various regions of the globe of animals and plants that were not previously characteristic of them. Many organisms have been accidentally transported thousands of kilometers by humans, for example, transported by sea vessels. In a number of cases, they were deliberately introduced for economic purposes, but then they settled uncontrollably and began to harm nature and humans (rabbits in Australia, hogweed in European Russia, etc.). We can say that at the present time, thanks to rash human activities, there is a general mixing of the faunas and flora of the globe. Most of the efforts of scientists are focused on the study of large invaders, as well as species the introduction of which had devastating consequences for ecosystems. Many people know the history of the appearance in the European part of Russia of the Colorado potato beetle, elodea and rotan fish. Materials on this topic can be found in the "Russian Journal of Biological Invasions", which has become a very famous publication on this topic. The most dangerous species for nature are listed in the book “The Most Dangerous Invasive Species of Russia (TOP-100) (ed. By Yu.Yu. Dgebuadze, V.G. Petrosyan, L.A. Khlyap).

A brief report on the expedition to the Ciscaucasia to study the phylogeography of Palaearctic species of hamsters within the framework of the RFBR grant 20-04-00102a (headed by Doctor of Biological Sciences, Corresponding Member of the Russian Academy of Sciences A.V.Surov). It is rather widely known that the Caucasus is a refugium for many animal species, including three species of hamsters: the common hamster (Cricetus cricetus), the Raddey hamster (Mesocricetus raddei), and the Brandt hamster (M. brandti), which are the objects of research by the IEE RAS staff. Previously, the DNA of animals from many localities has already been analyzed, but significant territories of the Caucasus have remained unexplored. The main goal of the 2021 expedition was to collect material on hamsters from new regions of Dagestan, Ossetia, Ingushetia and Kabardino-Balkaria. The ciscaucasian hamster (M. raddei nigriculus) was of particular interest as its taxonomic status requires revision. Visit to the Voroninsky State Nature Reserve. Director of the reserve, Ph.D. Burkanova Olga Anatolyevna

The theory says that inbreeding, despite its negative effects on offspring, should be more common in nature than is observed. In particular, closely related crosses are facilitated by a limited choice of partners and strict time constraints on the implementation of the life cycle: there is not enough time to choose a suitable, unrelated partner. Scientists from IEE RAS and Penza State University investigated the system of marital relations and ways to avoid inbreeding in the natural population of the yellow ground squirrel, Spermophillus fulvus. In yellow ground squirrels, like other hibernating mammals, a short period of terrestrial activity sets a strict time frame for the implementation of the entire sequence of the annual cycle - they live under time pressure conditions. In particular, a female yellow gopher within 3-3.5 months of ground activity must have time to meet the father of future children, carry them out and feed them, and also gain fat mass before the next hibernation. If we add to this that they have estrus once a year, it lasts several hours, and females live for three years, it becomes clear that there is no time left to choose a suitable unrelated partner and a high frequency of inbred crosses can be expected.

From 12 to 15 October 2021 the A.N. Severtsov Institute of Ecology and Evolution of the Russian Academy of Sciences hosted the II International Working Meeting dedicated to the rehabilitation and reintroduction of predatory mammals. The first such meeting was held in 2015 and aroused great interest among colleagues. The current Working Meeting was dedicated to the memory of the outstanding Russian zoologist Valentin Sergeevich Pazhetnov (1936-2021), an excellent specialist who developed a system for returning orphaned bears to nature. Valentin Sergeevich created a whole dynasty, continuing the work of his life at the biological station "Clean Forest" - the return to nature of bear cubs that lost their mothers. Some of the representatives of this dynasty were able to attend the conference in person, while their other colleagues continued to work with animals at the biological station.

Marina Yakovlevna Orlova-Benkovskaya, senior researcher at IEE RAS, and Andrei Olegovich Benkovsky, senior researcher at IEE RAS, revealed a new pest in the Russian Caucasus a year ago - the Asian fruit fly Drosophila suzukii. It is an invasive species native to East Asia. First, it was transported through fruit to Europe, and in 2014 - to Crimea. Spotted wing drosophila can cause great damage to fruit farms. Drosophila females use their ovipositor to lay eggs under the skin of the fruit. More than 60 types of berries and fruits are under threat, as well as wineries - these flies also damage grapes. The scientific community has been detecting the Drosophila suzukii in Russia since the beginning of the 21st century. “The Asian fruit fly Drosophila suzukii, a quarantine pest of fruit growing, was previously recorded in two regions of Russia: in the Primorsky Territory in 2001 and in the Crimea in 2014–2015. These findings are included in the database of the European and Mediterranean Organization for Plant Quarantine (EPPO),” says Marina Yakovlevna Orlova-Benkovskaya.

Russian scientists from the Severtsov Institute of Ecology and Evolution of the Russian Academy of Sciences have discovered an amazing phenomenon: the ash aphid has occupied all of Europe in less than two decades after being discovered on the continent. For the first time, woolly ash aphids were registered in 2003 in Budapest, and only sixteen years later they were spotted in Belarus and eight regions of the European part of Russia. It usually takes much longer for insects to spread, which is why scientists have paid such close attention to aphids. The results of the study, supported by a grant from the Russian Science Foundation (RSF), are published in the journal Forests. The aphids are small insects, but due to their ability to reproduce quickly they can cause tremendous harm to plants not only in parks, forests or gardens, but in households as well. This seemingly harmless creature sucks the juice from the aboveground organs of plants, as a result of which the leaves curl and die off, the buds are deformed and wither, growth slows down, and the fruits stop ripening.

The expedition was organized by the A. N. Severtsov Institute of Ecology and Evolution of the Russian Academy of Sciences (IEE RAS). It was attended by leading specialists of IEE RAS and students of the Faculty of Biology of Moscow State University in the framework of educational practice, as well as employees of the Baikal branch of FGBI VNIRO and FGBI "Zapovednoe Podlemorye". As part of the expedition, research work was carried out in three directions. Another summer expedition to study the state of the Baikal seal population took place from July 27 to August 17. Traditionally, field work took place on the Ushkany Islands, which are a place of accumulation of seals in the summer. Experts visually and using a quadrocopter estimated the size of the seal population, and satellite sensors were installed on 17 individuals to track the movement of animals. First, visual observations of the seals' haul-out on Tonky Island were carried out, which included an estimate of the seal population, the number of sick and non-molted animals. This work is a continuation of the work begun as part of the 2020 summer expedition. Secondly, seals were counted using a quadcopter on three of the four islands of the Ushkany archipelago. Registration on Tonky Island was carried out after a visual assessment, which will help to account for animals that were under water and were not available for visual observation. The censuses carried out on the Dolgiy and Krugly islands will make it possible to more accurately estimate the total number of the Baikal seal on the Ushkany Islands.

Pictured: Phylogeny and morphogeny of deep-sea gastropods of the Raphitomidae family in the South of Australia Although the Raphitomidae family is the dominant component of gastropod communities in the deep-water regions of the World Ocean, their taxonomy is still poorly understood. Focusing on the southeast of Australia, scientists from the A.N. Severtsov Institute of Ecology and Evolution of Russian Academy of Sciences, the Australian Museum of Natural History (Sydney), the Museum of Natural History of France (Paris) have collected the most complete sample of Raphitomidae to date. On behalf of Russia, Alexander Ernstovich Fedosov, Candidate of Biological Sciences, Researcher of the Laboratory of Morphology and Ecology of Marine Invertebrates, IEE RAS, participated in the study. Based on the morphological and molecular data obtained as a result of the study, specialists reconstructed the phylogeny of Raphitomidae and applied it to determine the genera of the family. The results for the fauna of South Australia show a large number of undescribed taxa - eleven genera and their type species are described as new to science. This study shows that the study of morphological features alone is rarely sufficient to accurately determine the species. As a result of the previously dominant conchological approach to the taxonomy of molluscs, some of the traditionally diverse genera of Raphitomidae (such as Gymnobela) are in fact artificial associations of unrelated, mostly undescribed lineages of the generic level. The observations of scientists confirm that similar morphologies of shells and radular elements observed at the genus level do not depend on phylogenetic relationships.

The article was co-authored by Yu.D. Nukhimovskaya, an employee of the IEE RAS. A century-old history of the development of the largest mesophilic ravine-gully community in the clayey Trans-Volga region on the northwestern coast of Lake Elton has been analyzed. It is shown that modern polydominant tree and shrub communities of the gully are the result of anthropogenic degradation of a ravine forest area. The stages of development of polydominant plantations associated with changes in the intensity of pasture load have been identified. The mechanisms of resistance of polydominant communities to grazing and fires and the conditions for the preservation and reproduction of such communities have been considered. It is shown that a closed massif of a polydominant community is resistant to fire and is restored in several years. However, as a result of grazing, it breaks up into fragments. Herbal vegetation penetrates into the plantation, rags and dead wood accumulate. In a fire, the litter burns out to the mineral layer, and most of the regeneration buds buried in the soil die. Rapid and massive coppice recovery does not occur, and the succession process stretches over decades. Under such conditions, with continued grazing and repeated fire, severe soil erosion may develop, leading to irreversible disturbances of the original habitats and, consequently, to the impossibility of restoration of the polydominant community.

A group of researchers from the A.N. Severtsov Institute of Ecology and Evolution of the Russian Academy of Sciences (IEE RAS) including Ph.D. O.A. Krylovich, Ph.D. E.A. Kuzmicheva, Doctor of Biological Sciences A.B. Savinetsky and a graduate student of the Samsonov Stanislav Institute on Bering Island, will carry out research in two major areas: the study of ecosystem dynamics over the past 10 thousand years and the study of the remains of Steller's sea cow. In 2020, in the northern part of Bering Island, scientists have already studied the peat bog and taken samples from its layers. This year the study will continue, as we are now able to learn much more about the history of the dynamics of the ecosystems of the Commander Islands over the past 10 thousand years. Using the method of stable isotope analysis of peat, spore-pollen analysis and radiocarbon analysis, scientists will be able to determine even the details of climatic conditions thousands of years ago. Here, a reference collection of pollen from various plant species will be selected for interpretation of the data obtained. Volcanic ash samples will also be taken for further detailed study. IEE RAS scientists will conduct a botanical analysis of peat samples, which will add new details to the history of the vegetation of the Commander Islands. The second and no less important task is to study the history of the Steller's sea cow off the coast of the Commander Islands. Radiocarbon analysis will determine the age of numerous animal remains found on the Commander Islands and stored in the osteological collection of the reserve.

Russian researchers analyzed the factors influencing the inhabitants of the tundra lakes most sensitive to external changes. Thereby, it will be possible to predict the impact of climate change on the ecosystems of the Arctic. The research results were published by the scientific journal Water, the press service of the Russian Science Foundation writes briefly about this. "Scientists studied the crustaceans Cladocera and Copepoda from thermokarst lakes in the Lena River delta and discovered what factors determine the species composition of the inhabitants of the bottom and the water column. <...> In particular, temperature and hydrochemicals are relevant for the inhabitants of the water column, similarly are he properties of water, and for benthic crustaceans - the composition of aquatic vegetation and type of soil. The data obtained will help to assess how climate fluctuations and growing pollution will affect the nature of the Arctic, since freshwater crustaceans are particularly sensitive to environmental changes," the report says.

Currently, an expedition of the A.N. Severtsov Institute of Ecology and Evolution RAS, with the information support of the Institute of Geography RAS is underway in the Tsey gorge. It includes entomologists, an acarologist (tick specialist) and a hydrobiologist. The main goal of the expedition is to study the process of the formation of forest communities as the Tsey glacier retreats. On the surface freed from ice, fireweed seeds sprout almost immediately, beetles and spiders flock on their cobwebs, and long-legged opiliones are drawn to it as well. The expedition is equipped with maps on which the employees of the Institute of Geography have marked lines dividing zones of different ages - from one year to 170 years and more. These dates were obtained by analyzing aerial and satellite images, as well as by drilling cores from the trunks of the Koch pine, which settled a decade after the glacier left. During the work of the ecological expedition, material is collected on soil amoebas, nematode worms, springtails, soil mites, microscopic fungi and algae. Various methods (traps, floating, sifting the bedding) are used to catch beetles, spiders and millipedes. Hundreds of soil samples have been delivered and will still be brought to laboratories in Moscow for analysis of the population of microarthropods after their extraction in special eclectrics.

The superfamily of carnivorous gastropods Buccinoidea, the trumpeter, has a worldwide distribution in the World Ocean in the entire depth range, from the littoral to the ultra-abyssal, and is one of the most diverse taxa of marine mollusks. According to the latter classification, the superfamily included 8 families with several subordinate tribes and subfamilies. For the first time, the monophilia of the superfamily and the relationship between its constituent taxa were tested on the basis of molecular data (sequences of five genetic markers), supplemented by data on morphology and anatomy. The analysis confirmed the monophilia of the superfamily. Relationships between subordinate taxa have been critically reassessed and a new classification of Buccinoidea has been proposed, which includes 20 families and 23 subfamilies. Five new families and one subfamily have been described. The radiation of the superfamily in high latitudes - the Arctic and Antarctic - is considered in more detail. The study was carried out by scientists from the A.N. Severtsov Institute of Ecology and Evolution RAS, National Museum of Natural History of France (MNHN), University of Tokyo (AORE) and Museum of Natural History of Santa Barbara (SBMNH) and published in the Zoological Journal of the Linnean Society.

Conducted at the Glubokoye Ozero N.Yu. Zograf hydrobiological station of IEE RAS, the school-conference was a continuation of a series of seminars-schools on the taxonomy and faunistics of cladocerans (the first school-seminar was held in 2008, the second - in 2013, the third - in 2018). On the other hand, it was a continuation of a series of conferences on cladocerans and other crustaceans of continental waters, held on the basis of the I. D. Papanin Institute for Biology of Inland Waters of RAS. In 2021, it was decided to transform the school-seminar into a school-conference, because of the restrictions due to the COVID19 epidemic, no other large events specifically dedicated to cladocerans are planned in the near future, and the presentation of the latest results on them for fellow carcinologists looks quite appropriate. Unlike previous schools, the 2021 school conference was attended almost exclusively by specialists for whom cladocerans are the primary object of their professional activity. The school-seminar was attended by 12 people - employees of IEE RAS (M.A. Aksenova, O.S. Boykova, P.G. Garibyan, A.G. Ibragimova, N.M. A. Neplyukhin), the Faculty of Biology of Moscow State University (A.Yu.Sinev, E.S. The participants were somewhat contingently divided into “teachers” and “students”, since in many cases the “students” were able to explain important aspects of the cladocera identification process to their colleagues themselves. The main purpose of the event was to acquaint the participants with the latest achievements, problems and methods of work in the field of taxonomy and faunistics of this group of micro-crustaceans.

Fyodor Vitalievich Lishchenko, a researcher at the Laboratory of Morphology and Ecology of Marine Invertebrates at IEE RAS, has become a co-chairman of the strategic initiative to integrate young scientists into the work of the International Council for the Exploration of the Sea (ICES). Fyodor's candidacy was approved by the ICES Secretariat for the period from July 1, 2021 to December 31, 2024. The main activities of the strategic initiative are to popularize the participation of young scientists in the work of the International Council for the Exploration of the Sea, unite and coordinate young scientists from various scientific communities engaged in ocean research, support young experts-members of the working groups of the International Council for the Exploration of the Sea, and form interdisciplinary research groups. As part of the work in these areas, annual meetings (during the meetings of the scientific and advisory councils of ICES), as well as conferences, courses and trainings on topical issues will be held for young scientists. Congratulations from the institute to Fyodor Vitalievich on his position!

This year, the Hydrobiological Station at Lake Glubokoye celebrates its 130th anniversary. The hydrobiological station on Lake Glubokoe, the first in Russia and one of the first scientific freshwater stations in the world, was established in 1891 under the auspices of the Imperial Russian Society for the Acclimatization of Animals and Plants, a public organization that existed and operated almost exclusively on private donations. Professor N.Yu. Zograf, the founder of the station, was at that time chairman of the Ichthyology Department of the Society. Lake Glubokoye was assigned the role of a model reservoir, “where the invertebrate fauna and other components of the biota will be studied in all details and in relation to the fish population, for this knowledge to be transferred to other reservoirs”. Moreover, the biological station was assigned the role of an experimental and acclimatization base. The presentation on the history of the biostation is available through this LINK.