Fig. 1. Eye of a parasitized Dolly Varden fish containing T. clavata metacercariae (right). Many parasites are able to change the behavior of their hosts to their advantage. This evolutionary adaptation is called "parasitic manipulation." In recent decades, this phenomenon has attracted increasing attention from researchers. There have been so many examples of manipulation that many parasites are unreasonably classified as manipulators without proper experimental testing. This happened with the trematode Tylodelphys clavata, which parasitizes the eyes of fish. Its close relative (from the same Diplostomidae family), the trematode Diplostomum pseudospathaceum, is indeed a parasite-manipulator, weakening the defensive behavior of fish. Perhaps this is why it was previously believed that T. clavata also changes the behavior of its hosts. It was assumed that during the day T. clavata moves to the front of the eye closer to the pupil, blocking the light and blinding the fish, thereby causing behavioral changes. In the dark, the parasite goes deep into the eye, where it feeds. Scientists from the Laboratory of Lower Vertebrate Behavior and the Center for Parasitology at the Severtsov Institute of Ecology and Evolution of the Russian Academy of Sciences (IEE RAS) experimentally tested whether the behavior of Dolly Varden infected with T. clavata changes. The fish were infected under controlled laboratory conditions, and the experimental design was identical to that for D. pseudospathaceum (a manipulator parasite; Gopko et al., 2023). Taking into account the putative mechanism of manipulation, the scientists tested the fish in the light and in the dark. Three behavioral traits of the fish were tested: locomotor activity, preferred diving depth, and the ability to avoid a net (imitation of a predator attack). Fig. 2. Preferred diving depth of Dolly Varden (distance to the bottom) in different groups under different lighting conditions. It is noticeable that the behavior of the fish was different in the light and in the dark: in the light, the fish stayed closer to the bottom. At the same time, the behavior of the control and T. clavata-infected fish did not differ. None of these behavioral traits were found to be altered by the parasite (Figure 2), whereas D. pseudospathaceum has previously been shown to sabotage each of them. The relationship between fish activity and size was found to differ among fish with different infection status (Figure 2A). Control fish increased their activity with increasing body weight, while infected fish did not. Fig. 3. (A) Relationship between the weight of Dolly Varden and its activity. Larger control fish were more active, while this relationship was absent in T. clavata-infected fish. Overall, the activity of fish in both groups did not differ. (B) Fish catching order. Infected and control fish did not differ in their ability to avoid the net. The obtained data show how much parasites can differ in their ability to manipulate host behavior, even if they are phylogenetically close and occupy similar ecological niches. The results cast doubt on the previously speculative assumption about the ability of T. clavata to change fish behavior. The work was carried out within the framework of the RSF project No. 23-24-00419 and published in the first quartile journal: Gopko, M., Sotnikov, D., Savina, K., Molchanov, A., Mironova, E. (2024). Does phylogenetic relatedness imply similar manipulative ability in parasites?. Biological Journal of the Linnean Society, 143(4), blae101. A preprint of the publication can be found on the authors' page in Researchgate.

In 1974, the Nauka Publishing House in Moscow, under the stamp of the USSR Academy of Sciences and the A. N. Severtsov Institute of Evolutionary Morphology and Ecology of Animals, published a book by V. N. Orlov entitled "Karyosystematics of Mammals". The subtitle of the book read: "Cytogenetic Methods in the Taxonomy of Mammals". The fairly quick release of the monograph, 6-7 years after the first journal publications by domestic authors and 5 years after the organized presentation of the country's karyologists at the II All-Union Conference on Mammals in Moscow (December 1969), confidently marked the emergence of a new direction in the genetic profile in zoology in general and at the Institute in particular. The author of the book, zoologist of the Moscow State University School Viktor Nikolaevich Orlov, his students and employees, over half a century of tireless work with cytogenetic, and then genetic methods, made a significant contribution to the modernization of the species system of modern mammals. Specific changes in the systematic composition of 19 Palearctic genera were recently restructured in a large review by Orlov et al. (2023). The work was published in a special issue of the Zoological Journal dedicated to a triad of anniversaries - the 50th anniversary of the Theriological Society of the Russian Academy of Sciences, the 90th anniversary of its founder Academician V.E. Sokolov, and the 300th anniversary of the Russian Academy of Sciences. The half-century anniversary of the book is an integral part of the great scientific history of the A.N. Severtsov Institute of Ecology and Evolution of the Russian Academy of Sciences (IEE RAS), which recently celebrated its 90th anniversary.

Fig.1. Examples of long transient regimes in natural ecosystems (observational data). (i) Biomass of game-fish in the Scottish East Shelf ecosystem; a steady state with low density changes to a dynamic regime with much higher average density (blue line – estimated carrying capacity); (ii) The leafroller moth has a much faster generation time than the host tree, resulting in long periods of low moth density interrupted by outbreaks. The blue curve represents a model fit to the data. Plots adapted from Hastings, A., Abbott, K.C., Cuddington, K., Francis, T., Gellner, G., Lai, Y.C., Morozov, A., Petrovskii, S., Scranton, K. and Zeeman, M.L., 2018. Transient phenomena in ecology. Science, 361(6406), p.eaat6412. Mathematical models in ecology have traditionally focused on asymptotic or long-term dynamics, such as the study of equilibrium states. However, a significant amount of recent research has shown the importance of studying the dynamics of transient processes in ecological systems, in particular the consideration of long-term transient processes that may last for hundreds of generations or even longer. Many models, as well as empirical studies, have shown that an ecosystem can function for a long time in a certain state or regime (we can call it metastable), but later it exhibits an abrupt transition to another regime of functioning without any prior change in parameters (or after a change that occurred long before the transition). This scenario, where the collapse of the studied population occurs without any obvious cause for the regime change, is also called 'metastability'. Despite considerable evidence for the existence of long transitions in real natural ecosystems as well as in theoretical models, until recently the study of long-term transitions in ecology remained in its infancy and was largely unsystematized. However, over the last decade, significant progress has been made in developing a unifying theory of long transitions in both deterministic (i.e., systems whose functioning is predetermined and completely determined) and stochastic (i.e., systems with external and internal random factors) systems. This has greatly accelerated further research on long transitions in ecological systems, particularly as the complexity of the models under consideration increases. This paper provides a detailed critical analysis of recent research on long transitions and associated regime changes in models of ecological dynamics. Particular attention in the work is paid to such factors as ecological stochasticity (the presence of noise in the system), the effect of multiple time scales (consideration of slow-fast systems, with periods of fast and slow changes), the influence of heterogeneity of the distribution of organisms over the area, as well as issues of spatial synchronization of fluctuations in population numbers. The predicted ubiquity of long-term transient processes emphasizes the need to take them into account in programs for the conservation of species diversity. The paper describes how such scenarios can be modeled and predicted. The paper also highlights the importance of using machine learning elements to study long-living transients. For example, one potential application of machine learning is to search for long-living transients in complex ecological models that include a large number of interacting species and, as a result, a large number of model parameters. The results are published in the journal Physics of Life Reviews. Morozov, A., Feudel, U., Hastings, A., Abbott, K.C., Cuddington, K., Heggerud, C.M. and Petrovskii, S., 2024. Physics of Life Reviews Long-living transients in ecological models: Recent progress, new challenges, and open questions. // Physics of Life Reviews, Vol., 51, pp.423-441.

Fig.1. Reconstruction of phylogenetic relationships of the studied species of the genus Niphargus (colored) from the Republic of North Ossetia-Alania based on the mtDNA COI gene marker (ML algorithm, GTR+G+I model). Sequences of related species were taken from the GenBank (NCBI) database. Currently, groundwater is considered one of the most unexplored and underestimated, but nevertheless, a key ecosystem in the world. The study of groundwater in the Caucasus and, in particular, the use of these data for both fundamental and applied research, for example, to search for sources of clean drinking water, is an important area of ​​scientific activity and is relevant for all territories of the Caucasus. The IEE RAS staff presented a review and partial revision of the diversity of freshwater hyporheic/stygobiotic crustaceans in the Republic of North Ossetia-Alania, North Caucasus. Previously, two species of the genus Proasellus Dudich, 1925 (Isopoda, Asellidae), P. uallagirus Palatov & Sokolova, 2020 and P. irystonicus Palatov & Sokolova, 2020, and one species of the genus Niphargus Schiödte, 1849 (Amphipoda, Niphargidae), N. alanicus Marin & Palatov, 2021, were known from this area. However, a more extensive sampling and a complete examination of the available material using an integrative approach showed that only one species of the genus occurs in this area (the second species is synonymized), while the diversity of the genus Niphargus was significantly higher than previously known. This paper describes six new species of the genus Niphargus from hyporheic/stygobiotic habitats of the Republic of North Ossetia–Alania, and discusses their phylogenetic relationships, ecology, and known distribution. Interspecific distances (p-distances), based on the mtDNA COI gene marker, between the studied species from North Ossetia exceed 9-19%, which also indicates their long-term isolation from each other, at least 3.6-7.6 million years ago. Fig.2. Distribution map of the studied species of the genus Niphargus in the Republic of North Ossetia–Alania, with the distribution of related taxa along the southern slope of the Greater Caucasus Mountains. Green squares - Proasellus uallagirus Palatov & Sokolova, 2020. White triangle - location of N. alasonicus Derzhavin, 1945. Twelve-pointed stars: blue - N. ablaskiri Birštein, 1940, 1940; light green - N. glontii Behning, 1940; red - N. alanicus Marin & Palatov, 2021; yellow - N. ardonicus sp.n.; orange - N. sadonicus sp.n.; purple - N. fiagdonicus sp.n.; light blue - N. chertschesovae sp.n.; green - N. osseticus sp.n.; white - undescribed species Niphargus spp. gr. "alasonicus" (according to Rendos et al., 2020). Five-pointed stars - species group “Niphargus borutzkyi” (according to Marin, 2020; Marin et al., 2023): light green - N. borutzkyi Birštein, 1933; red - N. amirani Marin, 2020; light blue - N. tvishiensis Marin, Marin, Barjadze, Maghradze & Palatov, 2023; pink - N. rachalechkhumensis Marin, Barjadze, Maghradze & Palatov, 2023; yellow - N. zeyensis sp.n. Geographically, it has been established that Proasellus uallagirus Palatov & Sokolova, 2020 in the republic is a fairly widespread species that is found in the water resources of large mountain gorges: the Urukh River (Digorskoye Gorge), Ardon (Alagirskoye) and Gizeldon (Kobanskoye), where it lives in a wide range of altitudes, from 700 to 1800 meters above sea level. However, at present, it is not found in the Fiagdon River basin (Kurtatinsky District) and the upper reaches of the Terek (Daryal Gorge). At the same time, it is specified that all nifargus are local endemics, and are currently found only in the republic. They are associated with underground aquatic habitats in various gorges/river valleys in the Republic of North Ossetia-Alania: Niphargus alanicus Marin & Palatov, 2021 is known from the Sardidon and Dargonkom River valleys (see Marin & Palatov, 2021; this study), Niphargus ardonicus sp. n. – Ardon, Mayramadag and Gizeldon River valleys, Niphargus sadonicus sp. n. – Sadon River valley, a tributary of the Ardon River, Niphargus tschertschesovae sp. n. – Gizeldon River valley and Niphargus zeyensis sp. n. from the Tseydon River basin (Tsey Gorge). Two species, Niphargus fiagdonicus sp. n. and Niphargus osseticus sp. n., found in different parts (upper and lower, branched) of the Fiagdon River valley (Fiagdon Gorge), as well as Niphargus tschertschesovae sp. n. and Niphargus ardonicus sp. n., were also found in different (mountainous) areas (upper and lower parts, respectively) of the Gizeldon River. At the same time, in none of the studied habitats was more than one species of the genus Niphargus found. The revealed level of endemism of the subterranean fauna significantly exceeds the terrestrial fauna of this region, which consists mainly of widespread species. Most of the studied hyporheic/stygobiotic crustaceans diverged from their relatives starting from the late Miocene, approximately 8-5.8 million years ago, and have survived there to the present day. According to the obtained data, we confirm that the riverine habitats in the mountainous part of the Republic of North Ossetia-Alania can be considered as post-Pliocene glacial refugia, the first known on the northern slope of the Greater Caucasus Mountain Range. The authors also believe that undescribed species belonging to both of these two genera of crustaceans, as well as representatives of other hyporheic/stygobiotic and other subterranean animals, may still exist on the territory of the Republic of North Ossetia-Alania. Also, the diversity of the Republic of North Ossetia-Alania stands out noticeably from other settlements on the northern slope of the Caucasus Mountains (North Caucasus). Currently, on the northern slope of the Caucasus Mountains, hyporheic/stygobiotic crustaceans are known only from the territory of Krasnodar Krai (e.g. Niphargus ciscaucasicus Marin & Palatov, 2019) (and the Republic of Adygea (unpublished data), while no such animal has been found in nearby mountainous areas such as Stavropol Krai, the Republic of Ingushetia, Kabardino-Balkaria, Karachay-Cherkessia or the Chechen Republic (Chechnya). It is very likely that more thorough and extensive fieldwork is also needed in these areas. The work carried out in the Republic of North Ossetia-Alania, as well as the discovery of new species here, once again confirms that in the Miocene, representatives of the genus Niphargus were much more widespread in the Ciscaucasian Plain and the territory north of the Greater Caucasus Range. The mountain gorges of this region provided a safe habitat for hyporheic/stygobiotic fauna during the climatic (temperature) fluctuations of the Pleistocene (Quaternary) ice ages (2.6 million years ago - present), and especially during the Last Glacial Maximum (LGM) (23-18 thousand years ago), which allowed them to survive to this day. It is worth emphasizing once again that underground species have a narrow localization and require strict protection and attention to their habitat, since the destruction of the population leads to the loss of unique ancient genetic lines that cannot be restored. One of the species is named in honor of the head of the Department of Zoology and Bioecology of the North Ossetian State University, Doctor of Biological Sciences, Professor, Susanna Konstantinovna Cherchesova, a hydrobiologist and entomologist known far beyond the borders of the Republic. The article is published in the international peer-reviewed journal Water: The Diversity of Freshwater Stygobiotic Crustaceans in the Republic of North Ossetia–Alania Provides New Evidence for the Existence of an Ancient Glacial Refugium in the North Caucasus Region by Ivan N. Marin and Dmitry M. Palatov, Water 2024, 16(9), 1212; https://doi.org/10.3390/w16091212.

Based on the results of the work, experts of the project "Russian desman - take care today so as not to lose tomorrow" Maria and Alexander Onufreni came to the conclusion that the habitats of the Russian desman need constant protection. This is the only way to restore the population of a unique species, the number of which has been critically declining in recent years. The Oka River basin is still one of the key habitats of the desman in Russia. The largest floodplain areas where this rare animal finds refuge are located in the Kaluga, Ryazan, Vladimir and Nizhny Novgorod regions. Scientists monitored the population in these regions. This study was the most detailed in recent years. In some areas, scientists had not conducted work for more than 10 years, and some areas were being studied for the first time. The expedition lasted one and a half months, during which 158 floodplain water bodies were examined. The total length of the routes along the banks was 165 km, and 432 desman burrows were recorded. The relative number of animals varied from 1.4 to 4 burrows per 1 km of the coastline in different parts of the Oka floodplain. The most favorable conditions for the desman are created in the Kaluga region, on the territory of the Ugra National Park. Thanks to the protected status of this natural zone and minimal human impact, the population here remains stable and is at a fairly high level. The situation in the Vladimir and Nizhny Novgorod regions highlights the importance of protecting floodplain water bodies. Despite the fact that these territories are ideal for the desman to live in, strong pressure from poachers using illegal gear and nets prevents the population from increasing. At the moment, it remains relatively stable, but has decreased by 17% - from 780 to 650 individuals. Experts are convinced that eliminating illegal fishing will increase the species' numbers by 7-10 times. The most difficult situation is in the middle reaches of the Oka. Over the past 15 years, the absence of spring floods and prolonged autumn droughts have led to a significant reduction in the area suitable for the desman. If in 2009-2010 in key habitats in the Ryazan region there were 1800-2000 individuals, now their numbers have decreased by 60% - to 750-800 animals. Even in the Oka Reserve, where a strict protection regime is in place, the population has decreased by more than half. The main task in this region is the restoration of degraded floodplain lands in the reserve's protected zone. Employees of the A.N. Severtsov Institute of Ecology and Evolution of the Russian Academy of Sciences (IEE RAS) took part in assessing the population of desmans in the Spassky District of the Ryazan Region. Among other things, modern means were used - an echo sounder and an underwater drone. The following employees took part in the expedition to search for desmans: Dmitry Glazov, Yulia Ganitskaya with her dog Zhuzha, Svetlana Artemyeva, Pavel Chukmasov, Milena Morozova, Polina Shibanova, Natalya Kryukova, Evgeny Nazarenko, Maria Slavina. The project "Russian desman - take care today so as not to lose tomorrow" is implemented by the non-profit partnership "Partnership for Nature Reserves" using funds from a grant from the President of the Russian Federation for the development of civil society.

Photo of a site in Kalmykia, part of the experiment (photo by D.I. Korobushkin). A new study published in the journal Nature has revealed how extreme weather events affect soil microorganisms, offering new insights into the risks associated with climate change. As extreme weather events such as acute heat, droughts, floods and frosts become more common due to global warming, understanding how soil microbes, which are crucial to the functioning of ecosystems, respond was the aim of the study. Microorganisms play a key role in natural processes such as the carbon cycle, which helps determine how much carbon is stored in the soil and how much is released into the atmosphere as carbon dioxide, a major driver of global warming. Researchers from the University of Manchester, working with a network of scientists across Europe, including colleagues from the Severtsov Institute of Ecology and Evolution RAS (IEE RAS), collected soil samples from 30 meadows in 10 countries. Each sampling site represents the diversity of biogeographic regions present in Europe: alpine (Austria), subarctic (Sweden), arctic (Iceland), Atlantic (Oxford and Lancaster, UK), boreal (Estonia), continental (Germany), Mediterranean (Spain and GR, Greece) and steppe climates (Russia). The study authors exposed the soil samples to simulated extreme weather events under controlled laboratory conditions to see how the microbes responded. The team found that microbial communities in soils from different parts of Europe responded differently to the extreme events. For example, soils from cooler, wetter climates were particularly vulnerable to heatwaves and droughts, while soils from drier regions suffered more from flooding. However, the scientists also found encouraging patterns and signs of predictability in the response. In particular, microbes can “pause” their activity and go into a dormant state — essentially waiting out difficult conditions — in all weather conditions. One of the study’s authors, RAS Professor Konstantin Gongalsky, said: “Soil microorganisms are one of the main mechanisms for the functioning of soil ecosystems. Their ability to adapt or fight climate change directly affects soil health, plant growth, food production, and carbon storage. By understanding the “survival strategy” of microorganisms during extreme weather events, we can better predict and possibly mitigate future impacts of these events, giving us important knowledge for protecting vulnerable regions.” The work was published in the journal Nature: Knight, C.G., Nicolitch, O., Griffiths, R.I., Goodall, T., Jones, B., Weser, C., Langridge, H., Davison, J., Dellavalle, A., Eisenhauer, N., Gongalsky, K.B., Hector, A., Jardine, E., Kardol, P., Maestre, F.T., Schädler, M., Semchenko, M., Stevens, C., Tsiafouli, M.A., Vilhelmsson, O., Wanek, W., De Vries, F.T., 2024. Soil microbiomes show consistent and predictable responses to extreme events // Nature. 2024. – V. 636. – P. 690–696.

Modern technologies combined with remote sensing tools provide the level of detail needed to identify and characterize patterns in the use of space by birds, as well as to find critical habitats. The aim of the study was to identify the features of the migration routes of the forest bean geese (Anser fabalis fabalis) of the eastern subpopulation, listed in the Red Book of Russia, the patterns of the geographical distribution of migration stops, and to assess the effectiveness of specially protected natural areas. Birds of the eastern subpopulation nest in the European part of Russia and the western part of Western Siberia, and winter in northern Europe. In 2019–2023, 45 spring and 36 autumn migration routes were tracked using GPS-GSM trackers. This allowed us to determine the phenology of migrations, the length of flights, and the geographical distribution of stops. An analysis of the geographical distribution of migration stops allows us to identify the most important regions for the species in the spring – the Baltic region, the Sviyago-Vyatka interfluve, and the central Volga region (Fig. 1). Fig. 2. Routes of spring (a), autumn (b) migration and distribution of migratory stops of the forest bean geese. Red rectangles highlight key areas where the most important migratory stops are concentrated: 1 – Baltic region; 2 – Central Black Earth region; 3 – Sviyaga-Vyatka interfluve. Currently, only 15.3% of forest bean geese stopover sites have government protection, which is not sufficient to ensure the safety of the species. Taking into account the dynamics of region use during spring migration, it has been proposed to limit spring hunting for anseriformes, the use of which will reduce the likelihood of this rare subspecies being targeted. The discussion on the legitimacy of including the forest bean geese in the Red Book, which unfolded in 2017-2020, led to a compromise: partial inclusion of this subspecies in the list of protected taxa at the federal level. In this study, we show that the alternative protection measures discussed by opponents representing the hunting lobby do not work, and the subspecies must be included in the Red Book of Russia as a whole. The results are published: Rosenfeld S.B., Strelnikov E.G., Volkov S.V. 2024. Migration routes and key stopovers of Anser fabalis fabalis (Anseriformes): an analysis of conservation issues // Nature Conservation Research. Reserve science. Vol. 9(4). P. 80–92.

Fig. 1. A - Kronotskoe Lake, B - material collection points, C/D - external morphology of ecomorphs of long-headed char Freshwater bodies occupy less than one percent of the Earth's surface and constitute only 0.02% of accessible aquatic habitats. Despite this, about 15,000 fish species live in freshwater, which is 40% of the total species diversity of modern ichthyofauna. One of the mechanisms for the formation of modern freshwater fish diversity is adaptive radiation, which leads to the formation of bundles (complexes) of phenotypically and ecologically distinct morphs or species. The most famous are the sympatric complexes of cichlid fish inhabiting large lakes in Africa, as well as many repeated cases of radiation of the three-spined stickleback. However, many other taxa of freshwater fish can also boast, although not as rich in the number of forms as cichlids, and not as frequently and stereotypically repeated as stickleback, but no less interesting examples of adaptive radiation. Thus, the relatively young Kronotskoye Lake (Kamchatka Peninsula), formed as a result of lava flows that blocked the main channel of the Paleo-Kronotskaya River about 12,000 years ago, is home to the richest morph-rich cluster of salmon fish (Salmonidae) (Fig. 1). It includes at least ten reproductively isolated, morphologically and ecologically distinct morphs of chars that formed as a result of rapid adaptive radiation of a population of anadromous Dolly Varden Salvelinus malma trapped in the lake. This case of rapid evolutionary transformations has long attracted the attention of Russian researchers, including employees of the A.N. Severtsov Institute of Ecology and Evolution of the Russian Academy of Sciences (IEE RAS), and the data obtained during its study have made a significant contribution to understanding the processes and factors that ensure adaptive radiation of fish. However, a number of key questions concerning the origins of this bundle, as well as the genetic changes accompanying the formation of its morphological and ecological diversity, remained open. The analysis of the conservative part of the genome of seven ecomorphs of Kronotsky char, conducted by the staff of the Institute of Ecology and Evolution of the Russian Academy of Sciences together with their American colleagues, made it possible to answer some of the questions. In particular, the monophyletic origin of the bundle was established and the scenario of its diversification was reconstructed: division into three independently diverging lines. A high degree of reproductive isolation of the ecomorphs was confirmed. Genetic features that distinguish lake forms of char from anadromous Dolly Varden were established. In addition, genetic evidence was obtained that the leading role in the formation of the ecological and phenotypic diversity of Kronotsky char was played by selection for traits associated with the development of cranial bones, energy metabolism and the activity of the hypothalamic-pituitary-thyroid axis, and the main ontogenetic mechanism for the formation of diversity is heterochrony - changes in the timing and rate of ontogenetic processes. The obtained data significantly enriched our knowledge of genetic processes, physiological, ontogenetic and morphological changes occurring during rapid adaptive radiation of fish and laid a good foundation for the development of such studies. The results of the work are published in a special issue of the journal Development: Uncovering Developmental Diversity: Katherine C. Woronowicz, Evgeny V. Esin, Grigorii N. Markevich, Crisvely Soto Martinez, Sarah K. McMenamin, Jacob M. Daane, Matthew P. Harris, Fedor N. Shkil; Phylogenomic analysis of the Lake Kronotskoe species flock of Dolly Varden charr reveals genetic and developmental signatures of sympatric radiation. Development 15 October 2024; 151 (20): dev203002. Related materials: AI-News: "Analysis of the Kronotskoe charr genome reveals genetic and ontogenetic signatures of their adaptive radiation"

Fig.1. Features of foxg1 gene expression in lamprey and ghastonome (IBC RAS). Researchers from the M.M. Shemyakin and Yu.A. Ovchinnikov Institute of Bioorganic Chemistry, A.N. Severtsov Institute of Ecology and Evolution (IEE RAS), All-Russian Research Institute of Fisheries and Oceanography, and N.K. Koltsov Institute of Developmental Biology have described for the first time three paralogues of the Foxg1 gene in the oldest living vertebrate, the river lamprey. Previously, it was believed that most vertebrates and their closest relatives have only one foxg1 gene, which is a molecular marker of the forebrain and related structures. However, the results of the study, published in the journal Frontiers in Cell and Developmental Biology, showed that lampreys, representatives of the oldest group of vertebrates, have several copies of this gene. To determine the relationship of these genes in lampreys and other vertebrate groups, various comparative studies of these genes were conducted in lampreys and another ancient vertebrate representative, the sterlet (ghastonome). Analysis of foxg1 gene expression showed that in lampreys all three genes are expressed in the telencephalon, although their expression patterns differ, while in the sterlet there is only one foxg1a gene. Thus, the presence of one foxg1 gene in higher vertebrates is not common to all vertebrates. Ancient groups such as cartilaginous, sturgeon, and bony fish usually have three foxg1 genes. Some representatives of these groups have two, and bony fish that have undergone additional genomic duplication have four. The detected expression of foxg1 genes in the forebrain structures, sensory organs, and cranial nerves of lampreys and gnathostomes may indicate their important role in shaping the body plan of vertebrate morphological traits. The researchers proposed two hypotheses: the emergence of three foxg1 paralogues in agnathans and gnathostomes could have occurred either as a result of two rounds of genome duplication in the common ancestor of vertebrates (hypothesis 2R), or as a result of the first common round with subsequent independent polyploidizations in two evolutionary lines (hypothesis 1R). Data from the published article: Galina V. Ermakova, Alexander V. Kucheryavyy, Nikolay S. Mugue, Aleksandr V. Mischenko, Andrey G. Zaraisky, Andrey V. Bayramov, Three foxg1 paralogues in lampreys and gnathostomes—brothers or cousins? Front. Cell Dev. Biol., 02 January 2024Sec. Evolutionary Developmental BiologyVolume 11 - 2023 | https://doi.org/10.3389/fcell.2023.1321317

Fig.1. New species Ornithomya delichoni sp. nov. Blood-sucking flies of the family Hippoboscidae Samouelle, 1819 are ectoparasites and parasitize birds and mammals. The genus Ornithomya Latreille, 1802 is one of the largest genera of blood-sucking flies. These flies parasitize various small passerine birds. Many of them prefer swallows as hosts. Swallows have a wide beak, short legs, thick plumage and poor plumage cleaning abilities. They feed in flight and therefore do not associate insects in their nests with food. A new species for the genus Ornithomya, O. delichoni sp. nov., has been described. A female of O. delichoni sp. nov. was collected in Spassky District of Primorsky Krai (Far East, Russia) from a western house martin. The new species differs from other Ornithomya species from this region in the size of the head and thorax, the width of the eyes, the number of bristles on the scutellum, and the arrangement of the microtrichia on the wings. The article provides the first complete key to all species of the world fauna of the genus Ornithomya, including the new one. This key is based on the following morphological characters: the total length of the head and thorax, the length of the wing, the number of bristles on the scutellum and mesonotum, the ratio of the costal vein segments between veins R1 and R2+3 and between veins R2+3 and R4+5, and the arrangement of the microtrichia on the wings. Additionally, known data on the hosts and distribution of Ornithomya species are provided. The work was published in the journal: E.P. Nartshuk, A.V. Matyukhin, M.Yu. Markovets and A.A. Yatsuk. 2024. Description of a new Ornithomya Latreille, 1802 (Diptera: Hippoboscidae) species with a key to all species of this genus. Proceedings of the Zoological Institute RAS Vol. 328, No. 4, 2024, pp. 640–657. 10.31610/trudyzin/2024.328.4.640 Работа опубликована в журнале: E.P. Nartshuk, A.V. Matyukhin , M.Yu. Markovets and A.A. Yatsuk. 2024. Description of a new Ornithomya Latreille, 1802 (Diptera: Hippoboscidae) species with a key to all species of this genus. Proceedings of the Zoological Institute RAS Vol. 328, No. 4, 2024, pp. 640–657. 10.31610/trudyzin/2024.328.4.640