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Tag: University of Connecticut

  • Fungus-Farming Ants Keep Gardens Healthy

    Fungus-Farming Ants Keep Gardens Healthy

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    Newswise — ‘Weed early and often’ is the key to a productive garden. Interestingly, certain species of ants are also avid gardeners, a practice they’ve refined over 50 million years. They too weed their underground fungus gardens, but how they know what to weed out has been a mystery. Now, a multidisciplinary team of scientists report in PNAS on June 15 how ants distinguish the good fungus from the bad.

    People rely on sight to identify weeds but ants grow fungus underground in the dark and must have other ways to sense undesirable garden denizens. A team led by Jonathan Klassen, Ph.D., at the University of Connecticut and Marcy Balunas, Ph.D., at the University of Michigan has found that the ants sniff out diseased fungus by detecting chemicals called peptaibols.

    The team focused on the ant species Trachymyrmex septentrionalis whose habitat follows the pine barren ecosystem from Long Island all the way south to East Texas. Trachymyrmex ants grow their fungus below ground and feed it fresh organic detritus. The fungus acts almost like an external gut for the ant colony; the fungus grows up and around the fresh food laid on top of it in honeycomb shapes, produces digested food for the ants as it grows, and then secretes waste.

    Klassen Lab graduate student Katie Kyle, a co-first author on the paper, experimentally infected ant nests with Trichoderma, a naturally occurring, disease-causing fungus that infects the ants’ gardens and found that the ants began working overtime to remove the infection from the nests, increasing their waste output.

    Over the winter, while the ants were dormant, the team analyzed the fungal biomes of several different ant nests collected from different locations and found Trichoderma in all of them.

    Co-first author Sara Puckett, Ph.D., a recent graduate from the Balunas’ UConn lab, prepared extracts of Trichoderma containing the organic compounds of the fungus to determine if the weeding was triggered by one or more of these compounds or simply by the presence of the pathogen’s cells. 

    “We were curious to see if the ants were weeding because of compounds produced by the infecting fungus,” Balunas said.

    The team found the Trichoderma extract, when applied to the fungus garden, sent the ants into frenzied weeding activity just as actual Trichoderma infections had.

    Working with scientists from University of California, San Diego and University of North Carolina, Greensboro, they discovered the nests contained peptaibols, a family of compounds known to be produced by Trichoderma. However, finding which specific peptaibols were causing ant weeding proved more challenging since these extracts contained many compounds. 

    The researchers tested pure peptaibols, including two new compounds called trichokindins VIII and IX.

    It turns out that all the peptaibols tested caused some level of ant weeding, a finding that implies it may not be one particular peptaibol but rather that the whole suite of peptaibols can induce the ants to weed their garden. 

    “This suite of Trichoderma compounds inducing ant behavior is in contrast to many other natural products whose activity can often be attributed to one compound,” Balunas says.

    Although their data support peptaibols as a signal to weed, it’s not clear what exactly the ants are perceiving. It may be that the invading Trichoderma fungus produces the peptaibols and the ants detect them and then weed, note the researchers. Or perhaps the ants are detecting a secondary response from the fungus garden itself.

     The next step is to figure out those details of ant-fungus communication, Klassen says.

    “Maybe the fungus is signaling ‘I’m sick’. Maybe the fungus is detecting the peptaibols. We need to flesh out the chain of signaling,” Klassen says. 

    The findings highlight one of the few known systems where an animal responds to a disease of its beneficial symbiotic partner instead of a disease of its own body, a phenomenon that Balunas and Klassen are calling an extended defense response, and one that they look forward to continuing to tease apart.

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  • Connecticut routs San Diego State to win its fifth NCAA men’s basketball title after dominating tournament | CNN

    Connecticut routs San Diego State to win its fifth NCAA men’s basketball title after dominating tournament | CNN

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    CNN
     — 

    The University of Connecticut won its fifth men’s basketball national title with a 76-59 victory over San Diego State University on Monday night at NRG Stadium in Houston.

    Senior guard Tristen Newton led UConn (31-8) with 19 points and 10 rebounds while Final Four Most Outstanding Player Adama Sanogo, a junior forward, chipped in with 17 points and 10 rebounds.

    “We weren’t ranked going into the year so we had the chip on our shoulder,” UConn head coach Dan Hurley told game broadcaster CBS. “We knew the level that we could play at, even through those dark times,” he added, referencing the team’s six losses in eight games during the regular season.

    He said going into the tournament his group had confidence garnered during the season.

    “And when you have the type of leaders like Andre Jackson (game-high six assists Monday) and Adama Sanogo, they kept this team together, got us back on track and we knew we were the best team in the tournament going in and we just had to play to our level,” he added.

    San Diego State (32-7) was topped by Keshad Johnson who had 14 points.

    UConn trailed very early but San Diego State was undone by an 11-minute, eight-second stretch in which they scored just five free throws and missed 12 consecutive shots from the field. The Huskies went from down 10-6 to up 36-24 at halftime.

    The Aztecs made a run midway through the second half and narrowed the deficit to five at 60-55 with 5:19 to play but the Huskies scored the next nine to take a comfortable lead into the final two minutes.

    “We battled. Battled back to five in the second half, but gave them too much separation,” San Diego State coach Brian Dutcher said. “We had to be at our best. We weren’t at our best. A lot had to do with UConn.”

    Senior guard Adam Seiko told reporters they gave themselves a chance with their second half comeback but UConn “just made a little bit more plays” at the end.

    “They have a lot of weapons. They were pretty good,” said Matt Bradley, also a senior guard. “To beat them, we had to make shots. I shot poorly. And you had to have a really good game to beat those dudes on the offensive end.”

    UConn won each of its six tournament games by at least 10 points, with its closest game being a 13-point win over the University of Miami in the national semifinals.

    “I just want to thank my teammates, my coaches who believed in me. If it were not for them I would not be here right now,” Sanogo told CBS.

    Jordan Hawkins, who scored 16 points for UConn, talked about winning the crown one day after his cousin, Angel Reese of Louisiana State University, won the women’s title.

    “I mean it’s absolutely amazing that we both get this opportunity and I mean the family reunion is going to be great so that’s all I know,” he said.

    UConn enters rarefied air as only the sixth team to win five NCAA men’s basketball championships, joining UCLA (11), Kentucky (eight), North Carolina (six), Duke (five) and Indiana (five). All of UConn’s titles have come since 1999 with the most recent before Monday occurring in 2014.

    UConn’s women’s teams have won 11 basketball national titles.

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  • UConn defeats Miami to advance to the NCAA Men’s Basketball Championship tournament title game | CNN

    UConn defeats Miami to advance to the NCAA Men’s Basketball Championship tournament title game | CNN

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    CNN
     — 

    Fourth seed UConn advanced to the NCAA men’s basketball championship game following a 72-59 win over No. 5 Miami in the Final Four on Saturday.

    It will be the first NCAA national championship game for the UConn Huskies since 2014.

    The Huskies got off to a quick start Saturday, going up 9-0 within the first five minutes of the game. The Miami Hurricanes tried to come crawling back into the game but ultimately the shots did not fall for the team. Up 10 points, UConn forward Alex Karaban knocked down a three-pointer at the buzzer to give the Huskies a 37-24 lead heading into the half.

    UConn’s strong start continued in the second half, extending the lead to 20 points before the Hurricanes’ shots started to fall. Miami cut the lead down to 10 points again before the Huskies regained momentum.

    Huskies star center Adama Sanogo, who has been observing Ramadan and said earlier he would be eating oranges and coconut water before tip-off, was his dominant self. He finished with a game-high 21 points and 10 rebounds. Guard Jordan Hawkins, who was questionable to play with a non-Covid illness, added 13 points.

    UConn head coach Dan Hurley gave all the credit to his coaching staff and players for the team’s success.

    “I’m just happy I was able to attract the right type of people to put me in this position,” Hurley told the CBS broadcast. “The coaching staff, these amazing players and I appreciate obviously the University of Connecticut. They took a chance on a guy that was a high school coach not too long ago. What a blessing and incredibly grateful. … We’ve been striving for five for a while.”

    Earlier Saturday, No. 5 San Diego State stunned No. 9 Florida Atlantic at the last second to win 72-71 and advance to its first NCAA title game. Trailing 71-70 with less than two seconds left in the game, Aztecs guard Lamont Butler hit a pull-up jumper at the buzzer to propel the school to the national championship game.

    The Huskies now look to win the program’s fifth national championship when they face off with San Diego State on Monday evening at NRG Stadium in Houston.

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  • Bow-and-arrow, technology of the first modern humans in Europe 54,000 years ago at Mandrin, France

    Bow-and-arrow, technology of the first modern humans in Europe 54,000 years ago at Mandrin, France

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    Newswise — If the emergence of mechanically propelled weapons in prehistory is commonly perceived as one of the hallmarks of the advance of modern human populations into the European continent, the existence of archery has always been more difficult to trace. The recognition of these technologies in the European Upper Paleolithic has been hampered by ballistic overlaps between weapons projected with a thruster or a bow. Archery technologies are essentially based on the use of perishable materials; wood, fibers, leather, resins, and sinew, which are rarely preserved in European Paleolithic sites and make archaeological recognition of these technologies difficult. It is the flint armatures that constitute the main evidence of these weapon technologies. Based on the analysis of these stone armatures, the recognition of archery is now well documented in Africa dating back some 70,000 years. Some flint or deer antler armatures suggest the existence of archery from the early phases of the Upper Paleolithic in Europe more than 35,000 years ago, but the morphology and the hafting modes of these ancient armatures do not allow them to be linked to a distinct mode of propulsion, making the possible existence of archery during the European Paleolithic nearly invisible. The demonstration of Paleolithic archery has been established only on the basis of the discovery of the oldest bows and arrows found in peat bogs of Northern Europe (at the Stellmoor site in Germany, for example) and dated from the 10 to 12 millennium.

    The data from Mandrin cave in Mediterranean France, presented in an article published Wednesday, February 22, 2023 in the journal Science Advances, profoundly enriches our knowledge of these technologies in Europe and now allows us to push back the age of archery in Europe by more than… 40 millennia! The study is based on the functional analysis of thousands of flint artifacts from the same archaeological level that revealed in February 2022 the oldest occupation of modern humans on the European continent. This very rich level, attributed to the Neronian culture, testifies to Homo sapiens occupations dating back to the 54th millennium and is interposed between numerous Neanderthal occupations occupying the cave before and after the modern human installations. The excavation of the Neronian settlement phases has revealed no less than 1500 flint points. Their analysis shows that a significant number of them were used as armatures for arrows propelled with a bow. It is the very small size and more precisely the small width of these armatures, of which some 30% weigh hardly more than a few grams, which allows us to exclude any other mode of ballistic propulsion for these very small weapons. If thanks to this study, archery in Europe, and more broadly throughout Eurasia, makes a remarkable leap back in time, it also sheds light on the weaponry of Neanderthal populations. The study shows that Neanderthals, contemporaries of Neronian modern humans, did not develop mechanically propelled weapons (like technologies using bows or thrusters) and continued to use their traditional weapons based on the use of massive spear-shaped points that were thrusted or thrown by hand, and thus requiring close contact with their game. The traditions and technologies mastered by these two populations were thus profoundly distinct, illustrating a remarkable objective technological advantage to modern populations during their expansion into the European continent. However, in their article, the authors place this debate in a much broader context in which technical choices cannot be limited solely to the cognitive capacities of differing human populations, referring us to the weight of traditions within these Neanderthal and modern human populations as well as to ethologies that may have been profoundly divergent between them.

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  • Federal Covid Relief Is Ending. Connecticut’s Public Colleges Could Face Big Cuts.

    Federal Covid Relief Is Ending. Connecticut’s Public Colleges Could Face Big Cuts.

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    Last week, a governor had a strong message for public colleges in his state: Get ready for a world without Covid-relief funding.

    Gov. Ned Lamont of Connecticut, a Democrat, has directed substantial cuts to higher ed in his state-budget proposal for the 2024 fiscal year. Lamont’s chief budget official told CT Mirror that the influx of federal money that’s poured in over the last three years was always temporary, and that colleges should have planned accordingly.

    The governor’s proposal hasn’t sat well with higher-ed leaders. Radenka Maric, the University of Connecticut’s president, estimated that her campus could lose $160 million in state funding next year. In response, Maric has threatened to sever ties with the arena in Hartford where the basketball team typically plays, according to The Daily Campus, the student newspaper, citing, in part, that the costs of the arena deal benefit the state and local businesses more than the university.

    Mason Holland, UConn’s student-body president, called on students to walk out of class on Wednesday and travel to the state capitol to protest the cuts.

    Colleges received more than $76 billion from three Covid-relief measures passed by Congress in 2020 and 2021. The aid allowed many colleges to keep students enrolled and maintain critical programs throughout the pandemic, while also scaling up investments in mental-health counselors, basic-needs resources, and other student-support initiatives.

    But that aid has mostly run out and will end entirely in a few months, leaving some colleges scrambling to find funding to cover the rising cost of operations. That challenge has come into sharp relief in Connecticut, where the state’s financial realities raise serious questions about how colleges can adjust.

    Robert Kelchen, a professor of higher education and head of the department of educational leadership and policy studies at the University of Tennessee at Knoxville, said declines in enrollment, the rising cost of facility maintenance and utilities, and salary increases for faculty and staff are driving increasing costs.

    The University of Connecticut originally received a one-time $28.4-million infusion of direct pandemic-related aid, which university officials said they distributed through grants to students and used to cover pandemic-related costs during the 2022 fiscal year. After Connecticut policy makers negotiated salary increases with public employees, state officials also gave colleges additional funding from the American Rescue Plan in 2023 to help cover the costs.

    Instead of states using their budget surpluses to make those investments in higher education, many states have been engaged in a race to the bottom with tax cuts.

    This year, UConn leaders again requested more state funding to help cover those employee-related costs, which will grow next year. But by the looks of Lamont’s budget, that isn’t going to happen.

    The proposal would decrease higher-ed funding over the next two fiscal years — amounting to a $159.6-million budget reduction at UConn next year and a $197.1-million reduction the following year based on a preliminary review, according to Maric.

    “The appropriations proposed for UConn and UConn Health fall far short of what is necessary to adequately fund the university, carry out our critical public health mission most effectively, and fully cover the sizable costs the state seeks to pass along to us,” Maric said in a letter to the university community last week.

    Terrence Cheng, president of Connecticut State Colleges and Universities, said the proposal has the potential to create “long-term harm” to the state’s institutions.

    Lamont’s office didn’t respond to several requests for comment from The Chronicle.

    As Kelchen sees it, economic challenges are a key driver of what’s happening in Connecticut.

    “Covid-relief funding helped plug a lot of gaps in states with budget challenges, and Connecticut is one of the states that hasn’t seen the growth and the revenue that other states have seen during the last couple of years,” Kelchen said.

    Beyond Connecticut, states across the country are considering tax cuts that would exacerbate higher-ed funding problems, said Tom Harnisch, vice president for government relations at the State Higher Education Executive Officers Association.

    “Instead of states using their budget surpluses to make those investments in higher education, many states have been engaged in a race to the bottom with tax cuts,” Harnisch said. “This will affect the ability of states to make investments in key priorities such as higher education when the economy slows down, and federal funds disappear.”

    If UConn were to try and cover the cost of these potential shortfalls by raising tuition, that would mean an increase of 19 percent — or $3,000 — per student next year, Maric said.

    “We simply cannot provide less while asking our students to pay more,” Maric said.

    Raising tuition is one way to alleviate financial pressures, both Kelchen and Harnisch noted. That isn’t always an option in states where the legislature or state governing board controls tuition. Colleges have the authority to raise tuition in Connecticut, but Harnisch said that approach has drawbacks.

    “We’ve seen this movie before,” Harnisch said. “Unfortunately, it ends with students taking on more debt.”

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    Eva Surovell

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  • Yellow evolution: Unique genes led to new species of monkeyflower

    Yellow evolution: Unique genes led to new species of monkeyflower

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    Newswise — Monkeyflowers glow in a rich assortment of colors, from yellow to pink to deep red-orange. But about 5 million years ago, some of them lost their yellow. In the Feb. 10 issue of Science, UConn botanists explain what happened genetically to jettison the yellow pigment, and the implications for the evolution of species.

    Monkeyflowers are famous for growing in harsh, mineral-rich soils where other plants can’t. They are also famously diverse in shape and color. And monkeyflowers provide a textbook example of how a single-gene change can make a new species. In this case, a monkeyflower species lost the yellow pigments in the petals but gained pink about 5 million years ago, attracting bees for pollination. Later, a descendent species accumulated mutations in a gene called YUP that recovered the yellow pigments and led to production of red flowers. The species stopped attracting bees. Instead, hummingbirds pollinated it, isolating the red flowers genetically and creating a new species.

    UConn botanist Yaowu Yuan and postdoctoral researcher Mei Liang (currently a professor at South China Agricultural University), with collaborators from four other institutes, have now shown exactly which gene it is that changed to prevent monkeyflowers from making yellow. Their research, published this week in Science, adds weight to a theory that new genes create phenotypic diversity and even new species.

    The YUP gene in question is found at a locus, or region, of the monkeyflower genome that has three new genes. These new genes are not found in species outside of this group. They are duplicates of other genes from other parts of the monkeyflower genome. In particular, YUP is a partial duplicate of a pre-existing gene that has nothing to do with color.

    Standard genetics thought is that partial duplicate genes regulate the genes they are derived from; it was very unlikely that these genes would affect an unrelated gene. Liang decided to investigate what these genes were doing anyway, against the advice of Yuan, who thought it was a waste of time.  But Liang’s persistence paid off: she discovered that the YUP gene was actually targeting the plants’ master regulator of carotenoids, the pigments that make monkeyflowers and other plants yellow. YUP produced many small RNAs that suppressed the carotenoid gene. There are very few examples of genes that produce small RNAs affecting traits important to the creation of a new species.

    “This experience really taught me how important it is not to constrain oneself with ‘conventional wisdom’,” Yuan says. Not only does YUP regulate a gene it is entirely unrelated to it; the other two genes at this same locus also affect monkeyflower color, Yuan says.

    The uniqueness of these three genes, only found in a few closely related monkeyflowers, is an important clue as to how new species evolve.

    “Almost every single species has unique genes,” called ‘taxon specific’ because they are only found in a small group of species. “For the most part, we have no idea what these genes do,” says Yuan. This research shows that these taxon specific genes can be the keys to the new species. Previously, many geneticists and evolutionary biologists thought that it was changes in the expression of common genes shared by many different species that differentiated them, and that the small number of idiosyncratic genes were unlikely to be important.

    “We think we understand evolution well enough to make predictions. But now we are realizing we really don’t. Evolution is just so unpredictable,” Yuan says.

    His lab is now looking at how the monkeyflower genome controls the production of pigment spatially. For example, some monkeyflowers have upper petals that are entirely white, but lower petals with color. Yuan and his colleagues want to know how the plants suppress pigment only in certain parts of the flower.

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  • Genetic barriers, a warming ocean, and the uncertain future for an important forage fish

    Genetic barriers, a warming ocean, and the uncertain future for an important forage fish

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    Newswise — In the vast oceans, one would assume their inhabitants can travel far and wide and, as a result, populations of a species would mix freely. But this doesn’t appear to be the case for a vital forage fish called the sand lance.

    Sand lance are small schooling fish impressively rich in lipids, which makes them a fantastic and significant food source for at least 70 different species ranging from whales and sharks to seabirds, says UConn Associate Professor of Marine Sciences Hannes Baumann.

    The Northern sand lance can be found from the waters off New Jersey all the way north to Greenland. Researchers, including Baumann and Ph.D. student Lucas Jones, were interested to see if sand lance constitute a massive, homogenous population, or whether there are genetically distinct groups. Their findings are published in the ICES Journal of Marine Science.

    Baumann explains these are important questions to answer when considering conservation and sustainable management of the species, especially since the regions where sand lance live are warming faster than many areas of the planet due to climate change.

    Sampling fish from such a broad range is no small task, but two years ago, Baumann and Jones began reaching out to other researchers to see if they had tissue samples to spare. Baumann credits the work to the international group of colleagues who contributed samples including co-authors from Canada and Greenland, and who helped sequence and analyze the data including co-authors from Cornell University.

    In all, Baumann, Jones, and the team were able to sequence and analyze nearly 300 samples from a variety of locations across the sand lance’s range using a technique called low-coverage whole genome sequencing. They also sequenced the first reference genome for sand lance.

    In a nutshell, Baumann says they found an area on the Scotian Shelf, off the coast of Nova Scotia, where a genetic break occurs. The researchers distinguished two distinct groups, one north and one south of the divide, with parts of the genome differing quite dramatically – namely on chromosomes 21 and 24. Without obvious physical barriers like a mountain range separating the groups, Baumann says it’s logical to ask how these differences are possible.

    “That is the scientific conundrum,” says Baumann, and the answer, it appears, lies in the currents.

    “When fish from the north reproduce and drift south, they are genetically less adapted to warmer southern waters, even if it’s five or six degrees warmer in the winter, they are just not surviving,” Baumann says. “These populations may be linked by the ocean currents, but the realized connectivity is basically zero.”

    This finding is a first for the sand lance, but it has been shown in other species such as lobsters, cod, and scallops, and this research adds further evidence to an apparent temperature divide at the Scotian Shelf, and helps demonstrate that temperature is an important factor in survival.

    “Example after example shows that the ocean is not as homogeneous a place as expected, and there are all kinds of things that prevent that constant mixing,”Baumann says. “We found another striking example of that.”

    When researchers find adaptation in an environment where mixing is continuous, like in the ocean, Baumann says, the question is how it is possible that groups stay different, even though they are constantly encountering other genotypes. That is where powerful genomic methods, like the ones used in this paper, come in handy.

    “Parts of the genome in many species have what we call a ‘genetic inversion,’ which means that the genes on the chromosome from one parent have a certain order and the genes on the same chromosome that come from the other parent that code for the same thing, and they’re the same area, but they’re flipped,” Baumann says.

    These inversions mean recombination cannot occur; therefore, the genes are passed down through the generations and play an important role in adaptation.

    “We discovered on chromosomes 21 and 24 there are whole regions that are completely different and that is like the trademark signature of what we call an inversion because there’s no recombination going on.”

    Baumann says that knowing there are genetic and ecological barriers on the Scotian Shelf is important, because with climate change, this barrier may move north and while that may be good news for southern fish, it’s bad news for the fish currently there.

    The researchers were also a little relieved in finding two clusters, because had there been many smaller clusters, it could make management and conservation more challenging, especially considering scenarios like the construction of offshore wind parks. Areas potentially well situated for wind turbines can also be habitats for sand lance, and construction disrupts habitats. If there were many, smaller population clusters, a single construction project could pose the risk of completely wiping out a cluster, whereas with more widely dispersed populations, though the local population may be temporarily disturbed, it will not be long before they are able to re-establish after construction is completed.

    Baumann plans to focus further research on studying the genetic basis of the thermal divide.

    “We want to make sure that this fish is productive and resilient, despite climate change, so we should make sure these areas where they are occurring are protected,” Bauman says. “These decisions should include experts to ensure if there’s an area that is very critical to sand lance, that any disturbance is temporary.”

    It isn’t an unsolvable conflict, but it is something that we need to do, says Baumann, who also notes that it is possible that sand lance north of the thermal divide are already suffering more from warming because the region is warming faster.

    “It could be that these two clusters have different vulnerabilities to climate change,” he says. “We don’t know that yet but that’s something that should be pursued.”

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    University of Connecticut

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  • Researcher aims to uncover plant invasions in the tropics

    Researcher aims to uncover plant invasions in the tropics

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    Newswise — Invasive species of plants have a knack for settling in new settings and making big changes to an ecosystem, even leading to extinctions of native species.

    Assistant Research Professor in UConn’s Institute of the Environment Julissa Rojas-Sandoval explains that invasive plants are non-native species that have been introduced into new areas generally as a result of human activities, and that they are actively spreading, causing harm to the environment, the economy, and human health.  Invasive plants may have significant long-term implications for the conservation of native biodiversity, but to combat the problem, we need to know which plants are invasive, where they’re from, and how they got there.

    Rojas-Sandoval leads an international collaboration including researchers from all Central American countries, working together to compile the most comprehensive databases of invasive plant species in Central America. The collaboration is called FINCA: Flora Introduced and Naturalized in Central America, and their first paper was published this week in Biological Invasions.

    The collaboration arose to meet a need, says Rojas-Sandoval. “While we have a good understanding of the processes and mechanisms of plant invasions in temperate regions, there is a huge gap in our knowledge about biological invasions in the tropics, and this lack of information is limiting our ability to respond to invasive plants.”

    Remediation and the impact on the conservation of biodiversity is an important focus, but invasive plants also threaten the social and economic impact aspects of the region. Rojas-Sandoval points out that for places like her native Costa Rica, which relies on eco-tourism and agriculture, the impacts of not dealing with the invasive species could be significant.

    It has been suggested that the huge diversity of plants in tropical regions may provide resistance to invasions, meaning that these ecosystems could be less threatened by invasive species because of the competition between so many different plants, but Rojas-Sandoval has studied this topic for the last 15 years and says the problem is greater than is widely understood.

    “Across the tropics, the acceleration in the rates of introduction of non-native plants, as well as increments in the rates of habitat loss and forest degradation, are transforming tropical forests and making them more susceptible and less resistant to invasions,” she says.

    Rojas-Sandoval explains that, as the juncture between North and South America, Central America is a regional hotspot of biodiversity, home to about 7% of the world’s plant and animal species. The region is also very vulnerable to climate change, she says:

    “Climate models predict more extreme events for Central America, more and stronger hurricanes, droughts, and other impacts related to climate change. But we don’t know how climate change is already impacting both native and invasive plant species across this region. That information is necessary to be able to start doing something.”

    Rojas-Sandoval and co-author Eduardo Chacón-Madrigal from the University of Costa Rica seized the opportunity and decided to start collecting and compiling any available information to make a comprehensive checklist necessary to address the challenges posed by invasive plants.

    They also reached out to other researchers from across Central America to see if they would be interested in collaborating and the timing was fortunate, says Rojas-Sandoval.

    “Due to COVID, people were stuck at home and, despite the many difficulties, we all had extra time to collaborate revising lists of species and providing crucial information for the project,” she says.

    The team gathered data from herbarium collections in Central America and from collections around the world as well as references from existing botanical surveys, lists of alien species, and other literature.

    “We compiled all this information into a list and then sent it to the experts in different countries so they could evaluate it. Then we did a second verification process because we wanted to be completely sure that we were dealing with species that were 100% alien to the region and to validate the occurrence and classification performed by the experts.

    “We were able to identify that species from all over the world have been introduced to different countries in Central America, and more than 60% of them have been introduced for ornamental purposes. It is good that we can identify those species, so we know where to focus for later studies.”

    The team also determined that invasive plants have made their way into all the major habitats in Central America, and the trend is steadily increasing. This information can now be used to generate specific recommendations for the governments or for the local authorities, to use their resources in the best ways possible to have an impact in controlling the invasive species, says Rojas-Sandoval, adding that the best remedy is prevention – alerting people to the issues before the plants even arrive.

    For invasive plants that have already been established, it will take education, persistence, and resources to deal with the problem. However, another important aspect of the problem is that developing countries often don’t have the additional resources needed to fully address the situation.

    “The local authorities and people in Central America and other regions in the tropics are already dealing with so many issues, including poverty, climate change, pollution, and over-exploitation of natural resources that it is even more important to optimize the use of any resources available to mitigate the impact of invasive species,” she says. “This is more bad news for many people dealing with so many problems, and it is crucial to increase awareness and support for the issue of biological invasions in the tropics.

    “The sooner we start doing something, the better the results will be.”

     

    The FINCA collaboration also includes: Eduardo Chacón-Madrigal (Universidad de Costa Rica), Lilian Ferrufino-Acosta (Universidad Nacional Autónoma de Honduras), Rodolfo Flores (Los Naturalistas, Panama), Omar López (Universidad de Panamá & Smithsonian Tropical Research Institute), AnaLu MacVean (York College), Indiana Coronado (Universidad Nacional Autónoma de Nicaragua), Pablo Galán and Dagoberto Rodríguez (Herbario Jardín Botánico La Laguna, El Salvador), and Yader Ruiz (Universidad de El Salvador).

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    University of Connecticut

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  • Both Types of THC Get You High–So Why Is Only One Illegal?

    Both Types of THC Get You High–So Why Is Only One Illegal?

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    Newswise — One is an illegal drug found in marijuana while the other is marketed as a safe herbal alternative. But the claimed differences between them aren’t backed by science, a group of UConn researchers report on Nov. 1 in Drug and Alcohol Dependence.

    Tetrahydrocannabinol, or THC, is the psychoactive compound produced by cannabis plants. The federal government lists Δ9 -THC (pronounced delta-9-THC) on the Schedule 1 list of dangerous drugs with no accepted medical use. But other versions of THC that differ only by the location of a double bond, such as Δ8-THC, remain quietly quasi-legal on the federal level.

    The legality differences between the various versions of THC are causing conflict between the hemp and cannabis industries. There is also potential for harm to consumers. Although Δ8-THC is viewed as an herbal extract of hemp, many manufacturers use solvents and chemical processes that can leave harmful residues in the product, and there are no standards for purity or safety. Because there are no limits, some products contain ridiculously high levels of ∆8 and other THC variants that could potentially cause harm due to the sheer dosage. And states do not agree on its safety or legality. Some states, such as Connecticut, have made Δ8-THC as controlled as Δ9-THC, while in others it remains legal. Cannabis producers allege the distinction is giving rise to unfair competition between the hemp and marijuana markets.

    If regulating Δ9-THC as an illegal drug is based on the fact that it has physical and psychoactive effects, then the first step to rational regulation of Δ8-THC would look at whether it, too, has those effects. And people who have experience with both say it does; most agree the effects of Δ8 are similar to Δ9.

    UConn School of Nursing professor and Center for Advancement in Managing Pain director Steve Kinsey, graduate student Olivia Vanegas, and their colleagues in UConn Chemistry and local startup 3BC Inc decided to test that in mice. Research done in Japan in the 1980s had shown that Δ8-THC produced the same effects in mice as Δ9-THC. Kinsey and Vanegas reproduced that work and found it to be true: the mice given Δ8 became lethargic, their body temperature dropped, and they became cataleptic, meaning the researchers could put the mice in unusual positions and they’d stay like that for several seconds, which is common in THC-treated mice, but not normal mice.

    Then the researchers took it a step farther, blocking the mice’s THC receptors. Blocked mice had no reaction to Δ8-THC, making it clear that Δ8 interacts with the same receptors as Δ9-THC.

    Then the researchers took a group of mice and gave them Δ8-THC twice a day for five days. Over time, the mice became desensitized to it. And when they were then given the THC blocker, the mice acted like they were in withdrawal.

    Finally collaborators at RTI International ran an experiment “asking” the mice how the drug felt. First they trained the mice to go to a specific spot for a reward if they were dosed with Δ9-THC. After the training, the mice were dosed with Δ8-THC. Unsurprisingly, they went to the same reward spot as when they were dosed with Δ9.

    “So they’re telling us the same thing people buying the stuff in gas stations tell us: Δ8 feels like THC,” Kinsey says.

    Chemically, it’s unsurprising. Molecules as similar as Δ8- and Δ9-THC usually (though not always) act the same in the body. But legally it causes a lot of complications.

    The distinction between Δ8- and Δ9- originally came about from the congressional Farm Bill covering hemp growing and sales. Hemp is defined as a cannabis plant that has less than 0.3% Δ9-THC by dry weight. Anything that has more concentrated Δ9-THC than that is considered marijuana. Additionally, the Farm Bill said anything else naturally present in the hemp plant is legal. That includes Δ8-THC.

    “It’s creating a fight between marijuana and hemp” growers, says John Harloe, an attorney on Colorado’s THC taskforce. Products classified as marijuana “must be sold through dispensaries and pay high taxes, while hemp producers can sell essentially the same product but without the same regulations, due to the ambiguity in the Farm Bill,” Harloe says.

    Harloe is bringing Kinsey and Vanegas’s paper to the Colorado taskforce to inform the discussion. The taskforce is trying to create appropriate regulation that will address the different chemical variations of THC and guard public safety without crippling the hemp industry. The paper is particularly valuable because there is so little research done on THC and its intoxicating effects, due to federal rules.

    “Any bit of science is going to be influential,” Harloe says.

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    University of Connecticut

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  • Thousands gather at funeral for 2 Connecticut officers

    Thousands gather at funeral for 2 Connecticut officers

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    EAST HARTFORD, Conn. — Thousands of police officers from around the country gathered in a stadium in Connecticut on Friday for a joint funeral for two officers who were shot to death in an apparent ambush.

    The service for Bristol officers Dustin DeMonte and Alex Hamzy was set to be held at Pratt & Whitney Stadium at Rentschler Field — the University of Connecticut’s 40,000-seat stadium in East Hartford. Major highway closures were announced for the processions of the two officers from funeral homes to the stadium.

    DeMonte, Hamzy and Officer Alec Iurato were shot on Oct. 12 in what police believe was an ambush set up by a 911 call made by the shooter, Nicholas Brutcher. Iurato, who survived a gunshot wound to his leg, struggled to get behind a police cruiser and fired a single shot that killed Brutcher. Brutcher’s brother, Nathan, also was shot and survived.

    At the time of the shooting, DeMonte was a sergeant with 10 years experience on the force and Hamzy was an officer for eight years. They were promoted posthumously to lieutenant and sergeant, respectively.

    Mourners including many police officers from New England and beyond streamed into the stadium hours before the service.

    Sgt. Greg Dube of the New Hampshire State Police said it was important to show support in large numbers after such a tragedy.

    “We’re all family,” he said. “We definitely feel their pain. The best way we can show our respect is in strength in numbers.”

    “I might not have met them, but I understand it could have easily happened to me or my colleagues. You just can’t take any day for granted,” Dube said.

    Authorities have not released a motive for the shooting. A preliminary report said Nicholas Brutcher fired more than 80 rounds as he attacked the officers from behind. The state inspector general also said in the report that it was evident Iurato’s deadly use of force on Nicholas Brutcher was justified.

    Calling hours for Hamzy on Wednesday drew hundreds of people, while a private wake for DeMonte was held Thursday.

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  • UConn Star Paige Bueckers Announces Deal With Cash App, Her Third Major NIL Partnership

    UConn Star Paige Bueckers Announces Deal With Cash App, Her Third Major NIL Partnership

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    University of Connecticut basketball star Paige Beuckers announced a new partnership Monday that’s sure to add to her buckets of cash off the court.

    The reigning Naismith College Player of the Year is partnering with Cash App, the mobile payment service owned by Jack Dorsey’s Block (formerly Square), to help launch the Paige Bueckers Foundation. Although specific details have yet to be released, the foundation will broadly focus on creating opportunities for children and families and promoting social justice. Cash App plans to endow an initial $100,000 Bitcoin donation, in addition to $100,000 in cash that will be given away to fans in $15 payments to promote the announcement. Other financial terms were not disclosed, but Forbes estimates that Bueckers is still a few deals away from hitting the $1 million mark in endorsements.

    “I know this deal isn’t like a super long-term contract,” Bueckers tells Forbes. “But I’m working with people and want to work with people who have the same values as me.”

    This marks Bueckers’ third major partnership since the NCAA stripped down its regulations in July, allowing college athletes to profit off their name, image and likeness. She signed with global e-commerce platform StockX in October and, one month later, became the first college athlete to join Gatorade’s ranks. In July, Bueckers trademarked the phrase “Paige Buckets,” which is the point guard’s nickname. 

    How Bueckers fares in the nascent NIL market could offer a glimpse of the opportunities emerging for the top tier of college athletes. Based on her sprawling social media presence—Bueckers has more than one million followers between Twitter and Instagram—a study from research outlet AthleticDirectorU named her the most marketable athlete in college sports prior to the NCAA’s rule change.

    “She is the best of the best, and these major brands want to leverage her appeal, particularly to a young and growing demographic,” Carnegie Mellon Tepper School of Business associate professor Tim Derdenger wrote in an email. “Her success will certainly spill over to other players.”

    It already has. Last month, Gonzaga forward Chet Holmgren signed a deal with Topps that the company said was its largest with a college athlete to date. Fresno State basketball players and TikTok stars Haley and Hanna Cavinder recently cofounded a streetwear clothing company in addition to striking partnerships with Boost Mobile, Champs, Eastbay and WWE. 

    The addition of Bueckers rounds out an impressive roster for Cash App, which has signed up a handful of high-profile athletes in the last few months. In November, Los Angeles Rams wide receiver Odell Beckham Jr. and Green Bay Packers quarterback Aaron Rodgers announced they were partnering with Cash App and taking part of their salaries in Bitcoin. Golden State Warriors stars Klay Thompson and Andre Iguodala said they would be doing the same in January. As cryptocurrency becomes a hot topic among athlete investors, at least ten North American-based professional athletes have taken part of their salaries or endorsement payments in some form of crypto.

    “Obviously, I’m still learning a lot about it and trying to understand,” Bueckers says. “I just started understanding what to do with my tax money, so now I have to learn what to do with Bitcoin and cryptocurrency.”

    A native of Hopkins, Minnesota, Bueckers arrived at UConn in 2020 as the top-ranked recruit in the United States and the 2019-20 Gatorade Female Athlete of the Year. She collected a string of awards during her freshman season and led the heavily favored Huskies to the Final Four, where they were upset by the University of Arizona. Bueckers picked up where she left off during her sophomore campaign before suffering a fracture in her left knee, which has sidelined her for the last two months. She hopes to return at the end of February.

    As she adds to her sponsorship portfolio, Bueckers plans to continue to use her platform to advocate for racial equity. At the 2021 ESPYs, where she won the award for best college athlete in women’s sports, Bueckers used her speech to honor and celebrate Black women. She’s adamant about including BIPOC creatives in anything she does. “I grew up with everything, a roof over my head and food on my plate,” she says. “I want to help younger kids that weren’t as fortunate as me.”

    This is likely just the start.

    “The current set of offers is just the tip of the iceberg,” Derdenger says. “She has a lucrative future ahead of her.”

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    Maria Abreu, Forbes Staff

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