Digital Commons Network^™

Supporting Information For “Using Drones Equipped With Thermal Cameras To Locate And Count Quail Individuals And Coveys: A Case Study Using Northern Bobwhite Colinus Virginianus In Mississippi, Usa”, Jared A. Elmore

Publications

Drone flights were conducted over bobwhite individuals and coveys and information was collected on the date, time of flight, number of individuals estimated in the covey, and number of individuals flushed from the covey (i.e., actual number of individuals). We also report season of flight and the thermal sensor used for each flight. NA denotes that flush or capture was not attempted.

Corrigendum To “Nigella Sativa As An Antibiotic Alternative To Promote Growth And Enhance Health Of Broilers Challenged With Eimeria Maxima And Clostridium Perfringens” [Poult.Sci.102 (8) (2023) 102831], Vishal Manjunatha, Julian E. Nixon, Greg F. Mathis, Brett S. Lumpkins, Zeynep B. Guzel-Seydim, Atif C. Seydim, Annel E. Greene, Xiuping Jiang

Publications

No abstract provided.

Nigella Sative As An Antibiotic Alternative To Promote Growth And Enhance Health Of Broilers Challenged With Eimeria Maxima And Clostridium Perfringens, Vishal Manjunatha, Julian E. Nixon, Greg F. Mathis, Brett S. Lumpkins, Zeynep B. Guzel-Seydim, Atif C. Seydim, Annel K. Greene, Xiuping Jiang

Publications

The poultry industry has significant coccidiosis and necrotic enteritis (NE) challenges, leading to high mortality and unacceptable growth without antibiotic treatment. This research explored supplementing Nigella sativa (black cumin) seed oil in poultry feed to mitigate coccidiosis and prevent or lessen NE in broilers. In vivo studies consisted of 384 and 320 Cobb 500 male broiler chicks distributed in a randomized complete block experimental design for trials 1 and 2, respectively. The first trial compared 3 concentrations (1, 2, and 5 mL/kg) of black cumin seed oil (BCSO), and trial 2 compared 2 concentrations (2 and 5 mL/kg) BCSO, with …

Abundance And Territory Location Data Of Forest Songbirds To Determine Effects Of Pipeline Collocation As A Mitigation Strategy, Lillie Langlois

All Data Sets

These data were collected for the purpose of determining potential ecological costs associated with a mitigation strategy used in shale gas development in the Appalachian basin. Collocation is the practice of siting new shale gas pipelines adjacent to existing surface disturbance such as forest roads to reduce habitat fragmentation and loss of core forest. These data result from spot mapping for species of songbird at paired forest road and shale gas corridors (expanded access roads collocated with pipelines) between May and July 2013 in north-central Pennsylvania, USA. The data file contains nine sheets that report data from different pieces of …

The Cryptococcus Neoformans Flc1 Homologue Controls Calcium Homeostasis And Confers Fungal Pathogenicity In The Infected Hosts, Piotr R. Stempinski, Kristie D. Goughenour, Lukas M. Du Plooy, J. Andrew Alspaugh, Michal A. Olszewski, Lukasz Kozubowski

Open Access Publishing Fund

Cryptococcus neoformans, an opportunistic yeast pathogen, relies on a complex network of stress response pathways that allow for proliferation in the host. In Saccharomyces cerevisiae, stress responses are regulated by integral membrane proteins containing a transient receptor potential (TRP) domain, including the flavin carrier protein 1 (Flc1), which regulates calcium homeostasis and flavin transport. Here, we report that deletion of C. neoformans FLC1 results in cytosolic calcium elevation and increased nuclear content of calcineurin-dependent transcription factor Crz1, which is associated with an aberrant cell wall chitin overaccumulation observed in the flc1Δ mutant. Absence of Flc1 or inhibition …

Alfalfa Establishment And Management In South Carolina, Liliane Silva, Michael Mrshall, Jeremy Greene, Matias Aguerre

Livestock and Forages

Alfalfa is a perennial legume with high forage quality that can be used under grazing or hay management. This publication outlines establishment and management recommendations for alfalfa plantings in South Carolina.

Water Requirements For Growth And Survival Of Swietenia Macrophylla And Tabebuia Heterophylla Juvenile Trees In Relation To Water Production Capacity Of Dew Condensers1, Jodelin Seldon, Victor A. Snyder, Eric Harmsen, Skip Van Bloem

Publications

Drought mortality of juvenile trees is a major cause for failure of reforestation projects. Portable devices such as passive radiative dew condensers can often provide 0.15 L/day of water in situ, possibly sufficient for tree survival until roots can access groundwater, allowing self-sustainability. To evaluate growth and survivability of juvenile trees of Tabebuia heterophylla Britton and Swietenia macrophylla King under such low water amounts, juvenile trees received approximately 0.033, 0.067, 0.134, 0.201 and 0.268 L/tree/day, representing fractions (relative evapotranspiration or RET) of 0.125, 0.25, 0.50, 0.75 and 1.00 of the evapotranspiration demand (ETo). The experiment lasted 60 days for S. …

Beyond Leaf Habit: Generalities In Plant Function Across 97 Tropical Dry Forest Tree Species, German G. Vargas, Tim J. Brodribb, Juan M. Dupuy, Roy Gonzalez, Catherine M. Hulshof, David Medvigy, Tristan A.P, Allerton, Camila Pizano, Beatriz Salgado-Negret, Naomi B. Schwartz, Skip Van Bloem, Bonnie G. Waring, Jennifer S. Powers

Publications

No abstract provided.

Soil Biogeochemistry Across Central And South American Tropical Dry Forests, Bonnie G. Waring, Mark E. De Guzman, Dan V. Du, Juan M. Dupuy, Maga Gei, Jessica Gutknecht, Catherine Hulshof, Nicolas Jelinski, Andrew J. Margenot, David Medvigy, Camila Pizano, Beatriz Salgado-Negret, Naomi B. Schwartz, Annette M. Trierweiler, Skip Van Bloem

Publications

The availability of nitrogen (N) and phosphorus (P) controls the flow of carbon (C) among plants, soils, and the atmosphere, thereby shaping terrestrial ecosystem responses to global change. Soil C, N, and P cycles are linked by drivers operating at multiple spatial and temporal scales: landscape-level variation in macroclimate and soil geochemistry, stand-scale heterogeneity in forest composition, and microbial community dynamics at the soil pore scale. Yet in many biomes, we do not know at which scales most of the biogeochemical variation emerges, nor which processes drive cross-scale feedbacks. Here, we examined the drivers and spatial/temporal scales of variation in …

The Motion Of Trees In The Wind: A Data Synthesis, Toby D. Jackson, Sarab Sethi, Ebba Dellwik, Nikolas Angelou, Amanda Bunce, Tim Van Emmerik, Marine Duperat, Jean-Claude Ruel, Axel Wellpott, Skip Van Bloem

Publications

Interactions between wind and trees control energy exchanges between the atmosphere and forest canopies. This energy exchange can lead to the widespread damage of trees, and wind is a key disturbance agent in many of the world's forests. However, most research on this topic has focused on conifer plantations, where risk management is economically important, rather than broadleaf forests, which dominate the forest carbon cycle. This study brings together tree motion time-series data to systematically evaluate the factors influencing tree responses to wind loading, including data from both broadleaf and coniferous trees in forests and open environments.

We found that …

Northern Giant Hornet (Vespa Mandarinia) And Yellow-Legged Hornet (Vespa Velutina), Potential Pests Of Honey Bees, Benjamin Andrew Powell

Agricultural Education

Exotic hornets present a significant threat to apiculture. Recent introductions of the yellow-legged hornet to Europe and the asian giant hornet to North America have made it critical that regulators, beekeepers and the general public be able to detect and identify these exotic hornets and to understand their biology to minimize the potential impacts to apiculture in South Carolina were they to be introduced.

Stem-Inhabiting Fungal Communities Differ Between Intact And Snapped Trees After Hurricane Maria In A Puerto Rican Tropical Dry Forest, François Maillard, Erin Andrews, Molly Moran, Peter G. Kennedy, Skip Van Bloem, Jonathan S. Schilling

Publications

Hurricanes impact forests by damaging trees and altering multiple ecosystem functions. As such, predicting which individuals are likely to be most affected has crucial economic importance as well as conservation value. Tree stem-inhabiting fungal communities, notably rot-causing agents, have been mentioned as a potential factor of tree predisposition to hurricane damage, but this assumption remains poorly explored. To examine this relationship, we sampled the stem wood of intact and damaged trees shortly after Hurricane Maria in a Puerto Rican dry tropical forest in 2017. We categorized samples depending on two types: trees with intact stems and trees in which stems …

Variable Fall Climate Conditions On Carbon Assimilation And Spring Phenology Of Young Peach Trees, Brian T. Lawrence, Juan Carlos Melgar

Publications

Variable fall temperature and moisture conditions may alter leaf senescence of deciduous fruit trees, influencing carbon assimilation before dormancy and phenology the following spring. This study explored gas exchange of young peach trees (Prunus persica (L.) Batsch) when senescence proceeded normally or was delayed during the fall under two soil moisture treatments: Well-irrigated trees or water deficit. Results showed leaf carbon assimilation was similar between the senescence treatments, but whole tree assimilation was estimated to be greater in delayed senescence trees compared to normal senescence trees based on timing of defoliation and total leaf area. The effect of soil moisture …

Toxoplasma Gondii Requires Its Plant-Like Heme Biosynthesis Pathway For Infection, Amy Bergmann, Kathleen Floyd, Melanie Key, Carly Dameron, Kerrick C. Rees, L. Brock Thornton, Daniel C. Whitehead, Iqbal Hamza, Zhicheng Dou

Publications

Heme, an iron-containing organic ring, is essential for virtually all living organisms by serving as a prosthetic group in proteins that function in diverse cellular activities ranging from diatomic gas transport and sensing, to mitochondrial respiration, to detoxification. Cellular heme levels in microbial pathogens can be a composite of endogenous de novo synthesis or exogenous uptake of heme or heme synthesis intermediates. Intracellular pathogenic microbes switch routes for heme supply when heme availability fluctuates in their replicative environment throughout infection. Here, we show that Toxoplasma gondii, an obligate intracellular human pathogen, encodes a functional heme biosynthesis pathway. A chloroplast-derived …

Comparative Lipidomic Analysis Reveals Heat Stress Responses Of Two Soybean Genotypes Differing In Temperature Sensitivity, Sruthi Narayanan, Zolian S. Zoong Lwe, Nitant Gandhi, Ruth Welti, Benjamin Fallen, James R. Smith, Sachin Rustgi

Publications

Heat-induced changes in lipidome and their influence on stress adaptation are not well-defined in plants. We investigated if lipid metabolic changes contribute to differences in heat stress responses in a heat-tolerant soybean genotype DS25-1 and a heat-susceptible soybean genotype DT97-4290. Both genotypes were grown at optimal temperatures (OT; 30/20 °C) for 15 days. Subsequently, half of the plants were exposed to heat stress (38/28 °C) for 11 days, and the rest were kept at OT. Leaf samples were collected for lipid and RNA extractions on the 9^th and 11^th days of stress, respectively. We observed a decline in …

Gender Differences In Diet-Induced Steatotic Disease In Cyp2b-Null Mice, Melissa M. Heintz, Rebecca Mcree, Ramiya Kumar, William S. Baldwin

Publications

Nonalcoholic fatty liver disease (NAFLD) is the most common liver disease; however, progression to nonalcoholic steatohepatitis (NASH) is associated with most adverse outcomes. CYP2B metabolizes multiple xeno- and endobiotics, and male Cyp2b-null mice are diet-induced obese (DIO) with increased NAFLD. However, the DIO study was not performed long enough to assess progression to NASH. Therefore, to assess the role of Cyp2b in fatty liver disease progression from NAFLD to NASH, we treated wildtype (WT) and Cyp2b-null mice with a normal diet (ND) or choline-deficient, L-amino acid-defined high fat diet (CDAHFD) for 8 weeks and determined metabolic and molecular changes. CDAHFD-fed …

Comparative Transcriptome Profiling Provides Insights Into Plant Salt Tolerance In Seashore Paspalum (Paspalum Vaginatum), Peipei Wu, Steven Cogill, Yijian Qiu, Zhigang Li, Man Zhou, Qian Hu, Zhihui Chang, Hong Luo, Rooksana E. Noorai, Xiaoxia Xia, Christopher Saski, Paul Raymer

Publications

Background

Seashore paspalum (Paspalum vaginatum), a halophytic warm-seasoned perennial grass, is tolerant of many environmental stresses, especially salt stress. To investigate molecular mechanisms underlying salinity tolerance in seashore paspalum, physiological characteristics and global transcription profiles of highly (Supreme) and moderately (Parish) salinity-tolerant cultivars under normal and salt stressed conditions were analyzed.

Results

Physiological characterization comparing highly (Supreme) and moderately (Parish) salinity-tolerant cultivars revealed that Supreme’s higher salinity tolerance is associated with higher Na+ and Ca2+ accumulation under normal conditions and further increase of Na+ under salt-treated conditions (400 mM NaCl), possibly by vacuolar sequestration. Moreover, K+ retention under …

Lionfish (Pterois Volitans) As Biomonitoring Species For Oil Pollution Effects In Coral Reef Ecosystems, Peter Van Den Hurk, Ian Edhlund, Ryan David, Jacob J. Hahn, Michel J. Mccomb, Elizabeth L. Rogers, Emily Pisarski, Katy Chung, Marie Delorenzo

Publications

With oil spills, and other sources of aromatic hydrocarbons, being a continuous threat to coral reef systems, and most reef fish species being protected or difficult to collect, the use of the invasive lionfish (Pterois volitans) might be a good model species to monitor biomarkers in potentially exposed fish in the Caribbean and western Atlantic. The rapid expansion of lionfish in the Caribbean and western Atlantic, and the unregulated fishing for this species, would make the lionfish a suitable candidate as biomonitoring species for oil pollution effects. However, to date little has been published about the responses of …

Trait Differentiation And Modular Toxin Expression In Palm-Pitvipers, Andrew J. Mason, Mark J. Margres, Jason L. Strickland, Darin R. Rokyta, Mahmood Sasa, Christopher L. Parkinson

Publications

Background

Modularity is the tendency for systems to organize into semi-independent units and can be a key to the evolution and diversification of complex biological systems. Snake venoms are highly variable modular systems that exhibit extreme diversification even across very short time scales. One well-studied venom phenotype dichotomy is a trade-off between neurotoxicity versus hemotoxicity that occurs through the high expression of a heterodimeric neurotoxic phospholipase A2 (PLA2) or snake venom metalloproteinases (SVMPs). We tested whether the variation in these venom phenotypes could occur via variation in regulatory sub-modules through comparative venom gland transcriptomics of representative Black-Speckled Palm-Pitvipers (Bothriechis …

Comparison Study Of Mold Growth Resistance Of Plastic Based Material Flooring (Pbm Flooring) And Ceramic Tile Flooring, Jyothi Rangineni, Jeremy Tzeng

Publications

Clemson University Department of Biological Sciences and Tile Council of North America Product Performance Testing Laboratory evaluated whether ceramic tile and Plastic Based Material (PBM¹) flooring support mold growth when exposed to fungal spores.

Mold grows in moisture-rich environments and requires only minimal sources of nutrition to support growth. It has long been identified to cause damage to buildings and construction materials and its presence in buildings has been connected to many major health concerns with various studies and reviews published on this matter.²

The method used to evaluate mold growth was ASTM G21-96 (2015).³ This …

Discovery Of Genomic Variations By Whole-Genome Resequencing Of The North American Araucana Chicken, Rooksana E. Noorai, Vijay Shankar, Nowlan H. Freese, Christopher M. Gregorski, Susan C. Chapman

Publications

Gallus gallus (chicken) is phenotypically diverse, with over 60 recognized breeds, among the myriad species within the Aves lineage. Domestic chickens have been under artificial selection by humans for thousands of years for agricultural purposes. The North American Araucana (NAA) breed arose as a cross between the Chilean “Collonocas” that laid blue eggs and was rumpless and the “Quetros” that had unusual tufts but with tail. NAAs were introduced from South America in the 1940s and have been kept as show birds by enthusiasts since then due to several distinctive traits: laying eggs with blue eggshells, characteristic ear-tufts, a pea …

Gluten Detection Methods And Their Critical Role In Assuring Safe Diets For Celiac Patients, Claudia E. Osorio, Jaime H. Mejias, Sachin Rustgi

Publications

Celiac disease, wheat sensitivity, and allergy represent three different reactions, which may occur in genetically predisposed individuals on the ingestion of wheat and derived products with various manifestations. Improvements in the disease diagnostics and understanding of disease etiology unveiled that these disorders are widespread around the globe affecting about 7% of the population. The only known treatment so far is a life-long gluten-free diet, which is almost impossible to follow because of the contamination of allegedly “gluten-free” products. Accidental contamination of inherently gluten-free products could take place at any level from field to shelf because of the ubiquity of these …

An Analysis Of Common Forest Management Practices For Carbon Sequestration In South Carolina, Lucas Clay, Marzieh Motallebi, Bo Song

Publications

South Carolina (SC) has a variety of different forest types, and they all have potential to sequester a certain amount of carbon. Private forest landowners control a significant portion of the overall forestland in SC, and their management efforts can maintain or improve forest carbon stocks. Currently, the second largest carbon market in the world is the California Carbon Market, which gives a monetary value to sequestered carbon. One carbon credit is equal to one metric ton of carbon and is currently worth around $15.00. Forest management plans are geared toward increasing carbon sequestration over time. This study aims to …

Non-Enzymatic Roles Of Human Rad51 At Stalled Replication Forks, Jennifer M. Mason, Yuen-Ling Chan, Ralph W. Weichselbaum, Douglas K. Bishop

Publications

The central recombination enzyme RAD51 has been implicated in replication fork processing and restart in response to replication stress. Here, we use a separation-of-function allele of RAD51 that retains DNA binding, but not D-loop activity, to reveal mechanistic aspects of RAD51’s roles in the response to replication stress. Here, we find that cells lacking RAD51’s enzymatic activity protect replication forks from MRE11-dependent degradation, as expected from previous studies. Unexpectedly, we find that RAD51’s strand exchange activity is not required to convert stalled forks to a form that can be degraded by DNA2. Such conversion was shown previously to require replication …

Thermal Cues Drive Plasticity Of Desiccation Resistance In Montane Salamanders With Implications For Climate Change, Eric A. Riddell, Emma Y. Roback, Christina E. Wells, Kelly R. Zamudio, Michael W. Sears

Publications

Organisms rely upon external cues to avoid detrimental conditions during environmental change. Rapid water loss, or desiccation, is a universal threat for terrestrial plants and animals, especially under climate change, but the cues that facilitate plastic responses to avoid desiccation are unclear. We integrate acclimation experiments with gene expression analyses to identify the cues that regulate resistance to water loss at the physiological and regulatory level in a montane salamander (Plethodon metcalfi). Here we show that temperature is an important cue for developing a desiccation-resistant phenotype and might act as a reliable cue for organisms across the globe. …

Expanding Beyond Carnivores To Improve Livestock Protection And Conservation, Shari L. Rodriguez, Christie Sampson

Publications

Promoting human–wildlife coexistence is critical to the long-term conservation of many wild animal species that come into conflict with humans. Loss of livestock to carnivore species (e.g., lions, tigers, wolves) is a well-documented occurrence and the focus of mitigation strategies around the world. One area that has received little research is the impact of noncarnivores on livestock. Both African and Asian elephant species are known to cause livestock injuries and deaths. Livestock owners within elephant ranges perceive elephants as a risk to their livestock, which may reduce their tolerance towards elephants and jeopardize conservation efforts in the area. Though feral …

Folian-Cv1 Is A Member Of A Highly Acidic Phosphoprotein Class Derived From The Foliated Layer Of The Eastern Oyster (Crassostrea Virginica) Shell And Identified In Hemocytes And Mantle, Mary Beth Johnston, A. P. Wheeler, Elizabeth P. Falwell, Meg E. Staton, Christopher A. Saski, Andrew S. Mount

Publications

The proteins derived from the foliated shell layer of the oyster, Crassostrea virginica, are unusually acidic and highly phosphorylated. Here we report the identification of a gene encoding a member of this class of phosphoproteins that we collectively refer to as folian. Using an in silico approach, a virtual probe was constructed from an N-terminal sequence (DEADAGD) determined for a 48 kDa folian phosphoprotein and used to screen an oyster EST databank. A sequence that matched the N-terminus of the 48 kDa protein was found and used to identify the full-length gene from a C. virginica BAC library. The …

Seed Rain Along A Gradient Of Degradation In Caribbean Dry Forest: Effects Of Dispersal Limitation On The Trajectory Of Forest Recovery, Brett T. Wolfe, Raúl Macchiavelli, Skip Van Bloem

Publications

Questions

Tropical dry forests that experience severe disturbances (e.g., fires) often remain degraded for long time periods, during which non-native grasses and trees dominate. One barrier to native tree regeneration in degraded areas may be seed dispersal limitation. To better understand how dispersal limitation influences recovery from degradation, we tested whether the mode and rates of seed dispersal differed in degraded sites dominated either by the exotic tree Leucaena leucocephala or open areas dominated by introduced pasture grasses. We also tested whether L. leucocephala stands facilitate the recruitment of native trees by increasing their seed input compared to open grass …

Evaluation Of Soybean [Glycine Max (L.) Merr.] Genotypes For Yield, Water Use Efficiency, And Root Traits, Harrison Gregory Fried, Sruthi Narayanan, Benjamin Fallen

Publications

Drought stress has been identified as the major environmental factor limiting soybean [Glycine max (L.) Merr.] yield worldwide. Current breeding efforts in soybean largely focus on identifying genotypes with high seed yield and drought tolerance. Water use efficiency (WUE) that results in greater yield per unit rainfall is an important parameter in determining crop yields in many production systems, and is often related with crop drought tolerance. Even though roots are major plant organs that perceive and respond to drought stress, their utility in improving soybean yield and WUE under different environmental and management conditions are largely unclear. The …

Evaluating Myopic Loss Aversion Of Forestland Owners, Mustapha Alhassan, Marzieh Motallebi

Publications

Attracting forestland owners to participate in carbon markets can be challenging for several reasons including offset price volatility, legislative uncertainties, high costs of offset project development, long contract lengths, and landowners’ risk preferences. In this article, we elicit risk preferences and investigate Myopic Loss Aversion (MLA) of forestland owners using an economic experiment. The economic experiment is a betting game and we find that forestland owners exhibit MLA because they bet higher when returns from their investments are evaluated less frequently. Our results provide valuable information for developing carbon market protocols, especially in setting optimal evaluation periods of forest carbon …