The vast majority of animal species do not tolerate severe water stress, but the encysted embryo of the brine shrimp Artemia franciscana is an exceptionally useful organism to investigate physiological mechanisms for enduring extreme environmental insults. Any substantial reduction in cellular water poses a threat to survival. Nevertheless anhydrobiotic animals survive virtually complete loss o...

Larvae of an African chironomid, Polypedilum vanderplanki, which live in temporal rock pools, are completely dehydrated when the pools dry up and undergo anhydrobiosis until the next rain comes. During the dehydration process, larvae accumulate large amounts of trehalose, which provides effective protection against desiccation because of its high capacity for water replacement and vitrification...

Mycosporine-like amino acids (MAAs) are UV absorbing pigments, and structurally distinct MAAs have been identified in taxonomically diverse organisms. Two novel MAAs were purified from the cyanobacterium Nostoc commune, and their chemical structures were characterized. An MAA with an absorption maximum at 335 nm was identified as a pentose-bound porphyra-334 derivative with a molecular mass of ...

Several aquatic organisms are able to withstand extreme desiccation in at least one of their life stages. This is commonly known as "anhydrobiosis." It was often thought that to tolerate such a desiccated state required high amounts of compatible solutes such as the nonreducing disaccharide trehalose, which protects cellular structures by water replacement and glass formation. Trehalose levels ...

This study was conducted to determine the effect of temperature and moisture stress on exsheathment process and infectivity of the infective larvae of the parasitic nematode Haemonchus contortus. Laboratory conditions were used in which infective (L3) of H. contortus were either subjected to gradually increasing temperatures, decreasing moisture or both. Post stress viability and exsheatment of...