BACKGROUND Quantifying genetic diversity and metapopulation structure provides insights into the evolutionary history of a species and helps develop appropriate management strategies. We provide the first assessment of genetic structure in spinner sharks (Carcharhinus brevipinna), a large cosmopolitan carcharhinid, sampled from eastern and northern Australia and South Africa. METHODS AND FIND...

BACKGROUND Poor nutritional status during childhood and its long-term impact on economic growth and wellbeing is well known. This study assessed the nutritional status of children in selected communities in northern Ghana, to serve as baseline data for the Africa Research in Sustainable Intensification for the Next Generation (Africa RISING) project that sought to improve farm-household nutriti...

The paleoecology of tropical Podocarpaceae is reviewed for Africa and Southeast Asia. The family first appeared in the Triassic of Gondwana, after which it diversified through the Cretaceous and earliest Tertiary, and although some Northern Hemisphere Jurassic records are known, it has essentially remained a southern or southernderived family until the present day. It seems to show a preference...

adequate nutrition is essential in early childhood to ensure healthy growth, proper organ formation and function, a strong immune system, and neurological and cognitive development. child malnutrition – as measured by poor child growth – is an important indicator for monitoring population nutritional status and health. in 2013, about 17%, or 98 million children under five years of age in develo...

Babesia canis and B. gibsoni are responsible for canine babesiosis throughout the world. Babesia canis consists of a group of three biologically different subspecies, namely B. c. canis, B. c. vogeli, and B. c. rossi. Babesia gibsoni is subdivided into 2 subspecies: the North American and Asian subspecies. Babesia c. canis is found in Europe, B. c. vogeli in northern Africa, North America and S...

Vegetation productivity is an essential variable in ecosystem functioning. Vegetation dynamics of dryland ecosystems are most strongly determined by water availability and consequently by rainfall and there is a need to better understand how water limited ecosystems respond to altered rainfall amounts and variability. This response is partly determined by the vegetation functional response to r...

The southern African species of the water beetle genus Limnebius Leach, 1815, are revised. Eleven new species are described, based on the examination and databasing of 6,201 specimens from 96 localities/events. Male genitalia are illustrated, and high resolution habitus images of the holotypes are provided. Distribution maps are provided for the eleven species now known from southern Africa, in...