Taxonomic Characters in the Genus Echinococcus (Cestoda: Taenlidae)

Not more than four species of cestodes of the genus Echinococcus Rudolphi, 1801, are recognized as valid. The larval stage of at least three of them is able to develop in man, causing respective types of hydatid disease. Accurate characterization of these cestodes, including both larval and adult stages, is essential for identification, upon which depends development of methods for preventing infection of man and domestic animals. Because morphological characteristics of the larval cestodes may be modified according to the species of host in which they develop, identification should be based upon taxonomic characters of specimens from the respective natural hosts, which can be identified by means of ecological investigations in endemic areas in combination with controlled infection of experimental animals. The morphological and biological characteristics of the known species are discussed, and the two species most important to public health and economically--E. granulosus (Batsch, 1786) and E. multilocularis Leuckart, 1863--are distinguished. French résumé: Trois espèces de cestodes du genre Echinococcus Rudolphi, 1801 ont été identifiées: E. granulosus (Batsch, 1786); E. multilocularis Leuckart, 1863; et E. oligarthrus (Diesing, 1863). On n'a pas encore déterminé avec certitude s'il fallait leur adjoindre E. patagonicus Szidat, 1960. Ce dernier mis à part, tous ces ténias sont connus pour provoquer chez l'homme des formes spécifiques d'échinococcose hydatique; l'infestation par les larves de E. granulosus est également fréquente chez les ongulés domestiques et la répartition de ce cestode est presque cosmopolite. E. multilocularis est très largement répandu dans l'hémisphère nord, tandis que E. oligarthrus ne se trouve que dans le centre et le sud de I'Amérique. Pour définir des critères morphologiques qui permettent de distinguer avec précision les différentes espèces d'Echinococcus, il convient de prendre les spécimens sur leurs hôtes naturels, sinon l'évolution du stade strobilaire se trouve habituellement retardée et le stade larvaire présente une gamme étendue de variations morphologiques. Pour identifier les hôtes naturels, il faut étudier l'écologie dans les zones d'éndemicité, ainsi que les manifestations de l'infection contrôlée chez des animaux d'expérience. Le stade strobilaire des ténias peut présenter plusieurs caractères spécifiques importants qui concernent notamment la taille, le nombre et la répartition des testicules, la position du pore génital dans les segments gravides, la forme de l'utérus gravide et, dans certains cas, la taille et la forme des crochets du rostre. La structure de la larve normalement développée est caractéristique de chacune des trois espèces relativement bien connues. Les caractéristiques biologiques jouent également un rôle important dans la différenciation de ces cestodes. Au stade larvaire, le laps de temps nécessaire au développement des scolex infectants est directement fonction de la durée de vie de l'hôte intermédiaire. La larve de E. multilocularis présente des scolex infectants dès le deuxième ou le troisième mois, alors qu'ils n'apparaissent qu'au bout d'un ou deux ans chez la larve de E. granulosus. Un tableau donne la liste comparative des caractéristiques taxonomiques qui permettent de faire la distinction entre ces deux espèces.

Orobothriurus (Scorpiones: Bothriuridae) phylogeny, Andean biogeography, and the relative importance of genitalic and somatic characters

The genus Orobothriurus Maury, 1976 (Bothriuridae Simon, 1880) displays an Andean pattern of distribution, most of its species occurring at high altitudes (over 2000-2500 m to a maximum altitude record of 4910 m) from central Peru to Argentina. The recent discovery of several new species and the uncertain phylogenetic position of Orobothriurus lourencoi Ojanguren Affilastro, 2003, required a reanalysis of Orobothriurus phylogeny. Thirty bothriurid taxa, including all species of Orobothriurus and Pachakutej Ochoa, 2004, were scored for 65 morphological characters and analysed with parsimony under equal and implied weighting. The resulting topology justifies the establishment of a new genus, Rumikiru Ojanguren Affilastro et al., in press, for O. lourencoi and a closely related, new species, Rumikiru atacama Ojanguren Affilastro et al., in press. It also offers new insights about the phylogeny and biogeography of Orobothriurus and related genera. Characters from the male genitalia (i.e. hemispermatophore), comprising approximately 26% of the morphological matrix, were found to be less homoplastic than those from somatic morphology, contradicting suggestions that genitalia are uninformative or potentially misleading in phylogenetic studies.

GENETIC VARIABILITY FOR JUVENILE CHARACTERS OF Cedrela fissilis VELL. PROGENIES: A SUBSIDY FOR DEFINITION OF SEED COLLECTION ZONE

The objective of this study was to evaluate the genetic differences among three matrix groups of Cedrela fissilis based on quantitative juvenile variables on a progeny test to define seed collecting zones and use of seeds of this species in the study region as well as to evaluate genetic variability of the sampled material. A progeny test was established in a nursery with seeds from 48 seed trees collected in the municipalities of Rio Negrinho, Mafra and Sao Bento do Sul, state of Santa Catarina, and in the municipalities of Lapa, Rio Negro, Campo do Tenente and Antonio Olinto, state of Parana. Of the collected seed trees, 33 sampled trees were distributed in three sites and 15 trees were dispersed in the studied region. It was used a complete random block design, with 8 replicates and 20 plants per plot. Evaluated data included: emergency rate; seedling base diameter and height (61, 102 and 145 days after the seeds were sowed); seedling survival; number of leaves per seedling; aerial section dry mass and root dry mass; and the foliar area of the third fully expanded leaf measured from the apical meristem. The Maximum Restricted Likelihood Method (REML) was used, using the software SELEGEN for analysis. It was found that the juvenile characters are strongly genetically controlled and they can be used to estimate genetic variability of population samples of Cedrela fissilis. The three groups of trees spatially limited did not significantly differ among each other, allowing to conclude that the three areas are part of the same tree seed transfer zone.

Virtual characters designed for forensic assessment and rehabilitation of sex offenders: standardized and made-to-measure

This paper presents two studies pertaining to the use of virtual characters applied in clinical forensic rehabilitation of sex offenders. The first study is about the validation of the perceived age of virtual characters designed to simulate primary and secondary sexual character of typical adult and child individuals. The second study puts to use these virtual characters in comparing a group of sex offenders and a group of non deviant individuals on their sexual arousal responses as recorded in virtual immersion. Finally, two clinical vignettes illustrating the use of made-to-measure virtual characters to more closely fit sexual preferences are presented in Discussion.

XSAMPL3D: An Action Description Language for the Animation of Virtual Characters

In this paper we present XSAMPL3D, a novel language for the high-level representation of actions performed on objects by (virtual) humans. XSAMPL3D was designed to serve as action representation language in an imitation-based approach to character animation: First, a human demonstrates a sequence of object manipulations in an immersive Virtual Reality (VR) environment. From this demonstration, an XSAMPL3D description is automatically derived that represents the actions in terms of high-level action types and involved objects. The XSAMPL3D action description can then be used for the synthesis of animations where virtual humans of different body sizes and proportions reproduce the demonstrated action. Actions are encoded in a compact and human-readable XML-format. Thus, XSAMPL3D describtions are also amenable to manual authoring, e.g. for rapid prototyping of animations when no immersive VR environment is at the animator's disposal. However, when XSAMPL3D descriptions are derived from VR interactions, they can accomodate many details of the demonstrated action, such as motion trajectiories,hand shapes and other hand-object relations during grasping. Such detail would be hard to specify with manual motion authoring techniques only. Through the inclusion of language features that allow the representation of all relevant aspects of demonstrated object manipulations, XSAMPL3D is a suitable action representation language for the imitation-based approach to character animation.