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Les habitats benthiques d’eau profonde autour des îles maltaises font partie des régions les moins étudiées en Méditerranée. À cause d’un effort de recherche limité, les recensements attribuent à la Méditerranée centrale une biodiversité moindre qu’aux régions alentours ; le bassin ouest, les mers Egée et Adriatique. C’est également le cas pour les échinodermes ; cet embranchement d’animaux marins est en général bien étudié, mais il y a encore un manque de données concernant les espèces des grands fonds. Avec l’arrivée récente des ROVs, petits robots sous-marins téléguidés, les grands fonds deviennent de plus en plus accessibles, en particulier les systèmes rocheux tels les canyons, escarpements et récifs coralliens d’eau froide, qui ne pouvaient pas être échantillonnés correctement par chalutage. L’objectif de cet étude était d’estimer la diversité en échinodermes dans les eaux maltaises de grande profondeur à travers l’analyse de vidéos prises par ROV. En plus, les distributions spatiale et bathymétriques, densités et habitats préférés des échinodermes furent décrits.
Les données vidéo furent collectionnées par le projet Life Baħar for Natura 2000 pendant les étés de 2015 et 2016, dans le cadre de leur étude des habitats benthiques maltais, délimitée par la zone de gestion des pêches de 25 miles nautiques de Malte.
Au total, 25 taxons d’échinodermes ont été identifiés, et comprenaient onze étoiles de mer, deux crinoïdes, quatre ophiures, cinq oursins et trois holothuries. Parmi ces espèces, trois furent trouvées pour la première fois en eau maltaise : les étoiles de mer Marginaster capreensis, Sclerasterias neglecta, et l’holothurie Mesothuria intestinalis. Six espèces furent observées à plus grandes profondeurs que leur limite actuelle en Méditerranée. Les espèces les plus abondantes étaient les crinoïdes Antedon mediterranea et Leptometra phalangium, suivis des oursins Stylocidaris affinis et Cidaris cidaris. Les crinoïdes formaient de très denses agrégations, dans une petite zone au sud de Malte. Cette zone abrite également la seule population méditerranéenne connue à ce jour de l’étoile de mer atlantique Coronaster briareus. Les autres espèces étaient plus largement distribués dans la région étudiée. La distribution bathymétrique variait selon l’espèce concernée, et la diversité globale en échinodermes semblait être constante parmi les gammes de profondeur échantillonnées. Les habitats privilégiés dépendaient également de l’espèce, mais les systèmes rocheux dominés par des coraux d’eau profonde étaient particulièrement diversifiés. Les objets d’origine anthropiques augmentaient la diversité des fonds sédimentaires en fournissant à diverses espèces des substrats durs à coloniser.
En conclusion, les grands fonds autour de l’archipel maltais s’avèrent être un système hétérogène abritant une faune diverse d’échinodermes. Par contre, il y a toujours un manque d’informations concernant la taxonomie et l’écologie de certaines espèces d’échinodermes d’eau profonde. Deep-sea benthic habitats around the Maltese islands are some of the least studied areas in the Mediterranean. Because of the limited research effort, inventories report a lower biodiversity in this area than in the surrounding regions, the Western Mediterranean, Aegean and Adriatic Sea. This is also the case for echinoderms; this marine phylum is generally well studied, but there is still a lack of data concerning deep-sea species. With the recent advent of remotely operated underwater vehicles (ROVs), the deep sea has become more accessible to scientists, especially rocky areas such as canyons, escarpments and cold-water coral reefs, which could not have been adequately sampled through trawling surveys. The aim of this study was to assess echinoderm diversity in deep Maltese waters, within the 25-nautical miles Fisheries Management Zone, through analysis of ROV video footage. In addition, the spatial and bathymetric distribution of echinoderms were described, as well as their density, preferred habitat and bottom types.
Video data were acquired through ROV surveys of Maltese benthic habitats as part of the Life Baħar for Natura 2000 project in the summers of 2015 and 2016. The bathymetric range covered by the videos used in the present study was from 216m to 1030m depth.
In total, 25 echinoderm taxa were identified, comprised of: 11 asteroids, 2 crinoids, 4 ophiuroids, 5 echinoids and 3 holothurians. Of these species, three were new records for Maltese waters: the sea stars Marginaster capreensis, Sclerasterias neglecta, and the holothurian Mesothuria intestinalis. Six species were observed deeper than their current accepted depth range in the Mediterranean. The most abundant species were the crinoids Antedon mediterranea and Leptometra phalangium, followed by the cidarids Stylocidaris affinis and Cidaris cidaris. Crinoids formed very dense aggregations of up to 2900 individuals/1000m², in a small area to the south of Malta. This area also hosts the only known Mediterranean population to date of the Atlantic sea star Coronaster briareus. Other echinoderms were more widely distributed across the studied area. Bathymetric distribution varied for each species, and the overall echinoderm diversity seemed stable across the surveyed depths. The preferred habitats also depended on each species, but rocky habitats dominated by deep-water corals were particularly diverse. Discarded anthropogenic objects proved to increase the diversity of sedimentary bottoms by providing colonizable hard substrata for sea stars, crinoids and sea urchins.
It can be concluded that the deep sea around the Maltese islands is a heterogeneous system hosting a diverse echinoderm fauna; however, there is still a lack of knowledge concerning the taxonomy and ecology of certain deep-sea echinoderms. The findings of the present study can be used to identify ecologically important areas for conservation purposes.

echinoderms --- Malta --- Mediterranean --- deep sea --- echinoderm distribution --- echinoderm diversity --- Sciences du vivant > Zoologie

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Lung cancer is the leading cause of cancer related mortality in Canada and USA. Majority of the patients present in advanced stage of the disease and of these only about 2% will be alive at 5 years. NSCLC is the most common form of lung cancer, accounting for approximately 87% of cases. Systemic chemotherapies have been used to treat metastatic NSCLC for decades, but the improvements of outcomes have reached a plateau. Recent advances in understanding signalling pathways for malignant cells, their interconections,the importance of various receptors and biomarkers and the interplay between various oncogenes have led to the development of targeted treatments that are improving both efficacy and safety of the treatments. Knowledge about the advantages of treatments with the targeted agents in metastatic NSCLC is growing rapidly. Combining various targeted agents or sequencing them properly will be important in the era of personalised medicine and overcoming development of the resistence to various targeted agents will be challenging. The importance of a team work,from the diagnosis through various treatments, to supportive care, from the interventional radiologists, pneumologists or surgeons, who have to obtain a satisfactory tumor tissue specimen, to pathologists, radiation and medical oncologists, to supportive care specialists, will be described in our publications. We will cover completely present and future approaches to personalised medicine in this rapidly evolving field of metastatic NSCLC.

Lungs --- Cancer. --- Epidermal growth factor receptors --- Non small cell lung cancer --- Echinoderm microtubule associated protein like 4 --- Quality of Life --- KRAS --- Anaplastic lymphoma kinase --- personalized medicine

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The books described marine glycoconjugates. Two articles concern microalgal metabolites such as steroid and sphingoid glycoconjugates, and a glycoprotein from a sea cucumber with interesting biological activities, respectively. One article discusses the fatty acid composition and thermotropic behavior of glycolipids and other membrane lipids of green macrophyte Ulva lactuca. Three articles cover lectin subjects. One review article analyzes perspectives of marine and freshwater lectins’ application in experimental oncology and the therapy of oncological diseases; another article describes the use of a sponge lectin in the construction of a recombinant virus. The third article concerns the function of the immunity of a lectin in producing this compound crinoid. Two articles concern steroid glycosides from star?sh, and two others concern triterpene glycosides from sea cucumbers. One article describes the e?ect of a glycosaminoglycan from the sea cucumber Apostichopus japonicus on hyperglycemia in the liver of insulin-resistant mice. One article concerns the isolation of 10 new triterpene glycosides from a fungus associated with a sea cucumber. The article by Dworaczek et al. characterizes the O-speci?c polysaccharide (O-antigen) of a bacterial pathogen of common carp by chemical and immunochemical methods. In total, the Special Issue comprises14 articles, including the editorial and two reviews.

n/a --- functions --- feather star --- Aeromonas --- glycosylceramides --- sghC1qDC --- O-antigen --- colony formation --- Bcl-2 proteins --- phospholipids --- sterol glycoconjugates --- Anthenea aspera --- glycosides --- Anneissia japonica --- cancer therapy --- secondary metabolites --- Echinoderm --- Apostichopus japonicus --- microalgae --- urease activity --- triterpene glycosides --- cytotoxic activity --- Alexandrium minutum --- Acremonium striatisporum --- betaine lipid --- signal transduction --- thermal adaptation --- Psolus fabricii --- O-polysaccharide --- oncolytic vaccinia virus --- N-Acetyllactosamine (LacNAc) --- l-perosamine --- differential scanning calorimetry --- Lethasterias fusca --- polyhydroxysteroids --- AMPK --- glycoprotein --- NMR spectroscopy --- glucose metabolism --- anti-biofilm activity --- ERK --- fish pathogen --- marine antiproliferative compounds --- lectin --- immunospecificity --- in vivo studies --- apoptosis --- distribution --- steroidal glycosides --- natural products --- biological activities --- Aphrocallistes vastus lectin --- marine fungi --- cell adhesion --- in vitro studies --- mass spectrometry --- psolusosides --- starfish --- sea cucumber --- glycosaminoglycan --- lipopolysaccharide (LPS) --- glycolipids --- fatty acids --- structures --- Akt --- diterpene glycosides --- body components --- structure --- mitophagy --- marine lectins --- crinoid --- cancer --- asterosaponins