Associazione Primatologica Italiana:
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APINN N.16 - - Novembre - Dicembre 1999

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NUMERI PRECEDENTI

N.1:	APRILE-GIUGNO 1997
N.2:	LUGLIO-AGOSTO 1997
N.3:	SETTEMBRE-OTTOBRE 1997
N.4:	NOVEMBRE-DICEMBRE 1997
N.5:	GENNAIO-FEBBRAIO 1998
N.6:	MARZO-APRILE 1998
N.7:	MAGGIO-GIUGNO 1998
N.8:	LUGLIO-AGOSTO 1998
N.9:	SETTEMBRE-OTTOBRE 1998
N.10	NOVEMBRE-DICEMBRE 1998
N.11	GENNAIO-FEBBRAIO 1999
N.12	MARZO-APRILE 1999
N.13	MAGGIO-GIUGNO 1999
N.14	LUGLIO-AGOSTO 1999
N.15	SETTEMBRE-OTTOBRE 1999

25-12-99: La Karger, editore di Folia Primatologica, invia per e-mail la ToC delle sue riviste; chi la vuole deve iscriversi, gratuitamente

23-12-99: Jellyfish gene successfully transferred to monkey embryo - Nando Times. Pushing medicine closer to the day when healthier humans can be engineered in the laboratory, scientists have successfully transferred glowing green jellyfish DNA to monkey embryos.

22-12-99: Death in the Family Tree by John Tuxill, Staff Researcher World Watch Magazine. As the human population continues its unprecedented expansion, the populations of more than half of the world's other primates continue their unprecedented decline. Will our demographic explosion amount to a death sentence for our closest relatives?

21-12-99: Testo completo del non recente (Conservation Biology, 1998) lavoro Monitoring Impacts of Natural Resource Extraction on Lemurs of the Masoala Peninsula, Madagascar by Adina Merenlender1, Claire Kremen2, Marius Rakotondratsima3, and Andrew Weiss4. Con foto e mappe della zona di intervento.

20-12-99: E' uscito il numero di gennaio 2000 di Laboratory Primate Newsletter

19-12-99: Il convegno MEASURING BEHAVIOR 2000 (3rd International Conference on Methods and Techniques in Behavioral Research) si terrà a Nijmegen, The Netherlands nei giorni 15-18 August 2000: Siamo al second announcement.

15-12-99: 10 PhD research positions are now available for primatologists in the fields of genetics, neurobiology and behaviour and reproduction, with a maximum duration of 3 years. Candidates will have an above-average degree in biology, veterinary medicine, medicine or agricultural sciences and be no older than 28 years. Enquiries and applications including the usual details should be addressed to the Speaker of the Programme (address below). Application deadline is 15.01.2000.

15-12-99: Scade oggi la possibilita' di iscriversi al corso per il Certificato europeo di Primatologia (ECP), che sarà organizato dal 13 al 31 marzo 2000 presso il German Primate Center (GPZ). Per informazioni: Dr.Paul Winkler <ECP2000@www.dpz.gwdg.de>

14-12-99: European Federation for Primatology Meeting London, November 27-29,2000. A scientific meeting will be held in London on the 27th, 28th and 29th November, 2000.

10-12-99: Primate Society of Great Britain's website has moved to a new URL. You can now access it at: http://www.psgb.org. The site has been redesigned so it should be a little easier to get around but please let me know if there are any problems. It contains information about the society and the various meetings we organise. There are also new application forms for the PSGB conservation grants and other bits of information.

9-12-99: Da Promed mail (global electronic reporting system for outbreaks of emerging infectious diseases): Congo DR: New haemorrhagic fever cases suspected: Two new suspected cases of haemorrhagic fever were reported during the second week of November [1999] in Province Orientale, a WHO official told IRIN on Tuesday. Both victims, one in Durba and the other in Watsa, have died. Some 60 people were estimated to have died of haemorrhagic fever, linked to the Marburg virus, in the Durba area between November 1998 and May 1999.

8-12-99: Ottimo servizio gratuito in Internet: PubCrawler - an Update Alerting Service for PubMed and GenBank

PubCrawler is a free "alerting" service that scans daily upda tes to the NCBI Medline (PubMed) and GenBank databases. PubCrawler can keep scientists informed of the current contents of Medline and GenBank, by listing new database entries that match their research interests. PubCrawler searches the NCBI PubMed (Medline) and Entrez (GenBank) databases daily using search parameters (keywords, author names, etc.) specified by the user. There is no limit on the number of searches that can be carried out. Previous search hits are stored and only the newest PubMed or GenBank records are shown each day. The results are presented as an HTML Web page, similar to the results of an NCBI PubMed or Entrez query. This Web page can be located on our computer (the PubCrawler WWW-Service), on your computer (the stand-alone program), or you can receive it via e-mail (set this up using the PubCrawler WWW-Service). The Web page sorts the results into groups of PubMed/GenBank entries that are zero-days-old, 1-day-old, 2-days-old, etc., up to a user-specified age limit. Info also here

7-12-99: Two fully-funded PhD studentships in primate behaviour are available at Liverpool John Moores University starting from February 2000. Successful candidates will be self-motivated, adaptable, and possess a first or upper second class honours degree or Masters degree in a relevant subject area. Candidates should also have a good knowledge of animal behaviour, project design, and statistical analysis.

27-11-99: BETHESDA, MARYLAND--For the first time in the history of the AIDS epidemic, the National Institutes of Health (NIH) convened a public meeting to discuss a proposed HIV vaccine experiment in chimpanzees. The reason for the extra scrutiny: The test involves giving the animals a strain of the virus that quickly destroys their immune systems and possibly even causes disease. [Message posted on Primate-Science list]

24-11-99: Presso il Deutsches Primatenzentrum (Kellnerweg, Goettingen FRG) è stato costituito The European Primate Information System (EPIS); it is an internet forum currently being built up in order to intensify the exchange of information between scientists or institutions, to accomplish an optimal use of resources, to avoid redundant investigations and to optimize the sharing of technology, methods, know-how and equipment, and last but not least to reduce the number of primates required for research. For this reason an internet server was programmed to store the offers and requests of potential users for animals, tissues, methods etc. in a self-sustaining data base. The inputs are sent via e-mail to the subscriber immediately and can also be accessed as interactive server pages with all common internet browsers. EPIS will be accessible on three security levels controlled via password and user-ID with each level providing different degrees of access. The user submitting data can declare the level of access for his input. Participation in the system is free of charge. EPIS is currently being designed on behalf of the EUPREN (European Primate Resources Network) and funded by the EU (DG XI). A beta-version will be ready for testing in the fall of 1999 so that, early in 2000, EPIS will be accessible. If you are interested in being informed, when the beta-version becomes available or if you need additional information, please contact Dr. Michael Schwibbe: Deutsches Primatenzentrum Kellnerweg 4 D - 37077 Goettingen FRGermany Tel.: (+)49 551 3851 120 Fax: (+)49 551 3851 103

22-11-99 WASHINGTON (AP) --Mandara, a 17-year-old lowland gorilla, gave birth for the fourth time -- in public, in full view of a very surprised crowd. Her guardians couldn't be more delighted. "Gorillas choose to give birth where they feel most comfortable," says Lisa Stevens, curator of the gorilla exhibit at the National Zoo. "Obviously, Mandara is very used to human visitors." The baby was born Saturday. Mandara is on loan from the Milwaukee County Zoo, and the first-time father, 16-year-old Kuja, belongs to the Brookfield Zoo, near Chicago.

22-11-99: Report of the conference 'Australian Primate Welfare in the New Millennium', which was convened in Sydney on 11 November by Primates for Primates. [Message posted on Primate-Science list]

17-11-99: Offerta di ospitalità per svolgere ricerche sui gibboni presso la Kalimantan Gibbons Conservation Program Kalaweit Research Station, gestita dall'associazione francese Etho-Passion, diretta da BRULE Aurelien Chanee. Il posto si trova qui nel parco nazionale Bukit Baka Bukit Raya. Informazioni più precise (anche sui costi, circa 200$ al mese oltre al viaggio) si ottengono cliccando sul link della stazione. Cliccare qui per le mappe della zona.

11-11-99: Shedding Light On The Origin Of Primate Color Vision Researchers at the University of Chicago have found evidence that trichromatic or full color vision originated in prosimians, a group of lemurs, Bush Babies and pottos rather than in higher primates, pushing the origin of primate color vision back roughly 20 million years. Previously it was thought that color vision first evolved in the common ancestor of higher primates about 35-40 million years ago. The new research pushes the origin of color vision in primates back to about 55 million years ago. Wen-Hsiung Li, Ph.D., professor of ecology & evolution at the University and his postdoctoral fellow Ying Tan, Ph.D., published their findings in the November 4 issue of Nature. Vedi anche Eurekalert e l'articolo dell'universita' di Chicago

10-11-99: Oklahoma, Nov. 10 — An obscure state committee has voted to require that all new biology textbooks carry a disclaimer saying evolution is a “controversial theory” after one member said not enough attention is paid to alternate xplanations of how life began. This summer the Kansas Board of Education passed new testing standards, minimizing the importance of evolution. And last month, Kentucky’s Education Department deleted the word “evolution” from its standards.

9-11-99: Il Prof.re Robert D. Martin dell’Università di Zurigo terrà due seminari nell’aula Monod a Palazzo Campana (a Torino) giovedì 18 Novembre 1999.

New light on the problem of phylogenetic relatedness in comparative studies

The Barbary macaque as a model for primate conservation genetics using DNA markers

7-11-99: CNN Unlawful logging threatens Indonesia's largest protected forest. One of Indonesia's largest remaining tracts of forest, though officially protected by the government,faces a growing threat from rampant unlawful logging, local conservationists say. At Gunung Leuser National Park in Northern Sumatra, lushly forested mountains and swamps cover nearly a million hectares, an area the size of Yellowstone National Park in the United States. Local wood processing companies pay desperate men without jobs to steal timber from the park. Encroaching farmers clear the forest to plant crops. One piece at a time, the forest disappears. C'e' pure un filmato!

6-11-99: Nonhuman Primate Physiological Data Needed The National Institute on Aging (NIA), the National Center for Research Resources (NCRR), and the Wisconsin Regional Primate Center are involved in a joint effort to establish and expand a computerized database (Primate Aging Database) for biomarkers of aging in nonhuman primates. The Primate Aging Database will be a useful resource to primate researchers and veterinarians, for aging research, as well as for clinical applications (e.g., establishing blood normative values with age). We wish to locate researchers at various primate research centers who may have useful, available data to contribute to the database. the present time, we are interested in obtaining hematology and blood chemistry measures on healthy, "normal" (i.e., control), aging animals. We also are particularly interested in data from shorter-lived NHP species.

If you may have physiological data on aging primates to potentially contribute to the Primate Aging Database, please contact Dr. Mark Lane or Dr. Darlene Smucny at National Institute on Aging, National Institutes of Health Animal Center, P.O. Box 56, Building 103/1B04, Poolesville, Maryland 20837, USA; 301.496-9416 (voice); 301.480.0504 (FAX). Email: mlane@vms.grc.nia.nih.gov; smucnyd@vms.grc.nia.nih.gov.

http://night.primate.wisc.edu/pin/smucny.html]

6-11-99: da Science del 5-11 un articolo di Kaessmann, H., Wiebe, V. and P 1999 del Max Planck Institute for Evolutionary Anthropology. Extensive nuclear DNA sequence diversity among chimpanzees. Science 286(5442):1159-1162: The chimpanzee genome project is way behind the Human Genome Project, so little surprises are not unexpected. Recent analysis of chimp DNA from the X chromosome reveals a few such surprises. For example, chimps appear to have a genetic diversity that is nearly four times greater than that of humans. Also, different subspecies of chimps are more alike genetically than previously believed. This would mean that behavioral differences in separated populations of chimps are probably not due to genetic differences. Finally, the work suggests that bonobos and chimpanzees are closer cousins than primatologists suspected. See also Kaessmann et al Nature Genetics 22: 78 (1999) and the GenBank entries with accession numbers AJ270061-AJ270095, AJ241023-AJ241093 which are the raw data. This 10Kb of non-coding DNA was so highly conserved. It seems it mutates about 30 times slower than primate mitochondrial DNA. If it is representative of nuclear DNA, it shows that humans are more than 99% identical to chimpanzees at the nucleotide level, and thus likely to be much more than 99% identical to chimpanzees at the amino acid sequence level (because many mutations are silent). Also noted, is that human genetic diversity is far less than chimpanzee genetic diversity. Apparently humans went through a genetic bottleneck and we are all descended from a small population not too long ago.

ABCNews

ENN

Eurekalert

5-11-99: Evolution of Language Paris April 3-6, 2000 Ecole Nationale Superieure des TelecommunicationsParis - France. Deadline for papers: 15 november. This will be the third conference in a series concerned with the evolutionary emergence of speech. From a wide range of disciplines, we seek to attract researchers willing to integrate their perspectives with those of modern Darwinism. The aim is to bring together linguists, computer scientists, anthropologists, palaeontologists, ethologists, geneticists, neuroscientists, and other scientists who are concerned with the question of the origin and evolution of language.

Frans B. M. de Waal

Sue Savage-Rumbaugh

4-11-99: Sono disponibili il programma e gli abstracts del prossimo 1999 Winter meeting del PSGB (1 dic 99: Meeting Rooms of the Zoological Society of London, Regent's Park, London NW1 4RY) dedicato a Mating & Social Systems of Old world Monkeys

3-11-99: Serie di congressi di livello internazionale prossimamente a Kyoto, dal 16 al 22 novembre; presso il Primate Research Institute of Kyoto University, City of Inuyama, JAPAN; si comincia il 16/17 con il congresso del SAGA (Support for African/Asian Great Apes), si continua il 18/20 con il COE (Center of Excellence) symposium dal titolo EVOLUTION OF THE APES AND THE ORIGIN OF HUMAN BEINGS (a cui sono stati invitati anche alcuni ricercatori europei: S.Paabo, P.Coppens, L.Aiello) e si chiude poi (21/22) con la riunione del CBSG (Conservation Breeding Specialist Group). Qualcosa (poco) di questi congressi, anche se non ci si va (a quello del SAGA, se interessa, non ci sono nemmeno quote di iscrizione, e chiunque può assistere...) lo si può gustare anche da casa. Ci sono infatti in rete gli abstracts del COE meeting, che possono essere visti anche come un unico file. Negli intevalli si può andare a visitare le pagine web di Ai (cercheranno di insegnarle anche il giapponese?).

The purpose of this COE symposium is threefold. Firstly, it aims to combine the various disciplines such as Ecology, Sociology, Ethology, Psychology, Neural and Molecular Biology, Physical Anthropology, and Paleontology to illuminate the evolution of the apes and the origin of human beings. Secondly, it aims to provide a rare opportunity for exchange of information and discussion among leading scientists from various disciplines with Primatology. Thirdly, it aims to promote future scientific collaboration between Japanese and other researchers of apes and humans from around the world. Participants are asked to contribute a paper describing her/his major research topic reviewing past and present trends plus her/his thoughts about its future directions.
SAGA is a non-profit organization founded in 1998. This will be its second international meeting for research, conservation, and animal welfare on the African and Asian Great Apes. Most of the ape researchers working in Japan as well as zoo people, conservationists, and others will join the meeting. This SAGA2 meeting on November 16 th and 17th will have three symposia (Future of chimpanzees in Japan, Animal welfare and environmental enrichment of captive apes, and Wild-life conservation of apes), and the poster session shared with the COE meeting. Birute Gardikas will have a plenary talk in the evening of 17th. Please contact Tetsuro Matsuzawa, the person in charge of this satellite meeting at matsuzaw@.pri.kyoto-u.ac.jp.
IUCN/CBSG will hold a preparatory meeting for the Bonobo PHVA (Population and Habitat Viability Assessment) workshop to be held in Kinshasa sometime in the near future. The bonobo researchers who were invited to the COE symposium are expected to join this satellite meeting. The persons in charge of this satellite meeting are Norman Rosen and Takeshi Furuichi. Please contact furuichi@gen.meijigakuin.ac.jp for further details.

NB: Prima di lasciare [le pagine web di] Inuyama, qualcuno potrebbe essere interessato a verificare l'offerta di un posto di visiting professor al CHEMR (Center for Human Evolutionary Modeling Research): The CHEMR is now seeking applications for the position of Visiting Professor/Associate Professor at the Section of Behavioral Development. The object of the Professor/Associate Professor position is to carry out research on behavioral development and personality formation in primates from the biological perspective. The successful candidate will be expected to contribute to teaching at the professional and graduate levels. The Closing Date for Applications: Dec. 6, 1999. Date of Employment: Effective April 1, 2000, start date optional (?? chi opta?). Period of Employment: From 3 months to 3 years, optional (!! chi opta?).

2-11-99: JAPAN: Nuove più rigide regolamentazioni per l'importazione in Giappone di primati dai paesi del terzo mondo dall'anno prossimo: The sources said importers are required to submit certificates from the nation of origin stating that the monkeys have been quarantined and do not possess Ebola and Marburg viruses. Japan imported 4,300 monkeys from 18 nations last year. Sixty percent to 70 percent of the animals were from Asian nations, 20 percent to 30 percent from South America and 10 percent from Africa. It is believed that 70 percent of the monkeys were used for lab experiments and the rest as pets. In 1993, four people in the same family in Kanagawa Prefecture contracted dysentery from their pet monkey. A survey said 30 percent of imported monkeys are contaminated with dysentery amoebas.
1-11-99: Pagine web sul comportamento dei Black-and-White Ruffed lemurs

This page (still living after 30 months) is managed (depending on info found or kindly sent) by Daniele Formenti.

Last revised: 16 Gen 2000.