MAY 2016|| 13New Gecko Species
A new species of fat-tailed gecko has been discovered by
scientists in outback Queensland.
Diplodactylus ameyiis a specialised termite predator
found in outback Queensland and northern NSW. It is
up to 8.5 cm in length and has a distinctive, broadly
rounded snout.
The gecko is tan to medium-dark brown with pale
spots, and is well camoulaged in the dry arid environ-
ments it inhabits. Like many other terrestrial geckos, it shel-
ters during the day in disused spider burrows.
Queensland Museum herpetologist Patrick Couper
and his colleague, Paul Oliver from the Australian National
University, named the species in honour of fellow herpetol-
ogist Dr Andrew Amey, who manages Queensland
Museum’s reptile and amphibian collections.
The gecko is formally described in Zootaxa
(http://tinyurl.com/h5tmf5x).
Models Predict Location
of New Megafauna Fossils
An international team of scientists has used the estimated ages and
spatial distribution of Australian megafauna fossils to develop mathe-
matical models that predict the most likely locations of undiscovered fossil
deposits. Published in PLOS ONE (http://tinyurl.com/jkxh3jf), the
models were developed for Australia but can be adapted for fossil-
hunters in other continents.
“A chain of ideal conditions must occur for fossils to form, which
means they are extremely rare, so inding as many as possible can tell us
more of what the past was like, and why certain species went extinct,”
says Prof Corey Bradshaw of The University of Adelaide.
“Typically, however, we use haphazard ways to ind fossils. Mostly
people just go to excavation sites and surrounding areas where fossils have
been found before. We hope our models will make it easier for palaeon-
tologists and archaeologists to identify new fossil sites that could yield
vast treasures of prehistoric information.”
The team modelled the past distribution of species, the geological suit-
ability of fossil preservation and the likelihood of fossil discovery in the
ield. They applied this information to a range of Australian megafauna
that became extinct over the last 50,000 years, such as the giant terror
bird Genyornis, the rhino-sized “wombat” Diprotodon and the marsu-
pial “lion” Thylacoleo.
To produce the species distribution models of these long-extinct
animals, the researchers used “hindcasted” global circulation models to
predict temperature and rainfall during the deep past, and matched this
with the estimated ages of the fossils.
“What we did was build a probability map for each of these layers –
the species distribution, the right sort of geological conditions for fossil
formation (for example, sedimentary rocks, or caves and lakes), and the
ease of discovery (for example, open areas rather than dense forest),”
Bradshaw says. “We combined each of these for an overall ‘suitability for
fossil discovery’ map.”
The model identiied areas south of Lake Eyre and west of Lake
Torrens in South Australia, a large area around Shark Bay in Western
Australia and other areas in the south-west of Australia as places with
a high potential to yield new megafauna fossils.
One Jab for Flu Vaccine
Researchers are a step closer to creating a universal one-
shot influenza vaccine following the discovery that T cells
can recognise and attack emerging mutant strains of the
virus.
An international research collaboration led by A/Prof
Katherine Kedzierska from the Peter Doherty Institute for
Infection and Immunity and Dr Stephanie Gras from
Monash University used cutting-edge technology to capture
the response of individual T cells to the various strains.
The study, published inProceedings of the National
Academy of Sciences(http://tinyurl.com/h77ejfe),
determined how the T cells reacted to new mutant strains of
influenza as well as viruses to which they had previously
been exposed.
The team used the Australian Synchrotron to scrutinise
the structure of the cells and identify how they recognise
the mutant strains. They found that their flexibility and
ability to adapt enabled the T cells to “bully” the new strains
into submission.
Kedzierska said that finding this piece of the puzzle was
a major step forward on the path to creating a one-shot T
cell-mediated influenza vaccine that provided life-long
immunity against the virus. “Previous research has shown us
that T cells provide universal protective immunity to
influenza, but we didn’t know why or how until now... This
study enabled us to dissect the immune response to
understand how this immunity occurs.”
However, further research is necessary before a
universal vaccine can be created. “Our past research has
shown that only a seventh of the world’s population have the
tissue make-up that provides universal immunity to
influenza – the difference between a runny nose and being
bed-ridden,” Kedzierska said. “Now we know what to look for,
our challenge is to find these receptors in those with a
different tissue composition and elicit a similar response.”