Tuesday, April 01, 2025

New plesiosaur discovery sheds light on early Jurassic evolution and plausible endemism

A nearly complete specimen of Plesiopterys wildi from Germany provides fresh insights into plesiosaur diversity and regional specialization

PeerJ

Skeleton of MH 7 exposed in ventral view. — image:
(A) Ventral view of the mandible and associated skull elements. (B) Mandible and skull elements labeled. (C) Left lateral view of the mandible. Abbreviations: an, angular; art, articular; d, dentary; j, jugal; R. mx, right maxilla; L. mx, left maxilla; p, palatine; R. pm, right premaxilla; sp, splenial; s.r., symphyseal ridge; sur, surangular.
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Credit: DOI: 10.7717/peerj.18960/fig-3

A nearly complete specimen of Plesiopterys wildi from Germany provides fresh insights into plesiosaur diversity and regional specialisation

A newly described plesiosaur fossil from southern Germany is providing crucial evidence about the diversification of these ancient marine reptiles during the Early Jurassic. Published in PeerJ Life and Environment, the study details the discovery and analysis of an exceptionally well-preserved Plesiopterys wildi specimen, which offers new clues about the evolution and geographic distribution of plesiosaurs in Europe nearly 180 million years ago.

Unearthed from the Lower Jurassic Posidonienschiefer Formation near Holzmaden, the fossil—referred to as MH 7—is one of the most complete articulated plesiosaur skeletons found in the region. Unlike ichthyosaurs and marine crocodile relatives, which dominate the fossil record of this formation, plesiosaurs are comparatively rare. The new discovery, therefore, provides a rare glimpse into the biodiversity of these long-necked marine reptiles.

Key Findings:

A pivotal new specimen of Plesiopterys wildi – MH 7 represents a subadult individual, refining the known characteristics of this species and confirming its validity as a distinct taxon.
Stepwise evolution towards cryptoclidids – Phylogenetic analysis positions Plesiopterys wildi as an early-diverging plesiosauroid, closely related to Franconiasaurus brevispinus, suggesting a gradual evolutionary transition towards more derived cryptoclidids of the Late Jurassic.
Possible regional endemism – The discovery supports the idea that plesiosaur species may have been regionally distinct within the epicontinental seas of Early Jurassic Europe, reinforcing patterns of paleobiogeographical segregation.

“The Holzmaden specimen gives us an unprecedented look at Plesiopterys wildi in a more mature stage of development, allowing us to refine our understanding of this species and its place in plesiosaur evolution,” said lead author Miguel Marx from Lund University. “It also suggests that distinct plesiosaur communities may have evolved in different regions of the European seas during the Early Jurassic.”

Implications for Plesiosaur Evolution and Biogeography

The findings highlight the Early Jurassic as a crucial period for plesiosaur evolution, as early forms diversified and set the stage for later groups that would dominate marine ecosystems. The presence of unique plesiosaur species in different parts of Europe reinforces the hypothesis that early members of this group may have been geographically restricted.

“Our research reinforces that plesiosaurs were already evolving specialized adaptations and distinct regional lineages much earlier than we used to believe,” added co-author Sven Sachs. “This has important implications for understanding how marine reptiles responded to environmental changes in the Jurassic seas.”

Study Details and Contact Information

The study was conducted by an international team of researchers from Lund University, Naturkunde-Museum Bielefeld, Uppsala University, and Urwelt-Museum Hauff.

Journal

PeerJ

DOI

10.7717/peerj.18960

Method of Research

Observational study

Article Title

A new specimen of Plesiopterys wildi reveals the diversification of cryptoclidian precursors and possible endemism within European Early Jurassic plesiosaur assemblages

Article Publication Date

31-Mar-2025

Self-belief in employees boosts workplace behavior and ethics, new study

The research demonstrates how self-efficacy influences both positive and counterproductive workplace behaviors

Aston University

New research, led by Aston University and published in the journal Personality and Individual Differences, has revealed how self-efficacy plays a crucial role in shaping workplace behaviour.

Self-efficacy refers to an individual's belief in their capacity to execute behaviours necessary to produce specific performance outcomes, essentially their confidence in their ability to succeed.

The study, Self-Efficacy and Nontask Performance at Work: A Meta-Analytic Summary, draws on data from nearly 50,000 employees across multiple industries to examine the relationship between self-efficacy, citizenship workplace behaviours and counterproductive actions.

The study, led by Professor Roberta Fida and an international team of researchers, found that employees with higher self-efficacy are significantly more likely to engage in citizenship performance, behaviours that go beyond formal job roles, such as helping colleagues, speaking up about concerns and contributing to a positive workplace culture. At the same time, self-efficacy serves as a protective factor against counterproductive workplace behaviours, including disengagement, misconduct and aggression.

The research also highlights that self-efficacy buffers employees from the negative effects of adverse working conditions, suggesting that fostering employees’ confidence can help mitigate workplace stress and improve overall organisational health.

According to the study, organisations can enhance self-efficacy through leadership, targeted training programmes and supportive workplace policies. These interventions could lead to a more engaged workforce, reduced workplace misconduct, and a stronger ethical climate.

Roberta Fida, professor of organisational behaviour & organisational psychology at Aston Business School, said:

“Our findings demonstrate that self-efficacy is not only a predictor of task performance but also a key factor in shaping an employee’s broader behaviour at work.

“Employees who believe in their ability to succeed are more likely to take initiative, contribute positively to their teams, and resist pressures that could lead to unethical or counterproductive actions.

“Encouraging self-efficacy in employees is not just beneficial for individuals—it has profound implications for organisational culture.

“Our study suggests that organisations that invest in developing employees’ self-efficacy are likely to see improvements in both performance and ethical behaviour.”

You can read the full study, published in Personality and Individual Differences, by visiting the journal’s website.

Journal

Personality and Individual Differences

DOI

10.1016/j.paid.2025.113179

Method of Research

Systematic review

Subject of Research

People

Article Title

Self-efficacy and nontask performance at work. A meta-analytic summary

Article Publication Date

28-Mar-2025

Psychedelics and sex: New research explores perceived impacts on sexuality and intimacy

University at Buffalo

image:
Daniel Kruger, PhD, research associate professor, Department of Community Health and Health Behavior, University at Buffalo.
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Credit: University at Buffalo

BUFFALO, N.Y. – The increasing availability of legal psychedelic therapy programs, such as those in Colorado and Oregon, has led researchers to take a broader look into various aspects of how people use these substances.

A team of researchers has just published the first paper of its kind reporting on the impact of psychedelics on sexuality and intimacy. The paper, published Friday (March 28) in the Journal of Sex Research, found that psychedelic experiences enhanced participants’ perceptions of their relationship quality, attraction to their current partner, and sexual activities.

“People in clinical trials and people going on psychedelic retreats in other countries have talked about a broad range of positive effects, including greater self-insight and feeling more connected to other people. Could there be benefits for intimate relationships in the long-term?” says Daniel Kruger, PhD, research associate professor in the University at Buffalo School of Public Health and Health Professions and first author on the paper.

And what about benefits for people experiencing gender dysphoria? There haven’t been any studies in these areas, so Kruger and his colleagues from the University of Michigan Medical School, University of Exeter, and University of South Carolina Salkehatchie, as well as two psychedelic therapists, decided to explore this gap.

Researchers sent a survey to nearly 600 individuals who have used psychedelics, querying them on how their use of psychedelics affected various aspects of their sexuality, gender identity, and romantic relationships. The most common psychedelics that participants reported using were psilocybin mushrooms, LSD, ecstasy or molly, and ketamine.

The results found that 70% of participants reported perceived impacts of psychedelic experiences on their sexuality and/or sexual experiences, with 65% mentioning short-term effects and nearly 53% reporting long-term effects.

Approximately 10% said that psychedelic experiences influenced their gender identity and/or expression, with some describing experiences of gender fluidity and feeling “waves” from feminine to masculine.

“I think the biggest surprise for me was the increase in same-sex attraction, reported by a quarter of women and about one in eight men,” says Kruger, a trained psychologist who studies medical cannabis, emerging cannabinoids, and therapeutic use of psychedelics. “A third of those with other gender identities also reported changes. Most people did not experience this, but the fact that so many people did is striking.”

So, why study how users of psychedelics perceive the effects this class of drugs has on their relationships and sexuality?

“Many people think that psychedelics will be the next generation of psychiatric medications,” Kruger says, adding there hasn’t been a major advance since Selective Serotonin Reuptake Inhibitors (SSRIs) like Prozac in the 1980s, “and psychedelics seem like they could be much more effective.” But, he adds, people shouldn’t simply “think of psychedelics as a magic pill that just makes everything better.”

There are also hundreds of clinical trials using psychedelics, as well as legal psychedelic therapy programs in multiple states, including Colorado and Oregon.

“Psychedelic use may be at an all-time high among young adults, and many older adults are trying psychedelics for the therapeutic benefits,” he says. “There are huge implications for public health when so many people are using psychedelics. We need to reduce risks and protect people from harms and educate people so they know what they are getting into.”

As this was the first study of its kind, it was meant to be broad and exploratory, according to Kruger, who plans to conduct further research to better understand what’s happening. They have launched an updated version of the survey, which can be taken anonymously by adults who have used psychedelics.

Journal

The Journal of Sex Research

DOI

10.1080/00224499.2025.2479197

Method of Research

Survey

Subject of Research

People

Article Title

Perceived Impact of Psychedelics on Sexual, Gender, and Intimate Relationship Dynamics: A Mixed-Methods Investigation

Article Publication Date

28-Mar-2025

LA REVUE GAUCHE - Left Comment: Search results for Psychedelic

MOPEVACLAS vaccine candidate for Lassa fever enters clinical trials

Institut Pasteur

After more than 20 years of research on arenaviruses, an Institut Pasteur team led by Sylvain Baize has developed an original vaccine platform known as MOPEVAC, which will strengthen the Institut Pasteur's pandemic preparedness initiatives. A Phase Ia clinical trial led by a research team at the Institut Pasteur is set to begin for the platform's first vaccine candidate, which targets Lassa fever, a hemorrhagic fever responsible for thousands of deaths worldwide each year. In the long term, the MOPEVAC platform will enable scientists to respond to the emergence of new viruses with effective candidate vaccines aimed at pathogens with high mortality rates. The MOPEVAC clinical trials are funded by the France 2030 program as part of the "Emerging infectious diseases and CBRN threats" strategy. They are led by the French Health Innovation Agency and operated on behalf of the French government by Bpifrance, which also supported the preclinical trials.

Lassa fever, caused by the Lassa arenavirus, claims between 5,000 and 6,000 lives in West Africa every year. The virus is contracted through exposure to the bodily fluids or feces of Natal multimammate mice (Mastomys natalensis) living near human populations. The disease is endemic in regions where the mice live, especially in Nigeria, the most affected country and the most populated country in Africa.

Given the lack of effective drugs, vaccination is the best strategy to tackle the disease. The team led by Sylvain Baize, Head of the Institut Pasteur’s Biology of Viral Emerging Infections Unit, therefore set out to develop an effective Lassa fever vaccine using attenuated viral vectors, with the help of the Institut Pasteur's Bioinformatics Hub and the Inserm-Jean Mérieux BSL-4 laboratory.

"To obtain lasting, effective protection, we needed to work on a vector-based vaccine that could be administered in remote areas in countries with limited healthcare infrastructure, and which would ideally be effective with a single dose, as is the case for the yellow fever vaccine, for example. For hemorrhagic fevers like Lassa fever, live attenuated vectors are the best targets," explains Sylvain Baize.

In 2003, Sylvain Baize's team shifted its research focus to this approach after comparing Lassa virus with Mopeia virus, another virus in the same family which is similar to Lassa but not pathogenic for humans. The scientists used reverse genetics techniques to modify the Mopeia virus. They deleted an immunosuppressive domain in the viral genome and replaced part of its genetic material with the envelope glycoprotein sequence from the Lassa virus. Glycoproteins are involved in viral entry into the cell at the point of infection and therefore represent a major target for the immune system. In this way the team obtained a virus that was still capable of replicating and induced a specific immune reaction against Lassa virus. This is the vaccine candidate used in the Phase I clinical trial in connection with the MOPEVAC project.

Testing the vector in humans for the first time

Preclinical trials were performed on animal cells and models, and extensive toxicology studies are currently being carried out. The production process was transferred to a manufacturer and optimized, and this same manufacturer will be responsible for producing the vaccine batch used for the Phase I trial. The Institut Pasteur is sponsoring the trial, which will be conducted in collaboration with the Cochin-Pasteur Vaccinology Clinical Investigation Center led by Odile Launay.

"The Phase Ia clinical trial will involve 72 healthy volunteers. The vaccine's safety and the immune responses it generates will be monitored in these subjects for more than a year. The first inclusion period should take place in early 2026," explains the scientist.

Sylvain Baize's team, with the support of the Institut Pasteur's Technology Transfer and Industrial Partnership Department and Medical Department, is particularly well placed to organize and monitor this project as it has expertise in basic virology research, hemorrhagic fever pathophysiology in animals and humans, and also diagnostics. The laboratory serves as the National Reference Center for Viral Hemorrhagic Fevers and therefore carries out regular field work, for example during the 2014 Ebola epidemic.

"We are involved at every stage: diagnosis, monitoring viral development with the description of new strains, and finally vaccine development. It is crucial that we monitor these viruses carefully and develop prevention and treatment strategies, as one of them may give rise to a future epidemic. Lassa hemorrhagic fever is the most frequently imported disease to Global North countries. This is a widespread public health problem and one that we need to prepare for by developing several different vaccine vector platforms," emphasizes the scientist.

While awaiting the results of the Lassa fever vaccine candidate, the MOPEVAC platform has also been adapted to obtain a more universal expression vector that would enable scientists to respond to emerging viruses with effective vaccine candidates against other pathogens with very high mortality rates. The Mopeia virus glycoprotein gene can be replaced with any of the glycoprotein genes from viruses in the same family, arenaviruses. So the team has adapted the MOPEVAC platform to the five arenaviruses that circulate in South America and are dangerous for humans, and has developed a pentavalent vaccine for these pathogens.

These programs are funded by the French government as part of the France 2030 investment plan.

Watch the video:
From lab to people, by Sylvain Baize [Fundamentally applied]

Method of Research

Randomized controlled/clinical trial

Subject of Research

People

Research Spotlight: How much does patient travel for healthcare contribute to carbon emissions?

Brigham and Women's Hospital

Hanna Zurl, MD, a research fellow in the Department of Urology at Brigham and Women’s Hospital (BWH), and the Center for Surgery and Public Health at BWH, is the lead author of a paper published in JAMA Network Open, Carbon Emissions from Patient Travel for Healthcare: Insights from a National Transportation Survey.

Alexander Putnam Cole, MD, an associate surgeon in the Department of Urology at BWH, an assistant professor of Surgery at Harvard Medical School and junior core faculty at the Center for Surgery and Public Health, is the senior author of the paper.

How would you summarize your study for a lay audience?

The United States (U.S.) healthcare sector has been estimated to generate about 8.5% of national greenhouse gas emissions.

Greenhouse gas emissions are associated with significant downstream effects on public health. This means that healthcare-related pollution can paradoxically worsen many of the disease’s healthcare professionals work tirelessly to treat and cure.

In previously published research, investigators estimated that U.S. healthcare-related pollution leads to a loss of over 300,000 disability adjusted life years (DALY), which measures the overall disease burden by combining years of life lost due to premature death and years lived with disability.
An area that has seen considerable growth of interest lately is adapting selective healthcare appointments into a ‘telehealth’ format, which could reduce carbon emissions because of patients no longer needing to travel to clinics or hospitals.

When we started studying this, we realized that reliable estimates of emissions associated with healthcare–related travel were lacking.

In this study, our team therefore estimated the amount of greenhouse gas emissions generated by patients traveling to and from medical appointments in the U.S. We used a national transportation survey that includes distance travelled, vehicle and fuel type.

We found that health care travel generates about 35.7 megatons of carbon emissions each year—roughly the same as the emissions from the electricity used by seven million homes in a year.

What methods or approach did you use?

This cross-sectional study used data from the 2022 National Household Travel Survey. We used data on travel distance, vehicle type, and fuel type to estimated carbon dioxide equivalent (CO2e) emissions from patient healthcare–related travel. Estimates were calculated per year, per patient, per trip, and per mile.

Furthermore, we analyzed the association between patient characteristics and emissions, identifying factors associated with higher CO2e emissions per trip.

An alternative scenario analysis was performed to estimate CO2e reductions if 30% or 50% of private vehicle users switched to electric vehicles.

What did you find?

The sample included a weighted total of 3.5 billion U.S. healthcare trips. We estimated that patient healthcare-related travel in the U.S. generates approximately 35.7 megatons of CO2e annually, accounting for about 6% of the nation's total healthcare-related emissions.

Other notable takeaways:

-- Emissions per trip were higher for patients in rural areas compared to patients in urban areas.
-- A 30% shift to electric vehicles was estimated to reduce healthcare-related carbon emissions to 27.6 megatons CO2e, and a 50% shift was estimated to lower emissions to 22.2 megatons CO2e.
-- Notably, this only focused on patient travel but did not include physicians or other staff members traveling to work.

What are the next steps?

These findings are essential for informing healthcare policy decisions and suggest that strategies such as telehealth appointment format and the adoption of electric vehicles may contribute to a small but significant reduction in healthcare–related greenhouse gas emissions.

Future research should focus on integrating emissions from healthcare-related travel into national estimates of carbon emissions from the U.S. healthcare sector. This would provide a more comprehensive understanding of the environmental impact of the healthcare sector and help guide policy decisions.

Another important next step is linking these carbon emissions to specific health outcomes. Further studies should examine how the expansion of telehealth services influences travel-related emissions at a national level. Investigating the potential of telehealth to reduce patient travel could inform strategies for lowering the carbon footprint of health care while maintaining accessibility and quality of care.

If we can find situations where telehealth is already working for patients and simultaneously reduce the environmental impact of health care, then that is a win for everyone involved.

Authorship: In addition to Zurl and Cole, Mass General Brigham authors include Zhiyu Qian, Daniel R Stelzl, Filippo Dagnino, Stephan Korn, Muhieddine Labban, Stuart Lipsitz, and Quoc-Dien Trinh,. Additional authors include Marianne Leitsmann, Sascha Ahyai, Chad Ellimoottil, Stacy Loeb, and Hari S. Iyer.

Paper cited: Zurl H et al. “Carbon Emissions from Patient Travel for Healthcare: Insights from a National Transportation Survey” JAMA Open DOI: 10.1001/jamanetworkopen.2025.2513

Disclosures: Korn reported receiving personal fees and speaker’s honoraria from Janssen and speaker’s honoraria from Astellas outside the submitted work. Loeb reported receiving personal fees from Astellas and Doceree outside the submitted work. Trinh reported receiving personal fees from Astellas, Bayer, Intuitive Surgical, Janssen, and Novartis, and grants from Pfizer outside the submitted work. Cole reported receiving personal fees from EDAP/TMS. Leitsmann reported receiving personal fees from Astellas, Ibsa, Ipsen, and Novartis. No other disclosures were reported.

Journal

JAMA Network Open

DOI

10.1001/jamanetworkopen.2025.2513

Article Title

Zurl H et al. “Carbon Emissions from Patient Travel for Healthcare: Insights from a National Transportation Survey” JAMA Open DOI: 10.1001/jamanetworkopen.2025.2513

Article Publication Date

27-Mar-2025