The sustainability assessment of Indigenous and local knowledge-based climate adaptation responses in agricultural and aquatic food systems

Unidad de excelencia María de Maeztu CEX2019-000940-MWe examine common Indigenous and local knowledge-based adaptive responses to climate change from the sustainability perspective among Indigenous and local communities globally. We draw upon an assessment of 98 peer-reviewed articles to access how local-level responses interact with the broader sustainability dimensions of social, economic, and environmental. We focus on five adaptive responses: 1) community-based adaptation, 2) diversification, 3) local governance and conflict resolution schemes, 4) land, soil, and water management, and 5) traditional weather forecast. Using sustainability framing, we illustrate how these adaptive responses can be both resilient and vulnerable. We argue that long-term successful adaptation to climate change should aim to avoid any increase in, and instead should decrease, vulnerability related to the social (e.g., loss of social bonds and mutual support), economic (e.g., insecure income), and environmental (e.g., soil contamination) dimensions. There is an urgent need to discuss successful adaptation to climate change from a holistic approach that includes long-term social, economic, and environmental sustainability aspects

L'elaboració del Pla de Gestió de dades : l'experiència de tres projectes de la UAB

Presentació dins la Setmana Internacional de l'Accés Obert 2022, on Pilar Rico, de FECYT, fa una introducció sobre la política de dades obertes en el programa Horizon Europe de la Comissió Europea. A continuació tres investigadors de la UAB, d'àmbits de coneixement diferents, amb projectes de l'European Research Council (ERC) expliquen la seva experiència redactant el Pla de Gestió de Dades: quins aspectes van haver de resoldre i com ho van fer

Refining Kidney Survival in 383 Genetically Characterized Patients With Nephronophthisis

Kidney survival; Nephronophthisis; Prognostic factorsSupervivencia renal; Nefronoptisis; Factores pronósticosSupervivència renal; Nefronoftisi; Factors pronòsticsIntroduction Nephronophthisis (NPH) comprises a group of rare disorders accounting for up to 10% of end-stage kidney disease (ESKD) in children. Prediction of kidney prognosis poses a major challenge. We assessed differences in kidney survival, impact of variant type, and the association of clinical characteristics with declining kidney function. Methods Data was obtained from 3 independent sources, namely the network for early onset cystic kidney diseases clinical registry (n = 105), an online survey sent out to the European Reference Network for Rare Kidney Diseases (n = 60), and a literature search (n = 218). Results A total of 383 individuals were available for analysis: 116 NPHP1, 101 NPHP3, 81 NPHP4 and 85 NPHP11/TMEM67 patients. Kidney survival differed between the 4 cohorts with a highly variable median age at onset of ESKD as follows: NPHP3, 4.0 years (interquartile range 0.3–12.0); NPHP1, 13.5 years (interquartile range 10.5–16.5); NPHP4, 16.0 years (interquartile range 11.0–25.0); and NPHP11/TMEM67, 19.0 years (interquartile range 8.7–28.0). Kidney survival was significantly associated with the underlying variant type for NPHP1, NPHP3, and NPHP4. Multivariate analysis for the NPHP1 cohort revealed growth retardation (hazard ratio 3.5) and angiotensin-converting enzyme inhibitor (ACEI) treatment (hazard ratio 2.8) as 2 independent factors associated with an earlier onset of ESKD, whereas arterial hypertension was linked to an accelerated glomerular filtration rate (GFR) decline. Conclusion The presented data will enable clinicians to better estimate kidney prognosis of distinct patients with NPH and thereby allow personalized counseling.NEOCYST (Network of Early Onset Cystic Kidney Diseases; www.neocyst.de)27 is funded by the German Federal Ministry of Education and Research—grant code 01GM1515A. This study was also supported by the European Reference Network for Rare Kidney Diseases, which is partly co-funded by the European Union within the framework of the Third Health Program “ERN-2016-Framework Partnership Agreement 2017-2021.

Protocol for the Collection of Cross-cultural Comparative Data on Local Indicators of Climate Change Impacts

Unidad de excelencia María de Maeztu CEX2019-000940-MThis protocol has been designed to collect local perceptions of climate change impacts on climatic (e.g. rainfall patterns change), physical (e.g., shrinking glaciers), biological (e.g., phenological changes), and socioeconomic systems (e.g., crop failure due to rainfall patterns change), but also adaptations to those impacts, local agricultural calendars and local narratives to allow the reconstruction of historical and relevant events using a combination of quantitative and qualitative methodologies

A collaborative approach to bring insights from local observations of climate change impacts into global climate change research

Bringing insights from Indigenous and local knowledge into climate change research requires addressing the transferability, integration, and scalability of this knowledge. Using a review of research on place-based observations of climate change impacts, we explore ways to address these challenges. Our search mostly captured scientist-led qualitative research, which - while facilitating place-based knowledge transferability to global research - did not include locally led efforts documenting climate change impacts. We classified and organized qualitative multi-site place-based information into a hierarchical system that fosters dialogue with global research, providing an enriched picture of climate change impacts on local social-ecological systems. A network coordinating the scalability of place-based research on climate change impacts is needed to bring Indigenous and local knowledge into global research and policy agendas.Peer reviewe

Consistency in climate change impact reports among indigenous peoples and local communities depends on site contexts

Unidad de excelencia María de Maeztu CEX2019-000940-MIndigenous Peoples and local communities are heavily affected by climatic changes. Investigating local understandings of climate change impacts, and their patterned distribution, is essential to effectively support monitoring and adaptation strategies. In this study, we aimed to understand the consistency in climate change impact reports and factors influencing consistency at site and individual levels. We conducted cross-cultural research among iTaukei (Fiji), Dagomba (Ghana), fisherfolks (Tanzania), Tsimane' (Bolivia), Bassari (Senegal), ribeirinhos (Brazil), Mapuche (Chile), Mongolian (China), Tibetan (China) and Daasanach (Kenya) communities using semi-structured interviews, focus groups, and surveys among 1860 individuals. We found that cross-culturally more than two-thirds of individual reports of climate change impacts match site-confirmed reports. Consistency in reports is higher for changes related to pastoralism than crop production and wild plant gathering. Individual's experience with nature, Indigenous and local knowledge, and local family roots are not significantly associated with consistency across sites, but site-specific associations are prevalent. Despite high average consistency among sites, there is considerable variation caused by site-specific factors, including livelihood activities, socio-cultural settings, and environmental conditions. Site contexts and related consistency in climate change impact reports need to be taken into account for climate change monitoring and adaptation planning

Genome-Wide Association Studies of Serum Magnesium, Potassium, and Sodium Concentrations Identify Six Loci Influencing Serum Magnesium Levels

Magnesium, potassium, and sodium, cations commonly measured in serum, are involved in many physiological processes including energy metabolism, nerve and muscle function, signal transduction, and fluid and blood pressure regulation. To evaluate the contribution of common genetic variation to normal physiologic variation in serum concentrations of these cations, we conducted genome-wide association studies of serum magnesium, potassium, and sodium concentrations using ∼2.5 million genotyped and imputed common single nucleotide polymorphisms (SNPs) in 15,366 participants of European descent from the international CHARGE Consortium. Study-specific results were combined using fixed-effects inverse-variance weighted meta-analysis. SNPs demonstrating genome-wide significant (p<5×10−8) or suggestive associations (p<4×10−7) were evaluated for replication in an additional 8,463 subjects of European descent. The association of common variants at six genomic regions (in or near MUC1, ATP2B1, DCDC5, TRPM6, SHROOM3, and MDS1) with serum magnesium levels was genome-wide significant when meta-analyzed with the replication dataset. All initially significant SNPs from the CHARGE Consortium showed nominal association with clinically defined hypomagnesemia, two showed association with kidney function, two with bone mineral density, and one of these also associated with fasting glucose levels. Common variants in CNNM2, a magnesium transporter studied only in model systems to date, as well as in CNNM3 and CNNM4, were also associated with magnesium concentrations in this study. We observed no associations with serum sodium or potassium levels exceeding p<4×10−7. Follow-up studies of newly implicated genomic loci may provide additional insights into the regulation and homeostasis of human serum magnesium levels