Spectral and growth characteristics of willows and maize in soil contaminated with a layer of crude or refined oil

Remote sensing holds great potential for detecting stress in vegetation caused by hydro-carbons, but we need to better understand the effects of hydrocarbons on plant growth and specific spectral expression. Willow (Salix viminalis var. Tora) cuttings and maize (Zea mays var. Lapriora) seedlings were grown in pots of loam soil containing a hydrocarbon-contaminated layer at the base of the pot (crude or refined oil) at concentrations of 0.5, 5, or 50 g·kg−1 . Chlorophyll concen-tration, biomass, and growth of plants were determined through destructive and nondestructive sampling, whilst reflectance measurements were made using portable hyperspectral spectrometers. All biophysical (chlorophyll concentration and growth) variables decreased in the presence of high concentrations of hydrocarbons, but at lower concentrations an increase in growth and chlorophyll were often observed with respect to nonpolluted plants, suggesting a biphasic response to hydrocarbon presence. Absorption features were identified that related strongly to pigment concentration and biomass. Variations in absorption feature characteristics (band depth, band area, and band width) were dependent upon the hydrocarbon concentration and type, and showed the same biphasic pattern noted in the biophysical measurements. This study demonstrates that the response of plants to hydrocarbon pollution varies according to hydrocarbon concentration and that remote sensing has the potential to both detect and monitor the variable impacts of pollution in the landscape.Atmospheric Remote Sensin

The Influence of Political Ideology and Socioeconomic Vulnerability on Perceived Health Risks of Heat Waves in the Context of Climate Change

Vulnerability and resilience to extreme weather hazards are a function of diverse physical, social, and psychological factors. Previous research has focused on individual factors that influence public perceptions of hazards, such as politics, ideology, and cultural worldviews, as well as on socioeconomic and demographic factors that affect geographically based vulnerability, environmental justice, and community resilience. Few studies have investigated individual socioeconomic and racial/ethnic differences in public risk perceptions of the health hazards associated with extreme heat events, which are now increasing due to climate change. This study uses multilevel statistical modeling to investigate individual- and geographic-level (e.g., census tract level and regional) social, economic, and biophysical influences on public perceptions of the adverse health impacts associated with heat waves. Political orientation and climate change beliefs are the strongest predictors of heat wave health risk perceptions; household income also has a relatively strong and consistent effect. Contextual socioeconomic vulnerability, measured with a social vulnerability index at the census tract level, also significantly affects heat wave risk perceptions. The strong influence of political orientation and climate beliefs on perceptions of adverse health impacts from heat waves suggests that ideological predispositions can increase vulnerability to climate change

Variations in tephra stratigraphy created by small-scale surface features in sub-polar landscapes

Financial support for this work was provided by NERC Doctoral Training Partnership Ph.D. studentship NE/L002558/1 to Polly I. J. Thompson.We explore the effect small-scale surface features have on influencing the morphology and grain-size distribution (GSD) of tephra layers within the Quaternary stratigraphy of sub-polar landscapes. Icelandic thúfur, small cryogenic earth mounds, are used to assess how and why the morphology and GSD of tephra layers vary over such formations. Through measurement of tephra layer thickness and GSD, Hekla 1947 and Grímsvötn 2011 tephra layers are analysed. Results indicate that such microtopographic features do indeed alter the form of tephra deposits and therefore the tephra layer that is preserved in the stratigraphy. Tephra thickness is significantly greater in hollows than on the thúfur crests. There is greater variation in tephra thickness measurements from thúfur in comparison to control measurements from a surface where thúfur are absent. Thúfur crests contain larger grain sizes than hollows, for both H1947 and G2011 tephras; however this was only statistically significant for the G2011 tephra. Such morphological patterns are thought to arise from an interplay of tephra characteristics, altered topography from the thúfur formations and earth surface processes operating at the sites. This study provides insight into the potential of tephra layer morphology and internal structures as indicators of Quaternary landforms and processes. Additionally, it provides important context for the appropriate sampling of tephra layers to infer volcanological processes, as the characteristics of preserved layers do not necessarily reflect those of the original fall-out.Publisher PDFPeer reviewe

Adaptive State Estimation for Nonminimum-Phase Systems with Uncertain Harmonic Inputs

Peer Reviewedhttp://deepblue.lib.umich.edu/bitstream/2027.42/90727/1/AIAA-2011-6315-484.pd

Climate Change Activism Among Latino and White Americans

Research indicates that Latinos have particularly strong pro-environmental attitudes and support for policies to reduce climate change. This study explores differences in climate change activism (i.e., contacting government officials) between Latino and non-Latino White citizens in the United States, and the individual and social factors that predict engagement. Two parallel, nationally representative surveys find that Latinos (n = 1,433) are more likely than Whites (n = 861) to report having contacted a government official in the past and are more willing to contact officials in the future. Key predictors of Latinos' significantly higher levels of political engagement include greater risk perceptions, egalitarian worldviews, pro-environment injunctive norms, collective political efficacy, and greater social network effects. Competitive mediation analyses find that stronger risk perceptions best predict differences in climate change activism between Latinos and Whites. Climate change communicators might particularly seek to amplify Latinos' pro-climate tendencies (e.g., heightened risk perceptions) and social norms to encourage greater climate action by this vital and growing segment of the U.S. population

Enhancement and suppression effects resulting from information structuring in sentences

Information structuring through the use of cleft sentences increases the processing efficiency of references to elements within the scope of focus. Furthermore, there is evidence that putting certain types of emphasis on individual words not only enhances their subsequent processing, but also protects these words from becoming suppressed in the wake of subsequent information, suggesting mechanisms of enhancement and suppression. In Experiment 1, we showed that clefted constructions facilitate the integration of subsequent sentences that make reference to elements within the scope of focus, and that they decrease the efficiency with reference to elements outside of the scope of focus. In Experiment 2, using an auditory text-change-detection paradigm, we showed that focus has similar effects on the strength of memory representations. These results add to the evidence for enhancement and suppression as mechanisms of sentence processing and clarify that the effects occur within sentences having a marked focus structure

The Mock LISA Data Challenges: from Challenge 3 to Challenge 4

The Mock LISA Data Challenges are a program to demonstrate LISA data-analysis capabilities and to encourage their development. Each round of challenges consists of one or more datasets containing simulated instrument noise and gravitational waves from sources of undisclosed parameters. Participants analyze the datasets and report best-fit solutions for the source parameters. Here we present the results of the third challenge, issued in Apr 2008, which demonstrated the positive recovery of signals from chirping Galactic binaries, from spinning supermassive--black-hole binaries (with optimal SNRs between ~ 10 and 2000), from simultaneous extreme-mass-ratio inspirals (SNRs of 10-50), from cosmic-string-cusp bursts (SNRs of 10-100), and from a relatively loud isotropic background with Omega_gw(f) ~ 10^-11, slightly below the LISA instrument noise.Comment: 12 pages, 2 figures, proceedings of the 8th Edoardo Amaldi Conference on Gravitational Waves, New York, June 21-26, 200

Spiroindolines Identify the Vesicular Acetylcholine Transporter as a Novel Target for Insecticide Action

The efficacy of all major insecticide classes continues to be eroded by the development of resistance mediated, in part, by selection of alleles encoding insecticide insensitive target proteins. The discovery of new insecticide classes acting at novel protein binding sites is therefore important for the continued protection of the food supply from insect predators, and of human and animal health from insect borne disease. Here we describe a novel class of insecticides (Spiroindolines) encompassing molecules that combine excellent activity against major agricultural pest species with low mammalian toxicity. We confidently assign the vesicular acetylcholine transporter as the molecular target of Spiroindolines through the combination of molecular genetics in model organisms with a pharmacological approach in insect tissues. The vesicular acetylcholine transporter can now be added to the list of validated insecticide targets in the acetylcholine signalling pathway and we anticipate that this will lead to the discovery of novel molecules useful in sustaining agriculture. In addition to their potential as insecticides and nematocides, Spiroindolines represent the only other class of chemical ligands for the vesicular acetylcholine transporter since those based on the discovery of vesamicol over 40 years ago, and as such, have potential to provide more selective tools for PET imaging in the diagnosis of neurodegenerative disease. They also provide novel biochemical tools for studies of the function of this protein family

Identifying Influenza Viruses with Resequencing Microarrays

Resequencing microarrays rapidly identify influenza viruses

Use of global coronary heart disease risk assessment in practice: a cross-sectional survey of a sample of U.S. physicians

<p>Abstract</p> <p>Background</p> <p>Global coronary heart disease (CHD) risk assessment is recommended to guide primary preventive pharmacotherapy. However, little is known about physicians' understanding and use of global CHD risk assessment. Our objective was to examine US physicians' awareness, use, and attitudes regarding global CHD risk assessment in clinical practice, and how these vary by provider specialty.</p> <p>Methods</p> <p>Using a web-based survey of US family physicians, general internists, and cardiologists, we examined awareness of tools available to calculate CHD risk, method and use of CHD risk assessment, attitudes towards CHD risk assessment, and frequency of using CHD risk assessment to guide recommendations of aspirin, lipid-lowering and blood pressure (BP) lowering therapies for primary prevention. Characteristics of physicians indicating they use CHD risk assessments were compared in unadjusted and adjusted analyses.</p> <p>Results</p> <p>A total of 952 physicians completed the questionnaire, with 92% reporting awareness of tools available to calculate CHD global risk. Among those aware of such tools, over 80% agreed that CHD risk calculation is useful, improves patient care, and leads to better decisions about recommending preventive therapies. However, only 41% use CHD risk assessment in practice. The most commonly reported barrier to CHD risk assessment is that it is too time consuming. Among respondents who calculate global CHD risk, 69% indicated they use it to guide lipid lowering therapy recommendations; 54% use it to guide aspirin therapy recommendations; and 48% use it to guide BP lowering therapy. Only 40% of respondents who use global CHD risk routinely tell patients their risk. Use of a personal digital assistant or smart phone was associated with reported use of CHD risk assessment (adjusted OR 1.58; 95% CI 1.17-2.12).</p> <p>Conclusions</p> <p>Reported awareness of tools to calculate global CHD risk appears high, but the majority of physicians in this sample do not use CHD risk assessments in practice. A minority of physicians in this sample use global CHD risk to guide prescription decisions or to motivate patients. Educational interventions and system improvements to improve physicians' effective use of global CHD risk assessment should be developed and tested.</p