Tradeoffs May Counteract Effects of Telecommunication Towers on Osprey Nesting

The number of telecommunication towers (TCTs) throughout the United States has and continues to increase exponentially. Increased TCT placement has been implicated in local population increases in platform nesting birds such as ospreys (Pandion haliaetus). However, osprey use of artificial structures can cause conflicts with humans because of economic costs and risks to human safety. Managers require better information regarding the effect of artificial nesting surfaces, such as TCTS, on osprey reproduction to make informed decisions regarding species conservation and to mitigate potential conflicts. The objective of our study was to evaluate the influence of TCTs on osprey productivity and adult nesting behaviors. From March to July 2019, we monitored 30 osprey nests located in western Kentucky, USA, on TCTs (n = 11), navigation channel markers (NCMs; n = 10), and natural surfaces (NATs; n = 9). We found no differences in nest success, productivity, or the proportion of male ospreys perched at the nest between surface types. Nests on NCMs received 1.9–2.1 times more fish than nests on NATs and TCTs, respectively. Moreover, NCMs experienced 5.4–8.0 times more disturbances per hour compared to NATs and TCTs, respectively. Our data suggest ospreys nesting on TCTs are productive contributors to local populations. We recommend deterrence of osprey nesting should be focused on locations that are unsafe for ospreys and/or pose insurmountable problems for communication infrastructure

Effect of chromophore-chromophore electrostatic interactions in the NLO response of functionalized organic-inorganic sol-gel materials

In the last years, important non-linear optical results on sol-gel and polymeric materials have been reported, with values comparable to those found in crystals. These new materials contain push-pull chromophores either incorporated as guest in a high Tg polymeric matrix (doped polymers) or grafted onto the polymeric matrix. These systems present several advantages; however they require significant improvement at the molecular level - by designing optimized chromophores with very large molecular figure of merit, specific to each application targeted. Besides, it was recently stated in polymers that the chromophore-chromophore electrostatic interactions, which are dependent of chromophore concentration, have a strong effect into their non-linear optical properties. This has not been explored at all in sol-gel systems. In this work, the sol-gel route was used to prepare hybrid organic-inorganic thin films with different NLO chromophores grafted into the skeleton matrix. Combining a molecular engineering strategy for getting a larger molecular figure of merit and by controlling the intermolecular dipole-dipole interactions through both: the tuning of the push-pull chromophore concentration and the control of TEOS (Tetraethoxysilane) concentration, we have obtained a r33 coefficient around 15 pm/V at 633 nm for the classical DR1 azo-chromophore and a r33 around 50 pm/V at 831 nm for a new optimized chromophore structure.Comment: 10 pages, 11 figures, 1 tabl

Relationship between river size and nutrient removal

Author Posting. © American Geophysical Union, 2006. This article is posted here by permission of American Geophysical Union for personal use, not for redistribution. The definitive version was published in Geophysical Research Letters 33 (2006): L06410, doi:10.1029/2006GL025845.We present a conceptual approach for evaluating the biological and hydrological controls of nutrient removal in different sized rivers within an entire river network. We emphasize a per unit area biological parameter, the nutrient uptake velocity (νf), which is mathematically independent of river size in benthic dominated systems. Standardization of biological parameters from previous river network models to νf reveals the nature of river size dependant biological activity in these models. We explore how geomorphic, hydraulic, and biological factors control the distribution of nutrient removal in an idealized river network, finding that larger rivers within a basin potentially exert considerable influence over nutrient exports.This work was funded by NASA-IDS (NNG04GH75G), NSF-LTER OCE-9726921, and NOAA (NA17RJ2612- 344 to Princeton U.)

Structural and Content Diversity of Mitochondrial Genome in Beet: A Comparative Genomic Analysis

Despite their monophyletic origin, mitochondrial (mt) genomes of plants and animals have developed contrasted evolutionary paths over time. Animal mt genomes are generally small, compact, and exhibit high mutation rates, whereas plant mt genomes exhibit low mutation rates, little compactness, larger sizes, and highly rearranged structures. We present the (nearly) whole sequences of five new mt genomes in the Beta genus: four from Beta vulgaris and one from B. macrocarpa, a sister species belonging to the same Beta section. We pooled our results with two previously sequenced genomes of B. vulgaris and studied genome diversity at the species level with an emphasis on cytoplasmic male-sterilizing (CMS) genomes. We showed that, contrary to what was previously assumed, all three CMS genomes belong to a single sterile lineage. In addition, the CMSs seem to have undergone an acceleration of the rates of substitution and rearrangement. This study suggests that male sterility emergence might have been favored by faster rates of evolution, unless CMS itself caused faster evolution

Weakness of investment in Portugal : what role do credit supply and fiscal consolidation shocks play?

In order to illustrate how tightened financial conditions have hampered investment in Portugal, we estimate a Factor Augmented Vector AutoRegressive model (FAVAR) with Bayesian techniques. We extract a financial conditions indicator and identify credit supply, demand and fiscal consolidation shocks with sign restrictions. We show that changes in financial conditions, which result from both credit supply shocks and fiscal shocks, have a protracted impact, especially on bank loans and bank lending spreads. We then develop a scenario in which we the tightening in financial condi- tions in the wake of the sovereign crisis is attributed to credit supply shocks. The analysis suggests that, due to the crisis, by the end of 2017, Portuguese GDP, corpo- rate investment and corporate loans were reduced by respectively 6, 22 and 20 p.p., public investment by 1 p.p. of GDP and bank lending spreads widened by 80 b.p.info:eu-repo/semantics/publishedVersio

A contiguous de novo genome assembly of sugar beet EL10 (Beta vulgaris L.)

A contiguous assembly of the inbred ‘EL10’ sugar beet (Beta vulgaris ssp. vulgaris) genome was constructed using PacBio long-read sequencing, BioNano optical mapping, Hi-C scaffolding, and Illumina short-read error correction. The EL10.1 assembly was 540 Mb, of which 96.2% was contained in nine chromosome-sized pseudomolecules with lengths from 52 to 65 Mb, and 31 contigs with a median size of 282 kb that remained unassembled. Gene annotation incorporating RNA-seq data and curated sequences via the MAKER annotation pipeline generated 24,255 gene models. Results indicated that the EL10.1 genome assembly is a contiguous genome assembly highly congruent with the published sugar beet reference genome. Gross duplicate gene analyses of EL10.1 revealed little large-scale intra-genome duplication. Reduced gene copy number for well-annotated gene families relative to other core eudicots was observed, especially for transcription factors. Variation in genome size in B. vulgaris was investigated by flow cytometry among 50 individuals producing estimates from 633 to 875 Mb/1C. Read-depth mapping with short-read whole-genome sequences from other sugar beet germplasm suggested that relatively few regions of the sugar beet genome appeared associated with high-copy number variation

Prefrontal Norepinephrine Determines Attribution of “High” Motivational Salience

Intense motivational salience attribution is considered to have a major role in the development of different psychopathologies. Numerous brain areas are involved in “normal” motivational salience attribution processes; however, it is not clear whether common or different neural mechanisms also underlie intense motivational salience attribution. To elucidate this a brain area and a neural system had to be envisaged that were involved only in motivational salience attribution to highly salient stimuli. Using intracerebral microdialysis, we found that natural stimuli induced an increase in norepinephrine release in the medial prefrontal cortex of mice proportional to their salience, and that selective prefrontal norepinephrine depletion abolished the increase of norepinephrine release in the medial prefrontal cortex induced by exposure to appetitive (palatable food) or aversive (light) stimuli independently of salience. However, selective norepinephrine depletion in the medial prefrontal cortex impaired the place conditioning induced exclusively by highly salient stimuli, thus indicating that prefrontal noradrenergic transmission determines approach or avoidance responses to both reward- and aversion-related natural stimuli only when the salience of the unconditioned natural stimulus is high enough to induce sustained norepinephrine outflow. This affirms that prefrontal noradrenergic transmission determines motivational salience attribution selectively when intense motivational salience is processed, as in conditions that characterize psychopathological outcomes

SNAPSHOT USA 2020: A second coordinated national camera trap survey of the United States during the COVID-19 pandemic

Managing wildlife populations in the face of global change requires regular data on the abundance and distribution of wild animals, but acquiring these over appropriate spatial scales in a sustainable way has proven challenging. Here we present the data from Snapshot USA 2020, a second annual national mammal survey of the USA. This project involved 152 scientists setting camera traps in a standardized protocol at 1485 locations across 103 arrays in 43 states for a total of 52,710 trap-nights of survey effort. Most (58) of these arrays were also sampled during the same months (September and October) in 2019, providing a direct comparison of animal populations in 2 years that includes data from both during and before the COVID-19 pandemic. All data were managed by the eMammal system, with all species identifications checked by at least two reviewers. In total, we recorded 117,415 detections of 78 species of wild mammals, 9236 detections of at least 43 species of birds, 15,851 detections of six domestic animals and 23,825 detections of humans or their vehicles. Spatial differences across arrays explained more variation in the relative abundance than temporal variation across years for all 38 species modeled, although there are examples of significant site-level differences among years for many species. Temporal results show how species allocate their time and can be used to study species interactions, including between humans and wildlife. These data provide a snapshot of the mammal community of the USA for 2020 and will be useful for exploring the drivers of spatial and temporal changes in relative abundance and distribution, and the impacts of species interactions on daily activity patterns. There are no copyright restrictions, and please cite this paper when using these data, or a subset of these data, for publication