Consequences of spring arrival dates for the breeding phenology of migratory warblers

Capsule: Early male arrival on the breeding grounds results in early pairing but not early nesting in Chiffchaffs Phylloscopus collybita, and Chiffchaffs can nest, fail, and re-nest before Willow Warblers Phylloscopus trochilus begin nesting. Aims: To quantify the consequences of timing of arrival for the subsequent timing of pairing, nesting, and re-nesting of short-distance (Chiffchaff) and long-distance (Willow Warbler) migrants. Methods: The arrival dates of 118 Chiffchaffs and 20 Willow Warblers were measured from March to June over 10 weeks in Foxley Wood nature reserve, Norfolk. Colour-ringing of 56 Chiffchaffs (55 males, 1 female) and 11 Willow Warblers (10 males, 1 female) was used to relate individual arrival dates to timing of male pairing, clutch initiation, and re-nesting. Results: Male Chiffchaffs started to arrive in early March and increased rapidly in number until early April, while the arrival of male Willow Warblers began in early April. Early-arriving male Chiffchaffs paired earlier than later-arriving individuals, but timing of clutch initiation was unrelated to male arrival dates. Early nesting by Chiffchaffs allowed replacement clutches following nest loss, the earliest of which occurred 12 days after the first Willow Warbler male had paired. Conclusions: Although early arrival in male Chiffchaffs does not translate into earlier nesting, timing of nesting in Chiffchaffs was sufficiently early to allow time for replacement clutches following nest loss. The later arrival of Willow Warblers is likely to mean fewer opportunities for replacement clutches following nest loss. This difference in breeding phenology could therefore contribute to differences in productivity between the species, especially if nest failure rates are high

Circadian Activity Rhythms and Fatigue of Adolescent Cancer Survivors and Healthy Controls: A Pilot Study.

STUDY OBJECTIVES: The primary objective of this study was to compare circadian activity rhythms (CARs) of adolescents within 5 years of completing cancer treatment (survivors) with that of healthy adolescent controls. Secondary objectives were to explore differences in the relationship of CARs and fatigue between survivors and controls and between early survivors (<12 months posttreatment) and late survivors (≥12 months posttreatment). METHODS: Twenty-nine survivors and 30 controls, aged 13–18 years, participated in this prospective, descriptive pilot study. Adolescents and their parents completed a baseline measure of adolescents’ fatigue. Adolescents wore a wrist actigraph continuously for 7 days and concurrently kept a sleep diary. Activity data recorded by actigraphy were fitted to an extended cosine model to calculate six CAR variables: acrophase, amplitude, midline estimating statistic of rhythm (MESOR), up-MESOR, down-MESOR, and F-statistic. Linear mixed models explored the relationship between CARs and fatigue. RESULTS: There were no group differences on CAR or fatigue measures. Among survivors, earlier down-MESOR was associated with greater parent-reported fatigue (P = .020), and earlier acrophase (P = .023) and up-MESOR (P = .025) were associated with greater adolescent-reported fatigue. Significant CAR-by-time posttreatment interaction effects were found on fatigue between early and late survivors. Among controls, greater parent-reported fatigue was associated with greater MESOR (P = .0495). CONCLUSIONS: Survivors within the first 5 years posttreatment were similar to controls in CARs and fatigue, suggesting robust recovery of circadian rhythms posttreatment. Different CAR characteristics were associated with fatigue in survivors and controls. Time posttreatment influenced the relationship between CARs and fatigue for survivors, with significant effects only for early survivors. CITATION: Rogers VE, Mobray C, Zhu S, et al. Circadian activity rhythms and fatigue of adolescent cancer survivors and healthy controls: a pilot study. J Clin Sleep Med. 2020;16(7):1141–1147

The New Zealand sustainability dashboard: unified monitoring and learning for sustainable agriculture in New Zealand

The New Zealand Sustainability Dashboard project will develop a sustainability assessment and reporting tool in partnership with five primary industry sectors in New Zealand. Internationally recognised frameworks and their key generic sustainability performance indicators (KPIs) will be co-opted to ensure that overseas consumers can benchmark and verify the sustainability credentials of New Zealand exported products. We will also design New Zealand and sector-specific KPIs to guide farmers and local consumers to best practices of special relevance to New Zealand society, ecology and land care. Monitoring protocols will be described, where possible for the farmers themselves to rapidly score their own performance across economic, social and environmental dimensions of food and fibre production. A multifunctional web application will be created that facilitates uploading of regular monitoring results and instantly summarises and reports back trends to the growers, to industry representatives, and to agriculture regulators and policy makers at regional and national government levels. Tests of the accuracy and statistical reliability of the KPIs will be coupled with ongoing research on how much the farmers use the tool, whether it changes their actions and beliefs for more sustainable agriculture, and whether stakeholders at all levels of global food systems trust and regularly use the tool. The Dashboard will be more than just a compliance and eco-verification tool – it will also provide a hub for learning to become more sustainable. It will create an information ‘clearing house’ for linking past data sources and at least five existing decision-support software applications so that growers can discover optimal choices for improved farming practice, should the Dashboard alert them that their KPIs are approaching amber of red alert thresholds. We will also design and test two new decision-support packages; one enabling farmers to calculate their energy and carbon footprint and how it can best be reduced; and a whole-farm ‘What if’ decision-support package that explores how investment in improving one sustainability KPI (eg. application of nitrogen fertilser) affects another (eg. farm profit). The Sustainability Dashboard will also include customisation capabilities for use in product traceability; for undertaking surveys of users; for estimating the value placed on different aspects of sustainability by growers, industry representatives, regulators and consumers; for comparing Māori and other communities’ values in sustainability assessments; and for identifying market opportunities and constraints. The Dashboard web application will be designed so it can be quickly integrated into an industry’s/sector’s existing IT platform and infrastructure and this will facilitate rapid uptake. Some host industries may force growers to use the Sustainability Dashboard as part of their existing Market Assurance scheme

Sensitivity of SARS-CoV-2 RNA polymerase chain reaction using a clinical and radiological reference standard: Clinical sensitivity of SARS-CoV-2 PCR.

ObjectivesDiagnostic tests for SARS-CoV-2 are important for epidemiology, clinical management, and infection control. Limitations of oro-nasopharyngeal real-time PCR sensitivity have been described based on comparisons of single tests with repeated sampling. We assessed SARS-CoV-2 PCR clinical sensitivity using a clinical and radiological reference standard.MethodsBetween March-May 2020, 2060 patients underwent thoracic imaging and SARS-CoV-2 PCR testing. Imaging was independently double- or triple-reported (if discordance) by blinded radiologists according to radiological criteria for COVID-19. We excluded asymptomatic patients and those with alternative diagnoses that could explain imaging findings. Associations with PCR-positivity were assessed with binomial logistic regression.Results901 patients had possible/probable imaging features and clinical symptoms of COVID-19 and 429 patients met the clinical and radiological reference case definition. SARS-CoV-2 PCR sensitivity was 68% (95% confidence interval 64-73), was highest 7-8 days after symptom onset (78% (68-88)) and was lower among current smokers (adjusted odds ratio 0.23 (0.12-0.42) pConclusionsIn patients with clinical and imaging features of COVID-19, PCR test sensitivity was 68%, and was lower among smokers; a finding that could explain observations of lower disease incidence and that warrants further validation. PCR tests should be interpreted considering imaging, symptom duration and smoking status