Recent and projected seasonal changes to river flows combine with human pressures to restructure the base of the marine food web in Puget Sound

Quantifying large-scale climate impacts, ecosystem responses, and human pressures requires sustained ecosystem monitoring and data integration. The Salish Sea is influenced by oceanic processes and hydrological cycles on land. The interplay of processes across the land-ocean continuum benefits the Puget Sound ecosystem by extending the productive cold-water food web of the upwelling system off Washington’s coast into Puget Sound during summer while buffering water temperatures in winter. Circulation patterns that drive water exchange between Puget Sound and the ocean are responding to climate and the timing of river flows. Historically the freshet and coastal upwelling coincide in summer and allow the productive foodweb to thrive in Puget Sound. Recent years have seen warmer winters causing both earlier snowmelt and therefore reduced summer flows. This temporal separation of upwelling and the freshet results in reduced ocean water renewal, increased water residence time, warmer water, and amplified human impacts during summer. In winter, however, water exchange is increased and keeps Puget Sound water warmer by importing heat from the ocean. These effects combine and have potential ecosystem-wide implications. Coastal eutrophication indicators (large algae blooms, red tides, macro-algae, and jellyfish) are already common place in Puget Sound. These changes in the timing of circulation patterns and nutrient characteristics alter the base of the marine food web while expanding the winter range of cold sensitive species into Puget Sound. In this presentation we conceptually lay out mechanisms, spatial connectivity, observations and hypotheses connecting the dots of climate impacts across the land-ocean continuum and the combined effects on ecosystem processes

Recent conditions highlight regional differences in temperature, salinity and dissolved oxygen between Strait of Juan de Fuca and Puget Sound sites under anomalous 2014-2017 climate patterns

Understanding impacts of climate change on Salish Sea water quality is critical yet challenging due to the complexity, strength and diversity of influences on circulation and mixing. Different extreme climate conditions in recent years (2014-2017) include record warm temperatures with reduced snow pack in 2014-2015 followed by a few years of alternating summer droughts with record rainy seasons. These conditions influenced marine water temperature, salinity and dissolved oxygen (DO) throughout the Salish Sea. Analyses reveal distinct differences in these key physical and chemical characteristics between Strait of Juan de Fuca sites and sites within Puget Sound basins. Extremely low DO water in the Strait not observed at neighboring sites in Puget Sound. This indicates that Puget Sound water exchange and circulation are responding to climate change impacts on the regional hydrological cycle. Lower stream flows are effecting seasonal exchange of ocean water masses under drought conditions, while extremely wet and stormy springs are changing the average salinity of Puget Sound basins and impacting the density structure. Following these physical fluctuations, DO conditions vary from season to season, with new anomalous lows occurring in the Strait and the extreme reaches of South Puget Sound. These conditions could reveal how biophysical drivers of Puget Sound water quality impact food web dynamics during adverse climate and ocean regimes. Local water quality issues that are exacerbated due to reduced circulation may be influencing distinct populations in different basins. We can use these basic biophysical properties to inform us about key drivers of regional differences in the Puget Sound food web

How did large scale climate anomalies impact 2015 phytoplankton blooms in Puget Sound?

The Washington State Department of Ecology has been routinely monitoring marine water quality throughout the Puget Sound since 1973. An established historic baseline from 1999 to 2008 allows us to examine how water quality varies year to year as a result of both natural and human influences. The recent large scale climate anomaly, the Blob, impacted this region when a mass of warm water entered Puget Sound in fall 2014. In conjunction with higher than normal air temperatures, patterns of estuarine circulation and stratification were regionally altered in Puget Sound. Changes to these physical patterns affect ecosystem functions starting at the base of the food web with phytoplankton. The water quality data collected monthly in 2015 allows us to gain a better understanding of how large-scale climate anomalies affect the timing and amplitude of phytoplankton biomass (chlorophyll a) in different regions of Puget Sound. Exploring the regional changes in phytoplankton biomass in response to the Blob provides us with insight into how future climate impacts could effect ecosystem functioning in different regions of Puget Sound

Recent climate patterns are affecting seasonal water residence times and water temperatures in Puget Sound

At the end of 2014 water temperatures in Puget Sound rapidly increased in response to The Blob and persisted into 2017. Climate anomalies on land caused premature snow melt and freshening of Puget Sound. The seasonal shift in freshwater delivery increased winter estuarine circulation allowing greater import of heat from the ocean but decreased summer circulation, retaining more heat in Puget Sound in summer. In both seasons, Puget Sound temperatures increased affecting water quality and ecosystem performance. We contrast salinity, temperature, and density records from 2014-2017 to infer residence time and changes in water masses during the extreme climate years. Increased winter temperatures \u3e8C might have promoted overwintering for temperature sensitive species such as anchovy

The authority of moral oversight : on the legitimacy of criminal law

An influential view in recent philosophy of punishment is that the apparatus of criminal justice should be geared at least in part to state censure of wrongdoing. I argue that if it were to be so geared, such an apparatus would make ambitious claims to authority, and that the legitimacy of the relevant state would then depend on whether those claims can be vindicated. This paper looks first at what kind of authority is being claimed by this apparatus. The criminal law, I argue, cannot merely be thought of as claiming a right to rule and to be obeyed. Rather, its authority is better understood as the authority of moral oversight: a power to alter, at will (though within certain limits), citizens’ liability to answer for their compliance with—and to be officially censured for their failure to comply with—a designated set of pre-existing moral reasons. The paper then looks at whether a state could realistically be expected to possess such authority—that is, whether a state that claims to have such a power could ever be legitimate

Stardust@home: A Massively Distributed Public Search for Interstellar Dust in the Stardust Interstellar Dust Collector

In January 2006, the Stardust mission will return the first samples from a solid solar system body beyond the Moon. Stardust was in the news in January 2004, when it encountered comet Wild2 and captured a sample of cometary dust. But Stardust carries an equally important payload: the first samples of contemporary interstellar dust ever collected. Although it is known that interstellar (IS) dust penetrates into the inner solar system [2, 3], to date not even a single contemporary interstellar dust particle has been captured and analyzed in the laboratory. Stardust uses aerogel collectors to capture dust samples. Identification of interstellar dust impacts in the Stardust Interstellar Dust Collector probably cannot be automated, but will require the expertise of the human eye. However, the labor required for visual scanning of the entire collector would exceed the resources of any reasonably-sized research group. We are developing a project to recruit the public in the search for interstellar dust, based in part on the wildly popular SETI@home project, which has five million subscribers. We call the project Stardust@home. Using sophisticated chemical separation techniques, certain types of refractory ancient IS particles (so-called presolar grains) have been isolated from primitive meteorites (e.g., [4] ). Recently, presolar grains have been identified in Interplanetary Dust Particles[6]. Because these grains are not isolated chemically, but are recognized only by their unusual isotopic compositions, they are probably less biased than presolar grains isolated from meteorites. However, it is entirely possible that the typical interstellar dust particle is isotopically solar in composition. The Stardust collection of interstellar dust will be the first truly unbiased one

Enhancing student learning in science using virtual laboratories

INTRODUCTION AND SIGNIFICANCE Delivering an engaging and realistic laboratory experience for undergraduate biomedical and biological science students is difficult due to increasing class sizes, stringent health and safety requirements as well as costs, maintenance and availability of equipment and reagents. Flow cytometry is a core technology, widely used in research and diagnostic laboratories, but due to its complexity and cost, laboratory classes on the application of this technology are inadequate. Virtual laboratories provide students with the opportunity for lifelike, interactive, one-on-one learning, that simulates real-laboratory experiences. There are no suitable flow cytometry simulations available in the education space and with the essential role that flow cytometry plays in the biomedical and biological sciences, as well as industrial research, this project addressed this need. METHODOLOGY A virtual laboratory focused on flow cytometry was developed for undergraduate, honours and postgraduate research students. The simulation and tutorial were developed using the Smart SparrowTM Adaptive eLearning Platform. The tutorial was designed to be adaptable to multiple audiences, with several platform datasets incorporated into the simulation to cover different scientific fields that use the technology. RESULTS The simulation developed (Figure 1) provides students with a personal experience with the interface very similar to the latest in flow cytometry technology. Students are in control of a wide range of experimental variables and instrument parameters, most of which are not usually available to them in laboratory classes. It is accessible online, and allows students to repeat lessons in their own time and to their own satisfaction. It was deployed in an undergraduate pathology class and to honours and postgraduate students receiving training in flow cytometry. Students reported that the lesson improved their understanding, their confidence in their technical skills and was targeted to their level of understanding. The average amount of time students spent in the lesson was 47 minutes with some returning for further revision. The tutorial is made available by the Biomedical Education, Skills and Training Network (BEST Network) (https://www.best.edu.au/lesson/?id=49734), a community of educators that create and share teaching resources, including other virtual laboratories that have been accessed over 4700 times. CONCLUSIONS Our flow cytometry virtual laboratory facilitates the learning of technical skills in data collection and analysis. Such skills are important for both undergraduate and postgraduate students who require an understanding of the applicability of this technology in the real-world for future employment and/or research opportunities

Proteomics Reveals Novel Oxidative and Glycolytic Mechanisms in Type 1 Diabetic Patients' Skin Which Are Normalized by Kidney-Pancreas Transplantation

Background: In type 1 diabetes (T1D) vascular complications such as accelerated atherosclerosis and diffused macro-/microangiopathy are linked to chronic hyperglycemia with a mechanism that is not yet well understood. End-stage renal disease (ESRD) worsens most diabetic complications, particularly, the risk of morbidity and mortality from cardiovascular disease is increased several fold. Methods and Findings: We evaluated protein regulation and expression in skin biopsies obtained from T1D patients with and without ESRD, to identify pathways of persistent cellular changes linked to diabetic vascular disease. We therefore examined pathways that may be normalized by restoration of normoglycemia with kidney-pancreas (KP) transplantation. Using proteomic and ultrastructural approaches, multiple alterations in the expression of proteins involved in oxidative stress (catalase, superoxide dismutase 1, Hsp27, Hsp60, ATP synthase δ chain, and flavin reductase), aerobic and anaerobic glycolysis (ACBP, pyruvate kinase muscle isozyme, and phosphoglycerate kinase 1), and intracellular signaling (stratifin-14-3-3, S100-calcyclin, cathepsin, and PPI rotamase) as well as endothelial vascular abnormalities were identified in T1D and T1D+ESRD patients. These abnormalities were reversed after KP transplant. Increased plasma levels of malondialdehyde were observed in T1D and T1D+ESRD patients, confirming increased oxidative stress which was normalized after KP transplant. Conclusions: Our data suggests persistent cellular changes of anti-oxidative machinery and of aerobic/anaerobic glycolysis are present in T1D and T1D+ESRD patients, and these abnormalities may play a key role in the pathogenesis of hyperglycemia-related vascular complications. Restoration of normoglycemia and removal of uremia with KP transplant can correct these abnormalities. Some of these identified pathways may become potential therapeutic targets for a new generation of drugs