Do Yourself a Favor – Go to France!

This letter from returnee Nicole Burnett explains the value of studying abroad in France

Zooplankton Monitoring in the Eelgrass Dominated Padilla Bay: A baseline for Examining Future Changes.

Padilla Bay, Washington is a shallow intertidal bay with over 8000 acres of eelgrass. Therefore, it can serve as a good proxy for the response to climate change for estuaries in the Salish Sea that are rich with aquatic vegetation. However, limited studies have been done in Padilla Bay to look at basic temporal and spatial patterns of such things as zooplankton despite its importance to nutrient cycling, energy transfer, population recruitment, and indicator of ecosystem health and changing climate. To address the lack of continuous monitoring, we initiated a monthly zooplankton monitoring program at the Padilla Bay National Estuarine Research Reserve (NERR) in 2007. Samples are collected at three sites in the bay. Two of these sites are located in channels draining eelgrass covered flats, and the third is in deep water outside the subtidal edge of the eelgrass beds. As part of the NERR system, long term monitoring of weather, water quality and nutrient concentrations have been conducted specific to each of these sites in Padilla Bay. With seven years of zooplankton, water, nutrient, and weather data, we can begin to look at zooplankton community changes in relation to physical and chemical changes both seasonally and interannually. This baseline data then serves as a place to evaluate changes in the zooplankton community due to natural oscillation, anthropogenic forces, and climate change

Habitat Characteristics of a Southern Fringe Greater Sage Grouse Population: Implications For Range-Wide Management

Range-wide declines in Greater Sage-Grouse (Centrocercus urophasianus) populations have prompted extensive research on sage grouse habitat use. However, habitat use information for fringe populations is limited. We examined nest, brood-rearing, and summer habitat use in a fringe sage-grouse population in southern Utah. We tracked 66 birds (17 females, 49 males) via VHF telemetry and surveyed vegetation plots at nest (n = 9), brood-rearing (n = 13), summer (n = 53), and random (n = 75) locations in 2011 and 2012. Although hens did not select for measured habitat characteristics (shrub, forb, grass, and bare ground) at nest sites, they did select for higher forb cover at brood-rearing sites as compared with random sites. The canopy cover of forbs and grasses at nest and brood-rearing sites was lower than range-wide habitat recommendations, while the shrub cover was greater. Non-reproductive sage grouse selected for lower shrub but higher forb and grass cover as compared with random sites. Their roost sites were characterized by higher shrub and lower forb and grass cover than range-wide recommendations for productive habitat. Discrepancies between sage-grouse habitat use in this population and range-wide recommendations may be explained by differing ecosystem dynamics in southern Utah, as well as unique habitat use patterns observed in fringe populations. The use of agricultural fields for summer habitat exemplifies a local adaptation to the absence of productive habitat that has unique management implications. This study highlights the importance of adaptive management techniques that address unique habitat preferences in local populations, particularly for a sensitive species

Warm water temperature regimes in eelgrass beds (Z. marina and Z. japonica) of Padilla Bay, WA

Padilla Bay, WA has over 3300 hectares of eelgrass with vast areas of intermixed beds of the native Zostera marina and non-native Zostera japonica. Water temperature is thought to be one of the primary influences on eelgrass distribution, and long term monitoring shows that temperatures in Padilla Bay have increased substantially (mean increase \u3e2°C) from 2011 through 2016. We were interested to see if changes in eelgrass distribution were correlated with the changes we observed in water temperature in Padilla Bay, however, our long term temperature monitoring station is located in a shallow channel within the eelgrass beds. Because of this sensor placement, we first needed to determine if these data were representative of temperatures experienced by eelgrass on the vegetated flats. To test this, we deployed 45 temperature loggers throughout the intertidal and subtidal distribution of Z. marina and Z. japonica. We found that temperatures recorded at our long term monitoring site greatly underestimated the high temperatures experienced by the intertidal eelgrass. In Padilla Bay, Zostera marina was exposed to temperatures above 8°C, the optimal temperature reported for Z. marina growth in the PNW, for over 90% of the time during the peak growing season (March – Sept.). Furthermore, Z. marina experienced extended periods of time above 15°C, temperatures thought to cause stress to local plants. Despite these elevated temperatures, Z. marina remain robust, suggesting that Z. marina in Padilla Bay may have a higher tolerance for warmer water temperatures than other beds in the PNW or may be living near the upper limits of tolerance for PNW plants. This study characterizes – on a fine spatial scale – the duration and intensity of temperatures extremes that eelgrass experience in shallow systems and ultimately provides insight into the health and performance of eelgrass in a warmer future ocean

My favorite unreliable source? Information sharing and acquisition through informal networks

Informal information networks are the personal connections of friends, family and colleagues that people use to help them find information. Recently, a great deal of attention has been paid to social network sites, and other social media, as a key source of information and misinformation in contemporary society. This panel will probe deeper, to investigate the personal connections that underpin and lie behind the social connections visible on social network sites. This issue is of increasing importance as more of our everyday lives are moved online. We will debate what we actually know, and do not know, about how people find information through others, both on‐ and off‐line. From the panel we hope to create a network of scholars interested in creating a research agenda to make informal networks a focus of study going forward.Peer Reviewedhttp://deepblue.lib.umich.edu/bitstream/2027.42/163474/2/pra2294.pdfhttp://deepblue.lib.umich.edu/bitstream/2027.42/163474/1/pra2294_am.pd

Evolution of an ancient protein function involved in organized multicellularity in animals.

To form and maintain organized tissues, multicellular organisms orient their mitotic spindles relative to neighboring cells. A molecular complex scaffolded by the GK protein-interaction domain (GKPID) mediates spindle orientation in diverse animal taxa by linking microtubule motor proteins to a marker protein on the cell cortex localized by external cues. Here we illuminate how this complex evolved and commandeered control of spindle orientation from a more ancient mechanism. The complex was assembled through a series of molecular exploitation events, one of which - the evolution of GKPID's capacity to bind the cortical marker protein - can be recapitulated by reintroducing a single historical substitution into the reconstructed ancestral GKPID. This change revealed and repurposed an ancient molecular surface that previously had a radically different function. We show how the physical simplicity of this binding interface enabled the evolution of a new protein function now essential to the biological complexity of many animals

Investigating the Associations between Core Strength, Postural Control and Fine Motor Performance in Children

Study design: Quantitative design including statistical analysis. Objectives: The objective of this study was to determine if there is an association between core strength, postural control, fine motor precision and integration, specifically in typical children in the first and third grades, ages 6-10. The secondary purpose of this study was to determine if there was an association between BMI and fine and gross motor ability in this same population. Background: The relationship between core strength, postural control and fine motor skills in children is not well understood. The assumption that trunk stability and control are necessary for the maturation of manual dexterity has influenced the development of therapeutic treatment methods. This is based on the idea that postural control and balance are the ability of the body to maintain its position in space for the purpose of stability. Methods and measures: 113 children were tested using the strength, balance, precision, and integration subtests of the Bruininks-Oseretsky Test of Motor Proficiency, second edition (BOT-2). Age, height, weight, percent body fat, and activity information were obtained. Results: An association was found between the subscales of strength and integration, integration and precision, and precision and balance. Significant associations were also found between BMI and the gross motor subtests. Conclusion: This study was among the first to examine the association between core strength, postural control, and fine motor skills. Further research is needed to determine if fine and gross motor skill attainment is correlated when a specific intervention is administered

Risperidone-induced weight gain is mediated through shifts in the gut microbiome and suppression of energy expenditure

AbstractRisperidone is a second-generation antipsychotic that causes weight gain. We hypothesized that risperidone-induced shifts in the gut microbiome are mechanistically involved in its metabolic consequences. Wild-type female C57BL/6J mice treated with risperidone (80μg/day) exhibited significant excess weight gain, due to reduced energy expenditure, which correlated with an altered gut microbiome. Fecal transplant from risperidone-treated mice caused a 16% reduction in total resting metabolic rate in naïve recipients, attributable to suppression of non-aerobic metabolism. Risperidone inhibited growth of cultured fecal bacteria grown anaerobically more than those grown aerobically. Finally, transplant of the fecal phage fraction from risperidone-treated mice was sufficient to cause excess weight gain in naïve recipients, again through reduced energy expenditure. Collectively, these data highlight a major role for the gut microbiome in weight gain following chronic use of risperidone, and specifically implicates the modulation of non-aerobic resting metabolism in this mechanism

Global estimates of mortality associated with long-term exposure to outdoor fine particulate matter.

Exposure to ambient fine particulate matter (PM2.5) is a major global health concern. Quantitative estimates of attributable mortality are based on disease-specific hazard ratio models that incorporate risk information from multiple PM2.5 sources (outdoor and indoor air pollution from use of solid fuels and secondhand and active smoking), requiring assumptions about equivalent exposure and toxicity. We relax these contentious assumptions by constructing a PM2.5-mortality hazard ratio function based only on cohort studies of outdoor air pollution that covers the global exposure range. We modeled the shape of the association between PM2.5 and nonaccidental mortality using data from 41 cohorts from 16 countries-the Global Exposure Mortality Model (GEMM). We then constructed GEMMs for five specific causes of death examined by the global burden of disease (GBD). The GEMM predicts 8.9 million [95% confidence interval (CI): 7.5-10.3] deaths in 2015, a figure 30% larger than that predicted by the sum of deaths among the five specific causes (6.9; 95% CI: 4.9-8.5) and 120% larger than the risk function used in the GBD (4.0; 95% CI: 3.3-4.8). Differences between the GEMM and GBD risk functions are larger for a 20% reduction in concentrations, with the GEMM predicting 220% higher excess deaths. These results suggest that PM2.5 exposure may be related to additional causes of death than the five considered by the GBD and that incorporation of risk information from other, nonoutdoor, particle sources leads to underestimation of disease burden, especially at higher concentrations