329 research outputs found
Ecological homogenization of urban USA
Author Posting. Β© Ecological Society of America, 2014. This article is posted here by permission of Ecological Society of America for personal use, not for redistribution. The definitive version was published in Frontiers in Ecology and the Environment 12 (2014): 74-81, doi:10.1890/120374.A visually apparent but scientifically untested outcome of land-use change is homogenization across urban areas, where neighborhoods in different parts of the country have similar patterns of roads, residential lots, commercial areas, and aquatic features. We hypothesize that this homogenization extends to ecological structure and also to ecosystem functions such as carbon dynamics and microclimate, with continental-scale implications. Further, we suggest that understanding urban homogenization will provide the basis for understanding the impacts of urban land-use change from local to continental scales. Here, we show how multi-scale, multi-disciplinary datasets from six metropolitan areas that cover the major climatic regions of the US (Phoenix, AZ; Miami, FL; Baltimore, MD; Boston, MA; MinneapolisβSt Paul, MN; and Los Angeles, CA) can be used to determine how household and neighborhood characteristics correlate with land-management practices, land-cover composition, and landscape structure and ecosystem functions at local, regional, and continental scales.We thank the MacroSystems Biology Program in the
Emerging Frontiers Division of the Biological Sciences
Directorate at NSF for support. The βEcological
Homogenization of Urban Americaβ project was supported
by a series of collaborative grants from this program
(EF-1065548, 1065737, 1065740, 1065741,
1065772, 1065785, 1065831, 121238320). The work
arose from research funded by grants from the NSF Long
Term Ecological Research Program supporting work in
Baltimore (DEB-0423476), Phoenix (BCS-1026865,
DEB-0423704 and DEB-9714833), Plum Island (Boston)
(OCE-1058747 and 1238212), Cedar Creek
(MinneapolisβSt Paul) (DEB-0620652), and Florida
Coastal Everglades (Miami) (DBI-0620409)
The stellar and sub-stellar IMF of simple and composite populations
The current knowledge on the stellar IMF is documented. It appears to become
top-heavy when the star-formation rate density surpasses about 0.1Msun/(yr
pc^3) on a pc scale and it may become increasingly bottom-heavy with increasing
metallicity and in increasingly massive early-type galaxies. It declines quite
steeply below about 0.07Msun with brown dwarfs (BDs) and very low mass stars
having their own IMF. The most massive star of mass mmax formed in an embedded
cluster with stellar mass Mecl correlates strongly with Mecl being a result of
gravitation-driven but resource-limited growth and fragmentation induced
starvation. There is no convincing evidence whatsoever that massive stars do
form in isolation. Various methods of discretising a stellar population are
introduced: optimal sampling leads to a mass distribution that perfectly
represents the exact form of the desired IMF and the mmax-to-Mecl relation,
while random sampling results in statistical variations of the shape of the
IMF. The observed mmax-to-Mecl correlation and the small spread of IMF
power-law indices together suggest that optimally sampling the IMF may be the
more realistic description of star formation than random sampling from a
universal IMF with a constant upper mass limit. Composite populations on galaxy
scales, which are formed from many pc scale star formation events, need to be
described by the integrated galactic IMF. This IGIMF varies systematically from
top-light to top-heavy in dependence of galaxy type and star formation rate,
with dramatic implications for theories of galaxy formation and evolution.Comment: 167 pages, 37 figures, 3 tables, published in Stellar Systems and
Galactic Structure, Vol.5, Springer. This revised version is consistent with
the published version and includes additional references and minor additions
to the text as well as a recomputed Table 1. ISBN 978-90-481-8817-
Observational and Physical Classification of Supernovae
This chapter describes the current classification scheme of supernovae (SNe).
This scheme has evolved over many decades and now includes numerous SN Types
and sub-types. Many of these are universally recognized, while there are
controversies regarding the definitions, membership and even the names of some
sub-classes; we will try to review here the commonly-used nomenclature, noting
the main variants when possible. SN Types are defined according to
observational properties; mostly visible-light spectra near maximum light, as
well as according to their photometric properties. However, a long-term goal of
SN classification is to associate observationally-defined classes with specific
physical explosive phenomena. We show here that this aspiration is now finally
coming to fruition, and we establish the SN classification scheme upon direct
observational evidence connecting SN groups with specific progenitor stars.
Observationally, the broad class of Type II SNe contains objects showing strong
spectroscopic signatures of hydrogen, while objects lacking such signatures are
of Type I, which is further divided to numerous subclasses. Recently a class of
super-luminous SNe (SLSNe, typically 10 times more luminous than standard
events) has been identified, and it is discussed. We end this chapter by
briefly describing a proposed alternative classification scheme that is
inspired by the stellar classification system. This system presents our
emerging physical understanding of SN explosions, while clearly separating
robust observational properties from physical inferences that can be debated.
This new system is quantitative, and naturally deals with events distributed
along a continuum, rather than being strictly divided into discrete classes.
Thus, it may be more suitable to the coming era where SN numbers will quickly
expand from a few thousands to millions of events.Comment: Extended final draft of a chapter in the "SN Handbook". Comments most
welcom
Severity Assessment of Lower Respiratory Tract Infection in Malawi: Derivation of a Novel Index (SWAT-Bp) Which Outperforms CRB-65
OBJECTIVE: To assess the validity of CRB-65 (Confusion, Respiratory rate >30 breaths/min, BP<90/60 mmHg, age >65 years) as a pneumonia severity index in a Malawian hospital population, and determine whether an alternative score has greater accuracy in this setting. DESIGN: Forty three variables were prospectively recorded during the first 48 hours of admission in all patients admitted to Queen Elizabeth Central Hospital, Malawi, for management of lower respiratory tract infection over a two month period (Nβ=β240). Calculation of sensitivity and specificity for CRB-65 in predicting mortality was followed by multivariate modeling to create a score with superior performance in this population. RESULTS: Median age 37, HIV prevalence 79.9%, overall mortality 18.3%. CRB-65 predicted mortality poorly, indicated by the area under the ROC curve of 0.649. Independent predictors of death were: Male sex, βSβ (AOR 2.6); Wasting, βWβ (AOR 6.6); non-ambulatory, βAβ (AOR 2.5); Temp >38Β°C or <35Β°C, βTβ (AOR 3.2); BP<100/60, βBpβ (AOR 3.7). Combining these factors to form a severity index (SWAT-Bp) predicted mortality with high sensitivity and specificity (AUC: 0.867). Mortality for scores 0β5 was 0%, 3.3%, 7.4%, 29.2%, 61.5% and 87.5% respectively. A score β₯3 was 84% sensitive and 77% specific for mortality prediction, with a negative predictive value of 95.8%. CONCLUSION: CRB-65 performs poorly in this population. The SWAT-Bp score can accurately stratify patients; β€2 indicates non-severe infection (mortality 4.4%) and β₯3 severe illness (mortality 45%)
GLI1 Confers Profound Phenotypic Changes upon LNCaP Prostate Cancer Cells That Include the Acquisition of a Hormone Independent State
The GLI (GLI1/GLI2) transcription factors have been implicated in the development
and progression of prostate cancer although our understanding of how they
actually contribute to the biology of these common tumours is limited. We
observed that GLI reporter activity was higher in normal (PNT-2) and
tumourigenic (DU145 and PC-3) androgen-independent cells compared to
androgen-dependent LNCaP prostate cancer cells and, accordingly, GLI mRNA levels
were also elevated. Ectopic expression of GLI1 or the constitutively active
ΞNGLI2 mutant induced a distinct cobblestone-like morphology in LNCaP cells
that, regarding the former, correlated with increased GLI2 as well as expression
of the basal/stem-like markers CD44, Ξ²1-integrin, ΞNp63 and BMI1, and
decreased expression of the luminal marker AR (androgen receptor). LNCaP-GLI1
cells were viable in the presence of the AR inhibitor bicalutamide and gene
expression profiling revealed that the transcriptome of LNCaP-GLI1 cells was
significantly closer to DU145 and PC-3 cells than to control LNCaP-pBP (empty
vector) cells, as well as identifying LCN2/NGAL as a highly induced transcript
which is associated with hormone independence in breast and prostate cancer.
Functionally, LNCaP-GLI1 cells displayed greater clonal growth and were more
invasive than control cells but they did not form colonies in soft agar or
prostaspheres in suspension suggesting that they do not possess inherent stem
cell properties. Moreover, targeted suppression of GLI1 or GLI2 with siRNA did
not reverse the transformed phenotype of LNCaP-GLI1 cells nor did double
GLI1/GLI2 knockdowns activate AR expression in DU145 or PC-3 cells. As such,
early targeting of the GLI oncoproteins may hinder progression to a hormone
independent state but a more detailed understanding of the mechanisms that
maintain this phenotype is required to determine if their inhibition will
enhance the efficacy of anti-hormonal therapy through the induction of a luminal
phenotype and increased dependency upon AR function
Two Homologous Putative Protein Tyrosine Phosphatases, OsPFA-DSP2 and AtPFA-DSP4, Negatively Regulate the Pathogen Response in Transgenic Plants
Protein phosphatases, together with protein kinases, regulate protein phosphorylation and dephosphorylation, and play critical roles in plant growth and biotic stress responses. However, little is known about the biological functions of plant protein tyrosine dual-specificity phosphatase (PFA-DSP) in biotic stresses. Here, we found that OsPFA-DSP2 was mainly expressed in calli, seedlings, roots, and young panicles, and localized in cytoplasm and nucleus. Ectopic overexpression of OsPFA-DSP2 in rice increased sensitivity to Magnaporthe grisea (M. grisea Z1 strain), inhibited the accumulation of hydrogen peroxide (H2O2) and suppressed the expression of pathogenesis-related (PR) genes after fungal infection. Interestingly, transgenic Arabidopsis plants overexpressing AtPFA-DSP4, which is homologous to OsPFA-DSP2, also exhibited sensitivity to Pseudomonas syringae pv. tomato DC3000 (Pst DC3000), reduced accumulation of H2O2 and decreased photosynthesic capacity after infection compared with Col-0. These results indicate that OsPFA-DSP2 and AtPFA-DSP4 act as negative regulators of the pathogen response in transgenic plants
- β¦