The Youngest Victims: Children and Youth Affected by War

In 1989, the United Nation Convention on the Rights of the Child declared, “[state parties] shall take all feasible measures to ensure protection and care of children who are affected by an armed conflict.” In addition to attempting to secure the welfare of children in armed conflict, the Convention went on to ban the recruitment and deployment of children during armed conflict. Despite the vast majority of sovereign nations signing and ratifying this agreement, this treaty, unfortunately, has not prevented children and youth from witnessing, becoming victims of, or participating in political, ethnic, religious, and cultural violence across the past three decades. This chapter offers an “ecological perspective” on the psychosocial consequences of exposure to the trauma of war-related violence and social disruption

Second World Ocean Assessment

The present subchapter focuses on benthic shrimps, worms, gastropods, bivalves and other invertebrates living on or in the sea floor that are important food sources for fishes, marine mammals, seabirds and humans, as well as invertebrate species that are targeted by some commercial fisheries. Those taxa form the basis for some of the most productive ecosystems on the planet (e.g., estuaries and coral reefs), rivalling tropical forests (Valiela, 1995) and creating habitats covering more of the Earth’s surface than all other habitats combined (Snelgrove and others, 1997). Changes in ocean use, the harvesting of organisms, climate change, pollution and invasive species contribute to global alterations in nature at rates unprecedented in human history. Historically, coastal biota have experienced greater pressures and impacts than the deep sea, but the depletion of coastal marine resources and new technologies create both the capacity and incentive to fish, mine and drill in some of the deepest parts of the ocean (McCauley and others, 2015). Alterations of biodiversity often erode economies, livelihoods, food security, health and quality of life worldwide (Intergovernmental Science-Policy Platform on Biodiversity and Ecosystem Services (IPBES), 2019).peer-reviewe

Amphipods in estuarine and marine quality assessment – a review

Summary: Amphipods are a diverse and important group of invertebrates contributing to the functioning of aquatic ecosystems. In spite of their variety, many species of amphipods share important biological and ecological characteristics that make them suitable test organisms for assessment of the ecological quality of estuarine and marine sediments. Their pertinence as test organism includes ecological relevance, close association with sediments, sensitivity to environmental contaminants, and amenability for culture and experimentation. Amphipod bioassays are used to examine the effect of exposure to contaminants, as well as to assess whole sediment quality, improve bioassay methods, develop more sensitive endpoints, and compare sensitivity and utility of species in environmental quality assessment. This work reviews the developments in this area of research over the last decades, focusing on European amphipods. The most often used species, the type of bioassays and endpoints investigated, confounding factors influencing the bioassays outcome, and the main applications of the bioassays have been presented. This review also addresses some aspects of amphipod biology that are relevant for bioassay methods and results analysis. Keywords: Ecotoxicology, Marine sediments, Amphipods, Corophium spp., Bioassay