Landscape ecology should be more visible at the Global Landscape Forum

Landscape ecology should be more visible at the Global Landscape Foru

Contribution of agronomy to land management issues - A Comparison of five interdisciplinary PhD theses

An introductory literature review highlights the growing attention within the processes taking place at farming region and landscape scale beside the classical spatial scales at cultivated/experimental plot level. This recent evolution in agronomy finds its origin in newly emerging land management issues. Meanwhile, geography and other disciplines are stressing the need for a greater integration of multifunctional agricultural activities into the decision-making processes at the various levels of land management, such as provinces, municipalities or watersheds. This requires also that studies on farmland management include explicitly the different environmental and social contexts influencing farming activities. In this paper we aim to analyse how recent agronomic oriented research are facing and supporting various land management issues. We have compared five interdisciplinary PhD theses examining their definitions and methods of analysis for: the farming system, the local land management issues at stake, the spatial scale selected for the study, the stakeholders' involvement and the interaction with other disciplines. Common issues which emerged from this comparison are delivery of agro-environmental services, sustainable land management and landscape conservation. Multiple spatial levels were considered, which included at least one administrative unit of policy decision/implementation. Consequently, the explicit (re)definition of some agronomic concepts and methods was needed. Regarding the interdisciplinary framework, the theses have stressed the interactions among agronomy, geography and ecology. All theses aimed at delivering tools for decision-making support, mainly in the form of cartography. Nevertheless the participation of local stakeholders was generally included as a final step; herewith the settings of stakeholders' involvement were various. In conclusion, we discuss how the produced knowledge has enhanced the land management issues in local planning tools. On these bases, we stress finally the issues at stake to strengthen the roles and contributions of agronomic oriented education and research to agricultural land management and development. (Résumé d'auteur

MASTERING AGTECH AGAIN: EMERGING OF NEW TRAINING OFFERS AND INTERMEDIATE PLAYERS

Agricultural machinery manufacturers historically referred to the intermediate players for selling, maintenance, customer service and/or training of equipment appear to interact with farmers and end-users. Intermediate players have therefore faced the burden to master the technology, in constant evolution, and the associated training needs at the interface between a sophisticated equipment and the end-user and its sociological characteristics (age, education, background, etc.). However, the effective deployment of agricultural technologies data augmented equipment demands well trained players. How to ensure that the intermediate players have the required skills to integrate the use of agtech in the farm? This paper will discuss the role of educational and ongoing vocational training for the mastery of agtech. We will start from a comparative review of some key national and European technical reports in the agricultural equipment and innovation domains. On these bases, we will focus on France to describe the role of intermediate players of the agricultural equipment sector to realize their agricultural and digital transitions

The Effect of Intrinsic and Extrinsic Motivations on Academics' Entrepreneurial Intention

This work investigates entrepreneurial intentions among academic scientists. Drawing from the literature on entrepreneurial behavior, it contributes to delineate the differences in motivations that are correlated with entrepreneurial intention to those that are considered to be linked to entrepreneurial behaviors. By disentangling the concept of motivations in its ultimately basic constructs of intrinsic and extrinsic motivations, we investigate how these two different types of motivations are related to the formation of entrepreneurial intention at the level of academic scientists. Through a survey conducted at the University of Ferrara—one of the leading universities in Italy in terms of technology transfer and scientific production—findings reveal that while academic entrepreneurial intention seems to be mostly driven by intrinsic motivations, the effect of extrinsic motivations, which are regarded as a main antecedent of entrepreneurial behavior among scientists, are largely mediated by academic positions, work environment and different combinations of these two factors. This work therefore highlights the importance of social norms in the investigation of entrepreneurial intention in academia

Diet of a restocked population of the European pond turtle Emys orbicularis in NW Italy

Recently several projects have been implemented for the conservation of the European turtle Emys orbicularis, but few aspects of the captive-bred animals released into the wild have been described. In this note we report about the trophic habits of a small restocked population of the endemic subspecies E. o. ingauna that is now reproducing in NW Italy. Faecal contents from 25 individuals (10 females, 11 males and 4 juveniles) were obtained in June 2016. Overall, 11 taxonomic categories of invertebrates were identified, together with seeds and plant remains. Plant material was present in 24 out of 25 turtle faecal contents, suggesting that ingestion was deliberate. There were no differences between the dietary habits of females and males, and the trophic strategy of adult individuals was characterised by a relatively high specialization on dragonfly nymphae. These findings suggest that captive bred turtles are adapting well to the wild and that restocked individuals assumed an omnivorous diet, a trophic behaviour typical of other wild turtle populations living in similar habitats

HPV as a marker for molecular characterization in head and neck oncology: Looking for a standardization of clinical use and of detection method(s) in clinical practice

Background: A consensus about the most appropriate diagnostic method(s) for head and neck human papillomavirus (HPV)\u2010induced carcinogenesis is still lacking because most of the commercially available assays have been designed for the cervix. Methods: This article summarizes current data and trends concerning HPV diagnostic strategies in oropharyngeal squamous cell carcinoma (OPSCC). Six main approaches are described. Results: The diagnostic gold standard for HPV\u2010related OPSCC, focusing on E6/E7 mRNA detection, requires fresh samples. Because most frequently available samples are formalin\u2010fixed paraffin\u2010embedded (FFPE), the pros and cons of the different approaches were analyzed. Conclusions: In the FFPE samples, the immunohistochemistry of p16, which is considered appropriate to assess HPV\u2010driven carcinogenesis in OPSCC according to the 8th American Joint Committee on Cancer TNM classification, may not be specific enough to become the diagnostic standard in the perspective of treatment deintensification. p16 may play a safer role in combination with another highly sensible assay. Other promising approaches are based on DNA detection through real\u2010time polymerase chain reaction and RNAscope

Experiences from a winter school on landscape agronomy: Stakes, difficulties, perspectives

International audienceIn the latest fifteen years, agronomic research has shown a growing interest for studies which link farm or field scale to landscape scale. Thus, agronomy is called to renew its research questions and methodologies, and as well its educational programmes. In this context, some French and Italian researchers interested in these topics, coming from different scientific fields but sharing interests on landscape scale issues in research and higher education, decided to join their efforts around a common one-week educational programme on Landscape Agronomy for undergraduate and PhD students. Their aim has been to develop a new form of knowledge transfer and application on Landscape Agronomy approaches to students of SSSA-Pisa (IT) and of the PhD School of ABIES-AgroParisTech-Paris (FR). The educational programme consisted of three phases : 1) some theoretical contributions supported by presentations on : issues regarding agriculture and farming practices at landscape level, main approaches on environmental functions of agriculture, changes in farmers practices driven by environmental questions,spatial organization of agricultural activities, role of farming in ecological dynamics, identification of complementarities among agro-environmental functions, environmental impacts of cropping systems,biodiversity influence on agro-ecosystem functions and vice-versa ; 2) two case-studies: a macro level one(at landscape scale) to analyse the role of agriculture on landscape dynamics, and a micro level one (at farm scale) to analyse farming practices and their environmental impacts ; 3) a final evaluation of the educational programme based on : contents of oral presentations on fieldwork results, global evaluation of the educational programme contents by all the participants, each individual ex-post analysis of fieldwork results. The evaluation of the students and teachers underlines benefits, requests and perspectives for education in landscape agronomy. Furthermore, this experience stimulated a collective conceptual and methodological debate that confirmed the necessity to favour and organise experience exchanges on researching and learning in landscape agronomy

Investigating mechanosensitive channels activation in concert with the mechanical properties of red blood cells

The activity of the mechanosensitive Ca2+ permeable channels expressed in the membrane of the red blood cells (RBC) is determined both by the mechanical stimuli and the mechanical properties of the cell. Therefore, it is of most importance to correlate the triggering stimulus with the mechanical properties. In this paper, we propose an approach to determine the activation pressure of the mechanosensitive channels and concomitantly evaluate cell mechanical properties as Young’s Modulus, membrane tension and viscosity, for individual cells. Cell deformation was accomplished by micro- pipette aspiration with a controlled pressure ramp and recorded by brightfield imaging to determine the mechanical properties. The Ca2+ transient was concomitantly monitored by fluorescence imaging, to get the activation pressure. The technique was validated comparing the behavior of three pools of RBCs, probed at different intervals of time after the cell suspension preparation by the same mechanical stimuli. We found relevant changes of the activation pressure, associated with the alteration of the mechanical properties, the latest becoming significant with the passage of time. Our approach opens a new direction to investigate the correlation between mechanosensitivity and mechanical properties for individual RBCs, which can be extended to other cells, in suspension or plated, under controlled environmental conditions

An Insight into Chemistry and Structure of Colloidal 2D-WS2 Nanoflakes: Combined XPS and XRD Study

The surface and structural characterization techniques of three atom-thick bi-dimensional 2D-WS2 colloidal nanocrystals cross the limit of bulk investigation, offering the possibility of simultaneous phase identification, structural-to-morphological evaluation, and surface chemical description. In the present study, we report a rational understanding based on X-ray photoelectron spectroscopy (XPS) and structural inspection of two kinds of dimensionally controllable 2D-WS2 colloidal nanoflakes (NFLs) generated with a surfactant assisted non-hydrolytic route. The qualitative and quantitative determination of 1T’ and 2H phases based on W 4f XPS signal components, together with the presence of two kinds of sulfur ions, S22− and S2−, based on S 2p signal and related to the formation of WS2 and WOxSy in a mixed oxygen-sulfur environment, are carefully reported and discussed for both nanocrystals breeds. The XPS results are used as an input for detailed X-ray Diffraction (XRD) analysis allowing for a clear discrimination of NFLs crystal habit, and an estimation of the exact number of atomic monolayers composing the 2D-WS2 nanocrystalline samples