17 research outputs found

    Changing the culture of ecology from the ground up

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    We are two early career soil ecologists in academia who entered the field of soil ecology with the goal of studying soil-climate feedbacks to make meaningful contributions to climate change mitigation. Although our training and research extensively focused on the effects of climate change on soil ecosystems, we were not trained during our PhD nor incentivized as postdocs to work on solutions for climate change mitigation. So the question we ask here is: Given the consensus among ecologists about the urgency of the climate crisis, why is our field not promoting more solutions-oriented research in training and practice? In this commentary, we provide our perspective on (1) the way forward shown by individual soil ecologists doing solutions-oriented research, (2) some specific cultural barriers to academic institutional support, and (3) three examples promoting solutions-oriented science that improve support for early career researchers and reduce barriers to entry

    The world of underground ecology in a changing environment

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    This special feature presents state-of-the-art soil ecological science and was sparked following the 2-day long online live event entitled “Ecology Underground” during the Ecological Society of America annual meeting of 2020. Here, we, the co-guest-editors of this special feature, present this body of research in context of the current state of the field. This issue highlights that we are currently in a hot time for microbial research in soil science. Specifically, we find that two themes emerge from this corpus as key next questions to answer to move the field forward. How do microbial processes scale up in space and time? And how do they respond to multiple interacting global change factors

    Promoting and maintaining changes in smoking behaviour for patients following discharge from a smokefree mental health inpatient stay: Development of a complex intervention using the Behaviour Change Wheel.

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    Evidence suggests that smokers can successfully quit, remain abstinent or reduce smoking during a smokefree mental health inpatient stay, provided behavioural/pharmacological support are offered. However, few evidence-based strategies to prevent the return to pre-hospital smoking behaviours post-discharge exist. We report the development of an intervention designed to support smoking-related behaviour change following discharge from a smokefree mental health stay. We followed the Behaviour Change Wheel (BCW) intervention development process. The target behaviour was supporting patients to change their smoking behaviours following discharge from a smokefree mental health stay. Using systematic reviews, we identified the barriers/enablers, classified according to the Theoretical Domains Framework (TDF). Potential intervention functions to address key influences were identified by consulting the BCW and Behaviour Change Technique (BCT) taxonomy. Another systematic review identified effectiveness of BCTs in this context. Stakeholder consultations were conducted to prioritise/refine intervention content. Barriers/enablers to supporting smoking cessation were identified within the domains of environmental context and resources (lack of staff time); knowledge (ill-informed interactions about smoking); social influences, and intentions (lack of intention to deliver support). Potential strategies to address these influences included goal setting, problem solving, feedback, social support, and information on health consequences. A strategy for operationalising these techniques into intervention components was agreed: pre-discharge evaluation sessions, personalised resource folder, tailored behavioural and text message support post-discharge, and a peer interaction group, delivered by a trained mental health worker. The intervention includes targeted resources to support smoking-related behaviour change in patients following discharge from a smokefree mental health setting. Using the BCW and TDF supported a theoretically and empirically informed process to define and develop a tailored intervention that acknowledges barriers and enablers to supporting smoking cessation in mental health settings. The result is a novel complex theory- and evidence-based intervention that will be formally tested in a randomised controlled feasibility study

    Biotic and Environmental Drivers of Plant Microbiomes Across a Permafrost Thaw Gradient

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    Plant-associated microbiomes are structured by environmental conditions and plant associates, both of which are being altered by climate change. The future structure of plant microbiomes will depend on the, largely unknown, relative importance of each. This uncertainty is particularly relevant for arctic peatlands, which are undergoing large shifts in plant communities and soil microbiomes as permafrost thaws, and are potentially appreciable sources of climate change feedbacks due to their soil carbon (C) storage. We characterized phyllosphere and rhizosphere microbiomes of six plant species, and bulk peat, across a permafrost thaw progression (from intact permafrost, to partially- and fully-thawed stages) via 16S rRNA gene amplicon sequencing. We tested the hypothesis that the relative influence of biotic versus environmental filtering (the role of plant species versus thaw-defined habitat) in structuring microbial communities would differ among phyllosphere, rhizosphere, and bulk peat. Using both abundance- and phylogenetic-based approaches, we found that phyllosphere microbial composition was more strongly explained by plant associate, with little influence of habitat, whereas in the rhizosphere, plant and habitat had similar influence. Network-based community analyses showed that keystone taxa exhibited similar patterns with stronger responses to drivers. However, plant associates appeared to have a larger influence on organisms belonging to families associated with methane-cycling than the bulk community. Putative methanogens were more strongly influenced by plant than habitat in the rhizosphere, and in the phyllosphere putative methanotrophs were more strongly influenced by plant than was the community at large. We conclude that biotic effects can be stronger than environmental filtering, but their relative importance varies among microbial groups. For most microbes in this system, biotic filtering was stronger aboveground than belowground. However, for putative methane-cyclers, plant associations have a stronger influence on community composition than environment despite major hydrological changes with thaw. This suggests that plant successional dynamics may be as important as hydrological changes in determining microbial relevance to C-cycling climate feedbacks. By partitioning the degree that plant versus environmental filtering drives microbiome composition and function we can improve our ability to predict the consequences of warming for C-cycling in other arctic areas undergoing similar permafrost thaw transitions
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