Home range and habitat use by Roosevelt elk in Olympic National Park, Washington

This research provides information on the distribution of an unexploited Roosevelt elk population in unaltered habitat in Olympic National Park. Radio-telemetry was used to document home range and habitat use by 11 adult cow elk in the Hoh Valley during March 1978, from 10 June-15 September 1978, and from 1 January-20 March 1979. That information provides a baseline for comparison with managed herds adjacent to the park and identification of long term changes in the distribution of elk in the Hoh Valley. Four groups of cow elk were identified in the study area. Cow groups were stable; elk within a group used a common home range and were highly associated. Home ranges of elk from adjacent groups overlapped but there was no permanent interchange of collared elk between groups during the period of study. There was no significant difference between mean summer and mean winter home range size; however, summer home range was larger than winter home range in five, of seven, comparisons. Average home range area of collared elk was 1034 ha during summer and 1003 ha during winter. Daily movement of elk was greater during summer than during winter; minimum daily movement distance averaged 843 m during summer and 676 m during winter. Movement of cow elk with newly born calves in June was considerably less than movement of elk without calves. The habitat use of radio-equipped elk was studied in relation to 13 habitat units on national park land and 11 units on non-park land. Collared elk were found primarily in habitat units on the valley floor during both seasons, although there was seasonal variation in the use of those units. Elk were least selective of habitat during winter, most selective during late winter and moderately selective during summer. Alder flats were selected by each collared elk during late winter and were identified as important elk habitat in the Hoh Valley because use of such areas was prevalent during a nutritionally important time of year for cow elk. Other patterns of habitat use were discussed in relation to thermal and nutritional characteristics of the watershed

Recognizing and integrating wildlife as Elwha restoration agents

Ecosystem restoration involving large dam removal spans large spatial extents, long time scales, and diverse societal constituencies. Restoration success requires collaboration among partner organizations. Success also can be facilitated by integrating components and processes of the ecosystem itself in restoration planning and practice. We review early and future roles of wildlife in restoration of valleys flooded by Elwha dams, with implications for dam removals on other rivers. Detecting early wildlife responses depended on baseline inventories prior to dam removal, followed by monitoring during and after dam removal. Pre-removal studies revealed patterns of small and mid-sized mammal occupancy, bear movement, amphibian occupancy, and avian distributions and species composition. In the few years since dam removal, wildlife colonization of exposed reservoir beds has been rapid, dominated by early successional and mobile species. Wildlife also perform important restoration functions, and contribute to all nine attributes defining restored ecosystems. This early in Elwha restoration, conspicuous wildlife functions include native seed dispersal to restoration sites, herbivore effects on revegetation, and organic matter dispersal to nutrient-poor sediments. In future decades, diverse wildlife also will help restore terrestrial-aquatic connections by dispersing nutrients from increasing salmon runs to riparian and terrestrial areas. Each of these wildlife roles is influenced by spatial distributions of pre-dam structural legacies and structures placed during active restoration efforts, particularly large woody debris. By placing these structures in locations and configurations that support wildlife functions, restoration planning and practice more effectively integrate wildlife in restoration. Benefits include increasing the rate of restoration progress and directing it along more desirable trajectories. In this way, the collaborative interdisciplinary approach in Elwha restoration can be expanded in future restoration projects to encompass active collaboration with the ecosystem itself

The Extrapolation of High Altitude Solar Cell I(V) Characteristics to AM0

The high altitude aircraft method has been used at NASA GRC since the early 1960's to calibrate solar cell short circuit current, ISC, to Air Mass Zero (AMO). This method extrapolates ISC to AM0 via the Langley plot method, a logarithmic extrapolation to 0 air mass, and includes corrections for the varying Earth-Sun distance to 1.0 AU and compensating for the non-uniform ozone distribution in the atmosphere. However, other characteristics of the solar cell I(V) curve do not extrapolate in the same way. Another approach is needed to extrapolate VOC and the maximum power point (PMAX) to AM0 illumination. As part of the high altitude aircraft method, VOC and PMAX can be obtained as ISC changes during the flight. These values can then the extrapolated, sometimes interpolated, to the ISC(AM0) value. This approach should be valid as long as the shape of the solar spectra in the stratosphere does not change too much from AMO. As a feasibility check, the results are compared to AMO I(V) curves obtained using the NASA GRC X25 based multi-source simulator. This paper investigates the approach on both multi-junction solar cells and sub-cells

Properties and Origin of the High-Velocity Gas Toward the Large Magellanic Cloud

In the spectra of 139 early-type Large Magellanic Cloud (LMC) stars observed with FUSE and with deep radio Parkes HI 21-cm observations along those stars, we search for and analyze the absorption and emission from high-velocity gas at +90<v<+175 km/s. The HI column density of the high-velocity clouds (HVCs) along these sightlines ranges from <10^18.4 to 10^19.2 cm^-2. The incidence of the HVC metal absorption is 70%, significantly higher than the HI emission occurrence of 32%. We find that the mean metallicity of the HVC is [OI/HI] = -0.51 (+0.12,-0.16). There is no strong evidence for a large variation in the HVC metallicity, implying that thes e HVCs have a similar origin and are part of the same complex. The mean and scatter of the HVC metallicities are more consistent with the present-day LMC oxygen abundance than that of the Small Magellanic Cloud or the Milky Way. We find that on average [SiII/OI] = +0.48 (+0.15,- 0.25) and [FeII/OI] = +0.33 (+0.14,-0.21), implying that the HVC complex is dominantly ionized. The HVC complex has a multiphase structure with a neutral (OI, FeII), weakly ionized (FeII, NII), and highly ionized (OVI) components, and has evidence of dust but no molecules. All the observed properties of the HVC can be explained by an energetic outflow from the LMC. This is the first example of a large (>10^6 M_sun) HVC complex that is linked to stellar feedback occurring in a dwarf spiral galaxy.Comment: Accepted for publication in the Ap

Promoting Mental Health and Preventing Mental Illness in General Practice

This paper calls for the routine integration of mental health promotion and prevention into UK General Practice in order to reduce the burden of mental and physical disorders and the ensuing pressure on General Practice. The proposals & the resulting document (https://ethicscharity.files.wordpress.com/2015/09/rcgp_keymsg_150925_v5.pdf) arise from an expert ‘Think Tank’ convened by the London Journal of Primary Care, Educational Trust for Health Improvement through Cognitive Strategies (ETHICS Foundation) and the Royal College of General Practitioners. It makes 12 recommendations for General Practice: (1) Mental health promotion and prevention are too important to wait. (2) Work with your community to map risk factors, resources and assets. (3) Good health care, medicine and best practice are biopsychosocial rather than purely physical. (4) Integrate mental health promotion and prevention into your daily work. (5) Boost resilience in your community through approaches such as community development. (6) Identify people at increased risk of mental disorder for support and screening. (7) Support early intervention for people of all ages with signs of illness. (8) Maintain your biopsychosocial skills. (9) Ensure good communication, interdisciplinary team working and inter-sectoral working with other staff, teams and agencies. (10) Lead by example, taking action to promote the resilience of the general practice workforce. (11) Ensure mental health is appropriately included in the strategic agenda for your ‘cluster’ of General Practices, at the Clinical Commissioning Groups, and the Health and Wellbeing Board. (12) Be aware of national mental health strategies and localise them, including action to destigmatise mental illness within the context of community development

UV and EUV Instruments

We describe telescopes and instruments that were developed and used for astronomical research in the ultraviolet (UV) and extreme ultraviolet (EUV) regions of the electromagnetic spectrum. The wavelength ranges covered by these bands are not uniquely defined. We use the following convention here: The EUV and UV span the regions ~100-912 and 912-3000 Angstroem respectively. The limitation between both ranges is a natural choice, because the hydrogen Lyman absorption edge is located at 912 Angstroem. At smaller wavelengths, astronomical sources are strongly absorbed by the interstellar medium. It also marks a technical limit, because telescopes and instruments are of different design. In the EUV range, the technology is strongly related to that utilized in X-ray astronomy, while in the UV range the instruments in many cases have their roots in optical astronomy. We will, therefore, describe the UV and EUV instruments in appropriate conciseness and refer to the respective chapters of this volume for more technical details.Comment: To appear in: Landolt-Boernstein, New Series VI/4A, Astronomy, Astrophysics, and Cosmology; Instruments and Methods, ed. J.E. Truemper, Springer-Verlag, Berlin, 201