Sampling design may obscure species–area relationships in landscape-scale field studies

We investigated 1) the role of area per se in explaining anuran species richness on reservoir forest islands, after controlling for several confounding factors. We also assessed 2) how sampling design affects the inferential power of island species–area relationships (ISARs) aiming to 3) provide guidelines to yield reliable estimates of area-induced species losses in patchy systems. We surveyed anurans with autonomous recording units at 151 plots located on 74 islands and four continuous forest sites at the Balbina Hydroelectric Reservoir landscape, central Brazilian Amazonia. We applied semi-log ISAR models to assess the effect of sampling design on the fit and slope of species–area curves. To do so, we subsampled our surveyed islands following both a 1) stratified and 2) non-stratified random selection of 5, 10, 15, 20 and 25 islands covering 1) the full range in island size (0.45–1699 ha) and 2) only islands smaller than 100 ha, respectively. We also compiled 25 datasets from the literature to assess the generality of our findings. Island size explained ca half of the variation in species richness. The fit and slope of species–area curves were affected mainly by the range in island size considered, and to a very small extent by the number of islands surveyed. In our literature review, all datasets covering a range of patch sizes larger than 300 ha yielded a positive ISAR, whereas the number of patches alone did not affect the detection of ISARs. We conclude that 1) area per se plays a major role in explaining anuran species richness on forest islands within an Amazonian anthropogenic archipelago; 2) the inferential power of island species–area relationships is severely degraded by sub-optimal sampling designs; 3) at least 10 habitat patches spanning three orders of magnitude in size should be surveyed to yield reliable species–area estimates in patchy systems

Characteristics of testicular tumors in prepubertal children (age 5–12 years)

Introduction Testicular tumors in children have two peaks with different types of tumors; in the first 4 years of life a third to half are benign with increased risk of malignancy during puberty. The pathology of testicular tumors between these peaks, at the age of 5–12 years, is not known. We hypothesized that because of the low level of testosterone at this time, the incidence of malignant tumors is very low. Objective To compare malignancy risk of primary testicular tumors in children in the prepubertal period (5–12 years) compared with younger (0–4 years) and pubertal (13–18 years) children. Study design We retrospectively (2002–2016) identified patients <18 years with surgery for primary testicular tumor. Patients with testicular tumor risk were excluded. Ultrasound studies were reviewed for contralateral testis volume, tumor morphology, and tumor maximal diameter, for three age groups: 0–4, 5–12, and 13–18 years. The Freeman-Halton extension of the Fisher exact probability test was adopted for categorical outcomes, and one-way ANOVA for continuous outcomes. Results Fifty-two patients (mean age 11.0 years, range 6 days–18 years) were identified. Malignant tumor prevalence significantly differed ( p 4 mL (pubertal surge) significantly ( p 4 mL. Discussion We found that preadolescent children between the ages of 5 and 12 years have distinctive characteristics compared with the other age groups. Most importantly, no malignant testicular tumors were found in this age group. About a third of the children presented with an incidental testicular mass. The testicular tumors were significantly smaller (9.3 ± 6.7 mm) compared with those in children aged 13–18 years (29.8 ± 4.4 mm). There were limitations because of the retrospective nature of the study. Conclusion We found no malignant testicular tumors in children aged 5–12 years with no risk factors and prior to pubertal surge. Our study suggests use of more conservative treatment in this group of patients

Background due to stored electrons following nuclear decays in the KATRIN spectrometers and its impact on the neutrino mass sensitivity

The KATRIN experiment is designed to measure the absolute neutrino mass scale with a sensitivity of 200 meV at 90% C.L. by high resolution tritium beta-spectroscopy. A low background level of 10 mHz at the beta-decay endpoint is required in order to achieve the design sensitivity. In this paper we discuss a novel background source arising from magnetically trapped keV electrons in electrostatic retarding spectrometers. The main sources of these electrons are alpha-decays of the radon isotopes (219,220)Rn as well as beta-decays of tritium in the volume of the spectrometers. We characterize the expected background signal by extensive MC simulations and investigate the impact on the KATRIN neutrino mass sensitivity. From these results we refine design parameters for the spectrometer vacuum system and propose active background reduction methods to meet the stringent design limits for the overall background rate

A framework for quantifying soundscape diversity using Hill numbers

Soundscape studies are increasingly used to capture landscape-scale ecological patterns. Yet, several aspects of soundscape diversity remain unexplored. Although some processes influencing acoustic niche usage may operate in the 24-hr temporal domain, most acoustic indices only capture the diversity of sounds co-occurring in sound files at a specific time of day. Moreover, many indices do not consider the relationship between the spectral and temporal traits of sounds simultaneously. To provide novel insights into landscape-scale patterns of acoustic niche usage at broader temporal scales, we present a workflow to quantify soundscape diversity through the lens of trait-based ecology. Our workflow quantifies the diversity of sound in the 24-hr acoustic trait space. We introduce the Operational Sound Unit (OSU), a unit of diversity measurement that groups sounds by their shared acoustic properties. Using OSUs and building on the framework of Hill numbers, we propose three metrics that capture different aspects of acoustic trait space usage: (i) soundscape richness, (ii) soundscape diversity and (iii) soundscape evenness. We demonstrate the use of these metrics by (a) simulating soundscapes to assess whether the indices possess a set of desirable behaviours and (b) quantifying soundscape richness and evenness along a gradient in species richness. We demonstrate that (a) the indices outlined herein have desirable behaviours and (b) the soundscape richness and evenness are positively correlated with the richness of sound-producing species. This suggests that more acoustic niche space is occupied when the species richness is higher. Additionally, species-poor acoustic communities have a higher proportion of rare sounds and use the acoustic space less evenly. Our workflow generates novel insights into acoustic niche usage at a landscape scale and provides a useful tool for biodiversity monitoring. Moreover, Hill numbers can also be used to measure the taxonomic, functional and phylogenetic diversity. Using a common framework for diversity measurement gives metrics a common behaviour, interpretation and standardised unit, thus ensuring comparisons between soundscape diversity and other metrics represent real-world ecological patterns rather than mathematical artefacts stemming from different formulae

Intakes of culinary herbs and spices from a food frequency questionnaire evaluated against 28-days estimated records

<p>Abstract</p> <p>Background</p> <p>Worldwide, herbs and spices are much used food flavourings. However, little data exist regarding actual dietary intake of culinary herbs and spices. We developed a food frequency questionnaire (FFQ) for the assessment of habitual diet the preceding year, with focus on phytochemical rich food, including herbs and spices. The aim of the present study was to evaluate the intakes of herbs and spices from the FFQ with estimates of intake from another dietary assessment method. Thus we compared the intake estimates from the FFQ with 28 days of estimated records of herb and spice consumption as a reference method.</p> <p>Methods</p> <p>The evaluation study was conducted among 146 free living adults, who filled in the FFQ and 2-4 weeks later carried out 28 days recording of herb and spice consumption. The FFQ included a section with questions about 27 individual culinary herbs and spices, while the records were open ended records for recording of herbs and spice consumption exclusively.</p> <p>Results</p> <p>Our study showed that the FFQ obtained slightly higher estimates of total intake of herbs and spices than the total intake assessed by the Herbs and Spice Records (HSR). The correlation between the two assessment methods with regard to total intake was good (r = 0.5), and the cross-classification suggests that the FFQ may be used to classify subjects according to total herb and spice intake. For the 8 most frequently consumed individual herbs and spices, the FFQ obtained good estimates of median frequency of intake for 2 herbs/spices, while good estimates of portion sizes were obtained for 4 out of 8 herbs/spices.</p> <p>Conclusions</p> <p>Our results suggested that the FFQ was able to give good estimates of frequency of intake and portion sizes on group level for several of the most frequently used herbs and spices. The FFQ was only able to fairly rank subjects according to frequency of intake of the 8 most frequently consumed herbs and spices. Other studies are warranted to further explore the intakes of culinary spices and herbs.</p

CODEX clusters : Survey, catalog, and cosmology of the X-ray luminosity function

Context. Large area catalogs of galaxy clusters constructed from ROSAT All-Sky Survey provide the basis for our knowledge of the population of clusters thanks to long-term multiwavelength efforts to follow up observations of these clusters.Aims. The advent of large area photometric surveys superseding previous, in-depth all-sky data allows us to revisit the construction of X-ray cluster catalogs, extending the study to lower cluster masses and higher redshifts and providing modeling of the selection function.Methods. We performed a wavelet detection of X-ray sources and made extensive simulations of the detection of clusters in the RASS data. We assigned an optical richness to each of the 24 788 detected X-ray sources in the 10 382 square degrees of the Baryon Oscillation Spectroscopic Survey area using red sequence cluster finder redMaPPer version 5.2 run on Sloan Digital Sky Survey photometry. We named this survey COnstrain Dark Energy with X-ray (CODEX) clusters.Results. We show that there is no obvious separation of sources on galaxy clusters and active galactic nuclei (AGN) based on the distribution of systems on their richness. This is a combination of an increasing number of galaxy groups and their selection via the identification of X-ray sources either by chance or by groups hosting an AGN. To clean the sample, we use a cut on the optical richness at the level corresponding to the 10% completeness of the survey and include it in the modeling of the cluster selection function. We present the X-ray catalog extending to a redshift of 0.6.Conclusions. The CODEX suvey is the first large area X-ray selected catalog of northern clusters reaching fluxes of 10(-13) ergs s(-1) cm(-2). We provide modeling of the sample selection and discuss the redshift evolution of the high end of the X-ray luminosity function (XLF). Our results on z<0.3 XLF agree with previous studies, while we provide new constraints on the 0.3<z<0.6 XLF. We find a lack of strong redshift evolution of the XLF, provide exact modeling of the effect of low number statistics and AGN contamination, and present the resulting constraints on the flat CDM.Peer reviewe

Hygienic quality of dehydrated aromatic herbs marketed in Southern Portugal

Dehydrated aromatic herbs are highly valued ingredients, widely used at home level and by food processing industry, frequently added to a great number of recipes in the Mediterranean countries. Despite being considered low-moisture products and classified as GRAS, during pre and post-harvesting stages of production they are susceptible of microbial contamination. In Europe an increasing number of food recalls and disease outbreaks associated with dehydrated herbs have been reported in recent years. In this study the microbial quality of 99 samples of aromatic herbs (bay leaves, basil, coriander, oregano, parsley, Provence herbs, rosemary and thyme) collected from retails shops in the region of Algarve (Southern Portugal) was assessed. All the samples were tested by conventional methods and were assayed for the total count of aerobic mesophilic microorganisms, Salmonella spp., Escherichia coli, coagulase-positive staphylococci and filamentous fungi. Almost 50 % of the herbs did not exceed the aerobic mesophilic level of 104 CFU/g. The fungi count regarded as unacceptable (106 CFU/g) was not found in any of the tested herbs, while 84 % of the samples ranged from ≤102 to 104 CFU/g. No sample was positive for the presence of Salmonella spp., Escherichia coli and staphylococci. The results are in compliance with the European Commission criteria although they point out to the permanent need of surveillance on the good standards of handling/cooking practices as well as the importance of avoiding contamination at production, retailing and distribution. The microbiological hazards associated with the pathogenic and toxigenic microbiota of dried herbs remain as a relevant public health issue, due to the fact that they are added to foods not submitted to any following lethal procedure. Control measures should be adopted in order to ensure that all phases of their supply chain respect the food safety standards.FCT: UID/BIA/04325/2019.info:eu-repo/semantics/publishedVersio

Search for R-parity violating supersymmetry via the LLE couplings lambda_{121}, lambda_{122} or lambda_{133} in ppbar collisions at sqrt(s)=1.96 TeV

A search for gaugino pair production with a trilepton signature in the framework of R-parity violating supersymmetry via the couplings lambda_121, lambda_122, or lambda_133 is presented. The data, corresponding to an integrated luminosity of L~360/pb, were collected from April 2002 to August 2004 with the D0 detector at the Fermilab Tevatron Collider, at a center-of-mass energy of sqrt(s)=1.96 TeV. This analysis considers final states with three charged leptons with the flavor combinations eel, mumul, and eetau (l=e or mu). No evidence for supersymmetry is found and limits at the 95% confidence level are set on the gaugino pair production cross section and lower bounds on the masses of the lightest neutralino and chargino are derived in two supersymmetric models.Comment: 9 pages, 4 figures (fig2 includes 3 subfigures