Effects of beaver engineering on downstream fluxes in Colorado mountain streams, The

2019 Spring.Includes bibliographical references.Beaver meadows compose only a small fraction of catchment area in mountain watersheds, but they provide a potentially large role in retaining fluxes of water, sediment, and organic carbon (OC) in mountain meadows. Beaver (Castor canadensis) build dams and ponds that encourage overbank flows and deposition of fine sediment along with particulate OC that create an anastomosing stream channel and a geomorphically heterogeneous floodplain with high biodiversity. I combined geomorphic surveys, soil depth probing by rebar, and soil cores analyzed for carbon content to investigate the influence of beaver activity, geomorphic unit, soil depth, soil moisture, and drainage area on fluxes of fine sediment and organic carbon storage in 7 active and abandoned beaver meadows in Rocky Mountain National Park. I found that surface spatial heterogeneity and mean soil moisture differed significantly only between active and long abandoned meadows, indicating a nonlinear change through time. Soil depth and OC stock did not differ significantly between different levels of beaver activity, indicating that larger-scale geologic controls on valley sediment depth contribute to long-term storage of OC after beaver abandon a meadow. I examined the seasonal hydrologic flux between the inflow and outflow of 19 active and abandoned beaver meadows to determine the influence of beaver activity, valley geometry, elevation, drainage area, and meadow size relative to drainage area on the reduction of peak flow, enhancement of base flow, and lag of the recession curve of the meadow hydrographs during the Spring and Summer. I found that beaver activity, along with meadow size relative to drainage area, and valley geometry, influence peak flow attenuation. Predicting the flow attenuation is complicated by these additional factors, as well as the difficulty of quantifying subsurface processes that contribute to the lateral flow, storage, and release of water from the meadows. These results indicate that relatively wide meadows located in the upper reaches of channel networks are the best candidates among abandoned beaver meadows in mountain environments to store more organic carbon and attenuate peak flows if beaver are successfully reintroduced

Sea-level history during the Last Interglacial complex on San Nicolas Island, California: implications for glacial isostatic adjustment processes, paleozoogeography and tectonics

San Nicolas Island, California has one of the best records of fossiliferous Quaternary marine terraces in North America, with at least fourteen terraces rising to an elevation of ~270 m above present-day sea level. In our studies of the lowest terraces, we identified platforms at 38–36 m (terrace 2a), 33–28 m (terrace 2b), and 13–8 m (terrace 1). Uranium-series dating of solitary corals from these terraces yields three clusters of ages: ~120 ka on terrace 2a (marine isotope stage [MIS] 5.5), ~120 and ~100 ka on terrace 2b (MIS 5.5 and 5.3), and ~80 ka (MIS 5.1) on terrace 1.We conclude that corals on terrace 2b that date to ~120 ka were reworked from a formerly broader terrace 2a during the ~100 ka sea stand. Fossil faunas differ on the three terraces. Isolated fragments of terrace 2a have a fauna similar to that of modern waters surrounding San Nicolas Island. A mix of extralimital southern and extralimital northern species is found on terrace 2b, and extralimital northern species are on terrace 1. On terrace 2b, with its mixed faunas, extralimital southern species, indicating warmer than present waters, are interpreted to be from the ~120 ka high sea stand, reworked from terrace 2a. The extralimital northern species on terrace 2b, indicating cooler than present waters, are interpreted to be from the ~100 ka sea stand. The abundant extralimital northern species on terrace 1 indicate cooler than present waters at ~80 ka. Using the highest elevations of the ~120 ka platform of terrace 2a, and assuming a paleo-sea level of þ6 m based on previous studies, San Nicolas Island has experienced late Quaternary uplift rates of ~0.25–0.27 m/ka. These uplift rates, along with shoreline angle elevations and ages of terrace 2b (~100 ka) and terrace 1 (~80 ka) yield relative (local) paleo-sea level elevations of +2 to +6 m for the ~100 ka sea stand and –11 to –12 m for the ~80 ka sea stand. These estimates are significantly higher than those reported for the ~100 ka and ~80 ka sea stands on New Guinea and Barbados. Numerical models of the glacial isostatic adjustment (GIA) process presented here demonstrate that these differences in the high stands are expected, given the variable geographic distances between the sites and the former Laurentide and Cordilleran ice sheets. Moreover, the numerical results show that the absolute and differential elevations of the observed high stands provide a potentially important constraint on ice volumes during this time interval and on Earth structure

Coastal tectonics on the eastern margin of the Pacific Rim: late Quaternary sea-level history and uplift rates, Channel Islands National Park, California, USA

The Pacific Rim is a region where tectonic processes play a significant role in coastal landscape evolution. Coastal California, on the eastern margin of the Pacific Rim, is very active tectonically and geomorphic expressions of this include uplifted marine terraces. There have been, however, conflicting estimates of the rate of late Quaternary uplift of marine terraces in coastal California, particularly for the northern Channel Islands. In the present study, the terraces on San Miguel Island and Santa Rosa Island were mapped and new age estimates were generated using uranium-series dating of fossil corals and amino acid geochronology of fossil mollusks. Results indicate that the 2nd terrace on both islands is ~120 ka and the 1st terrace on Santa Rosa Island is ~80 ka. These ages correspond to two global high-sea stands of the Last Interglacial complex, marine isotope stages (MIS) 5.5 and 5.1, respectively. The age estimates indicate that San Miguel Island and Santa Rosa Island have been tectonically uplifted at rates of 0.12-0.20 m/ka in the late Quaternary, similar to uplift rates inferred from previous studies on neighboring Santa Cruz Island. The newly estimated uplift rates for the northern Channel Islands are, however, an order of magnitude lower than a recent study that generated uplift rates from an offshore terrace dating to the Last Glacial period. The differences between the estimated uplift rates in the present study and the offshore study are explained by the magnitude of glacial isostatic adjustment (GIA) effects that were not known at the time of the earlier study. Set in the larger context of northeastern Pacific Rim tectonics, Channel Islands uplift rates are higher than those coastal localities on the margin of the East Pacific Rise spreading center, but slightly lower than those of most localities adjacent to the Cascadia subduction zone. The uplift rates reported here for the northern Channel Islands are similar to those reported for most other localities where strike-slip tectonics are dominant, but lower than localities where restraining bends (such as the Big Bend of the San Andreas Fault) result in crustal shortening

The CTSA Consortium's Catalog of Assets for Translational and Clinical Health Research (CATCHR)

The 61 CTSA Consortium sites are home to valuable programs and infrastructure supporting translational science and all are charged with ensuring that such investments translate quickly to improved clinical care. Catalog of Assets for Translational and Clinical Health Research (CATCHR) is the Consortium's effort to collect and make available information on programs and resources to maximize efficiency and facilitate collaborations. By capturing information on a broad range of assets supporting the entire clinical and translational research spectrum, CATCHR aims to provide the necessary infrastructure and processes to establish and maintain an open‐access, searchable database of consortium resources to support multisite clinical and translational research studies. Data are collected using rigorous, defined methods, with the resulting information made visible through an integrated, searchable Web‐based tool. Additional easy‐to‐use Web tools assist resource owners in validating and updating resource information over time. In this paper, we discuss the design and scope of the project, data collection methods, current results, and future plans for development and sustainability. With increasing pressure on research programs to avoid redundancy, CATCHR aims to make available information on programs and core facilities to maximize efficient use of resources.Peer Reviewedhttp://deepblue.lib.umich.edu/bitstream/2027.42/106893/1/cts12144.pd

The CTSA Consortium's Catalog of Assets for Translational and Clinical Health Research (CATCHR): The Ctsa Consortium's Catchr

The 61 CTSA Consortium sites are home to valuable programs and infrastructure supporting translational science and all are charged with ensuring that such investments translate quickly to improved clinical care. CATCHR (Catalog of Assets for Translational and Clinical Health Research) is the Consortium’s effort to collect and make available information on programs and resources to maximize efficiency and facilitate collaborations. By capturing information on a broad range of assets supporting the entire clinical and translational research spectrum, CATCHR aims to provide the necessary infrastructure and processes to establish and maintain an open-access, searchable database of consortium resources to support multi-site clinical and translational research studies. Data is collected using rigorous, defined methods, with the resulting information made visible through an integrated, searchable web-based tool. Additional easy to use web tools assist resource owners in validating and updating resource information over time. In this article, we discuss the design and scope of the project, data collection methods, current results, and future plans for development and sustainability. With increasing pressure on research programs to avoid redundancy, CATCHR aims to make available information on programs and core facilities to maximize efficient use of resources

Mobility in the child (and carer) friendly city : SEQ vs. Stockholm

The rationale for providing state subsidised public transport has changed over time from a social obligation to provide transport options for those without access to private transport to an environmental and economic imperative to minimize congestion and greenhouse gas emissions. In many jurisdictions this shift has seen a greater focus on the provision of peak hour commuter services and a shift in the demographic profile of the riding public and a significant increase in the number of commuter passengers relative to others. The scheduling of commuter services is not geared to meet the needs of children and their generally female carers who often need to engage in trip chaining and travel outside peak commuting periods and on weekends. In addition to service scheduling difficulties, transport infrastructure, both on-board and supporting infrastructure such as bus stops, train stations and connecting footpaths often do not support children and their carers to use public transport services. Combined with a negative attitude by passengers and service providers, such as bus drivers, which may see children, babies and young people as out of place and unwelcome on commuter services, these issues conspire to hinder the use of public transport by children and their carers. Overlaying feminist geography analysis and insights and child-friendly cities objectives, this paper proposes some basic criteria for the provision of public transport services and supporting infrastructure which meets the needs of children, babies and their carers and juxtaposes the achievement of these in South East Queensland, Australia and Stockholm, Sweden

Predicting stream temperatures for native fish habitat management in White River National Forest, Colorado

2014 Summer.Includes bibliographical references.Stream temperature is a critical habitat parameter for many cold-water fish, particularly the salmonids family that includes trout. Colorado River cutthroat trout (Oncorhynchus clarkii pleuriticus), a native fish in the Colorado River Basin, currently exists in fragmented, isolated populations as a result of degraded thermal habitat, competition with nonnative trout and other reasons. Managers of the White River National Forest in northwestern Colorado want to reintroduce this native trout to additional streams within its historic range to help protect the subspecies from extinction. To identify additional streams within the Forest that have the appropriate thermal regime for Colorado River cutthroat trout, this research has created two multiple regression models to predict summer stream temperature metrics related to lethal and sublethal thermal tolerances for the subspecies. The 7-day mean of daily maximum stream temperature for the warmest 7 days can be equated with the critical thermal maximum, which is the extreme high temperature beyond which the fish cannot survive. The mean temperature of the warmest month can be equated with the upper limit of the optimum temperature range for the species, beyond which the fish experience sublethal temperature effects. The models can be used to identify streams cool enough throughout the year to support Colorado River cutthroat trout populations. The strongest predictor variables of these metrics were the drainage area, the discharge and the residual pool volume. Most previous studies found that air temperature was the strongest predictor variable in stream temperature models, but for the mountain headwater streams in this study, variables related to stream flow volume and stream morphology had better explanatory power. The models, created from and tested against field data, were able to explain 66% and 51% of the variability in monthly mean and 7-day mean stream temperatures, respectively, and had prediction errors of less than 2°C. Results from the models suggest that many of the streams in White River National Forest still have cool enough summer thermal regimes to support Colorado River cutthroat trout populations. Management of cold-water fish that reconnects fragmented populations by reintroducing species to thermally appropriate habitat is a step toward reducing the vulnerability of the species to extirpation by future climate changes or other disturbances

Out of mind, Out of sight: putting children in their place in urban planning

There is emerging evidence that the shape of Australian cities and neighbourhoods may not be good for the health and wellbeing of our children. This has been borne out in medical and academic research as well as the observations and reflections of urban planning practitioners. Despite this recognition, the perspectives of children are rarely sought or given sufficient consideration in urban design, planning and infrastructure and service provision. It has been suggested that this omission is a function of the perceived difficulties in accessing and responding to the views of children and young people. We argue that this is exacerbated by the ‘invisibility’ of children in urban spaces and the political and performative processes that produce both urban spaces and the place of children within them. In this presentation, we advocate the possibilities for meaningful engagement with children and the ‘child within’ that actively promotes the voice of children in urban planning and legitimises their experiences of and place in the city

King George glare: reflections on the (re)design of Brisbane's city square

Public spaces are important sites in the definition and practice of public space. Physically, public squares located at the crossroad of streets are hubs which experience the flows of city life in its people, lights and sounds. Since its creation more than a century ago King George Square in central Brisbane, Australia has been an influential public space both int terms of the functional roles it plays but also in terms of its symbolic and political importance. Originally named Albert Square in honour of Queen Consort Prince Albert of the United Kingdom, the square has borne witness to the changing priorities and ideologies of Brisbane's political elites.These symbolic and political changes have been reflected in, or perhaps even shaped by the physical design and use of the square itself. Once celebrated as a place of civic pride, the latest redevelopment of King George Square has attracted widespread criticism and concern. A combination of hard exposed surfaces, the removal of natural elements, and an obvious emphasis on commercialisation and behaviour management strategies has alarmed many residents and commentators. The redevelopment of the square - both through its design and regulatory function - has had a significant impact on the way the square is, or indeed can be, used. This chapter considers the implications of the changing landscape of this public space. In particular, we wonder whether the appropriation of public space by the public in a liberal democracy like Australia can ever truly be threatened by design, control, commercialisation and behaviour management strategies? We hope that this chapter provokes wider consideration of the role of central city squares in the lives of citizens