Indicadores de resiliencia y sostenibilidad para la vivienda urbana panameña frente al cambio climático

In recent decades, urban centers have been facing enormous challenges with the increase in natural disasters, and the impossibility of recovering from them. In this context, the objective of this research is to propose resilience and sustainability indicators for Panamanian urban housing by considering the effects of climate change through an extensive analysis of the country's vulnerability. Using qualitative processes, validated by national and international professionals, it was possible to characterize resilient and sustainable housing and develop a proposal of 29 indicators that respond to current and future climate change-related impacts: 15 for resilience and 14 for sustainability. Thus, building a simple useful tool to evaluate the resilience and sustainability of urban housing.Nas últimas décadas, os centros urbanos têm enfrentado enormes desafios como o aumento das catástrofes naturais e a impossibilidade de recuperação dos estragos causados por estas. Neste contexto, o objetivo desta pesquisa é propor indicadores de resiliência e sustentabilidade para a habitação urbana panamenha em função dos efeitos das alterações climáticas mediante uma análise extensiva da vulnerabilidade do país. Esta informação foi analisada por meio de processos qualitativos que permitiram caracterizar uma habitação resiliente e sustentável validada por profissionais nacionais e internacionais. Isto permitiu desenvolver uma proposta de 29 indicadores que respondem aos impactos atuais e futuros das alterações climáticas: 15 para a resiliência e 14 para a sustentabilidade. Neste sentido, obteve-se um instrumento útil e simples para avaliar a resiliência e a sustentabilidade da habitação urbana.En las últimas décadas, los centros urbanos han enfrentado enormes desafíos, como el aumento de desastres naturales y la imposibilidad de recuperarse de los mismos. En este contexto, el objetivo de esta investigación es proponer indicadores de resiliencia y sostenibilidad para la vivienda urbana panameña en función de los efectos del cambio climático, a través de un extenso análisis sobre la vulnerabilidad del país. Mediante procesos cualitativos fue posible caracterizar una vivienda resiliente y sostenible validada por profesionales nacionales e internacionales para el desarrollo de una propuesta de 29 indicadores que responden a los impactos actuales y futuros producidos por cambio climático: 15 para resiliencia y 14 para sostenibilidad. En este sentido, se logró elaborar una herramienta útil y sencilla para evaluar la resiliencia y sostenibilidad de la vivienda urbana

Changing Forests in a Warming World

Severe fires can dramatically alter the future growth of a spruce forest. A severe fire is likely to change the forest to one dominated by broadleaf deciduous trees, especially in drier places.York's Knowledge Mobilization Unit provides services and funding for faculty, graduate students, and community organizations seeking to maximize the impact of academic research and expertise on public policy, social programming, and professional practice. It is supported by SSHRC and CIHR grants, and by the Office of the Vice-President Research & Innovation. [email protected] www.researchimpact.c

Long-term experimental warming and nutrient additions increase productivity in tall deciduous shrub tundra

© The Author(s), 2014. This article is distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License. The definitive version was published in Ecosphere 5 (2014): art72, doi:10.1890/ES13-00281.1.Warming Arctic temperatures can drive changes in vegetation structure and function directly by stimulating plant growth or indirectly by stimulating microbial decomposition of organic matter and releasing more nutrients for plant uptake and growth. The arctic biome is currently increasing in deciduous shrub cover and this increase is expected to continue with climate warming. However, little is known how current deciduous shrub communities will respond to future climate induced warming and nutrient increase. We examined the plant and ecosystem response to a long-term (18 years) nutrient addition and warming experiment in an Alaskan arctic tall deciduous shrub tundra ecosystem to understand controls over plant productivity and carbon (C) and nitrogen (N) storage in shrub tundra ecosystems. In addition, we used a meta-analysis approach to compare the treatment effect size for aboveground biomass among seven long-term studies conducted across multiple plant community types within the Arctic. We found that biomass, productivity, and aboveground N pools increased with nutrient additions and warming, while species diversity decreased. Both nutrient additions and warming caused the dominant functional group, deciduous shrubs, to increase biomass and proportional C and N allocation to aboveground stems but decreased allocation to belowground stems. For all response variables except soil C and N pools, effects of nutrients plus warming were largest. Soil C and N pools were highly variable and we could not detect any response to the treatments. The biomass response to warming and fertilization in tall deciduous shrub tundra was greater than moist acidic and moist non-acidic tundra and more similar to the biomass response of wet sedge tundra. Our data suggest that in a warmer and more nutrient-rich Arctic, tall deciduous shrub tundra will have greater total deciduous shrub biomass and a higher proportion of woody tissue that has a longer residence time, with a lower proportion of C and N allocated to belowground stems.This research was supported by NSF grants DEB-0516041, DEB-0516509 and the Arctic LTER (DEB-0423385)

Pulse Knowledge, Attitudes, Practices, and Cooking Experience of Midwestern US University Students

Many American college students fail to meet dietary guideline recommendations for fruits, vegetables, and fiber. Pulses are a subgroup of legumes, harvested solely for dry grain seeds within a pod. Commonly consumed pulses include dry beans, dry peas, lentils, and chickpeas. Pulses are high in shortfall nutrients and could fill some nutritional gaps of college students. However, little is known about pulse intakes among young adults. The study aims were: (1) to identify knowledge, attitudes, and practices regarding pulse consumption; and (2) to describe experiences of preparing dry pulses among college students. A convenience sample of 1433 students aged 18–30 enrolled at a Midwestern university in the United States completed an online survey in April 2020. Demographic and attitude variables were compared by the monthly count of pulse types eaten using chi-square, analysis of variance, and logistic regression modeling to predict pulse type intakes. Higher numbers of pulse types eaten was associated with being White, vegetarian/vegan, higher cooking self-efficacy, positive attitudes toward pulses, and greater daily intake of fruits, vegetables, and fiber. Knowledge and experience of cooking dry pulses was low, with canned pulses purchased more often. College students may not be consuming pulses due to unfamiliarity with them, low knowledge of nutrition benefits, and a general lack of cooking self-efficacy. Increased familiarization and promotion surrounding pulses may increase their consumption

Effects of tillage and poultry manure application rates on Salmonella and fecal indicator bacteria concentrations in tiles draining Des Moines Lobe soils

Application of poultry manure (PM) to cropland as fertilizer is a common practice in artificially drained regions of the Upper Midwest United States. Tile-waters have the potential to contribute pathogenic bacteria to downstream waters. This 3-year study (2010–2012) was designed to evaluate the impacts of manure management and tillage practices on bacteria losses to drainage tiles under a wide range of field conditions. PM was applied annually in spring, prior to planting corn, at application rates ranging from 5 to 40 kg/ha to achieve target rates of 112 and 224 kg/ha nitrogen (PM1 and PM2). Control plots received no manure (PM0). Each treatment was replicated on three chisel-plowed (CP) plots and one no-till (NT) plot. Tile-water grab samples were collected weekly when tiles were flowing beginning 30 days before manure application to 100 days post application, and additional grab samples were obtained to target the full spectrum of flow conditions. Manure and tile-water samples were analyzed for the pathogen,Salmonella spp. (SALM), and fecal indicator bacteria (FIB), Escherichia coli (EC), and enterococci (ENT). All three bacterial genera were detected more frequently, and at significantly higher concentrations, in tile-waters draining NT plots compared to CP plots. Transport of bacteria to NT tiles was most likely facilitated by macropores, which were significantly more numerous above tiles in NT plots in 2012 as determined by smoke-testing. While post-manure samples contained higher concentrations of bacteria than pre-manure samples, significant differences were not seen between low (PM1) and high (PM2) rates of PM application. The highest concentrations were observed under the NT PM2 plot in 2010 (6.6 × 103 cfu/100 mL EC, 6.6 × 105 cfu/100 mL ENT, and 2.8 × 103 cfu/100 mL SALM). Individual and 30-day geometric mean ENT concentrations correlated more strongly to SALM than EC; however, SALM were present in samples with little or no FIB

Nutrient-specific solubility patterns of leaf litter across 41 lowland tropical woody species

Abstract. Leaching is a mechanism for the release of nutrients from litter or senesced leaves that can drive interactions among plants, microbes, and soil. Although leaching is well established in conceptual models of litter decomposition, potential nutrient solubility of mineral elements from recently senesced litter has seldom been quantified. Using a standardized extraction (1:50 litter-to-water ratio and four-hour extraction) and recently senesced leaf litter of 41 tropical tree and liana species, we investigated how solubility varies among elements, and whether the solubility of elements could be predicted by litter traits (e.g., lignin, total element concentrations). In addition, we investigated nutrient forms (i.e., inorganic and organic) and ratios in leachate. Water-soluble elements per unit litter mass were strongly predicted by total initial litter element concentrations for potassium (K; r 2 ¼ 0.79), sodium (Na; r 2 ¼ 0.51) and phosphorus (P; r 2 ¼ 0.66), while a significant but weaker positive relationship was found for nitrogen (N; r 2 ¼ 0.36). There was no significant relationship for carbon (C) or calcium (Ca). Element-specific solubility varied markedly. On average 100% of total K, 35% of total P, 28% of total Na, 5% of total N, 4% of total Ca, and 3% of total C were soluble. For soluble P, 90% was inorganic orthophosphate. The high solubility of K, Na, and P as inorganic orthophosphate suggests that these nutrients can become rapidly available to litter microbes with no metabolic cost. Few common predictors of decomposition rates were correlated with element solubility, although soluble C (milligrams per gram of litter) was negatively related to lignin content (r 2 ¼ 0.19; P , 0.004). Solubility of elements was linked within a species: when a species ranked high in the soluble fraction of one element, it also ranked high in the solubility of other elements. Overall nutrient-specific patterns of solubility from recently senesced litter emphasize that litter elements cannot be treated equally in our conceptual and empirical models of decomposition. The relatively high potential solubility of P as orthophosphate from fresh litter advances our understanding of ecological stoichiometric ratios and nutrient bioavailability in tropical forests