Distribution of Tetrahymena pyriformis in Europe *

One hundred eighty-eight fresh-water samples from France (30), Italy (42), Austria (12), Germany (1), Switzerland (35), Holland (20), England (26), and Sweden (22) were examined for T. pyriformis. The habitats included rivers, mountain streams, lakes, ponds, irrigation ditches, roadside ditches, running and dead water canals, and fountains. The temperature ranged from 10° to 30°C, locations from 42° to 68° North latitude, with elevations from sea level to approximately 3,000 feet. Of the samples taken 28 contained T. pyriformis from which 411 clones were established in axenic media. Thirty-three additional samples contained ciliates other than T. pyriformis. All clones grew well in 1% proteose peptone; when screened for their nutritional requirements a few failed to grow on the completely defined medium and several others survived eight sub-inoculations without thiamine. The nuclear and sexual activity pattern followed that of previous collections. In distribution, variety 6 was found in Italy, variety 3 in Austria, and variety 4 in England. A new variety (variety 10) with two mating types was isolated from four different habitats in England. Several strains from Italy, France, Holland, and England constitute one group which mated among themselves, but only a few of which reacted with mating type I of variety 6 from America. This demonstrates the close affinities of the European and American strains, yet shows the possible evolution of a new variety (species).Peer Reviewedhttp://deepblue.lib.umich.edu/bitstream/2027.42/72167/1/j.1550-7408.1962.tb02595.x.pd

Reimagining heritage buildings as technological spaces

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Marine heatwave challenges solutions to human-wildlife conflict

Despite the increasing frequency and magnitude of extreme climate events, little is known about how their impacts flow through social and ecological systems or whether management actions can dampen deleterious effects. We examined how the record 2014-2016 Northeast Pacific marine heatwave influenced trade-offs in managing conflict between conservation goals and human activities using a case study on large whale entanglements in the U.S. west coast\u27s most lucrative fishery (the Dungeness crab fishery). We showed that this extreme climate event diminished the power of multiple management strategies to resolve trade-offs between entanglement risk and fishery revenue, transforming near win-win to clear win-lose outcomes (for whales and fishers, respectively). While some actions were more cost-effective than others, there was no silver-bullet strategy to reduce the severity of these trade-offs. Our study highlights how extreme climate events can exacerbate human-wildlife conflict, and emphasizes the need for innovative management and policy interventions that provide ecologically and socially sustainable solutions in an era of rapid environmental change

Assessing a New Clue to How Much Carbon Plants Take Up

Current climate models disagree on how much carbon dioxide land ecosystems take up for photosynthesis. Tracking the stronger carbonyl sulfide signal could help

Computational approaches for understanding the diagnosis and treatment of Parkinson's disease

This study describes how the application of evolutionary algorithms (EAs) can be used to study motor function in humans with Parkinson’s disease (PD) and in animal models of PD. Human data is obtained using commercially available sensors via a range of non-invasive procedures that follow conventional clinical practice. EAs can then be used to classify human data for a range of uses, including diagnosis and disease monitoring. New results are presented that demonstrate how EAs can also be used to classify fruit flies with and without genetic mutations that cause Parkinson’s by using measurements of the proboscis extension reflex. The case is made for a computational approach that can be applied across human and animal studies of PD and lays the way for evaluation of existing and new drug therapies in a truly objective way

Scientific Communities Striving for a Common Cause: Innovations in Carbon Cycle Science

Where does the carbon released by burning fossil fuels go? Currently, ocean and land systems remove about half of the CO₂ emitted by human activities; the remainder stays in the atmosphere. These removal processes are sensitive to feedbacks in the energy, carbon, and water cycles that will change in the future. Observing how much carbon is taken up on land through photosynthesis is complicated because carbon is simultaneously respired by plants, animals, and microbes. Global observations from satellites and air samples suggest that natural ecosystems take up about as much CO₂ as they emit. To match the data, our land models generate imaginary Earths where carbon uptake and respiration are roughly balanced, but the absolute quantities of carbon being exchanged vary widely. Getting the magnitude of the flux is essential to make sure our models are capturing the right pattern for the right reasons. Combining two cutting-edge tools, carbonyl sulfide (OCS) and solar-induced fluorescence (SIF), will help develop an independent answer of how much carbon is being taken up by global ecosystems. Photosynthesis requires CO₂, light, and water. OCS provides a spatially and temporally integrated picture of the “front door” of photosynthesis, proportional to CO₂ uptake and water loss through plant stomata. SIF provides a high-resolution snapshot of the “side door,” scaling with the light captured by leaves. These two independent pieces of information help us understand plant water and carbon exchange. A coordinated effort to generate SIF and OCS data through satellite, airborne, and ground observations will improve our process-based models to predict how these cycles will change in the future

Regulatory Improvement Legislation: Risk Assessment, Cost-Benefit Analysis, and Judicial Review

As the number, cost, and complexity of federal regulations have grown over the past twenty years, there has been growing interest in the use of analytic tools such as risk assessment and cost-benefit analysis to improve the regulatory process. The application of these tools to public health, safety, and environmental problems has become commonplace in the peer-reviewed scientific and medical literatures. Recent studies prepared by Resources for the Future, the American Enterprise Institute, the Brookings Institution, and the Harvard Center for Risk Analysis have demonstrated how formal analyses can and often do help government agencies achieve more protection against hazards at less cost than would otherwise occur. Although analytic tools hold great promise, their use by federal agencies is neither consistent nor rigorous. The 103rd, 104th, 105th and 106th Congresses demonstrated sustained interest in the passage of comprehensive legislation governing the employment of these tools in the federal regulatory process. While legislative proposals on this issue have attracted significant bipartisan interest, and recent amendments to particular enabling statutes have incorporated some of these analytical requirements, no comprehensive legislation has been enacted into law since passage of the Administrative Procedure Act in 1946. The inability to pass such legislation has been attributed to a variety of factors, but a common substantive concern has been uncertainty and controversy about how such legislation should address judicial review issues. For example, the judicial review portion of The Regulatory Improvement Act (S. 981), the 105th Congress\u27s major legislative initiative, was criticized simultaneously as meaningless (for allegedly offering too few opportunities for petitioners to challenge poorly reasoned agency rules) and dangerous (as supposedly enabling petitioners to paralyze even well-reasoned agency rules). Thus, a significant obstacle to regulatory improvement legislation appears to be the conflicting opinions among legal scholars and practitioners about how judicial review issues should be addressed in such legislation. The Clinton Administration and the authors of S. 981 believe they have crafted a workable compromise, one that accommodates the need to bring more rigor and transparency to an agency\u27s decisional processes without imposing excessive judicial review. Nevertheless, it is clear that their agreement on this subject, if included in future legislative deliberations, will be scrutinized and contested. Recognizing the importance of the judicial review issue to this and, indeed, any effort to improve the regulatory process, the Center for Risk Analysis at the Harvard School of Public Health convened an invitational Workshop of accomplished legal practitioners and scholars to discuss how judicial review should be handled in legislation of this kind. The full-day Workshop was conducted in Washington, D.C. on December 17, 1998. Its purpose was to discuss principles, experiences, and insights that might inform future public debate about how judicial review should be addressed in legislative proposals that entail use of risk assessment and/or cost-benefit analysis in agency decision-making (whether the proposals are comprehensive or agency-specific). In order to provide the Workshop a practical focus, participants analyzed the provisions of S. 981 (as modified at the request of the Clinton Administration). An exchange of letters between S. 981\u27s chief sponsors and the Clinton Administration defining the terms of the agreement was examined as well. This Report highlights the themes of the Workshop discussion and offers some specific commentary on how proposed legislation (including but not limited to S. 981) could be improved in future legislative deliberations