Refining genetic boundaries for Agassiz’s desert tortoise (Gopherus agassizii) in the western Sonoran Desert: the influence of the Coachella Valley on gene flow among populations in southern California

Understanding the influence of geographic features on the evolutionary history and population structure of a species can assist wildlife managers in delimiting genetic units (GUs) for conservation and management. Landscape features including mountains, low elevation depressions, and even roads can influence connectivity and gene flow among Agassiz’s desert tortoise (Gopherus agassizii) populations. Substantial changes in the landscape of the American Southwest occurred during the last six million years (including the formation of the Gulf of California and the lower Colorado River), which shaped the distribution and genetic structuring of tortoise populations. The area northwest of the Gulf of California is occupied by the Salton Trough, including the Coachella Valley at its northern end. Much of this area is below sea level and unsuitable as tortoise habitat, thus forming a potential barrier for gene flow. We assessed genetic relationships among three tortoise populations separated by the Coachella Valley. Two adjacent populations were on the east side of the valley in the foothills of the Cottonwood and Orocopia mountains separated by Interstate 10. The third population, Mesa, was located about 87 km away in the foothills of the San Bernardino Mountains at the far northwestern tip of the valley. The Cottonwood and Orocopia localities showed genetic affiliation with the adjacent Colorado Desert GU immediately to the east, and the Mesa population exhibited affiliation with both the Southern Mojave and Colorado Desert GUs, despite having a greater geographic distance (0.5x–1.5x greater) to the Colorado Desert GU. The genetic affiliation with the Colorado Desert GU suggests that the boundary for that GU needs to be substantially extended to the west to include the desert tortoise populations around the Coachella Valley. Their inclusion in the Colorado Desert GU may benefit these often overlooked populations when recovery actions are considered

Report on CTSA Consortium Use of the Community Engagement Consulting Service: Carter-Edwards et al. ·Community Engagement Consultation Service

The CTSA Community Engagement Consultative Service (CECS) is a national partnership designed to improve community engaged research (CEnR) through expert consultation. This report assesses the feasibility of CECS and presents findings from 2008–2009

A possible role for river restoration enhancing biodiversity through interaction with wildfire

BackgroundHistorically, wildfire regimes produced important landscape-scale disturbances in many regions globally. The “pyrodiversity begets biodiversity” hypothesis suggests that wildfires that generate temporally and spatially heterogeneous mosaics of wildfire severity and post-burn recovery enhance biodiversity at landscape scales. However, river management has often led to channel incision that disconnects rivers from their floodplains, desiccating floodplain habitats and depleting groundwater. In conjunction with predicted increases in frequency, intensity and extent of wildfires under climate change, this increases the likelihood of deep, uniform burns that reduce biodiversity.Predicted synergy of river restoration and biodiversity increaseRecent focus on floodplain re-wetting and restoration of successional floodplain habitat mosaics, developed for river management and flood prevention, could reduce wildfire intensity in restored floodplains and make the burns less uniform, increasing climate-change resilience; an important synergy. According to theory, this would also enhance biodiversity. However, this possibility is yet to be tested empirically. We suggest potential research avenues.Illustration and future directionsWe illustrate the interaction between wildfire and river restoration using a restoration project in Oregon, USA. A project to reconnect the South Fork McKenzie River and its floodplain suffered a major burn (“Holiday Farm” wildfire, 2020), offering a rare opportunity to study the interaction between this type of river restoration and wildfire; specifically, the predicted increases in pyrodiversity and biodiversity. Given the importance of river and wetland ecosystems for biodiversity globally, a research priority should be to increase our understanding of potential mechanisms for a “triple win” of flood reduction, wildfire alleviation and biodiversity promotion

Sex differences modulating serotonergic polymorphisms implicated in the mechanistic pathways of risk for depression and related disorders:

Peer Reviewedhttps://deepblue.lib.umich.edu/bitstream/2027.42/137310/1/jnr23877.pdfhttps://deepblue.lib.umich.edu/bitstream/2027.42/137310/2/jnr23877_am.pd

Changing the System

There is no more urgent task in American politics than to make fundamental change in how we govern ourselves. Some will argue that other priorities are more urgent: creating jobs for the millions of our unemployed fellow citizens; making health care and education more affordable; improving the quality of our public schools; or any of a hundred other important matters on the public agenda, from national security to rebuilding our aging roads and highways. No one can dispute the enormity of those tasks or the importance of addressing them as soon as possible. But without fundamental political reform, the likelihood that those concerns will be addressed promptly or wisely is minimal at best. Each of them, and many other less critical issues, demand thoughtfulness, a fair assessment of the root problems, and an honest consideration of alternatives – none of which is likely in a system in which the battle for party dominance trumps every other consideration. So long as all the players in the decision-making process are focused on seeking out only those facts that support their predetermined positions, on ensuring that the presentation of other views is suppressed, and on eschewing compromise that might weaken one’s hand in the next round of elections, schools will continue to be inadequate and costly, health care costs will threaten to rob one’s entire lifetime savings, and jobs will continue to flow overseas. To imagine a different kind of system, with more choice, more honest representation, and more focus on the collective (and individual good) than on what’s best for party insiders, seems beyond the imaginative capacity of a great many Americans. It will do no good for us simply to bemoan the inability of the federal government—our government—to serve our interests. We must also remind ourselves to regard each other simply as Americans—the bond we share—rather than as encampments of rival armies out to destroy each other. Because incentives work, it is up to all of us to change them: instead of responding to the loud voices demanding intransigence, legislators should instead be answering to the large numbers of us who are increasingly demanding bipartisanship and compromise. The late Steve Jobs insisted on the Apple iPhone campaign that urged people to “think different.” The correct usage would seem to be “think differently,” but Jobs had a point: to think “different” is a much greater inversion of the normal process. If we want to change the current political system, we’ll have to think different. Changing the entire procedure in either the House or Senate is a difficult task, but insisting that your representatives act differently, and holding them accountable for doing so, is not difficult, and it should be done. The system must be changed. The beautiful thing about our governmental system is that, in the end, the power to change it rests with us

Panel II: Power to the People: Public Lawmaking and Direct Democracy in Theory and Practice

The Parties Versus the People: How to Turn Republicans and Democrats into Americans Queer Eye for the Civil Rights Guy: Why Romer v. Evans is Applicable to Marriage Equality in New Jersey Contestatory Democracy and the Interpretation of Popular Initiative