Simulated estuary-wide response of seagrass (Zostera marina) to future scenarios of temperature and sea level

© The Author(s), 2020. This article is distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License. The definitive version was published in Scalpone, C. R., Jarvis, J. C., Vasslides, J. M., Testa, J. M., & Ganju, N. K. Simulated estuary-wide response of seagrass (Zostera marina) to future scenarios of temperature and sea level. Frontiers in Marine Science, 7, (2020): 539946, doi:10.3389/fmars.2020.539946.Seagrass communities are a vital component of estuarine ecosystems, but are threatened by projected sea level rise (SLR) and temperature increases with climate change. To understand these potential effects, we developed a spatially explicit model that represents seagrass (Zostera marina) habitat and estuary-wide productivity for Barnegat Bay-Little Egg Harbor (BB-LEH) in New Jersey, United States. Our modeling approach included an offline coupling of a numerical seagrass biomass model with the spatially variable environmental conditions from a hydrodynamic model to calculate above and belowground biomass at each grid cell of the hydrodynamic model domain. Once calibrated to represent present day seagrass habitat and estuary-wide annual productivity, we applied combinations of increasing air temperature and sea level following regionally specific climate change projections, enabling analysis of the individual and combined impacts of these variables on seagrass biomass and spatial coverage. Under the SLR scenarios, the current model domain boundaries were maintained, as the land surrounding BB-LEH is unlikely to shift significantly in the future. SLR caused habitat extent to decrease dramatically, pushing seagrass beds toward the coastline with increasing depth, with a 100% loss of habitat by the maximum SLR scenario. The dramatic loss of seagrass habitat under SLR was in part due to the assumption that surrounding land would not be inundated, as the model did not allow for habitat expansion outside the current boundaries of the bay. Temperature increases slightly elevated the rate of summer die-off and decreased habitat area only under the highest temperature increase scenarios. In combined scenarios, the effects of SLR far outweighed the effects of temperature increase. Sensitivity analysis of the model revealed the greatest sensitivity to changes in parameters affecting light limitation and seagrass mortality, but no sensitivity to changes in nutrient limitation constants. The high vulnerability of seagrass in the bay to SLR exceeded that demonstrated for other systems, highlighting the importance of site- and region-specific assessments of estuaries under climate change.This research was supported by the National Science Foundation Research Experience for Undergraduates Program (OCE-1659463), the Woods Hole Oceanographic Institution Summer Student Fellowship Program, the Barnegat Bay Partnership (through a US EPA Clean Water Act grant to Ocean County College; CE98212313), and the USGS Coastal and Marine Hazards/Resources Program. Although this project has been funded in part by the United States Environmental Protection Agency pursuant to a grant agreement with Ocean County College, it has not gone through the Agency’s publications review process and may not necessarily reflect the views of the Agency; therefore, no official endorsement should be assumed. Any use of trade, firm, or product names is for descriptive purposes only and does not imply endorsement by the U.S. Government

Association of kidney disease measures with risk of renal function worsening in patients with type 1 diabetes

Background: Albuminuria has been classically considered a marker of kidney damage progression in diabetic patients and it is routinely assessed to monitor kidney function. However, the role of a mild GFR reduction on the development of stage 653 CKD has been less explored in type 1 diabetes mellitus (T1DM) patients. Aim of the present study was to evaluate the prognostic role of kidney disease measures, namely albuminuria and reduced GFR, on the development of stage 653 CKD in a large cohort of patients affected by T1DM. Methods: A total of 4284 patients affected by T1DM followed-up at 76 diabetes centers participating to the Italian Association of Clinical Diabetologists (Associazione Medici Diabetologi, AMD) initiative constitutes the study population. Urinary albumin excretion (ACR) and estimated GFR (eGFR) were retrieved and analyzed. The incidence of stage 653 CKD (eGFR < 60 mL/min/1.73 m2) or eGFR reduction > 30% from baseline was evaluated. Results: The mean estimated GFR was 98 \ub1 17 mL/min/1.73m2 and the proportion of patients with albuminuria was 15.3% (n = 654) at baseline. About 8% (n = 337) of patients developed one of the two renal endpoints during the 4-year follow-up period. Age, albuminuria (micro or macro) and baseline eGFR < 90 ml/min/m2 were independent risk factors for stage 653 CKD and renal function worsening. When compared to patients with eGFR > 90 ml/min/1.73m2 and normoalbuminuria, those with albuminuria at baseline had a 1.69 greater risk of reaching stage 3 CKD, while patients with mild eGFR reduction (i.e. eGFR between 90 and 60 mL/min/1.73 m2) show a 3.81 greater risk that rose to 8.24 for those patients with albuminuria and mild eGFR reduction at baseline. Conclusions: Albuminuria and eGFR reduction represent independent risk factors for incident stage 653 CKD in T1DM patients. The simultaneous occurrence of reduced eGFR and albuminuria have a synergistic effect on renal function worsening

Incidence of tumors in organ transplants.

0 RGAN transplantations have in the last years modified treatment of some diseases with bad outcome. However, regardless of the benefits of transplantation, some inconveniences have limited its success. Rejection, drug toxicity, or opportunistic infections together with neoplasm have been described occurring in these patients. In the past years, the occurrence of neoplasms has been quite rare; recently, however, their manifestations have consistently increased. We report the occurrence of neoplasms and their relative percentage in a group of 339 transplanted patients from the University of Rome “La Sapienza” between 1990 and 1995. The aim of our study was to estimate the relative occurrence of each neoplasm in our case population, the histologic subtype, the degree of differentiation, the site of involvement, disease-free survival from the date of transplant, and the type of neoplasm developed correlated to the organ transplanted and the drug administered

Un semplice algoritmo per la prevenzione del rischio cardiovascolare e metabolico nella pratica quotidiana.

Le malattie cardiovascolari (CVD) sono la prima causa di morte in Italia, essendo responsabili del 44% di tutti i decessi. In questo scenario \ue8 importante che le CVD siano diagnosticate con tempestivit\ue0. A questo scopo \ue8 stato costituito un gruppo di lavoro multidisciplinare che ha concordato sulla necessit\ue0 di creare un percorso diagnostico terapeutico assistenziale (PDTA) di facile consultazione basato sulle attuali linee di guida internazionali sul rischio cardiovascolare per evitare che le stesse, per mancanza di tempo e per la scarsa chiarezza, vengano disattese e quindi non applicate

Recommendations for the implementation of international standardization of glycated hemoglobin in Italy.

This document is issued by the Italian Society of Clinical Biochemistry and Clinical Molecular Biology (SIBioC) and a number of other National Scientific Societies and Associations in order to promote a coordinated plan for implementing the standardization of glycated hemoglobin (HbA(1c)) measurement in Italy according to the recommendations by the International Federation of Clinical Chemistry and Laboratory Medicine (IFCC). Changes in reporting HbA(1c) results, new units, how to relate old and new units, a timeline for changes and definition of the analytical goals are the main issues discussed