The Effectiveness of a New Mole Repellent for Preventing Damage to Lawns by Eastern Moles

A new product containing 65% castor oil with the trade name Mole-Med was evaluated for its effectiveness in repelling eastern moles (Scalopus aquaticus) from lawns. Seven lawns in southern Michigan during September, 1993 were selected as preliminary test sites, and the ridges over mole tunnels in the lawns were flattened each day for 3 days. If some existing and new ridges were raised each day, the site was classified as having mole activity and continuing damage. The repellent was then applied according to label directions, and ridges above mole tunnels were flattened as described previously. If no tunnels were raised on the test lawn after one week, the repellent was considered to be effective. The repellent was classified as effective on all 7 test lawns. In May-July, 1994, 17 additional lawns were selected in the same way as preliminary test sites and classified as having or not having mole damage. Eleven received repellent treatment, while 6 were considered control, 3 adjacent to a treated area, 3 not adjacent to treated areas. Raised mole produced ridges were flattened on all test sites. On any site where ridges remained flattened and no new ridges were created for one week, moles were considered repelled. Mole activity as indicated by raised ridges ceased on eleven treated sites but continued on 5 of 6 control sites. The effectiveness of the repellent as indicated by the lack of new ridges continued for 65 days on one treatment site and for 30 days on the remaining treatment sites

Earth Observation to Address Inequities in Post-Flood Recovery

Floods impact communities worldwide, resulting in loss of life, damaged infrastructure and natural assets, and threatened livelihoods. Climate change and urban development in flood-prone areas will continue to worsen flood-related losses, increasing the urgency for effective tools to monitor recovery. Many Earth Observation (EO) applications exist for flood-hazard monitoring and provide insights on location, timing, and extent in near real-time and historically to estimate flood risk. Less attention has been paid to flood recovery, even though differing recovery rates and outcomes can have immediate and enduring distributional effects within communities. EO data are uniquely positioned to monitor post-flood recovery and inform policy on hazard mitigation and adaptation but remain underutilized. We encourage the EO and flood research community to refocus on developing flood recovery applications to address growing risk. Translation of EO insights on flood recovery among flood-affected communities and decision-makers is necessary to address underlying social vulnerabilities that exacerbate inequitable recovery outcomes and advocate for redressing injustices where disparate recovery is observed. We identify an unequivocal need for EO to move beyond mapping flood hazard and exposure toward post-flood recovery monitoring to inform recovery across geographic contexts. This commentary proposes a framework for remote sensing scientists to engage community-based partners to integrate EO with non-EO data to advance flood recovery monitoring, characterize inequitable recovery, redistribute resources to mitigate inequities, and support risk reduction of future floods

The effects of the Health Insurance Portability and Accountability Act privacy rule on influenza research using geographical information systems

The Health Insurance Portability and Accountability Act (HIPAA) privacy rule was enacted to protect patients’ personal health information from undue disclosure. Despite its intention to protect patients, recent reports suggest that HIPAA restrictions may be negatively impacting health research. Quantitative, visual geographical and statistical analysis of zip code geographical information systems (GIS) mapping, comparing 3-digit HIPAA-compliant and 5-digit HIPAA-non-compliant simulated data, was chosen to identify and describe the type of distortion that may result. It was found that unmitigated HIPAA compliance with HIPAA mapping rules distorted the GIS zip code data by 28% leading to erroneous results. Thus, compliance with HIPAA privacy rule when mapping may lead investigators to publish erroneous GIS maps

Understanding the role of illicit transactions in land-change dynamics

Anthropogenic land use has irrevocably transformed the natural systems on which humankind relies. Advances in remote sensing have led to an improved understanding of where, why and how social and economic processes drive globally important land-use changes, from deforestation to urbanization. The role of illicit activities, however, is often absent in land change analysis. The paucity of data on unrecorded, intentionally hidden transactions makes them difficult to incorporate into spatially specific analyses of land change. We present a conceptual framework of illicit land transactions and a two-pronged approach using remotely sensed data to spatially link illicit activities to land uses

Updating century old Congo River navigation maps and revealing their geomorphological secrets

River transport, with more than 17,000 km of navigable channels in the Congo, is a crucial part of the economy for many of the countries sharing the river basin and allows the transport of many goods (timber, charcoal, minerals etc.) and enables access to many areas where roads do not exist. However, river transport falls short of the role it could play in development of the region and has actually declined since the Congo basin countries became independent in the 1960s. This is in part due to years of civil unrest, aging equipment, a lack of infrastructure maintenance, and the poor support and operation of public waterway agencies. River navigation maps are a specialist form of map specifically designed to allow safe navigation of river traffic such as for barges carrying cargo. Boat captains use them as they travel along the river to follow the advised navigation route and avoid hazards such as submerged rocks and shallow channels. The navigation maps for the 1,700 km of river between Kinshasa and Kisangani are issued by RVF (Régie de Voie Fluvial), the state river navigation authority, and are therefore used by all boat captains. These maps originate from the early 1900s and have not been updated since colonial times. As part of the CRuHM project we are exploring the possibility of updating these maps using modern remote sensing methods, together with RVFs experienced input. As part of the update process, RVF have provided us with detailed digital scans of the original navigation maps and we are geo-referencing these to modern geospatial projections, in line with the remote sensing data. This provides us with a unique opportunity to compare snapshots of the river system geomorphology separated by nearly 100 years. We will show the current state of the project and some of the river secrets we have discovered so far

Matrilysin/MMP-7 Cleavage of Perlecan/HSPG2 Complexed with Semaphorin 3A Supports FAK-Mediated Stromal Invasion by Prostate Cancer Cells

Interrupting the interplay between cancer cells and extracellular matrix (ECM) is a strategy to halt tumor progression and stromal invasion. Perlecan/heparan sulfate proteoglycan 2 (HSPG2) is an extracellular proteoglycan that orchestrates tumor angiogenesis, proliferation, differentiation and invasion. Metastatic prostate cancer (PCa) cells degrade perlecan-rich tissue borders to reach bone, including the basement membrane, vasculature, reactive stromal matrix and bone marrow. Domain IV-3, perlecan's last 7 immunoglobulin repeats, mimics native proteoglycan by promoting tumoroid formation. This is reversed by matrilysin/matrix metalloproteinase-7 (MMP-7) cleavage to favor cell dispersion and tumoroid dyscohesion. Both perlecan and Domain IV-3 induced a strong focal adhesion kinase (FAK) dephosphorylation/deactivation. MMP-7 cleavage of perlecan reversed this, with FAK in dispersed tumoroids becoming phosphorylated/activated with metastatic phenotype. We demonstrated Domain IV-3 interacts with the axon guidance protein semaphorin 3A (Sema3A) on PCa cells to deactivate pro-metastatic FAK. Sema3A antibody mimicked the Domain IV-3 clustering activity. Direct binding experiments showed Domain IV-3 binds Sema3A. Knockdown of Sema3A prevented Domain IV-3-induced tumoroid formation and Sema3A was sensitive to MMP-7 proteolysis. The perlecan-Sema3A complex abrogates FAK activity and stabilizes PCa cell interactions. MMP-7 expressing cells destroy the complex to initiate metastasis, destroy perlecan-rich borders, and favor invasion and progression to lethal bone disease