Searching for effective natural-resources policy: The special challenges of ecosystem management

No matter how elegant ecosystem management is scientifically, it will not reach its potential in western U.S., with its abundant public lands, unless it is effective public policy. Such policy is (1) an adaptive process, (2) utilizes the most appropriate science and technology, (3) is implementable, and (4) has low transaction cost. This paper focuses on the latter two characteristics which are shaped by social legitimacy, and proposes a procedure termed Collaborative Learning as a promising decision-making process for ecosystem management. Two defining criteria of social legitimacy in contemporary American public policy are (1) policy solutions must be recognized as technically sound; and (2) if people\u27s lives are affected, they must have a voice in policy process. The increasing sophistication of science and technology makes them less understood by the general public, and creates a dilemma between the narrow politics of expertise and a broad politics of public inclusion. Land management of any form in western U.S., with its mixed land ownership, is complicated and constrained by deeply held public values; multiple world views, parties and issues; legal constraints; and an entrenched conflict industry. Ecosystem management compounds these difficulties by adding more technical complexity and uncertainty, a systems view, increased focus on mixed-ownership solutions, and the importance of institutional continuity. Collaborative Learning (CL) is a framework for natural-resources policy making with public involvement. It is a hybrid between soft-systems methodology, which promotes learning and systems thinking, and alternative dispute resolution, which deals with value differences and strategic behaviors. CL stresses improvement rather than solution, situation over problem or conflict, concerns and interests rather than positions, progress over success, desirable and feasible change rather than desired future condition. Evaluations of CL conclude that the process broadens participants\u27 understanding, improves communication between diverse communities, and implements improvements. And while strategic behaviors persist, there is increased rapport, respect, and trust among participants. It is well-suited to ecosystem management

From the Forest to the River: Citizens\u27 Views of Stakeholder Engagement

Since the early 1990s collaboration and consensus processes have become associated with success in the environmental policy and natural resource policy arenas. Interest in collaboration and consensus processes have emerged, in part, out of a frustration with more conventional efforts used to involve stakeholders, to work though conflicts, and to make decisions in the environmental and natural resource policy arenas. Collaboration and consensus processes, when designed well and applied appropriately, provide opportunities for meaningful stakeholder engagement. This essay features aspects of two government-led or agency-based (Koontz et al. 2004; Moore and Koontz 2003) planning efforts that consider collaboration and citizens/stakeholder engagement. Both projects, a forest management plan revision on the Allegheny National Forest in Pennsylvania, and a regional sediment management planning effort at the mouth of the Columbia River in the Pacific Northwest, have considered a Collaborative Learning (CL) approach (Daniels and Walker 2001) for stakeholder involvement. As part of these CL applications, citizens/stakeholders have been asked for their views of the kind of participation processes they value and how they prefer to be involved. This essay presents a summary of citizens\u27 ideas. In doing so, it addresses the question: How do stakeholders want to be engaged in agency-led planning efforts? Data reveal that stakeholders prefer active engagement, access to information and events, and clearly defined decision space. Prior to presenting the project data germane to this question, the paper highlights the trinity of voice and Collaborative Learning

Spatial audio in small display screen devices

Our work addresses the problem of (visual) clutter in mobile device interfaces. The solution we propose involves the translation of technique-from the graphical to the audio domain-for expliting space in information representation. This article presents an illustrative example in the form of a spatialisedaudio progress bar. In usability tests, participants performed background monitoring tasks significantly more accurately using this spatialised audio (a compared with a conventional visual) progress bar. Moreover, their performance in a simultaneously running, visually demanding foreground task was significantly improved in the eye-free monitoring condition. These results have important implications for the design of multi-tasking interfaces for mobile devices

Collaboration in Environmental Conflict Management and Decision-Making: Comparing Best Practices With Insights From Collaborative Learning Work

For much of the past three decades, when environmental or natural resource conflicts have emerged, diverse parties (government agencies, stakeholder organizations, and citizens) have often sought an alternative to adversarial battles. They have turned to collaboration, and in so doing, have attempted to work through conflicts to find common ground and make sound decisions. And in so doing their experiences have given rise to the development of “best practices” for conducting collaborative work. This essay considers three sets of best practices for collaboration and compares those practices with the “best practices” that the authors have determined from their 27 years of Collaborative Learning fieldwork. When insights from Collaborative Learning projects are combined with a collective set of best practices, 18 areas emerge to guide collaborative efforts

Transcriptional down-regulation of ccr5 in a subset of HIV+ controllers and their family members.

HIV +Elite and Viremic controllers (EC/VCs) are able to control virus infection, perhaps because of host genetic determinants. We identified 16% (21 of 131) EC/VCs with CD4 +T cells with resistance specific to R5-tropic HIV, reversed after introduction of ccr5. R5 resistance was not observed in macrophages and depended upon the method of T cell activation. CD4 +T cells of these EC/VCs had lower ccr2 and ccr5 RNA levels, reduced CCR2 and CCR5 cell-surface expression, and decreased levels of secreted chemokines. T cells had no changes in chemokine receptor mRNA half-life but instead had lower levels of active transcription of ccr2 and ccr5, despite having more accessible chromatin by ATAC-seq. Other nearby genes were also down-regulated, over a region of ~500 kb on chromosome 3p21. This same R5 resistance phenotype was observed in family members of an index VC, also associated with ccr2/ccr5 down-regulation, suggesting that the phenotype is heritable

The improvement of Mo/4H-SiC Schottky diodes via a P2O5 surface passivation treatment

Molybdenum (Mo)/4H-silicon carbide (SiC) Schottky barrier diodes have been fabricated with a phosphorus pentoxide (P2O5) surface passivation treatment performed on the SiC surface prior to metallization. Compared to the untreated diodes, the P2O5-treated diodes were found to have a lower Schottky barrier height by 0.11 eV and a lower leakage current by two to three orders of magnitude. Physical characterization of the P2O5-treated Mo/SiC interfaces revealed that there are two primary causes for the improvement in electrical performance. First, transmission electron microscopy imaging showed that nanopits filled with silicon dioxide had formed at the surface after the P2O5 treatment that terminates potential leakage paths. Second, secondary ion mass spectroscopy revealed a high concentration of phosphorus atoms near the interface. While only a fraction of these are active, a small increase in doping at the interface is responsible for the reduction in barrier height. Comparisons were made between the P2O5 pretreatment and oxygen (O2) and nitrous oxide (N2O) pretreatments that do not form the same nanopits and do not reduce leakage current. X-ray photoelectron spectroscopy shows that SiC beneath the deposited P2O5 oxide retains a Si-rich interface unlike the N2O and O2 treatments that consume SiC and trap carbon at the interface. Finally, after annealing, the Mo/SiC interface forms almost no silicide, leaving the enhancement to the subsurface in place, explaining why the P2O5 treatment has had no effect on nickel- or titanium-SiC contacts

Malpais spring virus is a new species in the genus vesiculovirus

BACKGROUND: Malpais Spring virus (MSPV) is a mosquito-borne rhabdovirus that infects a variety of wild and feral ungulates in New Mexico, including horses and deer. Although, initial serologic tests and electron microscopy at the time of isolation nearly 25 years ago provided evidence that MSPV is a novel virus, possibly related to vesiculoviruses, the virus still has not been approved as a new species. FINDINGS: Use of the illumina platform allowed us to obtain the complete genome of MSPV. Analysis of the complete 11019 nt genome sequence of the prototype 85-488NM strain of MSPV indicates that it encodes the five common rhabdovirus structural proteins (N, P, M, G and L) with alternative ORFs (> 180 nt) in the N, M and G genes, including a 249 nt ORF in the G gene predicted to encode a 9.26 kDa highly basic transmembrane protein. Although antigenically very distant, phylogenetic analysis of the L gene indicates that MSPV is most closely related to Jurona virus, also isolated from mosquitoes in Brazil, as well as a number of other vesiculoviruses. CONCLUSIONS: In sum, our analysis indicates MSPV should be classified as a member of the genus Vesiculovirus, family Rhabdoviridae. The complete genome sequence of MSPV will be helpful in the development of a reverse genetics system to study the unique aspects of this vesiculovirus in vivo and in vitro, and will assist development of specific diagnostic tests to study the epidemiology of MSPV infection

Improved Techniques for the Surveillance of the Near Earth Space Environment with the Murchison Widefield Array

In this paper we demonstrate improved techniques to extend coherent processing intervals for passive radar processing, with the Murchison Widefield Array. Specifically, we apply a two stage linear range and Doppler migration compensation by utilising Keystone Formatting and a recent dechirping method. These methods are used to further demonstrate the potential for the surveillance of space with the Murchison Widefield Array using passive radar, by detecting objects orders of magnitude smaller than previous work. This paper also demonstrates how the linear Doppler migration methods can be extended to higher order compensation to further increase potential processing intervals.Comment: Presented at the 2019 IEEE Radar Conference in Boston earlier this yea

Planar and Three-Dimensional Printing of Conductive Inks

Printed electronics rely on low-cost, large-area fabrication routes to create flexible or multidimensional electronic, optoelectronic, and biomedical devices1-3. In this paper, we focus on one- (1D), two- (2D), and three-dimensional (3D) printing of conductive metallic inks in the form of flexible, stretchable, and spanning microelectrodes