Perceptions of vulture supplementary feeding site managers and potential hidden risks to avian scavengers

Under the current African vulture crisis, supplementary feeding sites (SFS), which provide carrion resources, have become a popular conservation tool to address vulture declines. In South Africa, this practice is unregulated and the context in which SFS operate and their adherence to best management practices is currently unknown. In this study, we conducted a survey with SFS managers regarding the management of their SFS to evaluate potential conservation implications of different practices. Half of the SFS surveyed were associated with livestock farming. Overall, most managers (84%) perceived some benefit from running an SFS, largely attributed to cleaning services provided by vultures. Over half of the managers perceived no disadvantages from running SFS. We found a positive correlation between numbers of vultures seen at SFS and the amount of food provided there. Despite unintentional and intentional poisoning being identified by experts as the most critical threats to vultures in Southern Africa, only 47 and 24% of managers, respectively, listed these as potential threats to vultures, highlighting limited understanding of current vulture conservation issues. Most managers (85%) vetted carcasses for provisioning suitability based on whether they had been treated with veterinary drugs, but relatively few managers (10%) did the same for lead (Pb) contamination. Only 30% of managers considered threats to vultures when they decided on a location for their SFS. Overall, this study unveils that at many SFS, safety conditions are not met and vultures may be exposed to risks, such as the ingestion of toxic substances (e.g., Pb) or electrocution by energy infrastructure. To minimize unintended negative consequences from SFS, it will be essential to increase the interaction between SFS managers and conservation practitioners, to increase the flow of information on best management practices and enforce stringent and clear guidelines that minimize any risks to vultures.Peer reviewe

Investigating Alaskan Methane and Carbon Dioxide Fluxes Using Measurements from the CARVE Tower

Northern high-latitude carbon sources and sinks, including those resulting from degrading permafrost, are thought to be sensitive to the rapidly warming climate. Because the near-surface atmosphere integrates surface fluxes over large ( ∼ 500–1000 km) scales, atmospheric monitoring of carbon dioxide (CO2) and methane (CH4) mole fractions in the daytime mixed layer is a promising method for detecting change in the carbon cycle throughout boreal Alaska. Here we use CO2 and CH4 measurements from a NOAA tower 17 km north of Fairbanks, AK, established as part of NASA\u27s Carbon in Arctic Reservoirs Vulnerability Experiment (CARVE), to investigate regional fluxes of CO2 and CH4 for 2012–2014. CARVE was designed to use aircraft and surface observations to better understand and quantify the sensitivity of Alaskan carbon fluxes to climate variability. We use high-resolution meteorological fields from the Polar Weather Research and Forecasting (WRF) model coupled with the Stochastic Time-Inverted Lagrangian Transport model (hereafter, WRF-STILT), along with the Polar Vegetation Photosynthesis and Respiration Model (PolarVPRM), to investigate fluxes of CO2 in boreal Alaska using the tower observations, which are sensitive to large areas of central Alaska. We show that simulated PolarVPRM–WRF-STILT CO2 mole fractions show remarkably good agreement with tower observations, suggesting that the WRF-STILT model represents the meteorology of the region quite well, and that the PolarVPRM flux magnitudes and spatial distribution are generally consistent with CO2 mole fractions observed at the CARVE tower. One exception to this good agreement is that during the fall of all 3 years, PolarVPRM cannot reproduce the observed CO2 respiration. Using the WRF-STILT model, we find that average CH4 fluxes in boreal Alaska are somewhat lower than flux estimates by Chang et al. (2014) over all of Alaska for May–September 2012; we also find that enhancements appear to persist during some wintertime periods, augmenting those observed during the summer and fall. The possibility of significant fall and winter CO2 and CH4 fluxes underscores the need for year-round in situ observations to quantify changes in boreal Alaskan annual carbon balance

Arbeitsqualität und wirtschaftlicher Erfolg: Längsschnittstudie in deutschen Betrieben ; Endbericht

Die Studie Arbeitsqualität und wirtschaftlicher Erfolg hat zum Ziel, die Wirkung von Personalmaßnahmen und insbesondere die Zusammenhänge zwischen der Arbeitsqualität der Beschäftigten und dem wirtschaftlichen Erfolg von Betrieben zu untersuchen. Es handelt sich um eine Längsschnittstudie, in der in drei Befragungswellen seit 2012 jeweils eine Betriebs- und eine Beschäftigtenbefragung durchgeführt wurde. Der Abschlussbericht fasst die Daten aus allen Befragungswellen zusammen. Die Forschungsstudie wird vom Bundesministerium für Arbeit und Soziales (BMAS) und vom Institut für Arbeitsmarkt- und Berufsforschung (IAB) getragen und vom IAB, vom Seminar für Allgemeine Betriebswirtschaftslehre und Personalwirtschaftslehre der Universität zu Köln, dem Lehrstuhl für Managerial Accounting der Eberhard Karls Universität Tübingen und vom Zentrum für Europäische Wirtschaftsforschung (ZEW) durchgeführt. In Verlängerung des Forschungsprojekts wir derzeit eine vierte Befragungswelle vorbereitet

Using atmospheric trace gas vertical profiles to evaluate model fluxes: a case study of Arctic-CAP observations and GEOS simulations for the ABoVE domain

Accurate estimates of carbon&ndash;climate feedbacks require an independent means for evaluating surface flux models at regional scales. The altitude-integrated enhancement (AIE) derived from the Arctic Carbon Atmospheric Profiles (Arctic-CAP) project demonstrates the utility of this bulk quantity for surface flux model evaluation. This bulk quantity leverages background mole fraction values from the middle free troposphere, is agnostic to uncertainties in boundary layer height, and can be derived from model estimates of mole fractions and vertical gradients. To demonstrate the utility of the bulk quantity, six airborne profiling surveys of atmospheric carbon dioxide (CO2), methane (CH4), and carbon monoxide (CO) throughout Alaska and northwestern Canada between April and November&nbsp;2017 were completed as part of NASA's Arctic&ndash;Boreal Vulnerability Experiment (ABoVE). The Arctic-CAP sampling strategy involved acquiring vertical profiles of CO2, CH4, and CO from the surface to 5&thinsp;km altitude at 25 sites around the ABoVE domain on a 4- to 6-week time interval. All Arctic-CAP measurements were compared to a global simulation using the Goddard Earth Observing System (GEOS) modeling system. Comparisons of the AIE bulk quantity from aircraft observations and GEOS simulations of atmospheric CO2, CH4, and CO highlight the fidelity of the modeled surface fluxes. The model&ndash;data comparison over the ABoVE domain reveals that while current state-of-the-art models and flux estimates are able to capture broad-scale spatial and temporal patterns in near-surface CO2 and CH4 concentrations, more work is needed to resolve fine-scale flux features that are captured in CO observations. &nbsp;</p

The three Rs of river ecosystem resilience : Resources, recruitment, and refugia

This review article may be used for non-commercial purposes in accordance with Wiley Terms and Conditions for Use of Self-Archived VersionResilience in river ecosystems requires that organisms must persist in the face of highly dynamic hydrological and geomorphological variations. Disturbance events such as floods and droughts are postulated to shape life history traits that support resilience, but river management and conservation would benefit from greater understanding of the emergent effects in communities of river organisms. We unify current knowledge of taxonomic-, phylogenetic-, and trait-based aspects of river communities that might aid the identification and quantification of resilience mechanisms. Temporal variations in river productivity, physical connectivity, and environmental heterogeneity resulting from floods and droughts are highlighted as key characteristics that promote resilience in these dynamic ecosystems. Three community-wide mechanisms that underlie resilience are (a) partitioning (competition/facilitation) of dynamically varying resources, (b) dispersal, recolonization, and recruitment promoted by connectivity, and (c) functional redundancy in communities promoted by resource heterogeneity and refugia. Along with taxonomic and phylogenetic identity, biological traits related to feeding specialization, dispersal ability, and habitat specialization mediate organism responses to disturbance. Measures of these factors might also enable assessment of the relative contributions of different mechanisms to community resilience. Interactions between abiotic drivers and biotic aspects of resource use, dispersal, and persistence have clear implications for river conservation and management. To support these management needs, we propose a set of taxonomic, phylogenetic, and life-history trait metrics that might be used to measure resilience mechanisms. By identifying such indicators, our proposed framework can enable targeted management strategies to adapt river ecosystems to global change

ECRG4 is a candidate tumor suppressor gene frequently hypermethylated in colorectal carcinoma and glioma

<p>Abstract</p> <p>Background</p> <p>Cancer cells display widespread changes in DNA methylation that may lead to genetic instability by global hypomethylation and aberrant silencing of tumor suppressor genes by focal hypermethylation. In turn, altered DNA methylation patterns have been used to identify putative tumor suppressor genes.</p> <p>Methods</p> <p>In a methylation screening approach, we identified <it>ECRG4 </it>as a differentially methylated gene. We analyzed different cancer cells for <it>ECRG4 </it>promoter methylation by COBRA and bisulfite sequencing. Gene expression analysis was carried out by semi-quantitative RT-PCR. The <it>ECRG4 </it>coding region was cloned and transfected into colorectal carcinoma cells. Cell growth was assessed by MTT and BrdU assays. ECRG4 localization was analyzed by fluorescence microscopy and Western blotting after transfection of an <it>ECRG4-eGFP </it>fusion gene.</p> <p>Results</p> <p>We found a high frequency of <it>ECRG4 </it>promoter methylation in various cancer cell lines. Remarkably, aberrant methylation of <it>ECRG4 </it>was also found in primary human tumor tissues, including samples from colorectal carcinoma and from malignant gliomas. <it>ECRG4 </it>hypermethylation associated strongly with transcriptional silencing and its expression could be re-activated <it>in vitro </it>by demethylating treatment with 5-aza-2'-deoxycytidine. Overexpression of <it>ECRG4 </it>in colorectal carcinoma cells led to a significant decrease in cell growth. In transfected cells, ECRG4 protein was detectable within the Golgi secretion machinery as well as in the culture medium.</p> <p>Conclusions</p> <p><it>ECRG4 </it>is silenced via promoter hypermethylation in different types of human cancer cells. Its gene product may act as inhibitor of cell proliferation in colorectal carcinoma cells and may play a role as extracellular signaling molecule.</p

A global agenda for advancing freshwater biodiversity research

Global freshwater biodiversity is declining dramatically, and meeting the challenges of this crisis requires bold goals and the mobilisation of substantial resources. While the reasons are varied, investments in both research and conservation of freshwater biodiversity lag far behind those in the terrestrial and marine realms. Inspired by a global consultation, we identify 15 pressing priority needs, grouped into five research areas, in an effort to support informed stewardship of freshwater biodiversity. The proposed agenda aims to advance freshwater biodiversity research globally as a critical step in improving coordinated actions towards its sustainable management and conservation