SITE-SPECIFIC AND LANDSCAPE FEATURES ASSOCIATED WITH SHRUBLAND BIRD OCCURENCE IN ANTHROPOGENIC SHRUBLANDS IN THE NORTHEASTERN UNITED STATES

Habitats dominated by low-growing trees and shrubs are becoming increasingly uncommon in the northeastern U.S. Human development, altered natural-disturbance regimes, and forest succession have reduced the quantity and quality of these shrublands. As a result, over half of the shrubland-dependent songbirds in the region have experienced long-term population declines. Anthropogenic shrublands, including regenerating clearcuts, sand and gravel mines, old fields, and transmission line rights-of-way may provide nesting habitat for most shrubland birds; but differences in size, site-specific features, and landscape composition may affect bird use. To assess the features that may influence shrubland bird occurrence in anthropogenic shrublands, I conducted presence/absence surveys of 8 species [alder flycatcher (Empidonax alnorum), brown thrasher (Toxostoma rufum), blue-winged warbler (Vermivora cyanoptera), chestnut-sided warbler (Setophaga pensylvanica), eastern towhee (Pipilo erythrophthalmus), field sparrow (Spizella pusilla), indigo bunting (Passerina cyanea), and prairie warbler (Setophaga discolor)] in 101 sites in southeastern New Hampshire during the 2015 and 2016 nesting seasons. For each shrubland, I measured area, site-specific features (e.g., vegetation height, density, and coverage), and characteristics of surrounding landscape features within different buffer zones. Overall, 67% of the variables in the best models predicting bird occurrence were landscape features and 33% were site-specific features. Bird occurrence at a site was positively associated with the proportion of shrublands in the surrounding landscape, particularly within a 500 m buffer. Occurrence of all species except blue-winged warblers and indigo buntings was negatively associated with the proportion of urban development in the surrounding landscape. Shrubland bird species richness increased with vegetation density until vegetation density became too dense for brown thrashers, field sparrows, and prairie warblers. Occurrence of all species except blue-winged warblers increased with shrubland size. These results provide opportunities to enhance existing anthropogenic habitats to benefit populations of declining shrubland birds

The responsibility of the Chinese native pastor in Christian education

https://place.asburyseminary.edu/ecommonsatsdissertations/1963/thumbnail.jp

Industrial Section of Salem: The Great Leather and Shoe City

https://digitalcommons.salemstate.edu/books_pamphlets/1031/thumbnail.jp

El primer contacto entre los musulmanes y los cristianos en la época del Profeta Muhammad (en los primeros tiempos de la Hégira a través de las misivas del Profeta Muhammad primera mitad del siglo I H / VII D.C.)

El título de esta Tesis Doctoral: El primer contacto entre los musulmanes y los cristianos en la Época del Profeta Muḥammad (en los primeros tiempos de la Hégira a través de las misivas del Profeta Muḥammad primera mitad del siglo I H. / VII d. C.), alude a su contenido, un estudio de las misivas que el Profeta Muḥammad envió al Negús de Abisinia, al Muqawqis de Egipto y al emperador de Bizancio, Heraclio, así como a los gobernantes de la Península Arábiga, desde un punto de vista críticohistórico y cultural. Dicho estudio se basará en las misivas conservadas, en las tradiciones proféticas musulmanas que aluden a esa cuestión y en los tratados clásicos árabo-islámicos. La elección del tema de nuestra Tesis Doctoral no fue sencilla, pues, aunque su interés es evidente y existen las suficientes fuentes para emprenderlo, sin embargo los estudios modernos omni-comprensivos son tan escasos como compleja la traducción de las tradiciones proféticas que aluden a la cuestión, y en general carecen de aparato crítico. Además, las fuentes disponibles ofrecen problemas textuales muy arduos y complejos, como expondremos en los siguientes epígrafes de esta Tesis Doctoral. No obstante, nos decantamos por el análisis de los primeros contactos entre musulmanes y cristianos durante la vida del Profeta, no sólo a causa de su evidente interés desde un punto de vista histórico y cultural, sino también porque nuestra inclinación al estudio de este tema se remonta a los inicios de nuestra vida docente: a la sazón, desarrollamos las bases de la presente tesis en un libro de nuestra autoría intitulado “Ḥiwār al-ḥaḍārāt bayna l-wāqi‘ wa ṭ-Ṭumūḥ” (El diálogo entre las civilizaciones, la realidad y la ambición), presentado durante el año 1428 H. / 2007 d. C. Posteriormente, pero durante el mismo año, ampliamos ese tema en nuestro máster, titulado “Al-Iṣlāḥ an-Naqdī fī l-‘Aṣr al-Umawī wa-āṯaruhu ‘alà qtīṣād ad-Dawla waidāratihā” (Estudio de la numismática islámica durante la era omeya). En dicha tesina estudiamos el nexo existente entre la numismática cristiana y la islámica..

A molecular timescale of eukaryote evolution and the rise of complex multicellular life

BACKGROUND: The pattern and timing of the rise in complex multicellular life during Earth's history has not been established. Great disparity persists between the pattern suggested by the fossil record and that estimated by molecular clocks, especially for plants, animals, fungi, and the deepest branches of the eukaryote tree. Here, we used all available protein sequence data and molecular clock methods to place constraints on the increase in complexity through time. RESULTS: Our phylogenetic analyses revealed that (i) animals are more closely related to fungi than to plants, (ii) red algae are closer to plants than to animals or fungi, (iii) choanoflagellates are closer to animals than to fungi or plants, (iv) diplomonads, euglenozoans, and alveolates each are basal to plants+animals+fungi, and (v) diplomonads are basal to other eukaryotes (including alveolates and euglenozoans). Divergence times were estimated from global and local clock methods using 20–188 proteins per node, with data treated separately (multigene) and concatenated (supergene). Different time estimation methods yielded similar results (within 5%): vertebrate-arthropod (964 million years ago, Ma), Cnidaria-Bilateria (1,298 Ma), Porifera-Eumetozoa (1,351 Ma), Pyrenomycetes-Plectomycetes (551 Ma), Candida-Saccharomyces (723 Ma), Hemiascomycetes-filamentous Ascomycota (982 Ma), Basidiomycota-Ascomycota (968 Ma), Mucorales-Basidiomycota (947 Ma), Fungi-Animalia (1,513 Ma), mosses-vascular plants (707 Ma), Chlorophyta-Tracheophyta (968 Ma), Rhodophyta-Chlorophyta+Embryophyta (1,428 Ma), Plantae-Animalia (1,609 Ma), Alveolata-plants+animals+fungi (1,973 Ma), Euglenozoa-plants+animals+fungi (1,961 Ma), and Giardia-plants+animals+fungi (2,309 Ma). By extrapolation, mitochondria arose approximately 2300-1800 Ma and plastids arose 1600-1500 Ma. Estimates of the maximum number of cell types of common ancestors, combined with divergence times, showed an increase from two cell types at 2500 Ma to ~10 types at 1500 Ma and 50 cell types at ~1000 Ma. CONCLUSIONS: The results suggest that oxygen levels in the environment, and the ability of eukaryotes to extract energy from oxygen, as well as produce oxygen, were key factors in the rise of complex multicellular life. Mitochondria and organisms with more than 2–3 cell types appeared soon after the initial increase in oxygen levels at 2300 Ma. The addition of plastids at 1500 Ma, allowing eukaryotes to produce oxygen, preceded the major rise in complexity

Geoscience after IT: Part L. Adjusting the emerging information system to new technology

Coherent development depends on following widely used standards that respect our vast legacy of existing entries in the geoscience record. Middleware ensures that we see a coherent view from our desktops of diverse sources of information. Developments specific to managing the written word, map content, and structured data come together in shared metadata linking topics and information types