Reforming state-level coastal management and development policies: strategic retreat as an innovative, proactive and equitable coastal environmental management strategy

Atlantic and Gulf Coast shorelines include some of the most unique and biologically rich ecosystems in the United States that provide immeasurable aesthetic, habitat and economic benefits. Natural coastal ecosystems, however, are under increasing threat from rampant and irresponsible growth and development. Once a boon to local economies, complex natural forces – enhanced by global climate change and sea level rise - are now considered hazards and eroding the very foundation upon which coastal development is based. For nearly a century, beach restoration and erosion control structures have been used to artificially stabilize shorelines in an effort to protect structures and infrastructure. Beach restoration, the import and emplacement of sand on an eroding beach, is expensive, unpredictable, inefficient and may result in long-term environmental impacts. The detrimental environmental impacts of erosion control structures such as sea walls, groins, bulkheads and revetments include sediment deficits, accelerated erosion and beach loss. These and other traditional responses to coastal erosion and storm impacts- along with archaic federal and state policies, subsidies and development incentives - are costly, encourage risky development, artificially increase property values of high-risk or environmentally sensitive properties, reduce the post-storm resilience of shorelines, damage coastal ecosystems and are becoming increasingly unsustainable. Although communities, coastal managers and property owners face increasingly complex and difficult challenges, there is an emerging public, social and political awareness that, without meaningful policy reforms, coastal ecosystems and economies are in jeopardy. Strategic retreat is a sustainable, interdisciplinary management strategy that supports the proactive, planned removal of vulnerable coastal development; reduces risk; increases shoreline resiliency and ensures long term protection of coastal systems. Public policies and management strategies that can overcome common economic misperceptions and promote the removal of vulnerable development will provide state and local policy makers and coastal managers with an effective management tool that concomitantly addresses the economic, environmental, legal and political issues along developed shorelines. (PDF contains 4 pages

Utilizing Background Music to Increase In-Seat Behavior for Students with Disabilities

Students diagnosed with moderate to severe disabilities often struggle to stay on-task and in their seat during classroom lessons. When students are off-task, they are not attending or participating in learning activities, which impacts their ability to acquire new skills. Practical whole class interventions that can be easily implemented are needed to keep students focused and in their seat. The current study provided calming background music during daily learning activities to determine whether on-task, specifically in-seat, behavior would increase in relation to when background music was not provided. Three students participated in an A-B-A-B single case design study where the baseline conditions had no background music and the intervention phases included background music. Results demonstrated an increase of in-seat behavior across the study sample. This indicates that providing background music in a special day class setting may be useful to increase in-seat behavior in special education students with a diagnosis in the moderate to severe range

She Who Laughs Loudest: A Meditation on Zen Humor

Articulating a Zen Buddhist perspective on humor, this paper examines the Japanese Zen Buddhist response of humor in the face of the suffering of situated existence and the motivations for this response. The examination will take the school of Rinzai Zen Buddhism as its exemplar. I argue that in order to appreciate the function of humor in Zen a number of cultural and historical influences must be considered: correlative ontology; the Buddhist notion of emptiness; the impotence of language; sense and nonsense; and the senselessness of transgression

Comparative mitochondrial genomics within and among species of killifish

<p>Abstract</p> <p>Background</p> <p>This study was motivated by the observation of unusual mitochondrial haplotype distributions and associated physiological differences between populations of the killifish <it>Fundulus heteroclitus </it>distributed along the Atlantic coast of North America. A distinct "northern" haplotype is fixed in all populations north of New Jersey, and does not appear south of New Jersey except in extreme upper-estuary fresh water habitats, and northern individuals are known to be more tolerant of hyposmotic conditions than southern individuals. Complete mitochondrial genomes were sequenced from individuals from northern coastal, southern coastal, and fresh water populations (and from out-groups). Comparative genomics approaches were used to test multiple evolutionary hypotheses proposed to explain among-population genome variation including directional selection and hybridization.</p> <p>Results</p> <p>Structure and organization of the <it>Fundulus </it>mitochondrial genome is typical of animals, yet subtle differences in substitution patterns exist among populations. No signals of directional selection or hybridization were detected. Mitochondrial genes evolve at variable rates, but all genes exhibit very low dN/dS ratios across all lineages, and the southern population harbors more synonymous polymorphism than other populations.</p> <p>Conclusion</p> <p>Evolution of mitochondrial genomes within <it>Fundulus </it>is primarily governed by interaction between strong purifying selection and demographic influences, including larger historical population size in the south. Though directional selection and hybridization hypotheses were not supported, adaptive processes may indirectly contribute to partitioning of variation between populations.</p

Establishing a Quantifiable Model of Whale Shark Avoidance Behaviours to Anthropogenic Impacts in Tourism Encounters to Inform Management Actions

As the world's largest living fish, the whale shark has received much scientific attention in recent years, although despite this a great deal is still unknown on the life history and behavioural ecology of these majestic sharks. Whale shark related tourism has exploded in the last two decades from only a few sites in the 1990s to more than 12 sites internationally, allowing it to become a highly lucrative industry based upon this Vulnerable species. This study assesses the effects of anthropogenic impact on the sharks’ avoidance behaviours within modern day tourism encounters, and provides recommendations on how to control and reduce unnecessary disturbance to the species. By means of stereo-photogrammetry, continuous high definition videos of human-animal interactions were recorded and analyzed for behavioural changes against pre-selected independant variables. The use of Stereo-photogrammetry imagery also allowed for the accumulation of repeatable, proximity measurements of swimmer distance to the shark, permitting more precise and accurate results. Avoidance behaviours of 33 individual whale sharks were monitored during typical tourism encounters (n=75). A total of 192 search hours were documented over the collection periods, which incorporated three-aggregation sites spanning the Indian Ocean (the Seychelles, the Philipines & Mozambique). A generalized linear model demonstrated that proximity of swimmers to the shark was found to be significant (p=0.0295) in explaining the probability of the whale sharks showing disturbed behaviour. A proportional odds plot for proximity was developed to give an indication of the animals disturbance level in tourism interactions. At recommended distances of three metres from the sides of the shark, there is on average a 42% chance of disturbance, while at the distance of four metres from the tail area results showed a 31% chance of overall disturbance. The true estimate for either distance is likely to lie between 22-53% respectively with regards to the uncertainty around the mean predictions. Whale shark tourism is viewed as a potential means of protecting this threatened species, while also providing a sustainable livelihood for local communities and tourism providers. Management recommendations presented offer suggestions on how to tackle concerns over proximity distances and links to disturbance. Additionally judgments for future research endeavors into assessing both the impacts of uncontrolled tourism and participants behaviour

Two Cases of Platypnoea-Orthodexia

Platypnoea-orthodexia syndrome is a rare cause of dyspnoea when hypoxaemia is induced by the upright position and relieved by recumbency. We report two cases in which platypnoea-orthodexia syndrome was present and caused by two different mechanisms: intracardiac shunt and intrapulmonary shunt

Variation in tissue-specific gene expression among natural populations

BACKGROUND: Variation in gene expression is extensive among tissues, individuals, strains, populations and species. The interactions among these sources of variation are relevant for physiological studies such as disease or toxic stress; for example, it is common for pathologies such as cancer, heart failure and metabolic disease to be associated with changes in tissue-specific gene expression or changes in metabolic gene expression. But how conserved these differences are among outbred individuals and among populations has not been well documented. To address this we examined the expression of a selected suite of 192 metabolic genes in brain, heart and liver in three populations of the teleost fish Fundulus heteroclitus using a highly replicated experimental design. RESULTS: Half of the genes (48%) were differentially expressed among individuals within a population-tissue group and 76% were differentially expressed among tissues. Differences among tissues reflected well established tissue-specific metabolic requirements, suggesting that these measures of gene expression accurately reflect changes in proteins and their phenotypic effects. Remarkably, only a small subset (31%) of tissue-specific differences was consistent in all three populations. CONCLUSIONS: These data indicate that many tissue-specific differences in gene expression are unique to one population and thus are unlikely to contribute to fundamental differences between tissue types. We suggest that those subsets of treatment-specific gene expression patterns that are conserved between taxa are most likely to be functionally related to the physiological state in question

The Kashmir conflict of 1947 : testimonies of a contested history

[Abstract not included]

Modelling sediment supply and transport in the River Lugg: strategies for controlling sediment loads

The River Lugg has particular problems with high sediment loads that have resulted in detrimental impacts on ecology and fisheries. A new dynamic, process-based model of hydrology and sediments (INCA- SED) has been developed and applied to the River Lugg system using an extensive data set from 1995–2008. The model simulates sediment sources and sinks throughout the catchment and gives a good representation of the sediment response at 22 reaches along the River Lugg. A key question considered in using the model is the management of sediment sources so that concentrations and bed loads can be reduced in the river system. Altogether, five sediment management scenarios were selected for testing on the River Lugg, including land use change, contour tillage, hedging and buffer strips. Running the model with parameters altered to simulate these five scenarios produced some interesting results. All scenarios achieved some reduction in sediment levels, with the 40% land use change achieving the best result with a 19% reduction. The other scenarios also achieved significant reductions of between 7% and 9%. Buffer strips produce the best result at close to 9%. The results suggest that if hedge introduction, contour tillage and buffer strips were all applied, sediment reductions would total 24%, considerably improving the current sediment situation. We present a novel cost-effectiveness analysis of our results where we use percentage of land removed from production as our cost function. Given the minimal loss of land associated with contour tillage, hedges and buffer strips, we suggest that these management practices are the most cost-effective combination to reduce sediment loads