Determinates of Georgia White-Tailed Deer Harvests

This manuscript provides recent evidence regarding the determinates of white-tailed deer harvest densities in the state of Georgia. The data from the 2016/17-2020/21 deer hunting seasons indicates total deer harvest density is positively influenced by the prior year’s mature buck harvest density, the turkey harvest density, higher unemployment rates, higher median incomes, and a higher level of education. Deer harvest density was found to be negatively impacted by larger public land harvests the year before and greater human population densities

The Hall of Mirrors Perceptions and Misperceptions in the Congressional Foreign Policy Process

Explores several factors related to an inconsistency in the voting record by the U.S. Congress on foreign policy issues, compared with the position taken by the public, administration officials, and leaders in business, labor, media, and education

Climate policy implications for agricultural water demand

Energy, water and land are scarce resources, critical to humans. Developments in each affect the availability and cost of the others, and consequently human prosperity. Measures to limit greenhouse gas concentrations will inevitably exact dramatic changes on energy and land systems and in turn alter the character, magnitude and geographic distribution of human claims on water resources. We employ the Global Change Assessment Model (GCAM), an integrated assessment model to explore the interactions of energy, land and water systems in the context of alternative policies to limit climate change to three alternative levels: 2.5 Wm-2 (445 ppm CO2-e), 3.5 Wm-2 (535 ppm CO2-e) and 4.5 Wm-2 (645 ppm CO2-e). We explore the effects of two alternative land-use emissions mitigation policy options—one which taxes terrestrial carbon emissions equally with fossil fuel and industrial emissions, and an alternative which only taxes fossil fuel and industrial emissions but places no penalty on land-use change emissions. We find that increasing populations and economic growth could be anticipated to almost triple demand for water for agricultural systems across the century even in the absence of climate policy. In general policies to mitigate climate change increase agricultural demands for water still further, though the largest changes occur in the second half of the century, under both policy regimes. The two policies examined profoundly affected both the sources and magnitudes of the increase in irrigation water demands. The largest increases in agricultural irrigation water demand occurred in scenarios where only fossil fuel emissions were priced (but not land-use change emission) and were primarily driven by rapid expansion in bioenergy production. In these scenarios water demands were large relative to present-day total available water, calling into question whether it would be physically possible to produce the associated biomass energy. We explored the potential of improved water delivery and irrigation system efficiencies. These could potentially reduce demands substantially. However, overall demands remained high under our fossil-fuel-only tax policy. In contrast, when all carbon was priced, increases in agricultural water demands were smaller than under the fossil-fuel-only policy and were driven primarily by increased demands for water by non-biomass crops such as rice. Finally we estimate the geospatial pattern of water demands and find that regions such as China, India and other countries in south and east Asia might be expected to experience greatest increases in water demands

On the need for an international effort to capture, share and use crystallization screening data

Development of an ontology for the description of crystallization experiments and results is proposed

The Long-Baseline Neutrino Experiment: Exploring Fundamental Symmetries of the Universe

The preponderance of matter over antimatter in the early Universe, the dynamics of the supernova bursts that produced the heavy elements necessary for life and whether protons eventually decay --- these mysteries at the forefront of particle physics and astrophysics are key to understanding the early evolution of our Universe, its current state and its eventual fate. The Long-Baseline Neutrino Experiment (LBNE) represents an extensively developed plan for a world-class experiment dedicated to addressing these questions. LBNE is conceived around three central components: (1) a new, high-intensity neutrino source generated from a megawatt-class proton accelerator at Fermi National Accelerator Laboratory, (2) a near neutrino detector just downstream of the source, and (3) a massive liquid argon time-projection chamber deployed as a far detector deep underground at the Sanford Underground Research Facility. This facility, located at the site of the former Homestake Mine in Lead, South Dakota, is approximately 1,300 km from the neutrino source at Fermilab -- a distance (baseline) that delivers optimal sensitivity to neutrino charge-parity symmetry violation and mass ordering effects. This ambitious yet cost-effective design incorporates scalability and flexibility and can accommodate a variety of upgrades and contributions. With its exceptional combination of experimental configuration, technical capabilities, and potential for transformative discoveries, LBNE promises to be a vital facility for the field of particle physics worldwide, providing physicists from around the globe with opportunities to collaborate in a twenty to thirty year program of exciting science. In this document we provide a comprehensive overview of LBNE's scientific objectives, its place in the landscape of neutrino physics worldwide, the technologies it will incorporate and the capabilities it will possess.Comment: Major update of previous version. This is the reference document for LBNE science program and current status. Chapters 1, 3, and 9 provide a comprehensive overview of LBNE's scientific objectives, its place in the landscape of neutrino physics worldwide, the technologies it will incorporate and the capabilities it will possess. 288 pages, 116 figure

Quantitative evidence for the effects of multiple drivers on continental-scale amphibian declines.

Since amphibian declines were first proposed as a global phenomenon over a quarter century ago, the conservation community has made little progress in halting or reversing these trends. The early search for a "smoking gun" was replaced with the expectation that declines are caused by multiple drivers. While field observations and experiments have identified factors leading to increased local extinction risk, evidence for effects of these drivers is lacking at large spatial scales. Here, we use observations of 389 time-series of 83 species and complexes from 61 study areas across North America to test the effects of 4 of the major hypothesized drivers of declines. While we find that local amphibian populations are being lost from metapopulations at an average rate of 3.79% per year, these declines are not related to any particular threat at the continental scale; likewise the effect of each stressor is variable at regional scales. This result - that exposure to threats varies spatially, and populations vary in their response - provides little generality in the development of conservation strategies. Greater emphasis on local solutions to this globally shared phenomenon is needed

Beyond Environmental Regulatory Fragmentation: Signs of Integration in the Case of the Great Lakes Basin

Peer Reviewedhttp://deepblue.lib.umich.edu/bitstream/2027.42/72007/1/j.1468-0491.1995.tb00197.x.pd

WMO Guidelines on Multi-hazard Impact-based Forecast and Warning Services Part II: Putting Multi-hazard IBFWS into Practice

This new addition to the Guidelines, Part II – Putting Multi-hazard IBFWS into Practice, is intended to be authoritative and useful. It is certainly not dogmatic or exhaustive. IBFWS is a rapidly evolving field and the additional chapters here should be considered as reflecting and complementing the growing body of literature on IBFWS, emanating from WMO such as the HiWeather project The Future of Forecasts: Impact-based Forecasting for Early Action, the 2020 guide published by the International Federation of Red Cross and Red Crescent Societies (IFRC). In addition to these Guidelines, a wealth of additional material, including many more case studies and information and training resources, is available on a companion web page at the WMO website. Globally, we are still in the very early stages of implementing IBFWS, and there is still much benefit to be offered, especially to the most vulnerable communities in the world, through continuing the work of applying the concepts of IBFWS and strengthening them wherever possible. The team of experts who assembled these Guidelines hope that they can make some contribution to this progress

Dimerization of FIR upon FUSE DNA binding suggests a mechanism of c-myc inhibition

c-myc is essential for cell homeostasis and growth but lethal if improperly regulated. Transcription of this oncogene is governed by the counterbalancing forces of two proteins on TFIIH—the FUSE binding protein (FBP) and the FBP-interacting repressor (FIR). FBP and FIR recognize single-stranded DNA upstream of the P1 promoter, known as FUSE, and influence transcription by oppositely regulating TFIIH at the promoter site. Size exclusion chromatography coupled with light scattering reveals that an FIR dimer binds one molecule of single-stranded DNA. The crystal structure confirms that FIR binds FUSE as a dimer, and only the N-terminal RRM domain participates in nucleic acid recognition. Site-directed mutations of conserved residues in the first RRM domain reduce FIR's affinity for FUSE, while analogous mutations in the second RRM domain either destabilize the protein or have no effect on DNA binding. Oppositely oriented DNA on parallel binding sites of the FIR dimer results in spooling of a single strand of bound DNA, and suggests a mechanism for c-myc transcriptional control