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Full-Text Articles in Life Sciences

Homogenization Of Forest Plant Communities And Weakening Of Species-Environment Relationships Via Agricultural Land Use, Mark Vellend, Kris Verheyen, Kathryn M. Flinn, Hans Jacquemyn, Annette Kolb, Hans Van Calster, George Peterken, Bente Jessen Graae, Jesse Bellemare, Olivier Honnay, Jörg Brunet, Monika Wulf, Fritz Gerhardt, Martin Hermy May 2007

Homogenization Of Forest Plant Communities And Weakening Of Species-Environment Relationships Via Agricultural Land Use, Mark Vellend, Kris Verheyen, Kathryn M. Flinn, Hans Jacquemyn, Annette Kolb, Hans Van Calster, George Peterken, Bente Jessen Graae, Jesse Bellemare, Olivier Honnay, Jörg Brunet, Monika Wulf, Fritz Gerhardt, Martin Hermy

Biological Sciences: Faculty Publications

Disturbance may cause community composition across sites to become more or less homogenous, depending on the importance of different processes involved in community assembly. In north-eastern North America and Europe local (alpha) diversity of forest plants is lower in forests growing on former agricultural fields (recent forests) than in older (ancient) forests, but little is known about the influence of land-use history on the degree of compositional differentiation among sites (beta diversity). Here we analyse data from 1446 sites in ancient and recent forests across 11 different landscapes in north-eastern North America and Europe to demonstrate decreases in beta diversity …


Chumming On The Chesapeake Bay And Complexity Theory: Why The Precautionary Principle, Not Cost-Benefit Analysis, Makes More Sense As A Regulatory Approach, Hope M. Babcock Jan 2007

Chumming On The Chesapeake Bay And Complexity Theory: Why The Precautionary Principle, Not Cost-Benefit Analysis, Makes More Sense As A Regulatory Approach, Hope M. Babcock

Georgetown Law Faculty Publications and Other Works

Estuaries like the Chesapeake Bay ("Bay") and Puget Sound are in grave trouble. They each suffer from poor water quality, loss of habitat, and declining biodiversity, and efforts to restore their health are straining both public and private resources. While accomplishments are often recorded in the fight against these ills, it is clear these accomplishments "are not yet equal to the scale of the problems." The focus of this article is on the nation's largest estuary, the Bay. Despite the investment of billions of dollars to improve water quality, the Bay continues to suffer from severe environmental degradation that impairs …


In The Heat Of The Law, It's Not Just Steam: Geothermal Resources And The Impact On Thermophile Biodiversity, Donald J. Kochan, Tiffany Grant Dec 2006

In The Heat Of The Law, It's Not Just Steam: Geothermal Resources And The Impact On Thermophile Biodiversity, Donald J. Kochan, Tiffany Grant

Donald J. Kochan

Significant research has been conducted into the utilization of geothermal resources as a ‘green’ energy source. However, minimal research has been conducted into geothermal resource utilization and depletion impacts on thermophile biodiversity. Thermophiles are organisms which have adapted over millions of year to extreme temperature and chemical compositions and exist in hot springs and other geothermal resources. Their ability to withstand high temperatures makes them invaluable to scientific and medical research. Current federal and California case law classify geothermal resources as a mineral, not a water resource. Acquisition of rights to develop a geothermal resource owned or reserved by the …