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Full-Text Articles in Life Sciences

Biodiversity And The Challenge Of Saving The Ordinary, Holly Doremus Nov 2012

Biodiversity And The Challenge Of Saving The Ordinary, Holly Doremus

Holly Doremus

No abstract provided.


Nature, Knowledge And Profit: The Yellowstone Bioprospecting Controversy And The Core Purposes Of America's National Parks, Holly Doremus Nov 2012

Nature, Knowledge And Profit: The Yellowstone Bioprospecting Controversy And The Core Purposes Of America's National Parks, Holly Doremus

Holly Doremus

Examines response to an agreement between Diversa Corp., a biotechnology company, and Yellowstone National Park, which would allow Diversa to use microbes for commercial purposes; includes laws on technology transfer and National Parks, and the role of National Parks; US.


Effects Of Nitrogen Deposition And Empirical Nitrogen Critical Loads For Ecoregions Of The United States, Linda H. Pardo, Mark E. Fenn, Christine L. Goodale, Linda H. Geiser, Charles T. Driscoll, Edith B. Allen, Jill S. Baron, Roland Bobbink, William D. Bowman, Christopher M. Clark, Bridget Emmett, Frank S. Gilliam, Tara L. Greaver, Sharon J. Hall, Erik A. Lilleskov, Lingli Liu, Jason A. Lynch, Knute J. Nadelhoffer, Steven S. Perakis, Molly J. Robin-Abbott, John L. Stoddard, Kathleen C. Weathers, Robin L. Dennis Sep 2012

Effects Of Nitrogen Deposition And Empirical Nitrogen Critical Loads For Ecoregions Of The United States, Linda H. Pardo, Mark E. Fenn, Christine L. Goodale, Linda H. Geiser, Charles T. Driscoll, Edith B. Allen, Jill S. Baron, Roland Bobbink, William D. Bowman, Christopher M. Clark, Bridget Emmett, Frank S. Gilliam, Tara L. Greaver, Sharon J. Hall, Erik A. Lilleskov, Lingli Liu, Jason A. Lynch, Knute J. Nadelhoffer, Steven S. Perakis, Molly J. Robin-Abbott, John L. Stoddard, Kathleen C. Weathers, Robin L. Dennis

Frank S. Gilliam

Human activity in the last century has led to a significant increase in nitrogen (N) emissions and atmospheric deposition. This N deposition has reached a level that has caused or is likely to cause alterations to the structure and function of many ecosystems across the United States. One approach for quantifying the deposition of pollution that would be harmful to ecosystems is the determination of critical loads. A critical load is defined as the input of a pollutant below which no detrimental ecological effects occur over the long-term according to present knowledge. The objectives of this project were to synthesize …


Effects Of Experimental Nitrogen Additions On Plant Diversity In Tropical Forests Of Contrasting Disturbance Regimes In Southern China, Xiankai Lu, Jiangming Mo, Frank S. Gilliam, Guirui Yu, Wei Zhang, Yunting Fang, Juan Huang Sep 2012

Effects Of Experimental Nitrogen Additions On Plant Diversity In Tropical Forests Of Contrasting Disturbance Regimes In Southern China, Xiankai Lu, Jiangming Mo, Frank S. Gilliam, Guirui Yu, Wei Zhang, Yunting Fang, Juan Huang

Frank S. Gilliam

Responses of understory plant diversity to nitrogen (N) additions were investigated in reforested forests of contrasting disturbance regimes in southern China from 2003 to 2008: disturbed forest (withharvesting of understory vegetation and litter) and rehabilitated forest (without harvesting). Experimental additions of N were administered as the following treatments: Control, 50 kg N ha1yr1, and 100kg N ha1yr1. Nitrogen additions did not significantly affect understory plant richness, density,and cover in the disturbed forest. Similarly, no significant response was found for canopy closure in thisforest. In the rehabilitated forest, species richness and density showed no significant response to Nadditions; however, understory cover …


Synthesis, Linda H. Pardo, Linda H. Geiser, Mark E. Fenn, Charles T. Driscoll, Christine L. Goodale, Edith B. Allen, Jill S. Baron, Roland Bobbink, William D. Bowman, Christopher M. Clark, Bridget Emmett, Frank S. Gilliam, Tara Greaver, Sharon J. Hall, Erik A. Lilleskov, Lingli Liu, Jason A. Lynch, Knute Nadelhoffer, Steven S. Perakis, Molly J. Robin-Abbott, John L. Stoddard, Kathleen C. Weathers Sep 2012

Synthesis, Linda H. Pardo, Linda H. Geiser, Mark E. Fenn, Charles T. Driscoll, Christine L. Goodale, Edith B. Allen, Jill S. Baron, Roland Bobbink, William D. Bowman, Christopher M. Clark, Bridget Emmett, Frank S. Gilliam, Tara Greaver, Sharon J. Hall, Erik A. Lilleskov, Lingli Liu, Jason A. Lynch, Knute Nadelhoffer, Steven S. Perakis, Molly J. Robin-Abbott, John L. Stoddard, Kathleen C. Weathers

Frank S. Gilliam

Human activity in the last century has led to a substantial increase in nitrogen (N) emissions and deposition. This N deposition has reached a level that has caused or is likely to cause alterations to the structure and function of many ecosystems across the United States. One approach for quantifying the level of pollution that would be harmful to ecosystems is the critical loads approach. The critical load is dei ned as the level of a pollutant below which no detrimental ecological effect occurs over the long term according to present knowledge. The objective of this project was to synthesize …


Local Engagements With Urban Bushland: Moving Beyond Bounded Practice For Urban Biodiversity Management, Nicholas J. Gill, Gordon R. Waitt, Lesley M. Head Jun 2012

Local Engagements With Urban Bushland: Moving Beyond Bounded Practice For Urban Biodiversity Management, Nicholas J. Gill, Gordon R. Waitt, Lesley M. Head

Nicholas J Gill

Management of ecologically significant urban green space is likely to be increasingly governed by biodiversity policy frameworks. These frameworks tend to reproduce bounded thinking and strategies that separate green space from its context and characterise people as a disturbance. Like many green spaces these ecologically significant areas are highly valued by visitors and nearby residents. Green space is important for engagement with nature, social interaction, and for respite from daily life: it is strongly connected to surrounding areas and to the lives of people who live there. The dissonance between bounded management thinking and the role of green space in …


Protistan Diversity In The Arctic: A Case Of Paleoclimate Shaping Modern Biodiversity?, Thorsten Stoeck, Jennifer Kasper, John Bunge, Chesley Leslin, Valya Ilyin, Slava S. Epstein May 2012

Protistan Diversity In The Arctic: A Case Of Paleoclimate Shaping Modern Biodiversity?, Thorsten Stoeck, Jennifer Kasper, John Bunge, Chesley Leslin, Valya Ilyin, Slava S. Epstein

Slava Epstein

Background The impact of climate on biodiversity is indisputable. Climate changes over geological time must have significantly influenced the evolution of biodiversity, ultimately leading to its present pattern. Here we consider the paleoclimate data record, inferring that present-day hot and cold environments should contain, respectively, the largest and the smallest diversity of ancestral lineages of microbial eukaryotes. Methodology/Principal Findings We investigate this hypothesis by analyzing an original dataset of 18S rRNA gene sequences from Western Greenland in the Arctic, and data from the existing literature on 18S rRNA gene diversity in hydrothermal vent, temperate sediments, and anoxic water column communities. …