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Physical Sciences and Mathematics Commons

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Full-Text Articles in Physical Sciences and Mathematics

Turning Students Into Problem Solvers, Larkin Powell, Andrew Tyre, Michael Conroy, James Peterson, B. Williams Apr 2013

Turning Students Into Problem Solvers, Larkin Powell, Andrew Tyre, Michael Conroy, James Peterson, B. Williams

Andrew J Tyre

In the popular movie Apollo 13, based on the actual NASA mission, three astronauts are stranded in space, their craft’s electrical system broken, their oxygen quickly running out. To help them fix the problem and return home safely, mission controllers summon a group of engineers, dump a pile of equipment onto a desk—the tools available to the astronauts—and tell them to find a solution, or more specifically, “a way to put a square peg in a round hole. Rapidly.” Eventually, the engineers’ plan saves the day, and the astronauts make it home. State and federal agency biologists generally do not …


Estimating Nest Density When Detectability Is Incomplete: Variation In Nest Attendance And Response To Disturbance By Western Meadowlarks, Matthew Giovanni, Max Post Van Der Burg, Lars Anderson, Larkin Powell, Walter H. Schacht, Andrew Tyre Apr 2013

Estimating Nest Density When Detectability Is Incomplete: Variation In Nest Attendance And Response To Disturbance By Western Meadowlarks, Matthew Giovanni, Max Post Van Der Burg, Lars Anderson, Larkin Powell, Walter H. Schacht, Andrew Tyre

Andrew J Tyre

Researchers commonly model nest density as a function of ecological variables, but nests, like birds, can be undetected while present. In the Nebraska Sandhills in 2007, we used the rope-drag method on previously located Western Meadowlark (Sturnella neglecta) nests to model nest-detection error and nest density. Detecting nests by rope dragging (commonly used for nests of grassland birds) is conditional on two primary sources of nest availability, adults attending nests and adults flushing from nests in response to disturbance from the rope, the behavioral cue necessary for nest detection. On the basis of our trials with rope dragging, the probability …


Planning For Robust Reserve Networks Using Uncertainty Analysis, Atte Moilanen, Michael C. Runge, Jane Elith, Andrew Tyre, Yohay Carmel, Eric Fegraus, Brendan A. Wintle, Mark Burgman, Yakov Ben-Haim Apr 2013

Planning For Robust Reserve Networks Using Uncertainty Analysis, Atte Moilanen, Michael C. Runge, Jane Elith, Andrew Tyre, Yohay Carmel, Eric Fegraus, Brendan A. Wintle, Mark Burgman, Yakov Ben-Haim

Andrew J Tyre

Planning land-use for biodiversity conservation frequently involves computer-assisted reserve selection algorithms. Typically such algorithms operate on matrices of species presence–absence in sites, or on species-specific distributions ofmodel predicted probabilities of occurrence in grid cells. There are practically always errors in input data—erroneous species presence–absence data, structural and parametric uncertainty in predictive habitat models, and lack of correspondence between temporal presence and long-run persistence. Despite these uncertainties, typical reserve selection methods proceed as if there is no uncertainty in the data or models. Having two conservation options of apparently equal biological value, one would prefer the option whose value is relatively …