Conserving oyster reef habitat by switching from dredging and tonging to diver-harvesting

A major cause of the steep declines of American oyster (Crassostrea virginica) fisheries is the loss of oyster habitat through the use of dredges that have mined the reef substrata during a century of intense harvest. Experiments comparing the efficiency and habitat impacts of three alternative gears for harvesting oysters revealed differences among gear types that might be used to help improve the sustainability of commercial oyster fisheries. Hand harvesting by divers produced 25−32% more oysters per unit of time of fishing than traditional dredging and tonging, although the dive operation required two fishermen, rather than one. Per capita returns for dive operations may nonetheless be competitive with returns for other gears even in the short term if one person culling on deck can serve two or three divers. Dredging reduced the height of reef habitat by 34%, significantly more than the 23% reduction caused by tonging, both of which were greater than the 6% reduction induced by diver hand-harvesting. Thus, conservation of the essential habitat and sustainability of the subtidal oyster fishery can be enhanced by switching to diver hand-harvesting. Management schemes must intervene to drive the change in harvest methods because fishermen will face relatively high costs in making the switch and will not necessarily realize the long-term ecological benefits

Current-Induced Entanglement of Nuclear Spins in Quantum Dots

We propose an entanglement mechanism of nuclear spins in quantum dots driven by the electric current accompanied by the spin flip. This situation is relevant to a leakage current in spin-blocked regions where electrons cannot be transported unless their spins are flipped. The current gradually increases the components of larger total spin of nuclei. This correlation among the nuclear spins markedly enhances the spin-flip rate of electrons and hence the leakage current. The enhancement of the current is observable when the residence time of electrons in the quantum dots is shorter than the dephasing time T*_2 of nuclear spins.Comment: 4 pages, 4 figure

Factors associated with benign multiple sclerosis in the New York State MS Consortium (NYSMSC)

BACKGROUND: This retrospective analysis explored prognostic factors associated with a benign multiple sclerosis (BMS) disease course at baseline and over the 4-year follow-up. METHODS: Patients from the centralized New York State Multiple Sclerosis Consortium registry were classified as having BMS according to 3 different criteria centered on disease duration and disability. Additional analyses explored prognostic factors associated with BMS using the most conservative disability criteria (Expanded Disability Status Scale ≤2 and disease duration ≥10 years). RESULTS: Among 6258 patients who fulfilled eligibility criteria, 19.8 % to 33.3 % were characterized as having BMS, at baseline depending on classification criteria used. Positive prognostic factors for BMS at baseline included female sex (p < 0.0001) and younger age at onset (p < 0.0001); negative prognostic factors included progressive-onset type of MS and African-American race. Of the 1237 BMS patients (per most conservative criteria), 742 were followed for a median of 4 years to explore effect of disease-modifying treatment (DMT) on benign status. DMT (p = 0.009) and longer disease duration (p = 0.007) were the only significant positive predictors of maintaining BMS at follow-up. The protective effect was stronger for patients taking DMT at both enrollment and follow-up (OR = 0.71; p = 0.006). CONCLUSIONS: There is a need for development of more reliable prognostic indicators of BMS. Use of DMT was significantly associated with maintaining a benign disease state. ELECTRONIC SUPPLEMENTARY MATERIAL: The online version of this article (doi:10.1186/s12883-016-0623-2) contains supplementary material, which is available to authorized users

Managing toxicities associated with immune checkpoint inhibitors: consensus recommendations from the Society for Immunotherapy of Cancer (SITC) Toxicity Management Working Group.

Cancer immunotherapy has transformed the treatment of cancer. However, increasing use of immune-based therapies, including the widely used class of agents known as immune checkpoint inhibitors, has exposed a discrete group of immune-related adverse events (irAEs). Many of these are driven by the same immunologic mechanisms responsible for the drugs\u27 therapeutic effects, namely blockade of inhibitory mechanisms that suppress the immune system and protect body tissues from an unconstrained acute or chronic immune response. Skin, gut, endocrine, lung and musculoskeletal irAEs are relatively common, whereas cardiovascular, hematologic, renal, neurologic and ophthalmologic irAEs occur much less frequently. The majority of irAEs are mild to moderate in severity; however, serious and occasionally life-threatening irAEs are reported in the literature, and treatment-related deaths occur in up to 2% of patients, varying by ICI. Immunotherapy-related irAEs typically have a delayed onset and prolonged duration compared to adverse events from chemotherapy, and effective management depends on early recognition and prompt intervention with immune suppression and/or immunomodulatory strategies. There is an urgent need for multidisciplinary guidance reflecting broad-based perspectives on how to recognize, report and manage organ-specific toxicities until evidence-based data are available to inform clinical decision-making. The Society for Immunotherapy of Cancer (SITC) established a multidisciplinary Toxicity Management Working Group, which met for a full-day workshop to develop recommendations to standardize management of irAEs. Here we present their consensus recommendations on managing toxicities associated with immune checkpoint inhibitor therapy

2016 ESC Position Paper on cancer treatments and cardiovascular toxicity developed under the auspices of the ESC Committee for Practice Guidelines: The Task Force for cancer treatments and cardiovascular toxicity of the European Society of Cardiology (ESC)

Peer reviewe

Emissions pathways, climate change, and impacts on California

The magnitude of future climate change depends substantially on the greenhouse gas emission pathways we choose. Here we explore the implications of the highest and lowest Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change emissions pathways for climate change and associated impacts in California. Based on climate projections from two state-of-the-art climate models with low and medium sensitivity (Parallel Climate Model and Hadley Centre Climate Model, version 3, respectively), we find that annual temperature increases nearly double from the lower B1 to the higher A1fi emissions scenario before 2100. Three of four simulations also show greater increases in summer temperatures as compared with winter. Extreme heat and the associated impacts on a range of temperature-sensitive sectors are substantially greater under the higher emissions scenario, with some interscenario differences apparent before midcentury. By the end of the century under the B1 scenario, heatwaves and extreme heat in Los Angeles quadruple in frequency while heat-related mortality increases two to three times; alpine subalpine forests are reduced by 50–75%; and Sierra snowpack is reduced 30–70%. Under A1fi, heatwaves in Los Angeles are six to eight times more frequent, with heat-related excess mortality increasing five to seven times; alpine subalpine forests are reduced by 75–90%; and snowpack declines 73–90%, with cascading impacts on runoff and streamflow that, combined with projected modest declines in winter precipitation, could fundamentally disrupt California’s water rights system. Although interscenario differences in climate impacts and costs of adaptation emerge mainly in the second half of the century, they are strongly dependent on emissions from preceding decades

The Future of Agriculture in Our Community: A Pilot Program to Increase Community Dialogue About Agricultural Sustainability

The Future of Agriculture in Our Community is a program developed to allow Pennsylvania communities to assess and address the needs of local agriculture. This article describes the program in detail and provides results from an evaluation conducted of the pilot program. Findings (n=55) suggest that the program was received very well among participants and seemed to increase community organization skills, knowledge of local agriculture, interest in agriculture and in community life, and intentions to participate in future volunteer efforts. Based on these results, recommendations are offered for those interested in pursuing similar programs

HOW HABITAT DEGRADATION THROUGH FISHERY DISTURBANCE ENHANCES IMPACTS OF HYPOXIA ON OYSTER REEFS

Oysters are ecosystem engineers that create biogenic reef habitat important to estuarine biodiversity, benthic-pelagic coupling, and fishery production. Prevailing explanations for the dramatic decline of eastern oysters (Crassostrea virginica) during the last century overlook ecosystem complexity by ignoring interactions among multiple environmental disturbances. To explain oyster loss, we tested whether (1) mortality of oysters on natural oyster reefs varies with water depth (3 m vs. 6 m), (2) harvesting by oyster dredges reduces the height of oyster reefs, and (3) bottom-water hypoxia/anoxia and reduction in reef height through fishery disturbance interact to enhance mortality of oysters in the Neuse River estuary, North Carolina, USA. The percentage of oysters found dead (mean ± 1 SD) during a survey of natural reefs in May 1993 was significantly greater at 6-m (92 ± 10%) than at 3-m (28 ± 9%) water depth. Less than one scason's worth of oyster dredging reduced the height of restored oyster reefs by ∼30%. During stratification of the water column in summer, oxygen depletion near the seafloor at 6 m caused mass mortality of oysters, other invertebrates, and fishes on short, deep experimental reefs, while oysters and other reef associates elevated into the surface layer by sufficient reef height or by location in shallow water survived. Highly mobile blue crabs (Callinectes sapidus) abandoned burrows located in hypoxic/anoxic bottom waters but remained alive in shallow water. Our results indicate that interaction of reef habitat degradation (height reduction) through fishery disturbance and extended bottom-water hypoxia/anoxia caused the pattern of oyster mortality observed on natural reefs and influences the abundance and distribution of fish and invertebrate species that utilize this temperate reef habitat. Interactions among environmental disturbances imply a need for the integrative approaches of ecosystem management to restore and sustain estuarine habitat

Single quantum dot states measured by optical modulation spectroscopy

Using optical modulation spectroscopy, we report the direct observation of absorption lines from excitons localized in GaAs single quantum dot potentials. The data provide a measurement of the linewidth, resonance energy, and oscillator strength of the transitions, and show that states which decay primarily by nonradiative processes can be directly probed using this technique. The experiments establish this technique for the characterization of single quantum dot transitions, thereby complementing luminescence studies. © 1999 American Institute of Physics.Peer Reviewedhttp://deepblue.lib.umich.edu/bitstream/2027.42/70527/2/APPLAB-75-19-2933-1.pd