ALBERT

Description: Presented at CERF 2015: Grand Challenges in Coastal & Estuarine Science, Portland, Oregon, November 8 - 12, 2015 and at the Eighth Symposium on Harmful Algae in the U.S., Long Beach, California, November 15 – 19, 2015

Description: A growing concern for coastal management is the choice of appropriate public or private responses to HABs as a natural hazard. Considerable efforts have been devoted to understanding the scientific aspects of HABs, including their distributions in space and time, their ecological roles, and the nature of their toxic effects, among others. Much energy also has been directed at exploring socio-economic impacts and identifying potential management actions, including actions to prevent, control, or mitigate blooms. Using blooms of Florida red tide (Karenia brevis) as a case study, we develop an approach to the choice of policy responses to K. brevis blooms. Importantly, several new types of public health, environmental, and socio-economic impacts now are beginning to be revealed, including human gastrointestinal and potential neurological illnesses; morbidities and mortalities of protected species, including manatees, cetaceans, and sea turtles; increased numbers of hospital emergency room visits for the elderly; increased respiratory morbidities in workers, such as beach lifeguards; and potential reduced K- 12 school attendance. Optimal policy responses to this hazard are likely to depend critically upon why and where a bloom occurs, its spatial and temporal scales and toxicity, and the nature of its impacts. In the face of significant ongoing scientific uncertainties, and given estimates of impacts, we find that policies to expand and stabilize scientific research programs and environmental monitoring efforts, to develop and implement education programs for both residents and tourists, and to communicate the physical aspects of blooms to the public in a timely fashion are likely optimal.

Description: This research was sponsored by the National Science Foundation under NSF/CNH Grant No. 1009106.

Description: Presented at the Eighth Symposium on Harmful Algae in the U.S., Long Beach, California, November 15 – 19, 2015

Description: Coupled human-nature systems (CHANS) involve dynamic interactions between humans and nature, often influenced by and affecting the distinct dynamic characteristics of each component. We present an overview of an ongoing interdisciplinary research program focused on a specific type of systems that couple expanding and fluctuating human coastal populations to episodic blooms of toxic marine algae, drawing examples primarily from human interactions with blooms of the toxic dinoflagellate Karenia brevis from the eastern Gulf of Mexico (“Florida red tides”). We introduce a set of HAB Symposium “speed” presentations and associated posters based on multi-disciplinary research. Using extant, but extraordinary, data to specify empirical models, this program of research has focused on characterizing the influence of anthropogenic sources on K. brevis blooms, assessing the public health and economic impacts of these blooms in an exposure-response framework, and defining the choice of appropriate human policy responses to the hazard. We present examples of the generic aspects of CHANS systems in the context of Florida red tides, and we discuss also some of the challenges involved in compiling and analyzing the relevant data to support our positive and normative analytical efforts.

Description: NSF/CNH NO.1009106

Description: Presented at CERF 2015: Grand Challenges in Coastal & Estuarine Science, Portland, Oregon, November 8 - 12, 2015 and at the Eighth Symposium on Harmful Algae in the U.S., Long Beach, California, November 15 – 19, 2015.

Description: The Coupled Natural and Human Systems program of US National Science Foundation is supporting our effort to elucidate linkages between harmful algal blooms and associated impacts on human health, society and economy of coastal communities. The human respiratory system is negatively impacted by inhaled toxic aerosols from the Florida red tide dinoflagellate, Karenia brevis. It has been hypothesized that surf height, wind speed, and wind direction were the predominant factors determining the amount of toxin reaching exposed individuals. Recent findings indicate that there are more environmental factors influencing the level of respiratory impacts from brevetoxins. We report on analyses that include additional factors such as air temperature, water temperature, dew point, barometric pressure, K. brevis cell counts, annd distance and direction from K. brevis cells to the individual. Factors contributing most to differences between no respiratory irritation and mild respiratory irritation were water temperature, air temperature, and dew point. Those factors contributing most to differences between mild respiratory irritation and moderate respiratory irritation were wind direction, surf conditions, and wind speed. Data on respiratory impacts was provided by the Beach Conditions Reporting System (BCRS). This system provides twice daily reports from lifeguards and park rangers at public beaches. These subjective reports include observed levels of respiratory irritation among beach-goers. Other environmental data were provided by a variety of local sources including private and public weather stations and many monitoring and research efforts. The resultant model provides a means to forecast respiratory impacts from observations of HAB distribution, and meteorological and oceanographic conditions.

Description: ECOHAB FL – NA06NOS478024; NSF Coupled Human and Natural Systems - # 1009106; Research Experience for Undergraduates - # 0453955; FWCC – FL Red Tide Cooperative Agreements

Description: Presented at the Eighth Symposium on Harmful Algae in the U.S. November 15 - 19, 2015, Long Beach, California

Description: Karenia brevis is a marine dinoflagellate responsible for Florida red tide (FRT) blooms off the west coast of Florida. K. brevis contains brevetoxins, a neurotoxin that is absorbed by shellfish as well as released into the air. Brevetoxins are known to cause disruptions in normal neurological functions and are associated with neurotoxic shellfish poisoning (NSP). Previous research has emphasized the effect of FRT blooms on human health, from gastrointestinal to respiratory illnesses. However, there has been little research examining the effect of FRT blooms on neurological illnesses. There is research highlighting the biochemical effects of brevetoxins on mammalian nervous systems, so these symptoms can be matched to hospital codes that describe a hospital patient’s affliction. With these hospitalization codes, it is possible to study the relationship between FRT blooms and the occurrence of neurological illnesses in affected counties. The hospital data consists of inpatient data from 1988-2010 and emergency room data from 2005-2010. We will also use data containing K. brevis cells per liter as a measure of red tide occurrences.

Description: This research was sponsored by the National Science Foundation under NSF/CNH grant no. 1009106

Description: Presented at the Seventh Symposium on Harmful Algae in the U.S., Sarasota, FL, 27-31 October 2013.

Description: Coupled nature-human (CNH) systems are now the focus of a growing number of inter-disciplinary research programs worldwide. As implied by the term “coupled,” these systems in-volve interactions between humans and nature, often affecting the dynamic characteristics of each component. Both natural and social scientists are engaged in developing a deeper un-derstanding of these dynamics, focusing on the linkages and feedbacks affecting the trajectories of coupled system behavior. Several researchers have begun to identify the generic aspects of nature-human couplings. Many of these aspects have been adapted from the field of ecology, where the dynamic characteristics of ecological systems have been studied for decades. These aspects include system heterogeneity, time lags, reciprocal feedbacks, thresholds, surprises, legacies, and resilience. The presence of such aspects has implications for the stability and persistence of particular ecosystem states, leading potentially to further implications for human heath and welfare. This talk reviews a specific type of natural hazard-human coupling that relates to coastal blooms of toxic marine algae, drawing examples primarily from human interactions with blooms of the toxic dinoflagellate Karenia brevis from the eastern Gulf of Mexico. This talk introduces a set of HAB Symposium “speed” presentations relating to different aspects of an ongoing multi-institutional and inter-disciplinary research project that examines Florida red tides as a type of CNH system. We present examples of the generic aspects of CNH systems in the context of Florida red tides, and we discuss also some of the challenges involved in compiling relevant data to support our analytical efforts.

Description: Presented at the Eighth Symposium on Harmful Algae in the U.S. November 15 - 19, 2015, Long Beach, California

Description: We analyzed a potential relationship between changes in school absences in Sarasota County and Karenia brevis (Kb) count data. Brevetoxins released during Kb blooms could be a reason for students experiencing increased respiratory or gastrointestinal illnesses, causing an increase in absence rates. We designed a map to relate the locations of Sarasota County schools and the distributions of those Kb counts with a minimum of 10,000 cell counts per liter and above. Due to the proximity of Kb counts, we hypothesized that brevetoxins could have a greater effect on the schools near the coast of Florida rather than the schools inland. Because individuals could be affected by brevetoxins up to several days after being exposed, we expected to find a lagged effect of a bloom occurrence on school absences. Using a regression approach, we were unable to detect an association between Kb counts and student absences. In some cases, the direction of the effects were opposite to what would be expected (i.e., an increase in Kb counts was associated with a reduction in the percent absent rate). The results indicated that over 70% of the variation in the school percent absent rate could be explained by the latent characteristics of individual schools (such as variations in student populations across different schools), by school week, by month (such as the effects of flu outbreaks or and other seasonal factors), and by year.

Description: Author(s): Yue Jia, Rajesh V. Chopdekar, Elke Arenholz, Zhiqi Liu, Michael D. Biegalski, Zachary D. Porter, Apurva Mehta, and Yayoi Takamura Epitaxial L a 0.7 S r 0.3 Mn O 3 ( LSMO ) / L a 0.7 S r 0.3 Fe O 3 (LSFO) superlattices on (111)-oriented SrTi O 3 substrates with sublayer thicknesses ranging from 3 to 60 unit cells (u.c.) were synthesized and characterized. Detailed analysis of their structural, electronic, and magnetic properties were performed to exp… [Phys. Rev. B 93, 104403] Published Thu Mar 03, 2016

Description: Author(s): Nicholas A. Porter, Charles S. Spencer, Rowan C. Temple, Christian J. Kinane, Timothy R. Charlton, Sean Langridge, and Christopher H. Marrows Magnetic materials without structural inversion symmetry can display the Dzyaloshinskii-Moriya interaction, which manifests itself as chiral magnetic ground states. These chiral states can interact in complex ways with applied fields and boundary conditions provided by finite sample sizes that are o… [Phys. Rev. B 92, 144402] Published Thu Oct 01, 2015

Description: The light emitted by all galaxies over the history of the Universe produces the extragalactic background light (EBL) at ultraviolet, optical, and infrared wavelengths. The EBL is a source of opacity for gamma rays via photon-photon interactions, leaving an imprint in the spectra of distant gamma-ray sources. We measured this attenuation using 739 active galaxies and one gamma-ray burst detected by the Fermi Large Area Telescope. This allowed us to reconstruct the evolution of the EBL and determine the star formation history of the Universe over 90% of cosmic time. Our star formation history is consistent with independent measurements from galaxy surveys, peaking at redshift z ~ 2. Upper limits of the EBL at the epoch of reionization suggest a turnover in the abundance of faint galaxies at z ~ 6.

Description: No large group of recently extinct placental mammals remains as evolutionarily cryptic as the approximately 280 genera grouped as 'South American native ungulates'. To Charles Darwin, who first collected their remains, they included perhaps the 'strangest animal[s] ever discovered'. Today, much like 180 years ago, it is no clearer whether they had one origin or several, arose before or after the Cretaceous/Palaeogene transition 66.2 million years ago, or are more likely to belong with the elephants and sirenians of superorder Afrotheria than with the euungulates (cattle, horses, and allies) of superorder Laurasiatheria. Morphology-based analyses have proved unconvincing because convergences are pervasive among unrelated ungulate-like placentals. Approaches using ancient DNA have also been unsuccessful, probably because of rapid DNA degradation in semitropical and temperate deposits. Here we apply proteomic analysis to screen bone samples of the Late Quaternary South American native ungulate taxa Toxodon (Notoungulata) and Macrauchenia (Litopterna) for phylogenetically informative protein sequences. For each ungulate, we obtain approximately 90% direct sequence coverage of type I collagen alpha1- and alpha2-chains, representing approximately 900 of 1,140 amino-acid residues for each subunit. A phylogeny is estimated from an alignment of these fossil sequences with collagen (I) gene transcripts from available mammalian genomes or mass spectrometrically derived sequence data obtained for this study. The resulting consensus tree agrees well with recent higher-level mammalian phylogenies. Toxodon and Macrauchenia form a monophyletic group whose sister taxon is not Afrotheria or any of its constituent clades as recently claimed, but instead crown Perissodactyla (horses, tapirs, and rhinoceroses). These results are consistent with the origin of at least some South American native ungulates from 'condylarths', a paraphyletic assembly of archaic placentals. With ongoing improvements in instrumentation and analytical procedures, proteomics may produce a revolution in systematics such as that achieved by genomics, but with the possibility of reaching much further back in time.〈br /〉〈span class="detail_caption"〉Notes: 〈/span〉Welker, Frido -- Collins, Matthew J -- Thomas, Jessica A -- Wadsley, Marc -- Brace, Selina -- Cappellini, Enrico -- Turvey, Samuel T -- Reguero, Marcelo -- Gelfo, Javier N -- Kramarz, Alejandro -- Burger, Joachim -- Thomas-Oates, Jane -- Ashford, David A -- Ashton, Peter D -- Rowsell, Keri -- Porter, Duncan M -- Kessler, Benedikt -- Fischer, Roman -- Baessmann, Carsten -- Kaspar, Stephanie -- Olsen, Jesper V -- Kiley, Patrick -- Elliott, James A -- Kelstrup, Christian D -- Mullin, Victoria -- Hofreiter, Michael -- Willerslev, Eske -- Hublin, Jean-Jacques -- Orlando, Ludovic -- Barnes, Ian -- MacPhee, Ross D E -- England -- Nature. 2015 Jun 4;522(7554):81-4. doi: 10.1038/nature14249. Epub 2015 Mar 18.〈br /〉〈span class="detail_caption"〉Author address: 〈/span〉1] BioArCh, University of York, York YO10 5DD, UK [2] Department of Human Evolution, Max Planck Institute for Evolutionary Anthropology, 04103 Leipzig, Germany. ; BioArCh, University of York, York YO10 5DD, UK. ; Department of Earth Sciences, Natural History Museum, London SW7 5BD, UK. ; Centre for GeoGenetics, Natural History Museum of Denmark, University of Copenhagen, Oster Voldgade 5-7, 1350 Copenhagen K, Denmark. ; Institute of Zoology, Zoological Society of London, London NW1 4RY, UK. ; CONICET- Division Paleontologia de Vertebrados, Museo de La Plata. Facultad de Ciencias Naturales y Museo de La Plata, Universidad Nacional de La Plata. Paseo del Bosque s/n, B1900FWA, La Plata, Argentina. ; Seccion Paleontologia de Vertebrados. Museo Argentino de Ciencias Naturales "Bernardino Rivadavia", 470 Angel Gallardo Av., C1405DJR, Buenos Aires, Argentina. ; Institute of Anthropology, Johannes Gutenberg-University, Anselm-Franz-von-Bentzel-Weg 7, D-55128 Mainz, Germany. ; Department of Chemistry, University of York, York YO10 5DD, UK. ; Bioscience Technology Facility, Department of Biology, University of York, York YO10 5DD, UK. ; Department of Biological Sciences, Virginia Polytechnic Institute and State University, Blacksburg, Virginia 24061, USA. ; Target Discovery Institute, Nuffield Department of Medicine, University of Oxford, Roosevelt Drive, Oxford OX3 7FZ, UK. ; Applications Development, Bruker Daltonik GmbH, 28359 Bremen, Germany. ; Novo Nordisk Foundation Center for Protein Research, Faculty of Health Sciences, University of Copenhagen, Blegdamsvej 3b, 2200 Copenhagen, Denmark. ; Department of Materials Science and Metallurgy, University of Cambridge, Cambridge CB3 0FS, UK. ; Smurfit Institute of Genetics, Trinity College Dublin, Dublin 2, Ireland. ; 1] BioArCh, University of York, York YO10 5DD, UK [2] Institute for Biochemistry and Biology, Karl-Liebknecht-Strasse 24-25, 14476 Potsdam OT Golm, Germany. ; Department of Human Evolution, Max Planck Institute for Evolutionary Anthropology, 04103 Leipzig, Germany. ; Department of Mammalogy, American Museum of Natural History, New York, New York 10024, USA.〈br /〉〈span class="detail_caption"〉Record origin:〈/span〉 〈a href="http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/25799987" target="_blank"〉PubMed〈/a〉