Indoor and outdoor air pollution and lung cancer in New Hampshire and Vermont

Indoor and outdoor air pollution is known to contribute to increased lung cancer incidence. This study is the first to address the contribution of home heating fuel and geographical course particulate matter (PM₁₀) concentrations to lung cancer rates in New Hampshire, USA. First, Pearson correlation analysis and geographically weighted regression were used to investigate spatial relationships between outdoor PM₁₀ and lung cancer rates. While the aforementioned analyses did not indicate a significant contribution of PM₁₀ to lung cancer in the state, there was a trend towards a significant association in the northern and southwestern regions of the state. Second, case-control data were used to estimate the contributions of indoor pollution and secondhand smoke to the risk of lung cancer with adjustment for confounders. Increased risk was found among those who used wood or coal to heat their homes for more than 10 winters before the age of 18, with a significant increase in risk per winter. Resulting data suggest that further investigation of the relationship between heating-related air pollution levels and lung cancer risk is needed.     

Myths and assumptions about human-wildlife conflict and coexistence

Recent extinctions often resulted from humans retaliating against wildlife that threatened people's interests or were perceived to threaten current or future interests. Today's subfield of human-wildlife conflict and coexistence (HWCC) grew out of an original anthropocentric concern with such real or perceived threats and then, starting in the mid-1990s, with protecting valued species from people. Recent work in ethics and law has shifted priorities toward coexistence between people and wild animals. To spur scientific progress and more effective practice, we examined 4 widespread assumptions about HWCC that need to be tested rigorously: scientists are neutral and objective about HWCC; current participatory, consensus-based decisions provide just and fair means to overcome challenges in HWCC; wildlife threats to human interests are getting worse; and wildlife damage to human interests is additive to other sources of damage. The first 2 assumptions are clearly testable, but if they are entangled can become a wicked problem and may need debunking as myths if they cannot be disentangled. Some assumptions have seldom or never been tested and those that have been tested appear dubious, yet the use of the assumptions continues in the practice and scholarship of HWCC. We call for tests of assumptions and debunking of myths in the scholarship of HWCC. Adherence to the principles of scientific integrity and application of standards of evidence can help advance our call. We also call for practitioners and interest groups to improve the constitutive process prior to decision making about wildlife. We predict these steps will hasten scientific progress toward evidence-based interventions and improve the fairness, ethics, and legality of coexistence strategies.     

Heavy metals and pesticides in anuran spawn and tadpoles,water, and sediment

High concentrations of metals (cadmium, copper, lead, and zinc) and of lindane were measured in the sediment and in the spawn and tadpoles of Bufo bufo, Rana dalmatina, and Rana ridibunda from two Austrian locations. Residues in spawn suggest maternal transfer. Increase of the metal concentrations from spawn to advanced tadpole stage is explained by the larval microphaguous feeding habits which cause high exposition of the tadpoles to substances concentrating in sediments and suspended particles. Metal and pesticide concentrations in spawn and tadpoles are toxic to various other aquatic organisms and are furthermore considered to be potentially hazardous to the anurans themselves. The results are conform with world‐wide observations of contamination of anuran larvae with heavy metals, and prove the significance of non‐point source chemical exposure due to allochthonous toxicant input by wind load and precipitation.     

市场经济与土肥科技

土肥的基础地位是不随社会性质或社会经济类型的变化而变化的，它既具重要性，又具长久性．市场经济是仍然需要土肥科技的．土肥科技的教学、科研和推广的力度必须加大，局面必须改观，且宜快不宜迟．土肥科技工作者一定要将培肥地力作为中心工作．根据广东的实际，增施有机肥是培肥地力的主要措施，因而抓秸秆还田和发展冬绿肥是我们工作的重点．     

Characteristics of dispersions and water-soluble extracts of crude and refined oils and their toxicity to estuarine crustaceans and fish

The quantitative hydrocarbon composition and behavior in seawater of water-soluble fractions (WSF) and oil-in-water dispersions (OWD) of 4 oils was investigated. Two crude oils, South Louisiana crude and Kuwait crude, and two refined oils, No. 2 fuel oil and bunker C residual oil, were used in these investigations. The WSFs of the crude oils had higher total oil-hydrocarbon concentrations and were richer in light aliphatics and single-ring aromatics than were the WSFs of the refined oils. The WSFs of the refined oils contained significantly higher concentrations of naphthalenes than did those of the crudes. The hydrocarbon composition of the aqueous phase of OWDs closely resembled that of the parent oils. Gentle aeration of the OWDs resulted in a loss of 80 to 90% of the aqueous hydrocarbons in 24 h. Alkanes disappeared from the dispersions more rapidly than aromatics. The WSFs and OWDs of the refined oils were considerably more toxic to the 6 test species than were those of the crude oils. The test species can be ranked according to increasing sensitivity to oil as follows: Cyprinodon variegatus, Menidia beryllina, Fundulus similus, Penaeus aztecus postlarvae, Palaemonetes pugio and Mysidopsis almyra. The results of this investigation are discussed in relation to the potential impacts of oil spills on the marine and estuarine environments.     

Instream and offstream environmental conditions and stream biotic integrity: Importance of scale and site similarities for learning and prediction

Two different methods to predict biotic integrity were tested and compared in the present paper. The first one tries to predict the fish indices of biotic integrity (IBI) at the state or regional scale based on the most similar observations to a specific target site of interest using the simple to implement k-nearest neighbors (or kNN) method. Two different distance functions were considered to find the k-nearest neighbors: the Euclidean and the Mahalanobis. The second method was applied on the same datasets and consisted of a step-wise multiple regression. The two modeling approaches yielded similar results but kNN proved to be more time-efficient and very fast computationally for the given dataset sizes, which allowed applying a leave-one-out cross validation.In an attempt to reveal the importance of scale in the prediction of IBI, regression models were constructed at the state (or regional) scale and at the more refined cluster of sampling sites scale. Clusters of sites were extracted using Kohonen's self-organizing maps (SOM) followed by k-means clustering of the SOM neurons. Cluster-level regression models, constructed after site patterning, performed better in IBI prediction than global regression models constructed without any previous site patterning. The importance of identifying groups of sites with similar environmental characteristics affecting the IBI was revealed. The combined use of site patterning and regression modeling for IBI prediction also helped identifying important variables acting at the local scale which remain latent at the global scale.     

Individual and combined effect of mercury and manganese on phenol and proline content in leaf and stem of mungbean seedlings

Mungbean (Vigna radiata L. Wilczelk cv. Pusa Baisakhi seedlings were raised in individual (0, 1, 10, 100 and 1000 ppm) and combined solutions (1 : 1, 10: 1, 1: 0 ppm Hg : Mn) of mercury and manganese for 6 days. Phenol and proline were found to accumulate in leaves in response to treatment with heavy metals. The magnitude of accumulation correlated with concentration of metals. However, a reverse trend was noticed in stem for phenol. Accumulation of phenol in response to heavy metal treatment was organ specific and occurred at higher rate in plant parts, which faced the stress mostly. However, accumulation of proline helped the plant to survive stress situation. In combined solutions, amelioration of mercurial toxicity by manganese was recorded.     

河流底泥污染及其控制与修复

水体底泥污染是世界范围内的一个环境问题。污染物通过大气沉降、废水排放、雨水淋溶与冲刷进入水体,最后沉积到底泥中并逐渐富集,使底泥受到严重污染。在河流环境中,河床沉积底泥以推移和悬浮形式输送,很大程度上导致了上覆水和沉积底泥的相互物理作用。河流有强有力的自然环境,在河流系统中趋向有利于沉积底泥的解吸作用,从而将会影响上覆水的水质。因此,在水质管理计划中,应该将已污染的沉积底泥作为一个污染源予以考虑,沉积底泥是河流污染的一个重要方面。文章根据近年来国内外对河流底泥污染的控制、处理、修复及利用的文献资料,分析了河流底泥的污染现状及主要类型,包括重金属、NP营养物质、难降解有机物和持久性有毒污染物等,指出了目前在底泥污染修复中存在的问题。针对河流底泥污染控制与修复技术,介绍了除控制外源污染物外的物理修复、化学修复和生物修复等几种主要的修复方法和技术,分析了各种方法的利弊以及适用情况。在阐述了堆肥、建材利用、低温热解、湿地及栖息地建设、修复废弃地和建设填方等利用方式后,提出具体的控制和修复应因地制宜,综合各种恢复技术及利用方式,以达到控制及修复污染的河流底泥,恢复河流生态系统之目的。     

Hotspot detection and clustering: ways and means

This paper reviews the development of methods for the analysis of hotspots and clustering. Discussion focusses on different data types and the usefulness of density estimation, scan testing and model-based approaches to clustering. Various application areas are considered ranging from ecology, over health mapping to genomics and landscape analysis. A discussion of software availability is also provided.     

水肥耦合与旱地农业持续发展

水资源不足及人口增长给农业生产增加了很大压力,寻求开发旱农区相对丰富的土地资源成为满足需求增长的重要方法。文章讨论了旱地农业持续发展的限制因子、旱地水肥关系、水肥耦合效应机理以及水肥耦合对旱地农业持续发展的意义。     

包装材料及食品中纳米材料的检测与表征技术

随着纳米技术的发展,纳米材料在包装行业及食品工业中得到了广泛的应用。然而,纳米材料的安全应用高度依赖于对其生物及环境效应的了解。有研究表明,纳米材料对人类健康及生态环境存在着潜在危害,这使得纳米材料的安全性成为毒理学领域的热点研究课题。同时纳米材料的安全性问题也成为纳米复合包装材料及纳米食品研究和开发的新瓶颈。在对纳米材料没有充分认识的情况下,为了消费者和生态环境的安全,必须控制包装材料及食品中纳米颗粒的种类、来源、含量及可能的释放,这就需要可靠的方法对纳米颗粒的性质和结构进行检测及表征。首先,综述了目前纳米材料在复合包装材料及食品加工中的应用,然后总结了包装材料及食品中纳米材料的检测技术及表征方法,例如显微技术、色谱分离技术、光谱与质谱技术等。由于纳米材料的理化性质参数众多,应用多种分析手段来检测和表征纳米材料成为必然。最后对目前检测技术及表征方法的不足和今后发展方向进行了探讨。     

湿解产物与堆肥在土壤中的稳定性和腐熟度比较分析

研究了不同培养阶段湿解产物与土壤混合物(HTS)的物质变化特征、稳定性和腐熟度,并与堆肥和土壤混合物(CS)及自然土壤进行了对比。结果表明:在培养过程中,所有HTS和CS的参数变化趋势相似,HTS的温度变化接近于CS的温度变化,稍高于自然土壤的温度,低于环境温度;pH值变化不大,基本稳定在7.6左右;在培养初期,水溶性有机碳比有机态氮w(WSC)/w(Norg)小于0.55,种子发芽系数(GI)高于80%;培养14d后,w(C)/w(N)降低至小于20,w(NH4 -N)/w(NO3--N)渐渐趋于稳定至小于0.16,GI基本高于100%;49d后,HTS的CO2释放率接近CS和自然土壤的CO2释放率;种子发芽系数的变化表明,湿解产物中含有更丰富的营养元素,可以促进植物根系的生长;相关性分析显示,w(WSC)/w(Norg)、w(NH4 -N)/w(NO3--N)和GI可以作为湿解产物腐熟度的评价指标。综合各项参数表明,湿解产物在土壤中会很快达到稳定,可以安全应用。     

Growth and pollution convergence: Theory and evidence

Stabilizing pollution levels in the long run is a pre-requisite for sustainable growth. We develop a neoclassical growth model with endogenous emission reduction predicting that, along optimal sustainable paths, pollution growth rates are (i) positively related to output growth (scale effect) and (ii) negatively related to emission levels (defensive effect). This dynamic law reduces to a convergence equation that is empirically tested for two major and regulated air pollutants – sulfur oxides and nitrogen oxides – with a panel of 25 European countries spanning the years 1980–2005. Traditional parametric models are rejected by the data. More flexible regression techniques confirm the existence of both the scale and the defensive effect, supporting the model predictions.     

Estimation and simulation for geospatial porosity and permeability data

Reservoir simulation of \(\hbox {CO}_2\) sequestration, energy recovery, and environmental contamination scenarios must be accompanied by uncertainty quantification. Typically this is done by stochastically modeling porosity and permeability fields, simulating realizations based on the model, and then numerically simulating flow and transport. The challenge is to generate simulated porosity and permeability fields with characteristics as similar as possible to those known of the reservoir under study. In this paper we focus on the first two steps above in analyzing a large 3-dimensional array of geospatial porosity data and using the results to produce simulated data with characteristics mimicking those of the original porosity observations. The spatial covariance is empirically approximated from horizontal cross sections of the data via a kernel principle component analysis yielding dimension reduction. Simulations in three dimensions are produced by linking consecutive parallel cross sections via conditioning on a small subarray of the data. The conditional simulations effectively reproduce observed channeling, an important large scale feature of interest in the sub-surface relevant to transport of contaminates. The original porosity data is non-Gaussian and requires additional analysis and transformation to generate both porosity and permeability fields.     

Linking Terrestrial and Marine Conservation Planning and Threats Analysis

Abstract:  The existence of the Gulf of Mexico dead zone makes it clear that marine ecosystems can be damaged by terrestrial inputs. Marine and terrestrial conservation planning need to be aligned in an explicit fashion to fully represent threats to marine systems. To integrate conservation planning for terrestrial and marine systems, we used a novel threats assessment that included 5 cross-system threats in a site-prioritization exercise for the Pacific Northwest coast ecoregion (U.S.A.). Cross-system threats are actions or features in one ecological realm that have effects on species in another realm. We considered bulkheads and other forms of shoreline hardening threats to terrestrial systems and roads, logging, agriculture, and urban areas threats to marine systems. We used 2 proxies of freshwater influence on marine environments, validated against a mechanistic model and field observations, to propagate land-based threats into marine sites. We evaluated the influence of cross-system threats on conservation priorities by comparing MARXAN outputs for 3 scenarios that identified terrestrial and marine priorities simultaneously: (1) no threats, (2) single-system threats, and (3) single- and cross-system threats. Including cross-system threats changed the threat landscape dramatically. As a result the best plan that included only single-system threats identified 323 sites (161,500 ha) at risk from cross-system threats. Including these threats changed the location of best sites. By comparing the best and sum solutions of the single- and cross-system scenarios, we identified areas ideal for preservation or restoration through integrated management. Our findings lend quantitative support to the call for explicitly integrated decision making and management action in terrestrial and marine ecosystems.     

乡镇企业可持续发展与小城镇建设

通过对乡镇企业的经济效益、环境效益和社会效益以及小城镇发展的优越性分析可知，乡镇企业不宜在农村发展，应该在小城镇中发展。     

天津地区表层土壤和河流沉积物中甾烷与五环三萜烷的分布特征及污染源分析

分析了天津地区表层土壤和具有代表性的河流沉积物中甾烷和五环三萜烷系列化合物的组成与分布特征，讨论了这类化合物的来源及环境意义。分析表明，在天津地区不同环境功能区表层土壤和河流沉积物中均检测到了甾烷和五环三萜烷系列化合物，但样品之间其含量存在明显的差别；表层土壤与河流沉积物中甾烷、五环三萜烷化合物的组成与石油中的基本一致，样品间这类化合物在饱和烃中的相对含量与正烷烃CPI之间有较好的负相关关系，表明它们主要来源于石油及副产品，可以根据样品中甾、萜化合物与正构烷烃的比值来反映饱和烃中石油烃污染源的贡献。论文根据样品中甾烷、五环三萜烷化合物与正构烷烃的比值，并结合正烷烃CPI参数初步分析了天津地区不同环境功能区表层土壤和河流沉积物中饱和烃污染物的污染源。     

锑和砷对固氮菌的毒性效应及其机制研究

锑作为一种具有毒性和致癌性的类金属,其不合理的开发造成了严重的生态环境污染,尤其是土壤中高浓度锑和砷污染导致了环境中多种营养元素的缺乏。其中,氮素的缺乏严重阻碍了环境的恢复。然而,固氮微生物不仅能为氮素匮乏环境提供稳定的氮素来源,而且其固氮潜能可以作为监测土壤金属污染的敏感指标。为此,该文通过乙炔还原法(ARA)微宇宙培养试验手段,研究了不同价态锑和砷(三价及五价)在不同质量浓度(100、200、500、1 000、2 500、5 000 mg·L^-1)水平下对棕色固氮菌固氮潜能的影响,同时进一步探究了土壤固氮菌群落固氮潜能对土壤中主要锑和砷价态[Sb(Ⅴ)和As(Ⅴ)]的响应机制。结果表明,锑和砷浓度与棕色固氮菌和土壤固氮微生物的固氮潜能均呈显著负相关,验证了以固氮微生物固氮潜能作为生物指示物的可行性。此外,Sb(Ⅴ)对土壤固氮微生物的毒性显著小于As(Ⅴ)。三价锑和砷污染对固氮菌固氮潜能的毒性高于五价[As(Ⅲ)>Sb(Ⅲ)>As(Ⅴ)>Sb(Ⅴ)],这可能是由于Sb(Ⅲ)和As(Ⅲ)对细胞的致裂性强于Sb(Ⅴ)和As(Ⅴ)。相较于Sb(Ⅴ)和As(Ⅴ)对于棕色固氮菌固氮潜能的抑制作用,其对土壤固氮菌群落的固氮潜能的影响相对较弱。这一差异可能是由于土壤复杂的理化性质以及微生物群落和功能多样性而导致的。     

Morphological and histological changes during the growth and starvation of herring and plaice larvae

Reared herring (Clupea harengus L.) and plaice (Pleuronectes platessa L.) were examined for morphological and histological changes during growth and starvation. The growth rate of herring larvae of 0.22 mm/day was less than that reported for wild stock, but this difference was attributed to survival of runts in laboratory. Larval plaice had a growth rate of 0.16 mm/day. The relative condition factor (antilogarithm of intercept of length-weight line) was used to assess condition throughout the larval stages. Starvation resulted in a progressive collapse of the larval body, especially of the ventral body surface around the pectoral girdle of both species (assessed by the pectoral angle) and of the spacing between the organs of the head in herring. There was a breakdown of the herring gut with decreases in epithelial cell height and catabolism of the connective tissue coat and a marked reduction in the transverse sectional area of the plaice liver. The changes in the pectoral angle in both herring and plaice and the eye height to head height ratio in herring should be useful to fishery biologists for assessing nutritional condition, even on board ship.     

Uncertainty in epidemiology and health risk and impact assessment

Environmental epidemiology and health risk and impact assessment have long grappled with problems of uncertainty in data and their relationships. These uncertainties have become more challenging because of the complex, systemic nature of many of the risks. A clear framework defining and quantifying uncertainty is needed. Three dimensions characterise uncertainty: its nature, its location and its level. In terms of its nature, uncertainty can be both intrinsic and extrinsic. The former reflects the effects of complexity, sparseness and nonlinearity; the latter arises through inadequacies in available observational data, measurement methods, sampling regimes and models. Uncertainty occurs in three locations: conceptualising the problem, analysis and communicating the results. Most attention has been devoted to characterising and quantifying the analysis—a wide range of statistical methods has been developed to estimate analytical uncertainties and model their propagation through the analysis. In complex systemic risks, larger uncertainties may be associated with conceptualisation of the problem and communication of the analytical results, both of which depend on the perspective and viewpoint of the observer. These imply using more participatory approaches to investigation, and more qualitative measures of uncertainty, not only to define uncertainty more inclusively and completely, but also to help those involved better understand the nature of the uncertainties and their practical implications.