<Emphasis Type="Italic">Lyngbya majuscula</Emphasis> blooms and the diet of small subtropical benthivorous fishes

Increasing concerns about the ecological impacts of ongoing and possibly worsening blooms of the toxic, carcinogenic cyanobacteria Lyngbya majuscula in Moreton Bay, Australia, led us to assess differences in meiofaunal prey assemblages between bloom and non-bloom substrates and the potential dietary impacts of dense L. majuscula blooms on the omnivorous benthivore, the Eastern Long-finned Goby, Favonigobius lentiginosus and the obligate meiobenthivorous juveniles of Trumpeter Whiting, Sillago maculata. Marked differences in invertebrate communities were found between sandy and L. majuscula bloom foraging substrates, with copepods significantly more abundant (18.49% vs. 70.44% numerical abundance) and nematodes significantly less abundant (55.91% vs. 1.21% numerical abundance) within bloom material. Gut analyses showed that bentho-planktivorous fishes exposed to L. majuscula in captivity had consumed a significantly greater quantity of prey by both total number (P < 0.0019) and volume (P < 0.0006) than fish exposed to sand treatments. Thus, it is likely for such fishes that L. majuscula blooms increase rates of prey encounter and consumption, with consequent changes in trophic relationships through shifts in predator–prey interactions between small benthivorous fishes and their meiofaunal prey.     

Transboundary Pollution and Absorptive Capacity

The impact of the investment in absorptive capacity on transboundary pollution is studied by considering two countries, each of them regulating a firm. Firms can invest in inventive research and in absorptive research to lower their pollution intensity. The absorptive research enables a firm to capture part of the inventive research made by the other one. We show that by means of adequate emission taxes, original and absorptive research and development (R&D) subsidies, regulators can reach the non-cooperative social optimum. Interestingly, we show that the investment in absorptive research enables non-cooperating regulators to better internalize transboundary pollution. The higher is the learning parameter of absorption, the greater is the proportion of transboundary pollution internalized. Therefore, it is recommended for the international community to make the patent laws more flexible and enabling learning from the research made by others more interesting. Moreover, the investment in absorptive R&D may lead to multiple equilibria necessitating non-cooperating countries to coordinate on an equilibrium, which constitutes an incentive for them to cooperate.     

Monitoring of methylene blue monomers and dimers to control the bacterialogical water quality including application to photocatalysis

Environmental Science and Pollution Research - In this study, we propose the development of a rapid and reliable method to control and to monitor microbial water quality. The methylene blue (MB)...     

The loss of an indigenous constructed landscape following British invasion of Australia: An insight into the deep human imprint on the Australian landscape

Indigenous people play an integral role in shaping natural environments, and the disruption to Indigenous land management practices has profound effects on the biosphere. Here, we use pollen, charcoal and dendrochronological analyses to demonstrate that the Australian landscape at the time of British invasion in the 18th century was a heavily constructed one—the product of millennia of active maintenance by Aboriginal Australians. Focusing on the Surrey Hills, Tasmania, our results reveal how the removal of Indigenous burning regimes following British invasion instigated a process of ecological succession and the encroachment of cool temperate rainforest (i.e. later-stage vegetation communities) into grasslands of conservation significance. This research provides empirical evidence to challenge the long-standing portrayal of Indigenous Australians as low-impact ‘hunter-gatherers’ and highlights the relevance and critical value of Indigenous fire management in this era of heightened bushfire risk and biodiversity loss.     

The use of benthic mesocosms for the assessment of sediment contamination.

The diagnostic capability of changes in the benthic macroinvertebrate community composition to determine the cause in contaminated sediments were addressed using box core mesocosms subjected to cadmium, atrazine and nutrient enrichment. Intact cores of lake sediment were collected from Lake Erie at four occasions during 1996 and were returned to laboratory where they were maintained and manipulated. The benthic community composition of the artificially polluted mesocosms was compared with field data, collected at the same time as the intact cores, and to untreated control boxes. Community composition was related to the measured environmental variables using multi-dimensional scaling (MDS) and principle axis correlation (PCC). Community responses to different treatments were both different and consistent, suggesting that the community structure of these mesocosms could be used to identify the primary source of impact.     

鄱阳湖一些水文特征和整治战略

本文分析研究了鄱阳湖湖水面积和容积大,随水位变动月际变化也大,过境水径流的年际、月际变化大,但对“五河”和长江水量调节量小、又不适时的水文特征。提出了驯服“五河”,人工控制鄱阳湖,协调长江、“五河”与鄱阳湖的关系,整治鄱阳湖的战略。     

修正的BP神经网络森林火灾成灾面积预测研究

以1997-2012年《中国林业统计年鉴》的全国森林火灾成灾面积为依据,应用BP神经网络模型对成灾面积进行了预测,对预测方法进行了检验.在此基础上,利用残差提出了修正的BP神经网络模型,并对预测方法进行了改进.研究结果表明,修正的BP神经网络预测精度高于BP神经网络,预测相对误差平均为7.2％,可应用于森林火灾成灾面积的预测.