Nutritional risks of vegan diets to women and children: Are they preventable?

The potential health risks of vegan diets specifically for women and children are discussed. Women and children are at higher risk of malnutrition from consumption of unsupplemented vegan diets than are adult males. Those who are very young, pregnant, lactating, elderly, or who suffer from poverty, disease or other environmentally induced disadvantages are at special risk. The size of these risks is difficult to quantify from existing studies. Fortunately the risk of dietary deficiency disease can be avoided and the potential health benefits of vegan diets can be realized when diets for these groups are planned in line with theRecommended Dietary Allowances so that nutrient intakes reach or exceed recommended levels, and access to preventive and curative health services is assured.     

Smart and eco-cities in India and China

ABSTRACT

Smart and eco-cities have become important notions for thinking about urban futures. This article contributes to these ongoing debates about smart and eco-urbanism by focussing on recent urbanisation initiatives in Asia. Our study of India’s Smart Cities Mission launched under the administration of Narendra Modi and China’s All-In-One eco-cities project initiated by Xi Jinpin unfolds in two corresponding narratives. Roy and Ong’s [2011. Worlding Cities: Asian Experiments and the Art of Being Global. Oxford: Wiley-Blackwell] “worlding cities” serves as the theoretical backdrop of our analysis. Based on a careful review of a diverse set of academic literature, policy and other sources we identify five process-dimensions for analysing the respective urban approaches. We show how the specific features of China’s and India’s urban focus, organisation, implementation, governance and embedding manifest both nations’ approaches to smart and eco-urbanism. We argue that India’s Smart City Mission and China’s All-in-One project are firmly anchored in broader agendas of change that are set out to transform the nation and extend into time. The Indian Smart City Mission is part of a broader ambition to transform the nation enabling her “smart incarnation” in modernity. Smart technologies are seen as the key drivers of change. In China the framework of ecological civilisation continues a 5000-year historical tradition of civilisation excellence. By explicitly linking eco-urbanism to the framework, eco-cities become a means to enact ecological civilisation on the (urban) ground.     

Nitrogen deposition and the biodiversity of boreal forests: implications for the nitrogen critical load

The critical load concept is used to establish the deposition levels which ecosystems can tolerate without significant harmful effects. Here we summarize work within the Swedish research program Abatement Strategies for Transboundary Air Pollution (ASTA) assessing the critical load of N for boreal forests. Results from both field experiments in an area with low background N deposition in northern Sweden, and from a large-scale monitoring study, show that important vegetational changes start to take place when adding low N doses and that recovery of the vegetation after ceasing N input is a very slow process. The data presented indicate that changes in key ecosystem components occur even at a lower rate of N input than the present recommended empirical critical load for boreal forest understorey vegetation of 10-15 kg N ha(-1) yr(-1). Based on the data presented, we suggest that the critical load should be lowered to 6 kg N ha(-1) yr(-1).     

The effects of farm size and organic farming on diversity of birds, pollinators, and plants in a Swedish landscape

This study compares diversity and abundance of birds plus abundance of butterflies, bumblebees and herbaceous plants between six small farms (<52 ha arable land) and six large farms (>135 ha arable land) in Roslagen in southeastern Sweden. Two of the large and four of the small farms were organic. Large-scale landscape mosaic and underlying bedrock were similar for all farms. Statistical analysis was performed using box-plots on medians and analysis of variance on mean values. More than twice as many bird species and territories, butterflies, and herbaceous plant species, and five times more bumblebees were found on the small compared to the large farms. The largest differences were found between small organic and large conventional farms. Differences were also noted between small and large organic farms: 56% more bird species were found on small organic than on large organic farms, although none of the farms used any pesticides. We therefore argue that the consideration of organic agriculture's effect on biodiversity should include factors affected by farm size.     

Methodology to translate policy assessment problems into scenarios: the example of the SEAMLESS integrated framework

Scenario-based approaches in environmental and policy assessment studies are increasingly applied within integrated assessment and modelling frameworks. The SEAMLESS project develops such an integrated framework (SEAMLESS-IF) aiming to assess, ex-ante, impacts of alternative agro-environmental policies on the sustainability of agricultural systems. A particular challenge in this context is the consistent translation of a wide range of policy questions into scenarios that a modelling framework can assess. The present work defines a methodology for scenario-development in integrated policy assessment with specific emphasis on SEAMLESS-IF. After a general overview on scenario concepts for integrated policy assessment the adopted scenario concept and its development procedure is presented. They allow building integrated scenarios capturing the range of drivers of the assessed agricultural system in a consistent way across temporal and spatial scales. Then focus is on the particular procedures to translate the policy assessment questions into scenario parameters and to implement these parameters into SEAMLESS-IF. Two examples targeted at European and regional level combining integrated assessments of policy changes and technological innovations are considered to illustrate the SEAMLESS scenario concept. We conclude that the proposed methodology to translate policy assessment problems into scenarios effectively supports integrated assessment in SEAMLESS-IF or even in other modelling frameworks.     

Vole response to unintentional changes in the chemistry of GM poplars

Summary.  There is an increased interest for the use of GM trees in forestry and several commercially promising lines are now available. However, the ecological implications of the use of GM trees, e.g. effects on non-target natural enemies, have rarely been explored. The aim of this study was to determine if modification of non-defensive traits in GM poplars unintentionally can influence plant chemistry in a way that has consequences for palatability to voles. In a greenhouse experiment, we used two lines, SPS33A and SPS26, of GM hybrid poplars (Populus tremula x tremuloides) with 1.5 and 4 times, respectively, over-expression sucrose-phosphate synthase (SPS). This enzyme plays a central role in sucrose synthesis, affecting cold acclimation, mesophyll sucrose content and biomass production. As a control we used the isogenic unmodified wild type. Stems of these poplars were presented to bank voles and field voles in cafeteria experiments. The concentration of condensed tannins was higher in leaves of lines SPS33A and SPS26 than in the isogenic wild-type and the concentration of nitrogen was higher in line SPS33A than in both the wild-type and line SPS26. Although the bank voles consumed slightly less bark from SPS33A, there were no significant differences in the preference of bank vole or field vole for the different poplar lines. This indicates that the changes in plant chemistry were insufficient to produce any strong herbivore response or that alteration in tannins and nitrogen counteracted each other. Still, changes in the interactions between mammalian herbivores and GM trees are important to consider in future cost-benefits analyses of GM trees.     

Butterfly effects in mimicry? Combining signal and taste can twist the relationship of Müllerian co-mimics

Müllerian co-mimics are aposematic species that resemble each other; sharing a warning signal is thought to be mutually beneficial for the co-mimics by reducing per capita predation risk. In Batesian mimicry, edible mimics avoid predation by resembling an aposematic model species. The protection of both the model and the mimic is weakened when the mimics are abundant compared to the models. The quasi-Batesian view suggests that defended (Müllerian) co-mimics, when unequal in their defences, could also show a Batesian-like trend of increasing mortality with increasing abundance of a less defended “mimic”. We manipulated frequencies of unequally distasteful artificial co-mimics that were prey for great tits. The co-mimics had different signals (imperfect mimicry) but were equally preferred by the birds when palatable. Unexpectedly, when unpalatable, one of the signals was easier for the birds to learn to avoid. Consequently, during predator learning, the signal design of the prey strongly affected mortality of the co-mimics; there was an interaction between the signal and frequency treatments, but increasing the frequency of a less defended “mimic” did not increase co-mimic mortalities as predicted. In contrast, in a memory test that followed, the effect of signal design disappeared; if the birds had experienced high frequency of “mimics” during learning, co-mimic mortalities did subsequently increase. Since the effect of co-mimic frequencies on mortalities changed depending on the signal design of the prey and predator experience, the results suggest that mimetic relationship may be an unpredictable interplay of several factors in addition to taste and abundance.     

Four genes,morphology and ecology: distinguishing a new species of <Emphasis Type="Italic">Acesta</Emphasis> (Mollusca; Bivalvia) from the Gulf of Mexico

There is currently an active scientific debate about the most correct and efficient way to identify species. To date, few studies in the marine realm have combined the available taxonomic methods. In this study we have used morphology, ecology and molecular analyses to identify a new species within the bivalve genus Acesta. All four genes studied (12S, 16S, Cytb, COI) suggested that a common cold-seep species in the Gulf of Mexico, A. bullisi, should be divided into two distinct species. This conclusion was supported by morphological traits and by observations of ecological distribution. A. oophaga Järnegren, Schander and Young n. sp. is described here, and A. bullisi Vokes (Tulane Stud Geol 2:75–92, 1963) is re-described. This study shows that DNA barcoding in combination with traditional morphological and ecological analyses may be an important tools to identify hidden biodiversity among deep-water organisms such as bivalves.     

Introduction of cob(I)alamin as an analytical tool: application to reaction-kinetic studies of oxiranes

The strongly nucleophilic cob(I)alamin, i.e. Vitamin B₁₂ with Co(III) reduced to Co(I), is introduced as a trapping agent in the determination of concentrations of electrophilic reagents. This compound was applied, in comparison with the previously used moderately reactive nicotinamide (H.J.C.F. Nelis and J.E. Sinsheimer (1981). Anal. Biochem., 115, 151.). Oxiranes, metabolites of 1-alkenes, were chosen as model electrophiles. The reagents (nicotinamide and cob(I)alamin) were evaluated in the determination of the rates of reaction toward valine methylamide, a model of N-terminal valines in hemoglobin often used for monitoring of doses in vivo of genotoxic carcinogens. The rate constants for reaction at 37°C with valine methylamide (k _VMA) determined by the cob(I)alamin and nicotinamide procedure, respectively, were for ethylene oxide (1.6, 1.7), propylene oxide (0.9, 1.1), 1,2-epoxybutane (0.7, 0.8) and 1,2-epoxyoctane (0.5, 0.6) M^?1?h^?1, decreasing with increasing number of carbons of the oxirane. Concentrations of oxiranes trapped with nicotinamide are underrated in reaction mixtures containing valine methylamide due to consumption by reaction with the competing nucleophile, a disturbance that is not observed in trapping with cob(I)alamin which reacts about 10⁵ times faster than nicotinamide. Cob(I)alamin which was demonstrated to be an efficient nucleophile for trapping of electrophiles, also in the presence of competing nucleophiles, is promising as an analytical tool in toxicological studies of reactive compounds. Furthermore, cob(I)alamin can be used to detect, measure and compare electrophilic reactivity of chemical substances, a property that is associated with genotoxic potency.     

Fertile diploid males in the ant Cataglyphis cursor: a potential cost of thelytoky?

Under the hymenopteran single-locus complementary sex-determination system, production of diploid males results from homozygosity at the sex-determiner locus. This arises when both parents transmit identical alleles at the locus to the offspring. In species reproducing asexually through thelytokous parthenogenesis, production of diploid males may also occur when the sex locus undergoes recombination and becomes homozygous in the offspring. Diploid males represent a substantial genetic load in hymenopteran populations because they often produce unviable sperm or sire sterile triploid female offspring. In the Mediterranean ant Cataglyphis cursor, the queen and workers can produce female offspring through automictic thelytokous parthenogenesis with central fusion, a mode of parthenogenesis that increases homozygosity. We report, for the first time, the presence of about 39 % of colonies producing adult diploid males (seven colonies out of 18). Overall, 8 % of adult males were diploid (12 diploid males out of the 146 males genotyped). Genotyping workers from the seven colonies producing diploid males showed that three diploid males were sons of queens and produced by thelytoky, six were probably sons of workers also produced by thelytoky and three were non-natal. Furthermore, the mating of a diploid male with two virgin queens in the laboratory led to the production of sterile triploid workers, which shows that diploid males in C. cursor are fertile, mate successfully and produce viable and functional but probably sterile female offspring. Because diploid males originate from thelytokous reproduction, they are only produced during sexual production and hence do not impair colony growth, which could explain why they are not removed at early brood stages.