Major shifts in Amazon wildlife populations from recent intensification of floods and drought

In the western Amazon Basin, recent intensification of river‐level cycles has increased flooding during the wet seasons and decreased precipitation during the dry season. Greater than normal floods occurred in 2009 and in all years from 2011 to 2015 during high‐water seasons, and a drought occurred during the 2010 low‐water season. During these years, we surveyed populations of terrestrial, arboreal, and aquatic wildlife in a seasonally flooded Amazonian forest in the Loreto region of Peru (99,780 km²) to study the effects of intensification of natural climatic fluctuations on wildlife populations and in turn effects on resource use by local people. Shifts in fish and terrestrial mammal populations occurred during consecutive years of high floods and the drought of 2010. As floods intensified, terrestrial mammal populations decreased by 95%. Fish, waterfowl, and otter (Pteronura brasiliensis) abundances increased during years of intensive floods, whereas river dolphin and caiman populations had stable abundances. Arboreal species, including, macaws, game birds, primates, felids, and other arboreal mammals had stable populations and were not affected directly by high floods. The drought of 2010 had the opposite effect: fish, waterfowl, and dolphin populations decreased, and populations of terrestrial and arboreal species remained stable. Ungulates and large rodents are important sources of food and income for local people, and large declines in these animals has shifted resource use of people living in the flooded forests away from hunting to a greater reliance on fish.     

Dissipation of sulfamethoxazole and trimethoprim antibiotics from manure-amended soils

In this study, the dissipation of two antibiotics, sulfamethoxazole (SMX) and trimethoprim (TRM), in three soils under both aerobic and anaerobic conditions are evaluated. Under aerobic conditions, SMX dissipated rapidly through biodegradation but TRM was more persistent. Within the first 20 days in biologically active soils, >50% of the SMX was lost from the clay loam and loamy sand soils, and >80% loss was noted in the loam soil. Anaerobic dissipation of both compounds was more rapid than aerobic dissipation. The addition of manure to the soil only slightly increased the initial dissipation rate of the two compounds. Little effect was found on glucose mineralisation in soil following the addition of SMX and TRM, even as mixtures at high concentrations.     

Designing and implementing an urban river remediation

In 2017, Consumers Energy completed a sediment response action in the Flint River to address manufactured gas plant‐related impacts in sediments and at the groundwater‐surface water interface. The project site is located in an urban, channelized, developed reach of the river. Multiple property owners and site constraints presented unique challenges for the remedial design, including the presence of Hamilton Dam at the downstream edge of the site which was considered a high‐hazard dam in “very poor condition.” An additional consideration was the City of Flint water crisis which was initially exposed in 2014. The sediment response action was not related to the water crisis because the site is located approximately two miles downstream of the City's water intake, but design, permitting, and construction began after 2014, so the timing added a heightened sense of awareness from the public stakeholders. The successful completion of the sediment response action was the result of deliberate planning, iterative engineering, and open communication with stakeholders that enabled a careful balancing of objectives with sometimes competing interests.     

The design of child restraint system (CRS) labels and warnings affects overall CRS usability

A study was conducted that assessed the effectiveness of different child restraint system (CRS) label/warning designs on users' installation performance. Forty-eight paid participants installed a convertible CRS in a vehicle, and two child test dummies in a CRS, using one of four label conditions. The label conditions were: (1) no labels, (2) the manufacturer's labels that were already affixed to the CRS ("Current"), (3) labels that were designed according to a combination of the current U.S. regulations concerning CRS labels and recently proposed changes to these regulations ("Proposed"), and (4) labels that were designed according to human factors principles and guidelines, and that were based on a hierarchical behavioral task analysis ("Optimal"). Results demonstrated that, overall, the Optimal labels resulted in higher usability ratings and better task performance. This indicates that labels designed using human factors and task analyses that identify critical task information requirements for label features will result in increased user compliance with instructions, higher usability, and improved task performance. Surprisingly, having no labels on the CRS resulted in better installation performance than when either the Current or the Proposed label conditions were used. This indicates that label design can decrease task performance; the actual physical design of a CRS may be just as critical as label content in the installation choices provided to the user. Collectively, results suggest that implementation of the proposed changes to the U.S. regulations concerning CRS labeling would likely not result in increased performance or usability compared to existing manufacturer labels that follow the current guidelines. In order to achieve significantly better ease-of-use and task performance, it would be necessary to implement features of the Optimal label condition.     

Relationship between different size classes of particulate matter and meteorology in three European cities

Evidence on the correlation between particle mass and (ultrafine) particle number concentrations is limited. Winter- and spring-time measurements of urban background air pollution were performed in Amsterdam (The Netherlands), Erfurt (Germany) and Helsinki (Finland), within the framework of the EU funded ULTRA study. Daily average concentrations of ambient particulate matter with a 50% cut off of 2.5 microm (PM2.5), total particle number concentrations and particle number concentrations in different size classes were collected at fixed monitoring sites. The aim of this paper is to assess differences in particle concentrations in several size classes across cities, the correlation between different particle fractions and to assess the differential impact of meteorological factors on their concentrations. The medians of ultrafine particle number concentrations were similar across the three cities (range 15.1 x 10(3)-18.3 x 10(3) counts cm(-3)). Within the ultrafine particle fraction, the sub fraction (10-30 nm) made a higher contribution to particle number concentrations in Erfurt than in Helsinki and Amsterdam. Larger differences across the cities were found for PM2.5(range 11-17 microg m(-3)). PM2.5 and ultrafine particle concentrations were weakly (Amsterdam, Helsinki) to moderately (Erfurt) correlated. The inconsistent correlation for PM2.5 and ultrafine particle concentrations between the three cities was partly explained by the larger impact of more local sources from the city on ultrafine particle concentrations than on PM2.5, suggesting that the upwind or downwind location of the measuring site in regard to potential particle sources has to be considered. Also, relationship with wind direction and meteorological data differed, suggesting that particle number and particle mass are two separate indicators of airborne particulate matter. Both decreased with increasing wind speed, but ultrafine particle number counts consistently decreased with increasing relative humidity, whereas PM2.5 increased with increasing barometric pressure. Within the ultrafine particle mode, nucleation mode (10-30 nm) and Aitken mode (30-100 nm) had distinctly different relationships with accumulation mode particles and weather conditions. Since the composition of these particle fractions also differs, it is of interest to test in future epidemiological studies whether they have different health effects.