Genetic population structure of fishes: implications for coastal zone management

The pattern for distribution of genetic variation within and between populations is referred to as the genetic population structure of the species. To avoid depletion of genetic resources sustainable management should be based on knowledge of this structure. We discuss key aspects of genetic population structure in the context of identifying biological units for fisheries management, suggesting three basic types of structuring: distinct populations; continuous change; and no differentiation. The type of structure determines how units for genetically sustainable management are to be identified. We also review what is currently known regarding the genetic population structure of fishes exploited in the Swedish part of the Baltic Sea, and conclude that sufficient genetic information is lacking for most of the species. This is a serious problem, particularly considering that populations of several commercially exploited fishes are declining and some exhibit recruitment problems. For six species, Atlantic herring, Atlantic salmon, brown trout, European eel, turbot, and pike, sufficient genetic data are available to provide at least basic information on genetic structure and genetic units for biologically sustainable use. Current management practices do not sufficiently consider these data.     

Implementation of the ecosystem services approach in Swedish municipal planning

While ecosystem-based planning approaches are increasingly promoted through international and national policies, municipalities are still struggling with translating them into practice. Against this background, this paper aims to increase the knowledge of current advances and possible ways to support the implementation of the ecosystem services (ES) approach at the municipal level. More specifically, we analyze how ES have been integrated into comprehensive planning within the municipality of Malmö in Sweden over the last 60 years, a declared forerunner in local environmental governance. Based on a content analysis of comprehensive plans over the period 1956–2014 and interviews with municipal stakeholders, this paper demonstrates how planning has shifted over time toward a more holistic view of ES and their significance for human well-being and urban sustainability. Both explicit and implicit applications of the ES concept were found in the analyzed comprehensive plans and associated programs and projects. Our study shows how these applications reflect international, national, and local policy changes, and indicates how municipalities can gradually integrate the ES approach into comprehensive planning and facilitate the transition from implicit to more explicit knowledge use.     

Local environmental monitoring in Sweden: The need for a new strategy?

This paper discusses the present character of environmental monitoring in Swedish municipalities. We have found that local environmental monitoring in Sweden is insufficient. There is very little connection between monitoring activities and local environmental goals, and environmental goals have been established without considering information from the environmental monitoring. In practice, this means that local environmental monitoring has only a limited influence on political decisions and priorities in the municipalities. Our study also showed that local environmental monitoring was almost entirely focused on monitoring the state of the environment and showed a lack of flow-oriented information. There is a strong need to develop a unified strategy for local environmental monitoring to avoid sub-optimisations in local environmental management. A new strategy would, to a much higher degree, have to focus on monitoring diffuse sources of pollution and personal lifestyles. In this case, monitoring only the state of the environment would not be sufficient. It would have to include also the flows of materials through society, i.e. the whole metabolism of society, including biogeochemical as well as anthropogenic material flows.     

Does traumatic secretion transfer manipulate mating roles or reproductive output in a hermaphroditic sea slug?

Copulation in the simultaneous hermaphrodite Siphopteron sp. involves injection of prostate fluids into the mating partner with a stylet-shaped penile appendage before insemination. It has been hypothesised that such traumatic secretion transfer manipulates sex roles or the recipient’s short-term reproductive output. To test manipulative effects of traumatic secretion transfer, we ablated the stylet of male-acting individuals and then paired them to untreated focal individuals. Mating behaviour and egg output of focal individuals was then compared between this ‘no injection group’ and a ‘control group’ with sham-treated mating partners. We found that penile stylets were inserted at different areas prior to and during insemination, but prostate fluid injection was restricted to the first phase. Here, injections were into the anterior foot region, indicating that prostate secretions target the nearby male or female copulatory tracts. Our experimental manipulation of traumatic secretion transfer did not affect the exhibited mating roles. Matings in both treatments were usually reciprocal so that both partners acted in the male as well as female mating role. Moreover, sperm recipient reproductive output did not differ between treatments. We conclude that traumatic secretion transfer in this species either affects currently unmeasured traits, for instance the donor’s paternity share, or that these sea slugs are so well-adapted to traumatic secretion transfer that the effects were too subtle to be detected in our current assays.     

The Harm Principle and Genetically Modified Food

It is suggested that the Harm Principle can be viewedas the moral basis on which genetically modified (GM) food iscurrently regulated. It is then argued (a) that the concept ofharm cannot be specified in such a manner as to render the HarmPrinciple a plausible political principle, so this principlecannot be used to justify existing regulation; and (b) that evenif the Harm Principle were a plausible political principle, itcould not be used alone in the regulation of GM food, since itdoes not express a concern for the expected benefits of suchfood.     

Spatial anatomy of species survival: effects of predation and climate-driven environmental variability

The majority of survival analyses focus on temporal scales. Consequently, there is a limited understanding of how species survival varies over space and, ultimately, how spatial variability in the environment affects the temporal dynamics of species abundance. Using data from the Barents Sea, we study the spatiotemporal variability of the juvenile Atlantic cod (Gadus morhua) survival. We develop an index of spatial survival based on changes of juvenile cod distribution through their first winter of life (from age-0 to age-1) and study its variability in relation to biotic and abiotic factors. Over the 25 years analyzed (1980-2004), we found that, once the effect of passive drift due to dominant currents is accounted for, the area where age-0 cod survival was lowest coincided with the area of highest abundance of older cod. Within this critical region, the survival of age-0 cod was negatively affected by its own abundance, by that of older cod, and by bottom depth. Furthermore, during cold years, age-0 cod survival increased in the eastern and coldest portion of the examined area, which was typically avoided by older conspecifics. Based on these results we propose that within the examined area top-down mechanisms and predation-driven density dependence can strongly affect the spatial pattern of age-0 cod survival. Climate-related variables can also influence the spatial survival of age-0 cod by affecting their distribution and that of their predators. Results from these and similar studies, focusing on the spatial variability of survival rates, can be used to characterize species habitat quality of marine renewable resources.     

An ultraviolet receptor as a fourth receptor type in goldfish color vision

The Science of Nature -     

Circadian control of meal timing during temporal isolation

The Science of Nature -