Acid sulphate soil disturbance and metals in groundwater: implications for human exposure through home grown produce

A significant emerging environmental problem is the disturbance and oxidation of soils with high levels of iron sulphide minerals resulting in acidification and causing the mobilization of metals into groundwater. This process is occurring in many parts of the world. In Western Australia, impacted groundwater is extracted by residents for domestic use. We sought to establish domestic use patterns of bore water and the concentration of metals. Sixty-seven domestic bore water samples clearly indicated oxidation of sulphidic materials with heavy metal concentrations ranging for aluminium (相似文献   

Mainstreaming climate adaptation into urban planning: overcoming barriers, seizing opportunities and evaluating the results in two Dutch case studies

With cities facing climate change, climate adaptation is necessary to reduce risks such as heat stress and flooding and maintain the goals of sustainable urban development. In climate change literature, the focus has been on developing a new dedicated policy domain for climate adaptation. Yet, empirical evidence shows that in practice actors are searching for solutions that not only serve climate adaptation, but integrate the adaptation objective in existing policy domains (e.g., urban planning, water management, public health). The integration of adaptation in other policy domains, also called “mainstreaming climate adaptation,” can stimulate the effectiveness of policy making through combining objectives, increase efficient use of human and financial resources and ensure long-term sustainable investments. A better understanding of the process of mainstreaming is, however, lacking. The article introduces a conceptual model for mainstreaming climate adaptation to enhance our understanding of the concept as well as the barriers and opportunities that influence these integration processes and to explore strategies for overcoming barriers and creating opportunities. Two Dutch case studies—related to urban planning—are used to illustrate the value of the model. The cases demonstrate the dynamic process of mainstreaming and raise discussion of the appropriate criteria for evaluating mainstreaming in relation to the aims of climate adaptation. The paper concludes with an exploration of specific strategies to facilitate the mainstreaming of adaptation in existing and new policy domains.     

Ecological design criteria for a sustainable Canadian society

Summary The purpose of this paper is to develop specific ecological design criteria for a sustainable Canadian society. Ecological design criteria complement socio-political ones which have also been developed by the Sustainable Society Project at the University of Waterloo. The criteria derive from an evaluation of the major areas of human activity and interaction with the natural environment in light of our knowledge of ecological systems and resource management. The criteria, like the Sustainable Society Project as a whole, are an attempt to suggest needed, feasible, medium to long-term changes in human activities to comply with the ecological and socio-political limits and constraints that must be recognized in order to achieve societal sustainability. The specific design criteria identified here are not the only ones possible, desirable, or necessary — a complete and certain list is inherently impossible. But the design criteria developed here are illustrative of the kinds of changes that are necessary to achieve sustainability.Dr D. Scott Slocombe is Assistant Professor in the Department of Geography, and Co-Director of the Cold Regions Research Centre, Wilfrid Laurier University. His principal research interests include ecosystem and regional planning, and management for sustainability.Caroline Van Bers was Project Manager for the Sustainable Society Project at the University of Waterloo and she received her MA from the School of Urban and Regional Planning at that University. She currently works in the State of the Environment Reporting Branch of Environment Canada.     

A Preliminary Risk Assessment Protocol for Renegade Nanoparticles Deployed During Nanoremediation

The NanoRem European research project aims to support and develop the appropriate use of nanotechnology for contaminated land remediation by facilitating practical, economic, and exploitable nanotechnology for in situ remediation. This can only be achieved in parallel with a comprehensive understanding of the environmental risk‐benefit balance for the use of the nanoparticles (NPs) being investigated. While the NanoRem NPs could have a significant toxicity this is likely to be less potent than NPs currently being released into the environment, such as those from a variety of antibacterial products. The NanoRem NPs are likely to interact with the aquifer matrix, each other, and groundwater chemistry to rapidly cease to be mobile and are unlikely to penetrate into the aquifer more than a few meters from the point of injection. In terms of the source‐pathway‐receptor paradigm, the NanoRem NPs are cautiously presumed to represent a hazard (i.e., source). At least one receptor, in the form of not yet polluted groundwater, is present at all the NanoRem case study sites. While there are considerable uncertainties particularly with regards to the transport of NanoRem NPs, the ability of NPs to penetrate far into the formation is likely to be very limited. The relatively short travel distances reported in the literature for a variety of NP types and geological conditions suggest that the pathways are at best very limited in extent. Overall, this means that in many cases the level of risk renegade NPs can pose to the environment or human health is at most minimal. A qualitative protocol developed for the NanoRem field trials can demonstrate that injecting NanoRem NPs into contaminated groundwater poses a minimal level of risk due to the reduced pathway. ©2016 Wiley Periodicals, Inc.     

Differential reproductive success among subfamilies in queenless honeybee (<Emphasis Type="Italic">Apis mellifera</Emphasis> L.) colonies

With very rare exceptions, queenright worker honeybees (Apis mellifera L.) forego personal reproduction and suppress reproduction by other workers, preferring to rear the queens sons. This is in stark contrast to colonies that have lost their queen and have failed to rear a replacement. Under these conditions workers activate their ovaries and lay many eggs that develop parthenogenetically into a final brood of males (drones) before the colony perishes. Interestingly, not all workers contribute equally to this final generation of drones in queenless colonies. Some subfamilies (workers that share the same father) contribute a disproportionately greater number of offspring than other subfamilies. Here we explore some of the mechanisms behind this reproductive competition among subfamilies. We determined the relative contribution of different subfamilies present in colonies to laying workers, eggs, larvae and pupae by genotyping samples of all life stages using a total of eight microsatellite loci. Our colonies were headed by free-mated queens and comprised 8–17 subfamilies and therefore differed significantly from colonies used in an earlier study investigating the same phenomena where colonies comprised an artificially low number of subfamilies. We show that, first, subfamilies vary in the speed with which they activate their ovaries after queen-loss and, second, that the survival of eggs to the larval stage is unequal among subfamilies suggesting that some subfamilies lay eggs that are more acceptable than others. However, there is no statistically significant difference among subfamilies in the survival of larvae to pupae, indicating that ovary activation and egg survival are the critical components to reproductive competition among subfamilies of queenless honeybee workers.Communicated by R. Page     

The characterization of hCG regulation in cultured human amniotic fluid cells

The media from primary cultures and subcultures of second trimester human amniotic fluid (AF) cells were assayed by radioimmunoassay to quantitate production of human chorionic gonadotropin (hCG). Primary AF cultures produce more hCG per cell than do the corresponding subcultures. Sodium butyrate (2 mM) stimulates AF subcultures to produce 5-13 times more hCG per cell or per mg of cellular protein than do untreated subcultures. This stimulatory effect of sodium butyrate is dose dependent between 0 and 5 mM. Addition of sodium butyrate 24 hours after subculture, while stimulating production of hCG during the subsequent 3 days, also results in fewer cells and less protein per culture. This effect on cell growth is also dose-dependent. Previous investigators have proposed that the stimulation of hCG by sodium butyrate in other types of cell cultures is due to an effect of that agent on culture growth. Therefore, in these studies AF cells are allowed to grow to confluency before sodium butyrate was added. Production of hCG was stimulated by sodium butyrate about four-fold during the next 5 days although no significant changes were observed either in number of cells or amount of cellular protein per culture. These results suggest that stimulation of hCG by sodium butyrate is not dependent on its effect on growth of the cultures.     

Amniotic fluid microvillar enzyme activities in the early detection of fetal abnormalities

Measurement of the microvillar enzymes, γ-glutamyltranspeptidase (GGTP), aminopeptidase M (APM) and alkaline phosphatase (ALP), in amniotic fluid supernatant has been proposed as a method for the early prenatal diagnosis of cystic fibrosis. The activities of these enzymes in a series of other fetal abnormalities have now been examined. GGTP activities were below the 5th percentile in 28 out of 54 cases of trisomy 21 and 9 of 14 cases of trisomy 18, while APM values were below this cut-off in 26 of 54 cases of trisomy 21 and 8 of 14 cases of trisomy 18. Abnormal ALP isoenzyme ratios were found in 6 of 54 cases of trisomy 21 and 4 of 14 cases of trisomy 18. If prenatal cytogenetic studies are routinely carried out on amniotic fluid cells, the occasional confounding effect of abnormal microvillar enzymes associated with fetal trisomies rather than with cystic fibrosis should be avoided.