Characterization and pyrolysis of Chlorella vulgaris and Arthrospira platensis: potential of bio-oil and chemical production by Py-GC/MS analysis

Environmental Science and Pollution Research - Biofuels have been seen as potential sources to meet future energy demand as a renewable and sustainable energy source. Despite the fact that the...     

Electrooxidation of industrial wastewater containing 1,4-dioxane in the presence of different salts

The treatment of 1,4-dioxane solution by electrochemical oxidation on boron-doped diamond was studied using a central composite design and the response surface methodology to investigate the use of SO₄ ^2? and HCO₃ ^? as supporting electrolytes considering the applied electric current, initial chemical oxygen demand (COD) value, and treatment time. Two industrial effluents containing bicarbonate alkalinity, one just carrying 1,4-dioxane (S1), and another one including 1,4-dioxane and 2-methyl-1,3-dioxolane (S2), were treated under optimized conditions and subsequently subjected to biodegradability assays with a Pseudomonas putida culture. Electrooxidation was compared with ozone oxidation (O₃) and its combination with hydrogen peroxide (O₃/H₂O₂). Regarding the experimental design, the optimal compromise for maximum COD removal at minimum energy consumption was shown at the maximum tested concentrations of SO₄ ^2? and HCO₃ ^? (41.6 and 32.8 mEq L^?1, respectively) and the maximum selected initial COD (750 mg L^?1), applying a current density of 11.9 mA cm^?2 for 3.8 h. Up to 98 % of the COD was removed in the electrooxidation treatment of S1 effluent using 114 kWh per kg of removed COD and about 91 % of the COD from S2 wastewater applying 49 kWh per kg of removed COD. The optimal biodegradability enhancement was achieved after 1 h of electrooxidation treatment. In comparison with O₃ and O₃/H₂O₂ alternatives, electrochemical oxidation achieved the fastest degradation rate per oxidant consumption unit, and it also resulted to be the most economical treatment in terms of energy consumption and price per unit of removed COD.     

Systematic Temporal Patterns in the Relationship Between Housing Development and Forest Bird Biodiversity

As people encroach increasingly on natural areas, one question is how this affects avian biodiversity. The answer to this is partly scale‐dependent. At broad scales, human populations and biodiversity concentrate in the same areas and are positively associated, but at local scales people and biodiversity are negatively associated with biodiversity. We investigated whether there is also a systematic temporal trend in the relationship between bird biodiversity and housing development. We used linear regression to examine associations between forest bird species richness and housing growth in the conterminous United States over 30 years. Our data sources were the North American Breeding Bird Survey and the 2000 decennial U.S. Census. In the 9 largest forested ecoregions, housing density increased continually over time. Across the conterminous United States, the association between bird species richness and housing density was positive for virtually all guilds except ground nesting birds. We found a systematic trajectory of declining bird species richness as housing increased through time. In more recently developed ecoregions, where housing density was still low, the association with bird species richness was neutral or positive. In ecoregions that were developed earlier and where housing density was highest, the association of housing density with bird species richness for most guilds was negative and grew stronger with advancing decades. We propose that in general the relationship between human settlement and biodiversity over time unfolds as a 2‐phase process. The first phase is apparently innocuous; associations are positive due to coincidence of low‐density housing with high biodiversity. The second phase is highly detrimental to biodiversity, and increases in housing density are associated with biodiversity losses. The long‐term effect on biodiversity depends on the final housing density. This general pattern can help unify our understanding of the relationship of human encroachment and biodiversity response. Patrones Sistemáticos Temporales en la Relación entre Desarrollos Urbanos y la Biodiversidad de Aves de Bosque     

The data not collected on community forestry

Conservation and development practitioners increasingly promote community forestry as a way to conserve ecosystem services, consolidate resource rights, and reduce poverty. However, outcomes of community forestry have been mixed; many initiatives failed to achieve intended objectives. There is a rich literature on institutional arrangements of community forestry, but there has been little effort to examine the role of socioeconomic, market, and biophysical factors in shaping both land‐cover change dynamics and individual and collective livelihood outcomes. We systematically reviewed the peer‐reviewed literature on community forestry to examine and quantify existing knowledge gaps in the community‐forestry literature relative to these factors. In examining 697 cases of community forest management (CFM), extracted from 267 peer‐reviewed publications, we found 3 key trends that limit understanding of community forestry. First, we found substantial data gaps linking population dynamics, market forces, and biophysical characteristics to both environmental and livelihood outcomes. Second, most studies focused on environmental outcomes, and the majority of studies that assessed socioeconomic outcomes relied on qualitative data, making comparisons across cases difficult. Finally, there was a heavy bias toward studies on South Asian forests, indicating that the literature on community forestry may not be representative of decentralization policies and CFM globally.     

Effects of payments for ecosystem services on wildlife habitat recovery

Conflicts between local people's livelihoods and conservation have led to many unsuccessful conservation efforts and have stimulated debates on policies that might simultaneously promote sustainable management of protected areas and improve the living conditions of local people. Many government‐sponsored payments‐for‐ecosystem‐services (PES) schemes have been implemented around the world. However, few empirical assessments of their effectiveness have been conducted, and even fewer assessments have directly measured their effects on ecosystem services. We conducted an empirical and spatially explicit assessment of the conservation effectiveness of one of the world's largest PES programs through the use of a long‐term empirical data set, a satellite‐based habitat model, and spatial autoregressive analyses on direct measures of change in an ecosystem service (i.e., the provision of wildlife species habitat). Giant panda (Ailuropoda melanoleuca) habitat improved in Wolong Nature Reserve of China after the implementation of the Natural Forest Conservation Program. The improvement was more pronounced in areas monitored by local residents than those monitored by the local government, but only when a higher payment was provided. Our results suggest that the effectiveness of a PES program depends on who receives the payment and on whether the payment provides sufficient incentives. As engagement of local residents has not been incorporated in many conservation strategies elsewhere in China or around the world, our results also suggest that using an incentive‐based strategy as a complement to command‐and‐control, community‐ and norm‐based strategies may help achieve greater conservation effectiveness and provide a potential solution for the park versus people conflict.     

Implications of human value shift and persistence for biodiversity conservation

Large‐scale change in human values and associated behavior change is believed by some to be the ultimate solution to achieve global biodiversity conservation. Yet little is known about the dynamics of values. We contribute to this area of inquiry by examining the trajectory of values affecting views of wildlife in North America. Using data from a 19‐state study in the United States and global data from the Schwartz Value Survey, we explored questions of value persistence and change and the nature of attitudinal responses regarding wildlife conservation issues. We found support, based on subjects’ ancestry, for the supposition that domination is a prevalent American value orientation toward wildlife that has origins in European Judeo‐Christian traditions. Independent of that effect, we also found indications of change. Modernization is contributing to a shift from domination to mutualism value orientations, which is fostering attitudes less centered on human interests and seemingly more consistent with a biocentric philosophy. Our findings suggest that if value shift could be achieved in a purposeful way, then significant and widespread behavior change believed necessary for long‐term conservation success may indeed be possible. In particular, greater emphasis on mutualism values may help provide the context for more collaborative approaches to support future conservation efforts. However, given the societal forces at play, it is not at all clear that human‐engineered value shift is tenable. Instead of developing strategies aimed at altering values, it may be more productive to create strategies that recognize and work within the boundaries of existing values. Whereas values appear to be in a period of flux, it will be difficult to predict future trends without a better understanding of value formation and shift, particularly under conditions of rapid social‐ecological change.     

Archaeometric researches on the provenance of Mediterranean Archaic Phoenician and Punic pottery

The aim of this study is to setup a first chemical database that could represent the starting point for a reliable classification method to discriminate between Archaic Phoenician and Punic pottery on the base of their chemical data. This database up to now can discriminate between several different areas of production and provenance and can be applied also to unknown ceramic samples of comparable age and production areas. More than 100 ceramic fragments were involved in this research, coming from various archaeological sites having a crucial importance in the context of the Phoenician and Punic settlement in central and western Mediterranean: Carthage (Tunisia), Toscanos (South Andalusia, Spain), Sulci, Monte Sirai, Othoca, Tharros (Sardinia, Italy) and Pithecusa (Campania, Italy). Since long-time archaeologists hypothesised that Mediterranean Archaic Phoenician and Punic pottery had mainly a local or just a regional diffusion, with the exception of some particular class like transport amphorae. To verify the pottery provenance, statistical analyses were carried out to define the existence of different ceramic compositional groups characterised by a local origin or imported from other sites. The existing literature data are now supplemented by new archaeometric investigations both on Archaic Phoenician ceramics and clayey raw materials from Sardinia. Therefore, diffractometric analyses, optical microscopy observations and X-ray fluorescence analyses were performed to identify the mineralogical and chemical composition of Othoca ceramics and clayey raw material. The obtained results were then compared with own literature data concerning Phoenician and Punic pottery in order to find features related to the different ceramic productions and their provenance. Principal component analysis (PCA) and hierarchical cluster analysis (HCA) were also performed on the chemical compositional data in order to discriminate ceramic groups. A very complex situation was found: imported ceramics coming from Carthage, with a large-scale distribution, were found together with a predominant local production pottery. The archaeometric results demonstrate that historical and typological approach has to be supported by scientific analyses to better understand local or Mediterranean exchanges.     

Changes in the spatial distribution of spawning activity by north-east Atlantic mackerel in warming seas: 1977–2010

Migratory species with a broad geographic range, such as north-east Atlantic mackerel, may be amongst the fauna most able to respond to warming seas, typically with a poleward shift in range. Habitat heterogeneity could, however, produce more complex patterns than a simple polewards translation in distribution. We tested for changes in the central location and spatial spread of mackerel spawning over a 33-year period. Spatial statistics [centre of gravity (CoG) of egg production, spatial variance, and degree of anisotropy] were used to summarise interannual changes in the spawning locations of the western spawning stock of north-east Atlantic mackerel (NEA-WSC) using data from the ICES triennial egg survey. A northwards shift in CoG of egg production estimates was observed, related to both an expansion in the distribution in survey effort and warming waters of the north-east Atlantic. Sea surface temperature (SST) had a significant positive association with the observed northward movement of NEA-WSC mackerel, equivalent to a displacement of 37.7 km °C^?1 (based on spring mean SST for the region). The spatial distribution of spawning around the CoG also changed significantly with SST, with a less elongated spatial spread in warm years. An increase in the proportion of spawning over the Porcupine Bank demonstrated how habitat interacts with positional shifts to affect how north-east Atlantic mackerel are distributed around the centre of their spawning range.