Organochlorine pesticides and polychlorinated biphenyl congeners in lanner Falco biarmicus feldeggli Schlegel chicks and lanner prey in Sicily, Italy

This paper reports on research conducted to elucidate the risk posed to the Sicilian population of the endangered lanner falcon Falco biarmicus feldeggii Schlegel by organochlorine (OC) pesticides and polychlorinated biphenyls (PCBs), as part of a wider study on contaminant risk to the lanner. Seventeen lanner nest sites were studied in northern and central Sicily. Sampling (in 2005) and analysis were carried out for selected OC pesticides and PCB congeners in lanner chick blood (15 chicks from 6 nest sites) and in two of the main lanner prey species, magpie Pica pica (36 individuals from 6 lanner nest sites) and rock dove Columba livia (10 individuals from 2 lanner nest sites). No OC and PCB residues were found in lanner chick blood above the detection limits, except for one solitary congener PCB153 (21.8 ng g(-1) wet weight), suggesting that these contaminants do not pose a significant risk to lanner chicks in the study area. Magpie and dove appeared mostly free of contamination with OC pesticides, though contamination levels were significantly higher in magpie than in dove. The presence of exceptional DDE and HEOD values in approximately 8% of the P. pica sample, and one P. pica sample showing recent DDT contamination, may indicate a local OC pesticide hazard to some lanner. Future research to further elucidate the contaminant risk to lanner in Sicily is suggested.     

Fuzzy adaptive management of social and ecological carrying capacities for protected areas

Commonly used methods of evaluating the degree of consistency of protected area ecosystems with social and ecological carrying capacities are likely to result in decision errors. This occurs because such methods do not account for imprecision and uncertainty in inferring the degree of ecosystem consistency from an observed ecosystem indicator. This paper proposes a fuzzy adaptive management approach to determine whether a protected area ecosystem is consistent with ecological and social carrying capacities and, if not, to identify management actions that are most likely to achieve consistency when there is uncertainty about the current degree of consistency and how alternative management actions are likely to influence that consistency. The proposed approach is illustrated using a hypothetical example that uses an ecosystem indicator that reflects combinations of different levels of user satisfaction and conservation of threatened and endangered species. Application of the proposed fuzzy adaptive management approach requires a protected area manager to: (1) identify alternative management actions for achieving ecosystem consistency with social and ecological carrying capacities in each of several management zones in a protected area; (2) randomly assign alternative management actions to management zones; (3) define fuzzy sets for the ecosystem indicator and degree of ecosystem consistency, and fuzzy relations between the ecosystem indicator and the degree of ecosystem consistency; (4) monitor the indicator in each management zone; (5) define fuzzy sets based on the observed indicator in each management zone; and (6) combine the fuzzy sets defined on the observed indicator and the fuzzy relations between the indicator and the degree of ecosystem consistency to reach conclusions about the most likely degree of consistency for alternative management actions in each management zone. The fuzzy adaptive management approach proposed here is advantageous when the benefits of avoiding the decision errors inherent with crisp and stochastic decision rules outweigh the added cost of implementing the approach.     

Supporting waste and water management with proactive legal instruments

This study addresses the means local administrators and legislators in emerging economies dispose of to implement directives passed down to them by international environmental agreements. Specific reference is made to agreements and policies dealing with fresh water supply and waste management. Although the Johannesburg Summit asked that the proportion of people without access to drinking water and basic sanitation be halved by 2015, actions need to be developed on a local scale to reach the target. They need to consider the existence of supply limits for water and the subtle difference between sanitation and waste collection. The concepts of reactive and proactive legislation are confronted. Proactive legislation, already used in the industrialized World, is proposed to introduce new patterns of behavior into emerging economy communities. The proposed legal texts have the capacity to be self-fulfilling in the quest for local compliance with international targets.     

Investigation of Human and Animal Viruses in Water Matrices from a Rural Area in Southeastern Region of Brazil and Their Potential Use as Microbial Source-Tracking Markers

Food and Environmental Virology - This study assessed the sources of contamination of water matrices in a rural area using detection of a host-specific virus (human adenovirus [HAdV], porcine...     

Spindle dynamics identification using particle swarm optimization

Optimal parameters to eliminate machining chatter may be identified using analytical stability models which require the dynamics of the tool-holder-spindle-machine assembly. Receptance coupling substructure analysis (RCSA) provides a useful analytical tool to couple measured spindle-machine dynamics with tool-holder models to predict the tool point frequency response function for the assembly. Previous research has demonstrated a procedure to determine all required spindle receptances from a single measurement, where each mode within the measurement bandwidth was modeled as a fixed-free Euler–Bernoulli beam and fit using a manual, iterative procedure. Here, a particle swarm optimization technique is described for fitting the spindle-machine measurement using a fixed-free Euler–Bernoulli beam model for each mode. The performance of the optimization process and RCSA in predicting the tool tip frequency response is evaluated and the results are presented.     

Forecasting of cyanobacterial density in Torrão reservoir using artificial neural networks

The ability of general regression neural networks (GRNN) to forecast the density of cyanobacteria in the Torr?o reservoir (Tamega river, Portugal), in a period of 15 days, based on three years of collected physical and chemical data, was assessed. Several models were developed and 176 were selected based on their correlation values for the verification series. A time lag of 11 was used, equivalent to one sample (periods of 15 days in the summer and 30 days in the winter). Several combinations of the series were used. Input and output data collected from three depths of the reservoir were applied (surface, euphotic zone limit and bottom). The model that presented a higher average correlation value presented the correlations 0.991; 0.843; 0.978 for training, verification and test series. This model had the three series independent in time: first test series, then verification series and, finally, training series. Only six input variables were considered significant to the performance of this model: ammonia, phosphates, dissolved oxygen, water temperature, pH and water evaporation, physical and chemical parameters referring to the three depths of the reservoir. These variables are common to the next four best models produced and, although these included other input variables, their performance was not better than the selected best model.     

Use of three bivalve species for biomonitoring a polluted estuarine environment

Estuaries are marine areas at great contamination risk due to their hydrodynamic features. PAH are wide and ubiquitous contaminants with a high presence in these marine environments. Chemical analysis of sediments can provide information, although it does not give a direct measure of the toxicological effect of such contaminants in the biota. Samples of Venerupis pullastra, Cerastoderma edule, and Mytilus galloprovincialis were collected from two locations in Corcubión estuary (Norhwest of Spain). The level of PAH in sediment and biota, and its possible origin were assessed. A moderate level of contamination was observed with a predominance of PAH of a pyrogenic origin. Genotoxic damage, measured as single-strand DNA breaks with the comet assay, was evaluated in gill tissue and in hemolymph. The values of DNA damage obtained showed a higher sensitivity of clams and cockles to the pollution load level. These differences among species make us suggest the use of some other species coupled with mussels as an optimal tool for biomonitoring estuarine environments.     

Oxidative stress status,antioxidant metabolism and polypeptide patterns in Juncus maritimus shoots exhibiting differential mercury burdens in Ria de Aveiro coastal lagoon (Portugal)

This study assessed the oxidative stress status, antioxidant metabolism and polypeptide patterns in salt marsh macrophyte Juncus maritimus shoots exhibiting differential mercury burdens in Ria de Aveiro coastal lagoon at reference and the sites with highest, moderate and the lowest mercury contamination. In order to achieve these goals, shoot-mercury burden and the responses of representative oxidative stress indices, and the components of both non-glutathione- and glutathione-based H₂O₂-metabolizing systems were analyzed and cross-talked with shoot-polypeptide patterns. Compared to the reference site, significant elevations in J. maritimus shoot mercury and the oxidative stress indices such as H₂O₂, lipid peroxidation, electrolyte leakage and reactive carbonyls were maximum at the site with highest followed by moderate and the lowest mercury contamination. Significantly elevated activity of non-glutathione-based H₂O₂-metabolizing enzymes such as ascorbate peroxidase and catalase accompanied the studied damage-endpoint responses, whereas the activity of glutathione-based H₂O₂-scavenging enzymes glutathione peroxidase and glutathione sulfo-transferase was inhibited. Concomitantly, significantly enhanced glutathione reductase activity and the contents of both reduced and oxidized glutathione were perceptible in high mercury-exhibiting shoots. It is inferred that high mercury-accrued elevations in oxidative stress indices were obvious, where non-glutathione-based H₂O₂-decomposing enzyme system was dominant over the glutathione-based H₂O₂-scavenging enzyme system. In particular, the glutathione-based H₂O₂-scavenging system failed to coordinate with elevated glutathione reductase which in turn resulted into increased pool of oxidized glutathione and the ratio of oxidized glutathione-to-reduced glutathione. The substantiation of the studied oxidative stress indices and antioxidant metabolism with approximately 53-kDa polypeptide warrants further studies.