Screening and characterization of extremophiles in spacecraft assembly environment北大核心CSCD

Spacecrafts need to strictly control microorganisms before entering space flight. The Spacecraft Assembly, Integration, and Test Center (AITC) is an important environmental source for spacecrafts to carry microorganisms. The assembly clean room has characteristics of ventilation, dryness, and lack of nutrients that are not conducive to the growth and reproduction of microorganisms, except for extremophiles. In this study, based on the internal air and surface environment of the AITC in China, 13 strains of bacteria were identified by plate culture and 16S sequence analysis, and their extreme environmental tolerance, antibiotic resistance, and film-forming ability were tested. All these bacteria belonged to the Firmicutes and Proteobacteria phyla, and nine strains belonged to the Bacillus genus. All 13 strains of bacteria were salt-tolerant, acid-tolerant, and alkali-tolerant, and 69.2% of the bacteria survived heat shock at 80 ℃. Among these, one strain of Sphingomonas sp. JCM7513 isolated from the surface environment was insensitive to all the tested antibiotics and had strong drug resistance, while the other 12 strains were sensitive to most β-lactam antibiotics but had strong resistance to tetracyclic antibiotics and erythromycin. Most of the isolated bacteria exhibited strong biofilm-forming abilities. The study showed that there are a certain number of extremophiles in the spacecraft assembly environment. To protect spacecrafts from biological corrosion and planetary protection forward pollution, more effective monitoring and elimination methods are needed. © 2022 Science Press. All rights reserved.     

Transformation of rural communities: lessons from a local self-initiative for building resilience in the Solomon Islands

Solomon Islands is vulnerable to negative impacts from climate change, where people’s livelihoods and their well-being are threatened, especially the viability of isolated communities. Realising the increasing risks from climate change on communities, government, in partnership with aid-donor partners, has invested millions of dollars in climate change projects, through mitigation and adaptation strategies. As a form of adaptation, the government invests in programmes aimed at increasing the adaptive capacity of the vulnerable communities through landscape and seascape projects across the rural communities. Focusing on the “transformation concept” as a long-term adaptation strategy and enlargement of climate engineering and ecological resilience concepts, the paper discusses why building resilience from transformation of rural communities, as well as from landscape and seascape projects, would benefit communities and relevant authorities. This paper describes the findings of a study on two rural villages, Keigold and Mondo, from Ranogha Islands, Western Province, in Solomon Islands, where 80% of households decided to relocate from their old village “Mondo” to their new home “Keigold” after an earthquake in 2007, as part of a self-initiative. The reallocation process can be seen as a case of pro-active community transformation that provides valuable lessons to other rural communities that may be forced to move due to impacts from natural catastrophes, including those explained by climate change risks. Lessons from this experience suggest that policy-makers and non-government organisations should consider and empower local transformation initiatives as a way to building long-term adaptation to climate change.     

Sustainable consumption: the effects of knowledge,cultural values,environmental advertising,and demographics

As a result of human lifestyles and unsustainable consumption patterns, the environment continues to deteriorate and thus inhibit sustainable development. In order to curb this situation and promote a sustainable economy, one of the solution is to reduce conventional products consumption and shift to green products. Over the past 20 years, marketing managers keenly seek to understand the green market; however, inadequate information on how to promote consumers’ green behavioral intentions is slowing the growth of green markets and becomes a barrier for firms when developing segments and communicating strategies for effective promotion of green products in countries like Malaysia where the trend is fairly new. Therefore, this study attempts to examine the impact of environmental knowledge, cultural values, and environmental advertising and determine the moderating effect of income level, education level, and gender on consumers’ green purchase intentions. A survey was administered, and a total of 405 valid questionnaires were obtained. Structural equation modeling technique was used to evaluate the causal model by using SmartPLS 2.0 software. The finding results suggest that cultural values and environmental advertising are the main influences in building green purchase intentions, while environmental knowledge is not significantly related. The results also indicate that education level and gender have a significant positive moderation effect while income did not. This suggests that green purchase intentions’ motivational factors are greater among highly educated individuals, with females in particular. The discussions and implications of these findings are further elaborated.     

陕西2012年极端天气气候事件与气象灾害

利用极端天气气候事件监测系统监测结果,分析了陕西1981-2012年极端天气气候事件出现次数和强度,发现2012年陕西极端天气气候事件次数少于多年平均值,但华阴7月2-4日、佳县7月24-28日极端降水事件强度之大,为历史罕见,佳县27日降水量、26-28日3d降水量均超过百年一遇的水平,造成严重人员伤亡和经济损失.说明即便是在极端天气气候事件出现次数少,气候年景较好的年份,局地也会出现历史罕见的极端事件和灾害.此外,还分析了极端天气气候事件次数与灾情年景评估指数之间的相关性.     

Crop adaptation processes to extreme floods in Bangladesh: a case study

This paper investigates farmers’ crop adaptation processes in response to three recent devastating floods in Islampur, a case-study area in rural Bangladesh. The paper reports a multi-method research project which comprised a questionnaire survey, focus-group discussions and interviews with agricultural block supervisors. The author analyses three recent severe floods in Bangladesh, occurring in 1988, 1995 and 1998, and reviews the adaptation techniques and strategies embraced by the same group of farmers in order to survive the more devastating inundations that occur from time to time. The study concluded that vulnerable farmers are highly resilient and, with appropriate support, their adjustments can be sustainable. This enquiry showed that in the face of climate change both the inclusion of autonomous adaptations into planning and policy-making and the enhancement and support of community-based adaptation can be effective in ensuring the survival of riverine farming systems. This case study can be considered as a key reference case in regard to vulnerable locations in the Ganges–Brahmaputra–Meghna mega-delta basin, particularly in respect to Bangladesh.     

Heat-health warnings in regional Australia: examining public perceptions and responses

ABSTRACT

Heatwaves are an increasing environmental hazard and an important public health issue in Australia. Heat-health warnings are being adopted widely to promote protective behaviours, but there has been limited evaluation of public responses. This study used a household telephone survey to examine public attitudes and responses to heat-health warnings in regional areas in two Australian states, South Australia and Victoria. The results indicate a high level of recall of heat-health warnings and awareness about managing extreme heat. Respondents viewed heat-health warnings positively, but the effects on behaviour change were variable. Our findings suggest that the warnings may be reinforcing existing protective behaviours more than promoting change. Perceptions of heat risks were higher among women than men, but lower in older age groups. Evidence of this nature is important to identify ways to improve heat-health warnings and more effectively address the public health risks.     

Hierarchical modeling for extreme values observed over space and time

We propose a hierarchical modeling approach for explaining a collection of spatially referenced time series of extreme values. We assume that the observations follow generalized extreme value (GEV) distributions whose locations and scales are jointly spatially dependent where the dependence is captured using multivariate Markov random field models specified through coregionalization. In addition, there is temporal dependence in the locations. There are various ways to provide appropriate specifications; we consider four choices. The models can be fitted using a Markov Chain Monte Carlo (MCMC) algorithm to enable inference for parameters and to provide spatio–temporal predictions. We fit the models to a set of gridded interpolated precipitation data collected over a 50-year period for the Cape Floristic Region in South Africa, summarizing results for what appears to be the best choice of model.

基于保护地下水的北京市土壤通用筛选值推导

分别采用三相平衡耦合地下水稀释模型(以下称方法1)和SESOIL耦合地下水稀释模型(以下称方法2)对北京市不同水文地质条件(永定河山前冲洪积扇顶部区域、中上部区域和下部区域)下27种VOCs(挥发性有机污染物)、31种SVOCs(半挥发性有机污染物)、11种农药/PCBs(多氯联苯)及二英基于保护地下水的土壤通用筛选值进行推导. 结果表明,下部区域土壤通用筛选值最保守,顶部区域次之,中上部区域最宽松. 采用方法1推导的中上部区域土壤通用筛选值分别是顶部区域和下部区域的1.1~1.4、9.9~34.9倍,顶部区域土壤通用筛选值是下部的10.7~24.9倍;采用方法2推导的中上部区域土壤通用筛选值是下部区域的9.8~49.9倍. 对于有连续非饱和带弱水层的中上部区域及下部区域,方法2推导的结果较方法1宽松. 其中,PAHs(多环芳烃)、PCBs、二英、多数农药及酯类等高K_oc(有机碳-水分配系数)污染物均难以穿透清洁非饱和土壤进入地下水;而对于VOCs、酚类等低K_oc污染物,方法2推导的中上部区域土壤通用筛选值普遍是方法1的4.3~18.4倍,下部区域为方法1的3.0~24.6倍. 考虑到土壤通用筛选值应具有风险筛选功能及一定保守性,建议各种污染物以顶部区域方法1推导结果及中上部区域和下部区域方法2推导结果中最保守的值作为北京市基于保护地下水的土壤通用筛选值.      

The evaluation of ecology-based tourism potential in coastal villages in accordance with landscape values and user demands: the Bursa-Mudanya-Kumyaka case

Ecology-based tourism, which is integrated with nature, developed in environmentally conscious areas and enriched by different cultures, has become more important in the direction of extending tourism throughout the year. While the landscape values of the area are important functions for tourism activities to be carried out in natural characteristics, the preferences of the users are also important. Ecology-based tourism, which develops in connection with the concepts of intacteness, the protection-use balance and sustainability, and the demands and expectations of tourists, constitute the basis of our study. For this purpose, the study was carried out in Kumyaka, a small coastal neighborhood (village) of the county of Mudanya in the province Bursa, Turkey with important natural, historical and cultural assets. Fieldwork, field analysis, literature search, interviews with tourists coming to the field, interviews with the day trippers and survey work were conducted in the study. While evaluating the ecology-based tourism potential of the area, the demands and expectations of tourists have been taken into account together with the available area data. According to the results of the survey, tourists are mostly interested in having the most scenic value and quietness when choosing the area. The types of tourism that tourists most wanted to experience in the field were 42.38% culture tourism and 32.32% nature tourism. As a result of tourists’ demands and expectations, the tourism activities to be carried out in accordance with the possibilities of the area were examined and ecology based planning proposals and holistic planning approaches were developed.     

Environmental values and willingness to pay for a protected area: a segmentation of Italian university students

The study investigated students’ attitudes and willingness to pay (WTP) for the protection of some environmental values. The empirical study refers to a site located in Southern Italy and inserted into the Natura 2000 European Network. Students were segmented according to their appreciation of environmental values and the WTP for them. We considered two scenarios of the study site – of use and non-use – and four values – recreational, educational, bequest and existence. Five clusters, from the ‘unconcerned’ to the ‘committed’ one, reveal a diversity of profiles across the sample. Segmentation results point out the multifunctionality of the environmental heritage and highlight the heterogeneity of students’ environmental profiles.