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224 results for “environmental impact”
Fisher’s local ecological knowledge reveals valuable information about the impact of environmental changes on coastal fishing resources
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Data from: Environmental context determines pollution impacts on ecosystem functioning
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Use of density-impact functions to inform and improve the environmental outcomes of feral horse management
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Environmental impact assessment for large carnivores: a methodological review of the wolf (Canis lupus) monitoring in Portugal
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Environmental impacts on visual perception modulate behavioral responses of schooling fish to looming predators
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Stochastic hydro-financial watershed modeling for environmental impact bonds
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Benefit of Modified Atmosphere Packaging on the overall environmental impact of the supply chain of packed strawberries
<p>This dataset gives the raw results of Life Cycle Analysis of fresh strawberries packed in Modified Atmosphere Packaging (MAP) or conventionnel packaging (macroperfoated) stored either at ambiant temperature or refrigerated at household.</p> <p>These raw data were used to draw Figures 3, 4, 5 and Figure-S1 in the associated paper "Benefit of Modified Atmosphere Packaging on the overall environmental impact of the supply chain of packed strawberries".</p> <p>The dataset contains also results of the sensitivity analysis povided at:</p> <p>- consumer level</p> <p>- supermarket.</p> <p> </p>
Data from: Late Quaternary environmental and human impacts on the mitochondrial DNA diversity of four commensal rodents in Myanmar
<p>We addressed the spatiotemporal characteristics of four commensal rodent species occurring in Myanmar in comparison with other areas of the Indo-Malayan region. We examined sequence variations of the mitochondrial cytochrome <i>b</i>gene (<i>Cytb</i>) in the Pacific rat (<i>Rattus exulans</i>), roof rat(<i>Rattus rattus</i>complex, RrC), lesser bandicoot rat (<i>Bandicota bengalensis</i>), and house mouse(<i>Mus musculus</i>) using the recently developed time-dependent evolutionary rates of mtDNA. The <i>Cytb</i>sequences of RrC from Myanmar were shown to belong to RrC Lineage II, and their level of genetic diversity was relatively high compared to those of the other three species. RrC was found to have experienced bottleneck and rapid expansion events at least twice in the late Pleistocene period in Myanmar and a nearby region. Accordingly, paleoclimatic environmental fluctuations were shown to be an important factor affecting rodents in the subtropics of the Indo-Malayan region. Our results show that human activities during the last 10,000 years of the Holocene period affected the population dynamics of the rodent species examined, including introducing them to Myanmar from neighboring countries. Further study of these four commensal rodents in other geographic areas of the Indo-Malayan region would allow us to better understand the factors that drove their evolution and their ecological trends.</p>
Assessing seasonal demographic covariation to understand environmental-change impacts on a hibernating mammal
<p>Natural populations are exposed to seasonal variation in environmental factors that simultaneously affect several demographic rates (survival, development, reproduction). The resulting covariation in these rates determines population dynamics, but accounting for its numerous biotic and abiotic drivers is a significant challenge. Here, we use a factor-analytic approach to capture partially unobserved drivers of seasonal population dynamics. We use 40 years of individual-based demography from yellow-bellied marmots (Marmota flaviventer) to fit and project population models that account for seasonal demographic covariation using a latent variable. We show that this latent variable, by producing positive covariation among winter demographic rates, depicts a measure of environmental quality. Simultaneous, negative responses of winter survival and reproductive-status change to declining environmental quality result in a higher risk of population quasi-extinction, regardless of summer demography where recruitment takes place. We demonstrate how complex environmental processes can be summarized to understand population persistence in seasonal environments.</p>
Life Cycle Environmental Impact of Houston METRO System – Evaluation of Electric Alternatives
<p>In the Greater Houston Area, mobile sources (on- and off-road vehicles) contribute the highest share of nitrogen oxide (NOx) emissions and second-highest share of volatile organic (VOC) emissions. The Houston METRO system is a key element in Houston's infrastructure that can be expanded to lower emissions of criteria air pollutants (CAPs) and greenhouse gases (GHGs) and improve regional air quality. Currently, there is no comparative study for relative emissions and environmental impacts between passenger automobiles and METRO routes in Houston. Our research addressed this critical gap and developed environmental life cycle assessment for conventional diesel buses, diesel hybrid buses, and alternative electric buses in Houston using the GREET model. The life cycle GHG emissions of electric buses are slightly lower than the other two types of buses. However, all the other major emissions such as CO, NOx, PM10, PM2.5, VOCs, SOx, N2O, CH4, black carbon and primary organic carbon associated with electric buses are higher than diesel buses, thus causing higher environmental cost of electric buses than diesel buses. The life cycle costs of buses are very sensitive to future diesel and electricity prices. The results from this project would serve as a guiding framework to evaluate the effects of the decision to expand the METRO system and estimate the contribution of the METRO system in realizing the Greater Houston Area's environmental objectives.</p>
Data from: Development of a protocol for environmental impact studies using causal modelling
1- The global issue of water scarcity caused by climate change and human utilisation highlights the importance of an efficient assessment of water quality in freshwater systems. One of the challenges facing water management in environmental impact studies is the difficulty of inferring causality in complex systems. Traditional water assessment methods are inadequate because they are challenged to separate natural variation from the effect of human activities. 2- Knowing the causal structure of a complex ecosystem will enable managers to identify key anthropogenic, climate and flow drivers of water quality, and make informed decisions about interventions that improve water and environmental quality. In this study, I show how causal modelling can facilitate decision making for water treatment plant managers to improve their environmental management of this valuable resource. 3- Models built using causal modelling techniques, including structural equation modelling and the principles of Bayesian Networks, were utilised for management decision making purposes. The discharge load values were manipulated in the models to predict the effect of a potential intervention, e.g. treatment plant upgrade, on the values of the water quality variables in the creek. That is, water quality variables were predicted when an imaginary or counterfactual situation was imposed on the models. 4- This study showed that there would not be any observable effect of effluent on macroinvertebrate communities if the discharge loads of chlorophyll a, total organic carbon, total phosphorus, nitrate, and conductivity were reduced to 0.1 of observed values. The concentrations of environmental variables in the creek would return to their baseline levels when their corresponding discharge loads in the effluent were halved or divided by 10. 5- Based on the findings of this study, managers in the field of environmental impact studies can predict the response of a system in the presence of potential interventions under complex and uncertain conditions. The implementation of such techniques offers great promise in the wider field of environmental management where accounting for multiple factors structuring ecosystems in necessary to adequately represent causality.
Data from: Relative impacts of environmental variation and evolutionary history on the nestedness and modularity of tree-herbivore networks.
Nestedness and modularity are measures of ecological networks whose causative effects are little understood. We analyzed antagonistic plant–herbivore bipartite networks using common gardens in two contrasting environments comprised of aspen trees with differing evolutionary histories of defence against herbivores. These networks were tightly connected owing to a high level of specialization of arthropod herbivores that spend a large proportion of the life cycle on aspen. The gardens were separated by ten degrees of latitude with resultant differences in abiotic conditions. We evaluated network metrics and reported similar connectance between gardens but greater numbers of links per species in the northern common garden. Interaction matrices revealed clear nestedness, indicating subsetting of the bipartite interactions into specialist divisions, in both the environmental and evolutionary aspen groups, although nestedness values were only significant in the northern garden. Variation in plant vulnerability, measured as the frequency of herbivore specialization in the aspen population, was significantly partitioned by environment (common garden) but not by evolutionary origin of the aspens. Significant values of modularity were observed in all network matrices. Trait-matching indicated that growth traits, leaf morphology, and phenolic metabolites affected modular structure in both the garden and evolutionary groups, whereas extra-floral nectaries had little influence. Further examination of module configuration revealed that plant vulnerability explained considerable variance in web structure. The contrasting conditions between the two gardens resulted in bottom-up effects of the environment, which most strongly influenced the overall network architecture, however, the aspen groups with dissimilar evolutionary history also showed contrasting degrees of nestedness and modularity. Our research therefore shows that, while evolution does affect the structure of aspen–herbivore bipartite networks, the role of environmental variations is a dominant constraint.
Data from: Persistence, impacts and environmental drivers of covert infections in invertebrate hosts
Background: Persistent covert infections of the myxozoan, Tetracapsuloides bryosalmonae, in primary invertebrate hosts (the freshwater bryozoan, Fredericella sultana) have been proposed to represent a reservoir for proliferative kidney disease in secondary fish hosts. However, we have limited understanding of how covert infections persist and vary in bryozoan populations over time and space and how they may impact these populations. In addition, previous studies have likely underestimated covert infection prevalence. To improve our understanding of the dynamics, impacts and implications of covert infections we employed a highly sensitive polymerase chain reaction (PCR) assay and undertook the first investigation of covert infections in the field over an annual period by sampling bryozoans every 45 days from three populations within each of three rivers. Results: Covert infections persisted throughout the year and prevalence varied within and between rivers, but were often > 50%. Variation in temperature and water chemistry were linked with changes in prevalence in a manner consistent with the maintenance of covert infections during periods of low productivity and thus poor growth conditions for both bryozoans and T. bryosalmonae. The presence and increased severity of covert infections reduced host growth but only when bryozoans were also investing in the production of overwintering propagules (statoblasts). However, because statoblast production is transitory, this effect is unlikely to greatly impact the capacity of bryozoan populations to act as persistent sources of infections and hence potential disease outbreaks in farmed and wild fish populations. Conclusions: We demonstrate that covert infections are widespread and persist over space and time in bryozoan populations. To our knowledge, this is the first long-term study of covert infections in a field setting. Review of the results of this and previous studies enables us to identify key questions related to the ecology and evolution of covert infection strategies and associated host-parasite interactions.
Data from: Environmental monitoring through protist NGS metabarcoding: assessing the impact of fish farming on benthic foraminifera communities
The measurement of species diversity represents a powerful tool for assessing the impacts of human activities on marine ecosystems. Traditionally, the impact of fish farming on the coastal environment is evaluated by monitoring the dynamics of macrobenthic infaunal populations. However, taxonomic sorting and morphology-based identification of the macrobenthos demands highly trained specialists and is extremely time-consuming and costly, what makes it unsuitable for large-scale biomonitoring efforts involving numerous samples. Here, we propose to alleviate this laborious task by developing protist metabarcoding tools based on next-generation sequencing (NGS) of environmental DNA and RNA extracted from sediment samples. In this study, we analysed the response of benthic foraminiferal communities to the variation of environmental gradients associated with salmon farms in Scotland. We investigated the foraminiferal diversity based on ribosomal minibarcode sequences generated by the Illumina NGS technology. We compared the molecular data with morphospecies counts and with environmental gradients, including distance to cages and Redox used as a proxy for sediment oxygenation. Our study revealed high variations between foraminiferal communities collected in the vicinity of fish farms and at distant locations. We found evidence for alpha diversity loss in strongly impacted sites, especially visible in the RNA data. We also detected some candidate bioindicator foraminiferal species. Based on this proof-of-concept study, we conclude that NGS metabarcoding using foraminifera and other protists has considerable potential to become a new tool for surveying the impact of aquaculture and other industrial activities in the marine environment.
Data from: Mortality and lamb body mass growth in free-ranging domestic sheep – environmental impacts including lethal and non-lethal impacts of predators
The management and recovery of large predator populations in areas where human persecution has driven them to ecological extinction requires a solid understanding of the effects of both predation and food limitation on prey populations. We used 11 yr of data on reported losses among 17.3 million free-ranging sheep Ovis aries in the Norwegian farming industry to elucidate the relative roles of climate, vegetation characteristics, sheep densities, lamb body mass and densities of predators and alternative prey on the number of lambs and ewes lost on summer pastures. We first examined whether predator densities predicted autumn lamb body mass through possible impacts of predators on body growth (non-lethal effects) but found no evidence for such effects in our study system. This might be due to weak anti-predator behavioral responses in domesticated sheep. However, autumn lamb body mass was predicted by both sheep density and winter and spring weather conditions, probably through food availability. Losses of both lambs and ewes were positively and strongly related to the density of Eurasian lynx Lynx lynx, wolverine Gulo gulo and brown bear Ursus arctos. In addition, food availability and spring weather conditions were associated to losses of lambs, while precipitation in May predicted losses of ewes. There was little evidence for interaction effects of predator species on losses, suggesting that most of the effects of the predators were additive to each other. Given the strong effect of predator densities on sheep losses, we conclude that changing livestock husbandry practices towards a system that actively protects sheep and/or active management of predator densities may be necessary to reduce sheep losses where predators are recolonizing.
Predicting barrier effects of transportation networks on Asian elephants: Implications for environmental impact assessment
<p>The rapid proliferation of transportation networks (TNs) is a threat to wide–ranged animals through habitat erosion, road–kill, and indirect socio–ecological interaction. In most cases, environmental impact assessments of TNs about animals are descriptive and targeted to direct impacts of the "linear features", while indirect and cumulative impacts are relatively neglected. Using spatially explicit data of elephant–caused damage during 2012–2015 in China, we quantified barrier effects of TN on Asian elephants and predicted the effects under a TN expansion scenario using maximum entropy algorithms. We found that TN acted as a strong barrier even for the elephants that have inhabited highly fragmented landscapes for years, with only 18% of the damage occurred on the crossed side of roads. Also, the TN expansion will reduce elephant habitats, exacerbating herd isolation and human–elephant conflict locally. Thus, we suggest that mitigation of the conflicts should be integrated into future environmental impact assessments.</p>
Data from: ECOALIM: a dataset of environmental impacts of feed ingredients used in French animal production
Feeds contribute highly to environmental impacts of livestock products. Therefore, formulating low-impact feeds requires data on environmental impacts of feed ingredients with consistent perimeters and methodology for life cycle assessment (LCA). We created the ECOALIM dataset of life cycle inventories (LCIs) and associated impacts of feed ingredients used in animal production in France. It provides several perimeters for LCIs (field gate, storage agency gate, plant gate and harbour gate) with homogeneously collected data from French R&D institutes covering the 2005–2012 period. The dataset of environmental impacts is available as a Microsoft® Excel spreadsheet on the ECOALIM website and provides climate change, acidification, eutrophication, non-renewable and total cumulative energy demand, phosphorus demand, and land occupation. LCIs in the ECOALIM dataset are available in the AGRIBALYSE® database in SimaPro® software. The typology performed on the dataset classified the 149 average feed ingredients into categories of low impact (co-products of plant origin and minerals), high impact (feed-use amino acids, fats and vitamins) and intermediate impact (cereals, oilseeds, oil meals and protein crops). Therefore, the ECOALIM dataset can be used by feed manufacturers and LCA practitioners to investigate formulation of low-impact feeds. It also provides data for environmental evaluation of feeds and animal production systems. Included in AGRIBALYSE® database and SimaPro®, the ECOALIM dataset will benefit from their procedures for maintenance and regular updating. Future use can also include environmental labelling of commercial products from livestock production.
Nano- and microplastics commonly cause adverse impacts on plants at environmentally relevant levels: A systematic review
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Data from: Impact of environmental conditions on wood anatomical traits of green alder (Alnus alnobetula) at the alpine treeline
<p><strong>The data file</strong> (<em>Alnus alnobetula</em>_Wood anatomy.xlsx) contains all raw data, which have been used to create Figures 3-7 in the article.</p> <p> </p> <p><strong>Data are documented in the following article</strong>:</p> <p>Gruber A, G Wieser, M Fink, W Oberhuber (2024) Impact of environmental conditions on wood anatomical traits of green alder (<em>Alnus alnobetula</em>) at the alpine treeline.<strong> Forests, 15, 24; doi:10.3390/f15010024 <br></strong></p> <p> </p> <p><strong>Summary</strong></p> <p>Due to land use change, green alder (<em>Alnus alnobetula</em>), formerly restricted to moist slopes, is now expanding to drier south-facing sites at the alpine treeline. To evaluate wood anatomical adaptations, we analyzed vessel characteristics (mean vessel area, MVA; vessel density, VD; and theoretic conductive area, TCA) and axial parenchyma abundance, as well as their distribution in the annual ring at a moist north-facing and a dry south-facing site at the alpine treeline (2150 m asl) on Mt. Patscherkofel (Central European Alps, Austria). Results revealed that lower soil water availability and enhanced evaporative demand did not affect MVA, while VD and TCA were significantly reduced at the dry south-facing site. This suggests that in <em>A. alnobetula</em>, vessel size is a static trait whereas vessel number responds plastic. Harsh environmental conditions at the distributional limit of <em>A. alnobetula</em> led to a near semi-ring-porous distribution of vessels and an accumulation of parenchyma in the late growing season. We conclude that in a warmer and drier climate, physiological stress may set limits to the distribution of <em>A. alnobetula</em> at drought-prone sites at the alpine treeline.</p>
Decarbonization pathways promote improvements in cement quality and reduce the environmental impact of China's cement industry
<p>The data show the results of the papre "Decarbonization pathways promote improvements in cement quality and reduce the environmental impact of China’s cement industry".</p>
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Allen Brain Atlas
Allen Brain Atlas is an Allen Institute collection of brain map atlases, datasets, APIs, and analysis tools covering mouse, human, and non-human primate brain resources.
Annotated Behaviour and Observability Dataset (ABODe)
ABODe is a University of Edinburgh DataShare dataset for behavior classification in group-housed mice using home-cage video, identities, bounding boxes, ground-plate positions, and annotator labels.
DANDI Archive for NWB datasets
DANDI is a BRAIN Initiative archive for publishing and sharing neurophysiology data, including electrophysiology, optophysiology, and behavioral data packaged as NWB and related standards.
International Brain Laboratory public data
The International Brain Laboratory public data releases expose standardized mouse decision-making experiments, including Neuropixels recordings, widefield calcium imaging, behavior, and session metadata accessed through the ONE API.
OpenNeuro
OpenNeuro is a free, open platform for sharing neuroimaging datasets, with public search, dataset pages, and download paths for web, S3, DataLad, and the OpenNeuro CLI.