scholarly journals Historical ecology with real numbers: past and present extent and biomass of an imperilled estuarine habitat

2012 ◽  
Vol 279 (1742) ◽  
pp. 3393-3400 ◽  
Author(s):  
Philine S. E. Zu Ermgassen ◽  
Mark D. Spalding ◽  
Brady Blake ◽  
Loren D. Coen ◽  
Brett Dumbauld ◽  
...  
Keyword(s):  
Large Scale ◽  
Historical Ecology ◽  
The United States ◽  
Time Frame ◽  
Significant Loss ◽  
Marine Habitat ◽  
The Face ◽  
Late Twentieth ◽  
The Difference ◽  
Native Oyster

Historic baselines are important in developing our understanding of ecosystems in the face of rapid global change. While a number of studies have sought to determine changes in extent of exploited habitats over historic timescales, few have quantified such changes prior to late twentieth century baselines. Here, we present, to our knowledge, the first ever large-scale quantitative assessment of the extent and biomass of marine habitat-forming species over a 100-year time frame. We examined records of wild native oyster abundance in the United States from a historic, yet already exploited, baseline between 1878 and 1935 (predominantly 1885–1915), and a current baseline between 1968 and 2010 (predominantly 2000–2010). We quantified the extent of oyster grounds in 39 estuaries historically and 51 estuaries from recent times. Data from 24 estuaries allowed comparison of historic to present extent and biomass. We found evidence for a 64 per cent decline in the spatial extent of oyster habitat and an 88 per cent decline in oyster biomass over time. The difference between these two numbers illustrates that current areal extent measures may be masking significant loss of habitat through degradation.

Ban Ki-moon, 2007–2016

2018 ◽  
Author(s):  
Richard Gowan
Keyword(s):  
United States ◽  
Decision Making ◽  
Security Council ◽  
Large Scale ◽  
Central African Republic ◽  
The United States ◽  
Cautious Approach ◽  
Peacekeeping Operations ◽  
Council Decision ◽  
The Face

During Ban Ki-moon’s tenure, the Security Council was shaken by P5 divisions over Kosovo, Georgia, Libya, Syria, and Ukraine. Yet it also continued to mandate and sustain large-scale peacekeeping operations in Africa, placing major burdens on the UN Secretariat. The chapter will argue that Ban initially took a cautious approach to controversies with the Council, and earned a reputation for excessive passivity in the face of crisis and deference to the United States. The second half of the chapter suggests that Ban shifted to a more activist pressure as his tenure went on, pressing the Council to act in cases including Côte d’Ivoire, Libya, and Syria. The chapter will argue that Ban had only a marginal impact on Council decision-making, even though he made a creditable effort to speak truth to power over cases such as the Central African Republic (CAR), challenging Council members to live up to their responsibilities.

Planning or Improvisation

2020 ◽  
pp. 116-120
Author(s):  
Alasdair Roberts
Keyword(s):  
United States ◽  
Twentieth Century ◽  
Large Scale ◽  
The United States ◽  
Unintended Consequences ◽  
Governance Strategies ◽  
The Face ◽  
Imperfect Knowledge

This chapter assesses the role of planning in the design of governance strategies. Enthusiasm for large-scale planning—also known as overall, comprehensive, long-term, economic, or social planning—boomed and collapsed in twentieth century. At the start of that century, progressive reformers seized on planning as the remedy for the United States' social and economic woes. By the end of the twentieth century, enthusiasm for large-scale planning had collapsed. Plans could be made, but they were unlikely to be obeyed, and even if they were obeyed, they were unlikely to work as predicted. The chapter then explains that leaders should make plans while being realistic about the limits of planning. It is necessary to exercise foresight, set priorities, and design policies that seem likely to accomplish those priorities. Simply by doing this, leaders encourage coordination among individuals and businesses, through conversation about goals and tactics. Neither is imperfect knowledge a total barrier to planning. There is no “law” of unintended consequences: it is not inevitable that government actions will produce entirely unexpected results. The more appropriate stance is modesty about what is known and what can be achieved. Plans that launch big schemes on brittle assumptions are more likely to fail. Plans that proceed more tentatively, that allow room for testing, learning, and adjustment, are less likely to collapse in the face of unexpected results.

scholarly journals Scalable Extraction of Big Macromolecular Data in Azure Data Lake Environment

Molecules ◽  
2019 ◽  
Vol 24 (1) ◽  
pp. 179 ◽  
Author(s):  
Dariusz Mrozek ◽  
Tomasz Dąbek ◽  
Bożena Małysiak-Mrozek
Keyword(s):  
Nucleic Acids ◽  
Large Scale ◽  
Protein Complexes ◽  
Data Bank ◽  
Structural Features ◽  
Significant Loss ◽  
Processing Efficiency ◽  
Acid Protein ◽  
The Face ◽  
Public Repositories

Calculation of structural features of proteins, nucleic acids, and nucleic acid-protein complexes on the basis of their geometries and studying various interactions within these macromolecules, for which high-resolution structures are stored in Protein Data Bank (PDB), require parsing and extraction of suitable data stored in text files. To perform these operations on large scale in the face of the growing amount of macromolecular data in public repositories, we propose to perform them in the distributed environment of Azure Data Lake and scale the calculations on the Cloud. In this paper, we present dedicated data extractors for PDB files that can be used in various types of calculations performed over protein and nucleic acids structures in the Azure Data Lake. Results of our tests show that the Cloud storage space occupied by the macromolecular data can be successfully reduced by using compression of PDB files without significant loss of data processing efficiency. Moreover, our experiments show that the performed calculations can be significantly accelerated when using large sequential files for storing macromolecular data and by parallelizing the calculations and data extractions that precede them. Finally, the paper shows how all the calculations can be performed in a declarative way in U-SQL scripts for Data Lake Analytics.

scholarly journals The IGNITE Trial: Participant Recruitment Lessons Prior to SARS-CoV-2

2020 ◽  
Author(s):  
Eric D. Vidoni ◽  
Amanda Szabo-Reed ◽  
Chaeryon Kang ◽  
Jaime Perales-Puchalt ◽  
Ashley R. Shaw ◽  
...  
Keyword(s):  
Large Scale ◽  
The United States ◽  
Phase Iii ◽  
Trial Participant ◽  
The Novel ◽  
Brain Health ◽  
Challenges And Opportunities ◽  
Phase Iii Trials ◽  
The Face ◽  
Comprehensive Test

AbstractFull and diverse participant enrollment is critical to the success and generalizability of all large-scale Phase III trials. Recruitment of sufficient participants is among the most significant challenges for many studies. The novel SARS-CoV-2 coronavirus pandemic has further changed and challenged the landscape for clinical trial execution, including screening and randomization. The Investigating Gains in Neurocognition in an Intervention Trial of Exercise (IGNITE) study has been designed as the most comprehensive test of aerobic exercise effects on cognition and brain health. Here we assess recruitment into IGNITE prior to the increased infection rates in the United States, and examine new challenges and opportunities for recruitment with a goal of informing the remaining required recruitment as infection containment procedures are lifted. The results may assist the design and implementation of recruitment for future exercise studies, and outline opportunities for study design that are flexible in the face of emerging threats.

How Do Discrimination and Self-Esteem Control Beliefs Affect Prosociality? An Examination Among Black and Latinx Youth

2020 ◽  
pp. 027243162091248
Author(s):  
Corine P. Tyler ◽  
G. John Geldhof ◽  
Richard A. Settersten ◽  
Brian R. Flay
Keyword(s):  
The United States ◽  
Self Esteem ◽  
Time Frame ◽  
Control Beliefs ◽  
Positive Development ◽  
The Face ◽  
Race Ethnicity ◽  
Longitudinal Associations ◽  
Latinx Youth ◽  
Very High

Black and Latinx youth are situated in a maladaptive discriminatory context in the United States; however, prosociality may be one way that youth can promote their own positive development in the face of these experiences. We examined the longitudinal associations between discrimination and prosociality among 380 Black and Latinx early adolescents (MW6age = 12.38 years, 52% female) and considered race/ethnicity and self-esteem control beliefs as potential moderators to this association. Discrimination predicted higher levels of prosociality among Black youth 6 months later, but not among Latinx youth. Discrimination also predicted higher prosociality among youth with very high self-esteem control beliefs 6 months later, but not among youth with lower levels of self-esteem control beliefs. None of these associations were significant when looking across a 1-year time frame. Our findings support the predictions of self-esteem enhancement theory and highlight the importance of considering how youth’s unique racialized experiences can inform how they respond to discrimination.

scholarly journals Monthly Variations in Perfluorinated Compound Concentrations in Groundwater

Toxics ◽  
2018 ◽  
Vol 6 (3) ◽  
pp. 56 ◽  
Author(s):  
Megan Steele ◽  
Converse Griffith ◽  
Christin Duran
Keyword(s):  
Environmental Protection Agency ◽  
Large Scale ◽  
The United States ◽  
Temporal Variations ◽  
Sampled Data ◽  
Perfluorinated Compound ◽  
Us Epa ◽  
The Difference ◽  
Air Force Base ◽  
Monthly Variations

Large-scale manufacturing of poly- and perfluorinated compounds in the second half of the 20th century has led to their ubiquity in the environment, and their unique structure has made them persistent contaminants. A recent drinking water advisory level issued by the United States Environmental Protection Agency lowered the advisory level concentration of perfluorooctanesulfonic acid (PFOS) and perfluorooctanoic acid (PFOA) from 200 nanograms per liter and 400 nanograms per liter, respectively, to 70 nanograms per liter separately or combined. Small temporal variations in PFOS and PFOA concentrations could be the difference between meeting or exceeding the recommended limit. In this study, newly sampled data from a contaminated military site in Alaska and historical data from former Pease Air Force Base were collected. Data were evaluated to determine if monthly variations within PFOS and PFOA existed. No statistically significant temporal trend was observed in the Alaska data, while the results from Pease, although statistically significant, showed the spread of observed contaminant concentrations around the fitted line is broad (as indicated by the low R2 values), indicating that collection date has little value in predicting contaminant concentrations. Though not currently the subject of a US EPA health advisory, data on perfluorobutanesulfonic acid (PFBS), perfluorohexane sulfonic acid (PFHxS), perfluoroheptanoic acid (PFHpA), and perfluorononanoic acid (PFNA) were collected for each site and their average concentrations evaluated.

Tracking AI in climate innovation

2021 ◽  
Author(s):  
Vilhelm Verendel
Keyword(s):  
Large Scale ◽  
Climate Adaptation ◽  
The United States ◽  
Research Literature ◽  
Climate Mitigation ◽  
Transportation Energy ◽  
Mitigation And Adaptation ◽  
Wide Scale ◽  
The Difference ◽  
Manufacturing Technologies

Abstract Innovation in artificial intelligence (AI) is spreading rapidly in many areas of technology, and AI technologies may be of help to mitigate and adapt to climate change. However, previous studies of AI in the climate context mainly rely on expert judgement of the research literature, not large-scale data. Here, we present a new approach to analyzing the relation between AI and climate innovation on the economy-wide scale. We analyze over six million patents from the past 45 years from the United States, and find that the greatest amount of climate AI innovation has occured in transportation, energy, and manufacturing technologies. Green ICT and climate adaptation technologies is where AI innovations have higher shares, and breakthrough innovations have made up a larger share in adaptation technologies compared to technologies for climate mitigation. We estimate the difference that AI makes with statistical analysis: AI in mitigation and adaptation technologies is associated with 30-100% more subsequent innovations. Our approach provides new capabilities to track the exponential growth of AI in climate innovation.

Business Attitudes Toward European Immigration, 1880-1900

1953 ◽  
Vol 13 (3) ◽  
pp. 291-304 ◽  
Author(s):  
Morrell Heald
Keyword(s):  
Large Scale ◽  
The United States ◽  
Rapid Expansion ◽  
American Business ◽  
Business World ◽  
Native Workers ◽  
The Face ◽  
European Immigration ◽  
American Society ◽  
The Impact

Tradition depicts American business as the chiefexploiter of our national free immigration policy during the latter defender andhalf of the nineteenth century. The contribution of immigrant labor to the building of the American industrial empire is much discussed. The interest of employers in recruiting cheap labor and strikebreakers from Europe is a familiar story. That industrialists and their allies in the years of rapid expansion and mechanization of the American economy stood to gain as much as any other group, even including the aliens themselves, from the maintenance of large-scale immigration has appeared so obvious as to demand little careful investigation. Historians have ordinarily described the succession of laws after 1882, gradually narrowing the “open door” the United States offered to Europe and pulling in the welcome mat as well, as a series of labor and nativist victories in the face of dogged resistance by the business world. Yet such an interpretation fails to explain the fact that the period which saw the growth of strong anti-immigrant feeling among native workers witnessed a strikingly similar development in the ranks of businessmen. During the 1880's and 1890's, while labor leaders protested the competition of alien workers, business publications were criticizing no less bitterly the impact of immigration upon American society. When nativists sought financial support for their efforts to restrict immigration they found many businessmen in sympathy with their aims. Measures presented to Congress for regulating and limiting the admission of aliens were frequently concurred in by prominent business leaders. Indeed, a notable development in American business thought after 1880 was the rise of hostility toward the swarms of cheap foreign laborers which employers had long considered essential to their own, and the nation's, prosperity.

scholarly journals Sexual Violence Against Persons With Disabilities: A Meta-Analysis

2021 ◽  
pp. 152483802199597
Author(s):  
Amylee Mailhot Amborski ◽  
Eve-Line Bussières ◽  
Marie-Pier Vaillancourt-Morel ◽  
Christian C. Joyal
Keyword(s):  
Sexual Violence ◽  
Large Scale ◽  
Western Europe ◽  
Sexual Victimization ◽  
Meta Analysis ◽  
The United States ◽  
African Countries ◽  
Persons With Disabilities ◽  
Adult Participants ◽  
The Difference

A growing number of large-scale studies suggest that people with disabilities are at greater risk of sexual victimization than nondisabled individuals. However, certain results are inconsistent and whether potential moderators explain this variability in previous findings remain to be considered. This meta-analysis aimed to determine the magnitude of the difference in risk of being sexually victimized based on the presence of a disability. An additional objective was to evaluate the relative influence of gender, age, type of disability, type of sexual violence, and relationship with the perpetrator on the association between the presence of a disability and sexual victimization. Studies were searched using pertinent databases and retained if they included a group with a disability, provided data that quantify the occurrence of abuse, indicated the type of sexual violence, and was published between 1970 and 2018 in French or English. A total of 68 studies, allowing 84 independent samples and 12,427 participants, were included. Individuals with disabilities were at significantly higher risk of sexual victimization than persons without disabilities (odds ratio = 2.27). The risk of sexual victimization among individuals with a disability was significantly higher in adult participants compared with the risk in minor participants. Sensory impairment was the type of disability associated with the highest risk of sexual victimization. Odds of sexual victimization among individuals with a disability were significantly higher in African countries compared with all others, and odds in Western Europe were significantly lower than in the United States. No significant differences emerged across eras.

Investor Response to Workforce Downsizing: The Influence of Industry Waves, Macroeconomic Outlook, and Firm Performance

2017 ◽  
Vol 45 (5) ◽  
pp. 1775-1801 ◽  
Author(s):  
Matthias Brauer ◽  
Martin Zimmermann
Keyword(s):  
Large Scale ◽  
The United States ◽  
Past Performance ◽  
Firm Financial Performance ◽  
Behavioral Decision ◽  
Intensity Changes ◽  
The Face ◽  
Market Valuations ◽  
The Relationship ◽  
Compound Effect

Building on behavioral decision-making theory, we study the extent to which current industry downsizing intensity, changes in future macroeconomic outlook, and a firm’s past performance trend influence the relationship between downsizing magnitude and investor response. Based on the analysis of a large-scale sample of downsizing announcements in the United States over a period of 12 years, our results indicate that negative investor responses to downsizings are amplified in periods of industry downsizing waves, in the face of changes in macroeconomic outlook, and subsequent to deteriorating firm financial performance. Additionally, our empirical results suggest that investors’ cross-level aggregation of these cues has a significant, negative compound effect on downsizing firms’ market valuations.

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