The use of Ecological and Carbon Footprint Analysis in regional policy making: application and insights using the REAP model

This paper builds on and extends previous research to contribute to ongoing discussion on the use of resource and carbon accounting tools in regional policy making. The Northern Visions project has produced the first evidence-based footpath setting out the actions that need to be taken to achieve the step changes in the Ecological and Carbon Footprint of Northern Ireland. A range of policies and strategies were evaluated using the Resources and Energy Analysis Programme. The analysis provided the first regional evidence base that current sustainable development policy commitments would not lead to the necessary reductions in either the Ecological Footprint or carbon dioxide emissions. Building on previous applications of Ecological Footprint analysis in regional policy making, the research has demonstrated that there is a valuable role for Ecological and Carbon Footprint Analysis in policy appraisal. The use of Ecological and Carbon Footprint Analysis in regional policy making has been evaluated and recommendations made on ongoing methodological development. The authors hope that the research can provide insights for the ongoing use Ecological and Carbon Footprint Analysis in regional policy making and help set out the priorities for research to support this important policy area

The use of material flow analysis and the ecological footprint in regional policy-making: application and insights from Northern Ireland.

This paper aims to contribute to the ongoing debate on the use of resource accounting tools in regional policy making. The Northern Limits project applied Material Flow Analysis and Ecological Footprinting to regional policy making in Northern Ireland over a number of years. The early phase of the research informed the regions first sustainable development strategy which was published in 2006 with key targets relating to the Ecological Footprint and improving the resource efficiency of the economy. Phase II identified the next steps required to address data availability and quality and the use of MFA and EF in providing a measurement and monitoring framework for the strategy and in the development of the strategy implementation plan. The use of MFA and Ecological Footprinting in sustainable regional policy making and the monitoring of its implementation is an ongoing process which has raised a number of research issues which can inform the ongoing application and development of these and other resource accounting tools to within Northern Ireland, provide insights for their use in other regions and help set out the priorities for research to support this important policy area.

Multidimensional rehabilitation programmes for adult cancer survivors

This is the protocol for a review and there is no abstract. The objectives are as follows:

To assess the effectiveness of multidimensional rehabilitation programs in terms of maintaining or improving the physical and psychosocial well-being of adult cancer survivors.

The review will evaluate the extent to which:

Professionally led multidimensional rehabilitation programs achieve better outcomes than standard services for patients with cancer and their caregivers
Rehabilitation programmes exert a different impact on different domains (e.g. psychological health, physical functioning)
Different modes of delivery and different settings influence outcomes
There is relationship between the number, duration and intensity of rehabilitation sessions and degree of change in measured outcomes.

Essay - The role of ecological theory in microbial ecology

Microbial ecology is currently undergoing a revolution, with repercussions spreading throughout microbiology, ecology and ecosystem science. The rapid accumulation of molecular data is uncovering vast diversity, abundant uncultivated microbial groups and novel microbial functions. This accumulation of data requires the application of theory to provide organization, structure, mechanistic insight and, ultimately, predictive power that is of practical value, but the application of theory in microbial ecology is currently very limited. Here we argue that the full potential of the ongoing revolution will not be realized if research is not directed and driven by theory, and that the generality of established ecological theory must be tested using microbial systems.

The application of the ecological footprint in two Irish urban areas: Limerick and Belfast

The ecological footprint is now a widely accepted indicator of sustainable
development. Footprinting translates resource consumption into the land area
required to sustain it, and allows for an average per capita footprint for a region
or nation to be compared with the global average. This paper reports on a project
in which footprints were calculated for two Irish cities, namely Belfast in
Northern Ireland and Limerick in the Republic of Ireland for the year 2001. As
is frequently the case at sub-national scale, data quality and availability were
often problematic, and in general data gaps were filled by means of population
proxies or national averages. A range of methods was applied to convert
resource flows to land areas. Both footprints suggest that the lifestyles of citizens
of the cities use several times more land than their global share, as has been
found for other cities.

The Doñana ecological disaster:contamination of a world heritage estuarine marsh ecosystem with acidified pyrite mine waste

One of the most important bird breeding and over wintering sites in the west of Europe, the Coto Doñana, was severely impacted by the release of 5 million cubic meters of acid waste from the processing of pyrite ore. The waste entered ecologically sensitive areas of the park (including breeding areas for internationally endangered bird species) causing sustained pH decreases from pH 8.5 to 4.5 and resulting in massive metal contamination of the impacted ecosystem. The contaminating sludge waste contained arsenic at 0.6%, lead at 1.2% and zinc at 0.8% on a dry weight basis. The acid conditions facilitated the solubilization of these metals, leading to water concentrations lethal for aquatic wildlife. The accident caused considerable fish and invertebrate kills and has severe consequences for the protected bird species dependent on the impacted habitats and adjacent areas.

Parallel and nonparallel ecological, morphological and genetic divergence in lake-stream stickleback from a single catchment

Parallel phenotypic evolution in similar environments has been well studied in evolutionary biology; however, comparatively little is known about the influence of determinism and historical contingency on the nature, extent and generality of this divergence. Taking advantage of a novel system containing multiple lake-stream stickleback populations, we examined the extent of ecological, morphological and genetic divergence between three-spined stickleback present in parapatric environments. Consistent with other lake-stream studies, we found a shift towards a deeper body and shorter gill rakers in stream fish. Morphological shifts were concurrent with changes in diet, indicated by both stable isotope and stomach contents analysis. Performing a multivariate test for shared and unique components of evolutionary response to the distance gradient from the lake, we found a strong signature of parallel adaptation. Nonparallel divergence was also present, attributable mainly to differences between river locations. We additionally found evidence of genetic substructuring across five lake-stream transitions, indicating that some level of reproductive isolation occurs between populations in these habitats. Strong correlations between pairwise measures of morphological, ecological and genetic distance between lake and stream populations supports the hypothesis that divergent natural selection between habitats drives adaptive divergence and reproductive isolation. Lake-stream stickleback divergence in Lough Neagh provides evidence for the deterministic role of selection and supports the hypothesis that parallel selection in similar environments may initiate parallel speciation.

Effectiveness of multidisciplinary early rehabilitation in reducing behaviour-related risk factors

To evaluate the effect of a 4-week primary prevention programme on health-risk behaviours amongst employees at increased risk of work incapacity.

Parsing parallel evolution:Ecological divergence and differential gene expression in the adaptive radiations of thick-lipped Midas cichlid fishes from Nicaragua

The study of parallel evolution facilitates the discovery of common rules of diversification. Here, we examine the repeated evolution of thick lips in Midas cichlid fishes (the Amphilophus citrinellus species complex) - from two Great Lakes and two crater lakes in Nicaragua - to assess whether similar changes in ecology, phenotypic trophic traits and gene expression accompany parallel trait evolution. Using next-generation sequencing technology, we characterize transcriptome-wide differential gene expression in the lips of wild-caught sympatric thick- and thin-lipped cichlids from all four instances of repeated thick-lip evolution. Six genes (apolipoprotein D, myelin-associated glycoprotein precursor, four-and-a-half LIM domain protein 2, calpain-9, GTPase IMAP family member 8-like and one hypothetical protein) are significantly underexpressed in the thick-lipped morph across all four lakes. However, other aspects of lips' gene expression in sympatric morphs differ in a lake-specific pattern, including the magnitude of differentially expressed genes (97-510). Generally, fewer genes are differentially expressed among morphs in the younger crater lakes than in those from the older Great Lakes. Body shape, lower pharyngeal jaw size and shape, and stable isotopes (dC and dN) differ between all sympatric morphs, with the greatest differentiation in the Great Lake Nicaragua. Some ecological traits evolve in parallel (those related to foraging ecology; e.g. lip size, body and head shape) but others, somewhat surprisingly, do not (those related to diet and food processing; e.g. jaw size and shape, stable isotopes). Taken together, this case of parallelism among thick- and thin-lipped cichlids shows a mosaic pattern of parallel and nonparallel evolution. © 2012 Blackwell Publishing Ltd.

An outpatient respiratory rehabilitation program:Findings from a community hospital

Objectives: To determine patient satisfaction with a community hospital's respiratory rehabilitation program and to assess changes in patient physical and emotional function and quality of life. Design: Pre- and post-program measures were made on a variety of physiological and psychosocial factors. A modified version of the Chronic Respiratory Disease Questionnaire was administered before and after the 8-week multidisciplinary and comprehensive respiratory rehabilitation program. The post-program questionnaire also included a number of service delivery and patient satisfaction and quality-of-life questions. Setting: Respiratory Rehabilitation Program at St. Joseph's Hospital, a community hospital in Brantford, Ont., in active partnership with the Brant County Lung Association. Brant County is located in Central West Ontario, and has both urban and rural areas and a population of approximately 125 000 people. Participants: Twenty-nine patients, with a diagnosis of moderate to severe chronic obstructive pulmonary disease (COPD) who were referred to the Fall 1997 and Spring 1998 programs, were enrolled in the study. Outcome measures: Changes in physical and emotional function, health knowledge, skills mastery, quality of life and satisfaction with the program. Results: Twenty-one of 29 patients completed the program. Statistically significant and clinically important improvements were found between all pre- and post-program evaluation scores (distance walked, fatigue, dyspnea, emotional function, skills mastery and health knowledge). Participants were very satisfied with the program and felt it improved their quality of life. Conclusion: The positive outcomes reported rom randomized controlled trials of respiratory rehabilitation programs can be achieved in a community hospital setting.

Behavior problems in children requiring inpatient rehabilitation treatment for asthma

Forty-eight asthmatic children (age 6-16 years), inpatients at the Hugh McMillan Medical Centre, were rated by their parents on their behavior using Achenbach's Child Behaviour Checklist. Completed checklists were used to determine normalized T scores for behavior syndromes, and these were compared against norms for clinically referred and nonreferred children. Behavior problems were elevated compared with nonreferred children for both boys and girls, with boys scoring at a clinical level. While many behavior problems were recognized, somatic complaints was a prominent syndrome, particularly for those in the 6-11-year age group.

Demographic and psychosocial characteristics of asthmatic children in a Canadian rehabilitation setting

This study investigated the demographic and psychosocial characteristics of patients attending a residential treatment program for children with asthma. Measures of background information and standardized psychosocial variables were administered to 54 inpatients over an 18-month period. Typically, our patients presented with moderate to severe chronic asthma, mostly diagnosed before 3 years of age and often associated with atopic dermatitis. The families exhibited normal levels of emotional bonding and flexibility in response to stress. Psychosocially, most children were experiencing behavioral and school-related problems, with 6-11-year-old boys exhibiting global social competency problems as well. Girls exhibited lower self-esteem. Locus of control was within the normal range for all age groups. Half the children had not previously attended an asthma education program and two-thirds of the family members either smoked and/or had a pet. The treatment implications of these characteristics of our asthma population were considered.