Human genetic variation in the Baltic Sea region: Features of population history and natural selection

In this thesis, the genetic variation of human populations from the Baltic Sea region was studied in order to elucidate population history as well as evolutionary adaptation in this region. The study provided novel understanding of how the complex population level processes of migration, genetic drift, and natural selection have shaped genetic variation in North European populations. Results from genome-wide, mitochondrial DNA and Y-chromosomal analyses suggested that the genetic background of the populations of the Baltic Sea region lies predominantly in Continental Europe, which is consistent with earlier studies and archaeological evidence. The late settlement of Fennoscandia after the Ice Age and the subsequent small population size have led to pronounced genetic drift, especially in Finland and Karelia but also in Sweden, evident especially in genome-wide and Y-chromosomal analyses. Consequently, these populations show striking genetic differentiation, as opposed to much more homogeneous pattern of variation in Central European populations. Additionally, the eastern side of the Baltic Sea was observed to have experienced eastern influence in the genome-wide data as well as in mitochondrial DNA and Y-chromosomal variation – consistent with linguistic connections. However, Slavic influence in the Baltic Sea populations appears minor on genetic level. While the genetic diversity of the Finnish population overall was low, genome-wide and Y-chromosomal results showed pronounced regional differences. The genetic distance between Western and Eastern Finland was larger than for many geographically distant population pairs, and provinces also showed genetic differences. This is probably mainly due to the late settlement of Eastern Finland and local isolation, although differences in ancestral migration waves may contribute to this, too. In contrast, mitochondrial DNA and Y-chromosomal analyses of the contemporary Swedish population revealed a much less pronounced population structure and a fusion of the traces of ancient admixture, genetic drift, and recent immigration. Genome-wide datasets also provide a resource for studying the adaptive evolution of human populations. This study revealed tens of loci with strong signs of recent positive selection in Northern Europe. These results provide interesting targets for future research on evolutionary adaptation, and may be important for understanding the background of disease-causing variants in human populations.

Effects of management and landscape structure on biodiversity in boreal agricultural farmland

Intensified agricultural practises introduced after the Second World War are identified as a major cause of global biodiversity declines. In several European countries agri-environment support schemes have been introduced to counteract the ongoing biodiversity declines. Farmers participating in agri-environment schemes are financially compensated for decreasing the intensity of farming practises leading to smaller yields and lower income. The Finnish agri-environment support scheme is composed of a set of measures, such as widened field margins along main ditches (obligatory measure), management of features increasing landscape diversity, management of semi-natural grasslands, and organic farming (special agreement measures). The magnitude of the benefits for biodiversity depends on landscape context and the properties of individual schemes. In this thesis I studied whether one agri-environment scheme, organic farming, is beneficial for species diversity and abundance of diurnal lepidopterans, bumblebees, carabid beetles and arable weeds. I found that organic farming did not enhance species richness of selected insect taxa, although bumblebee species richness tended to be higher in organic farms. Abundance of lepidopterans and bumblebees was not enhanced by organic farming, but carabid beetle abundance was higher in mixed farms with both cereal crop production and animal husbandry. Both species richness and abundance of arable weeds were higher in organic farms. My second objective was to study how landscape structure shapes farmland butterfly communities. I found that the percentage of habitat specialists and species with poor dispersal abilities in butterfly assemblages decreased with increasing arable field cover, leading to a dramatic decrease in butterfly beta diversity. In field boundaries local species richness of butterflies was linearly related to landscape species richness in geographic regions with high arable field cover, indicating that butterfly species richness in field boundaries is more limited by landscape factors than local habitat factors. In study landscapes containing semi-natural grasslands the relationship decelerated at high landscape species richness, suggesting that local species richness of butterflies in field boundaries is limited by habitat factors (demanding habitat specialists that occurred in semi-natural grasslands were absent in field margins). My results suggest that management options in field margins will affect mainly generalists, and species with good dispersal abilities, in landscapes with high arable field cover. Habitat specialists and species with poor dispersal abilities may benefit of management options if these are applied in the vicinity of source populations.

The Temporal Landscape of Residential Aged Care Facilities – Implications for Context-Sensitive Health Technology

Health information technology (IT) can have a profound effect on the temporal flow and organisation of work. Yet research into the context, meaning and significance of temporal factors remains limited, most likely because of its complexity. This study outlines the role of communications in the context of the temporal and organizational landscape of seven Australian residential aged care facilities displaying a range of information exchange practices and health IT capacity. The study used qualitative and observational methods to identify temporal factors associated with internal and external modes of communication across the facilities and to explore the use of artifacts. The study concludes with a depiction of the temporal landscape of residential aged care particularly in regards to the way that work is allocated, prioritized, sequenced and coordinated. We argue that the temporal landscape involves key context-sensitive factors that are critical to understanding the way that humans accommodate to, and deal with health technologies, and which are therefore important for the delivery of safe and effective care.

Flight metabolic rate in the Glanville fritillary butterfly

Dispersal is a highly important life history trait. In fragmented landscapes the long-term persistence of populations depends on dispersal. Evolution of dispersal is affected by costs and benefits and these may differ between different landscapes. This results in differences in the strength and direction of natural selection on dispersal in fragmented landscapes. Dispersal has been shown to be a nonrandom process that is associated with traits such as flight ability in insects. This thesis examines genetic and physiological traits affecting dispersal in the Glanville fritillary butterfly (Melitaea cinxia). Flight metabolic rate is a repeatable trait representing flight ability. Unlike in many vertebrates, resting metabolic rate cannot be used as a surrogate of maximum metabolic rate as no strong correlation between the two was found in the Glanville fritillary. Resting and flight metabolic rate are affected by environmental variables, most notably temperature. However, only flight metabolic rate has a strong genetic component. Molecular variation in the much-studied candidate locus phosphoglucose isomerase (Pgi), which encodes the glycolytic enzyme PGI, has an effect on carbohydrate metabolism in flight. This effect is temperature dependent: in low to moderate temperatures individuals with the heterozygous genotype at the single nucleotide polymorphism (SNP) AA111 have higher flight metabolic rate than the common homozygous genotype. At high temperatures the situation is reversed. This finding suggests that variation in enzyme properties is indeed translated to organismal performance. High-resolution data on individual female Glanville fritillaries moving freely in the field were recorded using harmonic radar. There was a strong positive correlation between flight metabolic rate and dispersal rate. Flight metabolic rate explained one third of the observed variation in the one-hour movement distance. A fine-scaled analysis of mobility showed that mobility peaked at intermediate ambient temperatures but the two common Pgi genotypes differed in their reaction norms to temperature. As with flight metabolic rate, heterozygotes at SNP AA111 were the most active genotype in low to moderate temperatures. The results show that molecular variation is associated with variation in dispersal rate through the link of flight physiology under the influence of environmental conditions. The evolutionary pressures for dispersal differ between males and females. The effect of flight metabolic rate on dispersal was examined in both sexes in field and laboratory conditions. The relationship between flight metabolic rate and dispersal rate in the field and flight duration in the laboratory were found to differ between the two sexes. In females the relationship was positive, but in males the longest distances and flight durations were recorded for individuals with low flight metabolic rate. These findings may reflect male investment in mate locating. Instead of dispersing, males with high flight metabolic rate may establish territories and follow a perching strategy when locating females and hence move less on the landscape level. Males with low metabolic rate may be forced to disperse due to low competitive success or may show adaptations to an alternative strategy: patrolling. In the light of life history trade-offs and the rate of living theory having high metabolic rate may carry a cost in the form of shortened lifespan. Experiments relating flight metabolic rate to longevity showed a clear correlation in the opposite direction: high flight metabolic rate was associated with long lifespan. This suggests that individuals with high metabolic rate do not pay an extra physiological cost for their high flight capacity, rather there are positive correlations between different measures of fitness. These results highlight the importance of condition.

Phylogeography and hybrid swarms: history of brackish water bivalve diversity in North European marginal seas

This study addressed the large-scale molecular zoogeography in two brackish water bivalve molluscs, Macoma balthica and Cerastoderma glaucum, and genetic signatures of the postglacial colonization of Northern Europe by them. The traditional view poses that M. balthica in the Baltic, White and Barents seas (i.e. marginal seas) represent direct postglacial descendants of the adjacent Northeast Atlantic populations, but this has recently been challenged by observations of close genetic affinities between these marginal populations and those of the Northeast Pacific. The primary aim of the thesis was to verify, quantify and characterize the Pacific genetic contribution across North European populations of M. balthica and to resolve the phylogeographic histories of the two bivalve taxa in range-wide studies using information from mitochondrial DNA (mtDNA) and nuclear allozyme polymorphisms. The presence of recent Pacific genetic influence in M. balthica of the Baltic, White and Barents seas, along with an Atlantic element, was confirmed by mtDNA sequence data. On a broader temporal and geographical scale, altogether four independent trans-Arctic invasions of Macoma from the Pacific since the Miocene seem to have been involved in generating the current North Atlantic lineage diversity. The latest trans-Arctic invasion that affected the current Baltic, White and Barents Sea populations probably took place in the early post-glacial. The nuclear genetic compositions of these marginal sea populations are intermediate between those of pure Pacific and Atlantic subspecies. In the marginal sea populations of mixed ancestry (Barents, White and Northern Baltic seas), the Pacific and Atlantic components are now randomly associated in the genomes of individual clams, which indicates both pervasive historical interbreeding between the previously long-isolated lineages (subspecies), and current isolation of these populations from the adjacent pure Atlantic populations. These mixed populations can be characterized as self-supporting hybrid swarms, and they arguably represent the most extensive marine animal hybrid swarms so far documented. Each of the three swarms still has a distinct genetic composition, and the relative Pacific contributions vary from 30 to 90 % in local populations. This diversity highlights the potential of introgressive hybridization to rapidly give rise to new evolutionarily and ecologically significant units in the marine realm. In the south of the Danish straits and in the Southern Baltic Sea, a broad genetic transition zone links the pure North Sea subspecies M. balthica rubra to the inner Baltic hybrid swarm, which has about 60 % of Pacific contribution in its genome. This transition zone has no regular smooth clinal structure, but its populations show strong genotypic disequilibria typical of a hybrid zone maintained by the interplay of selection and gene flow by dispersing pelagic larvae. The structure of the genetic transition is partly in line with features of Baltic water circulation and salinity stratification, with greater penetration of Atlantic genes on the Baltic south coast and in deeper water populations. In all, the scenarios of historical isolation and secondary contact that arise from the phylogeographic studies of both Macoma and Cerastoderma shed light to the more general but enigmatic patterns seen in marine phylogeography, where deep genetic breaks are often seen in species with high dispersal potential.

Globalisation

This book provides an engaging and accessible analysis of traditional issues associated with mass education. The book challenges preconceptions about social class, gender and ethnicity discrimination; highlights the interplay between technology, media, popular culture and schooling; and inspects the relevance of ethics and philosophy in the modern classroom. This new edition has been comprehensively updated to provide current information regarding literature, statistics and legal policies, and significantly expands on the previous edition's structure of derailing traditional myths about education as a point of discussion. It also features two new chapters on Big Data and Globalisation and what they mean for the Australian classroom. Written for students, practising teachers and academics alike, This book summarises the current educational landscape in Australia and looks at fundamental issues in society as they relate to education.

Reproduction and population structure in European aspen

The European aspen (Populus tremula) is a keystone species for biodiversity in boreal forests. However, the future of aspen may be threatened, because large aspens have mostly been removed from managed forests, whereas regeneration and the long-term persistence of mature trees are subjects of concern in protected areas. Aspen is a pioneer tree, and it can reproduce both sexually by seed and asexually by root suckers. Through asexual reproduction aspen forms clones, groups of genetically identical trees (ramets). In my thesis, I have studied the structure of aspen populations in terms of number, size, clonal and demographic properties. Additionally, I have investigated the emergence and survival of seedlings as well as the seed quantity and quality in crosses between the European and hybrid aspen. To study the regeneration and population structure, mature aspens were recorded in old-growth and managed forests in eastern Finland based on a large-scale inventory (11 400 ha). In addition, small aspen trees were surveyed on sample plots. Clonal structure was investigated both by morphological characters and by DNA-based markers (microsatellites). Seedling emergence and survival was studied with two sowing experiments. With crosses between European and hybrid aspens we wanted to study whether elevated temperatures due to climate change would benefit the different crosses of European and hybrid aspen unequally and thus affect the gene flow between the two species. The average volumes of mature aspen were 5.3 m3/ha in continuous old-growth, and 0.8 m3/ha in managed forests. Results indicate also that large aspen trees in managed forests are a legacy of the past less intensively managed forest landscapes. Long-term persistence of aspen in protected areas can only be secured by restoration measures creating sufficiently large gaps for regeneration. More emphasis should be given to sparing aspens in thinnings and to retaining of mature aspens in regeneration cutting in managed forests. Aspen was found to be spatially aggregated in the landscape. This could be explained by site type, disturbance history and / or limitations in seed dispersal. Clonal structure does not explain the spatial aggregation, since average size of the clones was only 2.3 ramets, and most clones (70 %) consisted of just one ramet. The small size of the clones suggests that most of them are relatively young. Therefore, sexual reproduction may be more common than has previously been thought. Seedling emergence was most successful in mineral soil especially, when the site had been burned. Only few seedlings occurred on humus. Survival of the seedlings was low, and strongly dependent on moisture, but also on seedbed conditions. The seeds were found to maintain their germinability longer than has earlier been thought to be possible. Interspecific crosses produced more seeds with higher quality than intraspecific crosses. When temperature was elevated, germination of hybrid aspen seeds increased more than seeds from P. tremula x P. tremula crosses. These results suggest that hybrid aspen may have a significant genetic impact on the European aspen, and this effect may become strengthened by climate warming.

'Mutiny on the Bounty': The genetic history of Norfolk Island reveals extreme gender-biased admixture

Background The Pacific Oceania region was one of the last regions of the world to be settled via human migration. Here we outline a settlement of this region that has given rise to a uniquely admixed population. The current Norfolk Island population has arisen from a small number of founders with mixed Caucasian and Polynesian ancestry, descendants of a famous historical event. The ‘Mutiny on the Bounty’ has been told in history books, songs and the big screen, but recently this story can be portrayed through comprehensive molecular genetics. Written history details betrayal and murder leading to the founding of Pitcairn Island by European mutineers and the Polynesian women who left Tahiti with them. Investigation of detailed genealogical records supports historical accounts. Findings Using genetics, we show distinct maternal Polynesian mitochondrial lineages in the present day population, as well as a European centric Y-chromosome phylogeny. These results comprehensively characterise the unique gender-biased admixture of this genetic isolate and further support the historical records relating to Norfolk Island. Conclusions Our results significantly refine previous population genetic studies investigating Polynesian versus Caucasian diversity in the Norfolk Island population and add information that is beneficial to future disease and gene mapping studies.

History and development of public health

This chapter and the others that follow have the study of population health as their focus, as opposed to a focus on individual care and treatment. Clearly, however, we are concerned with the way in which population health is influenced by biomedical theories and practices, and the way population health is funded, and is influenced by the importance placed on therapeutic medicine. The discussions that follow include a brief overview of the ancient history of public health, and the modern history of Western public health dating from 1850. This date signifies the beginnings of a more organised, collective effort to protect the public’s health. These discussions will help you further expand your definition of public health. You will have an entertaining journey through public health achievements, and less successful outcomes, by examining the historical developments that have led us to a modern understanding of public health. The ancient Greeks and Romans, for example, had public health measures to ensure the safety and health of their populations, for a range of social and economic reasons. Convicts arrived in Australia with many health problems, and were put to work to satisfy the needs of a fledgling colony. It is important to understand the historical journey of public health and the way it is critically analysed, as it provides a looking-glass onto the present and the future.

Introduction: Reviewing Australian screen history

This special issue of Studies in Australasian Cinema features a selection of papers presented at the 17th Film and History Association of Australia and New Zealand (FHAANZ) conference, held at Queensland University of Technology between 1 and 3 July 2015. This was the first FHAANZ conference to be hosted in Queensland since 1998. Informed by historical and archival research, the articles examine overlooked or underdeveloped aspects of screen history, offer new historical perspectives, or consider key contemporary issues regarding the preservation of Australian screen history.

The Mid-Century Showroom: Knoll, Herman Miller and the Retail Exhibition of Modern American Design

Although occasionally illustrated and referenced in contemporary histories of modern furniture and design, there is surprisingly little critical discussion or consideration of the role of the showroom in the promotion and dissemination of modern design during the mid-twentieth century. In these years, when the American lifestyle was popularly articulated and forcefully propagandized, the furniture showroom served as a principle site of professional and public indoctrination. Appropriating display techniques from modern exhibition design to showcase the American lifestyle as an abstracted, spatially integrated art form, the showroom provided an unencumbered landscape ideally suited to camera’s lens and the public’s imagination. Leading modern American furniture manufacturers, such as Herman Miller and Knoll Associates collaborated with major cultural institutions as well as department stores and retailers to maximize exposure and consumer demand for their products. Through such integrated marketing and merchandising strategies, showrooms also contributed to the broader social project to educate American consumers about modern design and the advantages of modern living. Related to the many model home programs and “good design” exhibitions of the 1950s, the furniture showroom occupies a unique place within the history and discourse of the postwar era. The peculiarities of the furniture showroom and its position as a point of intersection between the trade and the consumer, the commercial and the cultural, and the aesthetic and the ideological form the focus of this study.

Vascular dilatory function and cardiovascular risk factors in women with a history of pre-eclampsia

Women with a history of pre-eclampsia have an increased risk of cardiovascular disease in later life. The mechanisms which mediate this heightened risk are poorly understood; it was long believed that pre-eclampsia was a separate disease without any connection to other pathologies. The present study was undertaken to investigate the cardiovascular risk milieu, vascular dilatory function and cardiovascular risk factors, in women with pre-eclampsia, 5 6 years after index pregnancy. The aim was to understand better the cardiovascular risks associated with pre-eclampsia and add tools to the evaluation of cardiovascular risk in women. --- The study involved 30 women with previous severe pre-eclampsia and 21 controls. The 2-day study protocol included venous occlusion plethysmography and pulse wave analysis for assessment of vascular dilatory function and central pulse wave reflection, respectively, office and ambulatory blood pressure measurements, assessment of insulin sensitivity, using a minimal model technique, and tests regarding renal function, lipid metabolism, sympathetic activity and inflammation. Vasodilatory function was impaired in women with a history of pre-eclampsia; this was seen in both endothelium-dependent and endothelium-independent vasodilatation. Proteinuria during pre-eclampsia did not predict changes in vasodilatation, and renal function was similar in the two groups. Insulin sensitivity was related to vasodilatation and features of metabolic syndrome, but only in the patient group, despite similar insulin sensitivity in the control group. Arterial pressure was higher in the patient group than in the controls and correlated with endothelin-1 levels in the patient group, whilst the overall difference between the groups was diminished in 24 hour arterial pressure measurements. Additionally, women with previous pre-eclampsia were characterized by increased sympathetic activity. Impaired vasodilatory function at the vascular smooth muscle level seems to characterize clinically healthy women with a history of pre-eclampsia. These vascular changes and the features of metabolic syndrome may be related to the increased risk of cardiovascular disease. Furthermore, increased blood pressure in combination with enhanced sympathetic activity may be additive as regards this risk. These women should be informed about their potential cardiovascular risk profile and the possibilities to minimize it via their own actions. Medical cardiovascular risk assessment in women should include obstetric history.