CDE links regional research and global efforts for sustainable mountain development

The Centre for Development and Environment (CDE) at the University of Bern has long-standing experience in conducting research in mountain regions around the world. CDE considers mountain regions to be a crucial context for sustainable development. Together with its partners, CDE aims to generate in-depth contextual knowledge about the dynamic social, economic, and ecological processes in mountain regions and elsewhere, with a view to informing development practices, while at the global level it engages in activities that help bring together these regional insights with the goal of informing policy-making. In doing so, CDE addresses the specific challenges of sustainable development—in mountains and elsewhere.

The consequences of nuclear war on the global environment [microform] : hearing before the Subcommittee on Investigations and Oversight of the Committee on Science and Technology, U.S. House of Representatives, Ninety-seventh Congress, second session, September 15, 1982.

"No. 171."

Safeguarding U.S. agriculture in the global environment.

"Issued September 2001"--Last p.

A Global Review on Peri-Urban Development and Planning

Urban regions worldwide are increasingly facing the challenge of dealing with highly dynamic metropolitan growth and, at the same time, institutional changes like decentralisation and globalisation. These kinds of changes express themselves most evidently in peri-urban areas, where urban and rural life meets. These peri-urban areas in particular have been the stage for rapid physical, social and economic transformations, both in developed and developing countries. Peri-urbanization takes place here. Based on literature review, this paper presents an effort to identify generic attributes of peri-urbanisation and the way in which development planning tends to reply. Three major attributes are identified: peri-urban space (the spatial expression of peri-urban development), peri-urban life (the functional appearance of land uses, activities and peri-urban innovation), and peri-urban change (a causal and temporal perspective featuring flows and drivers of change). It is also shown that prevalent institutional replies in planning and development generally fail to acknowledge the dynamic and increasingly fragmented attributes of global peri-urbanisation.

Changes in global gene expression patterns during development and maturation of the rat kidney

We set out to define patterns of gene expression during kidney organogenesis by using high-density DNA array technology. Expression analysis of 8,740 rat genes revealed five discrete patterns or groups of gene expression during nephrogenesis. Group 1 consisted of genes with very high expression in the early embryonic kidney, many with roles in protein translation and DNA replication. Group 2 consisted of genes that peaked in midembryogenesis and contained many transcripts specifying proteins of the extracellular matrix. Many additional transcripts allied with groups 1 and 2 had known or proposed roles in kidney development and included LIM1, POD1, GFRA1, WT1, BCL2, Homeobox protein A11, timeless, pleiotrophin, HGF, HNF3, BMP4, TGF-α, TGF-β2, IGF-II, met, FGF7, BMP4, and ganglioside-GD3. Group 3 consisted of transcripts that peaked in the neonatal period and contained a number of retrotransposon RNAs. Group 4 contained genes that steadily increased in relative expression levels throughout development, including many genes involved in energy metabolism and transport. Group 5 consisted of genes with relatively low levels of expression throughout embryogenesis but with markedly higher levels in the adult kidney; this group included a heterogeneous mix of transporters, detoxification enzymes, and oxidative stress genes. The data suggest that the embryonic kidney is committed to cellular proliferation and morphogenesis early on, followed sequentially by extracellular matrix deposition and acquisition of markers of terminal differentiation. The neonatal burst of retrotransposon mRNA was unexpected and may play a role in a stress response associated with birth. Custom analytical tools were developed including “The Equalizer” and “eBlot,” which contain improved methods for data normalization, significance testing, and data mining.

Gifted and talented children 4-11 : understanding and supporting their development.

Este manual muestra a los profesionales de educación infantil y primaria cómo identificar a los niños superdotados y con talento de sus clases. La autora aborda el debate de naturaleza/educación en relación con estos niños y discute temas relacionados con el desarrollo y dominios de aprendizaje. Para todos los docentes de estas etapas de enseñanza el volumen está lleno de prácticas que permiten: reconocer la naturaleza innata de la capacidad; proporcionar la enseñanza requerida para el talento que emerge; comprender las experiencias de los niños superdotados y talentosos; desarrollar actividades para desafiar y alentar a los niños superdotados y con talento a ampliar sus repertorios de habilidades y capacidades. Se incluye un capítulo sobre desarrollo neurológico para hacer frente a preguntas como 'qué es lo que permite a los niños hacerlo bien', 'hay un gen del genio', con respuestas discrepantes y contradictorias que son compartidas y debatidas. Por último, se plantea la cuestión de los niños superdotados y talentosos con una discordancia de aprendizaje/discapacidad y se dan ejemplos de cómo este ASD (desarrollo asincrónico) puede obstaculizar el reconocimiento de los dones y talentos de estos niños.

Transports and budgets in a 1/4 ° global ocean reanalysis 1989–2010

Large-scale ocean transports of heat and freshwater have not been well monitored, and yet the regional budgets of these quantities are important to understanding the role of the oceans in climate and climate change. In contrast, atmospheric heat and freshwater transports are commonly assessed from atmospheric reanalysis products, despite the presence of non-conserving data assimilation based on the wealth of distributed atmospheric observations as constraints. The ability to carry out ocean reanalyses globally at eddy-permitting resolutions of 1/4 ° or better, along with new global ocean observation programs, now makes a similar approach viable for the ocean. In this paper we examine the budgets and transports within a global high resolution ocean model constrained by ocean data assimilation, and compare them with independent oceanic and atmospheric estimates.