Diagnosis and management of auditory neuropathy/dys-sychrony

This paper discusses auditory neuropathy (AN) and auditory dys-sychrony (AD), and means of testing and diagnosis.

Breeding Biology of Grassland Birds in Western New York: Conservation and Management Implications

Declining grassland breeding bird populations have led to increased efforts to assess habitat quality, typically by estimating density or relative abundance. Because some grassland habitats may function as ecological traps, a more appropriate metric for determining quality may be breeding success. Between 1994 and 2003 we gathered data on the nest fates of Eastern Meadowlarks (Sturnella magna), Bobolinks (Dolichonyx oryzivorous), and Savannah Sparrows (Passerculus sandwichensis) in a series of fallow fields and pastures/hayfields in western New York State. We calculated daily survival probabilities using the Mayfield method, and used the logistic-exposure method to model effects of predictor variables on nest success. Nest survival probabilities were 0.464 for Eastern Meadowlarks (n = 26), 0.483 for Bobolinks (n = 91), and 0.585 for Savannah Sparrows (n = 152). Fledge dates for first clutches ranged between 14 June and 23 July. Only one obligate grassland bird nest was parasitized by Brown-headed Cowbirds (Molothrus ater), for an overall brood parasitism rate of 0.004. Logistic-exposure models indicated that daily nest survival probabilities were higher in pastures/hayfields than in fallow fields. Our results, and those from other studies in the Northeast, suggest that properly managed cool season grassland habitats in the region may not act as ecological traps, and that obligate grassland birds in the region may have greater nest survival probabilities, and lower rates of Brown-headed Cowbird parasitism, than in many parts of the Midwest.

Adaptive project planning and management based on best practices - COBRA system

Planning a project with proper considerations of all necessary factors and managing a project to ensure its successful implementation will face a lot of challenges. Initial stage in planning a project for bidding a project is costly, time consuming and usually with poor accuracy on cost and effort predictions. On the other hand, detailed information for previous projects may be buried in piles of archived documents which can be increasingly difficult to learn from the previous experiences. Project portfolio has been brought into this field aiming to improve the information sharing and management among different projects. However, the amount of information that could be shared is still limited to generic information. This paper, we report a recently developed software system COBRA to automatically generate a project plan with effort estimation of time and cost based on data collected from previous completed projects. To maximise the data sharing and management among different projects, we proposed a method of using product based planning from PRINCE2 methodology. (Automated Project Information Sharing and Management System -�COBRA) Keywords: project management, product based planning, best practice, PRINCE2

Climate change and heat-related mortality in six cities Part 2: climate model evaluation and projected impacts from changes in the mean and variability of temperature with climate change

Previous assessments of the impacts of climate change on heat-related mortality use the "delta method" to create temperature projection time series that are applied to temperature-mortality models to estimate future mortality impacts. The delta method means that climate model bias in the modelled present does not influence the temperature projection time series and impacts. However, the delta method assumes that climate change will result only in a change in the mean temperature but there is evidence that there will also be changes in the variability of temperature with climate change. The aim of this paper is to demonstrate the importance of considering changes in temperature variability with climate change in impacts assessments of future heat-related mortality. We investigate future heatrelated mortality impacts in six cities (Boston, Budapest, Dallas, Lisbon, London and Sydney) by applying temperature projections from the UK Meteorological Office HadCM3 climate model to the temperature-mortality models constructed and validated in Part 1. We investigate the impacts for four cases based on various combinations of mean and variability changes in temperature with climate change. The results demonstrate that higher mortality is attributed to increases in the mean and variability of temperature with climate change rather than with the change in mean temperature alone. This has implications for interpreting existing impacts estimates that have used the delta method. We present a novel method for the creation of temperature projection time series that includes changes in the mean and variability of temperature with climate change and is not influenced by climate model bias in the modelled present. The method should be useful for future impacts assessments. Few studies consider the implications that the limitations of the climate model may have on the heatrelated mortality impacts. Here, we demonstrate the importance of considering this by conducting an evaluation of the daily and extreme temperatures from HadCM3, which demonstrates that the estimates of future heat-related mortality for Dallas and Lisbon may be overestimated due to positive climate model bias. Likewise, estimates for Boston and London may be underestimated due to negative climate model bias. Finally, we briefly consider uncertainties in the impacts associated with greenhouse gas emissions and acclimatisation. The uncertainties in the mortality impacts due to different emissions scenarios of greenhouse gases in the future varied considerably by location. Allowing for acclimatisation to an extra 2°C in mean temperatures reduced future heat-related mortality by approximately half that of no acclimatisation in each city.