Democracy in animals: the evolution of shared group decisions

A 'consensus decision' is when the members of a group choose, collectively, between mutually exclusive actions. In humans, consensus decisions are often made democratically or in an 'equally shared' manner, i.e. all group members contribute to the decision. Biologists are only now realizing that shared consensus decisions also occur in social animals (other than eusocial insects). Sharing of decisions is, in principle, more profitable for groups than accepting the 'unshared' decision of a single dominant member. However, this is not true for all individual group members, posing a question as to how shared decision making could evolve. Here, we use a game theory model to show that sharing of decisions can evolve under a wide range of circumstances but especially in the following ones: when groups are heterogeneous in composition; when alternative decision outcomes differ in potential costs and these costs are large; when grouping benefits are marginal; or when groups are close to, or above, optimal size. Since these conditions are common in nature, it is easy to see how mechanisms for shared decision making could have arisen in a wide range of species, including early human ancestors.     

The body size of the New Zealand orb-weaving spider Waitkera waitakerensis (Uloboridae) is directly related to temperature and affects fecundity

Abstract. Waitkera waitakerensis occupies lowland forests of New Zealand's North Island, where temperatures decrease in a southwestward direction. The mean annual temperatures of 18 collecting sites, as extracted from GIS data, are directly related to the first femur length of adult females. Neither site elevation nor phylogeny affected spider size or other variables examined. The direct relationship between spider body size and environmental temperature followed a pattern observed in other terrestrial arthropods with a univoltine life cycle and can probably be explained by the longer growing season of warmer regions. Egg diameter was uniform across the species. Site temperature and female first femur length were each directly related to the number of eggs deposited in egg sacs. The date of egg sac collection was inversely related to egg number, suggesting that clutch size declines during the reproductive season. Females deposit eggs beneath a triangular platform and then cover them with a lower silk sheet. The area of this upper platform and the volume of the egg sac were each directly related to egg number, but not to female first femur length. The depth of the lower covering was not related to egg number or to spider first femur length. This suggests that spiders use information about the volume of eggs in their abdomens to construct an egg sac whose volume will accommodate the volume of eggs to be laid and that females do so principally by adjusting the size of the sac's upper triangular platform.     

Performance analysis of MPI collective operations

Previous studies of application usage show that the performance of collective communications are critical for high-performance computing. Despite active research in the field, both general and feasible solution to the optimization of collective communication problem is still missing. In this paper, we analyze and attempt to improve intra-cluster collective communication in the context of the widely deployed MPI programming paradigm by extending accepted models of point-to-point communication, such as Hockney, LogP/LogGP, and PLogP, to collective operations. We compare the predictions from models against the experimentally gathered data and using these results, construct optimal decision function for broadcast collective. We quantitatively compare the quality of the model-based decision functions to the experimentally-optimal one. Additionally, in this work, we also introduce a new form of an optimized tree-based broadcast algorithm, splitted-binary. Our results show that all of the models can provide useful insights into various aspects of the different algorithms as well as their relative performance. Still, based on our findings, we believe that the complete reliance on models would not yield optimal results. In addition, our experimental results have identified the gap parameter as being the most critical for accurate modeling of both the classical point-to-point-based pipeline and our extensions to fan-out topologies.

植被建设对黄土高原土壤水分的影响

为明确自退耕还林以来,黄土高原地区不同植被建设对土壤水分的影响。以Web of Science核心合集中黄土高原土壤水分研究的相关文献为对象,通过CiteSpace生成文献中的关键词并绘制关键词聚类图谱,分析植被建设对黄土高原水分的研究热点及前沿;同时以植被建设对黄土高原土壤水分影响的文献为基础,通过Meta分析量化了不同条件下(海拔,降雨、坡度等)植被建设对黄土高原土壤水分的影响程度。分析Web of Science核心合集中黄土高原土壤水分相关文献共232篇,结果显示近20 a黄土高原土壤水分研究主要包括4个方面的内容:(1)植被建设引起的土壤水分下降问题,(2)土壤水分时空变异特征,(3)土壤水分时空变异的影响因素,(4)遥感和水文模型模拟土壤水分四个方面。同时使用Meta分析了已发表的黄土高原植被建设对土壤水分影响文章103篇,结果表明:黄土高原植被建设大量消耗该区域土壤水分,乔木、灌木及草本植物对土壤水分的结合效应值(ES)依次为-1.893、-1.661、-1.239。植被建设对土壤水分的影响程度随年均降雨量的增大而减小,不同降雨区间的ES值为-0.864(≥500 mm)、-1.423(400-500 mm)、-1.534(<400 mm);在不同海拔区间,植被建设对土壤水分的消耗程度随海拔高度的增加而增加;在3个坡度范围,植被建设对土壤水分消耗程度以<15°最大,>25°次之,15-25°最小。总体而言,植被建设对土壤水分的消耗随着生长年限的增长而加剧,而灌木植被中柠条出现差异,其不同生长年限的效应值为-1.983(>30 a),-1.642(<20 a),-1.107(20-30 a)。由于黄土高原处于干旱与半干旱地区,大面积植被恢复加剧土壤水分消耗,影响到植被生长及其功能的可持续性。因此,应选择适宜植被并给予适当管理(修枝、稀植等措施)以提高土壤水分利用效率,使该地区土壤水分状况得到改善。     

城乡建设用地关联对生态系统服务的影响——以洞庭湖地区为例

城乡建设用地数量及相互联系的变化是空间要素及结构演化的重要方面,深刻影响着生态环境质量和生态系统服务水平,研究城乡建设用地关联对生态系统服务的影响对国土空间高质量发展具有重要意义。以洞庭湖地区为研究对象,从土地利用关联视角出发,运用引力模型、InVEST模型、面板数据模型等方法,定量研究了城乡建设用地关联对生态系统服务的影响。结果表明：（1）洞庭湖地区城镇建设用地规模呈现上升趋势,农村居民点用地规模呈现下降趋势;（2）城乡建设用地关联强度呈不断增强趋势,且强关联网格以建成区为核心向周边扩展,低关联网格分布于远离建成区的地方;（3）生境质量和碳储量呈现下降趋势,食物供给则呈现上升趋势,各项生态系统服务价值具有显著的空间异质性;（4）城乡建设用地关联强度对生态系统服务具有负向影响,人口密度、GDP密度、夜间灯光、道路网络对生态系统服务也呈现负向影响,归一化差异植被指数与生态系统服务之间则存在显著的正相关。研究结果有助于了解关联视角下城乡建设用地对生态系统服务的影响机制,可以为制定合理的城乡空间发展战略提供科学依据。     

Leadership solves collective action problems in small-scale societies

Observation of leadership in small-scale societies offers unique insights into the evolution of human collective action and the origins of sociopolitical complexity. Using behavioural data from the Tsimane forager-horticulturalists of Bolivia and Nyangatom nomadic pastoralists of Ethiopia, we evaluate the traits of leaders and the contexts in which leadership becomes more institutional. We find that leaders tend to have more capital, in the form of age-related knowledge, body size or social connections. These attributes can reduce the costs leaders incur and increase the efficacy of leadership. Leadership becomes more institutional in domains of collective action, such as resolution of intragroup conflict, where collective action failure threatens group integrity. Together these data support the hypothesis that leadership is an important means by which collective action problems are overcome in small-scale societies.     

医院疾病资源库标准化建设探讨

疾病资源库在转化医学发展中发挥着重要作用,收集人类遗传资源和疾病相关资源信息,建设疾病资源库越来越受到重视。首都医科大学附属北京佑安医院在建设乙型肝炎和艾滋病疾病资源库的过程中,总结疾病资源库建设经验,为中国疾病资源库建设的标准化提供参考。     

地市级妇幼保健机构部制改革问题与对策探讨

妇幼机构四大保健部设置,是国家卫生计生委在新妇幼机构规范化建设标准中提出,其目的是解决妇幼保健管理、认识和定位的误区,各妇幼保健机构在落实四大部设置中存在的困难。文章以秦皇岛市妇幼保健院部制改革为例,寻求探索解决地市妇幼保健机构实施四大保健部设置的方法。     

江苏省生态文明建设水平指标体系构建与评估

生态文明建设是近期学者、政府和公众关注的焦点,科学评价区域生态文明发展水平、明确关键制约因素是推动生态文明建设的基础。以地处中国东部沿海的江苏省为例,在全面分析已有指标体系的基础上,综合考虑关联性、针对性、适用性和可获性,构建包含生态经济、生态环境、生态生活、生态文化和生态制度在内的指标体系,对2007年、2012年江苏省生态文明建设水平和各指标的进步率进行评价。结果表明:江苏省生态文明建设水平迅速提高,生态文化和生态生活水平提升最快,生态经济和生态制度文明水平有一定增加,而生态环境改善较慢;江苏生态文明建设水平处于全国中等偏上位置,但资源消耗和污染物产生强度仍然较高、生态环境质量并未得到实质性改善、绿色生活方式尚有待提升、有利于生态建设和环境保护的生态文明制度尚未系统建立。推动发展方式转型、加强生态环境保护和完善生态制度是未来推动生态文明建设的重点工作。