Modeling Biowaste Flows for Life‐Cycle Assessment: Calculation of the Potential and Collected Weight of Kitchen and Garden Waste

This article presents an integrative approach to calculating the weight of potential biowaste and collected biowaste materials, as the basis for a life‐cycle assessment (LCA) of biowaste management. Biowaste contains kitchen and garden (yard) waste of households. This approach could be used for waste management planning and for the implementation of biowaste schemes. Case studies and examples in the literature are analyzed to model the mass of the flow of biowaste. This article defines relevant operands, presents the main assumptions, and describes the calculation principles. Spatial aspects and the uncertainties related to the inclusion of this aspect are explicitly considered in the calculation of the weight of the potential biowaste. We also present the calculation principles for obtaining the weight of (1) biowaste used in home composting, (2) the organic portion of residual waste, (3) biowaste separately collected by a bring system, and (4) biowaste separately collected by curbside collection (known in some areas as kerbside collection). By choosing the biowaste potential in kilograms per capita year (kg/cap yr) as the functional unit, previously ignored options within the biowaste system could be assessed. For example, widening the system boundaries allows LCA studies to assess the contribution of private and public transport of waste to ecological impact categories. It allows examining the effects of supporting home composting through financial incentives and the introduction of a separate collection system. This study focuses on the comparison of different collection types and on the characteristics of the area under investigation. It also incorporates the behavior of the inhabitants of households and includes a sensitivity analysis of relevant operands. This approach is being included in an LCA assessing biowaste management options.     

Effects of decadal climate change on zooplankton over the last 50 years in the western subarctic North Pacific

Decadal‐ to multi‐decadal variations have been reported in many regional ecosystems in the North Pacific, resulting in an increasing demand to elucidate the link between long‐term climatic forcing and marine ecosystems. We detected phenological and quantitative changes in the copepod community in response to the decadal climatic variation in the western subarctic North Pacific by analyzing the extensive zooplankton collection taken since the 1950s, the Odate Collection. Copepod species were classified into five seasonal groups depending on the timing of the annual peak in abundance. The abundance of the spring community gradually increased for the period 1960–2002. The spring–summer community also showed an increasing trend in May, but a decadal oscillation pattern of quasi‐30‐year cycles in July. Phenological changes coincided with the climate regime shift in the mid‐1970s, indicated by the Pacific decadal oscillation index (PDO). After the regime shift, the timing of the peak abundance was delayed one month, from March–April to April–May, in the spring community, whereas it peaked earlier, from June–July to May–June, in the spring–summer community, resulting in an overlap of the high productivity period for the two communities in May. Wintertime cooling, followed by rapid summertime warming, was considered to be responsible for delayed initiation and early termination of the productive season after the mid‐1970s. Another phenological shift, quite different from the previous decade, was observed in the mid‐1990s, when warm winters followed by cool summers lengthened the productive season. The results suggest that climatic forcing with different decadal cycles may operate independently during winter–spring and spring–summer to create seasonal and interannual variations in hydrographic conditions; thus, combinations of these seasonal processes may determine the annual biological productivity.     

A double‐mutant collection targeting MAP kinase related genes in Arabidopsis for studying genetic interactions

Mitogen‐activated protein kinase cascades are conserved in all eukaryotes. In Arabidopsis thaliana there are approximately 80 genes encoding MAP kinase kinase kinases (MAP3K), 10 genes encoding MAP kinase kinases (MAP2K), and 20 genes encoding MAP kinases (MAPK). Reverse genetic analysis has failed to reveal abnormal phenotypes for a majority of these genes. One strategy for uncovering gene function when single‐mutant lines do not produce an informative phenotype is to perform a systematic genetic interaction screen whereby double‐mutants are created from a large library of single‐mutant lines. Here we describe a new collection of 275 double‐mutant lines derived from a library of single‐mutants targeting genes related to MAP kinase signaling. To facilitate this study, we developed a high‐throughput double‐mutant generating pipeline using a system for growing Arabidopsis seedlings in 96‐well plates. A quantitative root growth assay was used to screen for evidence of genetic interactions in this double‐mutant collection. Our screen revealed four genetic interactions, all of which caused synthetic enhancement of the root growth defects observed in a MAP kinase 4 (MPK4) single‐mutant line. Seeds for this double‐mutant collection are publicly available through the Arabidopsis Biological Resource Center. Scientists interested in diverse biological processes can now screen this double‐mutant collection under a wide range of growth conditions in order to search for additional genetic interactions that may provide new insights into MAP kinase signaling.     

Adaptations of an Emergence Trap for Use in Tropical Streams

An emergence trap based on the MPI Schlitz model was designed for use in the tropics and it was tested over one year in Palawan, the Philippines. Instructions for construction and use are given here. Only commonly available materials were used, except for the collection assembly made of UV‐light permeable acrylic glass. Heavy and bulky assemblies were avoided to enable easy transportation in the field. A special modification allows a fast and easy replacement of the screen when damaged by flooding, as is often required when traps are used downstream of headwaters. This type of trap also allows sampling of a wide littoral strip. Problems concerning the use of emergence traps in the humid tropics are discussed based on experience at different longitudinal stream sections in Palawan. The results presented here suggest that this trap should be used especially for qualitative or semi‐quantitative approaches. (© 2004 WILEY‐VCH Verlag GmbH & Co. KGaA, Weinheim)     

黄山药不同物候期薯蓣皂甙元含量变化规律研究

本文主要研究黄山药(Dioscorea panthaica)不同物候期薯蓣皂甙元的消涨规律.分析了各物候期薯蓣皂甙元含量与根茎产量和著蓣皂甙元产量的关系,提出了采挖根茎的最佳时期,对生产有重要指导意义.     

中国植物采集先行者钟观光的采集考证

基于文献与标本的研究, 本文重新梳理和考证了中国植物采集先行者钟观光先生的采集历史。钟观光是我国第一个进行大规模植物标本采集的学者, 已知其最早的标本采自1912年(采集于北京), 最晚的是1933年(采集于浙江)。目前能够确定的钟观光采集的馆藏标本计10,228份, 其中大部分保存于北京大学生物系植物标本室(PEY, 4,584份)、中国科学院植物研究所植物标本馆(PE, 2,966份)和北京师范大学生命科学学院植物标本室(BNU, 2,032份), 共计9,582份, 约占钟观光馆藏标本总数的93.7%。英国皇家植物园邱园植物标本馆、爱丁堡植物园标本馆、美国哈佛大学植物标本馆等亦存有少量钟观光采集的标本(16份)。     

西江中下游鳤的遗传多样性与种群动态历史

鳤(Ochetobius elongatus)曾经是我国许多河流的重要经济鱼类, 然而由于环境污染和人为干扰等原因, 鳤的资源量萎缩严重, 种群处于极度濒危的境地。目前, 常规采样方法获得鳤样本的难度较大, 致使相关研究难以开展。本研究通过仔鱼采集和成鱼采集的手段, 测定两个线粒体基因和两个核基因, 对西江中下游鳤的遗传多样性和种群动态历史进行研究。结果显示, 西江中下游鳤的遗传多样性处于较低水平并且出现了衰退的迹象, 可能经历了遗传瓶颈效应。此外, 种群动态历史分析发现, 西江中下游鳤在后更新世期间(0.06和0.13百万年前)经历了种群扩张, 刚好处于中更新世(0.78-0.126百万年前)冰期褪去之后, 表明更新世气候的波动影响了西江中下游鳤的种群动态。作为鳤可能的重要产卵场, 西江中下游部分江段可以考虑建立鳤的自然保护区, 用于保育和修复鳤的种质资源。     

絮凝方法收集产氨短杆菌MA-2、黄色短杆菌MA-3条件的优化

采用壳聚糖作絮凝剂收集富含延胡索酸酶活力的产氨短杆菌MA-2、黄色短杆菌MA-3。研究了絮凝剂加入量及加入时混合方式与时间等因素对延胡索酸酶活力及分离效果的影响,并对壳聚糖絮凝收集产氨短杆菌MA-2、黄色短杆菌MA-3的过程进行了初步分析。     

Potential natural product discovery from microbes through a diversity-guided computational framework

As the occurrence of natural compounds is related to the spatial distribution and evolution of microorganisms for biological and ecological relevance, the data integration of chemistry, geography, and phylogeny within an analytical framework is needed to make better decisions on sourcing the microbes for drug discovery. Such a framework should help researcher to decide on (a) which microorganisms are capable to produce the structurally diverse-bioactive compounds and (b) where those microbes could be found. Here, we present GIST (Geospatial Integrated Species, sites and bioactive compound relationships Tracking tool), a computational framework that could describe and compare how the chemical and genetic diversity varied among microbes in different areas. GIST mainly exploits the measures of bioactive diversity (BD) and phylogenetic diversity (PD), derived from the branch length of bioactive dendrogram and phylogenetic tree, respectively. Based on BD and PD, our framework could provide guidance and tools for measuring, monitoring, and evaluating of patterns and changes in biodiversity of microorganisms to improve the success rate of drug discovery. Electronic supplementary material  The online version of this article (doi:) contains supplementary material, which is available to authorized users.