Sustainable Consumption and Worktime Reduction

This article argues that in the global North a successful path to sustainability will entail a stabilization of consumption through reductions in hours of work, a solution that neither ecologists nor economists have addressed seriously. The article presents data on the slowdown of hours reductions in many countries and discusses the need for policy intervention to counter firm-level disincentives to reducing hours of work. It then discusses the potential popularity of work-hour reductions with consumers. It ends with an argument that technological changes will be insufficient to achieve sustainable consumption patterns and that averting continued increases in the scale of consumption through trading income for time is imperative.     

Review: Towards the agroecological management of ruminants,pigs and poultry through the development of sustainable breeding programmes: I-selection goals and criteria

Agroecology uses natural processes and local resources rather than chemical inputs to ensure production while limiting the environmental footprint of livestock and crop production systems. Selecting to achieve a maximization of target production criteria has long proved detrimental to fitness traits. However, since the 1990s, developments in animal breeding have also focussed on animal robustness by balancing production and functional traits within overall breeding goals. We discuss here how an agroecological perspective should further shift breeding goals towards functional traits rather than production traits. Breeding for robustness aims to promote individual adaptive capacities by considering diverse selection criteria which include reproduction, animal health and welfare, and adaptation to rough feed resources, a warm climate or fluctuating environmental conditions. It requires the consideration of genotype×environment interactions in the prediction of breeding values. Animal performance must be evaluated in low-input systems in order to select those animals that are adapted to limiting conditions, including feed and water availability, climate variations and diseases. Finally, we argue that there is no single agroecological animal type, but animals with a variety of profiles that can meet the expectations of agroecology. The standardization of both animals and breeding conditions indeed appears contradictory to the agroecological paradigm that calls for an adaptation of animals to local opportunities and constraints in weakly artificialized systems tied to their physical environment.     

Visual census methods underestimate density and diversity of cryptic reef fishes

The diversity and density of small, benthic reef fishes were estimated using visual census and enclosed rotenone stations. Visual census underestimated the number of species present and the density of common species by up to 91%.     

A continental measure of urbanness predicts avian response to local urbanization

Understanding species-specific relationships with their environment is essential for ecology, biogeography and conservation biology. Moreover, understanding how these relationships change with spatial scale is critical to mitigating potential threats to biodiversity. But methods which measure inter-specific variation in response to environmental parameters that are also generalizable across multiple spatial scales are scarce. We used broad-scale avian citizen science data, over continental Australia, integrated with remotely-sensed products, to produce a measure of urban-tolerance for a given species at a continental-scale. We then compared these urban-tolerances to modelled responses to urbanization at a local-scale, based on systematic sampling within four small cities. For 49 species which had sufficient data for modelling, we found a significant relationship (R² = 0.51) between continental-scale urbanness and local-scale urbanness. We also found that relatively few citizen science observations (~250) are necessary for reliable estimates of continental-scale species-specific urban scores to predict local-scale response to urbanization. Our approach demonstrates the applicability of broad-scale citizen science data, contrasting both the spatial grain and extent of standard point-count surveys generally only conducted at small spatial scales. Continental-scale responses in Australia are representative of small-scale responses to urbanization among four small cities in Australia, suggesting that our method of producing species-specific urban scores is robust and may be generalized to other locations lacking appropriate data.     

Witch Hunts, Herbal Healing, and Discourses of Indigenous Ecodevelopment in North India: Theory and Method in the Anthropology of Environmentality

ABSTRACT  In this article, we examine the environmental thought and practice of indigenous peoples living in and around a wildlife sanctuary in North India. Analysis reveals that those religious specialists (such as shamans) who possess knowledge of herbal healing are more committed than other villagers to preventing or mitigating the overharvesting of natural resources. To explain these results, reference is made to a specific juncture of native traditions and modern conditions and in particular to an intersection of local economies with global discourses of "ecodevelopment." Drawing on theories and methods from political ecology and cultural psychology, we present a framework for testing the extent that local actors—in this case, shamanic and herbalist healers—are differently positioned to resist or accommodate state and parastate structures of "environmentality" than are other villagers.     

Surgical trauma-induced CCL18 promotes recruitment of regulatory T cells and colon cancer progression

Background: Surgical stress has been suggested to facilitate colon cancer growth and metastasis. However, the precise mechanisms by which surgical trauma promotes colon cancer progression remain poorly understood. Methods: To unravel the mechanisms underlying surgery-induced colon cancer progression, a syngenic transplantation tumor model was established with CT26 cells, and the effect of laparotomy on tumor progression was investigated. Especially, the expression of several chemokines was assessed, and their roles in recruiting CD4+ CD25+ regulatory T cells (Tregs) after surgery were analyzed. Results: Tregs population was significantly increased in the tumor tissue and peripheral blood of tumor-bearing mice after laparotomy. C-C motif chemokine ligand 18 (CCL18) expression was significantly upregulated after laparotomy in tumor tissue and the peritoneal cavity of tumor-bearing mice, and it was positively correlated with the recruitment of Tregs. Functionally, CCL18 knockdown significantly reduces tumor growth and angiogenesis compared with control. Through analysis of Tregs, we found an upregulated proportion of Tregs in tumor tissue, peritoneal cavity, and peripheral blood after laparotomy, but this enhancement was blocked after CCL18 knockdown. In patients with colon cancer, a higher Tregs proportion is positively correlated to more advanced clinical TNM stages and shorter survival. Furthermore, a positive correlation was found between the serum CCL18 level and the Treg proportion in clinical samples. Conclusion: Surgical trauma contributes to colon cancer progression by increasing CCL18 expression and hence promotes Treg recruitment, which leads to an immunosuppressive environment.     

Swimming movements of ctenophores,and the mechanics of propulsion by ctene rows

This study focuses on the mechanics of ciliary movement of ctenophores in relation to locomotion and feeding, with field and laboratory observations documented with 35 mm photographs and video sequences. Movement through the water is strongly modified by subtleties of body morphology. Whereas the entire ctenophore moves in a flow regime where the Reynolds numbers range from 100 to 6000, the cilia on the surface of the ctenophores move in a flow regime where the Reynolds numbers range only from 10 to 300. The water flow patterns seen by use of fluorescein dye do not match any current model of ciliary flow and assumptions for a new model are postulated. Ctenophores exhibit a wide variety of morphological adaptations that reduce drag, and a variety of behaviours that exploit fine-scale water movements for prey capture.