scholarly journals Ecological traps: current evidence and future directions

2016 ◽  
Vol 283 (1824) ◽  
pp. 20152647 ◽  
Author(s):  
Robin Hale ◽  
Stephen E. Swearer

Ecological traps, which occur when animals mistakenly prefer habitats where their fitness is lower than in other available habitats following rapid environmental change, have important conservation and management implications. Empirical research has focused largely on assessing the behavioural effects of traps, by studying a small number of geographically close habitat patches. Traps, however, have also been defined in terms of their population-level effects (i.e. as preferred habitats of sufficiently low quality to cause population declines), and this is the scale most relevant for management. We systematically review the ecological traps literature to (i) describe the geographical and taxonomic distribution of efforts to study traps, (ii) examine how different traps vary in the strength of their effects on preference and fitness, (iii) evaluate the robustness of methods being used to identify traps, and (iv) determine whether the information required to assess the population-level consequences of traps has been considered. We use our results to discuss key knowledge gaps, propose improved methods to study traps, and highlight fruitful avenues for future research.

2020 ◽  
Vol 29 (158) ◽  
pp. 200264
Author(s):  
Antenor Rodrigues ◽  
Gerard Muñoz Castro ◽  
Cristina Jácome ◽  
Daniel Langer ◽  
Selina M. Parry ◽  
...  

Respiratory physiotherapists have a key role within the integrated care continuum of patients with respiratory diseases. The current narrative review highlights the profession's diversity, summarises the current evidence and practice, and addresses future research directions in respiratory physiotherapy. Herein, we describe an overview of the areas that respiratory physiotherapists can act in the integrated care of patients with respiratory diseases based on the Harmonised Education in Respiratory Medicine for European Specialists syllabus. In addition, we highlight areas in which further evidence needs to be gathered to confirm the effectiveness of respiratory therapy techniques. Where appropriate, we made recommendations for clinical practice based on current international guidelines.


2020 ◽  
Author(s):  
Ian Burton

Tendinopathy is a chronic degenerative tendon disorder which is characterised by pain, swelling and impaired physical function and performance, presenting in both athletes and the general population. Extracorporeal shockwave therapy (ESWT) is an increasingly common treatment for tendinopathy, which can initiate tendon healing and regeneration. The review presents current understanding of mechanisms of action of ESWT and provides a brief overview of its history and development. The central purpose of the review is to synthesise research findings investigating the effectiveness of ESWT for seven common tendinopathies (plantar heel pain, rotator cuff, lateral elbow, Achilles, gluteal, hamstring and patellar tendinopathy) and provide recommendations on clinical applicability. Collectively, the available evidence indicates that ESWT is effective and can be recommended in treatment for the seven tendinopathies. However, the evidence is stronger for certain tendinopathies compared to others and uncertainties remain regarding the optimal ESWT treatment parameters. The consensus from recent literature is that although ESWT can be effective in isolation it should be combined with other treatments in tendinopathy, which needs to be addressed in future research.


2021 ◽  
Vol 288 (1957) ◽  
pp. 20210325
Author(s):  
Kelly A. Keen ◽  
Roxanne S. Beltran ◽  
Enrico Pirotta ◽  
Daniel P. Costa

Assessing the non-lethal effects of disturbance from human activities is necessary for wildlife conservation and management. However, linking short-term responses to long-term impacts on individuals and populations is a significant hurdle for evaluating the risks of a proposed activity. The Population Consequences of Disturbance (PCoD) framework conceptually describes how disturbance can lead to changes in population dynamics, and its real-world application has led to a suite of quantitative models that can inform risk assessments. Here, we review PCoD models that forecast the possible consequences of a range of disturbance scenarios for marine mammals. In so doing, we identify common themes and highlight general principles to consider when assessing risk. We find that, when considered holistically, these models provide valuable insights into which contextual factors influence a population's degree of exposure and sensitivity to disturbance. We also discuss model assumptions and limitations, identify data gaps and suggest future research directions to enable PCoD models to better inform risk assessments and conservation and management decisions. The general principles explored can help wildlife managers and practitioners identify and prioritize the populations most vulnerable to disturbance and guide industry in planning activities that avoid or mitigate population-level effects.


2020 ◽  
Vol 60 (2) ◽  
pp. 402-412 ◽  
Author(s):  
Eric J McElroy ◽  
Diego Sustaita ◽  
Lance D McBrayer

Synopsis Many researchers work at the interface of organisms and environment. Too often, the insights that organismal, or functional, biologists can bring to the understanding of natural history, ecology, and conservation of species are overlooked. Likewise, natural resource managers are frequently focused on the management of populations and communities, while ignoring key functional traits that might explain variation in abundance and shifts in species composition at these ecological levels. Our intention for this symposium is two-fold: (1) to bring to light current and future research in functional and ecological morphology applicable to concerns and goals of wildlife management and conservation and (2) to show how such studies can result in measurable benchmarks useful to regulatory agencies. Symposium topics reveal past, present, and future collaborations between functional morphologists/biomechanists and conservation/wildlife biologists. During the SICB 2020 Annual Meeting, symposium participants demonstrated how data gathered to address fundamental questions regarding the causes and consequences of organismal form and function can also help address issues of conservation and wildlife management. Here we review how these, and other, studies of functional morphology, biomechanics, ecological development morphology and performance can inform wildlife conservation and management, principally by identifying candidate functional traits that have clear fitness consequences and population level implications.


2020 ◽  
Vol 86 (6) ◽  
Author(s):  
Fabio Sangalli ◽  
Giacomo Bellani ◽  
Alessandro Affronti ◽  
Francesca Volpi ◽  
Marco Feri ◽  
...  

2019 ◽  
Vol 14 ◽  
Author(s):  
Khaleel Ahmad ◽  
Afsar Kamal

Background: Privacy enhancing techniques are developed in order to provide strong protection to cyberspace. These techniques aim to allow users to keep their identities hidden during the communication when they are sending email, making payments online, browsing the Web or posting to newsgroups. MixNet is the most practical solution for concealing identities of message and sender’s identities. Objective: It provides sender and receiver anonymity as well as message security. The main goal of MixNet is to overcome vulnerability and enhance the performance of communication. It can efficiently handle the messages of various length and produce desirable results with privacy. The main objective of this paper is to acquire information and concepts regarding MixNet. We also provide guidelines for future research and references. Methods : The designing of MixNet depends on what cryptosystem method is used. Symmetric and Asymmetric both are used. Other methods could be also used such as PIR, CSP and FDR model, RPC, Token-based approach or others. Result: In this paper we provide an overview of MixNet approaches and presented a survey on MixNet based techniques and different models. We also constructed the comparison tables as per our requirements for better understanding. For this purpose, we found a total of 120 articles related to the MixNet published between 1990 and 2018 from the most relevant scientific resources. However, only 86 papers were analyzed due to comprehensiveness and relevancy to this article. Conclusion: Focused on the security and privacy of communication and how it can be achieved. This survey also reveals research progress and research gap on MixNet.


2018 ◽  
Author(s):  
Lorraine Tudor Car ◽  
Bhone Myint Kyaw ◽  
Josip Car

BACKGROUND Digital technology called Virtual Reality (VR) is increasingly employed in health professions’ education. Yet, based on the current evidence, its use is narrowed around a few most applications and disciplines. There is a lack of an overview that would capture the diversity of different VR applications in health professions’ education and inform its use and research. OBJECTIVE This narrative review aims to explore different potential applications of VR in health professions’ education. METHODS The narrative synthesis approach to literature review was used to analyse the existing evidence. RESULTS We outline the role of VR features such as immersion, interactivity and feedback and explain the role of VR devices. Based on the type and scope of educational content VR can represent space, individuals, objects, structures or their combination. Application of VR in medical education encompasses environmental, organ and micro level. Environmental VR focuses on training in relation to health professionals’ environment and human interactions. Organ VR educational content targets primarily human body anatomy; and micro VR microscopic structures at the level of cells, molecules and atoms. We examine how different VR features and health professional education areas match these three VR types. CONCLUSIONS We conclude by highlighting the gaps in the literature and providing suggestions for future research.


Author(s):  
Maryann Feldman ◽  
Paige Clayton

This chapter examines the relationship between entrepreneurs and the communities in which they are embedded. It argues that the actions of entrepreneurs and their firms are contextually situated in specific geographies that make their actions endogenous in the development of place and define a place-specific institutional logic. This argument is at odds with the view that industry clustering is due to the role of incumbent firms. This chapter reconciles these views by adopting a temporal view, allowing both incumbents and geography to co-occur and influence clustering. It then considers the current evidence of entrepreneurs’ effects on regional resources and capacity, and concludes with suggestions for future research.


Author(s):  
Tera D. Letzring

This chapter identifies several well-established findings and overarching themes within personality trait accuracy research, and highlights especially promising directions for future research. Topics include (1) theoretical frameworks for accuracy, (2) moderators of accuracy and the context or situation in which judgments are made, (3) the important consequences of accuracy, (4) interventions and training programs to increase judgmental ability and judgability, (5) the generalizability of previous findings, and (6) standardized tests of the accuracy of judging personality traits. The chapter ends by stating that it is an exciting time to be a researcher studying the accuracy of personality trait judgments.


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