scholarly journals Assessment of the American Flamingo distribution, trends, and important breeding areas

PLoS ONE ◽  
2020 ◽  
Vol 15 (12) ◽  
pp. e0244117
Author(s):  
Leopoldo Torres-Cristiani ◽  
Salima Machkour-M’Rabet ◽  
Sophie Calmé ◽  
Holger Weissenberger ◽  
Griselda Escalona-Segura

The American Flamingo, Phoenicopterus ruber, is a charismatic bird distributed throughout the Caribbean, North and South America. Its wide distribution, the complexity of international monitoring due to its capacity for long-distance flying, and a focus mostly on local populations, make it difficult to understand the dynamics between sites. Here, we took advantage of the citizen eBird science project to present a global perspective on the distribution of the American Flamingo, and identify the potentially most important countries for breeding. We obtained 16,930 records for the Americas from the 1960s until October 2018, of which 9,283 could be used for our objectives. The eBird database indicated a considerable increase in the total number of records over the last decade (2010s), probably reflecting an increase in tourism facilities, research investment, technological advancement, interest in conservation, and the worldwide availability of eBird. We also observed a range extension in the Gulf of Mexico in the United States and a significant recolonization in the Florida Peninsula. The apparent range extension to the South is more likely to be linked to biases in the data; for example, in any given country the number of records might reflect either reporting efforts or actual numbers. eBird data confirmed that six countries host the main breeding colonies (Bahamas, Bonaire, Cuba, Ecuador, Mexico, and Venezuela). We suggest three additional countries as potential breeding areas for the species (Colombia, Curaçao, Turks and Caicos Islands) for which more field observations are necessary to support this possibility. This global appraisal of the distribution of the American Flamingo using citizen science data provides valuable information for national and international management and conservation programs such as the need to verify the species breeding status in areas where it appears to be expanding its distribution.

FACETS ◽  
2019 ◽  
Vol 4 (1) ◽  
pp. 238-253
Author(s):  
D. T. Tyler Flockhart ◽  
Maxim Larrivée ◽  
Kathleen L. Prudic ◽  
D. Ryan Norris

Monarch butterflies ( Danaus plexippus, Linnaeus, 1758) are comprised of two migratory populations separated by the Rocky Mountains and are renowned for their long-distance movements among the United States, Canada, and Mexico. Both populations have declined over several decades across North America prompting all three countries to evaluate conservation efforts. Monitoring monarch distribution and abundance is a necessary aspect of ongoing management in Canada where they are a species at risk. We used presence-only data from two citizen science data sets to estimate the annual breeding distribution of monarch butterflies in Canada between 2000 and 2015. Monarch breeding distribution in Canada varied widely among years owing to natural variation, and when considering the upper 95% of the probability of occurrence, the annual mean breeding distribution in Canada was 484 943 km2 (min: 173 449 km2; max: 1 425 835 km2). The area of occurrence was approximately an order of magnitude larger in eastern Canada than in western Canada. Habitat restoration for monarch butterflies in Canada should prioritize productive habitats in southern Ontario where monarchs occur annually and, therefore, likely contribute most to the long-term viability of monarchs in eastern North America. Overall, our assessment sets the geographic context to develop successful management strategies for monarchs in Canada.


Author(s):  
Robert A. Mercure

With research and technology (R&T) development activities for the next generation SuperSonic Transport (SST) being pursued globally over the past few years, the options to proposed airframe and engine concepts appears to be converging. The United States, the Europeans, and the Japanese are all engaged in developing the technologies needed for a future SST that is environmentally compatible and economically practical. Boeing and McDonnell Douglas are part of the team under an R&T contract with the National Aeronautics and Space Administration to develop critical components and enabling materials that will allow industry to make a production decision by 2003. Europe’s three main aircraft manufacturer’s — i.e., Aerospatiale, British Aero-space, and Deutsche Aerospace — comprise the European Supersonic Research Program (ESRP). A primary Japanese effort called the Hypersonic Transport Propulsion System Research (HYPR) project consists of a consortium of four international engine manufacturers and the National Japanese Laboratory. The manufacturers are: Ishikawajima-Harima Heavy Industries Co. Ltd., the Kawasaki Heavy Industries Co. Ltd., Mitsubishi Heavy Industries Co. Ltd., and General Electric Aircraft Engines Company, USA. A recent study by the Japan Aircraft Development Corporation (Reference 1) also addressed the technology requirements for the next generation SST. There are basically three major challenges that must be met before a new SST can become a reality. They are the technical, environmental, and economic challenges. The technical challenges of the propulsion system primarily reduce the development of new materials capable of sustaining higher temperatures and vibration (high and low frequency) over longer exposure times as well as capable of being produced at reasonable costs. Low emission combustors and low exhaust jet noise are the primary environmental challenges, which are a technical challenge in themselves. The economic challenge is to produce an aircraft and propulsion system that allows the manufacturers to recover development and manufacturing costs as well as realize a reasonable Return-On-Investment (ROI). In addition, Life Cycle Costs (LCC) must not be substantially above future subsonic airliners in order to justify premium fares the public would be willing to pay for the time savings of long-distance flights and still be profitable to the airlines.


2019 ◽  
Vol 5 ◽  
pp. 1
Author(s):  
Qin Sheng ◽  

The Sino–United States (US) trade war since 2017 has triggered Sino–US confrontations in the economic field and also intensified geopolitical competition. From a historical perspective, the current Sino–US trade war is a continuation of the conservative US trade policy, rather than a dramatic development. From a global perspective, the trade dispute between China and the United States is only part of President Donald Trump's grand global economic strategy that aims to stabilize the economic hegemony of the United States. Trump's economic diplomacy targets both China and its Western allies, with the goal of achieving a comprehensive and complete solution. The developmental status of the United States shows that its economic strength is increasingly insufficient to support the status of global hegemony, as well as being increasingly incapable of meeting the global requirements for providing public goods. Therefore, trade wars are essentially trade policy adjustments made by the United States to consolidate its hegemonic foundations and fight against potential opponents, e.g., the trade wars against Germany in the 1960s and Japan in the 1980s. Based on the timeline of the current trade war, Trump was obviously well prepared. Trump's behavior now clearly violates the basic rules of WTO and his policy does not focus on technology and innovation, which is key to future economic growth. Whether Trump's well-planned and aggressive economic strategy will work, it will fundamentally change China's US policy from cooperative to more independent.


2020 ◽  
Vol 1 (1) ◽  
pp. 141-153
Author(s):  
Adolphus G. Belk ◽  
Robert C. Smith ◽  
Sherri L. Wallace

In general, the founders of the National Conference of Black Political Scientists were “movement people.” Powerful agents of socialization such as the uprisings of the 1960s molded them into scholars with tremendous resolve to tackle systemic inequalities in the political science discipline. In forming NCOBPS as an independent organization, many sought to develop a Black perspective in political science to push the boundaries of knowledge and to use that scholarship to ameliorate the adverse conditions confronting Black people in the United States and around the globe. This paper utilizes historical documents, speeches, interviews, and other scholarly works to detail the lasting contributions of the founders and Black political scientists to the discipline, paying particular attention to their scholarship, teaching, mentoring, and civic engagement. It finds that while political science is much improved as a result of their efforts, there is still work to do if their goals are to be achieved.


Author(s):  
Thomas Borstelmann

This book looks at an iconic decade when the cultural left and economic right came to the fore in American society and the world at large. While many have seen the 1970s as simply a period of failures epitomized by Watergate, inflation, the oil crisis, global unrest, and disillusionment with military efforts in Vietnam, this book creates a new framework for understanding the period and its legacy. It demonstrates how the 1970s increased social inclusiveness and, at the same time, encouraged commitments to the free market and wariness of government. As a result, American culture and much of the rest of the world became more—and less—equal. This book explores how the 1970s forged the contours of contemporary America. Military, political, and economic crises undercut citizens' confidence in government. Free market enthusiasm led to lower taxes, a volunteer army, individual 401(k) retirement plans, free agency in sports, deregulated airlines, and expansions in gambling and pornography. At the same time, the movement for civil rights grew, promoting changes for women, gays, immigrants, and the disabled. And developments were not limited to the United States. Many countries gave up colonial and racial hierarchies to develop a new formal commitment to human rights, while economic deregulation spread to other parts of the world, from Chile and the United Kingdom to China. Placing a tempestuous political culture within a global perspective, this book shows that the decade wrought irrevocable transformations upon American society and the broader world that continue to resonate today.


2020 ◽  
Author(s):  
Josep del Hoyo ◽  
Peter F. D. Boesman ◽  
Ernest Garcia

Author(s):  
Geoffrey Jones

The chapter examines green business during the 1960s and 1970, decades of new environmental awareness. In organic food natural beauty, a number of commercially viable green businesses and brands began to be built, and distribution channels created. There was significant innovation in wind and solar energy in the wake of the first oil crises although they remained marginal in the energy industry. Green entrepreneurs still faced huge obstacles finding both capital and consumers. In the case of the capital-intensive solar energy business, the main solution was to sell start-ups to cash-rich oil companies. Green businesses clustered in hubs of environmental and social activism, such as Berkeley and Boulder in the United States, Allgäu in Germany, and rural areas of Denmark. These clusters enabled small firms to build skills and competences which could eventually be used to expand into more mainstream locations.


Author(s):  
Steven L Schwarcz

Securitisation represents a significant worldwide source of capital market financing. European investors commonly invest in asset-backed securities issued in U.S. securitisation transactions, and vice versa One of the key goals of the European Commission's proposed Capital Markets Union (CMU) is to further facilitate securitisation as a source of capital market financing as a viable alternative to bank-based finance for companies operating in the EU. To that end, this chapter explains securitisation and attempts to put its rise, its decline after the global financial crisis, and its recent CMU-inspired revival into a global perspective. It examines not only securitisation's relationship to the financial crisis but also post-crisis comparative regulatory approaches in the EU and the United States.


Comic book studies has developed as a solid academic discipline, becoming an increasingly vibrant and field in the United States and globally. A growing number of dissertations, monographs, and edited books publish every year on the subject, while world comics represent the fastest-growing sector of publishing. The Oxford Handbook of Comic Book Studies examines the history and evolution of the visual narrative genre from a global perspective, bringing together readable, jargon-free essays written by established and emerging scholars from diverse geographic, institutional, gender, and national backgrounds. In particular, the Handbook explores how the term “global comics” has been defined, as well the major movements and trends that drive the field. Each essay will help readers understand comic books as a storytelling form grown within specific communities, and will also show how these forms exist within what can be considered a world system of comics.


Sign in / Sign up

Export Citation Format

Share Document