BioScience articles from April 2007

BioScience archives from April 2007

Where the birds are going.(bird species of North America)(Editorial)
April 1, 2007... For those who see science as an ever finer parsing of causes and effects, the article in this issue of BioScience on changes in bird abundance in eastern North America might seem less than completely satisfying. The authors, Ivan Valiela...

Open sourcing ecological data.(Column)
April 1, 2007... In a thought-provoking Viewpoint, Cassey and Blackburn (2006) suggest that reproducibility should not be required of ecological studies. Thus, ecological journals should not require authors to publish data as a requirement of publication, nor...

Ghosts in our midst: coming to terms with amphibian extinctions.
April 1, 2007... A global mass extinction of amphibians is well under way, driven both by habitat loss and by environmental changes. As amphibian communities in Central America are being decimated by chytrid disease, scientists are working to fashion an...

Return of the pronghorn: the Sonoran pronghorn, one of five pronghorn subspecies, may be the most endangered large mammal in the United States. Once ranging more widely, today they are found in the United States only on protected lands in southwestern Arizona. Captive breeding programs and desert enhancements are starting to revive Sonoran pronghorn numbers.
April 1, 2007... Michael Coffeen looked on last fall as the gates of a wire-mesh pen deep in the Sonoran Desert in Arizona swung open. Inside, two Sonoran pronghorn cautiously eyed the open door. First one, and then a few minutes later the other, exited the...

Creating a "green" campus.(Eye on Education)
April 1, 2007... The world is getting warmer, but that's just the beginning. Glaciers will melt, sea levels will rise and flood coastal cities, hurricanes will increase in intensity, entire ecosystems will be lost--and humans carry most of blame. If we act now,...

Transforming the rules on federal regulations.(Washington Watch)
April 1, 2007... In mid-January, as national attention focused on congressional reorganization and the never-ending controversies surrounding the Iraq war, the White House rewrote key chapters of the book on federal regulations. In one fell swoop, Executive...

Understanding regional change: a comparison of two lake districts.
April 1, 2007... We compared long-term change in two lake districts, one in a forested rural setting and the other in an urbanizing agricultural region, using lakes as sentinel ecosystems. Human population growth and land-use change are important drivers of...

The significance of the erosion-induced terrestrial carbon sink.
April 1, 2007... Estimating carbon (C) balance in erosional and depositional landscapes is complicated by the effects of soil redistribution on both net primary productivity (NPP) and decomposition. Recent studies are contradictory as to whether soil erosion...

Tales from the blackgum, a consummate subordinate tree.
April 1, 2007... No species in the eastern United States better exemplifies a ubiquitous yet subordinate tree than does blackgum (Nyssa sylvatica). What enables blackgum to grow nearly everywhere, but almost always at very low densities? It is the longest-lived...

Changes in bird abundance in Eastern North America: urban sprawl and global footprint?
April 1, 2007... The abundance of birds recorded in the North American Breeding Bird Survey decreased by up to 18 percent between 1966 and 2005. The abundance of US and Canadian resident species decreased by 30 percent, and that of migrants within the United...

Themes on variation.(Variation: A Central Concept in Biology)(Book review)
April 1, 2007... Variation: A Central Concept in Biology. Benedikt Hallgrimsson and Brian K. Hall, eds. Elsevier Academic Press, Burlington, MA, 2005. 592 pp. $74.95 (ISBN 9780120887774 cloth). Darwin's engine, natural selection, requires fuel to drive it,...

From research to technology.(Biotech: The Countercultural Origins of an Industry)(Book review)
April 1, 2007... Biotech: The Countercultural Origins of an Industry. Eric J. Vettel. University of Pennsylvania Press, Philadelphia, 2006. 296 pp. $39.95 cloth (ISBN 9780812239478). Biotech: The Countercultural Origins of an Industry appears in the...

The evolution of evolutionary genetics.(Evolutionary Genetics: Concepts and Case Studies)(Book review)
April 1, 2007... Evolutionary Genetics: Concepts and Case Studies. Charles W. Fox and Jason B. Wolf, eds. Oxford University Press, New York, 2006. 608 pp., illus. $59.50 (ISBN 9780195168181 paper). We evolutionary geneticists hold the history of our field...

New titles.
April 1, 2007... Atlas of Bird Migration: Tracing the Great Journeys of the World's Birds. Jonathan Elphick, ed. Firefly Books, Westport, CT, 2007. 176 pp., illus. $35.00 (ISBN 9781554072484 cloth). Biological Invasions Belowground: Earthworms as Invasive...

AIBS announces awards to Brewer, Eldredge, Levin, and Murdoch.(AIBS news)
April 1, 2007... The AIBS Board and Awards Committee is pleased to announce the recipients of the following awards, which will be presented at 1:30 p.m. on 14 May during the AIBS annual meeting: * Education Award: Carol A. Brewer, University of Montana,...

AIBS Emerging Public Policy Leader Award winners named.(AIBS news)
April 1, 2007... AIBS is pleased to announce the recipients of the 2007 Emerging Public Policy Leader Award: Amber Szoboszlai, of California State University, and Sarah Wright, of the University of Wisconsin. Szoboszlai and Wright receive an AIBS...

Initial NEON candidate core sites.(AIBS news)
April 1, 2007... NEON, Inc., has announced the initial group of 20 candidate core sites across the United States that will be included in the NEON Project Execution Plan. The NEON, Inc., observing strategy and site selection process is based on systematic...

NEON selects mathematician to be project manager.(AIBS news)
April 1, 2007... Minnesota native Karin A. Remington has been named project manager for the National Ecological Observatory Network. Her initiation into the NEON planning effort was immediate. "My first day on the job was at the Boulder site selection...

Change your bookmarks!(AIBS news)
April 1, 2007... The AIBS Virtual Library, repository of video recordings of plenary lectures given by some of the world's most eminent biologists at AIBS annual meetings since 2000, has been renamed the Media Library. The new URL is www.aibs.org/...

Executive director's recent blog entries online at http://blogs.aibs.org/richardogrady.(AIBS news)
April 1, 2007... * NEON Education and Training Survey Up Next for Discussion * ESA Invites Community Feedback on NEON Education and Training

Recent articles online at www.actionbioscience.org.(AIBS news)
April 1, 2007... Original article in English * "Talking Past Each Other: Genetic Testing and Indigenous Populations," by Ikechi Mgbeoji, associate professor of law at Osgoode Hall Law School, York University, Toronto, Canada Lesson for classroom...

Recent AIBS Public Policy Reports online at www.aibs.org.(AIBS news)
April 1, 2007... Public Policy Report for 5 March 2007 * Congress begins budget hearings, asks questions about funding balance * Administration plants seeds for new farm bill * 2007 AIBS Emerging Public Policy Leader Award recipients named *...

Calendar of meetings.(Calendar)
April 1, 2007... April 16-20 Coastal Education and Research Foundation, Gold Coast, Australia; www. cerf-jcr.org 18-21 Association of Southeastern Biologists, Columbia, SC; www.asb.appstate.edu/meeting. php 19-21 Southwestern Association of...

Exotoxins.(BrioBriefs)
April 1, 2007... ESTUARINE WHODUNIT Remember the fish kills that precipitated "Pfiesteria hysteria" in the media 10 years ago? A break in the mystery, and an end to the ongoing controversy over what caused so many fish deaths in eastern US estuaries and...