BioScience articles from January 2005

BioScience archives from January 2005

A busy, innovative year for AIBS.(Editorial)
January 1, 2005... As we embark on a new year in which science continues to hold the key to success in many major ventures in public policy, AIBS has plans for helping to establish national scientific goals. Our program of activities for 2005 is somewhat...

When did the discovery rate for invasive species in the North American Great Lakes accelerate?(Letters)
January 1, 2005... Holeck and colleagues (2004) rightly draw attention to transoceanic ships as a source of nonindigenous species (NIS) in the North American Great Lakes. We agree that "management strategies aimed at preventing new invasions must consider the...

Religious freeing of wildlife promotes alien species invasion.(Letters)
January 1, 2005... We read with interest October's cover article on the invasion of zebra mussels into North America (John M. Drake and Jonathan M. Bossenbroek, "The Potential Distribution of Zebra Mussels in the United States," BioScience 54: 931-941). Alien...

Clouds among the ecological visions.(Viewpoint)
January 1, 2005... In 2002, the Ecological Society of America (ESA) appointed a committee of 20 scientists, known as the Ecological Visions Committee, "to develop an action plan for the Society and for the future of ecological science in general" (Palmer et al....

After the divorce: improving science at federal wildlife agencies.
January 1, 2005... Michael Runge and his colleagues from the US Geological Survey (USGS) and the US Fish and Wildlife Service (FWS) got out of their car, hiked the short distance to Chaska Lake near the Minnesota River, and looked around carefully. Here, at the...

Teaching students with disabilities: applying and learning scientific habits of mind.(Eye on Education)
January 1, 2005... Jay Hatch, associate professor of biological sciences at the University of Minnesota (UMN) and associate curator of fishes at the Bell Museum of Natural History in Minneapolis, has been a scientist for over 25 years. During his career, he has...

Environmental science sacrificed in latest US budget.(Washington Watch)
January 1, 2005... In early December, President George Bush told Canadians that by "relying on sound science and mutual goodwill, we can resolve issues." One week later, he signed a budget for fiscal year 2005 that slashes funding for the federal programs...

Winter biological processes could help convert arctic tundra to shrubland.
January 1, 2005... In arctic Alaska, air temperatures have warmed 0.5 degrees Celsius ([degrees]C) per decade for the past 30 years, with most of the warming coming in winter. Over the same period, shrub abundance has increased, perhaps a harbinger of a...

Multifunctional agriculture in the United States.
January 1, 2005... We evaluated possible changes to current farming practices in two Minnesota watersheds to provide insight into how farm policy might affect environmental, social, and economic outcomes. Watershed residents helped develop four scenarios to...

Mechanisms underlying the costs of egg production.
January 1, 2005... Female birds incur costs associated with increased egg production, including reductions in chick provisioning ability, in future fecundity, in survival, and in egg and chick viability. It should be possible to identify the components of the...

Bugs reveal an extensive, long-lost northern tallgrass prairie.
January 1, 2005... Only tiny remnants of unplowed natural meadows remain in the eastern part of the state of North Dakota, and in Canada from eastern Saskatchewan to Manitoba. Those west of Lake Manitoba and the Red River Valley are characterized by their...

Diagnosable versus distinct: evaluating species limits in birds.(Forum)
January 1, 2005... I review new species of birds described from 1993 to 2002, comparing the methods used to diagnose (identify) new bird species with those used for other classes of vertebrates. Birds are described and subsequently identified using a jar more...

GK-12 partnership: a model to advance change in science education.(Education)
January 1, 2005... Elementary science is a local district, state, and national weak link in the continuum of K-16 (kindergarten through college) science education. To address that, core curriculum guidelines are calling for emphasis on "a hands-on and minds-on...

A good review of our understanding of speciation.
January 1, 2005... Speciation. Jerry A. Coyne and H. Allen Orr. Sinauer, Sunderland, MA, 2004. 545 pp., illus. $89.95 (ISBN 0878930914 cloth). "Why are there are so many species and how did they form?" is a fundamental question in biology. Jerry Coyne and...

Extinction of the rocky mountain locust.
January 1, 2005... Locust: The Devastating Rise and Mysterious Disappearance of the Insect that Shaped the American Frontier. Jeffrey A. Lockwood. Basic Books, New York, 2004. 288 pages, illus. $25.00 (ISBN 0738208949 cloth). The Rocky Mountain grasshopper,...

Is our view of animal phylogeny fundamentally wrong?
January 1, 2005... The Origins of Larvae. Donald I. Williamson. Kluwer Academic, Dordrecht, The Netherlands, 2003.264 pp., illus. $99.00 (ISBN 1402015143 cloth). This book is a revised and enlarged edition of Donald I. Williamson's Larvae and Evolution:...

New titles.
January 1, 2005... America's Environmental Report Card: Are We Making the Grade? Harvey Blatt. MIT Press, Cambridge, MA, 2004. 277 pp., illus. $27.95 (ISBN 0262025728 cloth). Bioinformatics: A Practical Guide to the Analysis of Genes and Proteins. 3rd ed....

AIBS Board of Directors for 2005.(AIBS news)
January 1, 2005... AIBS welcomes its Board of Directors for 2005. Six of the 13 seats on the board were open for election this year. The president-elect serves a one-year term and automatically succeeds to a one-year term as president, then a one-year term as...

NEON gathers momentum.(AIBS news)
January 1, 2005... In September 2004, AIBS finalized a cooperative agreement with the National Science Foundation to develop a detailed planning document for the National Ecological Observatory Network (NEON) by June 2006. Now the NEON planning process is on a...

Recent articles online at www.actionbioscience.org.(AIBS news)
January 1, 2005... Original articles in English * "The Dose Makes the Poison--Or Does It?" by Nancy Trautmann, director of Cornell University's Environmental Inquiry program * "Plant Content in the National Science Education Standards," by David...

Recent public policy reports online at www.aibs.org.(AIBS news)
January 1, 2005... Public Policy Report for 6 December 2004 * Report recommends strengthening role of federal science advisors * Secretary of the Interior Norton nominates new assistant secretary for water and science * Dover (Pennsylvania) latest...

Recent AIBS education reports online at www.aibs.org.(AIBS news)
January 1, 2005... Education Report for November-December 2004 * Teaching the value of gardens * American Association for Higher Education--upcoming conferences and workshops * Scientists and students with disabilities in SACNAS News * NSF...

Calendar of meetings.(Calendar)
January 1, 2005... January 4-8 Society for Integrative and Comparative Biology 2005 Annual Meeting, San Diego, CA; Web site: www.sicb.org/ meetings/2005/index.php 3 February 7-10 Annual Meeting of the Weed Science Society of America, Honolulu, HI; Web site:...

A new piece in the puzzle of Global Amphibian declines.(BioBriefs)
January 1, 2005... The results of the first global survey of amphibians, outlined in a paper published online by Science on 14 October 2004, were sobering even to those on the front lines of research on amphibian declines. The Global Amphibian Assessment (GAA)...