Search results for "EPA"
showing 10 items of 8995 documents
Epibiotic barnacles of sea turtles as indicators of habitat use and fishery interactions: An analysis of juvenile loggerhead sea turtles, Caretta car…
2019
Abstract Sea turtles exploit a variety of habitats during their lifetime and are thus exposed to a number of anthropogenic threats, including interaction with fisheries. Mitigating this impact requires determining patterns of habitat use by turtles, which largely relies on data from marked individuals. We investigated the use of epibiotic barnacles as a cost-effective method to ascertain habitat use by sea turtles, choosing the juvenile loggerhead sea turtles (Caretta caretta) in the western Mediterranean as a model. A total of 200 turtles collected in the central Spanish Mediterranean between 1990 and 2017 were examined for epibionts: 25% were accidentally captured by pelagic longliners, 1…
Dust and grit matter: abrasives of different size lead to opposing dental microwear textures in experimentally fed sheep (Ovis aries)
2020
ABSTRACT External abrasives ingested along with the herbivore diet are considered main contributors to dental wear, though how the different sizes and concentrations of these abrasives influence wear remains unclear. Dental microwear texture analysis (DMTA) is an established method for dietary reconstruction which describes a tooth9s surface topography on a micrometre scale. The method has yielded conflicting results as to the effect of external abrasives. In the present study, a feeding experiment was performed on sheep (Ovis aries) fed seven diets of different abrasiveness. Our aim was to discern the individual effects of size (4, 50 and 130 µm) and concentration (0%, 4% and 8% of dry mat…
The way wear goes: phytolith-based wear on the dentine–enamel system in guinea pigs (Cavia porcellus)
2019
The effect of phytoliths on tooth wear and function has been contested in studies of animal–plant interactions. For herbivores whose occlusal chewing surface consists of enamel ridges and dentine tissue, the phytoliths might particularly erode the softer dentine, exposing the enamel ridges to different occlusal forces and thus contributing to enamel wear. To test this hypothesis, we fed guinea pigs (Cavia porcellus; n = 36 in six groups) for threeweeks exclusively on dry or fresh forage of low(lucerne), moderate (fresh timothy grass) or very high (bamboo leaves) silica content representing corresponding levels of phytoliths. We quantified the effect of these treatments with measuremen…
Natural Selection Fails to Optimize Mutation Rates for Long-Term Adaptation on Rugged Fitness Landscapes
2008
The rate of mutation is central to evolution. Mutations are required for adaptation, yet most mutations with phenotypic effects are deleterious. As a consequence, the mutation rate that maximizes adaptation will be some intermediate value. Here, we used digital organisms to investigate the ability of natural selection to adjust and optimize mutation rates. We assessed the optimal mutation rate by empirically determining what mutation rate produced the highest rate of adaptation. Then, we allowed mutation rates to evolve, and we evaluated the proximity to the optimum. Although we chose conditions favorable for mutation rate optimization, the evolved rates were invariably far below the optimu…
Atlas of Finnish bats
2019
This atlas is based on information in museum collections, literature, databases and unpublished data. In the last 150 years, the number of bat species in Finland increased from six to thirteen. Of these, five are common and regularly breeding (Eptesicus nilssonii, Myotis brandtii, Myotis daubentonii, Myotis mystacinus, Plecotus auritus), and eight rare (Eptesicus serotinus, Myotis dasycneme, Myotis nattereri, Nyctalus noctula, Pipistrellus nathusii, Pipistrellus pipistrellus, Pipistrellus pygmaeus, Vespertilio murinus), of which breeding of two (M. nattereri, P. nathusii) have been confirmed. The total number of records in the study is 11 234, of which 9717 are identified to species. The re…
Carbohydrate dynamics in particle-size fractions of sandy spodosols following forest conversion to maize cropping
2006
International audience; In southwest France, much of the forested land on sandy spodosols has been converted to continuous maize cropping in the last few decades. To evaluate the impacts of this change on soil organic matter properties, we compared total organic C and neutral and amino sugars content in whole soil and particle size separates of two forested, and five related sites that had been either clear-cut for 12 and 18 mo, or cultivated to maize for 4-22yr. Soil carbohydrates accounted for 4-7% of the total organic C across all sites. Soil organic C contents of clear-cut and cultivated sites were only 57-79% of the average value measured in forested sites. Accordingly, carbohydrate co…
New national and regional bryophyte records, 37
2013
Ellis et al.
Assessing the importance of nursery areas of European hake (Merluccius merluccius) using a body condition index
2017
Abstract In this study, we analysed the variability of reserve storage in juvenile European hake (Merluccius merluccius) off the western coasts of Italy (Central Mediterranean Sea). Reserve storage was measured by the hepatosomatic index (HSI), in relation to environmental and population covariates. HSI has been proved to be a consistent measure of energy storage in gadoids, thus reflecting quantity and quality of food availability for growth. Generalized Additive Models for Location, Scale and Shape (GAMLSS) were used to model the effect of depth, bottom temperature, bottom currents, fish density and fish body size on HSI of juvenile European hake. The results revealed that reserve storage…
Modelling the effects of more selective trawl nets on the productivity of European hake (Merluccius merluccius) and deep-water rose shrimp (Parapenae…
2018
Single-species Gadget models were used to assess the effects of using a sorting grid mounted on the traditional trawl net used by Sicilian trawlers to exploit the deep-water rose shrimp in the Strait of Sicily. The main commercial by-catch species of this fleet is the European hake (Merluccius merluccius), often caught at sizes well below the minimum conservation reference size. Selectivity curves based on the results of an experimental survey carried out in the area using a commercial trawler equipped with an ad hoc-designed sorting grid were incorporated into single-species Gadget models to forecast the effects of changing fishery selectivity on the performance of the two stocks in terms …
A new rationale for not picking low hanging fruits: The separation of ownership and control
2019
Recent attempts at explaining the energy-efficiency gap rely on considerations related to organizational and behavioral/cognitive failures. In this paper, we build on the strategic delegation literature to advance a complementary explanation. It is shown that strategic market interaction may encourage business owners to instill a bias against energy efficiency in managerial compensation contracts. Since managers respond to financial incentives, their decisions will reflect this bias, resulting in lack of investment.