Search results for "evidence."
showing 10 items of 1017 documents
A review of mental health and wellbeing under climate change in small island developing states (SIDS)
2021
AbstractSmall island developing states (SIDS) are often at the forefront of climate change impacts, including those related to health, but information on mental health and wellbeing is typically underreported. To help address this research lacuna, this paper reviews research about mental health and wellbeing under climate change in SIDS. Due to major differences in the literature’s methodologies, results, and analyses, the method is an overview and qualitative evidence synthesis of peer-reviewed publications. The findings show that mental health and wellbeing in the context of climate change have yet to feature prominently and systematically in research covering SIDS. It seems likely that m…
Rethinking the perishable: Identifying organic remains in metal objects at the Iron Age site of La Bastida de les Alcusses (Moixent, Spain)
2019
Abstract The use of certain perishable materials for handicraft, such as wood, has been underestimated in archaeological investigation due to their poor preservation. Its study through indirect evidence (other non-perishable materials, ethnographic sources) is partial, and does not account for the real importance of wood in domestic, craft and ritual contexts in past societies. In this review we reclaim the use of wood as a co-constitutive material of objects by focusing on Iron Age tools, weapons and carpentry elements from a case-study in the Western Mediterranean. We also suggest the adoption of protocols for sampling and analysing the remains of wood adhered to metal objects, which may …
Five centuries of Central European temperature extremes reconstructed from tree-ring density and documentary evidence
2010
Future climate change will likely influence the frequency and intensity of weather extremes. As such events are by definition rare, long records are required to understand their characteristics, drivers, and consequences on ecology and society. Herein we provide a unique perspective on regional-scale temperature extremes over the past millennium, using three tree-ring maximum latewood density (MXD) chronologies from higher elevations in the European Alps. We verify the tree-ring-based extremes using documentary evidences from Switzerland, the Czech Republic, and Central Europe that allowed the identification of 44 summer extremes over the 1550-2003 period. These events include cold temperat…
Climate indices in historical climate reconstructions: a global state of the art
2021
Narrative evidence contained within historical documents and inscriptions provides an important record of climate variability for periods prior to the onset of systematic meteorological data collection. A common approach used by historical climatologists to convert such qualitative information into continuous quantitative proxy data is through the generation of ordinal-scale climate indices. There is, however, considerable variability in the types of phenomena reconstructed using an index approach and the practice of index development in different parts of the world. This review, written by members of the PAGES (Past Global Changes) CRIAS working group – a collective of climate historians a…
Current Wildland Fire Patterns and Challenges in Europe: A Synthesis of National Perspectives
2021
Changes in climate, land use, and land management impact the occurrence and severity of wildland fires in many parts of the world. This is particularly evident in Europe, where ongoing changes in land use have strongly modified fire patterns over the last decades. Although satellite data by the European Forest Fire Information System provide large-scale wildland fire statistics across European countries, there is still a crucial need to collect and summarize in-depth local analysis and understanding of the wildland fire condition and associated challenges across Europe. This article aims to provide a general overview of the current wildland fire patterns and challenges as perceived by natio…
Testing the hypothesis of post-volcanic missing rings in temperature sensitive dendrochronological data
2013
a b s t r a c t The precise, annual dating control, inherent to dendrochronology, has recently been questioned through a combined analysis of tree-growth and coupled climate models (Mann et al. (2012; hereafter MAN12)) suggesting single tree-rings in temperature limited environments are missing following large volcanic events. We test this hypothesis of missing, post-volcanic rings by using a compilation of maximum late- wood density (MXD) records that are typically used for reconstructing temperature and the detection of volcanic events, together with a unique set of long instrumental station data from Europe reaching back into the early 18th century. We investigate the temporal coherence …
Biased predation could promote convergence yet maintain diversity within Müllerian mimicry rings of Oreina leaf beetles.
2019
Mullerian mimicry is a classic example of adaptation, yet Muller's original theory does not account for the diversity often observed in mimicry rings. Here, we aimed to assess how well classical Mullerian mimicry can account for the colour polymorphism found in chemically defended Oreina leaf beetles by using field data and laboratory assays of predator behaviour. We also evaluated the hypothesis that thermoregulation can explain diversity between Oreina mimicry rings. We found that frequencies of each colour morph were positively correlated among species, a critical prediction of Mullerian mimicry. Predators learned to associate colour with chemical defences. Learned avoidance of the green…
Anti-brood Parasite Defences: The Role of Individual and Social Learning
2017
In this chapter, we consider the ways in which learning is involved in the anti-brood parasitism defences that hosts deploy across the nesting cycle. Brood parasitism varies in space and through time, and hosts have accordingly evolved plastic defences that can be tuned to local conditions. Hosts can achieve their defence plasticity by individual and social learning, as well as by experience-independent mechanisms. While these mechanisms can profoundly affect the coevolutionary dynamics between hosts and their brood parasites, our understanding of how they feature across the host nesting cycle is far from complete. Hosts can actively defend themselves against brood parasitism via a variety …
The genetic basis of balanced polymorphism in Philaenus (Homoptera)
2009
In Philaenus spumarius (Homoptera), colour polymorphism is mainly determined by a series of allelic genes. The dominance and co-dominance relationships of the following seven alleles were analysed: T (trilineatus), M (marginellus), F (flavicollis-F), L (lateralis), C (flavicollis-C, gibbus and leucocephalus), O (quadrimaculatus, albomaculatus and leucophthalmus) and t (typicus). The colour phenotypes are indicated in brackets. On the basis of partly direct and partly indirect evidence, T was found to be the top dominant and t the bottom recessive allele in the female sex. In the males, T is also the top dominant, but t comes second in the hierarchy. Conclusive evidence of the dominance of T…
Empowering education professionals with twenty-first century skills through master's of education dissertation/thesis work
2021
This paper aims to explore the potential role of Master’s of Education dissertation/thesis work in developing twenty-first century skills. A total of 600 education professionals studying Master’s of Education programmes in five countries – Poland, Portugal, England, Latvia, and Romania – were surveyed. The findings have revealed that participants recognise the usefulness of twenty-first century skills for their (future) professional practice, and perceive dissertation/thesis work as a valuable foundation for developing these skills. This study offers practical implications for designers of Master’s of Education programmes and contributes to our understanding that this assignment is not only…