Local Group Research Articles

Volunteer commitment and longevity in community-based conservation in Aotearoa New Zealand

ABSTRACT Committed volunteers are the driving force of successful community-based conservation initiatives. However, many groups struggle with recruitment and retention of volunteers. This research adds to the limited knowledge on what motivates community-based conservation volunteers to become committed to a conservation initiative, by carrying out a case study on community-based conservation volunteers in the Manawatū region of New Zealand. Twenty-one semi-structured interviews with key members of community-conservation groups were carried out along with a survey distributed to all local community-based conservation groups. This research showed that the key long-term motivation factors are ‘to care for the environment’, ‘to help the local community’, ‘to be outside, or amongst nature’ and to have ‘a connection to nature’. There was minimal change between long-term and initial motivation factors, with only three motivation factors increasing in importance; ‘to socialise with others’, ‘for stress relief or escape’ and ‘to help the local community', and one decreasing in importance; ‘to learn new skills and knowledge’. In order to enhance commitment of volunteers there is a need to take motivation factors into account within project design and management, allow time for socialisation, and provide ongoing training, education and recognition.

Experiences from targeted removal of farmed Atlantic salmon from Norwegian rivers

Abstract Farmed salmon escaping from aquaculture and interbreeding with wild conspecifics pose a significant threat to the genetic integrity of natural salmon populations. Despite advancements in aquaculture security, escape incidents persist, prompting the need for effective mitigation strategies. This study summarizes experiences from efforts to remove escaped farmed salmon over a 12-year period in 63 western Norwegian rivers, using either (1) spearfishing during snorkelling by trained personnel or (2) traditional fishing methods employed by local groups. Recaptured farmed salmon ranged widely in size and included both spawners as well as immature fish, demonstrating that farmed fish entering rivers comprise fish of different ages and escape histories. Traditional fishing by locals recaptured the highest number of farmed fish, while removal during snorkelling in general captured larger and mature fish. On average, 53% of the farmed salmon observed during snorkelling were recaptured. This efficacy was influenced by the number of farmed fish present and the size of the farmed fish. In addition, efficacy increased over time, indicating that the removal team became more efficient. The study underscores that active removal, when executed judiciously, contributes to reducing the ecological risks associated with escaped farmed fish, complementing broader strategies for sustainable aquaculture.

Access to the European cultural heritage of settlements and towns in the Danube macro-region through interoperable strategies digital transformation

Tangible cultural heritage is a strategic resource for the development of rural and urban settlements. Cooperation with stakeholders from EU countries and regions within the Danube macro-region, such as cultural heritage institutions and competent authorities, allows to agree on the preparation and adaptation of compatible digital innovation strategies in local initiative groups in the Republic of Moldova and Ukraine, as well as on impact mapping through a set of pan-European socio-economic indicators. Objectives of the study: to analyse the available European best practices and methodology for adaptation in the integration of the regions of the Republic of Moldova and Ukraine in the interregional innovation partnership on the smart specialisation "Cultural and Creative Regional Ecosystems" (CCRE-S3) [1]. The overall horizontal objective of the integration into the platform should be to add value to the common characteristics of the cultural and creative sector and to create a permanent discovery mechanism that will carry out activities to identify strategic investments and the use of innovation transfer tools. Previous works: previous concept, research and experience are described in the articles [2] and [3]. Approach: European benchmarking, comparative analysis, bibliographic research. Outcome: recommendations aimed at stimulating new ideas and opportunities related to cultural and creative experiences for local communities and residents by involving several groups of professions that use, apply and implement new technologies in the cultural and creative industries sector. The European Programmes provide resources to support their implementation. In this way, the Danube Strategy participating States [4], by supporting partnerships between the cultural heritage sector and other sectors such as higher education and vocational education and training, creative industries and sustainable cultural tourism, will be able to stimulate innovation for new services and applications in their regions.

Volunteer and NGO Matching Platform

According to a poll conducted in 2021, during the epidemic, the number of donors in India increased by 43%. During the pandemic, Indian non-governmental organizations (NGOs) volunteered their services in every manner conceivable, and they still do. However, over the years, the proportion of volunteers has remained consistent. This demonstrates a disconnect between the general population and nonprofits as well as volunteerism. Establishing a platform that connects these volunteers with other charitable organizations would be crucial. The "Volunteer Matching Platform" project may be able to bridge this gap. This web-based platform is intended to facilitate volunteer connections between non-governmental organizations and local groups. NGOs will use this platform to promote their events to the nation's citizens. On the other hand, volunteers will be able to browse through the available opportunities, filtering based on their interests, location, and availability.

Conceptual framework for Information and Communication Technology applications to enhance eco-efficiency

The quality of community decisions about the key characteristics of urban services depends on the level of involvement of local stakeholder groups. The identification of the environmental, economic and social impacts of investments to improve urban services is a critical aspect of the decision preparation phase. Assessment of the main stakeholder groups being affected by the impacts of urban services is required to understand what kind of problems they perceive. Based on their demand, different solutions can be provided to create an Information and Communication Technology (ICT) software system to facilitate environmental cooperations. The aim of this research is to propose an ICT system to support citizens’ active involvement in the transformation of the environment with access to essential information, and enable them to make more effective decisions about the investments. Most of the features of the proposed system have the potential to support eco-effective environmental policy implementations and form part of a sustainable policy toolkit. We explore the different interests and what functions should be provided to make access to information easier and more integrated. Our proposed conceptual framework would fulfill the requirements and gives practical examples how to increase eco-efficiency of products, technologies or investments in urban areas.

Etiological characterization of invasive non-typhoid Salmonella strains in Guangdong Province from 2018 to 2022

Objective: To understand the serotype distribution, drug resistance and molecular characterization of invasive non-typhoid Salmonella (iNTS) in Guangdong Province from 2018 to 2022 and provide scientific evidence for the prevention and treatment of blood flow infection caused by Salmonella. Methods: Serological identification, antimicrobial susceptibility testing, multilocus sequence typing (MLST), and whole genome sequencing were performed on Salmonella isolated from blood and stool samples in Guangdong from 2018 to 2022. Simultaneously, annotated the sequencing results for drug resistance genes and virulence factors by a microbial gene annotation system. Results: The 136 iNTS strains were divided into 25 serotypes, and Salmonella enteritidis accounted for 38.24% (52/136). The OR of other iNTS serotypes were calculated with Salmonella typhimurium as the control. The OR values of Oreninburg, Rysson, and Pomona serotypes were the highest, which were 423.50, 352.92, and 211.75, respectively. The drug resistance rate of iNTS was 0.74%-66.91%, which was lower than that of non-iNTS (3.90%-77.21%). The main iNTS of drug resistance were ampicillin and tetracycline, with resistance rates of 66.91% (91/136) and 50.00% (68/136), respectively, while the resistance rates to ciprofloxacin (5.88%,8/136), ceftazidime (5.88%,8/136), gentamicin (5.13%,7/136) and cefoxitin (0.74%, 1/136) were relatively low. iNTS carried a variety of drug-resistance genes and virulence factors, but no standard virulence factor distribution has been found. MLST cluster analysis showed that iNTS was divided into 26 sequence types, and ST11 accounted for 38.24% (52/136). Conclusions: The iNTS strains in Guangdong were dominated by Salmonella enteritidis, of which three serotypes, Oreninburg, Rison, and Pomona, may be associated with a higher risk of invasive infection during 2018 to 2022. iNTS was sensitive to clinical first-line therapeutic drugs (cephalosporins and fluoroquinolones), with highly diverse sequences and clear phylogenetic branches. ST11 was the local dominant clone group.

Massively scalable workflows for quantum chemistry: BigChem and ChemCloud.

Electronic structure theory, i.e., quantum chemistry, is the fundamental building block for many problems in computational chemistry. We present a new distributed computing framework (BigChem), which allows for an efficient solution of many quantum chemistry problems in parallel. BigChem is designed to be easily composable and leverages industry-standard middleware (e.g., Celery, RabbitMQ, and Redis) for distributed approaches to large scale problems. BigChem can harness any collection of worker nodes, including ones on cloud providers (such as AWS or Azure), local clusters, or supercomputer centers (and any mixture of these). BigChem builds upon MolSSI packages, such as QCEngine to standardize the operation of numerous computational chemistry programs, demonstrated here with Psi4, xtb, geomeTRIC, and TeraChem. BigChem delivers full utilization of compute resources at scale, offers a programable canvas for designing sophisticated quantum chemistry workflows, and is fault tolerant to node failures and network disruptions. We demonstrate linear scalability of BigChem running computational chemistry workloads on up to 125 GPUs. Finally, we present ChemCloud, a web API to BigChem and successor to TeraChem Cloud. ChemCloud delivers scalable and secure access to BigChem over the Internet.

“Planning for anything, not for everything:” Uncertainty and temporal coordination in social movement organizing

A month before the 2020 US presidential election, then President Trump amplified a false claim about poll watchers monitoring early voting in Philadelphia, stating “They were thrown out. They weren’t allowed to watch. You know why? Because bad things happen in Philadelphia, bad things.” The months preceding the November 3rd election featured many similar discursive attacks on the integrity of Philadelphia's election systems, part of a larger right-wing campaign to delegitimate election outcomes in advance. Fearing what this might portend for election day, dozens of local progressive movement organizations and activist groups formed the “Philadelphia Action Council” (PAC), a coordinative space for organizing and planning a mobilized response to a contested election. Strategic collective action involves the coordination of complex temporal orientations, at multiple scales, however, PAC activists couldn’t be sure when, where, or for how long they may need to mobilize, nor what sorts of targets or messages or tactics the action should be orientated around. In fact, they couldn’t be sure if they would need to mobilize at all. In this paper, I analyze the temporal structure of the PAC's “action council” model, arguing that the contingent, eventful temporality embedded in the structure of the PAC engendered similarly contingent modifications in the temporal orientations of its participants, allowing PAC activists to embrace uncertainty in ways that they typically strive to avoid. I then demonstrate how the embrace of uncertainty (somewhat paradoxically) expanded the PAC's collective capacity for improvisation and adaptation in the days following the election. This research draws on (and contributes to) critical time studies to further the emergent project of temporalities research in the field of social movements studies.

Genomics reveals heterogeneous Plasmodium falciparum transmission and selection signals in Zambia

BackgroundGenomic surveillance is crucial for monitoring malaria transmission and understanding parasite adaptation to interventions. Zambia lacks prior nationwide efforts in malaria genomic surveillance among African countries.MethodsWe conducted genomic surveillance of Plasmodium falciparum parasites from the 2018 Malaria Indicator Survey in Zambia, a nationally representative household survey of children under five years of age. We whole-genome sequenced and analyzed 241 P. falciparum genomes from regions with varying levels of malaria transmission across Zambia and estimated genetic metrics that are informative about transmission intensity, genetic relatedness between parasites, and selection.ResultsWe provide genomic evidence of widespread within-host polygenomic infections, regardless of epidemiological characteristics, underscoring the extensive and ongoing endemic malaria transmission in Zambia. Our analysis reveals country-level clustering of parasites from Zambia and neighboring regions, with distinct separation in West Africa. Within Zambia, identity by descent (IBD) relatedness analysis uncovers local spatial clustering and rare cases of long-distance sharing of closely related parasite pairs. Genomic regions with large shared IBD segments and strong positive selection signatures implicate genes involved in sulfadoxine-pyrimethamine and artemisinin combination therapies drug resistance, but no signature related to chloroquine resistance. Furthermore, differences in selection signatures, including drug resistance loci, are observed between eastern and western Zambian parasite populations, suggesting variable transmission intensity and ongoing drug pressure.ConclusionsOur findings enhance our understanding of nationwide P. falciparum transmission in Zambia, establishing a baseline for analyzing parasite genetic metrics as they vary over time and space. These insights highlight the urgency of strengthening malaria control programs and surveillance of antimalarial drug resistance.

Species Diversity and Habitat Fragmentation Per Se: The Influence of Local Extinctions and Species Clustering.

AbstractAnthropogenic fragmentation of habitat is considered to be a critical factor contributing to the decline of species. However, a general consensus on the degree to which habitat loss and what has been called "habitat fragmentation per se" contribute to the loss of species diversity has not yet emerged. For empirical and theoretical reasons the topic has recently attracted renewed attention, thus reviving the "single large or several small" (SLOSS) debate. To study the effect of fragmentation per se, we use a spatially explicit and continuous, competitively neutral simulation model with immigration from a regional pool. The model accounts for the influence of ecological drift and intrafragment species clustering (due to limited dispersal) on local (plot) and global (landscape) diversity. We find that fragmentation increases global diversity but decreases local diversity, prominently so if fragments become more isolated. Cluster formation is a key mechanism reducing local diversity. By adding external disturbance events that lead to the occasional extinction of entire communities in habitat fragments, we show that the combined effect of such extinctions and cluster formation can create nonlinear interactive effects of fragmentation and fragment isolation on diversity patterns. We conclude that while in most cases fragmentation will decrease local and increase landscape diversity, universal predictions concerning the SLOSS debate should be taken with care.

B 0— B¯0 mixing in the U(1) X SSM

U(1) X SSM is a non-universal Abelian extension of the Minimal Supersymmetric Standard Model and its local gauge group is extended to SU(3) C × SU(2) L × U(1) Y × U(1) X . Based on the latest data of neutral meson mixing and experimental limitations, we investigate the process of B0−B0¯ mixing in U(1) X SSM. Using the effective Hamiltonian method, the Wilson coefficients and mass difference Δm B are derived. The abundant numerical results verify that vS,MD2,λC,μ,M2,tanβ,gYX,M1 and λ H are sensitive parameters to the process of B0−B0¯ mixing. With further measurement in the experiment, the parameter space of the U(1) X SSM will be further constrained during the mixing process of B0−B0¯ .

Reconstructing the evolution history of networked complex systems

The evolution processes of complex systems carry key information in the systems’ functional properties. Applying machine learning algorithms, we demonstrate that the historical formation process of various networked complex systems can be extracted, including protein-protein interaction, ecology, and social network systems. The recovered evolution process has demonstrations of immense scientific values, such as interpreting the evolution of protein-protein interaction network, facilitating structure prediction, and particularly revealing the key co-evolution features of network structures such as preferential attachment, community structure, local clustering, degree-degree correlation that could not be explained collectively by previous theories. Intriguingly, we discover that for large networks, if the performance of the machine learning model is slightly better than a random guess on the pairwise order of links, reliable restoration of the overall network formation process can be achieved. This suggests that evolution history restoration is generally highly feasible on empirical networks.

Chemical Localization With Robotic Bronchoscopy: Can It Aid Resection of Subsolid Lung Nodules?

IntroductionSubsolid nodules or those located deep in lung parenchyma are difficult to localize using minimally invasive thoracic surgery. While image-guided percutaneous needle localization has been performed, it is inconvenient and has potential complications. In this study, the role of chemical localization using robotic bronchoscopy to facilitate resection was evaluated. MethodsConsecutive patients undergoing surgical resection for lung nodules between 8/2019-3/2022 were included. Patients with subsolid lung nodules, or small nodules deep in lung parenchyma that were deemed difficult to localize, were chemically localized (CL) using robotic bronchoscopy before resection. Clinico-demographic data were obtained retrospectively using a prospectively maintained database. ResultsLocalization of lung nodules before resection was performed in 139 patients while 110 patients were not localized. Daily activity score was higher for localized patients. Nodules in the localized group were smaller (P < 0.001) and had similar solid:ground glass ratio. In the localized group, larger margins were observed, and no re-resection of the parenchymal margin was required. Twenty patients in the non-localized group required re-resection intraoperatively due to close pathological margins or inability to locate the nodule in the resected specimen. Operative time was a median of 10-15 min longer for localized patients, P < 0.001. Length of stay was shorter in the localized group (P < 0.05). ConclusionsChemical localization of lung nodules using robotic bronchoscopy appears to be a safe and effective method of identifying the location of nodules with small size and less density and aids increased tumor margins intraoperatively.

252 Chronic Subdural Hematoma Drainage Under Local Versus General Anesthesia: Systematic Review and Meta-analysis

INTRODUCTION: Chronic subdural hematoma (CSDH) is one of the most encountered conditions seen in neurosurgery. Although mainstay treatment of cSDH has been burr hole drainage, no consensus yet exists on optimal anesthetic technique for surgical treatment between general (GA) and local (LA) anesthesia. METHODS: A search was conducted in MEDLINE (1946 to November 11, 2022), Embase (1974 to November 11, 2022), and PubMed (up to November 11, 2022). We followed the Preferred Reporting Items for Systematic Reviews and Meta-analyses (PRISMA) guidelines to systematically screen studies. RESULTS: Our literature search identified 521 studies, out of which 20 were included. There were a total of 1750 patients in the LA group and 699 patients in the GA group. Our meta-analysis found that the LA group had significant shorter operative time (mean difference -29.28 minutes, p &lt;0.0001), length of admission (Mean difference -1.58 days, 95% CI = -2.40 to -0.76 days, p = 0.0002), and postoperative complications rate (odds ratio 0.38, 95% CI = 0.25 to 0.59, p &lt; 0.0001) compared to GA. There was no significant difference between the two groups in revision rate (odds ratio 2.71, 95% CI 0.89 to 8.25, p = 0.08) and mortality rate (odds ratio 1.23, 95% CI 0.63 to 2.43, p = 0.55). CONCLUSIONS: In this meta-analysis, LA shows benefits in shorter operative time, shorter admission length, and fewer postoperative complications. This makes local anesthesia a less invasive alternative to general anesthesia especially in elderly patients.

Unipolar optical transitions in nanoclusters of ellipsoidal geometry

The quantum states of an ellipsoidal nanocluster of a heterophase system InAs/GaAs are studied using an exact analytical approach, in contrast to the generally accepted theoretical model based on the adiabatic approximation. It is shown that the spectrum of a nanoobject is formed from local groups, consisting of discrete levels, separated by terahertz frequency intervals. A double random degeneration of certain spectrum states is revealed. Allowed mid-infrared (IR) optical transitions between different spectral states are analyzed. The role of dimensional parameters and features of the shape of a nanoobject in the characteristics of unipolar transitions is assessed. The absorption spectrum for the transition in the lower part of the substructure spectrum is calculated.

Addition of the Local Volume sample of galaxies from the FAST HI survey

We report the discovery of 20 new dwarf galaxies in the Local Volume identified as optical counterparts to the Five-hundred-meter Aperture Spherical radio Telescope (FAST) All Sky HI Survey (FASHI) sources. The galaxies have a median stellar mass of 7.8 × 106 M⊙ and a median HI mass of 1.0 × 107 M⊙. Most of them are field galaxies, while three are probable members of the M 101 and M 106 groups. We also found seven FASHI radio sources to be probable dark HI clouds in nearby groups. Together with four other known HI clouds in the local groups, their mean-square radial velocity difference of 49 km s−1 with respect to the host galaxies yields an average total mass of (2.7 ± 1.0)×1011 M⊙ for these groups on the projected scale of 90 kpc.

What is the ideal time to begin tapering opioid agonist treatment? A protocol for a retrospective population-based comparative effectiveness study in British Columbia, Canada

IntroductionOpioid agonist treatment (OAT) tapering involves a gradual reduction in daily medication dose to ultimately reach a state of opioid abstinence. Due to the high risk of relapse and overdose...

A Hierarchical Utilization of Semantic Gradients and Scene Structure for Visual Place Recognition

Visual Place Recognition (VPR) is a fundamental element for long-term Simultaneous Localization and Mapping (SLAM) systems. For long-term VPR, severe appearance and viewpoint variations are inevitable. In this paper, we introduce a novel VPR system named Semantic Scene Structure Place Recognition (3SPR), inspired by the repeatability of semantic gradients and the scene structure of urban environments. Semantic gradients are densely sampled according to the sum of absolute gradients of all channels in the logits layer. Features of the semantic gradients in different layers are concatenated to exploit features’ characteristics at different levels. Based on partitions by vanishing points of road lines and Vector of Locally Aggregated Descriptors (VLAD), the Scene Structure VLAD (SSVLAD) is generated from concatenated features of the semantic gradients. Moreover, a local point group match method is used to enhance the spatial verification. Experimental results show that our method achieves state-of-the-art performance on the Oxford Robotcar dataset and the Synthia dataset.

The Birth and Beyond (BABY) study: protocol for a birth cohort study investigating the social and environmental determinants of pregnancy-related outcomes in Black American families

IntroductionIn the USA, Black birthing people and infants experience disproportionately worse pregnancy-related health outcomes. The causes for these disparities are unknown, but evidence suggests that they are likely socially and...

Strengthening the trainee voice at the Medical Local Faculty Group

Strengthening the trainee voice at the Medical Local Faculty Group