Remote Valley Research Articles

On the occurrence of Sorbus tianschanica Rupr. (Rosaceae), a climate relict from Ladakh, Indian Trans Himalaya

ABSTRACT A new distribution record of Sorbus tianschanica Rupr., a tree or shrub native to the temperate northern hemisphere, is reported for Ladakh. Thirty-one individuals of S. tianschanica were seen growing on exposed cliffs and also on shadowed cliff bases in a remote valley in the western Ladakh region of Kargil. A detailed taxonomic description, diagnostic features and notes on the habitat of the species along with its distribution and climatic range in the adjacent phytogeographic regions (Gilgit-Baltistan, Tajikistan, Kyrgyzstan, Kazakhstan and some provinces of China) are provided. Further, information on the species palaeoecology and biogeography has been reviewed, and its conservation significance is discussed. Our findings emphasise the importance of keeping records of local biodiversity up to date. This is critical for implementing global biodiversity policies and meeting conservation goals.

Reducing the burden of travel and environmental impact through decentralization of cancer care.

Life expectancy, quality of life and satisfaction of oncologic patients highly depend on access to adequate specialized services, that consider their conditions in a holistic way. The present study aims to evaluate the introduction of oncology services in an outpatient setting in a mountain village in Northern Italy. The initiative is evaluated using the three pillars of sustainability (social, economic and environmental) as dimensions that are often overlooked by healthcare policy makers. Using micro data on 18,625 interventions, we estimate the number of kilometers saved by patients (reduction of "travel burden" as indicator of social sustainability), the additional travel costs for the NHS (indicator of economic sustainability) and the implied reduction of CO2 emissions (indicator of environmental sustainability). Over the period July 2016-2021, the decentralized health center delivered 2,292 interventions saving 218,566km for a corresponding value of €131,140. The additional costs for the NHS was €26,152. The reduction of CO2 emissions was 32.37 Tons (€5,989). Overall, the socio-economic benefit of reducing travel of care for the patients residing in this remote valley was €110,976. This study adds original understanding of the benefits of decentralizing oncologic care and shows its operational feasibility conditions. Given the modest number of similar projects, it provides evidence to policy makers and, especially, managers who are faced with the challenge to implement the decentralization of specialized services.

Keeping their own and integrating the other: medicinal plant use among Ormurs and Pathans in South Waziristan, Pakistan

BackgroundIn multicultural societies, traditional knowledge among minorities faces several challenges. Minority groups often face difficult situations living in specific peripheral geographies and striving to retain their biocultural heritage, including medicinal plant knowledge and practices. Folk medicinal plant knowledge is a dynamic eco-cultural complex influenced by various environmental, socio-cultural, and political factors. Examining medicinal plant knowledge among minorities has been an increasingly popular topic in cross-cultural ethnobiology. It also helps understand the dynamics of local/traditional ecological knowledge (LEK/TEK) change within a given community. The current study was designed to investigate the status of medicinal plant knowledge among two linguistic groups, i.e. Ormurs and Pathans, living in a remote valley of West Pakistan.MethodsWe recruited 70 male study participants from the studied groups for semi-structured interviews to record the medicinal plant use of their communities. Data were compared among the two studied communities using the stacked charts employing the presence or absence of data with Past 4.03 and Venn diagrams. Use reports (URs) were counted for each recorded taxon.Results and DiscussionA total of seventy-four medicinal plants were quoted as used as ethnomedicines by the researched communities. Most of the reported plants were used to treat digestive and liver problems. The cross-cultural comparison revealed a considerable homogeneity of medicinal plant knowledge (the two groups commonly used more than seventy plants); however, comparing uses recorded for the widely utilised medicinal plants showed numerous idiosyncratic uses among Ormurs but very few among Pathans. Ormurs reported a higher number of cultivated, wild, and imported plant uses than did Pathans. These results indicate that, compared to Pathans, the Ormur linguistic minority retain more folk medicinal plant knowledge, which may be explained by the fact that they have incorporated different folk remedies: their “own knowledge” plus that of Pathans, with whom they have lived together for centuries. Moreover, the local plant nomenclature among Ormurs was highly affected by the plant nomenclature of Pathans.ConclusionThe current study revealed that living together for a few centuries has not implied sharing plant knowledge (as the Pathans do not seem to have learnt from the Ormurs) or, in other words, that plant knowledge exchanges have been unidirectional. The findings show that the Pashto dominant culture may have possibly put pressure on the minority groups and affected local plant-centred cultural practices, as we see in the case of local plant nomenclature hybridisation among Omuri speakers. Hence, it is imperative to employ diverse educational strategies to revitalise the decline of medicinal plant knowledge in the studied communities, especially among Ormurs, who need more attention as they face more challenges than the other group. Locally based strategies should be devised to restore the fading connection with nature, which will be advantageous for revitalising plant knowledge.

Kekulé Moiré Superlattices.

In this paper, we discuss a new moiré system where the long moiré periodicity emerges from two dissimilar van der Waals layers with vastly different lattice constants. We reconstruct the first layer using a by supercell resembling the Kekulé distortion in graphene, and such reconstruction becomes nearly commensurate with the second layer. We term this construction a Kekulé moiré superlattice, which enables coupling between moiré bands from remote valleys in momentum space. Kekulé moiré superlattices can be realized in heterostructures of transition metal dichalcogenides and metal phosphorus trichalcogenides such as MoTe2/MnPSe3. By first-principles calculations, we demonstrate that the antiferromagnetic MnPSe3 strongly couples the otherwise degenerate Kramers' valleys of MoTe2, resulting in valley pseudospin textures that depend on the Néel vector direction, stacking geometry, and external fields. With one hole per moiré supercell, the system becomes a Chern insulator with highly tunable topological phases.

The wild Scots Pines (Pinus sylvestris) of Kielderhead

In the British Isles, Scots Pine (Pinus sylvestris L.) is currently considered to be native only in the Scottish Highlands. Once widespread throughout the archipelago, the species is thought to have declined to extinction outside the Scottish Highlands c.4500 cal BP, and c.1550 cal BP in Ireland. However, there have been discussions about whether some naturally occurring populations may have persisted outside the Highlands into modern times, and potentially may still be alive today. One such population is the enigmatic “Kielderhead Pines” in a remote valley just on the English side of the Scottish border at the heart of the c.60,000 ha Kielder Forest in Northumberland. Debate about the origins of this small population of apparently wild living pines has been ongoing since the 1950s, which has inspired the creation of the “Kielderhead Wildwood” to support its conservation and restoration. We outline the status, significance and the state-of-play in 2023 of our understanding of the origin of these trees, summarising research on the age of the trees, bioclimatic studies, possible botanical evidence of flora and lichen species typical of the Scottish pinewoods and genetics. We conclude that the explanation for the occurrence of the Kielderhead Pines - that they are locally native - remains a possibility, but we recognise and recommend that further research is required. We summarise the conservation efforts that have taken place to secure the pines within a landscape of restored, wild native upland woodland and mires i.e. re-creation of a Northumbrian equivalent of the Caledonian Forest. We also reflect on how the Kielderhead Pines support the case for greater consideration of the restoration of W18 pine woodland vegetation in appropriate locations outside the Scottish Highlands. We conclude by reflecting that one day these few pines, discovered in an isolated valley in Kielder Forest in the 1950s, may be seen as the start of something much bigger in the uplands of northern England, southern Scotland and beyond.

From Silicon to Himalayan Valley(s): Tales of Serendipitous Exposure and Interfaith Contact on Social Media

This study compares two adjacent remote valleys in the Himalayas of Pakistan, which only differ in terms of the availability of internet access. Using a unique methodological approach, combining a natural experiment design and an interview method, we explore the role of serendipitous exposure and interfaith contact on social media in relation to the religious majority’s knowledge about religious minorities and willingness to engage with them. We find that those who have internet access and use social media show more knowledge about and engagement with religious minorities than those who do not. Serendipitous exposure largely explains the differences—social media users do not intentionally seek information about religious minorities but still serendipitously come across it while using social media for other activities. Moreover, social media users tend to have extensive networks of social ties (i.e., Facebook friends), which frequently cut across religious lines and likely act as the main facilitators of serendipity. We argue that mediated serendipity and increased interfaith contact promoted by social media platforms are essential contributors to democratic citizenship in present-day Pakistan, where religious minorities represent a small segment of the population and often face discrimination and persecution.

Researching Change – Understanding Change – Facing Change. 3500 years of human-environment relations in the Hallstatt/Dachstein region

The Hallstatt High Valley represents one of Europe’s oldest cultural and industrial landscapes. For millennia this remote alpine valley was the demographic and economic center of a wide region. In this landscape the venture of large-scale underground salt mining spans from the present back to the Bronze Age. The oldest secure evidence for large-scale underground salt mining dates to the 14th cent. BC. But various indicators point towards a much older tradition of salt production, reaching far into Neolithic times. The extraordinary preservation conditions in the salt mines and the variety of archaeological, historical and environmental sources allow for unique insights into prehistoric technology, raw material management, working processes and human-environment relations. The Hallstatt/Dachstein region represents an alpine environment, where the evolution of human-environment relations can be tracked over a long time period. Recent research has focused on the impact of natural extreme events on these highly sophisticated socioeconomic systems. Through this research it was possible to document the high degree of resilience of Bronze Age and Iron Age communities in the face of devastating extreme natural events such as mass movements and substantial climate change. In this paper we will address the questions of “understanding past adaptation strategies and facing future challenges” and “the role of archaeologists in addressing climate change” based on our longstanding research and outreach activities in the Hallstatt region.

Contributors

Contributors

High altitude epidemic malaria in Bamian province, central Afghanistan

We report an epidemic of Plasmodium falciparum malaria in the remote valley of Bamian (altitude 2250 m-2400 m) in the central highlands of Afghanistan. A team of malaria experts from the World Health Organization and HealthNet International carried out the investigation. A total of 215 peripheral blood smears were obtained and 63 cases of malaria (90.5% P. falciparum, the remainder P. vivax) were confirmed. The study revealed that areas vulnerable to malaria in Afghanistan are more widespread than previously recognized. The area had been malaria-free until recently, when the disease appears to have been introduced as a consequence of protracted conflict and resultant population movement, and transmitted locally during the short summer months. The outbreak led to severe morbidity and high mortality in a province having only a few poorly-provisioned health care facilities.

Microscopic and Metagenomic Evidence for Eukaryotic Microorganisms Associated with Atacama Desert Populations of Giant Equisetum

Understanding features that fostered the persistence of Equisetum–Earth's oldest extant vascular plant genus–since Mesozoic times and through episodes of significant global environmental change, is of current interest in view of modern challenges to plant survival. In addition to known structural and physiological adaptations, we hypothesized that microscopy and shotgun metagenomic sequencing might reveal eukaryotic microorganisms such as fungi that may aid Equisetum survival. Here, we report evidence for several lineages of eukaryotic microbes associated with giant Equisetum xylochaetum, which dominates vegetation in saline streambeds of remote valleys in the hyper-arid Atacama Desert, Chile. Plant material was collected and field-preserved at two comparatively low-disturbance sites; DNA extracted in Chile using low-shear methods was later sequenced, 18S and 28S rDNA taxonomic marker sequences were selected for SILVAngs classification, allowing comparisons to eukaryotic microorganisms previously inferred for earlier-diverging plant lineages. SEM, fluorescence microscopy, and/or LM of toluidine blue-stained sections of roots indicated protists, epiphytic and endophytic fungi, and cortical nematodes. Eukaryotic genera inferred from 18S rDNA at >100X mean sequencing depth included the ciliate Engelmanniella, hyphal chytrid Monoblepharella, predatory ascomycete Cephaliophora, a salpingoecid choanoflagellate, and an annelid worm. 23S rDNA sequences indicated ascomycete Capnodiales fungi at one site and four types of Pezizomycotina fungi at the other. No evidence for vesicular-arbuscular mycorrhizal fungi was found, but we hypothesized that Equisetum may benefit from other types of fungal associations, some possibly inherited from ancestral plant lineages.

Exploring the Boundaries of Microbial Habitability in Soil

AbstractMicrobes are widely assumed to be capable of colonizing even the most challenging terrestrial surface environments on Earth given enough time. We would not expect to find surface soils uninhabited by microbes as soils typically harbor diverse microbial communities and viable microbes have been detected in soils exposed to even the most inhospitable conditions. However, if uninhabited soils do exist, we might expect to find them in Antarctica. We analyzed 204 ice‐free soils collected from across a remote valley in the Transantarctic Mountains (84–85°S, 174–177°W) and were able to identify a potential limit of microbial habitability. While most of the soils we tested contained diverse microbial communities, with fungi being particularly ubiquitous, microbes could not be detected in many of the driest, higher elevation soils—results that were confirmed using cultivation‐dependent, cultivation‐independent, and metabolic assays. While we cannot confirm that this subset of soils is completely sterile and devoid of microbial life, our results suggest that microbial life is severely restricted in the coldest, driest, and saltiest Antarctic soils. Constant exposure to these conditions for thousands of years has limited microbial communities so that their presence and activity is below detectable limits using a variety of standard methods. Such soils are unlikely to be unique to the studied region with this work supporting previous hypotheses that microbial habitability is constrained by near‐continuous exposure to cold, dry, and salty conditions, establishing the environmental conditions that limit microbial life in terrestrial surface soils.

Experience Oneness with Creation: The Pathway to Universal Consciousness

Experience Oneness with Creation: The Pathway to Universal Consciousness

Conserving a Valley System: Measuring the Effectiveness of the Shaxi Rehabilitation Project and Its Potential as a Model for the Conservation of Chinese Agricultural Heritage

ABSTRACT This article shows how an integrated approach to the conservation of cultural landscapes can significantly contribute to sustainable tourism. First, the authors illustrate how the Shaxi Rehabilitation Project in Yunnan, China – an international initiative for the conservation of tangible built and natural heritage – has exceeded its original aim and provided a framework for the long-term governance of the entire Shaxi valley system. Second, the authors employ a transdisciplinary analytical tool to evaluate the impact of tourism on the valley’s environmental and cultural heritage and to evaluate the effectiveness of the project. The results highlight increasing tourism pressures, especially during peak tourism season, that will be amplified by upcoming developments to transport infrastructure. By adding new variables and examining the availability of established indicators, the study also contributes to the methodological advancement in the field of heritage preservation through its testing and discussion of the advantages and limitations of the application of the pressure-state-response model to a remote valley system.

Understanding visitor interaction with a projection augmented relief model display: insights from an in-the-wild study in the English Lake District

Projection augmented relief models (PARMs) are a promising tangible display technology for assisting users in orientating themselves within the represented landscape. The production of physical models is now easier than ever thanks to more freely available digital terrain data and 3D fabrication technology. When placed in a public setting, such as a visitor centre, the physical nature of such displays coupled with digital surface projection is compelling, enticing passers-by to notice and interact playfully with the display. In this article, we describe findings from our in-the-wild study of a PARM display designed to engage and orient visitors to the rural landscape of a remote valley in the heart of the English Lake District. The deployment has involved close collaboration with the Lake District National Trust, and the results of our 3-day observation study (n = 221) contribute to the growing research community seeking to explore and uncover technology designs that are both playful and unobtrusive to the nature experience. Our research also contributes to the literature on public and situated digital displays and, in particular, understandings of visitor behaviour as considered through the so-called audience funnel framework. Our observations revealed that a significant portion (79%) of visitors noticed the PARM display and that, of these, 68% transitioned to giving the display their focal attention. We also observed an apparent expectation for the PARM display to support direct tangible interaction (such as pointing gestures) which contrasts to the phenomenon of interaction blindness discussed in the literature.

Seroprevalence of rodent-borne viruses in Afro-descendent communities in Brazil.

ABSTRACTDuring the Brazilian slavery period, many African migrants were brought to the American continent. Historically, some of these migrants escaped from the Brazilian gold mines and farms to which they had been brought and settled in remote valleys and this was the main mode of resistance to the slavery system. These runaway-slave descendant communities are called quilombos, a group with distinct ethnic identity, specific behavioral habits, including geographic isolation and conservative practices. The objective of this study was to investigate the prevalence of rodent-borne viruses in two Afro-descendent communities from Mato Grosso do Sul State, Midwestern Brazil. A total of 319 individuals from rural and urban quilombola communities were enrolled. Twelve (3.76%) had anti-rodent-borne virus IgG antibodies. Seven (2.19%) were anti-mammarenavirus reactive and nine (2.82%) had anti-orthohantavirus antibodies. The literature includes limited data on the health status of quilombola communities, but all the studies emphasize the disparity of attention of local healthcare personnel to these communities compared to the general population. The findings of this study highlight the vulnerability and the precarious health conditions of quilombola groups, especially those living in rural areas and thus, point to the need of preventive measures to improve access to healthcare for this ethnic group.

Floristic composition and biological spectrum of Keran - a remote valley of northwestern Himalaya

The Himalayas are one of the youngest and richest ecosystems on earth with a variety of species and forest types due to the varying altitude, topographic, and climatic conditions. The present study was aimed to investigate the floristic composition and biological spectrum of Keran valley, a region nestled in the northwestern frontiers of Himalayan biodiversity hotspot. Floristically, a total of 183 species were recorded, out of which 55 were aliens. Herbaceous growth form was dominant (67%) and therophytes were the dominant (37%) life form. Likewise, mesophylls (34%) followed by nanophylls (29%) and microphylls (27%) were major leaf size categories; and the simple leaf lamina type was recorded in majority of the species (65%). Almost 1/3rd of the total species pool was growing in the forest habitats, while as the 2/3rd occur within the rest 9 habitat types which were largely human-modified. The vegetation phenology observed during different seasons revealed that most of the species were dominant in summer season (37%), followed by spring (29%), autumn (21%) and winter (13%). The present study provides baseline information on the plant diversity in this hitherto unexplored region of northwestern Himalaya.

Community Screening for Psychiatric Morbidity in Four Remote Valleys of Hindu Kush and Karakoram Regions of Pakistan.

To find out the frequency of psychiatric morbidity in patients reporting to general medical camps in the Hindu Kush and Karakoram ranges of Pakistan. A cross-sectional study. Four different valleys of the region, with the Psychiatry Department, Combined Military Hospital, Gilgit as the base, from August 2015 to December 2016. Consenting adults of either gender, reporting to medical camps for various health related issues were administered Bradford Somatic Inventory 21 (BSI 21) and Self Report Questionnaire (SRQ). Non-parametric statistical techniques including Mann-Whitney test, Kruskall-Wallis test, and Spearman correlation, along with median and inter quartile range, were used to analyse data. Out of a total of 478 (52.1% females) respondents, half [n=234 (48.9%) on BSI and n=243 (50.8%) on SRQ] reported positive psychiatric morbidity. Inter-valley differences were significant (BSI, X2=49.1, p <.001; SRQ, X2=66.5, p <.001). Females reported higher levels of psychiatric morbidity measured by BSI (p <.001) and SRQ (p <.001), as compared to males. Participants' occupation was significantly associated (BSI; X2=23.1, SRQ; X2=35.3, p <.001) while their age was not significantly associated (BSI, r=-.06, p >.05; SRQ, r=-.09, p >.05) with their psychiatric morbidity. Psychiatric morbidity was prevalent in the population studied, which may go unrecognized, overlooked, or mistreated by the locally available medical resources. There is a huge need for mental health services in these areas.

Mental Health Conceptualization and Resilience Factors in the Kalasha Youth: An Indigenous Ethnic and Religious Minority Community in Pakistan

The Kalasha are a religious, ethnic, and linguistic minority community in Pakistan. They are indigenous people living in remote valleys of the Hindu Kush Mountains in northern Pakistan, neighboring Afghanistan. The Kalasha are pastoral, as well as agricultural people to some extent, although they are increasingly facing pressures from globalization and social change, which may be influencing youth and community development. Their traditional world view dichotomizes and emphasizes on the division of the pure (Onjeshta) and the impure (Pragata). There remains a scarcity of literature on mental health and resilience of indigenous communities in South Asia and Pakistan generally, and the polytheistic Kalasha community specifically. Thus, the current study was conducted with the aim to explore the cultural protective factors (resilience) of the Kalasha youth (adolescents and emerging adults) and to explore their perceived etiological understandings and preferred interventions for mental health support systems. The theoretical framework of Bronfenbrenner's (1, 2) ecological systems model was used. Interpretative Phenomenological Analysis (IPA) was conducted, considering the advantage of its idiographic approach and the “double hermeneutic” analytic process. This methodology was consistent with the aim to understand and make sense of mental health and resilience from the Kalasha indigenous perspective. A total of 12 in-depth interviews were conducted with adolescents and emerging adults (5 males, 7 females), along with ethnographic observations. The analysis revealed 3 superordinate themes of mental health perceptions and interventions, each with more specific emergent themes: (1) Psychological Resilience/Cultural Protective Factors Buffering Against Mental Health Problems (Intra-Communal Bonding & Sharing; Kalasha Festivals & Traditions; Purity Concept; Behavioral Practice of Happiness and Cognitive Patterns); (2) Perceived Causes of Mental Health Issues (Biological & Psychosocial; Supernatural & Spiritual; Environmental); and (3) Preferred Interventions [Shamanic Treatment; Ta'awiz (Amulets); Communal Sharing & Problem Solving; Medical Treatment; Herbal Methods]. The overall findings point to the need for developing culturally-sensitive and indigenous measures and therapeutic interventions. The findings highlighted the Kalasha cultural practices which may promote resilience. The findings also call for indigenous sources of knowledge to be considered when collaboratively designing public health programs.

Correction: Genetic diversity, genetic structure and diet of ancient and contemporary red deer (Cervus elaphus L.) from north-eastern France.

[This corrects the article DOI: 10.1371/journal.pone.0189278.].

Genetic diversity, genetic structure and diet of ancient and contemporary red deer (Cervus elaphus L.) from north-eastern France.

In north-eastern France, red deer (Cervus elaphus L.) populations were rebuilt from a few hundred individuals, which have subsisted in remote valleys of the Vosges mountains, and to a lesser extent from individuals escaped from private enclosures; at present times, this species occupies large areas, mainly in the Vosges Mountains. In this study, we examined the population dynamics of red deer in the Vosges Mountains using ancient and contemporary mitochondrial DNA (mtDNA) from 140 samples (23 ancient + 117 modern) spanning the last 7’000 years. In addition, we reconstructed the feeding habits and the habitat of red deer since the beginning of agriculture applying isotopic analyses in order to establish a basis for current environmental management strategies. We show that past and present red deer in the Vosges Mountains belong to mtDNA haplogroup A, suggesting that they originated from the Iberian refugium after the last glacial maximum (LGM). Palaeogenetic analysis of ancient bone material revealed the presence of two distinct haplotypes with different temporal distributions. Individuals belonging to the two haplotype groups apparently occupied two different habitats over at least 7’000 years. AM6 correlates with an ecological type that feeds in densely forested mountain landscapes, while AM235 correlates with feeding in lowland landscapes, composed of a mixture of meadows and riverine, herb-rich woodlands. Our results suggest that red deer of north-eastern France was able to adapt, over the long term, to these different habitat types, possibly due to efficient ethological barriers. Modern haplotype patterns support the historical record that red deer has been exposed to strong anthropogenic influences as a major game species.