Volunteer Monitoring Research Articles

Development of a Metric of Aquatic Invertebrates for Volunteers (MAIV): A Simple and Friendly Biotic Metric to Assess Ecological Quality of Streams

Citizen science activities, involving local people in volunteer-supported and sustainable monitoring programs, are common. In this context, the objective of the present work was to develop a simple Metric of Aquatic Invertebrates for Volunteers (MAIV), including a user-friendly tool that can be easily accessed by volunteers, and to evaluate the efficiency of a volunteer monitoring program following an audit procedure. To obtain MAIV values, macroinvertebrate communities were reduced to 18 surrogate taxa, which represented an acceptable compromise between simplicity, efficiency, and reproducibility of the data, compared to the regular Water Framework Directive monitoring. When compared to results obtained with the National Classification System of Portugal, MAIV accurately detected moderate, poor, and bad ecological status. Thus, MAIV can be used by volunteers as a complement to the official monitoring program, as well as a prospective early warning tool for local problems related to ecological quality. Volunteers were students supervised by their teachers. Results obtained by volunteers were compared to results obtained by experts on macroinvertebrate identification to measure the efficiency of the procedure, by counting gains and losses on sorting, and identification. Characteristics of groups of volunteers (age and school level) did not influence significantly the efficiency of the procedure, and generally results of volunteers and experts matched.

Fecal indicator bacteria, fecal source tracking markers, and pathogens detected in two Hudson River tributaries

Volunteer monitoring in the Hudson River watershed since 2012 has identified that the Wallkill River and Rondout Creek tributary complex have elevated concentrations of the fecal indicator bacteria, enterococci. Concentrations of enterococci do not provide insight into the sources of pollution and are imperfect indicators of health risks. In 2017, the regular monthly volunteer monitoring campaign for culturable enterococci at 24 sites on the Wallkill and Rondout expanded to include: (1) culturable measurements of E. coli and quantification of E. coli and Enterococcus specific markers vis nanoscale qPCR, (2) microbial source tracking (MST) assays (avian, human, bovine, and equine) via real time PCR and nanoscale qPCR, and 3) quantification of 12 gastrointestinal pathogens including viruses, bacteria, and protozoa via nanoscale qPCR. Three human associated MST markers (HumM2, HF183, and B. theta) corroborated that human pollution was present in Rondout Creek and widespread in the Wallkill River. The presence of B. theta was associated with increased concentrations of culturable E. coli. Genes for adenovirus 40 and 41 conserved region, rotavirus A NSP3, E. coli eae and stx1, and Giardia lamblia 18S rRNA were detected in >45% of samples. Abundance of rotavirus A NSP3 genes was significantly correlated to the bovine marker gene, CowM3, though wild bird sources cannot be ruled out. This is the first study to investigate potential fecal pollution sources and pathogen concentrations in Hudson tributaries during the months of peak recreational use.

Usability of Existing Volunteer Water Monitoring Data: What Can the Literature Tell Us?

For decades citizen science has been used in environmental monitoring, and perhaps most commonly in water quality monitoring, as a tool to supplement professional data. Hundreds of volunteer monitoring efforts have generated datasets that cover large geographic areas over multiple years, and these large-scale datasets have been shown to be especially valuable for monitoring changes over time. Although volunteer water monitoring programs continue to grow worldwide, research shows that many of the existing datasets are still underutilized due to concerns about the accuracy of volunteer-collected data. An increasing number of “comparison studies” have attempted to address quality concerns by comparing volunteer data to professional data to assess relative accuracy, and the majority have reported that volunteer data are of a quality comparable to professional data. Nearly all of these studies, however, focused on a small subset of volunteer program data or data collected under experimental controls, and as such the results may not be applicable to existing, large-scale datasets with unknown controls and high levels of variation. Through a comprehensive look at water quality comparison studies to date, this review reveals a need for additional studies that specifically address the quality of highly variable, large-scale volunteer datasets and ultimately serve as a framework by which decades of volunteer efforts already in existence across the country can be better utilized.

Responsabilidad social universitaria: experiencia APyS en los grados de Maestro-Upna

El Aprendizaje y Servicio (APyS) contribuye a la articulación de dimensiones fundamentales del saber que, habitualmente, en el ámbito universitario están separadas: teoría y práctica, aula y realidad, así como formación y compromiso (Speck, 2001). Los estudios que apuestan por la inclusión de esta metodología para el desarrollo de competencias básicas e instrumentales en los Grados universitarios de Maestro son numerosos (Rodríguez Gallego, 2014; Rodríguez-Martín, Agudo Prado, Álvarez-Arregui, 2017; López-Fernández y Benítez-Porres, 2018). Se desarrolla una intervención de responsabilidad social universitaria que persigue un doble objetivo: a) dar respuesta a la demanda de un CPEIP de Pamplona para implementar metodologías cooperativas en los cursos 1º a 3º de EP, mediante docencia compartida con alumnado de los Grados de Maestro y b)que el alumnado universitario pueda adquirir aprendizajes competenciales del perfil profesional en el contexto educativo natural. A lo largo de dos cursos escolares desde la universidad se propicia la participación voluntaria de N=99 estudiantes (n=63 en el curso 2017/18 y n=36 en el presente curso 2018/19), con una distribución por sexo (85 ♀ y 14 ♂) proporcional a la propia de los Grados de Maestro. En cuanto al profesorado participante, 5 docentes universitarios (docentes de cinco asignaturas), se implican en la sensibilización, seguimiento y evaluación de voluntarios; por parte del centro escolar 12 docentes diseñan y desarrollan Talleres matemáticos, Propuestas artísticas, Reading Corner, Actividades de investigación, etc. La autoevaluación del alumnado destaca el máximo desarrollo de dos competencias CE4-Diseñar y regular espacios de aprendizaje en contextos de diversidad, multiculturales y plurilingües; Atender las necesidades singulares del alumnado, la igualdad de género, la equidad, el respeto y los derechos humanos y la CE5-Profundizar en los contextos de aprendizaje y de convivencia escolar, la aceptación de normas, la constancia, la disciplina personal y el respeto a los demás

Quantifying data quality in a citizen science monitoring program: False negatives, false positives and occupancy trends

AbstractData collected by volunteers are an important source of information used in species management decisions, yet concerns are often raised over the quality of such data. Two major forms of error exist in occupancy datasets; failing to observe a species when present (imperfect detection—also known as false negatives), and falsely reporting a species as present (false‐positive errors). Estimating these rates allows us to quantify volunteer data quality, and may prevent the inference of erroneous trends. We use a new parameterization of a dynamic occupancy model to estimate and adjust for false‐negative and false‐positive errors, producing accurate estimates of occupancy. We validated this model using simulations and applied it to 12 species datasets collected from a 15‐year, large‐scale volunteer amphibian monitoring program. False‐positive rates were low for most, but not all, species, and accounting for these errors led to quantitative differences in occupancy, although trends remained consistent even when these effects were ignored. We present a model that represents an intuitive way of quantifying the quality of volunteer monitoring datasets, and which can produce unbiased estimates of occupancy despite the presence of multiple types of observation error. Importantly, this allows the quality of volunteer monitoring data to be assessed without relying on comparisons with expert data.

Volunteer monitoring as a focus for community engagement in water management in Aotearoa-New Zealand: review and prospects

Abstract This article overviews community-based water monitoring (CBWM) in Aotearoa-New Zealand (NZ). CBWM was strongly boosted in NZ around 2000 by the development of the Stream Health Monitoring and Assessment Kit (SHMAK) and the Wai Care community initiative. Reform of freshwater management in NZ may be one driver for renewed interest recently in CBWM. Because professionals perceive volunteer-monitoring data as unreliable, they currently give little support to volunteer monitoring. To address their concern, we compared CBWM with measurements by regional authorities (RAs) – the main water management agencies in NZ. Agreement was encouragingly close for a comprehensive range of variables, including the important state-of-environment (SoE) indicators: visual clarity, Escherichia coli and macroinvertebrates. Community volunteers need and want ongoing professional support and encouragement, and, fortunately, there are important benefits for water management agencies, including engagement of citizens in water management and use of volunteer data. Professional support for CBWM in NZ could include: advice and encouragement, training, database development and quality assurance. Current research and development is focused on improving resources and systems for volunteer monitoring, notably with upgrading of the SHMAK. We are enlisting volunteers, equipped with improved tools and support systems, to assess the benefits of riparian rehabilitation and the suitability of water for swimming.

Effect of discharge and habitat type on the occurrence and severity of Didymosphenia geminata mats in the Restigouche River, eastern Canada

AbstractSince 2006, the Restigouche River watershed, eastern Canada, has been affected by nuisance growths of the mat‐forming diatom, Didymosphenia geminata. In 2010, in view of the potential impacts of this alga on the local Atlantic salmon fishery, we created a volunteer monitoring network to assess D. geminata mat severity within the watershed. Over the course of 6 monitoring summers, more than 1,200 observations of D. geminata mat severity were reported in 20 subwatersheds of the Restigouche River basin. Observations were mapped to illustrate the yearly severity of D. geminata mats throughout the watershed. Metrics were then extracted from this dataset to assess the spatial and temporal variability of mat severity. At the reach scale, D. geminata occurrence was predominantly found in riffles compared to any other river habitat type. At the watershed scale, a two‐sample Kolmogorov–Smirnov test highlighted a significant effect of maximum spring discharge on mean annual D. geminata mat severity, indicating that when maximum spring discharge is high, severity of D. geminata mats in the following months is significantly lower. Additionally, maximum spring discharge explained 71% of the variability in annual mat severity. This study contributes to the understanding of mat severity dynamics and illustrates the value of volunteer monitoring networks for studying complex ecosystem dynamics.

Making Waves: Marine Citizen Science for Impact

The benefit of engaging volunteers in marine citizen science projects goes beyond generation of data and has intrinsic value with regards to community capacity-building and education. Yet, despite the documented benefits of citizen science, there can be barriers to the process of developing strategic citizen science projects and translating data into valued results with natural resource management applications. This paper presents four case-studies from fifteen years of Reef Check Australia (RCA) marine citizen science research and education projects. These case studies convey approaches and lessons-learned from the process of designing, implementing and sharing citizen science programs with the goal to create valuable social and environmental outcomes: 1) Demonstrating citizen science data quality through a precision study on data and analysis of 15 years of standardized Reef Check (RC) reef health data in Queensland, Australia. 2) Identifying and responding to data gaps through volunteer monitoring of sub-tropical rocky reefs in South East Queensland, Australia. 3) Adapting citizen science protocols to enhance capacity building, partnerships and strategic natural resource management applications through reef habitat mapping. 4) Tailoring new pathways for sharing citizen science findings and engaging volunteers with the community via a Reef Check Australia Ambassadors community outreach program. These case studies offer insights into considerations for developing targeted and flexible citizen science projects, showcasing the work of volunteers and project stakeholders, and collaborating with partners for applications beneficial to research, management and education.

Black disk visibility, turbidity, and total suspended solids in rivers: A comparative evaluation

AbstractThis study compared horizontal black disk visibility (BDV), a measure of visual water clarity, to turbidity and total suspended solids (TSS) concentrations in five rivers of the southwestern Ozarks of Arkansas, U.S. to assess its usefulness in evaluating optical water quality. We investigated correlative relationships between BDV vs. turbidity and BDV vs. TSS, and compared them to those reported in similar studies. Our results indicated that replicate measures of horizontal BDV were subject to less error than replicate turbidity (coefficients of variation were 5.0% and 6.4%, respectively), and BDV was more strongly correlated with TSS concentrations than was turbidity (correlations coefficients were −0.97 and 0.92, respectively). We also assessed the validity of the black disk method as a surrogate for TSS concentrations and derived a predictive model for each river in the study. The benefits of the horizontal black disk method are both scientific and practical. Horizontal BDV provides a means of quantifying the beam attenuation coefficient. And, the low cost, ease of use, and usefulness in shallow rivers make the black disk method a versatile tool in water quality assessment. We ultimately conclude that the horizontal black disk method should be added to routine monitoring programs in the U.S., and that it be adopted by public groups involved in volunteer monitoring and water quality communication that may be limited by equipment availability or budget.

Monitoring Marcellus: A Case Study of a Collaborative Volunteer Monitoring Project to Document the Impact of Unconventional Shale Gas Extraction on Small Streams

The rapid growth of the natural gas extraction industry in Pennsylvania and neighboring states has stirred concerned citizens to seek ways to collect data on water quality impacts from the extraction activi- ties. As a response to requests from community members, the Alliance for Aquatic Resource Monitoring (ALLARM) developed a volunteer-friendly protocol in 2010 for early detection and reporting of surface water contamination by shale gas extraction activities in small streams. To date, ALLARM has trained more than 2,000 volunteers in Pennsylvania, New York, and West Virginia to monitor water quality (conductivity, barium, strontium, and total dissolved solids) and physical parameters (stream stage and visual observations) prior to, during, and after shale gas wells have been developed. This paper documents the operational models of Public Participation in Scientific Research (PPSR) used by ALLARM, describes the volunteer monitoring protocol developed, and examines three years of water quality results from hundreds of monitoring sites in Pennsylvania and New York. The majority of watersheds monitored are small, forested, headwater streams. Results indicate that mean conductivity in streams is strongly and positively related to the percentage of development and the percentage of limestone in the watersheds. Mean conductivity is not significantly related to number or density of drilled wells, although the dataset did not lend itself to finding a signal from shale gas activities because only 20% of the watersheds had wells drilled at the time of sampling. This fact enables the use of these data as baseline data for future documentation of shale gas impacts on water quality. Volunteers have reported multiple cases of visual pollution related to shale gas activities, but have not identified water contamination events based on stream water chemistry. The results of the volunteer dataset are compared with results from the scientific literature, affirming the credibility and usefulness of the data. Some lessons learned from this project include: The importance of strong and timely support to volunteers to ensure accurate reporting in real-time; the unique role that citi- zen scientists can play in a rural landscape where well sites are remote and government oversight is not prac- tical; and the importance of customizing a PPSR operational model to fit the goals and scale of the project. Recommendations for continued collection and analysis of data include: 1) develop and implement an intentional study design to monitor those watersheds that now have baseline data once drilling begins, 2) target watersheds whose characteristics are under-represented in this dataset, 3) consider the analysis of additional parameters and the monitoring of high risk systems, 4) develop a central, user-friendly data- base for volunteers to submit their own data and receive preliminary analyses, and 5) partner with other volunteer data collectors to collaborate with data analysis and interpretation.

Association of exposure to benzene and smoking with oxidative damage to nucleic acids by means of biological monitoring of general population volunteers.

In this study, the validation of liquid chromatography-tandem mass spectrometry (HPLC-MS/MS) isotopic dilution method for the determination of benzene and nicotine metabolites in urine was carried out. Limit of detection are 0.026μg/L for S-phenylmercapturic acid (SPMA), 0.55μg/L for t,t-muconic acid (t,t-MA), and 12.41μg/L for the cotinine, and the relative combined uncertainty was also calculated. The study involves 446 healthy volunteer residents since at least 10years in an area of central Italy. SPMA resulted to be strongly correlated with cotinine (p = 0.75), its concentration in smokers (93) being about ten times than in non/ex-smokers (197/156), while the t,t-MA of smokers is about twice the non/ex-smokers value. A cutoff value for the definition of smoker is set at 100μg/g creat. Oxidative stress was studied in smokers and non- and ex-smokers by means of the determination of the biomarkers 8-Oxo-7,8-dihydro-2'-deoxyguanosine (8-oxodGuo), 8-Oxo-7,8-dihydroguanosine (8-oxoGuo), and 8-Oxo-7,8-dihydroguanine (8-oxoGua): no significant differences were found between smokers and non/ex-smokers, but when subjects are classified according to the cotinine cutoff value, a correlation in smokers' urinary 8-oxodGuo is found with SPMA and cotinine (p = 0.60 and p = 0.57). Results were confirmed by chemometric analysis that also identified the experimental variables most contributing the discrimination as cotinine and t,t-MA.

Use of a Volunteer Monitoring Program to Assess Water Quality in a TMDL Watershed Utilized for Recreational Use, Pickens County, South Carolina

Municipalities, regulatory agencies, and resource advocacy organizations are often tasked with the enormous responsibility of monitoring water quality and implementing management strategies for vast areas within their jurisdictions. A potential means for addressing the resulting sampling shortfall is the use of volunteer monitoring programs. The project reported herein demonstrates the use of QA/QC protocols developed by Georgia Adopt-a-Stream (AAS) to monitor water quality issues for Twelve Mile Creek located in Pickens County, SC. The Twelve Mile watershed has a storied past as a U.S. EPA Superfund site due to industrial PCB contamination. Recent mitigation efforts involving the removal of two concrete dams have resulted in the creation of a nearly two-mile section of whitewater which is used by the local paddling community and is being marketed as a recreational destination. However, the Twelve Mile watershed also has a TMDL Implementation Plan in place due to chronic impairment from fecal coliform bacteria. Using sampling and monitoring methods developed by AAS, this project determined that E. coli levels increase significantly during high-flow discharges due to storm events and there were no significant differences in E. coli concentrations among sites located along a longitudinal gradient following the proposed Twelve Mile Creek Blueway. Ironically, the popularity of this area for paddling increases during periods of high discharge, thus recreational users are likely exposed to unhealthy levels of bacteria under these “desirable” conditions. Volunteer monitoring programs like AAS exhibit tremendous potential for gathering water quality data that may not be possible if left solely up to other stakeholders. Appropriately managed volunteer monitoring programs have the capability to increase the resolution, reach, and efficiency of existing monitoring programs and serve to benefit a variety of stakeholders.

Volunteer and professional macroinvertebrate monitoring provide concordant assessments of stream health

Whilst volunteer monitoring has many benefits for both volunteers and professionals, volunteer data must be validated to understand the value and potential applications of information from volunteer monitoring programmes. Our study aimed to assess the concordance between volunteer and professional data, including state and trend assessments. We compared macroinvertebrate data collected by volunteers using a simplified identification protocol to data collected by professionals following standard national protocols for collection and identification. We found that volunteer and professional macroinvertebrate data expressed as summary indices of ecological health were significantly correlated. However, the coarser level of taxonomic identification in the volunteer dataset limited the use of taxon richness as a biodiversity measure. We also demonstrated that the ability of volunteer data to detect long-term trends in ecological health is comparable to professional data. Overall, stream monitoring data collected by volunteers provided an assessment of stream health that was concordant with assessments based on data collected by professionals, indicating that volunteer data could be used to support professional monitoring programmes.

Exotic aquatic plant watch: development of a volunteer monitoring program for invasive species in Michigan lakes

Exotic aquatic plant watch: development of a volunteer monitoring program for invasive species in Michigan lakes

Dietary compositions and their seasonal shifts in Japanese resident birds, estimated from the analysis of volunteer monitoring data.

Determining the composition of a bird’s diet and its seasonal shifts are fundamental for understanding the ecology and ecological functions of a species. Various methods have been used to estimate the dietary compositions of birds, which have their own advantages and disadvantages. In this study, we examined the possibility of using long-term volunteer monitoring data as the source of dietary information for 15 resident bird species in Kanagawa Prefecture, Japan. The data were collected from field observations reported by volunteers of regional naturalist groups. Based on these monitoring data, we calculated the monthly dietary composition of each bird species directly, and we also estimated unidentified items within the reported foraging episodes using Bayesian models that contained additional information regarding foraging locations. Next, to examine the validity of the estimated dietary compositions, we compared them with the dietary information for focal birds based on stomach analysis methods, collected from past literatures. The dietary trends estimated from the monitoring data were largely consistent with the general food habits determined from the previous studies of focal birds. Thus, the estimates based on the volunteer monitoring data successfully detected noticeable seasonal shifts in many of the birds from plant materials to animal diets during spring—summer. Comparisons with stomach analysis data supported the qualitative validity of the monitoring-based dietary information and the effectiveness of the Bayesian models for improving the estimates. This comparison suggests that one advantage of using monitoring data is its ability to detect dietary items such as fleshy fruits, flower nectar, and vertebrates. These results emphasize the potential importance of observation data collecting and mining by citizens, especially free descriptive observation data, for use in bird ecology studies.

Space Weather and Citizen Science

Citizen science promotes public participation in the discovery of new knowledge. Also known as volunteer monitoring or crowd sourcing, this form of public science has taken hold in astronomy, water-quality monitoring, wildlife surveys, and a host of other endeavors. The American Geophysical Union (AGU) devoted one Union session and two Informatics sessions at the 2014 Fall meeting to citizen science. More than 50 meeting abstracts referred to citizen science. In our own community, partnership between amateur and professional scientists is growing. Four recent reports highlight this trend. Three of these appear in Space Weather; the third was presented at the Fall AGU meeting. Figure 1 shows a word cloud capturing the ideas associated with these reports. Barnard et al. [2014, DOI: 10.1002/2014SW001119] describe the Solar Stormwatch (SSW) System, a coronal mass ejection (CME) catalog developed from 4 years of Solar Terrestrial Relations Observatory (STEREO) Heliospheric Imager (HI) observations, with inputs from more than 16,000 citizen scientists (CSs). SSW is a collaboration between the Rutherford Appleton Laboratory, the Royal Observatory Greenwich, and Zooniverse at the University of Oxford, and now continues at the University of Reading. Citizen scientists use game mechanics, tailored for the project, to view STEREO-HI movies to identify and characterize CMEs. Averaging the observations of the CSs allowed them to trace the propagation of the ejecta through the HI field of view. Established methods were then used to estimate the CME speeds and directions. More than 140 CMEs during January 2007 to February 2010 were cataloged. SSW also generated a priori forecasts of Earth-directed CME speeds and arrival times from the space weather beacon mode STEREO-HI data. Tucker-Hood et al. [2014, DOI: 10.1002/2014SW001106] investigated the predictive skill of these forecasts. In a project involving ham radio operators, radio amateurs have voluntarily built networks that monitor transionospheric radio links in real time and report these observations back to central servers. These transionospheric radio links are generated by other hams engaging in friendly (and sometimes competitive) two-way transmissions. Frissell et al. [2014, DOI: 10.1002/2014SW001132] show how the Reverse Beacon Network was used to monitor variations in the high-frequency (HF) propagation paths in an interval surrounding the 13 May 2013 X2.9 solar flare. Prior to the flare, radio operators were using over 1100 HF paths between Europe, North America, South America, and Africa on frequencies from 7 to 28 MHz. As the flare peaked, less than 35% of the paths were available. Effects of the sudden ionospheric disturbance on ham operators lasted for multiple tens of minutes. Frissell et al. argue that CS amateur HF networks can be powerful tools for remote sensing of the ionosphere. Aurorasaurus is a citizen science project that uses the public's observations to track aurora. In her presentation at the Fall 2014 AGU meeting (https://agu.confex.com/agu/fm14/meetingapp.cgi#Paper/28083) E. MacDonald discussed how a team of space scientists, educators, and computer scientists are using auroral sightings to improve space weather models. This National Science Foundation sponsored project aims to provide better real-time notifications of the visibility of the aurora to the interested public via the combination of noisy crowd-sourced ground truth and satellite-based predictions. The website http://aurorasaurus.org monitors tweets about the aurora and supports a platform for explaining and appreciating the dynamics and beauty of the northern lights. Site visitors learn where and when the northern lights are likely to be visible. Further, they can judge whether tweets containing phrases associated with auroral phenomena are likely to be factual reports. Mobile apps, a blog, and a network of volunteer scientists also support outreach efforts. These projects are pathfinders for those of us seeking ways to promote the societal relevance of our discipline and engage with a distributed network of citizen collaborators. The Journal looks forward to publishing results from more projects involving Citizen Scientists. Delores J. Knipp is Editor in Chief of Space Weather and Space Weather Quarterly. She is a Research Professor at University of Colorado Boulder, and holds an appointment as Senior Research Associate with the High Altitude Observatory at the National Center for Atmospheric Research. Email: dknipp@agu.org. Space Weather 10.1002/2015SW001167KNIPP

Comparing monitoring data collected by volunteers and professionals shows that citizen scientists can detect long-term change on coral reefs

Citizen science is increasing and can complement the work of professional scientists, but the value of citizen data is often untested. We therefore compared the long-term changes to coral reefs that were detected by a professional and volunteer monitoring program, operated by University of Rhode Island (URI) staff and Reef Check volunteers, respectively. Both groups monitored reefs in the British Virgin Islands from 1997 to 2012 but mostly monitored different sites (URI 8 sites and Reef Check 4 sites). When URI staff visited the Reef Check sites to perform a side-by-side to comparison, Reef Check fish density estimates were consistently higher than those made by URI observers but benthic indicators showed better agreement. When long-term trends were compared, the two programs detected qualitatively similar trends in the % cover of live coral and coral rubble, but temporal changes in the cover of other benthic indicators were less consistent. The URI program detected a widespread increase in parrotfish densities and a decline in snappers, whereas the Reef Check surveys detected no consistent changes in any fish density indicators. Overall, site-specific temporal trends revealed by the URI program were more often statistically significant than those from Reef Check (twice as often for benthic taxa, and five times as often for fish taxa), which implies greater precision of the scientists’ counts. Nonetheless, volunteers were able to detect important changes in benthic communities and so have a valuable role to play in assessing change on coral reefs.

The role of conservation partnerships between scientists and nonprofit agencies in freshwater science and management

The role of conservation partnerships between scientists and nonprofit agencies in freshwater science and management

Integrating freshwater science and local management through volunteer monitoring partnerships: the Michigan Clean Water Corps

AbstractThousands of local watershed organizations and lake associations are actively involved in protection and management of freshwater systems throughout the USA. These nonprofit organizations may or may not have paid staff and rarely employ trained scientists or natural resource managers. Thus, they face challenges, including lack of access to technical assistance to support their lake and river assessment and management initiatives, and may struggle to convince decision makers of the validity of their efforts. Meanwhile, researchers and managers within academia and agencies are challenged by lack of access to long-term data sets, field sites, funding, and personnel, and sometimes struggle to demonstrate real-world application of research results and to build support for freshwater research and management programs. The Michigan Clean Water Corps (MiCorps) volunteer monitoring program is a partnership-based program involving state and regional organizations and local volunteers that has met the above c...

Innovations in point-of-care testing for enhanced United States disaster caches

To describe, innovate, recommend, and foster the implementation of point-of-care (POC) testing in disaster caches to enhance crisis standards of care and to improve triage, diagnosis, monitoring, treatment, and management of victims and volunteers in complex emergencies and disasters. The authors compared POC testing in United States disaster caches to commercially available POC testing to enhance the caches and to reflect current state-of-the-art diagnostic capabilities. The authors also provided recommendations based on literature review and knowledge from newly developed POC technologies from the UC Davis Point-of-Care Technologies Center. Presently, US POC testing caches comprise chemistry/electrolytes, pregnancy, hemoglobin, cardiac biomarkers, hematology, fecal occult blood, drugs of abuse, liver function, blood gases, and limited infectious diseases. Deficiencies with existing POC tests for cardiac biomarkers, hematology, and infectious diseases should be eliminated. POC resources can be customized for pandemics, complex emergencies, or disasters based on geographic location and potential infectious diseases. Additionally, a new thermally stabilized container can help alleviate environmental stresses that reduce test quality. Innovations in POC technologies can improve response preparedness with enhanced diagnostic capabilities. Several innovations, such as the i-STAT® Wireless, OraQuick ADVANCE® HIV-1/2, VereTrop™ Lab-on-a-Chip, and new compact hematology analyzers will improve test clusters that facilitate evidence-based decision making and crisis standards of care during US national disaster responses. Additionally, strategic resources and operator training should be globally harmonized to improve the efficiency of international responses.