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This is the longest continuous experiment where ethylenediurea (EDU) was used to protect plants from ozone (O3). Effects of long-term ambient O3 exposure (23 ppm h AOT40) on biomass of an O3 sensitive poplar clone (Oxford) were examined after six years from in-ground planting. Trees were irrigated with either water or 450 ppm EDU. Above (-51%) and below-ground biomass (-47%) was reduced by O3 although the effect was significant only for stem and coarse roots. Ambient O3 decreased diameter of the lower stem, and increased moisture content along the stem of not-protected plants (+16%). No other change in the physical wood structure was observed. A comparison with a previous assessment in the same experiment suggested that O3 effects on biomass partitioning to above-ground organs depend on the tree ontogenetic stage. The root/shoot ratios did not change, suggesting that previous short-term observations of reduced allocation to tree roots may be overestimated.

Hydromorphological features are crucial in structuring habitats for freshwater organisms. The quantification of these variables is often performed through accurate measuring or detailed estimation, but their assessment is not always feasible for river management purposes. Economic and time constraints often lead to difficulty in creating simple summaries of collected data for practical use. The Lentic-lotic River Descriptor (LRD) was developed to identify the character of a river site in terms of local hydraulic conditions. Information about the presence of flow types, channel substrates, in-stream vegetation, organic debris and artificial features is included in its calculation. The main aim of this paper is to investigate whether the lentic-lotic character of a river site, as summarized with the LRD descriptor, is relevant to aquatic invertebrate communities in nearly natural river sites. Invertebrate data were collected with multi-habitat, proportional sampling and hydromorphological information was gained by applying the CARAVAGGIO method (river habitat survey technique) in the field. The dataset was generated from High or Good ecological status river sites located in Mediterranean areas of Italy. Correspondence Analysis was performed to relate the invertebrate community structure to a set of catchment-scale, reach-scale and chemical environmental variables. The results of the multivariate analysis indicate that LRD provides a persuasive explanation of the most important axis of variation in benthic data. This paper also presents the optimal LRD range for a set of invertebrate taxa, accompanied by a short discussion of their potential use in conservation issues.

(Uploaded by Plazi for the Bat Literature Project) The evolutionary history of plant and animal species has been deeply influenced by both climate changes and human actions. Human actions have been particularly heavy during the Anthropocene, when over 250 mammal species became extinct, mostly on islands. Here, we shortly review the existing literature, and test whether the various mammalian orders are all equally prone to extinction risks. We concluded that species belonging to the orders Rodentia, Primates, and Artiodactyla were more prone to become extinct, whereas those belonging to the orders Chiroptera and Carnivora were less. Surprisingly, apparently IUCN red list placed higher conservation concerns for the species belonging to the mammalian orders which are globally least prone to become extinct during the Holocene.

The correlations between skeletal parameters (bulk density, micro-density and porosity), coral age and sea surface temperature were assessed along a latitudinal gradient in the zooxanthellate coral Balanophyllia europaea and in the azooxanthellate coral Leptopsammia pruvoti. In both coral species, the variation of bulk density was more influenced by the variation of porosity than of micro-density. With increasing polyp age, B. europaea formed denser and less porous skeletons while L. pruvoti showed the opposite trend, becoming less dense and more porous. B. europaea skeletons were generally less porous (more dense) than those of L. pruvoti, probably as a consequence of the different habitats colonized by the two species. Increasing temperature had a negative impact on the zooxanthellate species, leading to an increase of porosity. In contrast, micro-density increased with temperature in the azooxanthellate species. It is hypothesized that the increase in porosity with increasing temperatures observed in B. europaea could depend on an attenuation of calcification due to an inhibition of the photosynthetic process at elevated temperatures, while the azooxanthellate species appears more resistant to variations of temperature, highlighting possible differences in the sensitivity/tolerance of these two coral species to temperature changes in face of global climate change.

Species distribution models (SDMs) provide realistic scenarios to explain the influence of bioclimatic variables on plant pathogen distribution. Diplodia sapinea is most harmful to plantations of both exotic and native pine species in Italy, causing economic consequences expecially to edible seed production. In this study, we developed maximum entropy models for D. sapinea in Italy to reach the following goals: (i) to carry out the pathogen's first geographical distribution analysis in Italy and determine which ecogeographical variables (EGVs) may influence its outbreaks; (ii) to detect the effect of climate change on the potential occurrence of disease outbreaks by 2050 and 2070. We used Maxent ver. 3.4.0 to develop SDMs. We used six global climate models (BCC-CSM1-1, CCSM4, GISS-E2-R, MIROC5, HadGEM2-ES and MPI-ESM-LR) for two representative concentration pathways (4.5 and 8.5) and two time projections (2050 and 2070) to detect future climate projections of D. sapinea. The most important EGVs influencing outbreaks were land cover, altitude, mean temperature of driest and wettest quarter, precipitation of wettest quarter, precipitation seasonality and minimum temperature of coldest month. The distribution of D. sapinea mostly expanded in central and southern Italy and shifted in altitude upwards on average by ca. 93m a.s.l. Moreover the fungus expanded the range where disease outbreaks may be recorded in response to an increase in the mean temperature of wettest and driest quarter by ca. 1.9 C and 5.8 C, respectively in all climate change scenarios. Precipitation of wettest quarter did not differ between current and any of future models. Under different climate change scenarios D. sapinea's disease outbreaks will be likely to affect larger areas of pine forests in the country, probably causing heavy effects on the dynamics and evolution of these stands or perhaps constraining their survival.

The setup of an economic and sustainable method to increase the production and commercialization of products from microalgae, beyond niche markets, is a challenge. Here, a cascade approach has been designed to optimize the recovery of high valuable bioproducts starting from the wet biomass of Galdieria phlegrea. This unicellular thermo-acidophilic red alga can accumulate high-value compounds and can live under conditions considered hostile to most other species. Extractions were performed in two sequential steps: a conventional high-pressure procedure to recover phycocyanins and a solvent extraction to obtain fatty acids. Phycocyanins were purified to the highest purification grade reported so far and were active as antioxidants on a cell-based model. Fatty acids isolated from the residual biomass contained high amount of PUFAs, more than those recovered from the raw biomass. Thus, a simple, economic, and high effective procedure was set up to isolate phycocyanin at high purity levels and PUFAs.

The authors tested a 409kW forager turned into an industrial chipper through a special conversion kit. Conversion was temporary, and the forager could be returned to its original occupation with one day of work. The converted forager proved as effective as a dedicated chipper of the same power. Net chipping productivity varied between 25 and 33greenth-1. Productivity was highest with poplar tops and lowest with pine tops. Fuel consumption ranged from 1.6 to 1.8lgreent-1. Fuel consumption did not change with tree species, but increased significantly with knife wear. Temporary conversion allowed a better depreciation of the invested capital and resulted in a 25% reduction of unit chipping cost. The converted forager proved an ideal solution wherever the production of wood chips was a complementary business within the scope of a larger agricultural economy. In technical terms, this machine offered the combined advantages of road-capability and good off-road mobility, allowing low-cost independent relocation and effective in-field chipping. © 2013 Elsevier Ltd.

Enhanced or reduced pCO(2) (partial pressure of CO2) may affect the photosynthetic performance of marine microalgae since changes in pCO(2) can influence the activity of carbon concentrating mechanisms, modulate cellular RuBisCO levels or alter carbon uptake efficiency. In the present study we compared the photophysiology of the Antarctic diatom Chaetoceros brevis at two pCO(2) extremes: 750 ppmv (2x ambient) and 190 ppmv (0.5x ambient) CO2. Cultures were acclimated to four irradiance regimes: two regimes simulating deep or shallow vertical mixing, and two regimes mimicking limiting and saturating stable water column conditions. Then, growth rate, pigmentation, RuBisCO large subunit expression. RuBisCO activity, photosynthesis vs irradiance curves, effective quantum yield of PSII (F-v/F-m), and POC were measured. The four irradiance regimes induced a suite of photophysiological responses, ranging from low light acclimation to efficient photoprotection. Growth was reduced under the low constant and the deep mixing regime, compared to the shallow mixing and the stable saturating regime. Low stable irradiance resulted in higher light harvesting pigment concentrations, lower RuBisCO activity and a lower light saturation point (E-k) compared to the other irradiance regimes. Highest RuBisCO activity as well as P-max levels was measured in the shallow mixing regime, which received the highest total daily light dose. Photoprotection by xanthophyll cycling was observed under all irradiance regimes except the low stable irradiance regime, and xanthophyll cycle pool sizes were higher under the dynamic irradiance regimes. For the fluctuating irradiance regimes. E-v/E-m was hardly affected by previous excess irradiance exposure, suggesting minimal PSII damage. No significant differences between the two pCO(2) levels were found, with respect to growth, pigment content and composition, photosynthesis, photoprotection and RuBisCO activity, for all four irradiance regimes. Thus, within the range tested, pCO(2) does not significantly affect the photophysiological performance of C. brevis. (C) 2011 Elsevier B.V. All rights reserved.