PostBP: A Python library to analyze outputs from wildfire growth models.

Wildfire is an important natural disturbance agent in Canadian forests, but it has also caused significant economic damage nationwide. Spatial fire growth models have emerged as important tools for representing wildfire dynamics across diverse landscapes, enabling the mapping of key wildfire hazard metrics such as location-specific burn probabilities or likelihoods of fire ignition. While these summary metrics have gained popularity, they often fall short in capturing the directional spread of wildfires and their potential spread distances.

Restoration of linear disturbances from oil-and-gas exploration in boreal landscapes: How can network models help?

In western Canada, decades of oil-and-gas exploration have fragmented boreal landscapes with a dense network of linear forest disturbances (seismic lines). These seismic lines are implicated in the decline in wildlife populations that are adapted to function in unfragmented forest landscapes. In particular, anthropogenic disturbances have led to a decline of woodland caribou populations due to increasing predator access to core caribou habitat.

Denser forests across the USA experience more damage from insects and pathogens.

Forests across much of the United States are becoming denser. Trees growing in denser stands experience more competition for essential resources, which can make them more vulnerable to disturbances. Forest density can be expressed in terms of basal area, a metric that has been used to assess vulnerability of some forests to damage by certain insects or pathogens.

Safety and Efficacy of Hypersonic Vitrectomy for Retinal Reattachment Surgery in Proliferative Vitreoretinopathies.

Introduction: To investigate the safety and efficacy of the Vitesse hypersonic vitrectomy device for retinal reattachment surgery in proliferative vitreoretinopathy (PVR) or proliferative diabetic vitreoretinopathy (PDVR) cases. The Vitesse device utilizes hypersonic technology to liquefy instead of cutting the vitreous, providing an alternative to the traditional pneumatic guillotine cutter.

Material And Methods: A prospective, one-armed, non-comparative, open-label study was performed.

Detecting critical nodes in forest landscape networks to reduce wildfire spread.

Although wildfires are an important ecological process in forested regions worldwide, they can cause significant economic damage and frequently create widespread health impacts. We propose a network optimization approach to plan wildfire fuel treatments that minimize the risk of fire spread in forested landscapes under an upper bound for total treated area. We used simulation modeling to estimate the probability of fire spread between pairs of forest sites and formulated a modified Critical Node Detection (CND) model that uses these estimated probabilities to find a pattern of fuel reduction treatments that minimizes the likely spread of fires across a landscape.

Optimal invasive species surveillance in the real world: practical advances from research.

When alien species make incursions into novel environments, early detection through surveillance is critical to minimizing their impacts and preserving the possibility of timely eradication. However, incipient populations can be difficult to detect, and usually, there are limited resources for surveillance or other response activities. Modern optimization techniques enable surveillance planning that accounts for the biology and expected behavior of an invasive species while exploring multiple scenarios to identify the most cost-effective options.

Managing biological invasions in urban environments with the acceptance sampling approach.

Detections of invasive species outbreaks are often followed by the removal of susceptible host organisms in order to slow the spread of the invading pest population. We propose the acceptance sampling approach for detection and optional removal of susceptible host trees to manage an outbreak of the emerald ash borer (EAB), a highly destructive forest pest, in Winnipeg, Canada. We compare the strategy with two common delimiting survey techniques that do not consider follow-up management actions such as host removal.

An intraocular micro light-emitting diode device for endo-illumination during pars plana vitrectomy.

Purpose:: Development of a new, fiber-free, single-use endo-illuminator for pars plana vitrectomy as a replacement for fiber-based systems with external light sources. The hand-guided intraocularly placed white micro light-emitting diode is evaluated for its illumination properties and potential photochemical and thermal hazards.

Methods:: A micro light-emitting diode was used to develop a single-use intraocular illumination system.

A safety rule approach to surveillance and eradication of biological invasions.

Uncertainty about future spread of invasive organisms hinders planning of effective response measures. We present a two-stage scenario optimization model that accounts for uncertainty about the spread of an invader, and determines survey and eradication strategies that minimize the expected program cost subject to a safety rule for eradication success. The safety rule includes a risk standard for the desired probability of eradication in each invasion scenario.

A new hypervolume approach for assessing environmental risks.

Assessing risks of uncertain but potentially damaging events, such as environmental disturbances, disease outbreaks and pest invasions, is a key analytical step that informs subsequent decisions about how to respond to these events. We present a continuous risk measure that can be used to assess and prioritize environmental risks from uncertain data in a geographical domain. The metric is influenced by both the expected magnitude of risk and its uncertainty.

Proteomic Analysis of Vitreous Humor in Retinal Vein Occlusion.

Purpose: To analyze the protein profile of human vitreous of untreated patients with retinal vein occlusion (RVO).

Methods: Sixty-eight vitreous humor (VH) samples (44 from patients with treatment naïve RVO, 24 controls with idiopathic floaters) were analyzed in this clinical-experimental study using capillary electrophoresis coupled to mass spectrometer and tandem mass spectrometry. To define potential candidate protein markers of RVO, proteomic analysis was performed on RVO patients (n = 30) and compared with controls (n = 16).

Portable single port 23-gauge vitrectomy in postoperative endophthalmitis.

Aim: To evaluate the safety and effectiveness of the Intrector(®) for treating postoperative endophthalmitis.

Materials And Methods: In a retrospective multicenter study, patients who received a single port 23-gauge core pars plana vitrectomy and isovolumetric injection of vancomycin, ceftazidime, and dexamethasone/amphotericin B using the Intrector(®) for postoperative endophthalmitis of intermediate severity (grade II or III vitreous inflammation and best-corrected visual acuity between hand movements and 0.3 logMAR [logarithm of the minimum angle of resolution]) were evaluated.

Using a network model to assess risk of forest pest spread via recreational travel.

Long-distance dispersal pathways, which frequently relate to human activities, facilitate the spread of alien species. One pathway of concern in North America is the possible spread of forest pests in firewood carried by visitors to campgrounds or recreational facilities. We present a network model depicting the movement of campers and, by extension, potentially infested firewood.

Effects of core vitrectomy in the treatment of age-related macular degeneration.

Purpose: To investigate the clinical efficacy and safety of an additional core vitrectomy to the standard therapy in patients with exudative age-related macular degeneration (ARMD).

Methods: In this prospective, controlled, single-centre study, 50 eyes of 50 patients (mean age: 74.1 ± 7.

Exploring critical uncertainties in pathway assessments of human-assisted introductions of alien forest species in Canada.

Long-distance introductions of alien species are often driven by socioeconomic factors, such that conventional "biological" invasion models may not be capable of estimating spread fully and reliably. In this study, we demonstrate a new technique for assessing and reconstructing human-mediated pathways of alien forest species entries to major settlements in Canada via commercial road transportation and domestic trade. We undertook our analysis in three steps.

Correlation of inflammatory and proangiogenic cytokines from undiluted vitreous samples with spectral domain OCT scans, in untreated branch retinal vein occlusion.

Purpose: To assess the levels of inflammatory and angiogenic cytokines in undiluted vitreous from treatment-naïve patients with macular edema secondary to nonischemic branch retinal vein occlusion (BRVO), with flow cytometric bead array (CBA) and to correlate the results with subjective and multiple spectral-domain optical coherence tomography (SD-OCT) parameters.

Methods: A total of 43 eyes from 43 patients (mean age 69.7 years, 23 male) were divided into groups of new, "fresh" (n = 28; mean duration after onset 4.

A new multicriteria risk mapping approach based on a multiattribute frontier concept.

Invasive species risk maps provide broad guidance on where to allocate resources for pest monitoring and regulation, but they often present individual risk components (such as climatic suitability, host abundance, or introduction potential) as independent entities. These independent risk components are integrated using various multicriteria analysis techniques that typically require prior knowledge of the risk components' importance. Such information is often nonexistent for many invasive pests.

Dispersal of invasive forest insects via recreational firewood: a quantitative analysis.

Recreational travel is a recognized vector for the spread of invasive species in North America. However, there has been little quantitative analysis of the risks posed by such travel and the associated transport of firewood. In this study, we analyzed the risk of forest insect spread with firewood and estimated related dispersal parameters for application in geographically explicit invasion models.

Microincision vitrectomy procedure using Intrector technology.

Objective: To describe the procedure of pars plana vitrectomy (PPV) using an instrument designed for microincision vitrectomy.

Methods: In this retrospective, noncomparative, interventional case series, 6 different surgeons performed 4509 PPV procedures from August 1, 2005, through May 31, 2010, with 1-port vitrectomy using a miniaturized multifunction probe (the Intrector).

Results: Complications were reported in 20 eyes (0.

Comparison of cytokine levels from undiluted vitreous of untreated patients with retinal vein occlusion.

Purpose: To compare cytokines in undiluted vitreous of treatment-naïve patients with macular oedema without vitreomacular traction secondary to branch (BRVO), central (CRVO) and hemi-central (H-CRVO) retinal vein occlusion.

Methods: Ninety-four patients (median age 72 years, 42 men) underwent an intravitreal combination therapy, including a single-site 23-gauge core vitrectomy and the application of bevacizumab and dexamethasone due to vision-decreasing macular oedema. Among these were 43 patients with BRVO, 35 with CRVO and 16 patients with hemi-CRVO, which were distributed in a fresh or old retinal vein occlusion type (seven or more months after onset).

Quadruple therapy leads to a sustained improvement of vision in patients with wet age-related macular degeneration.

Aim: To investigate the efficacy of a combined intravitreal therapy with prior photodynamic therapy (PDT) in patients with wet age-related macular degeneration.

Methods: Fifty-two patients (mean age: 72.7 years) with predominantly classic choroidal neovascularization received low-fluence PDT (42 J/cm2 for 72 s), followed 24 h later by a 0.

Detection capacity, information gaps and the design of surveillance programs for invasive forest pests.

Integrated pest risk maps and their underlying assessments provide broad guidance for establishing surveillance programs for invasive species, but they rarely account for knowledge gaps regarding the pest of interest or how these can be reduced. In this study we demonstrate how the somewhat competing notions of robustness to uncertainty and potential knowledge gains could be used in prioritizing large-scale surveillance activities. We illustrate this approach with the example of an invasive pest recently detected in North America, Sirex noctilio Fabricius.

Combination therapy in diabetic macular oedema and retinal vein occlusion--past and present.

This paper summarizes the recent evidence for combined therapies in the intravitreal medical treatment of diabetic macular oedema or macular oedema, secondary to retinal vein occlusion. Since the introduction of anti-inflammatory or anti-VEGF drugs combined with or used alternatively to laser, visual acuity can be stabilized or improved in a significant number of patients. However, there is an ongoing debate regarding the safety, efficiency and economic concerns related to these intravitreal monotherapies because they warrant frequent repetition to maintain the clinical effect.

Robustness of risk maps and survey networks to knowledge gaps about a new invasive pest.

In pest risk assessment it is frequently necessary to make management decisions regarding emerging threats under severe uncertainty. Although risk maps provide useful decision support for invasive alien species, they rarely address knowledge gaps associated with the underlying risk model or how they may change the risk estimates. Failure to recognize uncertainty leads to risk-ignorant decisions and miscalculation of expected impacts as well as the costs required to minimize these impacts.

Prospective, randomized, controlled clinical study evaluating the efficacy of Rheopheresis for dry age-related macular degeneration. Dry AMD treatment with Rheopheresis Trial-ART.

Purpose: To evaluate Rheopheresis for the treatment of patients with high-risk dry age-related macular degeneration and no therapeutic alternative. Rheopheresis is a method of therapeutic apheresis using the methodology of double filtration plasmapheresis to treat microcirculatory disorders.

Methods: The dry AMD treatment with Rheopheresis trial (ART) was a randomised, controlled clinical study.