Cost-effort analysis of Baited Remote Underwater Video (BRUV) and environmental DNA (eDNA) in monitoring marine ecological communities.

Monitoring the diversity and distribution of species in an ecosystem is essential to assess the success of restoration strategies. Implementing biomonitoring methods, which provide a comprehensive assessment of species diversity and mitigate biases in data collection, holds significant importance in biodiversity research. Additionally, ensuring that these methods are cost-efficient and require minimal effort is crucial for effective environmental monitoring.

Health service needs and perspectives of a rainforest conserving community in Papua New Guinea's Ramu lowlands: a combined clinical and rapid anthropological assessment with parallel treatment of urgent cases.

Objectives: Determine community needs and perspectives as part of planning health service incorporation into Wanang Conservation Area, in support of locally driven sustainable development.

Design: Clinical and rapid anthropological assessment (individual primary care assessments, key informant (KI) interviews, focus groups (FGs), ethnography) with treatment of urgent cases.

Setting: Wanang (pop.

Bird preferences for fruit size, but not color, vary in accordance with fruit traits along a tropical elevational gradient.

Birds constitute one of the most important seed dispersal agents globally, especially in the tropics. The feeding preferences of frugivorous birds are, therefore, potentially of great ecological importance. A number of laboratory-based and observational studies have attempted to ascertain the preferences of certain bird species for certain fruit traits.

Rapid coral reef assessment using 3D modelling and acoustics: acoustic indices correlate to fish abundance, diversity and environmental indicators in West Papua, Indonesia.

Background: Providing coral reef systems with the greatest chance of survival requires effective assessment and monitoring to guide management at a range of scales from community to government. The development of rapid monitoring approaches amenable to collection at community level, yet recognised by policymakers, remains a challenge. Technologies can increase the scope of data collection.

Health service needs and perspectives of remote forest communities in Papua New Guinea: study protocol for combined clinical and rapid anthropological assessments with parallel treatment of urgent cases.

Introduction: Our project follows community requests for health service incorporation into conservation collaborations in the rainforests of Papua New Guinea (PNG). This protocol is for health needs assessments, our first step in coplanning medical provision in communities with no existing health data.

Methods And Analysis: The study includes clinical assessments and rapid anthropological assessment procedures (RAP) exploring the health needs and perspectives of partner communities in two areas, conducted over 6 weeks fieldwork.

Effect of river size on Amazonian primate community structure: A biogeographic analysis using updated taxonomic assessments.

The mechanisms that underlie the diversification of Neotropical primates remain contested. One mechanism that has found support is the riverine barrier hypothesis (RBH), which postulates that large rivers impede gene flow between populations on opposite riverbanks and promote allopatric speciation. Ayres and Clutton-Brock (1992) demonstrated that larger Amazonian rivers acted as barriers, delineating the distribution limits of primate species.

A new method for ecoacoustics? Toward the extraction and evaluation of ecologically-meaningful soundscape components using sparse coding methods.

Passive acoustic monitoring is emerging as a promising non-invasive proxy for ecological complexity with potential as a tool for remote assessment and monitoring (Sueur & Farina, 2015). Rather than attempting to recognise species-specific calls, either manually or automatically, there is a growing interest in evaluating the global acoustic environment. Positioned within the conceptual framework of ecoacoustics, a growing number of indices have been proposed which aim to capture community-level dynamics by (e.

Comparison of forest regeneration in two sites with different primate abundances in Northwestern Ecuador.

There is increasing evidence that large-bodied primates play important roles as seed dispersers and in the maintenance of tree diversity in forest ecosystems. In this study we compared forest regeneration at two sites with differing primate abundances in the Ecuadorian Chocoan rainforest. We predicted: (1) significant differences in primate abundance between the two sites; (2) higher understory tree species richness and density at the site with greater primate abundance; (3) the site with lower primate abundance characterized by tree species dispersed by non-primate biotic agents and/or abiotic factors.

A new species of Riama Gray, 1858 (Squamata: Gymnophthalmidae) from the Tropical Andes.

A new species of Riama lizard from the western slopes of the Andes in northern Ecuador is described herein. Morphologically, Riama yumborum sp. nov.

Cost-effectiveness of using small vertebrates as indicators of disturbance.

In species-rich tropical forests, effective biodiversity management demands measures of progress, yet budgetary limitations typically constrain capacity of decision makers to assess response of biological communities to habitat change. One approach is to identify ecological-disturbance indicator species (EDIS) whose monitoring is also monetarily cost-effective. These species can be identified by determining individual species' responses to disturbance across a gradient; however, such responses may be confounded by factors other than disturbance.

Research and in situ conservation of owl monkeys enhances environmental law enforcement at the Colombian-Peruvian border.

This study reports on impacts of illegal trade in owl monkeys (Aotus nancymaae, A. vociferans) for the biomedical research market in the Colombian-Peruvian Amazonian border. Through freedom of information requests and interviews with hunters we found that 912 owl monkeys, including A.

Intersex in Scrobicularia plana: transcriptomic analysis reveals novel genes involved in endocrine disruption.

Intersex, the appearance of female characteristics in male gonads, has been identified in a wide range of aquatic species worldwide, yet the underpinning molecular etiology remains uncharacterized. The presence of intersex has been shown to be a widespread phenomenon in bivalve, S. plana, populations from the southwest coast of the U.

Identification of the steroid fatty acid ester conjugates formed in vivo in Mytilus edulis as a result of exposure to estrogens.

Vertebrate-type sex steroids have been detected in a number of mollusk species and may play a role in the reproductive physiology of the animal. Mollusks are also exposed to exogenous estrogenic steroids that are present in sewage effluents, and these may add to the estrogenic burden of exposed animals. We investigated the uptake of estrogens in the blue mussel, Mytlius edulis and report for the first time the identity of estrogen fatty acid ester metabolites formed in vivo in an invertebrate.

Sediments are major sinks of steroidal estrogens in two United Kingdom rivers.

The occurrence of intersex fish in a number of European rivers has been attributed to exposure to estrogenic chemicals present in sewage treatment work (STW) effluents. To further understand the environmental fate of these contaminants, the estrogenic activity of effluents, water, and sediments were investigated both upstream and downstream of the major STW discharge in two United Kingdom rivers. Estrogenic activity, determined using the yeast estrogen-receptor transcription screen, of the major STW effluents on both rivers was similar, ranging from 1.

A tropical sediment toxicity test using the dipteran Chironomus crassiforceps to test metal bioavailability with sediment pH change in tropical acid-sulfate sediments.

The wetlands of the Magela floodplain of northern Australia, which is the major sink for dissolved metals transported in the Magela Creek system, contain acid-sulfate sediments. The rewetting of oxidized acid-sulfate soil each wet season produces acidic pulses that have the potential to alter the bioavailability of sediment-associated metal contaminants. Acute toxicity tests (72-h mean lethal concentration [LC50]) using the tropical chironomid Chironomus crassiforceps Kieffer showed that copper toxicity decreased from 0.