The bii4africa dataset of faunal and floral population intactness estimates across Africa's major land uses.

Sub-Saharan Africa is under-represented in global biodiversity datasets, particularly regarding the impact of land use on species' population abundances. Drawing on recent advances in expert elicitation to ensure data consistency, 200 experts were convened using a modified-Delphi process to estimate 'intactness scores': the remaining proportion of an 'intact' reference population of a species group in a particular land use, on a scale from 0 (no remaining individuals) to 1 (same abundance as the reference) and, in rare cases, to 2 (populations that thrive in human-modified landscapes). The resulting bii4africa dataset contains intactness scores representing terrestrial vertebrates (tetrapods: ±5,400 amphibians, reptiles, birds, mammals) and vascular plants (±45,000 forbs, graminoids, trees, shrubs) in sub-Saharan Africa across the region's major land uses (urban, cropland, rangeland, plantation, protected, etc.

Bird diversity along an urban to rural gradient in large tropical cities peaks in mid-level urbanization.

The gradient from natural to urban areas strongly associates with the structure of avian communities over that gradient. Most research on urban birds is from temperate areas and knowledge from tropical Southeast Asia is lacking. We examined bird species diversity, relative abundance, and species composition along an urban to rural gradient in three Myanmar cities, and assessed potential environmental factors responsible for the changes.

Solving the taxonomic identity of Hipposideros cineraceus sensu lato (Chiroptera: Hipposideridae) in the Thai-Malay Peninsula, with the description of a new species.

A new species of small Hipposideros in the bicolor group is described based on specimens from Thailand and Malaysia. It can be distinguished from other small Hipposideros in Southeast Asia by a combination of external, craniodental, and bacular morphology, as well as echolocation call frequency. The new species has a distinct rounded swelling on the internarial septum of the noseleaf, with a forearm length of 35.

Molecular detection of (Trypanosomatidae) in bats from Thailand, with their phylogenetic relationships.

The vast majority of trypanosome species is vector-borne parasites, with some of them being medically and veterinary important (such as Trypanosoma cruzi and Trypanosoma brucei) and capable of causing serious illness in vertebrate hosts. The discovery of trypanosomes in bats emphasizes the importance of bats as an important reservoir. Interestingly, there is a hypothesis that bats are ancestral hosts of T.

ChiroVox: a public library of bat calls.

Recordings of bat echolocation and social calls are used for many research purposes from ecological studies to taxonomy. Effective use of these relies on identification of species from the recordings, but comparative recordings or detailed call descriptions to support identification are often lacking for areas with high biodiversity. The ChiroVox website (https://www.

Longitudinal monitoring in Cambodia suggests higher circulation of alpha and betacoronaviruses in juvenile and immature bats of three species.

Recent studies suggest that coronaviruses circulate widely in Southeast Asian bat species and that the progenitors of the SARS-Cov-2 virus could have originated in rhinolophid bats in the region. Our objective was to assess the diversity and circulation patterns of coronavirus in several bat species in Southeast Asia. We undertook monthly live-capture sessions and sampling in Cambodia over 17 months to cover all phases of the annual reproduction cycle of bats and test specifically the association between their age and CoV infection status.

Home is where the safer ground is: the need to promote affordable housing laws and policies in receiving communities.

Increasingly frequent and intense extreme weather events are pushing communities to confront difficult decisions in order to protect people and infrastructure sitting in harm's way. One decision is around managed retreat or the voluntary movement and transition of individuals and communities away from coastal and other climate-vulnerable areas. "Receiving communities" and other low-risk areas where people may choose to relocate must adopt a multi-pronged strategy that addresses the full breadth of services and resources that relocating residents will need in order to adapt to their new communities, such as in areas of health, education, and workforce development.

Patterns of foraging activity and fidelity in a southeast Asian flying fox.

Background: Improved understanding of the foraging ecology of bats in the face of ongoing habitat loss and modification worldwide is essential to their conservation and maintaining the substantial ecosystem services they provide. It is also fundamental to assessing potential transmission risks of zoonotic pathogens in human-wildlife interfaces. We evaluated the influence of environmental and behavioral variables on the foraging patterns of Pteropus lylei (a reservoir of Nipah virus) in a heterogeneous landscape in Cambodia.

Historic changes in species composition for a globally unique bird community.

Significant uncertainties remain of how global change impacts on species richness, relative abundance and species composition. Recently, a discussion emerged on the importance of detecting and understanding long-term fluctuations in species composition and relative abundance and whether deterministic or non-deterministic factors can explain any temporal change. However, currently, one of the main impediments to providing answers to these questions is the relatively short time series of species diversity datasets.

primarily forages in residential areas in Kandal, Cambodia.

Bats are the second most species-rich Mammalian order and provide a wide range of ecologically important and economically significant ecosystem services. Nipah virus is a zoonotic emerging infectious disease for which pteropodid bats have been identified as a natural reservoir. In Cambodia, Nipah virus circulation has been reported in , but little is known about the spatial distribution of the species and the associated implications for conservation and public health.

Insectivorous bat reproduction and human cave visitation in Cambodia: A perfect conservation storm?

Cave roosting bats represent an important component of Southeast Asian bat diversity and are vulnerable to human disturbance during critical reproductive periods (pregnancy, lactation and weaning). Because dramatic growth of cave tourism in recent decades has raised concerns about impacts on cave bats in the region, we assessed the reproductive phenology of two insectivorous species (Hipposideros larvatus sensu lato and Taphozous melanopogon) at three caves in Cambodia for 23 months in 2014-2016 and evaluated human visitation to these sites between 2007 and 2014. Despite the differing foraging strategies employed by the two taxa, the temporal consistency observed in proportions of pregnant, lactating and juvenile bats indicates that their major birth peaks coincide with the time of greatest cave visitation annually, particularly for domestic visitors and namely during the Cambodian new year in April.

Climate Change and Public Health Policy.

Climate change poses real and immediate impacts to the public health of populations around the globe. Adverse impacts are expected to continue throughout the century. Emphasizing co-benefits of climate action for health, combining adaptation and mitigation efforts, and increasing interagency coordination can effectively address both public health and climate change challenges.

Thumb-pads up-a new species of thick-thumbed bat from Sumatra (Chiroptera: Vespertilionidae: Glischropus).

To date, three species of the genus Glischropus are recognized from the Indomalayan zoogeographic region-G. bucephalus from the Indochinese subregion, G. tylopus from the Sundaic subregion (Peninsular Thailand and Malaysia, Borneo, Sumatra, Moluccas) and G.

A new genus and species of false vampire (Chiroptera: Megadermatidae) from peninsular Thailand.

A new genus and associated species of false vampire, family Megadermatidae, are described based on three specimens from Bala Forest, Narathiwat Province, peninsular Thailand. The new taxon is characterised by a unique combination of distinctive dental, cranial, and external characters, some of which are shared with exclusively African genera and some with Asian genera. These characters are comparable to, or exceed in number, those differentiating currently recognised genera in the family Megadermatidae.

Taxonomic implications of geographical variation in (Chiroptera: Rhinolophidae) in mainland Southeast Asia.

Background: isdistributed throughout Southeast Asia. The taxonomic status of forms attributed to the species is unclear due to the limited sample size with incomplete datasets and the taxa have high variation in morphology and echolocation call frequency. The aim of the study was to evaluate the distribution and taxonomic status of the subspecific forms of in mainland Southeast Asia using large sample size with multiple datasets, including morphological, acoustic, and genetic data, both to elucidate taxonomic relationships and to test for congruence between these datasets.

TPPA and tobacco control: threats to APEC countries.

Background: Twelve-member countries of the Asia Pacific Economic Cooperation (APEC) are negotiating the Trans-Pacific Partnership Agreement (TPPA), a free trade agreement to facilitate international trade and investment. As reported by multiple sources, the TPPA would grant the same trade benefits and legal protections to tobacco products, services and investments that it would provide to other sectors. Malaysia proposed excluding tobacco control measures from the scope of all TPPA chapters while the US proposed only to establish a consultation process in tobacco-related disputes and to declare that tobacco control measures serve a health objective within the scope of the general exceptions.

A new species of Murina (Mammalia: Chiroptera: Vespertilionidae) from peninsular Thailand.

A new species of Murina belonging to 'suilla-group' is described based on two specimens collected with harp traps in lowland evergreen forest in the southernmost part of peninsular Thailand. Morphology and molecular (mitochondrial COI) data suggest that the new species is most closely related to M. eleryi, which is currently known from Indochina.