Study fills knowledge gaps about surgery outcomes for Inuit in Canada

Peer-Reviewed Publication

THE OTTAWA HOSPITAL

 

IMAGE: DR. JASON MCVICAR, ANESTHESIOLOGIST AT THE OTTAWA HOSPITAL AND ASSISTANT PROFESSOR AT THE UNIVERSITY OF OTTAWA. view more 

CREDIT: PETER DUFFY

A team of Canadian researchers, including Inuit and other Indigenous researchers, have published the first study of Inuit surgical outcomes today in CMAJ Open. The study used data from The Ottawa Hospital, which is the quaternary care provider to the Qikiqtani-Qikiqtaaluk Region, home to half of the Nunavut Inuit population.

After matching Inuit with non-Inuit patients who had similar surgeries, age, and medical conditions, the researchers found that Nunavut Inuit were 25% more likely to experience serious complications after surgery. The study found the death or complication rate among the general population to be 16%.

The team had previously found that little research has been done on Indigenous Peoples’ outcomes after of surgery in Canada, and none about Inuit patients.

The researchers think these poorer outcomes may be due to barriers in accessing timely and culturally appropriate healthcare, causing Nunavut Inuit to arrive at surgery with more advanced disease which increases their risk of complications.

“We know from past research that the healthier you are when you walk into an operating room, the likelier you are to have good outcomes. Many Nunavut Inuit patients experience chronic health conditions, poor access to healthcare services, and delayed surgical care,” said Dr. Jason McVicar, lead author on the study and a Métis anesthesiologist at The Ottawa Hospital and assistant professor at the University of Ottawa. “Our study establishes a baseline for Inuit surgical outcomes that can be used to determine whether policy changes are having a real impact.”

The research team looked at outcomes one month after surgery for all inpatient surgeries at The Ottawa Hospital between 2011 and 2018, not including obstetric or cardiac surgeries. Nunavut Inuit patients made up 928 (0.9%) of the 98,701 surgeries.  

Nunavut Inuit patients who had elective surgeries and cancer surgeries were respectively 58% and 63% more likely to have complications compared to non-Inuit patients. There was no difference in outcomes after emergency surgery between Inuit and non-Inuit patients.

Compared to non-Inuit patients, Nunavut Inuit had higher rates of hospital readmission, greater length of stay, higher cost of hospital care, and a greater chance of being sent to long-term care or other assisted living facility instead of going home after surgery.

“We’re seeing the impact of colonization in our operating rooms,” said Dr. Donna Kimmaliardjuk, study author and Inuk cardiac surgeon at Eastern Health, St. John’s. “To improve surgical outcomes for Inuit we need to start at the beginning, and work in partnership with Nunavut Inuit organizations to improve Inuit health and healthcare access. Some communities only have nursing station or a doctor two days a month, and that’s not enough to catch problems early.”

The researchers also showed for the first time that Inuit and non-Inuit patients coming for surgery had different baseline health characteristics. Inuit patients were on average eight years younger than non-Inuit patients, and had a different distribution of chronic diseases and conditions.

The researchers were able to identify Nunavut Inuit in this study thanks to a code in their Nunavut health card number that indicates they are an Inuit Land Claim Beneficiary. Indigenous identity data isn’t routinely collected by healthcare organizations, making this kind of research difficult. For example, patients from the large urban Inuit population in Ottawa could not be identified as Inuit in this study, because their Inuit identity is not collected in health data.

The researchers want to reassure Inuit patients who need surgery at The Ottawa Hospital that surgery is still very safe and that they will receive the best possible care.

“Nunavut Inuit patients should expect the same world-class care we all want for our loved-ones,” said Dr. McVicar. “The surgical procedure itself is not any different between an Inuk and a non-Inuk patient. However, we know travelling to the South involves language barriers, culture shock, racism and isolation from friends and family. That's why there are resources in place to support Nunavut patients coming to Ottawa for surgery.”

This study is part of a larger research program at The Ottawa Hospital and the University of Ottawa to better understand Indigenous Peoples’ experience of surgery in Canada. While this study looked at outcomes one month after surgery, the team’s next step is to use Nunavut health data to look at outcomes one year after surgery.

“The journey that leads to surgery is a saga that happens over years or decades,” said Dr. Nadine Caron, study author, general surgeon in Prince George and co-director of the Centre for Excellence in Indigenous Health at the University of British Columbia. “Our study only looked at one month of these patients’ care journeys. More research is needed to understand the complicated care journeys Nunavut Inuit patients must take across multiple healthcare systems in order to reduce barriers to care.”

The research team is also looking at the possibility of expanding the kinds of surgeries that can be done in Nunavut, so patients can receive care closer to home. The Ottawa Hospital and University of Ottawa already have partnerships with general surgery teams in Iqaluit that provide expertise, resources, and training to support surgeries that can be done in territory.

CAPTION

The patient referral pathway from Qikiqtani-Qikiqtaaluk Region to Ottawa

CREDIT

CMAJ

Resources:

• Resources at The Ottawa Hospital for Indigenous patients
• Appointment and travel management, discharge planning and access to translators for appointments from Ottawa Health Services Network Inc
• Culturally-appropriate accommodation, transportation and food services offered by Larga Baffin.
• Surgical care stories of Inuit Nunavut patients Saila Kipanek and Joellie Qaunaq at The Ottawa Hospital

Funding and support: This study was funded by The Ottawa Hospital Academic Medical Organization Innovation Fund and the Canadian Anesthesia Research Foundation. All research at The Ottawa Hospital is also enabled by generous donations to The Ottawa Hospital Foundation. Data was provided by The Ottawa Hospital Data Warehouse.

Full Reference: Postoperative Outcomes for Nunavut Inuit at a Canadian Tertiary Care Centre: A Retrospective Cohort Study. Jason A. McVicar, Jenny Hoang-Nguyen, Justine O’Shea, Caitlin Champion, Chelsey Sheffield, Jean Allen, Donna May Kimmaliardjuk, Alana Poon, Dylan Bould, Jason W. Nickerson, Nadine R. Caron, Daniel I. McIsaac. CMAJ Open. May 3, 2022. https://doi.org/10.9778/cmajo.20210108

About The Ottawa Hospital 
The Ottawa Hospital is one of Canada’s top learning and research hospitals, where excellent care is inspired by research and driven by compassion. As the third-largest employer in Ottawa, our support staff, researchers, nurses, physicians, and volunteers never stop seeking solutions to the most complex health-care challenges. Our multi-campus hospital, affiliated with the University of Ottawa, attracts some of the most influential scientific minds from around the world. Backed by generous support from the community, we are committed to providing the world-class, compassionate care we would want for our loved ones. www.ohri.ca

About the University of Ottawa
The University of Ottawa is home to over 50,000 students, faculty and staff, who live, work and study in both French and English. Our campus is a crossroads of cultures and ideas, where bold minds come together to inspire game-changing ideas. We are one of Canada’s top 10 research universities—our professors and researchers explore new approaches to today’s challenges. One of a handful of Canadian universities ranked among the top 200 in the world, we attract exceptional thinkers and welcome diverse perspectives from across the globe. www.uottawa.ca

Media Contact 
Amelia Buchanan
Senior Communication Specialist
Ottawa Hospital Research Institute
613-297-8315
ambuchanan@ohri.ca

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JOURNAL

CMAJ Open

DOI

10.9778/cmajo.20210108 

METHOD OF RESEARCH

Observational study

SUBJECT OF RESEARCH

People

ARTICLE TITLE

Postoperative outcomes for Nunavut Inuit at a Canadian tertiary care centre: A retrospective cohort study

ARTICLE PUBLICATION DATE

3-May-2022

Hormonal teamplay in trees

In poplars, two plant hormones boost each other in defense against pathogenic fungi

Peer-Reviewed Publication

MAX PLANCK INSTITUTE FOR CHEMICAL ECOLOGY

 

IMAGE: RUST-INFECTED BLACK POPLAR (POPULUS NIGRA). view more 

CREDIT: CHHANA ULLAH, MAX PLANCK INSTITUTE FOR CHEMICAL ECOLOGY

In contrast to previous assumptions, the defense hormones salicylic acid and jasmonic acid do not always suppress each other in regulating plant chemical defenses against pests and pathogens. In trees, the interplay of both hormones can actually increase plant resistance. This is the conclusion researchers from the Max Planck Institute for Chemical Ecology draw in a new study on poplars. The scientists showed that higher levels of jasmonic acid were also detectable in poplars that had been modified to produce increased levels of salicylic acid or that had been treated with salicylic acid. Plants that had higher concentrations of both hormones were also more resistant to the rust fungus Melamspora larici-populina, with no negative effect on growth. Knowledge of the positive interaction of these hormones involved in plant resistance could help to better protect poplars and other trees against pathogens.

The function of plant hormones or phytohormones is to coordinate the growth and development of plants. Moreover, they also control plant immune responses to microbial pathogens such as pathogenic fungi. Until now, there has been a broad consensus in science that the signaling pathways of the defense hormones salicylic acid and jasmonic acid act in opposite directions. Thus, if plants produce more salicylic acid, this would inhibit the production of jasmonic acidand vice versa. Scientists have repeatedly shown this negative interplay in studies of the model plant Arabidopsis thaliana (thale cress) and many other annual herbs. "Contrary to the assumption that the salicylic acid and jasmonic acid hormone signaling pathways work in an opposite manner, we had already observed in our earlier studies on poplar trees that both of these hormones increase in response to infection by pathogenic fungi. Therefore, the main research question was to determine the interaction between these two defense hormones in poplar," Chhana Ullah, first author of the publication, explains the starting point of the current study.

To study experimentally how salicylic acid levels affect the formation of jasmonic acid, the scientists genetically modified experimental plants of black poplar (Populus nigra) native to Germany so that they produced higher amounts of salicylic acid than control plants. In another experiment, they applied salicylic acid to the poplar leaves of genetically unmodified plants. "We manipulated salicylic acid levels in poplar by genetic engineering and direct chemical application, after which we conducted extensive chemical analyses of the plants with and without fungal infection. This allowed us to separate the effects of salicylic acid from other factors and show that it directly stimulates jasmonic acid production," explains Chhana Ullah. 

Plants that contained high levels of salicylic acid also had higher concentrations of jasmonic acid. In addition, these plants produced more antimicrobial substances, known as flavonoids, even if there was no infection with a pathogen. Further comparative studies with plants that produced high levels of salicylic acid and control plants that had each been infected with the rust fungus Melamspora larici-populina showed that high levels of salicylic acid made poplars more resistant to fungal attack.

Surprisingly, higher fungal resistance due to increased defenses did not negatively affect plant growth, as had been observed in Arabidopsis and other annual herbs. In Arabidopsis, either salicylic acid or jasmonic acid takes control of the immune response, while the other hormone is suppressed. Salicylic acid is produced in higher amounts after attack by biotrophic pathogens that do not kill plant tissue and feed on living plant material, while jasmonic acid is increased after attack by insects or necrotrophic pathogens that feed on dead plant tissue. "The negative interplay between the defense hormones salicylic acid and jasmonic acid in plants like Arabidopsis enables the plant to prioritize protection against one kind of enemy. Small herbs like Arabidopsis may benefit from such a narrow focus because they lack the resources to defend against different kinds of enemies at once. This may also be the reason why Arabidopsis plants reduce their growth rate when in a defense mode," says Jonathan Gershenzon, head of the Department of Biochemistry where the study was conducted. 

In contrast to annual herbs such as thale cress, resources are usually less limited for trees and other woody plants. Moreover, because of their long lifespan, trees are often attacked simultaneously by different enemies, such as fungal and bacterial pathogens, leaf-eating caterpillars, and wood-destroying insects. They may have evolved to use the salicylic and jasmonic acid signaling pathways together for defense. The greater availability of resources in long-living woody plants may also be the reason why high concentrations of salicylic acid do not affect plant growth in poplars.

The researchers were surprised to find that high levels of salicylic acid in poplars did not activate so-called pathogenesis-related (PR) genes, although these are established markers for the salicylic acid signaling pathway in Arabidopsis.  "However, we found that the magnitude of PR gene induction was positively correlated with the susceptibility of poplar to rust. Apparently, the activation of PR genes in poplar is not regulated by salicylic acid signaling, but by a different mechanism," Chhana Ullah explains.

The team of scientists led by Chhana Ullah still has to find out exactly how the molecular mechanism of the positive interaction between salicylic acid and jasmonic acid works in poplar. They also want to know which role PR genes play in poplar and other woody plants. What is certain, however, is that a fundamental knowledge of the positive interaction between salicylic acid and jasmonic acid in poplar and other related trees could make an important contribution to better protecting these plants from pest infestation and disease. Or, as Jonathan Gershenzon notes: "Poplars are known as the trees of the people for their diversified uses by humans, hence the genus name Populus: the Latin name for people. Incredibly fast-growing, poplars are cultivated as short-rotation woody crops and are extremely important of the pulp and paper industry. They are also desirable for biofuels." Improving their protection therefore serves us all.

CAPTION

Chhana Ullah characterizing transgenic high salicylic acid poplar lines.

CREDIT

Anna Schroll

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JOURNAL

New Phytologist

DOI

10.1111/nph.18148 

METHOD OF RESEARCH

Experimental study

SUBJECT OF RESEARCH

Not applicable

ARTICLE TITLE

Lack of antagonism between salicylic acid and jasmonate signaling pathways in poplar

ARTICLE PUBLICATION DATE

30-Apr-2022

Student satisfaction in flipped classroom is built on guidance, pedagogy, and a safe atmosphere

Peer-Reviewed Publication

UNIVERSITY OF EASTERN FINLAND

Students are satisfied with flipped classroom when they have systematic guidance on the teaching approach in use, comprehensive understanding of both the content being taught and the discipline more generally, and a safe learning atmosphere conducive to conversation. Teachers also need to pay attention to the students’ technological skills and their own contact teaching skills, according to a new study from the University of Eastern Finland.

In traditional higher education teaching, the student attends a lecture where the teacher gives an oral presentation to teach about a particular subject. After the lecture, the student goes home to complete the assignments given by the teacher and reads the study materials to get ready for an exam. In flipping, i.e., the flipped classroom approach, it is the other way round. The principle in implementing the flipped classroom model is to give the student pre-class materials, which the student independently goes through in the requested manner, and deeper learning on the content is then achieved collaboratively in class with the teacher and fellow students.

Flipping has become increasingly popular internationally in recent years and the learning outcomes, while partly contradictory, have been good. Growing popularity has also led to more research on flipping, however, this is the first time that the success of the flipped classroom approach has been studied from the perspective of student satisfaction. The study involved more than 400 Finnish higher education students.

“Our study showed that it is highly important to explain the approach in use to the students at the beginning of the course. In other words, they need information on the teaching method, the study method and the intended learning outcomes. Another important factor is to guide the students in managing their time and to promote self-regulation,” says Erkko Sointu, Professor of Special Education at the University of Eastern Finland and the lead author of the study published by an international team of researchers.

The students also need concrete evidence of the theories drawn from their discipline.

“The teacher should also take into account the technological skills of their students. One of the key factors in contact teaching is to create a safe atmosphere for the students to ask things, question the contents discussed and find explanations during the class collaboratively with their teacher and fellow students,” Sointu says.

Tips for successful teaching in the post-COVID-19 era

Though the research data was compiled during the academic year 2016–2017, the findings are highly relevant in our current situation. The COVID-19 pandemic has raised discussion on the challenges of distance learning and studying remotely, including the teachers and students getting tired of working alone. There is a lot of debate on the pros and cons of returning to “normal education”.

“We have seen the first real step towards blended teaching and learning during the time of the coronavirus pandemic. A better understanding of flipping and its key factors gained through our study provides teachers with the tools they need to successfully implement contact, distance and hybrid teaching.”

By taking account of the key factors, teachers are able to support the learning and well-being of students and apply the best practices of distance and contact teaching.

“My colleagues and I have started referring to flipping as cherry-picking as, rather than sitting in lectures listening to the teacher’s monologues, the flipped classroom approach gives students the opportunity to time- and place-independent study, to prepare for contact teaching using pre-class materials and technology, and then to deepen their knowledge in class.”

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JOURNAL

Higher Education

ARTICLE TITLE

Preliminary evidence of key factors in successful flipping: predicting positive student experiences in flipped classrooms.

Precipitation helped drive distribution of Alaska dinosaurs

Peer-Reviewed Publication

UNIVERSITY OF ALASKA FAIRBANKS

Precipitation more than temperature influenced the distribution of herbivorous dinosaurs in what is now Alaska, according to new research published this month.

The finding, published April 2 in the journal Geosciences, discusses the distribution of hadrosaurids and ceratopsids — the megaherbivores of the Late Cretaceous Period, 100.5 million to 66 million years ago.

The work can help scientists project what the Arctic region might look like in the years ahead if the climate turns similarly warm and wet.

University of Alaska Fairbanks Geophysical Institute geology professor Paul McCarthy, who is also chair of the UAF Department of Geosciences, is co-author of the research paper written by Anthony Fiorillo of Southern Methodist University in Texas. McCarthy has been studying the region’s ancient past for many years.

“The reason we've been looking at Cretaceous environments up here is because Earth was in a greenhouse state at that point in time, and it offers the potential to provide analogs to what we might see, eventually, if global warming continues,” McCarthy said.

“We can't simulate the rates of change, which are likely to have been totally different in the Cretaceous,” he said. “But we can simulate what an ice-free coast would look like and also see how rivers and floodplains would respond to spring snowmelt from the mountains if everything's not frozen. And we can look at the distribution of plants and animals.”

McCarthy, a sedimentologist and a fossil soils specialist, led the analysis of the depositional environments and ancient soils of three rock formations: the fossil-rich Prince Creek Formation along the Colville River in northern Alaska, the Lower Cantwell Formation in the Central Alaska Range and the Chignik Formation on the Alaska Peninsula.

The three formations are close enough to one another on the geologic time scale to allow for a climate comparison, according to the research paper. They all contain Late Cretaceous rocks that were deposited approximately 83 million to 66 million years ago.

Fossilized plants and animals and ancient footprints get most of the public attention, but fossil soil has equally important information to offer through its preserved features, mineral composition and chemical makeup.

“We can look at microscopic features preserved in the fossil soil samples and relate that to modern soil types to get an idea of where they formed,” McCarthy said. “Are we looking at deserts? Are we looking at tropical rainforest or temperate forest? Or grasslands?” 

“Fossil soil also preserves pollen grains that can tell us something about the composition of the local vegetation,” he said. “And it contains clay minerals, organic matter and the iron-carbonate mineral siderite, all of which can be used to determine precipitation and temperature using stable isotopic methods.”

From that, paleontologists can learn about the distribution of Alaska’s dinosaurs.

Through analysis at UAF and elsewhere, scientists studying the three Alaska formations found a correlation between the amount of precipitation and the distribution of hadrosaurids and ceratopsids. They also found a lesser correlation between temperature and the distribution of those two groups of dinosaurs.

Hadrosaurids, the duck-billed family of dinosaurs, preferred climates that were wetter and had a narrower annual temperature range. Adults weighed about 3 tons and reached about 30 feet in length. Their percentage dominance over the ceratopsids in the three studied formations increased in the more-favorable climate.

Ceratopsids, a family with beaks and horns, preferred a milder and drier climate but never became dominant in percentage over the hadrosaurids in the three formations. Triceratops is perhaps the best known ceratopsid, at a length of about 25 to 30 feet and weighing 4.5 to 5.5 tons.

The finding for greater influence of precipitation than temperature was based in part on prior research that looked at dinosaur teeth from the Prince Creek Formation, including teeth of hadrosaurids and ceratopsids. That study was led by Celina A. Suarez of the University of Arkansas and included work by McCarthy.

Results from that dental study, authors of the new paper write, suggest that ceratopsids preferred the drier, better-drained regions of the Late Cretaceous Arctic landscape and that hadrosaurids preferred wetter regions of the landscape. 

Others involved in the Geosciences paper include Yoshitsugu Kobayashi of the Hokkaido University Museum at Hokkaido University in Japan and Marina B. Suarez of the University of Kansas.

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CONTACTS:

Paul McCarthy, University of Alaska Fairbanks Geophysical Institute, 907-474-6894, pjmccarthy@alaska.edu

Rod Boyce, University of Alaska Fairbanks Geophysical Institute, 907-474-7185, rcboyce@alaska.edu

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JOURNAL

Geosciences

DOI

10.3390/geosciences12040161 

METHOD OF RESEARCH

Meta-analysis

SUBJECT OF RESEARCH

Animals

ARTICLE TITLE

Cretaceous Dinosaurs across Alaska Show the Role of Paleoclimate in Structuring Ancient Large-Herbivore Populations

Abnormal activity of brain circuit causes anorexia in animal model

Peer-Reviewed Publication

BAYLOR COLLEGE OF MEDICINE

A team of researchers at Baylor College of Medicine, Louisiana State University and collaborating institutions has discovered that abnormal activity in a particular brain circuit underlies anorexia in an animal model of the condition. Genetically and pharmacologically restoring the normal activity of the brain circuit improved the condition, opening the possibility of developing a treatment strategy for affected individuals in the future. The study appears in Nature Neuroscience.

“Anorexia is an eating disorder. People affected are highly concerned about gaining weight and usually severely restrict the amount of food they eat and exercise excessively, which leads to severe weight loss. Anorexia has the highest mortality rate among all psychiatric diseases,” said lead author Dr. Yong Xu, professor of pediatrics – nutrition and molecular and cellular biology at Baylor. “The condition has no approved treatment and the underlying cause is unclear. In this study we worked with an animal model of the condition that mimics many of the characteristics we observe in people to investigate brain circuit alterations that could be involved in the condition.”

Previous work in the Xu lab and by other groups has shown that dysfunction of dopamine and serotonin neurons, which regulate feeding, is associated with individuals with anorexia. However, how these two populations of neurons in the brain contribute to the condition was not clear.

“First, we found that under normal conditions dopamine neurons do communicate with serotonin neurons, and we studied this interaction to determine how it regulates feeding,” Xu said.

The researchers found that the strength of the signal transmitted along the dopamine-serotonin brain circuit determined how much the animals would eat.

“When dopamine neurons fired a lower-frequency signal, for example, between 2 and 10 Hertz, the result was inhibition of the serotonin neurons and overeating behavior,” Xu explained. “On the other hand, when dopamine neurons fired at a higher frequency between 10 and 30 Hertz, the serotonin neurons were activated and this led to lack of feeding.”

The researchers then investigated whether the dopamine-serotonin circuit would play a role in the development or persistence of anorexia in a mouse model. They discovered that this brain circuit is super activated in the animal model, when compared to controls, providing an explanation for the animals’ lack of appetite and excessive exercising.

In addition, the team identified the dopamine receptor DRD1 as a key mediator of the hyperactivity of this circuit. Knocking out the DRD1 gene partially restored normal eating and exercise behaviors in the animals.

“The findings suggested that pharmacologically inhibiting the DRD1 receptor could also help reduce the circuit’s hyperactivity, an approach that could have clinical applications,” Xu said. “Indeed, we found that a drug that interferes with DRD1 receptor activity can effectively prevent anorexia and weight loss in the animal model. These findings support further studies toward developing a similar therapeutic approach for individual with anorexia.”

Anorexia is more common in females than in males, but the reason for this difference is not clear. “In future work we plan to look into what mediates the differences between males and females and try to understand the mechanism,” Xu said.

Other contributors to this work include Xing Cai, Hailan Liu, Bing Feng, Meng Yu, Yang He, Hesong Liu, Chen Liang, Yongjie Yang, Longlong Tu, Nan Zhang, Lina Wang, Na Yin, Junying Han, Zili Yan, Chunmei Wang, Pingwen Xu, Qi Wu, Qingchun Tong and co-corresponding author Yanlin He. The authors are affiliated with one or more of the following institutions: Baylor College of Medicine, Louisiana State University and the University of Texas Health Science Center at Houston.

The investigators of this study were supported by grants from the NIH (NIH R01DK114279, R01DK109934, R21NS108091, R00 DK107008, R01 DK123098, P30 DK020595, K01DK119471, R01DK109194, R56DK109194, P01DK113954, R01DK115761, R01DK117281, R01DK120858 and P20 GM135002). Further support was provided by DOD (Innovative Grant W81XWH-19-PRMRP-DA), the Pew Charitable Trust awards (0026188), Baylor Collaborative Faculty Research Investment Program grants, USDA/CRIS (51000-064-01S) and the American Diabetes Association (7-13-JF-61, 1-17-PDF-138 and 1-15-BS-184).

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JOURNAL

Nature Neuroscience

DOI

10.1038/s41593-022-01062-0 

METHOD OF RESEARCH

Experimental study

SUBJECT OF RESEARCH

Animals

ARTICLE TITLE

A D2 to D1 shift in dopaminergic inputs to midbrain 5-HT neurons causes anorexia in mice

ARTICLE PUBLICATION DATE

2-May-2022

UTA biologist: Do chunky monkeys woo more mates?

Biologist investigates causes of seasonal weight gain in male squirrel monkeys

Grant and Award Announcement

UNIVERSITY OF TEXAS AT ARLINGTON

 

IMAGE: JC BUCKNER, ASSISTANT PROFESSOR, THE UNIVERSITY OF TEXAS AT ARLINGTON view more 

CREDIT: THE UNIVERSITY OF TEXAS AT ARLINGTON

An evolutionary biologist at The University of Texas at Arlington is studying seasonal weight gain in male squirrel monkeys to determine its relationship to the species’ potential to sire offspring.

The National Science Foundation has awarded JC Buckner, assistant professor of biology, a four-year grant to study the Brazilian primates’ genetic traits and how they impact sexual selection.

During their brief mating season, male squirrel monkeys gain weight. Researchers think it is likely that the individuals who add the most pounds have the most reproductive success. That may occur because female squirrel monkeys find them more attractive than their thinner competitors.

Through DNA analysis, Buckner will investigate if weight gain is a sign of genetic quality to females who may be seeking a healthy mate. If packing on the pounds correlates with reproductive success and healthy genes, Buckner said it is likely that females are actively selecting the best parent for their offspring.

Simultaneously, her lab will look for alternate causes of weight gain. She hypothesizes that additional mass may help hopeful fathers challenge competing males and gain access to females. If this is true, then females would be viewed as playing a more passive role in mate selection.

At a time when biodiversity is in decline worldwide, basic biological research is necessary to further scientists’ understanding of species adaptability and survival, Buckner said.

“Humans and wildlife are increasingly affected by climate change and habitat degradation, which contribute to disease, novel stressors and population decline,” Buckner said. “Basic research like this is important to our understanding of the evolution of sexual signals and how they are used by species to adapt, reproduce and survive.”

Buckner’s investigation is funded by a collaborative grant awarded to UTA, California Lutheran University (CLU) and the University of California, Los Angeles (UCLA). Anita Stone, CLU assistant professor of biology, will spend four summers conducting field research in the eastern Amazonian forest. At UCLA, biological anthropologist Jessica Lynch will conduct paternity tests on biological samples from the baby monkeys that are born.

CAPTION

A Brazilian squirrel monkey rests on a tree branch.

CREDIT

Photo courtesy of Claire Meuter of Cal Lutheran

New report assesses global anti-deforestation measures

Comprehensive scientific report shows REDD+ progress and effects on climate, nature and people

Peer-Reviewed Publication

INTERNATIONAL UNION OF FOREST RESEARCH ORGANIZATIONS (IUFRO)

• Reducing deforestation and forest degradation and their associated carbon emissions (REDD+) is part of the solution to climate change.
• However, the role that REDD+ plays in reducing these emissions, while important, is limited given the magnitude of the problem and actions required in other greenhouse gas emitting sectors.
• REDD+ implementation has the potential to deliver a range of benefits beyond reducing carbon if environmental and social aspects receive adequate attention.
• The performance of REDD+ could be improved considerably by reducing the complexity of its governance and leveraging synergies with similar global initiatives.

(Vienna, 4 May 2022) A major scientific assessment on REDD+ is published today, evaluating the world’s progress towards goals to reduce emissions from deforestation and forest degradation. The report and policy brief, prepared by the Global Forest Expert Panels (GFEP) Programme led by the International Union of Forest Research Organizations (IUFRO), analyses the past 10 years of REDD+ implementation with respect to forest governance, carbon measurements and effects on biodiversity and livelihoods. The findings are presented in a webinar during the World Forestry Congress week.

One major conclusion is that while REDD+ has provided a convenient umbrella for many forest and land use related activities aimed at reducing deforestation and forest degradation – and associated greenhouse gas emissions – the interlinkages and complexities of relationships between forests, land use and climate are profound.

The report, which aims to inform ongoing policy discussions on the 2030 Agenda for Sustainable Development, comes at a pivotal time: Human-induced climate change and increases in extreme weather events are impacting nature and people faster and more severely than had been expected 20 years ago. However, there is still a chance to reverse this trend and avoid further global warming, according to the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change. This requires drastic reductions in greenhouse gas emissions, particularly CO2, most of which stem from burning fossil fuels. Forests also play an important role in the global carbon cycle: they absorb carbon as they grow and emit carbon when they are destroyed. Every year nearly one-third of the global carbon emissions produced by humans can be absorbed by forests, yet deforestation and forest degradation are responsible for up to 10% of the annual man-made CO2 emissions.

In addition, interest in forests as a ‘nature-based solution’ has probably never been higher and the number of initiatives aimed at conserving, sustainably managing and restoring forests has increased considerably.

“For example, there has been growing interest in forest landscape restoration (FLR) since the launch of the Bonn Challenge in 2011. This and other initiatives contribute to REDD+ but also overlap with it and often create confusion among stakeholders. Optimizing synergies with them and with other sectors is both a challenge and an opportunity,” says IUFRO Task Force Deputy Coordinator and environmental consultant Stephanie Mansourian, one of the lead authors.

In addition to promoting forest protection and carbon sink enhancement, a key focus of REDD+ is to move the scope of interventions beyond climate impacts towards an integrated view of climate, biodiversity and livelihoods. REDD+ can deliver numerous environmental benefits, including reduced soil erosion, enhanced water quality and quantity, and increased resilience to drought and floods. It can potentially deliver important biodiversity benefits, although the availability of up-to-date biodiversity data remains a major challenge. “Such benefits have significant economic importance and may increase both the value of REDD+ programs and people’s willingness to engage with them. However, in the implementation of REDD+, greater attention to biodiversity and livelihood outcomes is needed,” says lead author and IUFRO President John Parrotta of the USDA Forest Service.

Evidence from social evaluations of REDD+ interventions indicates that, where direct and indirect benefits are clearly visible to local stakeholders, and have been delivered, community engagement is strong and projects have achieved positive carbon and social outcomes, at least in the short term. Furthermore, explicit attention to rights and tenure issues provides more transparent mechanisms for the reporting and monitoring of environmental and social co-benefits, as well as better, more equitable outcomes, particularly for more vulnerable communities. Case studies from Indonesia show that insecure tenure can exacerbate distrust between resource users and the government, and can keep local people from further participating in REDD+ activities. Evidence from Latin America and the Caribbean suggests that deforestation is lower in areas where Indigenous and Tribal Peoples’ collective land rights are recognized.

“Since 2012, implementation of REDD+ has advanced considerably in many countries but ultimately it is REDD+ governance that determines its performance. Yet, governance is distributed across a complex landscape of institutions with different sources of authority and power dynamics that influence its outcomes,” says GFEP Programme Coordinator Christoph Wildburger.

REDD+ is being applied in a wide diversity of contexts with an equally wide diversity of governance strategies, which are changing over time. Brazil, for example, was initially a leading global source of deforestation, then a world leader in reducing deforestation, and is now experiencing rising deforestation once again. While Brazil’s federal government has played a key role in these swings in deforestation rates, a number of Brazilian states are pursuing their own REDD+ initiatives with positive outcomes. Ghana, a relatively small country where deforestation has been strongly linked to the production of cocoa for export, is pursuing the ‘world’s first commodity-driven’ REDD+ strategy with private sector investments in ‘climate smart cocoa’. Both Brazil and Ghana illustrate the important role that actors other than national governments may play in shaping REDD+, such as sub-national state actors or private companies trading in forest risk commodities like cocoa.

Report and policy brief: Download link

Fact sheet: Download link

Online study launch: Webinar

The International Union of Forest Research Organizations IUFRO is a world-wide organization devoted to forest research and related sciences. Its members are research institutions, universities, and individual scientists as well as decision-making authorities and other stakeholders with a focus on forests and trees.

The IUFRO-led Global Forest Expert Panels GFEP Programme provides policymakers with a stronger scientific basis for their decisions and policies related to the contributions of forests to mitigate and adapt to climate change.

For more information, please contact: Gerda Wolfrum at +43-1-8770151-17 or wolfrum(at)iufro.org

Background: REDD+ is a global action plan to reduce emissions from deforestation and forest degradation primarily in tropical and sub-tropical regions, where the largest forest losses take place.

Initially created as “REDD” by the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change in 2007, the “+” was added in 2010 to include conservation and enhancement of forest carbon stocks, and sustainable management of forests.

REDD+ was conceived as a framework for high-income countries to pay low- and middle-income countries for the conservation, sustainable management, and restoration of their forests. This happens, for example, through bilateral commitments such as those between Norway or Germany (currently the largest contributors), and Brazil or Indonesia as major recipients.

Although experience to date from over 65 countries provides useful insights into both challenges and lessons for the future of REDD+, determining the actual effects of REDD+ on forests, biodiversity and people is hampered by insufficient or inadequate measurement and reporting.

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METHOD OF RESEARCH

Meta-analysis

 ELECTROCHEMISTRY

A better way to create compounds for pharmaceuticals, other chemicals

Study uses new process to make complex molecules

Peer-Reviewed Publication

OHIO STATE UNIVERSITY

COLUMBUS, Ohio – What do gunpowder, penicillin and Teflon all have in common? They were inventions that took the world by storm, but they were all created by complete accident. 

In a new study published in the journal Science, researchers used electricity to develop a tool that may make it easier and cheaper to fabricate the compounds used in pharmaceuticals and other natural products. Yet this invention, too, joins the ranks of the many unanticipated innovations that came before it. 

Christo Sevov, co-author of the study and an assistant professor of chemistry and biochemistry at The Ohio State University, was part of a team that initially sought to prepare a catalyst that could be activated by electricity to make the bonds of the targeted drug compounds.  

Their study’s findings suggest a general guideline for taking inexpensive and widely abundant materials, and using them to create complex compounds that wouldn’t normally work together. Streamlining this chemical process could allow researchers to safely create more valuable products with fewer steps and less waste. 

But to actually facilitate their chemical reactions in the lab, instead of using high-energy reagents, or added substances, as is customary when synthesizing materials, Sevov’s team utilized the power of electricity.

Because electricity is ecologically sustainable, there’s recently been a push in the industrial sector to move toward the use of electrochemistry to foster chemical change. 

“It's a very attractive way to do chemistry these days, because we have total control over how we run these reactions,” Sevov said. 

The research has broad applications in medicine, and in the creation of products like agrichemicals (like pesticides or herbicides) and certain plastics. But Sevov’s discovery, while seemingly serendipitous, took lots of hard work and patience to get right. 

“It took maybe three months of testing different combinations of additives, until all of a sudden something worked and it worked phenomenally well,” Sevov said. “Getting to that complex allowed us to stitch together materials that are very difficult to stitch together under normal circumstances.”

Because the precious metals many chemists use as catalysts can cost a pretty penny, Sevov’s team chose a nickel atom as the catalyst for their tool. In chemistry, catalysts are responsible for increasing or decreasing the rate of the chemical reaction as they make and create bonds. 

“Being able to use catalysts that are very inexpensive, like nickel, is very beneficial to everyone in the entire community in general,” he said. Besides being a cheap alternative for businesses that produce pharmaceuticals, plastics and polymers, using nickel also keeps the cost of food products down. For example, if farmers had to pay more for the agrichemicals these chemical reactions help create, the price of their crop would rise proportionally, Sevov said.

To build on their research further, the team will go on to collaborate with Merck, a multinational pharmaceutical company, to try creating other products using more difficult reactions and more complex molecules. But with their latest discovery, Sevov said that he’s optimistic that their work will start to create brand new avenues in the field of chemistry.

“We’re going to take advantage of this really reactive intermediate and see how far we can run with it,” Sevov said. 

Co-authors include Taylor Hamby and Matthew Lalama of Ohio State. This research was supported by the National Institutes of Health.  

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Written By Tatyana Woodall, Woodall.52@osu.edu

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JOURNAL

Science

DOI

10.1126/science.abo0039 

METHOD OF RESEARCH

Experimental study

SUBJECT OF RESEARCH

Not applicable

ARTICLE TITLE

Controlling Ni redox states by dynamic ligand exchange for electroreductive Csp3–Csp2 coupling