Protected areas for elephants work best if they are connected

Protection has kept populations stable, but to rebound elephants need connections

Peer-Reviewed Publication

DUKE UNIVERSITY

 

IMAGE: 

MAP OF ELEPHANT POPULATION GROWTH RATES ACROSS SOUTHERN AFRICA. FIGURE REPRODUCED FROM HUANG ET AL. 2024 (DOI: 10.1126/SCIADV.ADK2896)

view more 

CREDIT: FIGURE REPRODUCED FROM HUANG ET AL. 2024 (DOI: 10.1126/SCIADV.ADK2896)

PRETORIA, SOUTH AFRICA – Conservation measures have successfully stopped declines in the African savanna elephant population across southern Africa, but the pattern varies locally, according to a new study.

The evidence suggests that the long-term solution to elephant survival requires not only that areas are protected but that they are also connected to allow populations to stabilize naturally, an international research team says.

Their study, published on January 5th in the peer-reviewed journal Science Advances, collected survey estimates and calculated growth rates for more than 100 elephant populations in southern Africa between 1995 and 2020, accounting for an estimated 70% of the global savanna elephant population.

“This is the most comprehensive analysis of growth rates for any large mammal population in the world,” said co-author Rob Guldemond, director of the Conservation Ecological Research Unit (CERU) at the University of Pretoria, in South Africa.

Overall, the survey’s results are positive: There are the same number of elephants now as there were 25 years ago, a rare conservation win at a time when the planet is rapidly losing biodiversity. However, the pattern is not consistent across regions. Some areas, such as south Tanzania, eastern Zambia, and northern Zimbabwe, experienced severe declines due to illegal ivory poaching. In contrast, populations in other regions like north Botswana are booming.

“Unchecked growth isn’t necessarily a good thing, however,” says study co-author Stuart Pimm, the Doris Duke Professor of Conservation at Duke University in North Carolina. “Rapidly increasing populations can outgrow and damage their local environment and prove hard to manage — introducing a threat to their long-term stability,” Pimm says.

In addition to documenting local growth rates, the team also looked at the features of the local populations to identify what makes them stable, that is neither growing nor declining.

Elephant populations in well-protected but isolated parks, sometimes called “fortress conservation,” grow rapidly in the absence of threats but are unsustainable in the long term. These elephants will likely need future conservation interventions, such as translocation or birth control, which are both costly and intensive endeavors.

The team found that the most stable populations occur in large, core areas that are surrounded by buffer zones. The core areas are defined by their strong levels of environmental protection and minimal human impact, whereas the buffers allow some activities such as sustainable farming, forestry, or trophy hunting. Unlike the insular fortresses, core areas are connected to other parks, allowing herds to move naturally.

“What’s crucial is that you need a mix of areas with more stable core populations linked to more variable buffer areas,” said lead author Ryan Huang, a Duke Ph.D. now doing postdoctoral research at CERU.

“These buffers absorb immigrants when core populations get too high, but also provide escape routes when elephants face poor environmental conditions or other threats such as poaching,” Huang said.

Connecting protected areas means elephants can freely move in and out. This allows a natural equilibrium to occur without human intervention, sparing conservationists from using their limited resources to maintain balance.

“Calling for connecting parks isn’t something new. Many have done so,” Huang said. “But surprisingly, there has not been a lot of published evidence of its effectiveness so far. This study helps quantify why this works.”

“Connecting protected areas is essential for the survival of African savanna elephants and many other animal and plant species,” said Celesté Maré, co-author and doctoral student at Aarhus University in Denmark. “Populations with more options for moving around are healthier and more stable, which is important given an uncertain future from climate change.”

CITATION: “Protecting and Connecting Landscapes Stabilizes Populations of the Endangered Savannah Elephant,” Ryan M. Huang, Celesté Maré, Robert A. R. Guldemond, Stuart L. Pimm, Rudi J. van Aarde. Science Advances, Jan. 5, 2024. DOI: 10.1126/sciadv.adk2896

A herd of elephants in Hwange National Park, Zimbabwe.

Elephants take a dust bath to stay cool in Botswana.

CREDIT

Photograph by Prof. Rudi van Aarde

Baby elephant in South Luangwa National Park, Zambia.

CREDIT

Photograph by Ryan M. Huang

JOURNAL

Science Advances

DOI

10.1126/sciadv.adk2896 

METHOD OF RESEARCH

Data/statistical analysis

SUBJECT OF RESEARCH

Animals

ARTICLE TITLE

Protecting and Connecting Landscapes Stabilizes Populations of the Endangered Savannah Elephant

ARTICLE PUBLICATION DATE

5-Jan-2024

 

Cult mentality: SLU professor makes monumental discovery in Italy

Reports and Proceedings

SAINT LOUIS UNIVERSITY

 

IMAGE: 

AN AERIAL PHOTOGRAPH OF THE NEWLY-DISCOVERED IMPERIAL CULT RUINS BY DOUGLAS BOIN, PH.D., AND HIS TEAM. 

view more 

CREDIT: DOUGLAS BOIN, PH.D.

Douglas Boin, Ph.D., a professor of history at Saint Louis University, made a major announcement at the annual meeting of the Archeological Institute of America, revealing he and his team discovered an ancient Roman temple that adds significant insights into the social change from pagan gods to Christianity within the Roman Empire. 

“We found three walls of a monumental structure that evidence suggests belonged to a Roman temple that dates to Constantine's period,” Boin said. “It dates to the fourth century AD and it would be a remarkable addition to the landscape of this corner of Italy. It will significantly aid in the understanding of the ancient town, the ancient townscape and city society in the later Roman Empire because it shows the continuities between the classical pagan world and early Christian Roman world that often get blurred out or written out of the sweeping historical narratives.”

Boin and his excavation team made the monumental discovery over the summer. Boin, an expert in ancient Roman and its religious transitions, had been digging in the town of Spello, the famous medieval hilltop city about 20 minutes from Assisi and 2.5 hours north of Rome. Boin selected the town based on a rescript of a 4th century letter from Emperor Constantine to the townspeople regarding a religious holiday. 

This rescript, which was discovered in the 18th century, allowed the people of Spello to celebrate a religious festival in their hometown rather than travel a great distance to another festival. However, in order to do so, the town was told it must erect a temple to Constantine’s divine ancestors, the Flavian family, and worship them, showcasing how multicultural Roman society was at the time.

“There was a remarkable religious continuity between the Roman world and the early Christian world,” Boin said. “Things didn't change overnight. Before our find, we never had a sense that there were actual physical, religious sites associated with this late ‘imperial cult practice.’ But because of the inscription and its reference to a temple, Spello offered a very tantalizing potential for a major discovery of an Imperial cult underneath a Christian ruler.”

Boin traveled to Spello and oversaw underground imaging to determine if there were any potential ruins below the surface that needed to be uncovered. After many weeks, and almost by chance, Boin finally received promising images underneath a parking lot where the temple was suspected to be. 

Very carefully, the team dug into the ground until they found two adjoining walls. More digging unearthed what Boin believes to be the inside walls of the temple. This temple immediately became what Boin calls the largest evidence ever of the Imperial Cult in both fourth-century Italy and the late Roman Empire.. 

“There's evidence from other places throughout the Roman world that Christian rulers supported imperial cult practices,” Boin said. “We've known that pagans worshiped at their temples in the fourth century, but those findings have all been small and inconsequential. And we've known that Christians supported the imperial cult, and we’ve known that without any sense of where it would have happened. This temple bridges those two landmarks, and in that respect, it is unlike any temple that I know about from the Mediterranean world of the fourth century Roman Empire. Any study of the imperial cult in the fourth century Roman Empire is now going to have to take account of this temple, which is an incredible discovery to make.”

With the discovery, Boin now can show how the societal changes of the time moved very slowly. Though Constantine was the first Roman emperor to famously convert to Christianity, it would take almost 70 years for Christianity to become the official religion of the Roman Empire, under the Emperor Theodosius. During that time it still took many convincing and gradual shifts for those who worshiped pagan gods to convert to Christianity.

“This changes everything about how we perceive the pace of social change and our impression of the impact of social and cultural change,” Boin said. “This building, in a very radical way on its own, shows us the staying power of the pagan traditions that had been on the ground for centuries prior to the rise of Christianity, and it shows us how the Roman emperors continued to negotiate their own values, their own hopes and dreams for the future of the emperor and the Empire without knocking down or burying the past.”

Boin and his team will return to Spello next summer to completely excavate the area to examine the full temple, where he hopes to make even more significant discoveries. 

“We are on the cusp of giving people a very visible piece of evidence that really upends the neat and tidy ways people think about big moments of cultural change,” Boin said “Cultural changes are never as big as we think they are when living through them, and there’s a lot of gray area in between people’s customs and the broader society and culture. And a lot of those can be left out of the story. So to have this temple potentially be a temple dedicated to Constantice’s divine ancestors as a way to worship the emperor in an increasingly Christian world at the time, it’s so weird and I love that we can bring it to light.

 

After COP28 “insider” climate activists will become increasingly important, study suggests.

Peer-Reviewed Publication

UNIVERSITY OF EXETER

Climate campaigners will increasingly adopt “insider activist” roles, working to change or challenge their organisations from the inside rather than the outside, a new study says.

Research led by the University of Exeter identifies different types of climate activists. As well as “insiders”, there are others who seek to undermine, or even damage, climate-recalcitrant organisations they are members of in the hope of change.

The study says the growing climate backlash against traditional outside climate activism and rise of corporate “greenwashing” means collaborating or contesting for meaningful climate action from the inside of organisations is going to become an important new venue for climate activism.

Insider activists often team-up to work with others in different areas of their organisation or other groups.

The research, was conducted by Nick Kirsop-Taylor and Duncan Russel from the University of Exeter, and Anne Jensen, from the University of Aarhus. They analysed 48 existing studies as part of a literature review.

Dr Kirsop-Taylor said: “We found some activists utilise the tools of discussion and persuasion to influence others towards change. Groups of like-minded activists join together to form pressure groups that seek change in others through mobilisation, symbolic protest, and rational discourse drawing attention to injustices, imbalances, and other activist focus. Efforts are based on high levels of expertise in areas relevant to the topic.

“In contrast there are expert activists, who use their knowledge and expertise in their organisation to pursue change. Their risk profile is different, as they are risking their professional authority and legitimacy, and perceived scientific impartiality in their field of expertise.

“Some individuals adopt the philosophical perspective that confrontation is the more effective lever for precipitating change in others. They rarely work in true isolation but they can challenge and contest the opinions, positions, and privileges of others and seek to shame or force them to change rather than through reason and dialogue.

“Where and when critics seeking change in others coalesce and network with like-minded individuals, they can form social movements that exert themselves and take risks collectively for their shared cause. This includes mass civil disobedience, and in places, even violent and non-violent direct action in the pursuit of their cause. This can become the gateway to extremist activist identities and activities.”

 

---

JOURNAL

Humanities and Social Sciences Communications

DOI

10.1057/s41599-023-02398-z 

METHOD OF RESEARCH

Observational study

SUBJECT OF RESEARCH

People

ARTICLE TITLE

A typology of the climate activist

 

UofL researchers are unmasking an old foe’s tricks to thwart new diseases

Research team awarded grants for further research on plague-causing bacteria

Grant and Award Announcement

UNIVERSITY OF LOUISVILLE

 

IMAGE: 

MICROBIOLOGY AND IMMUNOLOGY PROFESSOR MATTHEW LAWRENZ, RIGHT, AND DOCTORAL STUDENT KATELYN SHENEMAN HAVE RECEIVED NEW RESEARCH FUNDING TO BETTER UNDERSTAND HOW BACTERIA CAN OUTMANEUVER THE IMMUNE SYSTEM. UOFL PHOTO.

view more 

CREDIT: UOFL PHOTO.

When the body encounters bacteria, viruses or harmful substances, its innate immune cells, neutrophils, assemble at the site to combat the invader.

Bacteria and viruses have ways to avoid these defenses, however. Yersinia pestis, the bacteria that causes bubonic and pneumonic plague, for example, can hide from the immune system, allowing it to replicate in the body unhindered until it can overwhelm the host. This ability allowed Y. pestis to spread bubonic plague across Europe in the 14th Century, killing a third of the European population.

While plague may not be a serious threat to human health in modern times, researchers at the University of Louisville are studying Y. pestis to better understand its ability to evade the immune system and apply that understanding to control other pathogens.

“If you look at human plague, people don’t show symptoms right away even though they have an active infection because the bacteria is hiding from the immune system. Then all of a sudden there is a lot of bacteria, the immune system is overwhelmed and in the case of pneumonic plague, the individual dies from pneumonia,” said Matthew Lawrenz, professor in the UofL Department of Microbiology and Immunology.

Neutrophils are the immune system’s first responders, sending out protein molecules to summon other neutrophils to attack and destroy the invader. Among the first molecules sent out by neutrophils to signal an infection are Leukotriene B4 (LTB4) lipid molecules. Y. pestis interferes with the immune response by suppressing the LTB4 signals. Lawrenz has received a new $2.9 million, four-year grant from the National Institutes of Health to investigate how Y. pestis blocks LTB4. Ultimately, he expects this understanding will lead to ways to prevent Y. pestis from blocking the signals and hopefully, apply that understanding to other types of infections.

“This historic pathogen is really good at manipulating the immune system, so we use it as a tool to better understand how white blood cells like neutrophils and macrophages respond to bacterial infection,” Lawrenz said. “In this project, we are using Yersinia to better understand why LTB4 is so important to controlling plague. This understanding would apply to almost any infection of the lungs or other areas, and it probably could apply to viruses also.”

A member of the UofL Center for Predictive Medicine for Biodefense and Emerging Infectious Diseases, Lawrenz has been studying plague bacteria for nearly two decades. His previous work includes discoveries of how Y. pestis acquires iron and zinc to overcome a host’s defense mechanism known as nutritional immunity and has increased understanding of how Y. pestis inhabits spaces within host macrophages to hide from the immune system.

Confocal microscopy images taken in the Lawrenz lab of neutrophils (blue) and Yersinia pestis (red). UofL photo.

CREDIT

UofL photo.

Katelyn Sheneman, a doctoral student in Lawrenz’s lab, also has received a prestigious $100,000 research award for trainees from the NIH. This grant will fund her research to understand how Y. pestis changes the contents of extracellular vesicles, cellular containers produced by immune cells that contain proteins, lipids such as LTB4 and other components. These vesicles are released into the bloodstream to communicate to other cells what is happening in their part of the body, such as an infection.

“My project is looking at how Y. pestis alters the number of vesicles being produced, what is being packaged in them and how other cells are responding to them,” Sheneman said. “We have some good evidence that pestis is able to manipulate the production of these vesicles, so we are going to look at the role the vesicles play in pulmonary infection and how that influence contributes to overall systemic infection.”

Since there is no effective vaccine against infection by Y. pestis and it has the potential to be used as a bioweapon, Lawrenz and Sheneman study Y. pestis in UofL’s Biosafety Level 3 facilities at the Regional Biocontainment Laboratory, part of a network of 12 regional and 2 national biocontainment laboratories for studying infectious agents. Biosafety Level 3 facilities are built to exacting federal safety and security standards in order to protect researchers and the public from exposure to the pathogens being investigated. 

 

Soil fungi may help explain the global gradient in forest diversity

New study offers twist on established explanation, introduces effects of beneficial soil fungi in addition to pathogens

Peer-Reviewed Publication

UNIVERSITY OF MARYLAND BALTIMORE COUNTY

A paper published in Nature Communications Biology contributes to the growing appreciation for the outsize role that microbes play in everything from human digestion to crop yields: Microbes in the soil—fungi in this case—appear to be influencing forest diversity on a global scale.

Forests on Earth exhibit a marked gradient from the equator toward the poles: Tropical forests near the equator tend to include a large number of different species, whereas forests nearer the poles support less plant diversity.

One explanation for this phenomenon maintains that soil pathogens, including bacteria and fungi, help create this gradient. Species-specific pathogens accumulate near adult trees, and their abundance can diminish the success of juveniles growing near their parents, thus promoting species diversity. This effect is stronger in warm, wet climates, contributing to the greater diversity in forests near the equator.

However, a new study led by Camille Delavaux, a lead scientist at ETH Zurich in Switzerland, adds a twist to this established story. Mycorrhizal fungi—soil fungi that form mutually beneficial relationships with the majority of plant roots globally—appear to be counteracting the effects of harmful soil pathogens in ways that influence global patterns of forest diversity.

“This paper provides an additional mechanism that may help explain why forest compositional diversity differs with latitude, and a little more about how microbes may regulate patterns of diversity across the planet,” says Matthew Baker, professor of geography and environmental systems at University of Maryland, Baltimore County (UMBC) and a co-author on the new study.

Microbes influence tree diversity

Both major classes of these mutualistic fungi, ectomycorrhizal and arbuscular mycorrhizal, may improve juvenile survival. However, Delavaux and colleagues’ paper found that ectomycorrhizal fungi have a more pronounced effect. Ectomycorrhizal fungi form a sheath around plant roots, which researchers believe may directly protect the plants against pathogens. Ectomycorrhizae are more common at higher latitudes, and they are also more likely to be specialists supporting a single tree species. 

Arbuscular fungi are more common near the equator, and they may offer less protection against pathogens. They are also less likely to specialize with a particular tree species. That means they are more likely to encourage different tree species to grow nearby. 

The new paper found initial evidence for both the diversity-promoting effects of arbuscular fungi and the diversity-reducing effects of ectomycorrhizal fungi, “which seems to suggest that these mechanisms could very well play a role in driving patterns of global biodiversity in tree species,” Baker explains. 

The research team’s findings taken together with previous understanding of these fungi may explain well-known patterns of forest tree diversity associated with latitude. “And that’s exciting,” Baker says. “Global patterns of biodiversity may not result solely from antagonistic relationships between trees and their pathogens, but also from symbiotic relationships with fungi in soils.”

A global network for forest science

“These findings were only possible because of an impressive global network of forest plots administered by the Smithsonian Institution’s Forest Global Earth Observatory (ForestGEO) Network,” Delavaux explains. To be a member of the network, researchers at ForestGEO sites must commit to inventorying the trees in their plots every five years, which entails recording the size and precise coordinates of every tree within the plot boundaries with a diameter of at least one inch. Some sites also collect data on wildlife, soil microbiota, and more using standardized protocols established by the network. The current study used data from 43 of 77 global ForestGEO plots, including a plot on UMBC’s main campus.

The network “reflects the willingness of people in the scientific community to pool resources for the greater good,” Baker says. In UMBC’s case, student volunteers, led by graduate student Anita Kraemer, collected the vast majority of the data.

Different forests, different microbes

UMBC’s two 6.25-hectare (about 15-acre) plots are unique in other ways: They were the first urban, temperate ForestGEO plots when they joined the network in 2012 at the initiative of Erle Ellis, professor of geography and environmental systems and a co-author on the new paper, and graduate student Jonathan Dandois. Dandois completed his Ph.D. in geography and environmental systems in 2013 and is now the Geographic Information Systems manager at Johns Hopkins University.

The UMBC plots include forest edges (adjacent to campus facilities like tennis courts, parking lots, and a swimming pool) and contain a variety of exotic species in addition to native plants. As a result, the plots’ species diversity per unit area exceeds other temperate forests and rivals some of the tropical forest plots in the network. Those observations have fueled Baker’s recent work on urban forests.

The new findings on the role of fungi in global forest structure may be just the beginning of understanding how microbes drive global biodiversity patterns. “The scientific community is very much in the learning stage about appreciating the diversity of different types of soil microbes and their distribution over the planet,” Baker says, “and investigators like Dr. Delavaux are expanding our understanding.”

Delavaux is excited about pursuing related work moving forward. “Future research will leverage the available tree census data and generate additional microbial genetic sequencing data from 30 plots to directly link the microbiome to plant community structure,” she says.

---

JOURNAL

Communications Biology

DOI

10.1038/s42003-023-05410-z 

METHOD OF RESEARCH

Data/statistical analysis

SUBJECT OF RESEARCH

Not applicable

ARTICLE TITLE

Mycorrhizal feedbacks influence global forest structure and diversity

 

UC Davis Health creates road map to diversify health care workforce

Peer-Reviewed Publication

UNIVERSITY OF CALIFORNIA - DAVIS HEALTH

How can health care systems increase diversity and inclusion in their workforce?

UC Davis Health, recognized by Forbes as a "Best Employer in California", has developed a road map for increasing workforce diversity across the industry. While California banned the consideration of race or ethnicity in hiring at public institutions in 1996, UC Davis Health has since come up with a holistic outreach and local recruitment plan that has proven effective. And that approach is now receiving global attention through a new case study published in New England Journal of Medicine Catalyst’s January 2024 issue.

The case study provides a step-by-step guide for medical centers and institutions that seek to diversify their health care workforces. It presents some of UC Davis Health’s successful recruitment efforts as a community-anchored institution.

“Evidence shows that UC Davis Health continues to distinguish itself as a national leader in workplace diversity and health equity while training the next generation of health care providers and research innovators,” said David Lubarsky, chief executive officer and vice chancellor for human health sciences at UC Davis Health. Lubarksy is also a co-author on the paper. “Those trainees are our future. They see firsthand how DEI (diversity, equity and inclusion) enriches all patient care and they will become ambassadors for equity wherever they work.”

UC Davis Health has received many national awards for diversity, health equity and community engagement.

Diversifying the workforce through locally anchored hiring strategy

Diversifying a workforce requires commitment from the executive leadership team and their direct reports at every hiring level. The objective is to create a workplace where everyone belongs.

For this reason, the UC Davis Health Talent Acquisition team within the Department of Human Resources has focused on cultivating a diverse and local workforce through strategic outreach efforts.

“Diversity, equity and inclusion are core tenets of our recruitment strategies,” said Lyndon Huling, interim lead for Talent Acquisition Unit and co-author of the case study. “We implement those values in our approach to outreach. We know that a diverse and local workforce cultivates innovation, improves patient outcomes and makes UC Davis Health an employer of choice.”

A 2019 Community Health Needs Assessment identified 10 ZIP codes within a 20-minute commute of UC Davis Medical Center in Sacramento with the greatest socioeconomic and health needs. In response, UC Davis Health pledged to hire and invest in the communities within these ZIP codes.

The Office for Health Equity, Diversity and Inclusion (HEDI) led this initiative and collaborated with human resources to prioritize local hiring from these neighborhoods. They initiated the Anchor Institution Mission (AIM) for community health. AIM represents UC Davis Health’s commitment to leverage its economic and human power to improve the local community’s health and well-being.

“We wanted to use our presence in the community to increase local hiring," said Victoria Ngo, co-first author of the case study and postdoctoral researcher at UC Davis Health. “Targeting outreach to local Sacramento neighborhoods of concern is just one way the anchor institution mission is focusing its efforts in reducing disparities in the long term.”

The AIM initiative draws upon the university’s ability and willingness to address complex problems like poverty through innovation, collaboration and community building.

“Tackling poverty and other social determinants of health is a daunting task. Yet, it is very near and dear to the heart and mission of UC Davis as a land grant and health care institution,” said co-first author Hendry Ton, associate vice chancellor for HEDI. He is also a clinical professor in the Department of Psychiatry and Behavioral Science at the UC Davis School of Medicine. “We are taking a vital step towards becoming an enduring community partner trusted for our commitment to the well-being of California's diverse communities. We hope this work inspires other organizations to do the same.”

Dedicated DEI leaders were involved in the design and implementation of outreach, recruitment, hiring and onboarding efforts for new employees from the AIM communities. The process included educating UC Davis Health leadership, managers and staff about the benefits of local hiring. Hiring new employees from these communities went from 12% in its pre-implementation year to 15% in the first year of implementation, then to 17% in its second year.

“Our AIM initiative generates meaningful connections between our local communities and our employee teams. This dynamic defines why UC Davis Health is a foundational pillar in Northern California and a trusted partner to many — especially those who have historically lacked access to care, education and employment,” Lubarsky added.

Future steps for UC Davis Health

UC Davis Health aims to employ 20% of its employees from AIM communities to meet the needs of tomorrow’s diverse communities. Achieving this goal requires mission-based, community-partnered hiring practices and further development of employee retention and advancement programs.

This means:

• Ongoing assessment and support for an inclusive work environment
• Programs that enhance a sense of belonging, particularly for underrepresented groups
• More career development and mentorship for entry-level employees
• More opportunities for staff to create and maintain meaningful connections with their local communities

“Significant work remains to be done, and we will meet this challenge,” Lubarsky said. “We are continuing to develop innovative ways to cultivate an inclusive environment for patients, employees and students.”

 

---

JOURNAL

NEJM Catalyst

DOI

10.1056/CAT.23.0261 

METHOD OF RESEARCH

Case study

ARTICLE TITLE

Using Social Determinants to Diversify the Health Care Workforce: UC Davis Health’s Playbook

 

PTSD, depression, and anxiety nearly doubles in Israel in aftermath of Hamas attack

Peer-Reviewed Publication

COLUMBIA UNIVERSITY IRVING MEDICAL CENTER

A study conducted by researchers at Ruppin Academic Center in Israel and Columbia University documents the broad impact on the mental health of Israelis, both Jews and Arabs, with sharp increases in post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD), depression, and anxiety in the aftermath Hamas' attack in October.

The study, published in the Lancet’s EClinicalMedicine  Jan. 5, 2023, found the prevalence of probable PTSD, depression, and anxiety in the weeks following the attacks (29% for PTSD, 42%-44% for depression and GAD, respectively), almost doubling the prevalence recorded two months before the attack.

“The prevalences of PTSD, depression, and anxiety are considerably higher than those reported in previous studies focusing on terrorist events, such as the 9/11 attacks and other attacks,” said Yossi Levi-Belz, PhD, a professor of clinical psychology and chair the Lior Tsfaty Center for Suicide and Mental Pain Studies at the Ruppin Academic Center in Israel who led the study.

The escalation of the longstanding Israeli-Palestinian conflict began Oct. 7 with Hamas’ attacks on civilians in Southern Israel that Israeli officials say killed more than 1,200 people and resulted in 240 being seized as hostages. The terrorist attack was followed by all-out war between the militant Palestinian group and Israeli forces, which followed more than a decade of relative calm across the Gaza-Israeli border. 

The nationwide cohort study, according to the researchers, addressed limitations of previous research by using prospective study design to evaluate the impact of the attack. The researchers employed a wide range of probable outcome measures including PTSD, depression, and generalized anxiety disorder (GAD), assessing a cohort of Israeli citizens, both Jews and Arabs, twice, 6-7 weeks before the attack and 5-6 weeks after the attacks.

Since the beginning of the conflict 240,000 Israeli civilians have evacuated their homes and 129 Israelis are still held hostage.  The ground war in Gaza has also taken a heavy toll on Palestinians.  The health ministry in the Hamas-ruled Gaza Strip said that more than 20,000 people have been killed in the Palestinian territory since the beginning of the war. 

Numerous studies have documented that traumatic events like war and armed conflicts can cause an alarming spike in post-traumatic stress and depression. Symptoms of PTSD were the most common health effect of the 9/11 attacks. Up to 20% of adults (link is external and opens in a new window)directly exposed to the disaster or injured in the attack had PTSD symptoms five to six years after the attack. Ten years after the attacks, 15% of the 70,000 enrollees in the World Trade Center Health Registry(link is external and opens in a new window) reported depression and 10% reported both depression and PTSD.

Study coauthor Yuval Neria, PhD, professor of clinical medical psychology (in psychiatry and epidemiology) at Columbia University Irving Medical Center and director of the PTSD Research and Treatment program at the New York State Psychiatric Institute (NYSPI), said the findings underline the crucial importance of conducting an immediate assessment of those exposed to severe trauma that taking into account pre-attack psychological difficulties and psychiatric 'diagnoses' in the aftermath of such a large-scale trauma. 

“Moreover, nation leaders and policymakers should consider taking steps to allocates all resources to facilitate evidence-based treatments of affected civilians,” Dr. Neria added. “Early to mid-term interventions must be made accessible to citizens as a whole, with the aim of promoting self- and community efficacy, connectedness, and hope immediately after the attacks and during a massive military confrontation for both Israelis and Arab populations." 

---

JOURNAL

EClinicalMedicine

DOI

10.1016/j.eclinm.2023.102418 

METHOD OF RESEARCH

Observational study

SUBJECT OF RESEARCH

People

ARTICLE TITLE

PTSD, depression, and anxiety after the October 7, 2023 attack in Israel: a nationwide prospective study

ARTICLE PUBLICATION DATE

5-Jan-2024

 

Global scientific network highlights plant genera named for women

Researchers enhanced the known genera linked to women by twenty-fold

Peer-Reviewed Publication

MISSOURI BOTANICAL GARDEN

A network of scientists across the globe have identified more than 700 plant genera named for women. This is a nearly twenty-fold increase in the number of genera linked to women before the group started working on the list. 

The project, which aimed to highlight the contribution of women to botany, was the result of social media conversations about plants named for people.  

What began as a simple question about how many and which plant genera were named for women evolved into a global network of scientists who built a dataset of plant genera named in honor of women. The group, which met virtually for over two years, also worked to improve data easily available about these genera that have information publicly available through the global resource Wikidata. 

The results, which included a dataset of 728 plant genera named for women and female beings (mythological), were recently published in a paper entitled, “Creating a multi-linked dynamic dataset: a case study of plant genera named for women.”  

“Our motivation for this research was not only to highlight the names of plant genera named after women, but to look at the roles and lives of these women, many with fascinating stories, and to better recognize the contribution to science of this historically marginalized group,” said Missouri Botanical Garden Curator Dr. Carmen Ulloa. 

Ulloa is one of eight co-authors of the paper that represents a multidisciplinary group of female experts from around the world with an interest in diversity and inclusion in science. Other authors involved in this research are from the Natural History Museum, London, the Royal Botanical Gardens at Kew, the Museum für Naturkunde Berlin, the Cambridge University Herbarium, and from Wellington, New Zealand.  

Historically, women were often excluded from scientific professions, the paper explains, and one way that is plainly visible is in  eponymy, or the practice of naming taxa for people. Like streets, monuments, and parks, plant names at all levels – species, genus, family, etc. – can be named for people. The group specifically focused on the names of flowering plant genera, as there are roughly 16,000 known genera compared to 450,000 known plant species.  

The group deliberately did not compare the number of names honoring women to those named for men with the intention of amplifying women’s contributions to the history and development of science. Their research found that many of the contributions of women honored were in unpaid roles, such as a supportive spouse, or obscured among a collection team and “whose role in the discovery of a new plant genus has been historically overlooked,” explained Ulloa. 

It also created a dataset that can be used by other researchers looking to build upon the work. The team deliberately used a push-pull method so that existing resources were constantly updated in an Open Science approach as work proceeded. 

“Taking this Open Science approach has ensured we have amplified the contribution of women to the field of botany,” the paper explains. “We hope to inspire others to use our methods and workflows to empower their own research and follow-up studies on under-represented and under-acknowledged groups in science.” 

# # #    

The Missouri Botanical Garden’s mission is “to discover and share knowledge about plants and their environment in order to preserve and enrich life.” Today, 165 years after opening, the Missouri Botanical Garden is a National Historic Landmark and a center for science, conservation, education and horticultural display. 

 

 

---

JOURNAL

Biodiversity Data Journal

METHOD OF RESEARCH

Content analysis

ARTICLE TITLE

Creating a multi-linked dynamic dataset: a case study of plant genera named for women