It’s possible that I shall make an ass of myself. But in that case one can always get out of it with a little dialectic. I have, of course, so worded my proposition as to be right either way (K.Marx, Letter to F.Engels on the Indian Mutiny)
Dr. Sabrina Coninx from Ruhr-Universität Bochum and Dr. Peter Stilwell from McGill University, Canada, have investigated how philosophical approaches can be used to think in new ways about pain and its management. The researchers advocate not merely reducing chronic pain management to searching and treating underlying physical changes but instead adopting an approach that focuses on the person as a whole. Their work was published online in the journal "Synthese" on 15 April 2021.
It is not currently possible to treat chronic pain effectively in many cases. This has encouraged researchers from various disciplines to consider new approaches to pain and its management over recent years. "Pain research and clinical practice do not take place in a vacuum, but instead involve implicit assumptions regarding what pain is and how it can be treated," says Sabrina Coninx, research assistant at the Bochum research training group Situated Cognition. "Our aim is to shed light on these assumptions and discover how we can think in new ways about pain and its management with the help of philosophical approaches." In their work, the authors develop a holistic, integrative and action-oriented approach.
Viewing patients as a whole
In specific terms, they suggest three things: firstly, addressing pain should involve more than just looking for and treating underlying physiological changes. A holistic approach places the focus on patients as a whole and creates space for their experiences, concerns, expectations and narratives. The influence of socio-cultural practices in the generation of chronic pain should also be taken into account. For example, pain patients are often initially encouraged to protect themselves from injury and avoid activity, which may be helpful in the beginning but can contribute to chronification in the long run.
Secondly, according to the researchers, chronic pain should be understood as a dynamic process in which many different factors interact in a non-linear way. The initial cause of pain, for instance, is not necessarily the cause of its chronification and also does not need to be the most crucial factor in treatment. The complex interaction of subjective experience, expectations, learned behavioural patterns, neural reorganisation, stigmatisation and other factors therefore needs to be considered.
Focus on action possibilities
Thirdly, according to Coninx and Stilwell, patients should be encouraged to interact with their environment and identify possibilities for action. This is based on the assumption that chronic pain fundamentally changes the way in which patients perceive themselves and their relationship with their environment. Pain treatment could therefore involve helping the patient to increasingly notice positively associated and personally meaningful options for action and view themselves as capable of taking action again. There is then less focus on the body as an obstacle, and instead the patients pay more attention to how they can overcome limitations.
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Research shows pain relieving effects ofCBD
A new study led by researchers at Syracuse University sheds light on the ability of CBD to reduce pain along with the impact that the so-called placebo effect may have on pain outcomes
It's been hailed as a wonder drug and it's certainly creating wonder profits. By some estimates, the Cannabidiol (or CBD) market could be worth $20 billion dollars by 2024. While users tout its effectiveness in pain relief, up until now there's been limited experimental human research on the actual effectiveness of the drug. However, a new study led by researchers at Syracuse University sheds light on the ability of CBD to reduce pain along with the impact that the so-called placebo effect may have on pain outcomes.
"For science and the public at large the question remained, is the pain relief that CBD users claim to experience due to pharmacological effects or placebo effects," asked Martin De Vita, a researcher in the psychology department at Syracuse University's College of Arts and Sciences. "That's a fair question because we know that simply telling someone that a substance has the ability to relieve their pain can actually cause robust changes in their pain sensitivity. These are called expectancy effects." De Vita, along with Syracuse Emeritus Psychology Professor Stephen Maisto, were uniquely prepared to answer that exact question. The pair, along with fellow lab member and doctoral candidate Dezarie Moskal, previously conducted the first systematic review and meta-analysis of experimental research examining the effects cannabinoid drugs on pain. As the first experimental pain trial to examine CBD, their study yielded consistent and noteworthy results. Among other findings, the data showed that CBD and expectancies for receiving CBD do not appear to reduce experimental pain intensity, but do make the pain feel less unpleasant.
De Vita and Maisto used sophisticated equipment that safely induces experimental heat pain, allowing them to measure how the recipient's nervous system reacts and responds to it. "Then we administer a drug, like pure CBD, or a placebo and then re-assess their pain responses and see how they change based on which substance was administered," said De Vita. Researchers then took it a step farther by manipulating the information given to participants about which substances they received. In some cases, participants were told that they got CBD when they actually received a placebo, or told they would be getting a placebo when they actually got CBD. "That way we could parse out whether it was the drug that relieved the pain, or whether it was the expectation that they had received the drug that reduced their pain," according to De Vita. "We hypothesized that we would primarily detect expectancy-induced placebo analgesia (pain relief). What we found though after measuring several different pain outcomes is that it's actually a little bit of both. That is, we found improvements in pain measures caused by the pharmacological effects of CBD and the psychological effects of just expecting that they had gotten CBD. It was pretty remarkable and surprising."
"The data is exciting but pretty complex in that different pain measures responded differently to the drug effect, to the expectancy, or both the drug and expectancy combined--so we're still trying to figure out what is behind the differential data with different kinds of pain measures," said Maisto. "The next step is studying the mechanisms underlying these findings and figuring out why giving instructions or CBD itself causes certain reactions to a pain stimulus."
Most people think of pain as an on and off switch, you either have it or you don't. But pain, as De Vita describes it, is a complex phenomenon with several dimensions influenced by psychological and biological factors. For example, whereas pain intensity reflects a "sensory" dimension of pain, unpleasantness represents an "affective," or emotional, aspect of pain. "If you think of pain as the noxious noise coming from a radio the volume can represent the intensity of the pain, while the station can represent the quality," said De Vita. Results from his previous study showed that while cannabinoid drugs weren't reducing the volume of pain, they were "changing the channel making it a little less unpleasant." According to De Vita, "It's not sunshine and rainbows pleasant, but something slightly less bothersome. We replicated that in this study and found that CBD and expectancies didn't significantly reduce the volume of the pain, but they did make it less unpleasant--it didn't bother them as much." As part of the study De Vita and Maisto developed advanced experimental pain measurement protocols "to pop the hood and start looking at some of these other mechanistic pain processes," said De Vita. "It's not just pain, yes or no, but there are these other dimensions of pain, and it would be interesting to see which ones are being targeted. We found that sometimes pharmacological effects of CBD brought down some of those, but the expectancies did not. Sometimes they both did it. Sometimes it was just the expectancy. And so, we were going into this thinking we were going to primarily detect the expectancy-induced pain relief but what we found out was way more complex than that and that's exciting."
One important note to also consider is the source of the CBD. "What we used in our study was pure CBD isolate oil," said De Vita. "Commercially available CBD products differ in their content and purity, so results might be different for different CBD products, depending on what other compounds they may or may not contain."
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Martin De Vita is currently completing a clinical psychology internship at Brooke Army Medical Center, JBSA, TX. The view(s) expressed herein are those of the author(s) and do not reflect the official policy or position of Brooke Army Medical Center, the U.S. Army Medical Department, the U.S. Army Office of the Surgeon General, the Department of the Army, the Department of the Air Force and Department of Defense or the U.S. Government
STONER ONE
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Syracuse University Emeritus Psychology Professor Stephen Maisto is a coauthor of the CBD pain relief study.
CREDIT
Syracuse University
STONER TWO
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Dezarie Moskal is a doctoral candidate at Syracuse University and assisted in the CBD pain relief study.
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Syracuse University
UNH research: Climate change affects deep-sea corals and sponges differently
DURHAM, N.H.-- Corals and sponges are important foundations in ocean ecosystems providing structure and habitats that shelter a high number of species like fish, crabs and other creatures, particularly in the seamounts and canyons of the deep sea. Researchers at the University of New Hampshire have discovered that when it comes to climate change not all deep-sea corals and sponges are affected the same and some could be threatened if average ocean temperatures continue to increase in the deep sea of the Northwest Atlantic.
"These deep-sea corals and sponges are ecologically important because they are foundational species that contribute to the food web and losing them could eventually lower the biodiversity of the deep sea," said Jennifer Dijkstra, a research assistant professor in UNH's Center for Coastal and Ocean Mapping.
In their study, published in the journal Global Ecology and Biogeography, the researchers combined data about temperature, dissolved oxygen, salinity and depth with high-resolution underwater video of the seafloor. The video was collected by a remotely operated vehicle (ROV) along the Northeast Canyons and New England Seamount Chain by the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA) Ocean Exploration and Research branch. The researchers analyzed the data and annotated the ROV video to determine the density of the corals and sponges in specific areas, allowing the scientists to identify their location. They linked environmental variables to emerging patterns and high densities in narrow environmental ranges. Although corals and sponges co-occur, climate-related variables temperature, salinity and dissolved oxygen contributed to the distribution of sponges, whereas seafloor properties of slope and substrate contributed to the distribution of corals.
"The paper shows that not all deep-sea corals and sponges were influenced by the same environmental variables and each has different levels of sensitivity," said Dijkstra. "Changes in temperature and dissolved oxygen, that go beyond what the deep-sea corals and sponges are used to, could stress the species' physiology affecting growth, tissue loss and reproduction."
In general, deep-sea corals are found 200 to 10,000 feet below sea level where sunlight is nonexistent. Unlike shallow-water coral reefs, which are limited to warm tropical waters, deep-sea corals are found throughout the world's oceans, from tropical to polar regions, forming groves of tree or fan shapes that can reach feet to meters tall. Deep-sea sponge populations can filter water, collect bacteria and process carbon, nitrogen, and phosphorus. Deep-sea corals and sponges have been found on continental shelves, canyons and seamounts in deep seas around the world but their full extent is unknown because only 15 percent of the Earth's seafloor has been mapped with high-resolution imaging.
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UPDATED
New species of dumbo octopus identified using minimally invasive techniques
A new species of deep-sea dwelling dumbo octopus called Grimpoteuthis imperator sp. nov. has been described using a combination of MRI, micro-CT and minimally invasive gene analysis rather than traditional dissection methods. The findings are presented in the open access journal BMC Biology.
The single specimen, which was identified as a mature male, was named G. imperator because it was discovered in the northern part of the Emperor Seamounts, an undersea mountain ridge in the Northwest Pacific Ocean. In addition to the scientific name in Latin, the authors suggest possible common names for this new species such as Emperor dumbo, Dumbo impérial (French), and Kaiserdumbo (German).
Finned or dumbo octopods, although considered rare organisms, form a significant part of the megafauna in deep-sea habitats down to at least 7,000 m depth. Current methods used to describe new cephalopod species often require dissection to examine internal organs, which involves damage to or even partial destruction of a specimen and may thus preclude analysis of singular, endangered, rare, or otherwise valuable organisms.
Alexander Ziegler and Christina Sagorny at Rheinische Friedrich-Wilhelms-Universität Bonn, Germany combined non-invasive methods including digital photography, standardized measurements, high-field magnetic resonance imaging (MRI), and micro-computed tomography (micro-CT), with minimally-invasive tissue sampling for DNA analysis to gather morphological as well as molecular information on the specimen collected during R/V SONNE's scientific cruise SO-249 BERING. Using this novel combination of non-invasive and minimally invasive techniques allowed the authors to describe a large zoological specimen for the first time without damaging it.
The authors were able to identify details including shell and gill shape, digestive tract morphology, as well as more minute structures such as the nervous system and sensory organs, but also morphological characters so far not used in the description of octopus species, such as the shape of the systemic heart. By using micro-CT, which is more suitable than MRI for visualization of chitinous tissues, the authors were also able to build the first interactive 3D model of a cephalopod beak.
Characteristics including shell form, fin position, and arm length identified the specimen as belonging to the genus Grimpoteuthis. However, the number of suckers, half-orange-shaped gills, and details of the shell differentiate it from all previously described Grimpoteuthis species.
Alexander Ziegler said: "The MRI and micro-CT datasets we have obtained here and which are publicly available from the repository MorphoBank could be used for further analyses that would not have been possible to this extent using conventional, invasive techniques. This may allow other researchers to draw conclusions about the life style and behaviour of hard-to-observe deep sea organisms."
Notes to editor:
1. Research article:
Holistic description of new deep sea megafauna (Cephalopoda: Cirrata) using a minimally invasive approach
Ziegler and Sagorny. BMC Biology 2021
DOI: 10.1186/s12915-021-01000-9
For an embargoed copy of the research article please contact Anne Korn at BMC or visit the Springer Nature press site.
After the embargo lifts, the article will be available here:
Please name the journal in any story you write. If you are writing for the web, please link to the article. All articles are available free of charge, according to BMC's open access policy.
2. BMC Biology is an open access journal publishing outstanding research in all areas of biology, with a publication policy that combines selection for broad interest and importance with a commitment to serving authors well.
3. A pioneer of open access publishing, BMC has an evolving portfolio of high quality peer-reviewed journals including broad interest titles such as BMC Biology and BMC Medicine, specialist journals such as Malaria Journal and Microbiome, and the BMC series. At BMC, research is always in progress. We are committed to continual innovation to better support the needs of our communities, ensuring the integrity of the research we publish, and championing the benefits of open research. BMC is part of Springer Nature, giving us greater opportunities to help authors connect and advance discoveries across the world.
First description of a new octopus specieswithout using a scalpel
Biologists at the University of Bonn use state-of-the-art non-destructive methods to study an octopus from the deep sea
An evolutionary biologist from the University of Bonn brought a new octopus species to light from depths of more than 4,000 meters in the North Pacific Ocean. The sensational discovery made waves in the media a few years ago. Researchers in Bonn have now published the species description and named the animal "Emperor dumbo" (Grimpoteuthis imperator). Just as unusual as the organism is the researchers' approach: in order to describe the new species, they did not dissect the rare creature, but instead used non-destructive imaging techniques. The results have now been published in the prestigious journal BMC Biology.
In the summer of 2016, Dr. Alexander Ziegler from the Institute of Evolutionary Biology and Ecology at the University of Bonn spent several months in the North Pacific aboard the research vessel SONNE. The crew lowered the steel basket to the seabed around 150 times in order to retrieve rocks, sediments, and living creatures. One organism in particular caused a media stir: a dumbo octopus. The animal, about 30 centimeters in size, was found in waters more than 4,000 meters deep. However, the octopus could not be recovered alive: "The deep-sea organism is not adapted to the environmental conditions of the ocean surface," Ziegler explains.
Dumbo octopuses are a group of deep-sea-dwelling octopuses that includes 45 species. The name is based on the flying elephant from the Walt Disney movie of the same name, who is made fun of because of his unusually large ears - the fins of the dumbo octopuses, which are on the sides of the head resemble these elephant ears. However, the dumbo on the research vessel SONNE differed significantly from the known octopus species. "It was clear to me straight away that we had caught something very special," the biologist reports. So Ziegler immediately photographed the unusual animal, took a small tissue sample for DNA analysis, and then preserved the octopus in formalin.
Together with his former master's student Christina Sagorny, Ziegler has now published a description of the previously unknown species. Just as unusual as the octopus was the methodology used. The animals are usually dissected by zoologists, as the internal organs are also important for the description of a new species. "However, as this octopus is very valuable, we were looking for a non-destructive method," explains the researcher.
High-field MRI instead of scalpel
The eight-armed cephalopod therefore did not end up under the scalpel, but in the high-field magnetic resonance imaging system of the German Center for Neurodegenerative Diseases (DZNE) in Bonn. This device is routinely used to image test persons' brains. Thankfully, Dr. Eberhard D. Pracht from the DZNE agreed to conduct a high-resolution scan of the dumbo octopus in 3D. As part of her master's thesis, Christina Sagorny then investigated whether high-field MRI can be used to study internal organs and other soft tissues just as well as through conventional dissection. "The quality is actually even better," Ziegler says.
One of the few exceptions: the beak and rasping tongue (radula) of the cephalopod are made of hard chitin that does not image well using MRI. The biologists therefore also consulted the micro-computed tomography system of the paleontologists at the University of Bonn. This technique showed the beak and radula razor-sharp and in 3D. "These hard part structures are an integral part of the species description of octopuses," Ziegler explains. The researchers also decoded the animal's genetic material to reconstruct the family relationships. Ziegler: "The DNA showed beyond a doubt that we were looking at a species of the genus Grimpoteuthis."
Examination of the reproductive organs revealed the dumbo octopus to be an adult male. Compared to other species of this genus, it displays several special characteristics. For example, an average of 71 suckers were detected on each arm, which the animal needs to catch prey and which reflect body size. The length of the cirri, which are small appendages on the arms that the deep-sea animals presumably use to sense their prey, also differs from species already known.
The web that stretches between the arms, with which the dumbo slowly floats down in the water column, catching worms and crustaceans as if in a bell, also only reaches just over halfway from the mouth down the arms. "The web is much longer in dumbo octopus species that mainly float freely in the water column," Ziegler says. This would indicate that the new species lives close to the seafloor, because otherwise the web would be a hindrance to movements on the bottom.
As the species-describing researchers, Sagorny and Ziegler had the privilege of naming the new species: they decided on Grimpoteuthis imperator - in English "Emperor dumbo". Background: the animal was discovered not far from Japan in an underwater mountain range whose peaks are named after Japanese emperors.
Digital copy of the organism
The combination of non-destructive methods produced a crisp digital copy of the animal. Anybody interested can download it from the online database "MorphoBank" for further research and learning purposes. The preserved octopus itself is kept in the archives of the Museum für Naturkunde in Berlin, Germany. "There, it can then still be analyzed 100 years from now, for example when more modern investigation methods or new questions arise," Ziegler explains. "Our non-destructive approach could set a precedent, especially for rare and valuable animals," said the Bonn-based evolutionary biologist.
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Funding:
No third-party funds were used to conduct the study.
Publication: Alexander Ziegler, Christina Sagorny: Holistic description of new deep sea megafauna (Cephalopoda: Cirrata) using a minimally invasive approach, BMC Biology, DOI: https://doi.org/10.1186/s12915-021-01000-9
the Emperor dumbo (Grimpoteuthis imperator). The description of the new species also includes the internal organs, which are shown here in color in the form of an interactive 3D model.
An interdisciplinary group of Spanish scientists, bringing together biologists and chemists from the Universities of Seville, Huelva, the Autonomous University of Madrid and the Institute of Marine Sciences of Andalusia of the CSIC in Cadiz, have just published the results of their pioneering research studying the management of marinas. The group of scientists, led by the US professor José Manuel Guerra García, studied in detail the sediments in Andalusia's marinas and has proposed a new index, the MEPI (Marinas Environmental Pollution Index) to quantify the level of contamination in these ports.
There has been a proliferation of marinas in recent years, in Spain, other Mediterranean countries and in the rest of the world. Marinas are highly modified ecosystems that have a great impact on marine biota. On the one hand, they alter the area's hydrodynamism, damming ecosystem in and tending to concentrate pollutants (heavy metals, hydrocarbons, etc.). In addition, recreational boats can be responsible for transporting invasive species from one area to another, attached to the boats' hulls.
"It is essential to regulate these marinas. To this end, authorities need scientists to provide tools to manage these ecosystems in the best possible way. Ideally, we should try to build more environmentally sustainable ports and aim to establish minimum ecological quality levels enabling us to identify marinas that make efforts to control environmental conditions and make their waters and sediments higher quality than elsewhere", explains Professor Guerra.
Specifically, the MEPI index is based on parameters such as hydrocarbons, heavy metals, faecal coliforms, nitrogen, phosphorus, sulphur and biocides such as Irgarol, which are used as a base in the manufacture of the antifouling paints applied to prevent organisms from adhering to recreational boats. The MEPI index was developed using national and international sediment quality recommendations and reference values and ranges proposed by legislation in different countries around the world. Together with the new index, the authors have applied a simple and complete ecological analysis method to determine a port's quality in a holistic and integrated way, taking into account both chemical and biological parameters. For this purpose their models used not only the MEPI, but also values relating to the diversity of organisms living in the sediments, biotic indices measuring the quality of the seabed based on these organisms, and biotic pollution indices based on the number and abundance of invasive species. Thus, communities of organisms living on the bottom of the ports were studied, including both macrofauna (those larger than 0.5 mm such crustaceans, molluscs, annelid worms and echinoderms mainly), and meiofauna (smaller than 0.5 mm, mainly copepods and nematodes).
"These small animals that live in ports are the best 'whistleblowers' of port quality, making the role of biologists crucial in understanding how these ecosystems function. Depending on the species we find, we can tell how polluted a port has become," adds the researcher.
The study's innovative approach enabled the integration of both environmental parameters, where the role of chemists was key, and biological parameters as part of a holistic model. Based on all the indicators used, the researchers have proposed a total scoring system (the sum of each parameter's partial score) that allows the ecological quality status of a port to be established using a scale that is easy for authorities to interpret and in line with the European water quality directives. On this basis, colour-coded quality levels can then be established for each marina, ranging from red (very poor quality) to blue (excellent quality).
Thanks to this excellent work, in which the researcher Alejandro Fernández-Romero also participated, and based on the study of the marinas along the Andalusian coast, simple and integrated environmental quality assessment tools are now available for application in any marina anywhere in the world. The information provided can be key, for example, to awarding distinctions, such as the blue flag, to marinas that meet environmental quality requirements. Similarly, Dr. Guerra carried out several studies during his doctoral thesis which demonstrated that the creation of tunnels or hydrodynamic channels in ports, or ports designed with double entrances, such as the port of Ceuta, allow greater water renewal, increase oxygen levels and favour higher levels of biological diversity.
"We must try to move towards 'eco-sustainable' designs that minimise the negative impact of creating or remodelling a port. In this sense, both biologists and chemists can contribute invaluable input for engineers, ensuring they opt for coastal infrastructure designs that are more ecological and less harmful to marine flora and fauna", concludes José Manuel Guerra.
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Climate change impacts conservation sites across the Americas
A continental-scale network of conservation sites is likely to remain effective under future climate change scenarios, despite a predicted shift in key species distributions.
New research, led by Durham University and published in the journal Frontiers in Ecology and Evolution, investigates the impacts of potential climate change scenarios on the network of Important Bird and Biodiversity Areas (IBAs) across the Caribbean, and Central and South America.
The research was carried out in collaboration with Senckenberg Biodiversity and Climate Research Centre, BirdLife International and the National Audubon Society.
IBAs are sites identified as being internationally important for the conservation of bird populations, with over 13,000 sites identified across 200 countries in the last 40 years. Many are covered by formal protected areas, while others are conserved by community-managed reserves or indigenous lands.
Two of the principal responses of species to recent climate change events are changes in range and abundance, leading to a global reshuffling of populations.
Range changes may cause species to disappear from areas they occupy, whilst providing them with opportunities to colonise new sites.
This redistribution could affect the ability of international site networks (including protected areas) to conserve species. Therefore, identifying which sites will continue to provide suitable conditions and which are likely to become unsuitable is important for effective conservation planning as our planet continues to warm.
Estimating the impact of climate change on species' distributions, and the consequences for networks of sites identified to conserve them, can help to inform conservation strategies to ensure that these networks remain effective.
The research modelled the effects of different scenarios of climate change on the wider network.
It determined that, for 73 percent of the 939 species of conservation concern for which IBAs have been identified, more than half of the IBAs in which they currently occur were projected to remain climatically suitable and, for 90 per cent of species, at least a quarter of sites remain suitable.
These results suggest that the network will remain robust under climate change. What is concerning however, is that seven percent of the species of conservation concern are projected to have no suitable climate in the IBAs currently identified for them."
Professor Stephen Willis, Director of Research in the Durham University Department of Biosciences said "The Caribbean and Central and South American region supports about 40% of all the bird species of the world, so this network is vital for a large proportion of the world's birds.
To develop realistic predictions of future changes, we not only considered where suitable climate will occur for species in future but also the likelihood of species dispersing to newly suitable sites.
This information is helping to identify potential management strategies across the IBA network."
Stuart Butchart, Chief Scientist at BirdLife International and a co-author on the study, said: "These results highlight how critical it is to effectively conserve the network of Important Bird and Biodiversity Areas across the Americas in order to help safeguard birds in the region under climate change.
"Despite projections of significant shifts in the distributions of individual species, the network as a whole will continue to play a key role in future conservation efforts."
Aurelio Ramos, Senior VP, Audubon International Alliances Program said "Applying this science to secure and strengthen IBAs in the Americas is essential to support the future of birds and people. Audubon, BirdLife International, American Bird Conservancy and REDLAC have partnered in the Americas on a project to strengthen protection of Climate secure IBAs identified in the research called Conserva Aves"
Alke Voskamp of the Senckenberg Biodiversity and Climate Research Centre added "The results of this study highlight the importance of a network-wide perspective when making conservation management decisions for individual sites when planning for climate change."
The researchers note that designating protected areas to safeguard biodiversity is a cornerstone of species conservation and the importance of considering local environmental management decisions and their impacts on wider, global conservation networks has never been more relevant.
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