That song is stuck in your head, but it's helping you to remember

UC Davis research suggests 'earworms' help to preserve memory for music, life events

UNIVERSITY OF CALIFORNIA - DAVIS

Research News

 

"So, no one told you life was going to be this way.
Your job's a joke, you're broke, you're love life's DOA.
It's like you're always stuck in second gear,
When it hasn't been your day, your week, your month, or even your year..."

If you have watched TV since the 1990s, the sitcom theme song, "I'll Be There for You," has likely been stuck in your head at one point or another. New research from UC Davis suggests these experiences are more than a passing nuisance -- they play an important role in helping memories form, not only for the song, but also related life events like hanging out with friends -- or watching other people hang with their friends on the '90s television show, Friends.

"Scientists have known for some time that music evokes autobiographical memories, and that those are among the emotional experiences with music that people cherish most," said Petr Janata, UC Davis professor of psychology and co-author on a new study.

"What hasn't been understood to date is how those memories form in the first place and how they become so durable, such that just hearing a bit of a song can trigger vivid remembering," said Janata.

The paper, "Spontaneous Mental Replay of Music Improves Memory for Incidentally Associated Event Knowledge," was published online in the Journal of Experimental Psychology: General. Co-authors are Janata and Benjamin Kubit, a postdoctoral researcher in cognitive neuroscience, both of the UC Davis Department of Psychology, and Center for Mind and Brain.

This new research offers an initial glimpse into these mechanisms and, somewhat surprisingly, finds that the songs that get stuck in your head help that process of strengthening memories as they first form, the authors said. Thus, this is the first research to link two of the most common phenomena people experience with music -- earworms (having a song stuck in your head) and music-evoked remembering.

For their latest study, the researchers worked with 25 to 31 different people in each of three experiments, over three different days, spaced weeks apart. Subjects first listened to unfamiliar music, and then, a week later, listened to the music again, this time paired with likewise unfamiliar movie clips. In one instance, movies were played without music. The research subjects, all UC Davis undergraduate and graduate students, were subsequently asked to remember as many details as they could from each movie as the music played. They were also quizzed about their recollection of the associated tunes and how often they experienced each of the tunes as an earworm. None of them had formal music training.

The more the tune played, the more accurate the memory

The results: the more often a tune played in a person's head, the more accurate the memory for the tune became and, critically, the more details the person remembered from the specific section of the movie with which the tune was paired.

With only one week between when they saw the movie, and when they were asked to remember as many details from the movie as they could while listening to the movie soundtrack, the effect of repeatedly experiencing a tune from the soundtrack as an earworm resulted in near-perfect retention of the movie details. These people's memories, in fact, were as good as when they had first seen the movie. Additionally, most subjects were able to report what they were typically doing when their earworms occurred, and none of them mentioned the associated movies coming to mind at those times.

"Our paper shows that even if you are playing that song in your mind and not pulling up details of memories explicitly, that is still going to help solidify those memories," Janata said.

"We typically think of earworms as random nuisance beyond our control, but our results show that earworms are a naturally occurring memory process that helps preserve recent experiences in long-term memory," Kubit said.

Future help for memory loss?

The authors said they hope the research, which is ongoing, could eventually lead to the development of nonpharmaceutical, music-based interventions to help people suffering from dementia and other neurological disorders to better remember events, people and daily tasks.

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Air pollution exposure during pregnancy may boost babies' obesity risk

UNIVERSITY OF COLORADO AT BOULDER

Research News

 

Women exposed to higher levels of air pollution during pregnancy have babies who grow unusually fast in the first months after birth, putting on excess fat that puts them at risk of obesity and related diseases later in life, new CU Boulder research shows.

The study of Hispanic mother-child pairs, published this week in the journal Environmental Health, is the latest to suggest that poor air quality may contribute at least in part to the nation's obesity epidemic, particularly among minority populations who tend to live in places with more exposure to toxic pollutants.

About one in four Hispanic youth in the United States are obese, compared to about 14% of white youth and 11% of Asian youth.

"Higher rates of obesity among certain groups in our society are not simply a byproduct of personal choices like exercise and calories in, calories out. It's more complicated than that," said senior author Tanya Alderete, an assistant professor in the Department of Integrative Physiology. "This study and others suggest it can also relate to how much of an environmental burden one carries."

Previous research has shown pregnant women who smoke or are chronically exposed to air pollution tend to have smaller birthweight babies. In the first year of life, those babies tend to race to catch up, gaining weight unusually fast. Accelerated weight gain in early life has been linked to diabetes, heart disease and weight problems in childhood and adolescence.

"This period, either during pregnancy or shortly after birth, is a critical window of development and adverse exposures can program the infant to have a host of problems later in life," said lead author William Patterson, a doctoral student.

To more closely examine how specific pollutants impact a baby's growth trajectory, the researchers followed 123 mother-infant pairs from the Mother's Milk Study, an ongoing trial in the Los Angeles region. About one-third were of normal weight pre-pregnancy, one-third overweight and one-third obese.

The researchers used data from the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency's Air Quality System, which records hourly air quality data from ambient monitoring stations, to quantify their prenatal exposure to four classes of pollutants: PM2.5 and PM10 (inhalable particles from factories, cars and construction sites), nitrogen dioxide (an odorless gas emitted from cars and power plants) and ozone (the main ingredient in smog).

Then they followed the babies, periodically measuring not only their weight and height, but also how much fat they carried and where.

"We found that greater exposure to prenatal ambient air pollution was associated with greater changes in weight and adiposity, or body fatness, in the first six months of life," said Patterson.

In some cases, pollutants seemed to impact males and females differently.

For instance, exposure to a combination of ozone and nitrogen dioxide in utero was associated with faster growth around the waist in females, while in males it was associated with slower growth in length and greater fat accumulation around the midsection.

In adults, excess fat around the midsection has been linked to heart disease and diabetes.

"It's not just how much fat you carry but where--that matters," said Patterson.

How can inhaling pollutants impact growth patterns of a mother's unborn child?

Researchers believe those pollutants can inflame the lungs and, in turn, cause systemic inflammation of organs, impacting metabolic processes, such as insulin sensitivity, that can influence fetal development. Pollutants have also been shown to impact gene expression in infants, potentially having life-long impacts that could transcend generations.

The authors note that the study includes a relatively small sample size. And because the study included only Hispanic mothers, a larger trial is necessary to confirm results apply to other populations.

But Alderete said that in an increasingly diverse country, where racial minorities have been shown repeatedly to shoulder a higher burden of pollutions, it's important to study how those toxins are influencing them.

In 2018, the EPA's National Center for Environmental Assessment published a study showing that poor people and people of color are exposed to as much as 1.5 times more airborne pollutants than their white counterparts.

"Generally speaking, there have not been very many studies that really represent the diversity we have in the United States," she said. "We want to fill that gap."

Meantime, the researchers recommend pregnant women take extra precautions to minimize their exposure to air pollution by closing windows on high ozone days, not exercising outdoors at times of high air pollution and steering clear of activities alongside busy roadways.

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Fungal spores from 250-year-old collections given new lease of life

UNIVERSITY OF COPENHAGEN - FACULTY OF SCIENCE

Research News

 

Echoing through history by reviving fungal specimens originally preserved and described a flabbergasting quarter of a millenium ago by the "Father of Modern Taxonomy" Carl Linnaeus, this study highlights the untapped potential of museum collections in modern research programmes. The results have just been published in the renowned Cell Press journal iScience.

The "desert coprinus" fungus Podaxis has fascinated scientists and explorers for centuries, still the genus has been subjected to relatively little research. These large mushrooms thrive in hostile and mostly species-free environments and while they occur seasonally and unpredictably in deserts and on termite mounds, researchers are faced with a problem common to many biologists: Where do we find it? The researchers from the Department of Biology turned to an unconventional sampling location: Museum collections. By requesting fungal spores from various collections, including the Linnaean Society of London and the Natural History Museum of Denmark, they were able to collect more than 200 specimens from every continent aside from Antarctica. The specimens varied in age from 2 to 250 years old.

Specimen from the South African National Collection of Fungi in Pretoria. Photo: Benjamin Schantz-Conlon

Given the finding that fungal spores can grow after 2-5 years in a museum, the limit for their revival was tested. Eventually the researchers succeeded in germinating and growing two Podaxis specimens collected in the 1770s and classified by Linnaeus in Uppsala. These results reveal an extraordinary capacity for Podaxis spores to remain viable through extended periods of drought and suggests that they can remain dormant in the environment for centuries before germinating once conditions allow.

- "It was really incredible to have these fungi growing in our lab, which we knew had been handled by a scientist as important as Linnaeus, who founded the system of naming species. It allowed us to perform experiments and produce genomes of a quality that would have been impossible with dried specimens," explains postdoc and first author Benjamin Schantz-Conlon of the Department of Biology, University of Copenhagen. Benjamin Schantz-Conlon continues: "It was very interesting to examine the adaptations allowing Podaxis to survive under extreme conditions, hereunder also in herbarium collections where the samples traditionally has been treated with mercury as a pesticide".

The researchers used the specimens to ask whether free-living Podaxis species growing in deserts were genomically and physiologically different from species growing on termite mounds. The results indicated that the association with termites gave rise to smaller genome sizes and a reduced tolerance to stressful conditions.

- "These findings suggest that Podaxis living in association with termites are experiencing a relaxed selection pressure and a potential protection from competition and exposure to stressors in the environment", says corresponding author Michael Poulsen, professor at the Department of Biology.

Podaxis growing on a termite mound. Photo: Z. Wilhelm de Beer Previous research has shown there is an overlap between tolerance to extreme conditions such as deserts and pathogenicity. By comparing the transition from a free-living state in a desert to a symbiotic state within a termite mound, the researchers hoped to learn more about the evolution of fungi that shift to associate with hosts, including pathogens.

- "While Podaxis living in an obligate association with termites exhibited relaxed selection, we also found some Podaxis which could survive both on termite mounds and free-living in deserts. In this case, we saw little genomic or physiological difference between them and the fully free-living Podaxis, suggesting the adaptations for life in the desert may facilitate the initial colonization of termite mounds; something which is also seen in opportunistic pathogens."

An immense resource of knowledge is stored in museum collections and we should work to ensure that these specimens can be used to answer important questions in science in the future.

Untapped rice varieties could sustain crop supplies in face of climate change

EARLHAM INSTITUTE

 NEWS RELEASE 15-JUN-2021

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IMAGE: WORKING ALONGSIDE INTERNATIONAL COLLABORATORS, THE EARLHAM INSTITUTE'S RICE GENOMICS PROJECT IN VIETNAM IDENTIFIES NEW VARIETIES TO HELP BREED CLIMATE-RESILIENT RICE CROPS. view more 

CREDIT: MEKONG DELTA, VIETNAM, MARCH 2014. CREDIT: GEORGINA SMITH, CIAT

Local rice varieties in Vietnam could be used to help breed improved crops with higher resilience to climate change, according to a new study published in Rice.

Earlham Institute researchers are part of an international collaboration with genebanks and rice breeders in Vietnam - championed by the International Rice Research Institute (IRRI) to help abolish world poverty and hunger - are aiming to identify varieties that can survive an increasingly unpredictable climate.

The new genomic data they have generated will significantly support efforts to breed resilient rice crops for optimum global production.

The unparalleled geography and history of Vietnam, together with its diverse range of ecosystems and latitudinal range, means it has been blessed with a vast diversity of rice landraces.

Rice production in Vietnam is of enormous value, both as an export commodity and a daily food staple for the more than 96 million people who live there. An important part of diets worldwide, rice is a healthy, versatile and cheap carbohydrate.

However, climate change is threatening its wide availability, with the country's unique geography and environments putting Vietnam at particular risk.

Critically, it is the world's poorest that are most dependent on this crop, who are also under the most threat from climate change - amplified by the COVID-19 pandemic disrupting food and nutrition security for billions of people.

Green super rice

To fully understand the uniqueness and potential of this native crop diversity, the research team analysed 672 Vietnamese rice genomes; 616 were newly sequenced, which encompass the range of rice varieties grown in the diverse ecosystems found throughout Vietnam.

The team of scientists discovered a previously overlooked 'I5 Indica' large rice subpopulation in some regions of Vietnam, which had not been used before to produce the more common elite rice varieties resulting from previous rice improvement studies.

These locally adapted rice varieties provide a potential source of novel genes that carry important agronomic traits, which can potentially be leveraged by future rice breeding programmes.

This will help with a new generation of 'Green Super Rice', designed to lower production input while enhancing nutritional content and suitability for growing on marginal lands - resulting in a sustainable and resilient rice to better withstand extreme weather conditions.

First author Dr Janet Higgins at the Earlham Institute, said: "Vietnam has a rich history in rice breeding, especially at the local level. The adaptation to multiple environmental conditions and regional preferences has created a wide range of varieties.

"Studies like this suggest that this diversity constitutes a largely untapped and highly valuable genetic resource for local and international breeding programmes."

To understand how rice diversity within Vietnam relates to worldwide varieties, the team analysed nine landrace subpopulations that were likely adapted to the demands in the different regions of origin.

They then compared this new data to the previous global study on rice diversity in Asia, consisting of fifteen worldwide Asian subpopulations (from 89 countries) in the publicly available '3000 Rice Genomes Project'. From this, the Earlham Institute researchers discovered how the new rice varieties native to Vietnam were related to the global Asian data set - leading to the I5 Indica subpopulation finding.

Sustainable rice breeding

This genetic diversity is a highly valuable resource when the highest rice production areas in the low-lying Mekong and Red River Deltas are enduring increasing threats from climate changes - unpredictable weather patterns, increasing sea levels causing overflow of saltwater, and consequential drought in the upland areas.

Dr Higgins, explains: "Improved varieties, which are high yielding but can also be grown sustainably, are needed to ensure we can continue to meet the worldwide demand for rice. Salt and drought tolerance are related critical traits which need to be addressed in order to secure future rice production.

"This requires agronomic, smart crop management practices and genomic solutions to stop the vicious cycle of rice contributing to global warming due to greenhouse gas emissions from crop fields, and areas of production being threatened by climate change.

"We are now analysing the Indica I5 subpopulation in further detail. We hope to try and detect regions of the genome which have been selected in the Indica I5 subpopulation and relate these to traits of interest for sustainable rice crops.

"It would be fantastic if the IRRI were in a position to incorporate some of the Indica I5 varieties from Vietnam we describe in our study in their future breeding programmes. We believe this new data will massively help optimise sustainable rice production for global demand while protecting our planet."

The paper 'Resequencing of 672 Native Rice Accessions to Explore Genetic Diversity and Trait Associations in Vietnam' is published in the journal Rice.

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Balanced rocks set design ground motion values for New Zealand dam

SEISMOLOGICAL SOCIETY OF AMERICA

Research News

 

IMAGE: FRAGILE GEOLOGIC FEATURE, CLYDE DAM AREA, NEW ZEALAND. view more 

CREDIT: MARK STIRLING

For the first time, researchers have used precariously-balanced rocks to set the formal design earthquake motions for a major existing engineered structure--the Clyde Dam, the largest concrete dam in New Zealand.

Mark Stirling of the University of Otago and colleagues identified and assessed the ages of these gravity-defying rock formations located about 2 kilometers from the dam site, using these data to determine the peak ground accelerations that the rocks could withstand before toppling.

This in turn was used to set the Safety Evaluation Earthquake (SEE) spectrum for the dam, or the expected peak earthquake ground motions occurring with a return period of 10,000 years that governs the safety assessment and seismic design of the structure.

As the researchers report in the Bulletin of the Seismological Society of America, the peak ground acceleration for the new SEE spectrum, developed from the rock data as well as an updated seismic hazard model for the region, is significantly reduced compared to their preliminary estimates developed in 2012.

However, the new design ground motion values are similar to those used--by chance--when the dam was built in the 1980s. "There is nothing that needs to be done in the way of dam strengthening," said Stirling. "However, the study shows all the relevant authorities that the dam is compliant given the modern regulations."

The study also "serves as an important proof-of-concept for future applications of fragile geologic features (FGFs) in engineering design," Stirling and his colleagues write.

FGFs are especially useful in setting engineering design parameters in places where the period between relevant earthquakes is very long--10,000 years or more. In these cases, the geologic features can help test probabilistic seismic hazard estimates. While seismologists have explored the usefulness of these features for other engineering design projects, such as the canceled Yucca Mountain nuclear waste repository in Nevada and the Diablo Canyon power plant in California, the Clyde Dam is the first to use fragile features to set design ground motion.

The Clyde Dam is located in the Central Otago "Range and Basin" region of the southern part of New Zealand's South Island. On a broad plateau located southwest of the dam called Cairnmuir flat, outcrops of schist rock that stick up above the landscape are carved by erosion into potentially unstable configurations.

In a painstaking effort, Stirling and colleagues identified these precariously-balanced rocks and took field measurements of their geometries to estimate their fragility. Then the researchers analyzed the formations using radionuclide data that estimate how long a rock surface has been exposed to the atmosphere. These data can show how long a rock has been balanced in a specific position.

"In terms of data collection, it was the FGF age estimation that was most challenging," said Stirling. "It required specialist input, hard physical work, and there were usually large uncertainties in interpreting the dates to say how long the FGFs had been fragile."

By combining these data with information on past earthquakes along the nearby Dunstan fault, Stirling and colleagues concluded that the rocks at Cairnmuir flat had been poised in their unstable positions since at least 24,000 years ago. This suggests that all of them have survived at least two Dunstan fault earthquakes.

The researchers then developed a fragility distribution of all precariously-balanced rocks in their study, based on peak ground acceleration, to determine the peak ground accelerations most likely to topple any random fragile rock structure with greater than 95% probability. This information was used to recommend a new SEE spectrum for the dam site.

Preliminary probabilistic seismic hazard calculations for the site suggested that "the FGFs in the area would be knocked down by these strong ground motions if they occurred--it's easy to roughly estimate the fragility of the features by eye in the field," Stirling explained. But since the features are still standing tall, it was then only a matter of time and research, he added, before the new Clyde Dam hazard estimates were revised.

CAPTION

Fragile geologic feature, Clyde Dam area, New Zealand.

CREDIT

David Barrell

CAPTION

Fragile geologic feature, Clyde Dam area, New Zealand.

CREDIT

David Barrell

 

Research suggests ways to tackle water security challenges in world's drylands

UNIVERSITY OF YORK

Research News

 

IMAGE: DRYLANDS view more 

CREDIT: LINDSAY STRINGER

The research - published ahead of World Day to Combat Desertification and Drought on 17 June 2021 - examines recent and projected climate change impacts on water security across the world's drylands up to the year 2100.

It concludes that more efficient water management, technology and infrastructure, and better demand and supply management can offer more equitable access to water resources and help to achieve development goals.

Lead author, Professor Lindsay Stringer from the Department of Environment and Geography at the University of York said "People in dryland areas are already adapting to climate changes, but they need to be supported with coherent system-oriented policies and institutions that put water security at their core."

Globally, water scarcity already affects between one and two billion people. Drylands in hot, tropical areas have already experienced temperature rises under climate change that is higher than the global average.

Projected climate changes indicate that in a few decades, millions more people (approximately half the world's population) will be living under conditions of high water stress.

The drylands' human and environmental systems could be hampered in their ability to adapt to water dynamics under climate change, with knock-on effects for other places beyond the drylands as well.

The paper's authors strongly support the integration of water concerns across borders and sectors, through approaches such as Integrated Water Resources Management (IWRM).

Professor Stringer said "To make sure no one gets left behind, more attention needs to be paid to how decisions about water management link to other things, like food, energy, livelihoods, migration and human health."

Professor Stringer also argues that achieving water security is not just an environmental challenge, but also a governance issue "We need to ensure access to water and its quality is properly managed. That requires political will, capacity, resourcing and leadership to develop a truly integrated approach to delivering water-related decisions."

"Stakeholder engagement is increasingly important, particularly in complex contexts where dryland rivers flow across multiple national borders, and approaches like IWRM are really vital in shaping more equitable water resource allocation."

The research is published in One Earth.

CAPTION

Wetlands in Drylands

CREDIT

Lindsay Stringer

Notes to editors

Professor Lindsay Stringer is currently a coordinating lead author for the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) Sixth Assessment Report.

DOI: https://doi.org/10.1016/j.oneear.2021.05.010

Bed sharing does not lead to stronger infant-mother attachment or maternal bonding

New research led by the University of Kent has found that there is no link between bed sharing, infant-mother attachment, and infant behavioral outcomes

UNIVERSITY OF KENT

Research News

 

New research led by the University of Kent has found that there is no link between bed sharing, infant-mother attachment, and infant behavioural outcomes.

Contrary to previous beliefs that bed sharing is beneficial (or even required) for babies to develop a secure attachment style and for mothers to develop a strong bond to their baby, researchers have found that it is neither associated with positive or negative outcomes related to infant attachment and maternal bonding.

There is a lot of controversial debate about bed sharing by parents and the infant sleep literature, in particular. Notably, researchers and practitioners recommend against bed sharing, particularly before four months of age due to the increased risk of Sudden Infant Death Syndrome (SIDS).

In reality, parents quite often share their bed with their baby due to several reasons such as practicality and breastfeeding, or because they follow the idea of 'attachment parenting'.

The research paper, published by the Journal of Developmental & Behavioral Pediatrics, analyses data from 178 infants and their parents, at term, three, six and eighteen months. No associations between bed sharing during the first six months and infant-mother attachment and infant behavioural outcomes (attention levels/hyperactivity and task persistence) at eighteen months were found. Similarly, there were no associations between bed sharing during the first six months and maternal bonding and sensitivity in interacting with the infant at consequent assessment points.

This new study, led by Dr Ayten Bilgin (Kent's School of Psychology) alongside Professor Dieter Wolke, Professor of Developmental Psychology and Individual Differences at the University of Warwick concludes that longer follow-up studies on effects on child development may be required.

Dr Bilgin said: 'A lot of people think that bed sharing is necessary to promote secure attachment with infants. However, there is little research in this area and quite mixed evidence. More insight into the outcomes of bed sharing is required to better inform parents, guardians and practitioners.'

Professor Wolke said: 'Around a third of all parents share their bed with their infant during the first 18 months of life occasionally to most nights in this UK study. We found the practice was associated with ease of breastfeeding and dealing with night waking of the baby.'

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The research paper 'Bed-Sharing in the First 6 Months: Associations with Infant-Mother Attachment, Infant Attention, Maternal Bonding and Sensitivity at 18 Months' is published by the Journal of Developmental & Behavioral Pediatrics. doi: 10.1097/DBP.0000000000000966

At underwater site, research team finds 9,000-year-old stone artifacts

Underwater archaeology team finds ancient obsidian flakes 2,000 miles from quarry

UNIVERSITY OF TEXAS AT ARLINGTON

Research News

 

IMAGE: ASHLEY LEMKE, UT ARLINGTON view more 

CREDIT: UT ARLINGTON

An underwater archaeologist from The University of Texas at Arlington is part of a research team studying 9,000-year-old stone tool artifacts discovered in Lake Huron that originated from an ocentral Oregon.

The obsidian flakes from the underwater archaeological site represent the oldest and farthest east confirmed specimens of western obsidian ever found in the continental United States.

obsidian quarry more than 2,000 miles away in "In this case, these tiny obsidian artifacts reveal social connections across North America 9,000 years ago," said Ashley Lemke, assistant professor of sociology and anthropology at UT Arlington. "The artifacts found below the Great Lakes come from a geological source in Oregon, 4,000 kilometers away---making it one of the longest distances recorded for obsidian artifacts anywhere in the world."

The unique study was a multi-faceted pursuit with divers in the water and researchers in the laboratory from UTA, the University of Michigan, Lake Superior National Marine Conservation Area, the University of Missouri Research Reactor Center, the Northwest Research Obsidian Studies Laboratory and the University of Georgia. Their combined work, "Central Oregon obsidian from a submerged early Holocene archaeological site beneath Lake Huron," was published last month in the journal PLOS One.

Because the site was underwater and undisturbed, researchers systematically and scientifically recovered the obsidian, a form of volcanic glass that was used and traded widely throughout much of human history as a prized material for making sharp tools.

"These are very small pieces that have very large stories to tell," Lemke said. "Obsidian from the far western United States is rarely found in the east."

Lemke is a leader and innovator in the field, serving as the chair of the Advisory Council on Underwater Archaeology, an international group dedicated to underwater archaeology and the preservation of underwater cultural resources. She is an expert on submerged ancient sites in the Americas and has researched other areas such as the Gulf of Mexico and Atlantic Ocean.

The find in Lake Huron is part of a broader study to understand the social and economic organization of caribou hunters at the end of the last ice age. Water levels were much lower then; scientists have found, for example, ancient sites like stone walls and hunting blinds that are now 100 feet underwater.

"This particular find is really exciting because it shows how important underwater archaeology is," Lemke said. "The preservation of ancient underwater sites is unparalleled on land, and these places have given us a great opportunity to learn more about past peoples."

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Study reveals bycatch risk for dolphins and porpoises in global small-scale fishe

A new study by Newcastle University shows that the risk of dolphins and porpoises being caught in small-scale (artisanal) fisheries is highest in low- and middle-income regions around the tropics and sub-tropics

NEWCASTLE UNIVERSITY

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IMAGE: THE BYCATCH THREAT OF GLOBAL SMALL-SCALE FISHERIES. view more 

CREDIT: PRODELPHIUS, PERU

A new study by Newcastle University shows that the risk of dolphins and porpoises being caught in small-scale (artisanal) fisheries is highest in low- and middle-income regions around the tropics and sub-tropics.

Marine scientists assessed the risk posed by small-scale fisheries to all 72 species of toothed whales found throughout the world's oceans. They found that this risk was highest in the Central Indo-Pacific, Temperate Northern Pacific, Temperate South America and the Western Indo-Pacific.

Publishing their findings in the journal Fish and Fisheries, the authors argue that addressing the bycatch risks posed by small-scale fisheries in the high-risk regions is especially challenging and must be considered a global priority for toothed whale conservation.

They warn that immediate management and conservation actions are required to reduce and ideally eliminate small-scale fisheries bycatch to prevent species extinctions.

Dr Andrew Temple, Research Associate at the School of Natural and Environmental Sciences and Senior Consultant at MRAG Ltd said: "Fisheries are the greatest threat to the survival of dolphins, porpoises and other toothed whales worldwide. This is the first study to take a global perspective on the threat to these species from small-scale fisheries."

Professor Per Berggren, of Newcastle University's School of Natural and Environmental Sciences, continued: "Small-scale fisheries are a particular threat to species found in coastal shallow waters where dolphin and porpoise distribution overlaps with gillnets use. Our results suggest that some of the most at-risk species are the four species of humpback dolphins, Irrawaddy dolphin, Australian snubfin dolphin, Franciscana dolphin, Guiana dolphin, Indo-Pacific finless porpoise, and the likely soon to be extinct vaquita."

Dr Andrew Temple added: "Our results highlight a "wicked problem" for toothed whale bycatch in small-scale fisheries. Small-scale fisheries are vital to the food, nutritional, and economic security of many communities in low- and middle-income nations. Managers of these fisheries therefore have to carefully balance the actions required to save these species against the risks that these actions might result in unintentional harm to fishing communities that rely on the oceans for their livelihoods. Solving this "wicked problem" is made even more challenging because funds available to fisheries managers are generally more limited in these high-risk regions, making effective fisheries management extremely difficult."

The study authors recognise that conservation actions need to be realistic and will certainly require international collaboration and cooperation. They call for mitigation actions that are tailored to the specific local economic and social contexts, and balance species and human needs.

CAPTION

Global risk assessment of toothed whale by-catch in small-scale fisheries by Large Marine Ecoregion (LME) Realms. (a) Relative risk scores by LME Realm, calculated as the Euclidean distance with fisheries pressure risk and species susceptibility risk as axes. (b) Fisheries pressure relative risk score by LME Realm. (c) Species susceptibility relative risk score by LME Realm. (d) Relative risk scores by LME Realm with associated weighted mean standard errors displayed. LME Realms = Arctic, Central Indo-Pacific (CIP), Eastern Indo-Pacific (EIP), Temperate Australasia (TA), Temperate Northern Atlantic (TNA), Temperate Northern Pacific (TNP), Temperate South America (TSA), Temperate Southern Africa (TSAf), Tropical Atlantic (TAt), Tropical Eastern Pacific (TEP) and Western Indo-Pacific (WIP).