Empower farmers to save native ecosystems in agricultural landscapes

Peer-Reviewed Publication

UNIVERSITY OF SOUTH AUSTRALIA

 

IMAGE: LESS THAN 5% OF NATIVE VEGETATION REMAINING ON PRIVATE PROPERTIES AND ROADSIDES ON THE YORKE PENINSULA OF SOUTH AUSTRALIA view more 

CREDIT: "JOHNBURG. GHOST TOWN BEYOND GOYDERS LINE. ESTABLISHED FOR FARMING IN 1879 IN SEMI DESERT COUNTRY. THE ROAD ACROSS THE OLADDIE HILLS TO CARRIETON." BY DENISBIN IS LICENSED UNDER CC BY-ND 2.0.

With less than 5% of native vegetation remaining on private properties and roadsides on the Yorke Peninsula of South Australia, University of South Australia researchers are calling for dramatic changes to land management measures in order to retain native ecosystems and prevent further biodiversity loss.

 

In a move to understand the barriers to native habitat conservation on and around farming properties, UniSA researchers surveyed 35 farmers managing 11% (56,980 hectares) of farming land on the Yorke Peninsula.

 

Conducted in partnership with the Kangaroo Island Research Station, the new study found that native vegetation conservation was  often hindered by a lack of trust and cohesion between farmers and the local Council, and a lack of access to natural resource management information.

 

UniSA researcher and PhD student Bianca Amato says farmers and rural communities must prioritise working together to protect and maintain native ecosystems.

 

“Agriculture is one of the main causes of land degradation and land clearance, leading to irreversible species and ecosystem endangerment in Australia,” Amato says.

 

“On the heavily cleared Yorke Peninsula, native vegetation loss has terrible consequences for ecosystem functions and biodiversity conservation.

 

“Little appropriate information is readily available for conservation, and most farmers rely on their own experience to manage vegetation.”

 

On the Yorke Peninsula, 86% of farmers use an agronomist for support and advice on new technologies, policy, best practices, and commercial enterprises. The researchers say that agronomists could play an important role in conservation.

 

“Dependence on agronomists for farming productivity means that most of the Yorke Peninsula area is in great part managed by very few agronomists, who currently have little stake in conservation. The inclusion of on-farm conservation as part of their role would be an effective way to facilitate positive landscape management,” Amato says.

 

“We need a radical change in policy and education to permit agronomists to champion conservation as part of their work, and to empower farmers to make positive changes in farming practices.”

 

The researchers also found that farmers’ distrust in Council and State Government organisations impeded conservation.

 

“Farmers believe that roadside management by Council is inadequate and that they can do a better job,” Amato says.

 

“Some also believe that other Government agencies are distanced from their needs in landscape management and their experience.

 

“To protect native vegetation, farmers must be empowered as leaders of conservation projects, with the support of Government agencies acting as facilitators rather than project managers. Only by working together will we be able to save some these remnant native habitats.”

 

Globally, agriculture occupies around 40% of the world’s land and is a major contributor to biodiversity loss and extinction. 86% of threatened species are at risk of extinction because of agriculture.

 

On the Yorke Peninsula, 24 out of 30 terrestrial native mammals are locally extinct.

 

Co-researcher, UniSA’s Sophie ‘Topa’ Petit says that demonstrating the tangible benefits of wildlife and remnant/roadside vegetation to farming, via Government schemes, could facilitate on-farm conservation.

 

“Farmers are attached to their land and care about wildlife. But those who are high adopters of on-farm conservation practices tend to be shunned by their peers,” Assoc Prof Petit says.

 

“They mentioned that the high competition among farmers tended to overshadow social connections. Loss of social networks can lead to isolation, High adopters of conservation felt somewhat ostracised and unable to share their views with their peers.

 

“We also noticed that farmers were hesitant to speak about their emotional connections to the land. They would say something like ‘native vegetation makes me feel good… but is that a benefit?’ Wellbeing is most definitely a benefit, and I suspect that accepting that wellbeing is central to successful farming could improve social connections and conservation in many farming landscapes.

 

“We recommend that, with the support of Government schemes, conservation be considered an integral part of farming success and be celebrated

 

“Farming success is more than yield. It is quality of life, the safety of ecosystem services, habitat and wildlife conservation, and the vibrancy of a close-knit community.”

 

…………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………

 

Media contact: Annabel Mansfield M: +61 479 182 489 E: Annabel.Mansfield@unisa.edu.au

Researchers:
Bianca Amato E: Bianca.Amato@outlook.com

Assoc Prof Sophie ‘Topa’ Petit E: Sophie.Petit@unisa.edu.au

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JOURNAL

Agriculture and Human Values

DOI

10.1007/s10460-023-10458-y 

METHOD OF RESEARCH

Case study

SUBJECT OF RESEARCH

People

ARTICLE TITLE

Improving conservation outcomes in agricultural landscapes: farmer perceptions of native vegetation on the Yorke Peninsula, South Australia

 

Early humans in the Hula Valley invested in systematic procurement of raw materials hundreds of thousands of years ago – much earlier than previously assumed

Peer-Reviewed Publication

TEL-AVIV UNIVERSITY

 

IMAGE: HANDAXES FROM GESHER BENOT YA'AQOV TESTED GEOCHEMICALLY. ARROWS INDICATE THE STRIKING OF FLAKES SAMPLED. view more 

CREDIT: TEL AVIV UNIVERSITY

A new study from Tel Aviv University and Tel-Hai College solves an old mystery: Where did early humans in the Hula Valley get flint to make the prehistoric tools known as handaxes? The researchers applied advanced methods of chemical analysis and AI to identify the geochemical fingerprints of handaxes from the Hula Valley's oldest prehistoric sites, Ma'ayan Barukh and Gesher Benot Ya'aqov. Their findings indicate that the raw material came from exposures of high-quality flint in the Dishon Plateau, about 20km to the west, and hundreds of meters above the Hula Valley. The researchers: "Our findings indicate that these early humans had high social and cognitive abilities: they were familiar with their surroundings, knew the available resources, and made great efforts to procure the high-quality raw materials they needed. For this purpose, they planned and carried out long journeys, and transferred this essential knowledge to subsequent generations."

 

The study was led by Dr. Meir Finkel of the Department of Archaeology and Ancient Near East Cultures, Tel Aviv University and Prof. Gonen Sharon of the MA Program in Galilee Studies, Tel-Hai College, in collaboration with Prof. Erez Ben-Yosef, Tel Aviv University, Dr. Oded Bar and Dr. Yoav Ben Dor, the Geological Survey of Israel, and Ofir Tirosh, the Hebrew University. The paper was published in Geoarchaeology.

 

Dr. Finkel: "The Hula Valley, located along the Dead Sea Transform Rift, is well known for its many prehistoric sites, the oldest of which date back to 750,000 years before present (YBP). The valley offered early humans rich sources of water, vegetation, and game, right on the northward migration route from Africa - the Great African Rift Valley. These early inhabitants left behind them many artifacts, including thousands of handaxes – flint stones chiseled to fit the human hand. One of the earliest and most universal tools produced by humans, the handaxe may have served as a multipurpose 'penknife' for many different tasks, from cutting game meat to digging for water and extracting roots. It was used in many different parts of the Old World, in Africa, Asia, and Europe, for about 1.5 million years."

 

In the present study the researchers looked for the source of the raw material used to produce thousands of handaxes found at two prehistoric sites in the Hula Valley: Gesher Benot Ya'aqov, dated to 750,000 YBP and Ma'ayan Barukh, dated to 500,000 YBP, both of the Acheulian culture.  Prof. Sharon: "Approximately 3,500 handaxes were found scattered on the ground at Ma'ayan Barukh, and several thousands more were discovered at Gesher Benot Ya'aqov. The average hand axe, a little over 10cm long and weighing about 200g, was produced by reducing stones that are five times larger – at least 1kg of raw material. In other words, to make the 3,500 handaxes found at Ma'ayan Barukh alone, early humans needed 3.5 tons of flint. But where did they obtain such a huge amount of flint? Many researchers have tried to answer this question, but our study was the first to use innovative 21st century technologies: advanced chemical analysis and an AI algorithm developed specifically for this purpose."

 

The researchers took samples from 20 handaxes – 10 from Gesher Benot Ya'aqov and 10 from Ma'ayan Barukh, ground them into powder and dissolved the powder in acid in a clean lab. For each sample they measured the concentration of approximately 40 chemical elements, using an ICP-MS (inductively coupled plasma mass spectrometer), a state-of-the-art device that accurately measures the concentration of dozens of elements, down to a resolution of one particle per billion.

 

In addition, in order to locate possible flint sources available to the Hula Valley's prehistoric inhabitants, the researchers conducted a field survey covering flint exposures in the Safed Mountains, Ramim Ridge, Golan Heights, and Dishon Plateau, as well as cobbles from streams draining into the Hula Valley: the Jordan, Ayun, Dishon, Rosh Pina, and Mahanayeem. This methodical survey was combined with a comprehensive literature review led by Dr. Bar of the Geological Survey of Israel. Flint samples collected from all potential sources were then analyzed using ICP-MS technology to enable comparison with the handaxes. A novel computational approach specially adapted by Dr. Ben Dor of the Geological Survey of Israel was used for this comparison. 

  

The Gesher Benot Ya'aqov area

CREDIT

Tel Aviv University

Dr. Ben Dor: "The complex process, from collecting and preparing the samples to the chemical analysis, produced a very large amount of data for each sample. To enable optimal matching between data from the archaeological artifacts and data from the flint exposures, we developed a dedicated algorithm based on several computational steps, alongside machine learning models. Thus, we were able to classify the archaeological artifacts according to the database derived from the geological samples."

 

Dr. Finkel: "Through the computational process we discovered that all 20 archaeological artifacts were made of flint from a single source: the Dishon Plateau's flint exposures dating back to the Eocene geological epoch, about 20km west of the Gesher Benot Ya'aqov and Ma'ayan Barukh sites. At the Dishon Plateau we also found a prehistoric flint extraction and reduction complex, indicating that the place served as a flint source for hundreds of thousands of years. In addition, we demonstrated that cobbles from streams draining into the Hula Valley were too small to be used as raw material for handaxes, ruling out this possibility."

 

Prof. Ben-Yosef: "Our findings clearly indicate that humans living in the Hula Valley hundreds of thousands of years ago, probably hominids of the homo erectus species, possessed high cognitive and social capabilities. To procure suitable raw materials for producing their vital handaxes, they planned and carried out 20km hikes that included an ascent from 70 to 800 meters above sea level. Moreover, they passed on this important knowledge from one generation to the next, over many millennia. All these suggest a high level of sophistication and ability, which modern researchers do not usually attribute to prehistoric humans from such an early period."

Link to the article:

onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1002/gea.21968

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DOI

10.1002/gea.21968 

Bioengineered yeast feed on agricultural waste

Result sets the stage for biomanufacturing of biofuels and other products with a very low carbon footprint

Peer-Reviewed Publication

TUFTS UNIVERSITY

 

IMAGE: BIOENGINEER NIKHIL NAIR AND HIS TEAM AT TUFTS UNIVERSITY SCHOOL OF ENGINEERING DEVELOPED BIOSYNTHETIC YEAST THAT CAN FEED ON SUGARS FROM AGRICULTURAL WASTE. THE INNOVATION SETS THE STAGE FOR MORE SUSTAINABLE METHODS FOR THE PRODUCTION OF BIOFUELS AND OTHER BIOSYNTHETIC PRODUCTS view more 

CREDIT: PHOTO BY ALONSO NICHOLS

Yeast has been used for thousands of years in the production of beer and wine and for adding fluff and flavor to bread. They are nature’s tiny factories that can feed on sugars found in fruit and grains and other nutrients – and from that menu produce alcohol for beverages, and carbon dioxide to make bread rise.

Researchers at Tufts University School of Engineering report making modified yeast that can feed on a wider range of materials, many of which can be derived from agricultural by-products that we don’t use – leaves, husks, stems, even wood chips – what is often referred to as “waste biomass”.

Why is it important to make yeast that can feed on these agricultural leftovers?

In recent years, scientists have modified yeast to make other useful products like pharmaceuticals and biofuels. It’s a clever way to let nature do our work in a way that does not require toxic chemicals for manufacturing. The technology – referred to as “synthetic biology” – is still young, but looking ahead to a future where biosynthetic production from yeast would operate at a very large scale, we need to feed yeast on something other than what we ourselves need to eat.

A lot to chew on – engineering yeast to grow on biomass sugars

The novel yeast made by the Tufts team can feed on sugars like xylose, arabinose and cellobiose which can be extracted from the indigestible woody parts of crops that are often tossed aside after harvesting, like corn stalks, husks and leaves, and wheat stems. About 1.3 billion tons of this waste biomass is produced each year, providing more than enough sugars to drive a vast industry of yeast biosynthesis.

“If we can get yeast to feed on waste biomass, we can create a biosynthetic industry with a low carbon footprint,” said Nikhil Nair, associate professor of Chemical and Biological Engineering at Tufts School of Engineering. “For example, when we burn biofuels made by yeast, we produce a lot of carbon dioxide, but that carbon dioxide is re-absorbed into crops the following year, which the yeast feed on to make more biofuel, and so on.”

Minimal engineering for maximum output

Nair and his team thought that the best chance for efficient consumption of waste biomass sugars might be to modify an existing genetic “dashboard” that the yeast uses to regulate galactose consumption (a sugar commonly found in dairy products). The dashboard, called a regulon, includes genes for sensors that detect the presence of sugar, and triggers enzymes for the chemical breakdown of sugar so its carbon and oxygen components can be rebuilt into new components. The new components are mostly small molecules and proteins that the yeast itself needs to survive, but they can also be novel products that scientists might have engineered into the yeast.

In an earlier study, the researchers modified the galactose regulon so that the sensor detects the biomass sugar xylose, and triggers enzymes to process xylose instead of galactose.

“Getting yeast to grow on xylose was an important advance,” said Sean Sullivan, a graduate student in the Nair lab who co-led the recent study, “but re-engineering different yeast organisms to grow on each biomass sugar is not the best approach. We wanted to design a single yeast organism that can feed off a complete, or nearly complete menu of biomass sugars.”

Sullivan made only minimal changes to the regulon already designed for xylose, by changing the sensor protein to more generally accept xylose, arabinose and cellobiose. Apart from a few more minor changes, the new regulon allowed the yeast organism to grow on these three sugars at rates comparable to yeast grown on native sugars glucose and galactose.

“By using native regulatory networks linked to cell growth and survival, we could take a minimal engineering approach to modifying and optimizing sugar consumption,” said Vikas Trivedi, a post-doctoral researcher who co-led the study. “It just so happens that yeast has the machinery to grow on non-native sugars, as long as we adapt sensors and regulons to recognize those sugars.”

Improving the back end of production

Remodeling yeast to grow on waste biomass sugars sets the stage for improved production of biosynthesized products, which includes drugs such as insulin, human growth hormone and antibodies. Yeast has also been engineered to produce vaccines by expressing small fragments of virus that stimulate the immune system.

In fact, yeast can be re-engineered to produce natural compounds used to make drugs, which are otherwise difficult to source because they have to be extracted from rare plants. These include scopolamine used for relieving motion sickness and postoperative nausea, and atropine used to treat Parkinson’s disease patients, and artemensin, used to treat malaria.

Ethanol is a well-known biofuel produced by yeast, but researchers have also engineered the organism to produce other fuels such as isobutanol and isopentanol, which can deliver more energy per liter than ethanol.

Bioengineered yeast can also produce building blocks of bioplastics, such as polylactic acid, which can then be used to make a variety of products, including packaging materials and consumer goods, without having to draw from petroleum sources.

“While the research community continues to innovate yeast to make new products, we are preparing the organism to grow efficiently on agricultural waste biomass, closing a carbon cycle that has so far eluded the manufacturing of fuels, pharmaceuticals and plastics,” said Nair.

 

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JOURNAL

Metabolic Engineering

DOI

10.1016/j.ymben.2023.07.001 

METHOD OF RESEARCH

Experimental study

SUBJECT OF RESEARCH

Cells

ARTICLE TITLE

Towards universal synthetic heterotrophy using a metabolic coordinator

ARTICLE PUBLICATION DATE

18-Jul-2023

 

Can we predict if a plant species will become exotic?

Peer-Reviewed Publication

PENSOFT PUBLISHERS

 

IMAGE: AGRICULTURAL LANDSCAPE DOMINATED BY EXOTIC SPECIES OF EUROPEAN ORIGIN (MERCED VERNAL POOL AND GRASSLAND RESERVE, CALIFORNIA, U.S.A.). view more 

CREDIT: DR JAVIER GALÁN DÍAZ

Plant species become exotic after being accidentally or deliberately transported by humans to a new region outside their native range, where they establish self-perpetuating populations that quickly reproduce and spread. This is a complex process mediated by many factors, such as plant traits and genetics, which challenges the creation of general guidelines to predict or manage plant invasions. Scientists from Spanish and Australian institutions have now defined a new framework to find the predictors of invasiveness, investigating species that have succeeded or failed to establish abroad after following similar historical introduction routes.

Dr Javier Galán Díaz, University of Seville, Spain, Dr Enrique G. de la Riva, University of León, Spain, Dr Irene Martín-Forés, The University of Adelaide, Australia, and Dr Montserrat Vilà, Doñana Biological Station (EBD-CSIC), Spain, described their findings in a new paper in the open-access journal NeoBiota.

“While current policies exert strong control on the import and export of living organisms, including pests, across countries, until only a few decades ago, very little attention was paid to this issue. This means that many species were translocated to new regions without any consideration of their potential impacts,” says Dr Javier Galán Díaz.

An example of this is the massive plant exchange among Mediterranean‐type regions as a consequence of European colonialism: crops and cattle were exported, along with tools and materials, potentially bringing along the seeds of many plant species.

“So far, most studies on plant invasions have tried to explain the success of exotic species by comparing their traits with those of the native plant communities where they arrive, or by comparing the traits of plant species that have achieved different levels of invasion in the same region. But, if we take into account that the most common plant species from European agricultural landscapes have been in contact with humans and have therefore had the potential to be inadvertently transported to other Mediterranean regions, then only those that have successfully invaded other regions have something different in them that allowed them to establish and spread abroad,” Dr Galán Díaz explains.

Following this approach, the scientists found that, when comparing plant species transported from the Mediterranean Basin to other Mediterranean-climate regions (California, Central Chile, the Cape Region of South Africa and Southwestern and South Australia) in the search of predictors of invasiveness, only those species with large distribution ranges that occupy climatically diverse habitats in their native region became exotic. Also, species with many dispersal vectors (for instance those that have seeds dispersed by animals, water or wind), long bloom periods and acquisitive above- and belowground strategies of resource use are most likely to become exotic. Most of this plant information is readily available or easy to obtain from free and open-access repositories.

“Determining the factors that pre-adapt plant species to successfully establish and spread outside of their native ranges constitutes a powerful approach with great potential for management,” the researchers write in their paper. “This framework has the potential to improve prediction models and management practices to prevent the harmful impacts from species in invaded communities.”

“Using the existing information, we can identify the key species to monitor. This is especially encouraging in the era of Big Data, where observations from citizen science applications add to those of scientists, increasing the potential of screening systems,” Dr Galán Díaz says in conclusion.

  

Ancient agricultural landscape dominated by plant species introduced in other Mediterranean regions (Parque Natural de Los Alcornocales, Andalucía, Spain).

CREDIT

Dr Javier Galán Díaz

Original source:

Galán Díaz J, de la Riva EG, Martín-Forés I, Vilà M (2023) Which features at home make a plant prone to become invasive? NeoBiota 86: 1-20. https://doi.org/10.3897/neobiota.86.104039

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JOURNAL

NeoBiota

DOI

10.3897/neobiota.86.104039 

ARTICLE TITLE

Which features at home make a plant prone to become invasive?

Ultra-processed foods largely missing from US food policy

Few federal and state policies consider ultra-processed foods, but policy activity is growing

Peer-Reviewed Publication

NEW YORK UNIVERSITY

Ultra-processed foods—including industrially produced packaged snacks, fruit-flavored drinks, and hot dogs—have been linked to health issues ranging from weight gain to certain cancers. So where are the food policies helping Americans to steer clear of these foods?

 

A new study published in the American Journal of Preventive Medicine finds that only a small number of U.S. policies consider ultra-processed foods, lagging behind countries such as Belgium, Brazil, and Israel. 

 

“In some countries, ultra-processed foods have been directly integrated into national dietary guidelines and school food programs, but in the U.S., few policies directly target ultra-processed foods,” said Jennifer Pomeranz, associate professor of public health policy and management at NYU School of Global Public Health and the first author of the study.

 

After decades of focusing on single nutrients such as protein, fat, and carbohydrates in nutrition science and food policy, a growing body of evidence shows that there is more to dietary quality than nutrients.

 

“It’s clear that the extent of processing of a food can influence its health effects, independent of its food ingredients or nutrient contents. Ultra-processed foods generally contain ‘acellular nutrients’—nutrients lacking any of the natural intact food structure of the source ingredient—and other industrial ingredients and additives that together can increase risk of weight gain, diabetes, and other chronic diseases,” said study co-author Dariush Mozaffarian, the Jean Mayer Professor of Nutrition at the Friedman School of Nutrition Science and Policy at Tufts.

 

Only a few countries around the world directly regulate ultra-processed foods, but those that do have limited its consumption in schools and recommend eating less ultra-processed food in dietary guidelines. The U.S. Dietary Guidelines for Americans, which inform the country’s food and nutrition policies, do not currently mention ultra-processed food. However, the scientific advisory committee for the 2025-2030 U.S. Dietary Guidelines has been tasked with evaluating research related to ultra-processed foods consumption as it relates to weight gain. 

 

To understand how U.S. policymakers have already addressed ultra-processed foods in policies, the researchers gathered all federal and state statutes, bills, resolutions, regulations, proposed rules, and Congressional Research Services reports related to “highly processed” and “ultra-processed” food. 

 

They identified only 25 policies—eight at the federal level and 17 at the state—that were proposed or passed between 1983 and 2022. The vast majority (22 of 25) were proposed or passed since 2011, showing that U.S. policy making on ultra-processed foods is quite recent.

 

The U.S. policies on ultra-processed foods tend to mention them as contrary to healthy diets. Most policies had to do with healthy eating for children, including limiting ultra-processed foods in schools and teaching kids about nutrition. Another common theme was the relatively higher price of healthy food versus ultra-processed foods. Only one policy (a Massachusetts school food bill) actually defined ultra-processed foods, and three policies sought to address the broader food environment by providing incentives to small retailers to stock healthy foods. 

 

“The emerging policy language in the U.S. on ultra-processed foods is consistent with international policies on the topic. We would urge a more robust discussion and consideration of ultra-processed foods for future policymaking,” added Pomeranz. “The United States should consider processing levels in school food policies—especially to update the ‘Smart Snack’ rules—and to ensure the U.S. Dietary Guidelines reflect the evidence on ultra-processed foods and health.”

 

Jerold Mande of the Harvard T.H. Chan School of Public Health and Nourish Science was also a co-author of the study. The research was supported by the National Institutes of Health (2R01HL115189-06A1).

 

About the NYU School of Global Public Health

At the NYU School of Global Public Health (NYU GPH), we are preparing the next generation of public health pioneers with the critical thinking skills, acumen, and entrepreneurial approaches necessary to reinvent the public health paradigm. Devoted to employing a nontraditional, interdisciplinary model, NYU GPH aims to improve health worldwide through a unique blend of global public health studies, research, and practice. The School is located in the heart of New York City and extends to NYU's global network on six continents. Innovation is at the core of our ambitious approach, thinking and teaching. For more, visit: publichealth.nyu.edu

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JOURNAL

American Journal of Preventive Medicine

DOI

10.1016/j.amepre.2023.07.006 

ARTICLE TITLE

U.S. Policies Addressing Ultra-processed Foods, 1980-2022

 

New research sheds light on factors influencing trust and bias in societies

Peer-Reviewed Publication

SOCIETY FOR PERSONALITY AND SOCIAL PSYCHOLOGY

People with more positive perceptions of their nation’s institutions are more likely to show favoritism toward fellow citizens, according to new research in Social Psychological and Personality Science. This research suggests that support for national institutions could pose a challenge for establishing trust across borders.

Researchers also found that people who identify strongly with their own nation are likely to favor their fellow citizens, which aligns with previous studies. The possible role of trust in national institutions, however, was an unexpected development for researchers.

“We observed greater favoritism in trust toward fellow citizens (as opposed to foreigners) from participants who yielded more positive perceptions of institutions as trustworthy, benevolent, and able to provide security,” says author Dr. Giuliana Spadaro, of Vrije Universiteit Amsterdam.

Researchers asked more than 3,200 participants in 17 societies to play a game that measured the level of trustworthiness they expect from a fellow citizen, someone not from their country, and an unidentified stranger.

Previous research has shown that institutions offering more support and security can guarantee safe interactions with others outside of a person’s in-group. Based on these findings, Dr. Spadaro’s team hypothesized that people with a more positive opinion of their country’s institutions would be less likely to show favoritism toward other citizens. Researchers were surprised to find that people with more faith in institutions were more likely to favor their fellow citizens.

“Trust among strangers is an essential feature of functioning societies,” says Dr. Spadaro. “Our findings can inform citizens about the potential factors that might be associated to discrimination, such as national identification or being embedded in well-functioning institutions.”

Dr. Spadaro emphasized that these findings do not show the cause of in-group favoritism, but rather that it is associated with positive opinions of national institutions. As a result, these findings should be considered preliminary and an encouragement for further investigation.

Looking ahead, Dr. Spadaro also believes that researchers should examine how people’s attitudes toward institutions within their own local communities play a role in favoritism.

“More attention should be paid to perceptions of local (compared to national) institutions, as citizens have a higher chance to interact first hand with local institutional representatives (e.g., police, municipalities, bureaucrats), and might actively rely on these perceptions,” says Dr. Spadaro.

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JOURNAL

Social Psychological and Personality Science

DOI

10.1177/19485506231172330 

METHOD OF RESEARCH

Experimental study

SUBJECT OF RESEARCH

People

ARTICLE TITLE

Identity and institutions as foundations of ingroup favoritism: An investigation across 17 countries.

ARTICLE PUBLICATION DATE

20-Jul-2023

How eelgrass spread around the world

An international research team led by GEOMAR reconstructs the worldwide colonisation history of the most widespread marine plant

Peer-Reviewed Publication

HELMHOLTZ CENTRE FOR OCEAN RESEARCH KIEL (GEOMAR)

Seagrasses evolved from freshwater plants and use sunlight and carbon dioxide (CO2) for photosynthesis and are able to thrive in depths down to 50 metres. In contrast to algae, they possess roots and rhizomes that grow in sandy to muddy sediments. The grass-like, leaf-shoots produce flowers and complete their life cycle entirely underwater. Seeds are negatively buoyant but seed-bearing shoots can raft, thus greatly enhancing dispersal distances at oceanic scale.

As a foundational species, eelgrass provides critical shallow-water habitats for diverse biotas and also provides numerous ecosystem services including carbon uptake. Seagrasses have recently been recognised as one of the important nature-based contributions to store carbon in the ocean. The sediment below seagrass meadows can sequester between 30 and 50 times more carbon annually that the roots of forests on land. Unfortunately, the continuing loss of seagrass beds worldwide – including eelgrass – is of acute concern.

An international group of researchers coordinated by Professor Thorsten Reusch, Head of the Research Division Marine Ecology at GEOMAR Helmholtz Centre for Ocean Research Kiel, used complete nuclear and chloroplast genomes from 200 individuals and 16 locations to reconstruct and date the colonisation history of the eelgrass Zostera marina from its origin in the Northwest Pacific Ocean to the Pacific, Atlantic and the Mediterranean. The findings described in a peer-reviewed publication and a Research Briefing published today in the scientific journal Nature Plants beg the question, “How well will eelgrass adapt to our new, rapidly changing climate?”

Using a phylogenomic approach the scientists were able to determine that eelgrass plants first crossed the Pacific from west to east in at least two colonization events, probably supported by the North Pacific Current. The scientists then applied two DNA “molecular clocks” – one based on the nuclear genome and one based on the chloroplast genome – to deduce the time when eelgrass populations diverged into new ones. The DNA mutation rate was calculated and calibrated against an ancient, whole genome duplication that occurred in eelgrass.

Both nuclear and chloroplast genomes revealed that eelgrass dispersed to the Atlantic through the Canadian Arctic about 243 thousand years ago. This arrival is far more recent than expected – thousands of years versus millions of years, as is the case with most Atlantic immigrant species during the Great Arctic Exchange some 3.5 million years ago. Reusch explains: “We thus have to assume that there were no eelgrass-based ecosystems – hotspots of biodiversity and carbon storage – in the Atlantic before that time. Recency was also mirrored in an analysis of the associated faunal community, which features many fewer specialised animals in the Atlantic as compared to the Pacific eelgrass meadows. This suggests that there was less time for animal-plant co-evolution to occur”, said Reusch. Mediterranean populations were founded from the Atlantic about 44 thousand years ago and survived the Last Glacial Maximum. By contrast, today’s populations found along the western and eastern Atlantic shores only (re)expanded from refugia after the Last Glacial Maximum, about 19 thousand years ago – and mainly from the American east coast with help from the Gulf Stream.

In addition, the researchers further confirmed the huge difference in genomic diversity between the Pacific and Atlantic, including latitudinal gradients of reduced genetic diversity in northern populations. “Both Atlantic compared to Pacific populations, and northern versus southern ones are less diverse on a genetic level than their ancestors by a factor of 35 among the most and least diverse one”, summarised postdoctoral scientist Dr. Lei Yu, first author of the publication which was a chapter in his doctoral thesis. “This is due to bottlenecks arising from past ice ages, which raises concerns as to how well Atlantic eelgrass, will be able to adapt to climate change and other environmental stressors based on its genetic capacity.”

“Warming oceans have already caused losses of seagrass meadows at the southern range limits, in particular North Carolina and southern Portugal. In addition, heat waves have also caused losses in shallow waters in some the northern parts of the distribution,” noted Reusch. “This is not good news because seagrass meadows form diverse and productive ecosystems, and no other species is able to take on the role of eelgrass if meadows cannot persist under future conditions.”

“One possibility for restoration might be to borrow some genetic diversity from Pacific eelgrass to fortify diversity in the Atlantic. Our next step is to interrogate the eelgrass pangenome. A new reference genome from Pacific eelgrass is currently under development and should tell us more about the adaptive ecotypic capacity across its global range of habitats,” said Prof. Jeanine Olsen, emeritus professor from the University of Groningen who initiated the study and coordinated the work between the Joint Genome Institute (JGI) and the research team. Thus, the verdict on rapid adaptation is out but there’s reason for optimism.

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JOURNAL

Nature Plants

DOI

10.1038/s41477-023-01464-3 

METHOD OF RESEARCH

Data/statistical analysis

SUBJECT OF RESEARCH

Not applicable

ARTICLE TITLE

Ocean current patterns drive the worldwide colonization of eelgrass (Zostera marina)

ARTICLE PUBLICATION DATE

20-Jul-2023