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The chapter investigates the democratic potential of politically and socially oriented civil society organizations (CSOs) to engage citizens and articulate citizens’ interests in the policymaking process in North Macedonia. To do so, the chapter reports on the responses of CSOs to a survey which sought information on the extent to which organizations involve members in organizational activities an

InP quantum dots (QDs) are the most competitive in terms of environmentally friendly QDs. However, the synthesis of InP QDs requires breakthroughs in low-cost and safe phosphorus precursors such as tri(dimethylamino)phosphine [(DMA)3P]. It is found that even if the oxygen is completely avoided, there are still oxidation state defects at the core/shell interface of InP QDs. Herein, the record-break

Right ventricular (RV) volumes are commonly obtained through time-consuming manual delineations of cardiac magnetic resonance (CMR) images. Deep learning-based methods can generate RV delineations, but few studies have assessed their ability to accelerate clinical practice. Therefore, we aimed to develop a clinical pipeline for deep learning-based RV delineations and validate its ability to reduce

Various rational metabolic engineering and random approaches have been applied to introduce and improve xylose utilization and ethanol productivity by Saccharomyces cerevisiae. Among them, the BUD21 gene was identified as an interesting candidate for enhancing xylose consumption as its deletion appeared to be sufficient to improve growth, substrate utilization and ethanol productivity on xylose, e

Diabetes mellitus (DM) incidence have been assessed in connection with air pollution exposure in several studies; however, few have investigated associations with source-specific local emissions. This study aims to estimate the risk of DM incidence associated with source-specific air pollution in a Swedish cohort with relatively low exposure. Individuals in the Västerbotten intervention programme

The end-Triassic Mass Extinction (ETME) is generally regarded as a consequence of the environmental changes associated with the emplacement of the Central Atlantic Magmatic Province (CAMP) and ranks among the ‘big five’ mass extinctions in Earth history. A notable feature of the ETME is a halt in marine carbonate deposition followed by the formation of unusual facies such as carbonate cement fans

Dagens svenska skogsbruk är inte ekologiskt hållbart. Att saluföra det som hållbart är därför – för att tala klarspråk – falsk marknadsföring, skriver forskare.

BACKGROUND: The ability of glucagon-like peptide-1 receptor agonists (GLP-1 RAs) to decrease certain microvascular events has called for the investigation of GLP-1 RAs against diabetic retinopathy (DR), but the evidence is limited. By combining data from observational and Mendelian randomization (MR) studies, we aimed to investigate whether GLP-1 RAs decrease the risk of DR.METHODS: We combined da

Farms can harbor substantial biodiversity, which in turn sustains the supply of ecosystem services. The effectiveness of farm management to enhance biodiversity, however, may be modified by land cover in the surrounding landscape beyond a farmer’s direct control. We examined how landscape pattern and farm management affect the abundance and diversity of native bees visiting highbush blueberry in V

Supporting ecosystem services and conserving biodiversity may be compatible goals, but there is concern that service-focused interventions mostly benefit a few common species. We use a spatially replicated, multiyear experiment in four agricultural settings to test if enhancing habitat adjacent to crops increases wild bee diversity and abundance on and off crops. We found that enhanced field edges

Natural hazards are naturally occurring physical events that can impact human welfare both directly and indirectly, via shocks to ecosystems and the services they provide. Animal-mediated pollination is critical for sustaining agricultural economies and biodiversity, yet stands to lose both from present exposure to natural hazards, and future climate-driven shifts in their distribution, frequency,

Depending on management practices, agricultural lands can either pose substantial barriers to species movement or can support landscape connectivity by linking areas of high-quality habitat. Balancing connectivity and sustainable food production on agricultural lands is critical to conservation in the conterminous United States (CONUS) where agriculture makes up close to half of total land area. H

Spatial aspects of connectivity have received considerable attention from ecologists and conservationists, yet temporal connectivity, the periodic linking of habitats, plays an equally important, but largely overlooked role. Different biological and biophysical attributes of ecosystems underpin temporal connectivity, but here we focus on resource continuity, the uninterrupted availability of forag

Ecosystem services (ES) are an increasingly popular policy framework for connecting biodiversity with human well-being. These efforts typically assume that biodiversity and ES covary, but the relationship between them remains remarkably unclear. Here we analyse >500 recent papers and show that reported relationships differ among ES, methods of measuring biodiversity and ES, and three different app

Animal pollination is an important input to the global food system, affecting 2/3 of crops and worth more than $100 billion annually. Mounting evidence of pollinators’ importance, and of their decline worldwide, has prompted efforts to conserve and restore wild bees within agricultural regions. To date, however, research on the value of wild pollinators has focused largely on crop productivity per

Biodiversity offsets are most commonly used to mitigate the adverse impacts of development on biodiversity, but some offsets are now also designed to support ecosystem services (ES) goals. Here, we assemble a global database of biodiversity offsets (n = 70) to show that 41% already take ES into consideration, with the objective of enhancing cultural, regulating, and provisioning services. We found

Managing the impacts of land use change on ecosystem services is essential to secure human wellbeing; but is a task often complicated by landscape-scale spatial dynamics. In this study, we focus on one type of spatial dynamic: multi-site interactions (MSI), which we define to occur when a change in the supply or use of an ecosystem service at one site affects that service at a second site. In sear

The orchid genera Catasetum employs a hair-trigger activated, pollen release mechanism, which forcibly attaches pollen sacs onto foraging insects in the New World tropics. This remarkable adaptation was studied extensively by Charles Darwin and he termed this rapid response "sensitiveness." Using high speed video cameras with a frame speed of 1000 fps, this rapid release was filmed and from the su