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Star wars : Doctor Aphra
\"Following her time in the clutches of Darth Vader, Doctor Aphra has barely escaped with her life. If the Dark Lord of the Sith ever learns of her survival, he'll hunt her to the ends of the galaxy. But for now, it's time for a return to what she does best. With droids Triple-Zero and BeeTee-One in tow, as well as Wookiee Black Krrsantan, she's off in search of rare artifacts from the galactic center to the Outer Rim -- and everywhere in between. Aphra's got debts to pay, after all. Just as long as she can stay one step ahead of the Empire, some bounty hunters...and just about everyone else in the galaxy!\"--Back cover of Volume 1.
Book
Linking climate warming and land conversion to species’ range changes across Great Britain
Although increased temperatures are known to reinforce the effects of habitat destruction at local to landscape scales, evidence of their additive or interactive effects is limited, particularly over larger spatial extents and longer timescales. To address these deficiencies, we created a dataset of land-use changes over 75 years, documenting the loss of over half (>3000 km
2
) the semi-natural grassland of Great Britain. Pairing this dataset with climate change data, we tested for relationships to distribution changes in birds, butterflies, macromoths, and plants (
n
= 1192 species total). We show that individual or additive effects of climate warming and land conversion unambiguously increased persistence probability for 40% of species, and decreased it for 12%, and these effects were reflected in both range contractions and expansions. Interactive effects were relatively rare, being detected in less than 1 in 5 species, and their overall effect on extinction risk was often weak. Such individualistic responses emphasise the importance of including species-level information in policies targeting biodiversity and climate adaptation.
Climate change and land use change may have independent or interactive effects on species’ distributions. Here, the authors show that changes in bird, lepidopteran and plant ranges across Great Britain are often explained by individual or additive effects of land conversion and temperature change.
Journal Article
Portugal
Lonely Planet's Portugal is your passport to the most up-to-date advice on what to see and skip, and what hidden discoveries await you. Explore the labyrinthine alleyways of Lisbon's Alfama district; discover the baroque churches and plazas of Ribeira in Porto; and play in the waves in the Algarve - all with your trusted travel companion.
Book
Extinction risk from climate change is reduced by microclimatic buffering
Protecting biodiversity against the impacts of climate change requires effective conservation strategies that safeguard species at risk of extinction1. Microrefugia allowed populations to survive adverse climatic conditions in the past2,3, but their potential to reduce extinction risk from anthropogenic warming is poorly understood3–5, hindering our capacity to develop robust in situ measures to adapt conservation to climate change6. Here, we show that microclimatic heterogeneity has strongly buffered species against regional extirpations linked to recent climate change. Using more than five million distribution records for 430 climate-threatened and range-declining species, population losses across England are found to be reduced in areas where topography generated greater variation in the microclimate. The buffering effect of topographic microclimates was strongest for those species adversely affected by warming and in areas that experienced the highest levels of warming: in such conditions, extirpation risk was reduced by 22% for plants and by 9% for insects. Our results indicate the critical role of topographic variation in creating microrefugia, and provide empirical evidence that microclimatic heterogeneity can substantially reduce extinction risk from climate change.
Journal Article
Star Wars, Doctor Aphra. Vol. 2, Doctor Aphra and the enormous profit
\"Aphra's back with a brand-new plan that's guaranteed to pay! There's just one teensy problem... it involves surrounding herself with some of the galaxy's biggest baddies. And they don't like the not-so-good doctor's tricks! Her mission to make quick credits by auctioning off an ancient Jedi artifact will start well... and end badly. And that's just when a dark figure from Aphra's past decides to make an appearance! Plus, a solo focus on Aphra's Wookiee shadow, Black Krrsantan! Find out why this beastly bounty hunter is as frightening as they say... and then some!\"--Back cover.
Book
The design, launch and assessment of a new volunteer-based plant monitoring scheme for the United Kingdom
Volunteer-based plant monitoring in the UK has focused mainly on distribution mapping; there has been less emphasis on the collection of data on plant communities and habitats. Abundance data provide different insights into ecological pattern and allow for more powerful inference when considering environmental change. Abundance monitoring for other groups of organisms is well-established in the UK, e.g. for birds and butterflies, and conservation agencies have long desired comparable schemes for plants. We describe a new citizen science scheme for the UK (the 'National Plant Monitoring Scheme'; NPMS), with the primary aim of monitoring the abundance of plants at small scales. Scheme development emphasised volunteer flexibility through scheme co-creation and feedback, whilst retaining a rigorous approach to design. Sampling frameworks, target habitats and species, field methods and power are all described. We also evaluate several outcomes of the scheme design process, including: (i) landscape-context bias in the first two years of the scheme; (ii) the ability of different sets of indicator species to capture the main ecological gradients of UK vegetation; and, (iii) species richness bias in returns relative to a professional survey. Survey rates have been promising (over 60% of squares released have been surveyed), although upland squares are under-represented. Ecological gradients present in an ordination of an independent, unbiased, national survey were well-represented by NPMS indicator species, although further filtering to an entry-level set of easily identifiable species degraded signal in an ordination axis representing succession and disturbance. Comparison with another professional survey indicated that different biases might be present at different levels of participation within the scheme. Understanding the strengths and limitations of the NPMS will guide development, increase trust in outputs, and direct efforts for maintaining volunteer interest, as well as providing a set of ideas for other countries to experiment with.
Journal Article
The grand food bargain : and the mindless drive for more
When it comes to food, Americans seem to have a pretty great deal.Our grocery stores are overflowing with countless varieties of convenient products.But like most bargains that are too good to be true, the modern food system relies on an illusion.It depends on endless abundance, but the planet has its limits.
eBook
Avengers arena : the complete collection
\"Trapped on an isolated island, sixteen superhuman teens -- including members of the Runaways and Avengers Academy -- are given a chilling ultimatum by their demented captor. And only one of them will make it out alive! Thus begins a primal battle that tests each combatant's skills, stamina, and morals. Welcome to Arcade's Murderworld -- where secrets are plenty, alliances are fleeting, and the key to victory might be rewriting the rules of the game\"--Page [4] of cover.
Book
Anthropogenic climate and land-use change drive short- and long-term biodiversity shifts across taxa
Climate change and habitat loss present serious threats to nature. Yet, due to a lack of historical land-use data, the potential for land-use change and baseline land-use conditions to interact with a changing climate to affect biodiversity remains largely unknown. Here, we use historical land use, climate data and species observation data to investigate the patterns and causes of biodiversity change in Great Britain. We show that anthropogenic climate change and land conversion have broadly led to increased richness, biotic homogenization and warmer-adapted communities of British birds, butterflies and plants over the long term (50+ years) and short term (20 years). Biodiversity change was found to be largely determined by baseline environmental conditions of land use and climate, especially over shorter timescales, suggesting that biodiversity change in recent periods could reflect an inertia derived from past environmental changes. Climate–land-use interactions were mostly related to long-term change in species richness and beta diversity across taxa. Semi-natural grasslands (in a broad sense, including meadows, pastures, lowland and upland heathlands and open wetlands) were associated with lower rates of biodiversity change, while their contribution to national-level biodiversity doubled over the long term. Our findings highlight the need to protect and restore natural and semi-natural habitats, alongside a fuller consideration of individual species’ requirements beyond simple measures of species richness in biodiversity management and policy.
Analysing changes in observations of birds, butterflies and plants in Great Britain over more than 50 years, the authors show that climate change and land conversion have led to increases in richness, biotic homogenization and warmer-adapted communities over both the long and short terms.
Journal Article