1,721,145 research outputs found
Preface
No full textBiodiversity is an important factor in maintaining
existing karst landscapes and nowadays provides
the important indicator of degraded karst
ecosystems.
The Biodiversity and conservation of karst
ecosytems is a synthesis of knowledge about
geological and geomorphological and biological
aspects, which clarifies the required conditions
for maintaining biodiversity on the karst and Karst
edge, a broad region located along the border of
Italy and Slovenia.
In this book we provide brief scientific summaries
of the research work conducted in BioDiNet project
– a network for biodiversity and cultural landscape
conservation. Funding was provided by the
European program of cross-border collaboration
(Slovenia-Italy 2007-2013).
Four major areas were identified as key to the
management of this landscape and require further
investigation.
ΔΔResearch related to genetic variation, species
and ecosystems needs to be integrated
and strengthened in order to provide better
conservation management of endemic
species, ecotypes and habitats.
ΔΔThere is a need to nominate and research bioindicator
species involved in habitat maintenance
to serve as the basis of landscape
scale monitoring programs.
ΔΔA more directed effort is required to estimate
the impact of different pollutants upon cave
ecosystems.
ΔΔDesign and implementation of an effective
conservation monitoring system based on
standardize surveys to aid with the prediction
of future landscape changes and biodiversity
patterns.
The book provides an annex named Guidelines for
the biodiversity conservation of karst ecosystems.
These guidelines are designed for stakeholders
and local public administration and are written in
Slovenian and Italian.
We express our sincere gratitude to the students
and volunteers who have helped researchers during
numerous field trips and with laboratory analyses.
We acknowledge and praise the dedication and
expertise of our co-authors, without their input and
insights this book would not have been possibl
Analysis of hematological parameters of Apis mellifera ligustica (Spinola, 1806) in a polluted site (Chapter 10)
No full textThe main immune defences of the honeybees
are the cellular responses represented by
phagocytosis and melanisation. There are a
number of factors that could impact on the
honeybees’ immune system and, therefore,
increase their susceptibility to disease and lower
their survivorship, such as: exposure to pesticides
in the air, pollen, nectar and water; fungicides from
both field and in-hive treatments; varroacides; the
pest Varroa destructor; antibiotics used in in-hive
treatments; fungal pathogens such Nosema apis
and the emerging Nosema ceranae; bacterial and
viral infections. More important, we highlight the
interactions among different chemicals and their
synergistic effects with diseases in the immune
suppression of individuals and on the colony.
The present study uses methodologies that can
describe the health status of the honeybees, such
as total hemocyte counts (THCs), the activities
of the plasmatic phenoloxidase (PO) and its
inactive form (proPO), to assess the immune
competence of individuals. Specimens of Apis
mellifera ligustica were collected in summer and
early autumn from beehives located in S. Giovanni
(Trieste, “control site”) and from hives placed in
Domio (Trieste, “polluted site”). In both seasons
the statistical comparison showed a greater
number of circulating hemocytes in honeybees
from Domio compared to the numbers recorded
in those from S. Giovanni. The Domio’s honeybees
showed a lower PO and proPO activities than those
from S. Giovanni. It should be noted that 52% of
the bees collected from the hives in Domio had
one or two individuals of Varroa destructor on the
tergites of the thorax. The higher PO and proPO
activities recorded in the bees from S. Giovanni
site are probably due to the different quality
of the environment in the two sampling sites
indicating a depression of non-specific immune
competence and an increased susceptibility to
Varroa destructor parasites in the honeybees from
the polluted site of Domio
The conservation of Apis mellifera (Linnaeus, 1758) in the Karst and Istria
No full textGenetic analyses conducted on bee samples from Istrian Karst have revealed the presence of a high degree of genetic reshuffling of local populations due to repeated imports of non-native bees for commercial purposes. Nevertheless, genetic traces of two presumably native ecotypes are still present. The first is a hybrid between the yellow Italian bee and the grey Carniolan bee and was found mainly in the area of the Karst above Trieste, the natural boundary between the two subspecies. The second, more abundant in Istria, could be the Istrian-Dalmatian ecotype, which is described in the literature as a coastal form of the Carniolan bee adapted to the warmer drier climate of the coastal Karst. These two ecotypes are morphologically very similar, but distinct from a genetic perspective. The identification and characterization of these local strains is a first step to implementing targeted programmes for the conservation and the restoration of their rearing. It then becomes of primary importance to create regulations that prohibit the introduction of non-native bees in the area to curb the risk of extinction of local varieties
Going Beyond Counting First Authors in Author Co-citation Analysis
Full text linkThe present study examines one of the fundamental aspects of author co-citation analysis (ACA) - the way co-citation
counts are defined. Co-citation counting provides the data on which all subsequent statistical analyses and mappings
are based, and we compare ACA results based on two different types of co-citation counting - the traditional type that
only counts the first one among a cited work's authors on the one hand and a non-traditional type that takes into
account the first 5 authors of a cited work on the other hand. Results indicate that the picture produced through this non-traditional author co-citation counting contains more coherent author groups and is therefore considerably clearer. However, this picture represents fewer specialties in the research field being studied than that produced through the traditional first-author co-citation counting when the same number of top-ranked authors is selected and analyzed. Reasons for these effects are discussed
Variations on the Author
Full text link“Variations on the Author” discusses two of Eduardo Coutinho’s recent films (Um Dia na Vida, from 2010, and Últimas Conversas, posthumously released in 2015) and their contribution to the general question of documentary authorship. The director’s filmography is characterized by a consistent yet self-effacing form of authorial self-inscription: Coutinho often features as an interviewer that rather than express opinions propels discourses; an interviewer that is good at listening. This mode of self-inscription characterizes him as an author who is not expressive but who is nonetheless markedly present on the screen. In Um Dia na Vida, however, Coutinho is completely absent form the image, while Últimas Conversas, on the contrary, includes a confessional prologue that moves the director from the margins to the center of his films. This article examines the ways in which these works stand out in the filmography of a director who offers new insights into the notion of cinematic authorship
Appropriate Similarity Measures for Author Cocitation Analysis
Full text linkWe provide a number of new insights into the methodological discussion about author cocitation analysis. We first argue that the use of the Pearson correlation for measuring the similarity between authors’ cocitation profiles is not very satisfactory. We then discuss what kind of similarity measures may be used as an alternative to the Pearson correlation. We consider three similarity measures in particular. One is the well-known cosine. The other two similarity measures have not been used before in the bibliometric literature. Finally, we show by means of an example that our findings have a high practical relevance.information science;Pearson correlation;cosine;similarity measure;author cocitation analysis
Dispelling the Myths Behind First-author Citation Counts
Full text linkWe conducted a full-scale evaluative citation analysis study of scholars in the XML research field to explore just how different from each other author rankings resulting from different citation counting methods actually are, and to demonstrate the capability of emerging data and tools on the Web in supporting more realistic citation counting methods. Our results contest some common arguments for the continued
use of first-author citation counts in the evaluation of scholars, such as high correlations between author rankings by first-author citation counts and other citation
counting methods, and high costs of using more realistic citation counting methods that are not well-supported by the ISI databases. It is argued that increasingly available digital full text research papers make it possible for citation analysis studies to go beyond what the ISI databases have directly supported and to employ more
sophisticated methods
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