Opportunities in Biology
Opportunities in Biology

Author: National Research Council

Publisher: National Academies

Published: 1989-01-01

Total Pages: 471

ISBN-13: 0309039274

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Biology has entered an era in which interdisciplinary cooperation is at an all-time high, practical applications follow basic discoveries more quickly than ever before, and new technologiesâ€"recombinant DNA, scanning tunneling microscopes, and moreâ€"are revolutionizing the way science is conducted. The potential for scientific breakthroughs with significant implications for society has never been greater. Opportunities in Biology reports on the state of the new biology, taking a detailed look at the disciplines of biology; examining the advances made in medicine, agriculture, and other fields; and pointing out promising research opportunities. Authored by an expert panel representing a variety of viewpoints, this volume also offers recommendations on how to meet the infrastructure needsâ€"for funding, effective information systems, and other supportâ€"of future biology research. Exploring what has been accomplished and what is on the horizon, Opportunities in Biology is an indispensable resource for students, teachers, and researchers in all subdisciplines of biology as well as for research administrators and those in funding agencies.

Conservation Is Our Government Now
Conservation Is Our Government Now

Author: Paige West

Publisher: Duke University Press

Published: 2006-05-31

Total Pages: 353

ISBN-13: 0822388065

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A significant contribution to political ecology, Conservation Is Our Government Now is an ethnographic examination of the history and social effects of conservation and development efforts in Papua New Guinea. Drawing on extensive fieldwork conducted over a period of seven years, Paige West focuses on the Crater Mountain Wildlife Management Area, the site of a biodiversity conservation project implemented between 1994 and 1999. She describes the interactions between those who ran the program—mostly ngo workers—and the Gimi people who live in the forests surrounding Crater Mountain. West shows that throughout the project there was a profound disconnect between the goals of the two groups. The ngo workers thought that they would encourage conservation and cultivate development by teaching Gimi to value biodiversity as an economic resource. The villagers expected that in exchange for the land, labor, food, and friendship they offered the conservation workers, they would receive benefits, such as medicine and technology. In the end, the divergent nature of each group’s expectations led to disappointment for both. West reveals how every aspect of the Crater Mountain Wildlife Management Area—including ideas of space, place, environment, and society—was socially produced, created by changing configurations of ideas, actions, and material relations not only in Papua New Guinea but also in other locations around the world. Complicating many of the assumptions about nature, culture, and development underlying contemporary conservation efforts, Conservation Is Our Government Now demonstrates the unique capacity of ethnography to illuminate the relationship between the global and the local, between transnational processes and individual lives.

U.S. Health in International Perspective
U.S. Health in International Perspective

Author: National Research Council

Publisher: National Academies Press

Published: 2013-04-12

Total Pages: 421

ISBN-13: 0309264146

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The United States is among the wealthiest nations in the world, but it is far from the healthiest. Although life expectancy and survival rates in the United States have improved dramatically over the past century, Americans live shorter lives and experience more injuries and illnesses than people in other high-income countries. The U.S. health disadvantage cannot be attributed solely to the adverse health status of racial or ethnic minorities or poor people: even highly advantaged Americans are in worse health than their counterparts in other, "peer" countries. In light of the new and growing evidence about the U.S. health disadvantage, the National Institutes of Health asked the National Research Council (NRC) and the Institute of Medicine (IOM) to convene a panel of experts to study the issue. The Panel on Understanding Cross-National Health Differences Among High-Income Countries examined whether the U.S. health disadvantage exists across the life span, considered potential explanations, and assessed the larger implications of the findings. U.S. Health in International Perspective presents detailed evidence on the issue, explores the possible explanations for the shorter and less healthy lives of Americans than those of people in comparable countries, and recommends actions by both government and nongovernment agencies and organizations to address the U.S. health disadvantage.

Natural Resources Management and Biological Sciences
Natural Resources Management and Biological Sciences

Author: Edward R Rhodes

Publisher: BoD – Books on Demand

Published: 2021-02-17

Total Pages: 388

ISBN-13: 1838804641

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The natural resources of the Earth are indispensable for the survival of humans, plants, and animals and for the state of biodiversity. The way they are managed determines the extent to which they will be preserved for future generations. Climate change underscores the need for the proper use of natural resources. This book brings together reviews of literature and the results of research studies on the status and management of soil, water, plant, and wildlife resources, especially as they relate to the biological sciences, in Africa, Asia, Europe, North America, and Latin America. It covers work on classification and inventories, impacts of anthropogenic activities, and exploitation and conservation. The book will be of interest to scientists and practitioners of natural resource management worldwide.

Fire Ecology and Management: Past, Present, and Future of US Forested Ecosystems
Fire Ecology and Management: Past, Present, and Future of US Forested Ecosystems

Author: Cathryn H. Greenberg

Publisher: Springer Nature

Published: 2021-10-01

Total Pages: 513

ISBN-13: 3030732673

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This edited volume presents original scientific research and knowledge synthesis covering the past, present, and potential future fire ecology of major US forest types, with implications for forest management in a changing climate. The editors and authors highlight broad patterns among ecoregions and forest types, as well as detailed information for individual ecoregions, for fire frequencies and severities, fire effects on tree mortality and regeneration, and levels of fire-dependency by plant and animal communities. The foreword addresses emerging ecological and fire management challenges for forests, in relation to sustainable development goals as highlighted in recent government reports. An introductory chapter highlights patterns of variation in frequencies, severities, scales, and spatial patterns of fire across ecoregions and among forested ecosystems across the US in relation to climate, fuels, topography and soils, ignition sources (lightning or anthropogenic), and vegetation. Separate chapters by respected experts delve into the fire ecology of major forest types within US ecoregions, with a focus on the level of plant and animal fire-dependency, and the role of fire in maintaining forest composition and structure. The regional chapters also include discussion of historic natural (lightning-ignited) and anthropogenic (Native American; settlers) fire regimes, current fire regimes as influenced by recent decades of fire suppression and land use history, and fire management in relation to ecosystem integrity and restoration, wildfire threat, and climate change. The summary chapter combines the major points of each chapter, in a synthesis of US-wide fire ecology and forest management into the future. This book provides current, organized, readily accessible information for the conservation community, land managers, scientists, students and educators, and others interested in how fire behavior and effects on structure and composition differ among ecoregions and forest types, and what that means for forest management today and in the future.

The Multiple Values of Wilderness
The Multiple Values of Wilderness

Author: H. Ken Cordell

Publisher: Venture Publishing (PA)

Published: 2005

Total Pages: 332

ISBN-13:

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"Gone are those of the 1950s and early 1960s who championed preserving wild lands and who influenced and saw the birth of the National Wilderness Preservation System (NWPS). Gone too are myriad eager managers and proponents of wild land protection of the late 1960s and 1970s who helped rear the fledgling Wilderness system and bring it into adolescence by adding management practices and policy interpretations. In this, the 40th year since the birth of the NWPS, this middle-age federal land system is surrounded by many new faces as its childhood friends have moved on to other callings, have retired, or are no longer with us. Needed in these new times is a clear, comprehensive articulation of the multiple values of Wilderness. The overall purpose of this book is to tell fully what we know about the range of values Americans hold toward the NWPS in a factual, wide-ranging, and science-based way. A multidisciplinary team of authors and researchers clarify the meaning of different types of Wilderness values and present replicable, science-based evidence of these values in this volume. The intended audience is all those new faces who can and do have power over the future of the U.S. National Wilderness Preservation System as well as all who seek to influence those who have this power. This book is also intended for teachers, students, and other inquisitive people involved in formal or informal learning and research programs. The authors intend this compilation to help better inform interested and engaged members of the general public about the values of their public Wilderness areas. After all, it is the American citizen who is ultimately responsible and can influence public policy in the greatest measure through their individual and collective voices and actions." -- Publisher.