High-resolution data are necessary to understand the effects of climate on plant population dynamics of a forest herb

Climate is assumed to strongly influence species distribution and abundance. Although the performance of many organisms is influenced by the climate in their immediate proximity, the climate data used to model their distributions often have a coarse spatial resolution. This is problematic because the local climate experienced by individuals might deviate substantially from the regional average. This problem is likely to be particularly important for sessile organisms like plants and in environments where small-scale variation in climate is large. To quantify the effect of local temperature on vital rates and population growth rates, we used temperature values measured at the local scale (in situ logger measures) and integral projection models with demographic data from 37 populations of the forest herb Lathyrus vernus across a wide latitudinal gradient in Sweden. To assess how the spatial resolution of temperature data influences assessments of climate effects, we compared effects from models using local data with models using regionally aggregated temperature data at several spatial resolutions (≥1 km). Using local temperature data, we found that spring frost reduced the asymptotic population growth rate in the first of two annual transitions and influenced survival in both transitions. Only one of the four regional estimates showed a similar negative effect of spring frost on population growth rate. Our results for a perennial forest herb show that analyses using regionally aggregated data often fail to identify the effects of climate on population dynamics. This emphasizes the importance of using organism-relevant estimates of climate when examining effects on individual performance and population dynamics, as well as when modeling species distributions. For sessile organisms that experience the environment over small spatial scales, this will require climate data at high spatial resolutions.

Climate adaptation of biodiversity conservation in managed forest landscapes

Conservation of biodiversity in managed forest landscapes needs to be complemented with new approaches given the threat from rapid climate change. Most frameworks for adaptation of biodiversity conservation to climate change include two major strategies. The first is the resistance strategy, which focuses on actions to increase the capacity of species and communities to resist change. The second is the transformation strategy and includes actions that ease the transformation of communities to a set of species that are well adapted to the novel environmental conditions. We suggest a number of concrete actions policy makers and managers can take. Under the resistance strategy, five tools are introduced, including: identifying and protecting forest climate refugia with cold-favored species; reducing the effects of drought by protecting the hydrological network; and actively removing competitors when they threaten cold-favored species. Under the transformation strategy, we suggest three tools, including: enhancing conditions for forest species favored by the new climate, but currently disfavored by forest management, by planting them at suitable sites outside their main range; and increasing connectivity across the landscape to enhance the expansion of warm-favored species to sites that have become suitable. Finally, we suggest applying a landscape perspective and simultaneously managing for both retreating and expanding species. The two different strategies (resistance and transformation) should be seen as complementary ways to maintain a rich biodiversity in future forest ecosystems.

Forest microclimates and climate change: Importance, drivers and future research agenda

Forest microclimates contrast strongly with the climate outside forests. To fully understand and better predict how forests' biodiversity and functions relate to climate and climate change, microclimates need to be integrated into ecological research. Despite the potentially broad impact of microclimates on the response of forest ecosystems to global change, our understanding of how microclimates within and below tree canopies modulate biotic responses to global change at the species, community and ecosystem level is still limited. Here, we review how spatial and temporal variation in forest microclimates result from an interplay of forest features, local water balance, topography and landscape composition. We first stress and exemplify the importance of considering forest microclimates to understand variation in biodiversity and ecosystem functions across forest landscapes. Next, we explain how macroclimate warming (of the free atmosphere) can affect microclimates, and vice versa, via interactions with land-use changes across different biomes. Finally, we perform a priority ranking of future research avenues at the interface of microclimate ecology and global change biology, with a specific focus on three key themes: (1) disentangling the abiotic and biotic drivers and feedbacks of forest microclimates; (2) global and regional mapping and predictions of forest microclimates; and (3) the impacts of microclimate on forest biodiversity and ecosystem functioning in the face of climate change. The availability of microclimatic data will significantly increase in the coming decades, characterizing climate variability at unprecedented spatial and temporal scales relevant to biological processes in forests. This will revolutionize our understanding of the dynamics, drivers and implications of forest microclimates on biodiversity and ecological functions, and the impacts of global changes. In order to support the sustainable use of forests and to secure their biodiversity and ecosystem services for future generations, microclimates cannot be ignored.

The role of age and mode of delivery in the STEPS intervention: a longitudinal pilot-study in treatment of posttraumatic stress symptoms in Danish survivors of sexual assault

Background: The STEPS programme has been succesfully implemented as a group-based treatment of trauma symptoms after rape for adolescents. The STEPS intervention was translated from Dutch to Danish and offered to adults in addition to adolescents as well as an individual intervention in addition to a group-based intervention at a Danish Centre for Rape Victims through 2011 to 2014. The programme was translated from Dutch to Danish and expanded to adults in addition to adolescents as well as to an individual intervention in addition to a group-based intervention at a Danish Centre for Rape Victims through 2011 to 2014. Objective: The present study observes  development in trauma symptoms and ICD-11 diagnostic status during an adapted version of the intervention programme 'STEPS' for survivors of sexual assault. Methods: A prospective uncontrolled study was conducted, monitoring symptoms of posttraumatic stress and other trauma-related symptomatology before treatment, after treatment and at 6 and 12 months' follow up for 103 referrals receiving individual or group-based STEPS. Tentative diagnoses of posttraumatic stress disorder (PTSD) and complex PTSD were assigned to participants according to the ICD-11 to observe the development in diagnostic status across time, and multilevel modelling was used to assess the development of symptom severity and to assess the moderating effect of age-group and mode of delivery. Results: A loglinear function representing large and statistically significant decline in symptomatology over time provided the best fit for all measures of trauma-related symptomatology. The decline was not moderated by age-group or mode of intervention. Dropout rates were independent of mode of intervention and age. Conclusion: The adaption of the STEPS programme to adults and as an individual intervention is feasible and maintains effect sizes comparable to those observed in the original intervention. Further research using randomized controlled trials is needed to ascribe the observed effect to the STEPS programme.

The Dangers of Being a Small, Oligotrophic and Light Demanding Freshwater Plant across a Spatial and Historical Eutrophication Gradient in Southern Scandinavia

European freshwater habitats have experienced a severe loss of plant diversity, regionally and locally, over the last century or more. One important and well-established driver of change is eutrophication, which has increased with rising population density and agricultural intensification. However, reduced disturbance of lake margins may have played an additional key role. The geographical variation in water chemistry, which has set the scene for - and interacted with - anthropogenic impact, is much less well understood. We took advantage of some recently completed regional plant distribution surveys, relying on hundreds of skilled citizen scientists, and analyzed the hydrophyte richness to environment relations in five contiguous South-Scandinavian regions. For three of the regions, we also assessed changes to the freshwater flora over the latest 50-80 years. We found a considerable variation in background total phosphorus concentrations and alkalinity, both within and between regions. The prevalence of functional groups differed between regions in accordance with the environmental conditions and the species' tolerance to turbid waters. Similarly, the historical changes within regions followed the same trend in correspondence to the altered environmental conditions over time. Small submerged species decreased relative to tall submerged and floating-leaved species along the regional and historical eutrophication gradients. These changes were accompanied by systematically greater relative abundance of species of higher phosphorus prevalence. We conclude that species traits in close correspondence with anthropogenic impacts are the main determinants of local, regional and historical changes of species distribution and occupancy, while pure biogeography plays a minor role. Conservation measures, such as re-oligotrophication and re-established disturbance regimes through grazing and water level fluctuations, may help reduce the tall reed vegetation, restore the former richness of the freshwater flora and safeguard red-listed species, although extended time delays are anticipated in nutrient-rich regions, in which species only survive at minute abundance in isolated refugia.

Secretory immunoglobulin deposits in renal glomeruli of children with extrahepatic biliary atresia: studies in a human counterpart of experimental ligation of the bile ducts

Experimental ligation of the biliary tract often results in glomerular deposits of polymeric IgA commonly associated with secretory component. These studies offer evidence that, in animals, hepatobiliary transport of polymeric IgA, which is of mucosal origin, is crucial for its clearance from the serum. We studied a human counterpart of bile duct ligation--extrahepatic biliary atresia--for the presence of secretory or polymeric immunoglobulins in renal glomeruli. Kidney was available at autopsy as paraffin or frozen blocks from 24 patients with biliary atresia and age-matched controls (5 weeks to 5 years old). Several of the patients had undergone portoenterostomy (Kasai procedure) or liver transplantation. Immunohistologic studies showed glomerular (often mesangial) deposits of IgA in 10 of 24 and IgM in 16 of 24 specimens. The differences with controls were highly significant for IgA but not for IgM. In frozen sections, secretory component was positive in glomeruli in seven of 12 specimens. In vitro glomerular binding of purified secretory component to glomeruli was shown in four of 12 samples, including three with IgM only. This last observation suggests that IgM in some of these patients was polymeric and thus derived from a mucosal source. Our study shows that in humans with biliary atresia, secretory IgA, polymeric IgA, and possibly polymeric IgM are deposited in glomeruli. The study confirms the occurrence of renal immunopathologic findings in liver disease and supports the existence of an active hepatobiliary immunosecretory transport mechanism even at the early age of these patients.