Treesearch

This research note describes the development of a pre-assessment survey of urban Black, Indigenous, and People of Color (BIPOC) youth participating in the Outward Bound Adventures (OBA) Environmental Studies Expeditions (ESE) program. The objective of the pre-assessment was to understand their baseline perceptions of nature and their experiences with the outdoors within their cultural context, as well as to inform the pre-and post-surveys that would be used to measure the benefits of OBA’s ESE program by focusing on participants’ understanding of nature, self-improvement, and the effect of...

Advance preparation for wildfire is essential for safe evacuation, and fire weather warnings can alert people to times of high fire danger when additional actions are recommended. However, little is known about the level of preparation of most wildland-urban interface (WUI) community residents, and potential influences on them carrying out preparatory actions. This study assessed the personal preparation undertaken by residents of California, United States, communities, including understanding of and response to fire weather warnings issued by the National Weather Service. We used a...

Cellulose is the most abundant naturally occurring polysaccharide. Its inherent mechanical stability, biocompatibility, biodegradability, and abundant hydroxyl groups available for derivatization provide benefits in the production of fiber-based materials such as conductive fibers. Cellulose derivatives, including cellulose esters such as cellulose acetate (CA), are readily generated in the fiber form following dissolution using a variety of solvents. Electrospinning is one of the emerging technologies with an outstanding ability to regenerate fibers in the nanoscale range. Polyaniline...

Alterations to the fire regime have contributed to widespread regeneration failure in oak (Quercus) forests of the eastern United States. Our long-term study was initiated in 2010 in southern Indiana to examine how oak reproduction in a dry oak forest responded to shelterwood and midstory treatments followed by a spring prescribed burn. We tracked the survival, height, and resprout response of individual seedlings through time, and tallied overall seedling density pre- and post-treatments. Mixed-effects models and nonmetric multidimensional scaling (NMDS) ordination were used to evaluate...

Current and long-term historic commercial logging in the Black Hills National Forest provided a cost-effective opportunity to investigate exotic plant responses to a wide range of thinning intensities on a large scale. We asked two questions. First, after over 125 years of post-settlement commercial logging, what role does the pre-harvest exotic plant community play in post-harvest responses to logging. Second, how does a broad range of harvest intensities influence exotic plant responses on a large spatial scale. We averaged exotic species relative cover and relative richness to create a...

Background. Wildfires, prescribed fires and slash-pile burns are disturbances that occur in many terrestrial ecosystems. Such fires produce variable surface heat fluxes causing a spectrum of effects on soil, such as seed mortality, nutrient loss, changes in microbial activity and water repellency. Accurately modeling soil heating is vital to predicting these second-order fire effects. The process-based Massman HMV (Heat-Moisture-Vapor) model incorporates soil water evaporation, heat transport and water vapor movement, and captures the observed rapid evaporation of soil moisture. Aims....

Although coal extraction is an important source of income for several countries, including Colombia, there are problems associated with mining activities, especially in open-pit coal mines. One of these is the deposition of air-borne dust in areas surrounding open pit mines, the accumulation of which can result in changes to the biogeochemistry of surrounding soils, as well as potential impacts on soil organisms, which have an important role in the maintenance of soil physicochemical properties, and other functional attributes of soils. This study aimed to determine the ecotoxicological...

Changing built environment conditions to impact health mindsets and health equity may be a promising target for public health interventions. The present study was a cluster randomized controlled trial to test the impact of remediating vacant and abandoned properties on factors related to health mindset—including well-being, health interconnectedness, social capital markers, neighborhood disorder, and worry—as well as direct and indirect violence experiences and the moderating role of racial and income segregation on outcomes. A residential cohort of 405 participants from 194 randomly...

Rates of family violence, including intimate partner violence (IPV) and child maltreatment, remain high in the USA and contribute to substantial health and economic costs. How neighborhood environment may influence family violence remains poorly understood. We examine the association between neighborhood vacant and abandoned properties and family violence, and the role collective efficacy may play in that relationship. Data were used from a longitudinal cohort of 218 maternal-child dyads in a southern US city known for elevated rates of violence. Women were matched on their propensity...

Context: As land-use change and climate change transform landscapes globally, increases in habitat fragmentation and shifts in habitat composition present challenges for the conservation of wildlife. Behavioral approaches to landscape ecology can explore how animal movement across complex landscapes can drive ecological processes like functional connectivity. By integrating mechanisms that link landscape change to animal behavior, simulation models can project how individuals and populations will respond to novel landscapes. Objectives: To understand how dispersal behavior and functional...