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Photosynthetic productivity is a key determinant of the abundance and distribution of biodiversity around the world. The effect of this productivity on the distribution patterns of mammals is frequently invoked; however, it is seldom measured directly. In this study, we used Sherman live traps set in dry and rainy seasons across a 2300-m elevation gradient in southwestern Mexico to assess small rodent species distributions, and to relate these patterns to habitat structure, climate, and a well-accepted measure of photosynthetic productivity: the normalized difference vegetation index (NDVI). While habitat structure and climate helped explain some of the patterns observed, NDVI proved to be the most important contributing variable for most of the distribution models. We also found that partitioning the gradient-distribution model by trapping season revealed strong differences in terms of the effect of NDVI and the other explanatory variables. For example, lower elevations were associated with seasonal and year-round reductions in rodent diversity and were composed almost exclusively of granivore-based species assemblages. By contrast, the middle and upper elevations were more species rich, less affected by seasonality, and characterized by omnivorous species. Our results suggest that the positive productivity-diversity relationship found may be due, at least in part, to increased food resources and niche opportunities at more productive elevations. Increased diversity at the higher elevations may also be partially due to reductions in competition that result from productivity increases, as well as from the broader spectrum of feeding guild representation that it and the lack of seasonality allow.
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Biodiversidad , Roedores , Animales , Ecosistema , México , Estaciones del AñoRESUMEN
Purpose The integration of oral health and primary care offers promising solutions to overcome barriers hindering patient access to oral health care. However, primary care providers require training in basic preventive oral health care and information regarding interprofessional practice opportunities. The purpose of this feasibility study was to examine the perspective of families, learners, faculty, and administrators who engaged in an interprofessional training experience for family medicine residents and dental hygiene students.Methods Family medicine residents and dental hygiene students participated in an interprofessional oral health integration training experience, which included didactic, preclinical, and clinical components. The clinical experience was conducted during a Medicaid Managed Care clinic session, which included the participation of children who had not undergone a well-child visit within the past year. The care teams were comprised of a family medicine resident and dental hygiene student, who collaborated on the provision of preventive oral health care services, including oral examinations, preventive interventions, patient education, and care coordination. Qualitative data gathered using field notes, focus groups, and key informant interviews were analyzed to identify themes from care team, patient/family, and administrative perspectives.Results The care teams provided preventive health oral health care services to 10 pediatric patients during their well child visit. Patients and family members reported appreciating the convenience and value of the care provided. The experience was well received by family medicine residents, dental hygiene students, and clinical faculty members, who highlighted the value of the experience in expanding access to care. The family medicine residents reported the training and interprofessional practice opportunity to be highly valuable, reporting better preparation for the identification, evaluation, and treatment of oral conditions that they may have otherwise overlooked or misdiagnosed.Conclusions This interprofessional educational experience demonstrates the potential value of integrating preventive oral health in primary care visits for children. This care integration may be especially helpful for populations that experience barriers to oral health care. Results of this study suggest that expanding interprofessional education between dental hygiene programs and family medicine residencies may be beneficial for preparing the future workforce for integrated care. Additional research is needed to formalize training models that support integration and promote interprofessional collaboration and practice.
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Higienistas Dentales , Medicina Familiar y Comunitaria , Internado y Residencia , Humanos , Medicina Familiar y Comunitaria/educación , Higienistas Dentales/educación , Grupo de Atención al Paciente , Niño , Atención Primaria de Salud , Estudios de Factibilidad , Salud Bucal/educación , Estados Unidos , Femenino , Masculino , Grupos Focales , Relaciones InterprofesionalesRESUMEN
Indiana University School of Dentistry remains committed to graduate competent general dentists. In the face of the cost of dental education, we are open to explore alternative educational and clinical models to enhance the educational experience for all students, while reducing the cost to provide that education. As dean, I welcome your thoughts and ideas to further reduce educational costs.
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Educación en Odontología/economía , Facultades de Odontología/economía , Costos y Análisis de Costo , Financiación Gubernamental , Humanos , Indiana , Apoyo a la Formación Profesional/economía , Estados UnidosRESUMEN
The IU School of Dentistry remains committed to serving its statewide mission to educate highly qualified individuals in preparation for the independent practice of dentistry. National dental workforce analyses indicate a stable number or slight decline in the number of dentists to 2025. Previous Indiana data indicate that 29 percent of nonresidents remain in the state following graduation. We believe our analysis strongly supports a need for DDS enrollment expansion consistent with the IUPUI Enrollment Shaping strategy if we are to achieve our goal of garnering new financial resources to construct a new dental building.
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Odontología , Odontólogos/provisión & distribución , Facultades de Odontología , Estudiantes de Odontología/estadística & datos numéricos , Odontología/tendencias , Odontólogos/tendencias , Educación en Odontología/tendencias , Humanos , Indiana , Facultades de Odontología/economía , Estados Unidos , Recursos HumanosRESUMEN
AIM: Incorporate species' trait information together with climate projections for associated habitat to assess the potential vulnerability of rodent taxa to climate change. LOCATION: Oaxaca State, Mexico. METHODS: We used a trait-based approach together with climate exposure models to evaluate the vulnerability of rodent species to projected climate conditions in the study region. Vulnerability was estimated based on three factors: (a) Level of climatic exposure that species are projected to experience across their current statewide range; (b) inherent species-specific sensitivity to stochastic events; and (c) species' capacity to cope with climate change effects. We defined species as inherently sensitive if they had any of the following: restricted geographic distribution in Mexico; narrow altitudinal range; low dispersal ability; or long generation length. RESULTS: Vulnerability varied depending on the climate change scenario applied. Under the MPI general circulation model and current emissions trends, by 2099, all species evaluated were projected to have some level of threat (vulnerable for at least one factor), with 4 out of 55 species vulnerable for all three factors, 29 for two factors, and 22 for one factor. Six out of ten rodent species endemic to Oaxaca were vulnerable for two or more factors. We found that species with narrow and restricted-range distributions combined with low adaptive capacity were projected to be particularly vulnerable. MAIN CONCLUSIONS: By including species-specific trait information in climate exposure assessments, researchers can contextualize and enhance their understanding about how climate change is likely to affect individual taxa in an area of interest. As such, studies like this one provide more relevant threat assessment information than exposure analyses alone and serve as a starting point for considering how climatic changes interact with an array of other variables to affect native species across their range.
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This article reviews current dental education economic challenges such as increasing student tuition and debt, decreasing funds for faculty salaries and the associated faculty shortage, and the high cost of clinic operations and their effect on the future of dentistry. Management tactics to address these issues are also reviewed. Despite recent efforts to change the clinical education model, implementation of proposed faculty recruitment and compensation programs, and creation of education- corporate partnerships, the authors argue that the current economics of public dental education is not sustainable. To remain viable, the dental education system must adopt transformational actions to re-engineer the program for long-term stability. The proposed re-engineering includes strategies in the following three areas: 1) educational process redesign, 2) reduction and redistribution of time in dental school, and 3) development of a regional curriculum. The intent of these strategies is to address the financial challenges, while educating adequate numbers of dentists at a reasonable cost to both the student and the institution in addition to maintaining dental education within research universities as a learned profession.
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Educación en Odontología/economía , Apoyo a la Formación Profesional , Control de Costos , Curriculum , Clínicas Odontológicas/economía , Docentes de Odontología/provisión & distribución , Humanos , Modelos Económicos , Modelos Educacionales , Innovación Organizacional , Asociación entre el Sector Público-Privado , Regionalización , Factores de TiempoRESUMEN
BACKGROUND: Quantifying terrestrial carbon (C) stocks in vineyards represents an important opportunity for estimating C sequestration in perennial cropping systems. Considering 7.2 M ha are dedicated to winegrape production globally, the potential for annual C capture and storage in this crop is of interest to mitigate greenhouse gas emissions. In this study, we used destructive sampling to measure C stocks in the woody biomass of 15-year-old Cabernet Sauvignon vines from a vineyard in California's northern San Joaquin Valley. We characterize C stocks in terms of allometric variation between biomass fractions of roots, aboveground wood, canes, leaves and fruits, and then test correlations between easy-to-measure variables such as trunk diameter, pruning weights and harvest weight to vine biomass fractions. Carbon stocks at the vineyard block scale were validated from biomass mounds generated during vineyard removal. RESULTS: Total vine C was estimated at 12.3 Mg C ha-1, of which 8.9 Mg C ha-1 came from perennial vine biomass. Annual biomass was estimated at 1.7 Mg C ha-1 from leaves and canes and 1.7 Mg C ha-1 from fruit. Strong, positive correlations were found between the diameter of the trunk and overall woody C stocks (R2 = 0.85), pruning weights and leaf and fruit C stocks (R2 = 0.93), and between fruit weight and annual C stocks (R2 = 0.96). CONCLUSIONS: Vineyard C partitioning obtained in this study provides detailed C storage estimations in order to understand the spatial and temporal distribution of winegrape C. Allometric equations based on simple and practical biomass and biometric measurements could enable winegrape growers to more easily estimate existing and future C stocks by scaling up from berries and vines to vineyard blocks.
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BACKGROUND: Understanding preventive dental visit utilization patterns facilitates planning of the dental health services delivery system. The authors examine these patterns by analyzing the receipt of preventive dental services in the United States by type of dental provider. METHODS: The authors analyzed data from the 1996 Medical Expenditure Panel Survey (MEPS) for the U.S. community-based population. They developed national estimates for the population with preventive dental visits by provider type, including the population with a preventive dental visit and mean number of preventive dental visits per person for socioeconomic and demographic categories. RESULTS: Respondents who are white, are older, are female, have dental insurance, are from higher income and education backgrounds, and reside in small metropolitan areas were more likely (P < .05) to receive preventive care from a dental hygienist than from a dentist. CONCLUSION: MEPS data showed that people's socioeconomic background and other demographic factors were associated with having a preventive dental visit with a dentist or dental hygienist. These factors also influence the per-person number of preventive visits by type of dental practitioner. These elements must be considered when planning for future dental work force needs. PRACTICE IMPLICATIONS: Estimating future dental work force needs through this analysis assists dentists in meeting patient demand and maximizing the productive output of all services rendered in their practices, including preventive services.
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Atención Odontológica/estadística & datos numéricos , Higienistas Dentales/estadística & datos numéricos , Odontólogos/estadística & datos numéricos , Odontología Preventiva , Adulto , Factores de Edad , Escolaridad , Etnicidad , Femenino , Gastos en Salud , Humanos , Seguro Odontológico , Masculino , Características de la Residencia , Factores Sexuales , Clase Social , Estados Unidos , Recursos HumanosRESUMEN
The factors that contribute to perceptual simulation during sentence comprehension remain underexplored. Extant research on perspective taking in language has largely focused on linguistic constraints, such as the role of pronouns in guiding perspective adoption. In the present study, we identify preferential usage of egocentric and allocentric reference frames in individuals, and test the two groups on a standard sentence-picture verification task. Across three experiments, we show that individual biases in spatial reference frame adoption observed in non-linguistic tasks influence visual simulation of perspective in language. Our findings suggest that typically reported grand-averaged effects may obscure important between-subject differences, and support proposals arguing for representational pluralism, where perceptual information is integrated dynamically and in a way that is sensitive to contextual and especially individual constraints.
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Lenguaje , Procesamiento Espacial , Estimulación Acústica , Adulto , Comprensión , Humanos , Individualidad , Lingüística , Masculino , Estimulación LuminosaRESUMEN
Despite many years of investigation into implicit learning in nonlinguistic domains, the potential for implicit learning to deliver the kinds of generalizations that underlie natural language competence remains unclear. In a series of experiments, we investigated implicit learning of the semantic preferences of novel verbs, specifically, whether they collocate with abstract or concrete nouns. After reading sentences containing the verbs, participants were required to judge the familiarity of pairs of novel verbs and nouns and to indicate their confidence or the basis of their judgment (i.e., guess, intuition, memory). Although all of the words had occurred in the texts, none of the critical items had actually occurred together. However, endorsement rates were significantly higher for pairs that respected the semantic preference rules than those that did not. Through analysis of subjective measures and verbal report, we argue that, for the majority of participants, this effect was based on unconscious knowledge. We argue that implicit learning of the kind of generalizations underlying semantic preferences is possible even after limited exposure.
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Aprendizaje , Multilingüismo , Semántica , Adulto , Concienciación , Femenino , Humanos , Juicio , Pruebas del Lenguaje , Masculino , Pruebas Psicológicas , Reconocimiento en PsicologíaRESUMEN
This opinion article applauds the recent introduction of a new dental accreditation standard addressing critical thinking and problem-solving, but expresses a need for additional means for dental schools to demonstrate they are meeting the new standard because articulated outcomes, learning models, and assessments of competence are still being developed. Validated, research-based learning models are needed to define reference points against which schools can design and assess the education they provide to their students. This article presents one possible learning model for this purpose and calls for national experts from within and outside dental education to develop models that will help schools define outcomes and assess performance in educating their students to become practitioners who are effective critical thinkers and problem-solvers.
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Acreditación/normas , Educación en Odontología/normas , Aprendizaje , Modelos Educacionales , Pensamiento , Competencia Clínica/normas , Educación Basada en Competencias/normas , Conferencias de Consenso como Asunto , Evaluación Educacional/métodos , Humanos , Solución de ProblemasRESUMEN
Research supports the claim that, when understanding language, people perform mental simulation using those parts of the brain which support sensation, action, and emotion. A major criticism of the findings quoted as evidence for embodied simulation, however, is that they could be a result of conscious image generation strategies. Here we exploit the well-known fact that bilinguals routinely and automatically activate both their languages during comprehension to test whether this automatic process is, in turn, modulated by embodied simulatory processes. Dutch participants heard English sentences containing interlingual homophones and implying specific distance relations, and had to subsequently respond to pictures of objects matching or mismatching this implied distance. Participants were significantly slower to reject critical items when their perceptual features matched said distance relationship. These results suggest that bilinguals not only activate task-irrelevant meanings of interlingual homophones, but also automatically simulate these meanings in a detailed perceptual fashion. Our study supports the claim that embodied simulation is not due to participants' conscious strategies, but is an automatic component of meaning construction.
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Comprensión , Lenguaje , Multilingüismo , Adulto , Femenino , Humanos , Masculino , Estimulación Luminosa , Tiempo de Reacción/fisiologíaRESUMEN
Montane forests of western China provide an opportunity to establish baseline studies for climate change. The region is being impacted by climate change, air pollution, and significant human impacts from tourism. We analyzed forest stand structure and climate-growth relationships from Jiuzhaigou National Nature Reserve in northwestern Sichuan province, along the eastern edge of the Tibetan plateau. We conducted a survey to characterize forest stand diversity and structure in plots occurring between 2050 and 3350 m in elevation. We also evaluated seedling and sapling recruitment and tree-ring data from four conifer species to assess: 1) whether the forest appears in transition toward increased hardwood composition; 2) if conifers appear stressed by recent climate change relative to hardwoods; and 3) how growth of four dominant species responds to recent climate. Our study is complicated by clear evidence of 20(th) century timber extraction. Focusing on regions lacking evidence of logging, we found a diverse suite of conifers (Pinus, Abies, Juniperus, Picea, and Larix) strongly dominate the forest overstory. We found population size structures for most conifer tree species to be consistent with self-replacement and not providing evidence of shifting composition toward hardwoods. Climate-growth analyses indicate increased growth with cool temperatures in summer and fall. Warmer temperatures during the growing season could negatively impact conifer growth, indicating possible seasonal climate water deficit as a constraint on growth. In contrast, however, we found little relationship to seasonal precipitation. Projected warming does not yet have a discernible signal on trends in tree growth rates, but slower growth with warmer growing season climates suggests reduced potential future forest growth.
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Dispersión de las Plantas/fisiología , Tracheophyta/fisiología , Árboles/fisiología , China , Cambio Climático , Ecosistema , Estaciones del Año , Tracheophyta/clasificación , Árboles/clasificaciónRESUMEN
BACKGROUND: Quantification of ecosystem services, such as carbon (C) storage, can demonstrate the benefits of managing for both production and habitat conservation in agricultural landscapes. In this study, we evaluated C stocks and woody plant diversity across vineyard blocks and adjoining woodland ecosystems (wildlands) for an organic vineyard in northern California. Carbon was measured in soil from 44 one m deep pits, and in aboveground woody biomass from 93 vegetation plots. These data were combined with physical landscape variables to model C stocks using a geographic information system and multivariate linear regression. RESULTS: Field data showed wildlands to be heterogeneous in both C stocks and woody tree diversity, reflecting the mosaic of several different vegetation types, and storing on average 36.8 Mg C/ha in aboveground woody biomass and 89.3 Mg C/ha in soil. Not surprisingly, vineyard blocks showed less variation in above- and belowground C, with an average of 3.0 and 84.1 Mg C/ha, respectively. CONCLUSIONS: This research demonstrates that vineyards managed with practices that conserve some fraction of adjoining wildlands yield benefits for increasing overall C stocks and species and habitat diversity in integrated agricultural landscapes. For such complex landscapes, high resolution spatial modeling is challenging and requires accurate characterization of the landscape by vegetation type, physical structure, sufficient sampling, and allometric equations that relate tree species to each landscape. Geographic information systems and remote sensing techniques are useful for integrating the above variables into an analysis platform to estimate C stocks in these working landscapes, thereby helping land managers qualify for greenhouse gas mitigation credits. Carbon policy in California, however, shows a lack of focus on C stocks compared to emissions, and on agriculture compared to other sectors. Correcting these policy shortcomings could create incentives for ecosystem service provision, including C storage, as well as encourage better farm stewardship and habitat conservation.
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Atención Odontológica/economía , Servicios de Salud Dental/economía , Odontólogos/provisión & distribución , Accesibilidad a los Servicios de Salud , Educación en Odontología , Humanos , Reembolso de Seguro de Salud , Medicaid , North Carolina , Prevención Primaria , Facultades de Odontología , Recursos HumanosAsunto(s)
Curriculum , Odontólogas , Educación en Odontología , Docentes de Odontología , Salud de la Mujer , Personal Administrativo , Canadá , Familia , Femenino , Humanos , Estados Unidos , Mujeres TrabajadorasRESUMEN
This report summarizes the history and curriculum of the American Dental Education Association/Academy for Academic Leadership Institute for Teaching and Learning (ADEA/AAL ITL) Program for Dental School Faculty, describes participant feedback, and reviews how the program serves the faculty development initiatives of the American Dental Education Association. The fifty-hour program (6.5 days), conducted in two phases at collaborating dental schools, enhances core academic competencies of new and transitional faculty, including faculty members whose responsibilities include predoctoral, allied, and postdoctoral dental education. The program's mission is to prepare participants to become more effective teachers and develop other skills that will facilitate confidence, job satisfaction, and professional growth in the academic environment. From 2005 to 2009, 174 individuals graduated from the program, representing forty-three schools of dentistry in the United States and Canada and twenty-nine private practices. A total of forty scholarships have been awarded to participants by the American Academy of Periodontology Foundation, the American Academy of Pediatric Dentistry, and the American Association of Orthodontists. In an online survey completed by 75 percent of ADEA/AAL ITL participants, 99 percent indicated they were positive or highly positive about their learning experience in this faculty development program. Ninety-six percent stated that the program had been important or very important in their effectiveness as a teacher. In 2010, the program will be held at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill School of Dentistry, with phase I occurring on August 19-22, 2010, and phase II on October 22-24, 2010. In summary, the ADEA/AAL ITL is addressing an unmet need through a formal professional development program designed to help new and potential faculty members thrive as educators and become future leaders in academic health care.