Championing inclusive terminology in ecology and evolution.

Amid a growing disciplinary commitment to inclusion in ecology and evolutionary biology (EEB), it is critical to consider how the use of scientific language can harm members of our research community. Here, we outline a path for identifying and revising harmful terminology to foster inclusion in EEB.

Increasing the spatial and temporal impact of ecological research: A roadmap for integrating a novel terrestrial process into an Earth system model.

Terrestrial ecosystems regulate Earth's climate through water, energy, and biogeochemical transformations. Despite a key role in regulating the Earth system, terrestrial ecology has historically been underrepresented in the Earth system models (ESMs) that are used to understand and project global environmental change. Ecology and Earth system modeling must be integrated for scientists to fully comprehend the role of ecological systems in driving and responding to global change. Ecological insights can improve ESM realism and reduce process uncertainty, while ESMs offer ecologists an opportunity to broadly test ecological theory and increase the impact of their work by scaling concepts through time and space. Despite this mutualism, meaningfully integrating the two remains a persistent challenge, in part because of logistical obstacles in translating processes into mathematical formulas and identifying ways to integrate new theories and code into large, complex model structures. To help overcome this interdisciplinary challenge, we present a framework consisting of a series of interconnected stages for integrating a new ecological process or insight into an ESM. First, we highlight the multiple ways that ecological observations and modeling iteratively strengthen one another, dispelling the illusion that the ecologist's role ends with initial provision of data. Second, we show that many valuable insights, products, and theoretical developments are produced through sustained interdisciplinary collaborations between empiricists and modelers, regardless of eventual inclusion of a process in an ESM. Finally, we provide concrete actions and resources to facilitate learning and collaboration at every stage of data-model integration. This framework will create synergies that will transform our understanding of ecology within the Earth system, ultimately improving our understanding of global environmental change, and broadening the impact of ecological research.

Preaching to the choir or composing new verses? Toward a writerly climate literacy in introductory undergraduate biology.

Climate change is one of the most pressing issues facing society today, yet a wide range of misconceptions exist in society about whether or why climate change is happening, what its consequences are, and what can be done to address it. Large introductory biology courses present an opportunity to teach a large number of students-some of whom may never take another course focused on climate, ecology, or the environment-about climate change. However, content knowledge alone may not be enough to prepare students to transform their knowledge into action. To begin understanding how content knowledge interacts with student constructions of climate change solutions, we administered and quantitatively analyzed a survey that examined student views of climate change and how they shifted with instruction during an undergraduate introductory biology course at a large Midwestern university. Almost all participants entered the course agreeing that climate change is occurring, and their certainty about the science of climate change increased after instruction. After taking the course, more participants described climate change as having more immediate impacts, reporting that climate change is already harming people and that climate change will harm them personally. However, both at the beginning and end of the course, participants tended to think that humans would either be unable or unwilling to reduce climate change. They were also more worried about climate change at the end of the course than they were before. Increased concern might result from students becoming more certain of the science and severity of climate change, while remaining pessimistic that humans will effectively act on climate change. This pattern suggests instructors have opportunities to modify curricula in ways that leave students with a greater sense of empowerment and efficacy; we suggest questions that instructors can ask themselves in order to modify their courses with this goal in mind.

Beyond Static Benchmarking: Using Experimental Manipulations to Evaluate Land Model Assumptions.

Land models are often used to simulate terrestrial responses to future environmental changes, but these models are not commonly evaluated with data from experimental manipulations. Results from experimental manipulations can identify and evaluate model assumptions that are consistent with appropriate ecosystem responses to future environmental change. We conducted simulations using three coupled carbon-nitrogen versions of the Community Land Model (CLM, versions 4, 4.5, and-the newly developed-5), and compared the simulated response to nitrogen (N) and atmospheric carbon dioxide (CO2) enrichment with meta-analyses of observations from similar experimental manipulations. In control simulations, successive versions of CLM showed a poleward increase in gross primary productivity and an overall bias reduction, compared to FLUXNET-MTE observations. Simulations with N and CO2 enrichment demonstrate that CLM transitioned from a model that exhibited strong nitrogen limitation of the terrestrial carbon cycle (CLM4) to a model that showed greater responsiveness to elevated concentrations of CO2 in the atmosphere (CLM5). Overall, CLM5 simulations showed better agreement with observed ecosystem responses to experimental N and CO2 enrichment than previous versions of the model. These simulations also exposed shortcomings in structural assumptions and parameterizations. Specifically, no version of CLM captures changes in plant physiology, allocation, and nutrient uptake that are likely important aspects of terrestrial ecosystems' responses to environmental change. These highlight priority areas that should be addressed in future model developments. Moving forward, incorporating results from experimental manipulations into model benchmarking tools that are used to evaluate model performance will help increase confidence in terrestrial carbon cycle projections.

The Impact of Donor and Recipient Renal Dysfunction on Cardiac Allograft Survival: Insights Into Reno-Cardiac Interactions.

BACKGROUND: Renal dysfunction (RD) is a potent risk factor for death in patients with cardiovascular disease. This relationship may be causal; experimentally induced RD produces findings such as myocardial necrosis and apoptosis in animals. Cardiac transplantation provides an opportunity to investigate this hypothesis in humans. METHODS AND RESULTS: Cardiac transplantations from the United Network for Organ Sharing registry were studied (n = 23,056). RD was defined as an estimated glomerular filtration rate <60 mL/min/1.73 m(2). RD was present in 17.9% of donors and 39.4% of recipients. Unlike multiple donor characteristics, such as older age, hypertension, or diabetes, donor RD was not associated with recipient death or retransplantation (age-adjusted hazard ratio [HR] = 1.00, 95% confidence interval [CI] 0.94-1.07, P = .92). Moreover, in recipients with RD the highest risk for death or retransplantation occurred immediately posttransplant (0-30 day HR = 1.8, 95% CI 1.54-2.02, P < .001) with subsequent attenuation of the risk over time (30-365 day HR = 0.92, 95% CI 0.77-1.09, P = .33). CONCLUSIONS: The risk for adverse recipient outcomes associated with RD does not appear to be transferrable from donor to recipient via the cardiac allograft, and the risk associated with recipient RD is greatest immediately following transplant. These observations suggest that the risk for adverse outcomes associated with RD is likely primarily driven by nonmyocardial factors.

Evidence of Mild Liver Dysfunction Identifies Stable Heart Failure Outpatients with Reversible Renal Dysfunction.

BACKGROUND: In decompensated heart failure (HF), reversible renal dysfunction (RD) is more frequently observed in patients with mild liver dysfunction likely due to the shared pathophysiologic factors involved. The objective of this study was to determine if these findings also apply to stable HF outpatients. METHODS: Patients in the Beta-Blocker Evaluation of Survival Trial (BEST) were studied. Improvement in renal function (IRF) was defined as a 20% improvement in the estimated glomerular filtration rate from baseline to 3 months. RESULTS: Elevated bilirubin (BIL), aspartate aminotransferase (AST), and alanine aminotransferase (ALT) were significantly associated with signs of congestion or poor perfusion. IRF occurred in 12.0% of all patients and was more common in those with elevated BIL (OR = 1.5, p = 0.003), ALT (OR = 1.4, p = 0.01), and AST (OR = 1.4, p = 0.01). In a model containing all 3 liver parameters and baseline characteristics, including markers of congestion/poor perfusion, BIL (OR = 1.6, p = 0.001) and ALT (OR = 1.7, p < 0.001) were independently associated with IRF. CONCLUSIONS: Biochemical evidence of mild liver dysfunction is significantly associated with IRF in stable HF outpatients. Given the widespread availability and low cost of these markers, additional research is necessary to determine the utility of these parameters in identifying patients with reversible RD who may benefit from cardiorenal interventions.

Influence of age-related versus non-age-related renal dysfunction on survival in patients with left ventricular dysfunction.

Normal aging results in a predictable decrease in glomerular filtration rate (GFR), and low GFR is associated with worsened survival. If this survival disadvantage is directly caused by the low GFR, as opposed to the disease causing the low GFR, the risk should be similar regardless of the underlying mechanism. Our objective was to determine if age-related decreases in estimated GFR (eGFR) carry the same prognostic importance as disease-attributable losses in patients with ventricular dysfunction. We analyzed the Studies Of Left Ventricular Dysfunction limited data set (n = 6,337). The primary analysis focused on determining if the eGFR-mortality relation differed by the extent to which the eGFR was consistent with normal aging. Mean eGFR was 65.7 ml/min/1.73 m(2) (SD = 19.0). Across the range of age in the population (27 to 80 years), baseline eGFR decreased by 0.67 ml/min/1.73 m(2)/year (95% confidence interval [CI] 0.63 to 0.71). The risk of death associated with eGFR was strongly modified by the degree to which the low eGFR could be explained by aging (p for interaction <0.0001). For example, in a model incorporating the interaction, uncorrected eGFR was no longer significantly related to mortality (adjusted hazard ratio 1.0 per 10 ml/min/1.73 m(2), 95% CI 0.97 to 1.1, p = 0.53), whereas a disease-attributable decrease in eGFR above the median carried significant risk (adjusted hazard ratio 2.8, 95% CI 1.6 to 4.7, p <0.001). In conclusion, in the setting of left ventricular dysfunction, renal dysfunction attributable to normal aging had a limited risk for mortality, suggesting that the mechanism underlying renal dysfunction is critical in determining prognosis.