Piloting wastewater-based surveillance of norovirus in England.

Wastewater-based epidemiology (WBE) gained widespread use as a tool for supporting clinical disease surveillance during the COVID-19 pandemic. There is now significant interest in the continued development of WBE for other pathogens of clinical significance. In this study, approximately 3,200 samples of wastewater from across England, previously collected for quantification of SARS-CoV-2, were re-analysed for the quantification of norovirus genogroup I (GI) and II (GII). Overall, GI and GII were detected in 93% and 98% of samples respectively, and at least one of the genogroups was detected in 99% of samples. GI was found at significantly lower concentrations than GII, but the proportion of each genogroup varied over time, with GI becoming more prevalent than GII in some areas towards the end of the study period (May 2021 - March 2022). Using relative strength indices (RSI), it was possible to study the trends of each genogroup, and total norovirus over time. Increases in norovirus levels appeared to coincide with the removal of COVID-19 related lockdown restrictions within England. Local Moran's I analyses indicated several localised outbreaks of both GI and GII across England, notably the possible GI outbreak in the north of England in early 2022. Comparisons of national average norovirus concentrations in wastewater against concomitant norovirus reported case numbers showed a significant linear relationship. This highlights the potential for wastewater-based monitoring of norovirus as a valuable approach to support surveillance of norovirus in communities.

A Scoping Review on GIS Technologies Applied to Farmed Fish Health Management.

Finfish aquaculture, one of the fastest growing intensive sectors worldwide, is threatened by numerous transmissible diseases that may have devastating impacts on its economic sustainability. This review (2010-2022) used a PRISMA extension for scoping reviews and a text mining approach to explore the extent to which geographical information systems (GIS) are used in farmed fish health management and to unveil the main GIS technologies, databases, and functions used to update the spatiotemporal data underpinning risk and predictive models in aquatic surveillance programmes. After filtering for eligibility criteria, the literature search provided 54 records, highlighting the limited use of GIS technologies for disease prevention and control, as well as the prevalence of GIS application in marine salmonid farming, especially for viruses and parasitic diseases typically associated with these species. The text mining generated five main research areas, underlining a limited range of investigated species, rearing environments, and diseases, as well as highlighting the lack of GIS-based methodologies at the core of such publications. This scoping review provides a source of information for future more detailed literature analyses and outcomes to support the development of geospatial disease spread models and expand in-field GIS technologies for the prevention and mitigation of fish disease epidemics.

Interaction of climate change and marine pollution in Southern India: Implications for coastal zone management practices and policies.

Climate change and marine litter are inextricably linked, and their interaction manifests differently depending on the specific environmental and biological characteristics, and other human activities taking place. The negative impacts resulting from those synergistic interactions are threatening coastal and marine ecosystems and the many goods and services they provide. This is particularly pervasive in the coastal zone of the Indian subcontinent. India is already experiencing severe climate change impacts, which are projected to worsen in the future. At the same time, the country is gripped by a litter crisis that is overwhelming authorities and communities and hindering the country's sustainable development goals. The coastal environment and communities of the southern states of Kerala and Tamil Nadu are particularly vulnerable to the impacts of climate change. While these state governments and authorities are stepping up efforts to improve the management of their coastal zones, the scale and severity of these issues are mounting. Here we review the combined effects of climate change and marine litter pollution in Southern India, focusing on the Gulf of Mannar Reserve in Tamil Nadu and the Malabar Coast in Kerala. Finally, we discuss effective management options that could help improve resilience and sustainability.

Connectivity of larval stages of sedentary marine communities between hard substrates and offshore structures in the North Sea.

Man-made structures including rigs, pipelines, cables, renewable energy devices, and ship wrecks, offer hard substrate in the largely soft-sediment environment of the North Sea. These structures become colonised by sedentary organisms and non-migratory reef fish, and form local ecosystems that attract larger predators including seals, birds, and fish. It is possible that these structures form a system of interconnected reef environments through the planktonic dispersal of the pelagic stages of organisms by ocean currents. Changes to the overall arrangement of hard substrate areas through removal or addition of individual man-made structures will affect the interconnectivity and could impact on the ecosystem. Here, we assessed the connectivity of sectors with oil and gas structures, wind farms, wrecks, and natural hard substrate, using a model that simulates the drift of planktonic stages of seven organisms with sedentary adult stages associated with hard substrate, applied to the period 2001-2010. Connectivity was assessed using a classification system designed to address the function of sectors in the network. Results showed a relatively stable overall spatial distribution of sector function but with distinct variations between species and years. The results are discussed in the context of decommissioning of oil and gas infrastructure in the North Sea.

Bottom trawl fishing footprints on the world's continental shelves.

Bottom trawlers land around 19 million tons of fish and invertebrates annually, almost one-quarter of wild marine landings. The extent of bottom trawling footprint (seabed area trawled at least once in a specified region and time period) is often contested but poorly described. We quantify footprints using high-resolution satellite vessel monitoring system (VMS) and logbook data on 24 continental shelves and slopes to 1,000-m depth over at least 2 years. Trawling footprint varied markedly among regions: from <10% of seabed area in Australian and New Zealand waters, the Aleutian Islands, East Bering Sea, South Chile, and Gulf of Alaska to >50% in some European seas. Overall, 14% of the 7.8 million-km2 study area was trawled, and 86% was not trawled. Trawling activity was aggregated; the most intensively trawled areas accounting for 90% of activity comprised 77% of footprint on average. Regional swept area ratio (SAR; ratio of total swept area trawled annually to total area of region, a metric of trawling intensity) and footprint area were related, providing an approach to estimate regional trawling footprints when high-resolution spatial data are unavailable. If SAR was ≤0.1, as in 8 of 24 regions, there was >95% probability that >90% of seabed was not trawled. If SAR was 7.9, equal to the highest SAR recorded, there was >95% probability that >70% of seabed was trawled. Footprints were smaller and SAR was ≤0.25 in regions where fishing rates consistently met international sustainability benchmarks for fish stocks, implying collateral environmental benefits from sustainable fishing.

Spatially explicit integrated modeling and economic valuation of climate driven land use change and its indirect effects.

We present an integrated model of the direct consequences of climate change on land use, and the indirect effects of induced land use change upon the natural environment. The model predicts climate-driven shifts in the profitability of alternative uses of agricultural land. Both the direct impact of climate change and the induced shift in land use patterns will cause secondary effects on the water environment, for which agriculture is the major source of diffuse pollution. We model the impact of changes in such pollution on riverine ecosystems showing that these will be spatially heterogeneous. Moreover, we consider further knock-on effects upon the recreational benefits derived from water environments, which we assess using revealed preference methods. This analysis permits a multi-layered examination of the economic consequences of climate change, assessing the sequence of impacts from climate change through farm gross margins, land use, water quality and recreation, both at the individual and catchment scale.

The economic implications of changing regulations for deep sea fishing under the European Common Fisheries Policy: UK case study.

Economic impact assessment methodology was applied to UK fisheries data to better understand the implications of European Commission proposal for regulations to fishing for deep-sea stocks in the North-East Atlantic (EC COM 371 Final 2012) under the Common Fisheries Policy (CFP). The aim was to inform the on-going debate to develop the EC proposal, and to assist the UK fishing industry and Government in evaluating the most effective options to manage deep sea fish stocks. Results indicate that enforcing the EC proposal as originally drafted results in a number of implications for the UK fleet. Because of the proposed changes to the list of species defined as being deep sea species, and a new definition of what constitutes a vessel targeting deep sea species, a total of 695 active UK fishing vessels would need a permit to fish for deep sea species. However, due to existing and capped capacity limits many vessels would potentially not be able to obtain such a permit. The economic impact of these changes from the status quo reveals that in the short term, landings would decrease by 6540 tonnes, reducing gross value added by £3.3 million. Alternative options were also assessed that provide mitigation measures to offset the impacts of the proposed regulations whilst at the same time providing more effective protection of deep sea Vulnerable Marine Ecosystems (VMEs). The options include setting a 400m depth rule that identifies a depth beyond which vessels would potentially be classified as fishing for deep sea species and designating 'core areas' for deep sea fishing at depths>400m to minimise the risk of further impacts of bottom fishing gear on deep sea habitats. Applying a 400m depth limit and 'core fishing' area approach deeper than 400m, the impact of the EC proposal would essentially be reduced to zero, that is, on average no vessels (using the status quo capacity baseline) would be impacted by the proposal.

Predicting microbial pollution concentrations in UK rivers in response to land use change.

The Water Framework Directive has caused a paradigm shift towards the integrated management of recreational water quality through the development of drainage basin-wide programmes of measures. This has increased the need for a cost-effective diagnostic tool capable of accurately predicting riverine faecal indicator organism (FIO) concentrations. This paper outlines the application of models developed to fulfil this need, which represent the first transferrable generic FIO models to be developed for the UK to incorporate direct measures of key FIO sources (namely human and livestock population data) as predictor variables. We apply a recently developed transfer methodology, which enables the quantification of geometric mean presumptive faecal coliforms and presumptive intestinal enterococci concentrations for base- and high-flow during the summer bathing season in unmonitored UK watercourses, to predict FIO concentrations in the Humber river basin district. Because the FIO models incorporate explanatory variables which allow the effects of policy measures which influence livestock stocking rates to be assessed, we carry out empirical analysis of the differential effects of seven land use management and policy instruments (fiscal constraint, production constraint, cost intervention, area intervention, demand-side constraint, input constraint, and micro-level land use management) all of which can be used to reduce riverine FIO concentrations. This research provides insights into FIO source apportionment, explores a selection of pollution remediation strategies and the spatial differentiation of land use policies which could be implemented to deliver river quality improvements. All of the policy tools we model reduce FIO concentrations in rivers but our research suggests that the installation of streamside fencing in intensive milk producing areas may be the single most effective land management strategy to reduce riverine microbial pollution.

Cost-effective mitigation of diffuse pollution: setting criteria for river basin management at multiple locations.

A case study of the Yorkshire Derwent (UK) catchment is used to illustrate an integrated approach for assessing the viability of policy options for reducing diffuse nitrate losses to waterbodies. For a range of options, modeling methods for simulating river nitrate levels are combined with techniques for estimating the economic costs to agriculture of modifying those levels. By incorporating spatially explicit data and information on catchment residence times (which may span many decades particularly in areas of groundwater discharge) a method is developed for efficient spatial targeting of measures, for example, to the most at-risk freshwater environments. Combining hydrological and economic findings, the analysis reveals that, in terms of cost-effectiveness, the ranking of options is highly sensitive to both (i) whether or not specific stretches of river within a catchment are regarded as a priority for protection, and (ii) the criterion of nitrate concentration deemed most appropriate as an indicator of the health of the environment. Therefore, given the focus under European legislation upon ecological status of freshwaters, these conclusions highlight the need to improve understanding of mechanistic linkages between the chemical and biological dynamics of aquatic systems.

Incorporating variations in pesticide catabolic activity into a GIS-based groundwater risk assessment.

The catabolic activity of incumbent microorganisms in soil samples of eleven dissimilar soil series was investigated, with respect to the herbicide isoproturon. Soils were collected from a 30x37 km area of river catchment to the north-west of London, England. Catabolic activity in each soil type during a 500 h assay was determined by 14C-radiorespirometry. Results showed four soils that exhibited high levels of catabolic activity (33-44% mineralisation) while the remaining seven soils showed lower levels of catabolic activity (12-16% mineralisation). There was evidence to suggest that soils exhibiting high catabolic activity had low (<22%) clay content and tended towards lower organic carbon content (<2.7%), but that these higher levels of catabolic activity were also related to pre-exposure to isoproturon. The 14C-radiorespirometric results were used to produce a GIS layer representing levels of catabolic activity for the dissimilar soils across the study area. This layer was combined with other GIS layers relating to pesticide attenuation, including soil organic carbon content, depth to groundwater and hydrogeology, to produce a map showing risk of groundwater contamination by isoproturon. The output from this approach was compared with output from an attenuation-only approach and differences appraised. Inclusion of the catabolism layer resulted in a lowering of risk in the model in 15% of the study area. Although there appears to be limited benefit in including pesticide catabolic activity in this regional-scale groundwater risk model, this type of addition could be useful in a site-specific risk assessment.