Effects of active and passive land use management after cropland abandonment on water and vegetation dynamics in the Central Spanish Pyrenees.

The Mediterranean mountains have been subject to significant land abandonment process during the second half of the 20th century. The subsequent natural revegetation following abandonment in rural areas has been widely documented to have substantial implications on the hydrological cycle and the vegetation. The Spanish Pyrenees are one of the most affected areas by these land transformations which could threaten their importance for water supply and agricultural activities in the downstream lowland areas. Land managers as well as scientists around the world have taken different positions on how to deal with these land use changes. Some are in favor of active management (AM) (i.e. density reduction) while others are supporting passive management (PM) (letting the process of revegetation continue). This study aims to investigate the implication of AM and PM on hydrological and vegetation dynamics under different climate trajectories in a representative abandoned cropland catchment in the Central Spanish Pyrenees. A coupled ecohydrologic model is used to estimate the post management response of streamflow (STR), evapotranspiration (ET), soil saturation deficit (SD) and plant carbon (PC) following shrub clearing. Clearing increased annual STR by 16%, while ET and SD decreased by around -9% and -6% respectively during the first year after management with changes to monthly flows. These changes to water regimes may be even higher in wetter years. Over a 10-years period of vegetation recovery annual STR increased between 7.1% and 24.2%, while annual ET and SD decreased between -2.6% to -8.7% and -2.7% to -6% respectively due to shrub clearing, with the highest changes occurring in the first three years of AM. On the effect of climate change, our results show that a 2 °C increase in temperature could reduce AM effects on water regimes and accelerate the recovery of PC given averaged rainfall conditions.

Impact of climate and land use change on water availability and reservoir management: scenarios in the Upper Aragón River, Spanish Pyrenees.

Streamflows in a Mediterranean mountain basin in the central Spanish Pyrenees were projected under various climate and land use change scenarios. Streamflow series projected for 2021-2050 were used to simulate the management of the Yesa reservoir, which is critical to the downstream supply of irrigation and domestic water. Streamflows were simulated using the Regional Hydro-Ecologic Simulation System (RHESSys). The results show that increased forest cover in the basin could decrease annual streamflow by 16%, mainly in early spring, summer and autumn. Regional climate models (RCMs) project a trend of warming and drying in the basin for the period 2021-2050, which will cause a 13.8% decrease in annual streamflow, mainly in late spring and summer. The combined effects of forest regeneration and climate change are expected to reduce annual streamflows by 29.6%, with marked decreases affecting all months with the exception of January and February, when the decline will be moderate. Under these streamflow reduction scenarios it is expected that it will be difficult for the Yesa reservoir to meet the current water demand, based on its current storage capacity (476 hm(3)). If the current project to enlarge the reservoir to a capacity of 1059 hm(3) is completed, the potential to apply multi-annual streamflow management, which will increase the feasibility of maintaining the current water supply. However, under future climate and land cover scenarios, reservoir storage will rarely exceed half of the expected capacity, and the river flows downstream of the reservoir is projected to be dramatically reduced.

Estadificación prequirúrgica del cáncer de recto mediante RM y correlación radiopatológica / Preoperative staging MRI for rectal cancer and pathologic correlation

Fundamento. El objetivo de este trabajo es revisar lautilidad de la RM pélvica para la estadificación del cáncerde recto y establecer una correlación radiopatológica.Material y métodos. Se realizó un análisis retrospectivode 120 pacientes con una edad comprendida entre 43 y87 años a los que se realizó una RM pélvica para el estadiajede cáncer rectal en nuestro hospital entre los años2005 y 2010. Se catalogaron los pacientes de acuerdo ala clasificación TNM.Resultados. De los 120 pacientes, 80 fueron tratadoscon RT y/o QT neoadyuvante debido a que presentabanenfermedad localmente avanzada (T3-T4), afectaciónganglionar (N1-N2) o metástasis resecables. Con los40 pacientes que no fueron sometidos a tratamientoneoadyuvante se realizó una correlación entre los hallazgosde la RM y de la anatomía patológica con unaprecisión diagnóstica para predecir el estadio T del72%, el estadio N del 60% y la distancia a la FMR del87,5%.Conclusión. La RM pélvica es una técnica útil para laestadificación locorregional del cáncer de recto, obteniendouna buena correlación radiopatológica aunquela identificación de la afectación ganglionar es todavíaun problema diagnóstico(AU)

Background. Our aim is to asses the accuracy of MRIfor preoperative rectal cancer staging and to establisha histopathologic correlation.Material and methods. A retrospective analysis wasperformed on 120 patients aged between 43 and 87 withhistologically proven rectal cancer who underwent MRIfor preoperative staging in our hospital between 2005and 2010. Patients were categorized according to theTNM classification.Results. Eighty of 120 patients underwent adjuvantchemoradiotheraphy because they had advanceddisease (T3-T4), lymph node involvement (N1-N2) orresectable metastases. With 40 patients who didn’tundergo neoadjuvant therapy we performed a correlationbetween MRI and histopathological findings witha diagnostic accuracy in predicting T stage of 72%, Nstage of 60% and distance to the mesorectal fascia of87,5%.Conclusion. Pelvic MRI is a useful technique for locoregionalstaging of rectal cancer with a good radiopathologiccorrelation although the identification of nodaldisease is still a diagnostic problem(AU)

Study of urban atmospheric pollution in Navarre (Northern Spain).

An ambient air quality study was undertaken in two cities (Pamplona and Alsasua) of the Province of Navarre in northern Spain from July 2001 to June 2004. The data were obtained from two urban monitoring sites. At both monitoring sites, ambient levels of ozone, NOx, and SO2 were measured. Simultaneously with levels of PM(10) measured at Alsasua (using a laser particle counter), PM(10) levels were also determined at Pamplona (using a beta attenuation monitor). Mean annual PM(10) concentrations in Pamplona and Alsasua reached 30 and 28 microg m(-3), respectively. These concentrations are typical for urban background sites in Northern Spain. By using meteorological information and back trajectories, it was found that the number of exceedances of the daily PM(10) limit as well as the PM(10) temporal variation was highly influenced by air masses from North Africa. Although North African transport was observed on only 9% of the days, it contributed the highest observed PM(10) levels. Transport from the Atlantic Ocean was observed on 68% of the days; transport from Europe on 13%; low transport and local influences on 7%; and transport from the Mediterranean region on 3% of the days. The mean O3 concentrations were 45 and 55 microg m(-3) in Pamplona and Alsasua, respectively, which were above the values reported for the main Spanish cities. The mean NO and NO2 levels were very similar in both sites (12 and 26 microg m(-3), respectively). Mean SO2 levels were 8 microg m(-3) in Pamplona and 5 microg m(-3) in Alsasua. Hourly levels of PM(10), NO and NO2 showed similar variations with the typically two coincident maximums during traffic rush hours demonstrating a major anthropogenic origin of PM(10), in spite of the sporadic dust outbreaks.