Predictors of coastal stakeholders' knowledge about seawater desalination impacts on marine ecosystems.

This study investigates variables that shape coastal stakeholders' knowledge about marine ecosystems and impacts of seawater desalination. The influence of trans-situational and situation-specific variables on self-assessed and factual knowledge among coastal residents and commercial marine stakeholders. Data were collected using a questionnaire based survey administered to a random sample of coastal residents and commercial marine stakeholders in eight communities in central California. Knowledge of biological features was higher than knowledge of physical and chemical processes. Both trans-situational and situation-specific variables were significant predictors of knowledge, in particular gender, education, and ocean use patterns. TV and social media were the only information sources that correlated negatively with knowledge. Predictors for distinct types of knowledge were different and provide insights that could help target specific ocean literacy gaps. The study also finds that commercial marine stakeholders were more knowledgeable than other coastal residents. Having an economic stake in the marine environment appears to be a strong motivation to be more educated about the ocean.

Dengue fever seroprevalence and risk factors, Texas-Mexico border, 2004.

Reported autochthonous dengue fever transmission in the United States has been limited to 5 south Texas border counties since 1980. We conducted a cross-sectional serosurvey in Brownsville, Texas, and Matamoros, Tamaulipas, Mexico (n = 600), in 2004 to assess dengue seroprevalence. Recent dengue infection was detected in 2% (95% confidence interval [CI] 0.5%-3.5%) and 7.3% (95% CI 4.3%-10.3%) of residents in Brownsville and Matamoros, respectively. Past infection was detected in 40% (95% CI 34%-45%) of Brownsville residents and 78% (95% CI 74%-83%) of Matamoros residents. For recent infection, only weekly family income

Socially strategic ecological restoration: a game-theoretic analysis [corrected].

Major transitions in a multiple-use or mosaic landscape often lead to frictions among new and existing users. In this article, we consider the problem of ecological restoration within a mosaic landscape in which restoration activities elicit feedbacks from individuals and groups that are harmed by restoration outcomes. Using game theory, we identify three potential outcomes ranked by the extent of restoration of ecosystem services and processes: nonstrategic, noncooperative strategic equilibrium, and cooperative bargaining solution. We identify conditions under which additional restoration can decrease the overall flow of ecosystem services and processes. A "strategic restorationist" will cease new restoration activities when the net effect of defensive response moves by farmers offsets gains. Imperfect information regarding expected payoffs to farmers can lead to inefficient overshooting or undershooting the optimal scale, geographical positioning, and form of restoration. Gains to all parties from cooperation might exist. As a case study and to aid model design, we consider restoration activities on California's upper Sacramento River.

Convergence across biomes to a common rain-use efficiency.

Water availability limits plant growth and production in almost all terrestrial ecosystems. However, biomes differ substantially in sensitivity of aboveground net primary production (ANPP) to between-year variation in precipitation. Average rain-use efficiency (RUE; ANPP/precipitation) also varies between biomes, supposedly because of differences in vegetation structure and/or biogeochemical constraints. Here we show that RUE decreases across biomes as mean annual precipitation increases. However, during the driest years at each site, there is convergence to a common maximum RUE (RUE(max)) that is typical of arid ecosystems. RUE(max) was also identified by experimentally altering the degree of limitation by water and other resources. Thus, in years when water is most limiting, deserts, grasslands and forests all exhibit the same rate of biomass production per unit rainfall, despite differences in physiognomy and site-level RUE. Global climate models predict increased between-year variability in precipitation, more frequent extreme drought events, and changes in temperature. Forecasts of future ecosystem behaviour should take into account this convergent feature of terrestrial biomes.