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Capstone experiences have high educational impact with a number of approaches for biology. In most capstones, students produce a major project, typically as an undergraduate research experience, with a primary goal to integrate students' learning. At Augustana, our senior biology capstone uses history and philosophy to frame students' reflections and to integrate their biological education within our liberal arts and sciences curriculum. In a flipped classroom approach, students write a response to the assigned reading before class, when the paper is discussed through student-led seminars. Assigned papers consider the philosophy and historical development of biology focusing on its three conceptual pillars: function, development, and evolution, allowing students to examine how biologists arrived at their current understanding of life. Assessment of ten years of course offerings indicates students' ability to write and speak are being successfully developed, but that thinking shows no significant learning gains between the midterm and final exams. Student quantitative and qualitative ratings of the course indicate that it is a valuable learning experience, despite its heavy workload and difficult nature.

Every November, the University of Calgary iGEM (international Genetically Engineered Machines) team presents their synthetic biology project to the world. Weekly team meetings are a microcosm of the iGEM experience of bringing ideas to fruition. The peer teaching, mentoring, and consultations that occur at these meetings are triggers for deeper conversations on teaching and learning. In the workshop described here, participants were invited to experience a simulated iGEM team meeting environment, where instead of synthetic biology, issues of teaching and learning were the subject of their conversations.

The COVID-19 pandemic posed, and continues to pose, many challenges to teaching and learning, most notably the need to pivot from traditional in-person course instruction and experiences to entirely virtual course delivery while maintaining course rigor and quality. Our guiding principle for course modification was the critical need for an equitable, accessible, engaging, and motivating learning experience for students that maintained the learning outcomes and objectives of the course in a fully virtual and digitized format. This paper illustrates the evidence-based approach that the instructional team of a first-year biology experiential learning course took in response to the need for instruction to occur in virtual space and time for the Fall 2020 (September to December 2020) semester.

As key components of self-regulated learning, metacognition and goal orientation have been tied to improvements in academic achievement. Some research supports a bidirectional relationship between metacognition and goal orientation in which they promote each other as well as learning outcomes. We created a learning philosophy assignment (LP) to encourage students' consideration of their learning strategies and goals resulting in a record of students' metacognition. Research suggests that low-achieving students may have different metacognitive capabilities and learning goals and as such may be differentially impacted by the assignment. This paper considers the content of the LPs. Students were split into achievement quartiles to explore any patterns in metacognition or learning goals distinct to achievement level. Our content analysis confirms that the LP was successful in documenting metacognition and learning goals in all students. There were some differences related to achievement level.

Educational techniques that improve student engagement have repeatedly been shown to improve performance at the class level at many institutions and in multiple disciplines. However, knowledge of engagement in individual activities in large first-year classes, where there may be several subpopulations of students in different programs reflecting varied interests, is limited. In this study, we examined two large, lecture-based, introductory first-year biology classes to determine whether there were any relationships between specific learning activities and student engagement and performance, both at the class level and as broken down by program of study. Surveys were used to quantify the level of student engagement through four activities: (a) student response systems (clickers), (b) in-class discussions and activities, (c) lab and seminar activities, and (d) interdisciplinary learning. Engagement scores were then compared to students' final grades. Students in all majors who reported higher levels of participation in most activities studied also reported feeling more engaged overall and achieved higher grades than their less-engaged peers; however, students in non-biology majors demonstrated notably weaker relationships between their engagement and performance in biology courses, where such relationships existed at all. In this paper, we discuss the learning activities which are associated with the greatest performance increases in both biology and non-biology majors and suggest how these results may be used to inform instructional techniques to benefit all students, regardless of major, in future course offerings.

Teaching and learning of many undergraduate science courses often remains confined within the boundaries of classrooms rendering learning of these subjects irrelevant and detached from students' lived experiences. Community-based experiential learning (CBEL) is one way to address this issue. This paper reports the development and implementation of a CBEL activity and its impact on students' learning of Biology in a large university within Western Canada. Data corpus for the study included written pre- and post-CBEL student reflections, which were analyzed qualitatively. The results suggest that CBEL experience significantly enhanced the quality of students' learning across academic, civic, and personal domains. Emerged themes inform that the students considered their CBEL experience as valuable and empowering as it created opportunities for them to contribute to their own and peers' learning, as well as to the local community's and entire ecosystem's ecological wellbeing. They acknowledged that the CBEL experience enhanced their academic understandings and technical skills, which they can utilize in many other contexts. Outcomes of this study will inform revisions of the Biology 1000 curriculum in new iterations of the course. The study will also interest science educators who strive to promote students' learning in wider Canadian and other international contexts.

Essentialism is the intuition that category membership relies on an invisible essence. Essentialist thinking about social categories is most evident in young children, while comparable methods do not reveal essentialist thinking about social groups in adult participants. However, previous work has found that essentialist thinking about gender was measurable in adults who experienced cognitive demand. In this paper, we studied essentialist intuitions about national identity, race, and gender, in adults under cognitive demand. We found that adults under cognitive demand essentialized national identity and gender more than adults who had time to deliberate, though cognitive demand had no effect on essentialist intuitions about race. Additionally, we found evidence that adults' essentialist intuitions were strongest for gender, followed by race, and then national identity. The asymmetry in essentialism levels across the three studies suggests that there may be different mental representations for different social categories.

Greer and Mark's (2016) paper suggested and reviewed different methods for evaluating the effectiveness of intelligent tutoring systems such as Propensity score matching. The current study aimed at assessing the effectiveness of automated personalized feedback intervention implemented via the Student Advice Recommender Agent (SARA) in a first-year biology class by means of statistical matching and by reviewing and comparing four different statistical matching methods (i.e., exact matching, nearest neighbor matching using the Mahalanobis distance, propensity score matching, and coarsened exact matching). Data from 1026 (73% female and 27% male) students who took a first-year biology course at a Western Canadian university were used. Two different measures for balance assessment of the matched data (i.e., % of balance improvement and standardized bias) were used to choose the best performing statistical matching method. Nearest neighbor matching using the Mahalanobis distance was found to be the most appropriate method for this study and results showed a statistically significant but small treatment effect for the group who received personalized feedback. Research and practical considerations were discussed and suggestions for future research are provided.

Student Services support, including learning skills assistance, can be integral in empowering learners. First-year students are expected to be self-directed in their learning, yet may have neither been challenged nor experienced negative consequences for a lack of perseverance. Academic skills professionals can be partners with teaching faculty in student success by helping to build transferable learning skills, especially for high-fail introductory courses. In this paper, I report on supplementary workshops developed to target fundamental skills with course-specific examples. This partnership included incentivizing academic support with both carrots and sticks; instructors in introductory biology strongly urged students receiving D grades or below on the first test to approach Student Services for support, while sociology faculty incorporated workshop attendance into the introductory course with participation grades. Following such incentivizing of learning skills, workshop attendance increased by 45%. In both courses, first test scores and high school averages for students attending workshops did not differ from students not attending workshops. However, students who attended learning skills workshops had significantly higher course grades, persistence, sessional grade point averages (GPAs), and cumulative GPAs than students not attending workshops. Controlling for high school average, each learning skills workshop attended was associated with a 0.11 to 0.27 increase in sessional GPA on a 4.3 point scale.

This paper attends to challenges for postsecondary science education improvement initiatives, notably understanding and responding to the realities guiding educators' teaching practices. We explored 16 postsecondary biology educators' instructional planning, providing novel insights into why educators select certain strategies over others, including lecturing. Our findings point to an array of factors that educators consider, factors that we believe push against the lecture versus active-learning dichotomy that we hear in some improvement rhetoric. We recommend professional development experiences (including peer evaluations of teaching) wherein educators and other proponents for teaching improvements explicitly explore rationales for teaching, including educators' considerations of the nature of the discipline (content and concepts and skills and processes) and students' needs. Educators with less experience with content were more likely to seek out additional instructional resources during planning, including other educators. Given this, teaching improvement proponents may want to offer professional development activities that sync with periodic and planned teaching assignments that take educators out of their disciplinary knowledge comfort zone. Disciplinary colleagues might serve as exemplars of planning and implementing teaching strategies that both convey foundational content and processes and engage students via evidence-based practices.

This research paper describes the use of computer mediated conferencing (CMC) to support the teaching of biology to undergraduates. The use of this pedagogical innovation was a first-time experience for both the instructor and his students. The objectives of this project were to increase students' active participation, to facilitate collaborative knowledge building, and to enhance the use of the scientific approach in problem-solving activities. The data indicate that some positive results were achieved for each objective. The use of online computer conferences shows a lot of promise when it is based on reflection, problem-solving, collaborative learning and knowledge building. Internet conferencing tools support students as they reflect and work together and open doors to numerous new educational experiences for both the students and the professors.

The objective of this study is to describe the way in which two important biological phenomena, namely diffusion and osmosis, are addressed in the classroom. The study builds on extensive research conducted over the past twenty years showing that students' appropriation of these two phenomena remains partial and incomplete. To understand some of the difficulties these students face in understanding such concepts, we have geared our research toward analysis of classroom practices based on a theoretical framework involving general and specific dimensions of teaching science. Using a case study (a course made up of eight periods), we collected data in three stages: interviews with the teacher regarding his planning; a video recording of the entire course; and feedback interviews with the teacher subsequent to the course. The study's results show that the difficulties encountered by the students cannot be attributed solely to their personal characteristics (state of development of the scientific mindset, prior learning, etc.). Instead, they appear to be largely associated with teaching practices and the potential these practices hold in terms of allowing students to appropriate these concepts. The results presented in this article are significant in their contribution to improving teaching methods for diffusion and osmosis, and thus to facilitating their understanding by students. The paper also presents an example of a conceptual and methodological framework for the study of classroom practices with a view to addressing the gap between educational research and classroom practice.

Science educators at all levels continuously struggle to keep pace with the rapidly developing understanding of the causes and potential solutions to current environmental issues while also trying to enthuse a new generation of passionate and knowledgeable scientists. However, how can future science teachers make science education more attractive ad meaningful to their students? The present paper describes (in a narrative style) an instructional practice that has been performed within a secondary science methods course in a teacher preparation program in Canada. More specifically, it draws on ideas presented in Agenda 21 and the United Nation's Millennium Development Goals to study the (often neglected) socio-environmental aspects of pollination. Ultimately, the proposed activity aims at promoting the ability of pre-service high school biology teachers to adopt a global education perspective on the science curriculum by (a) recognizing the unintended negative ecological impact caused by humanity's pursuit of sustainable development and sustainability and (b) reexamining traditional conceptions of scientific and ecological literacies.

This paper reports on a study that employed metacognition and social cognition theoretical frameworks to explore and interpret students' views of their cognitive roles and the nature of the mechanisms that they considered influenced and mediated their learning within small group contexts. An instrumental interpretive case study methodology was used to capture students' descriptive accounts of their Year 11 Biology learning experiences, as conveyed through their recollections and reflections concerning their interactions and roles, perceptions of the learning task, and their learning strategies that they considered to be manifest during a field trip visit to a nature center. We conclude that, even among apparently highly collegial student groups, deemed by their teacher to be effective learning groups, and constituted in ways consistent with the literature on effective collaborative group work, there existed metasocial metacognitive factors that influenced and shaped cognition in ways counterproductive to the effective learning of science. This study reveals the existence of metacognitive knowledge and processes, common among students and related to their views of what is appropriate thinking and behavior within small groups, which inform collective and individual task actions. We contend that students are highly aware of their social status within groups and of their individual group's social conditions and that this awareness affects cognition and behavior. Moreover, they monitor these conditions and employ strategies that simultaneously service both the task and social relationships and their learning processes to varying extents depending on individual and group factors. (Contains 3 tables.)

Reports that creationism has been specifically banned from the Provincial curriculum as a legitimate scientific subject in all public schools and level one private schools in British Columbia. (DDR)

Pollination biology in the widespread species Impatiens capensis Meerb. has only been studied in America, specifically in zones of the U.S.A. and Canada. In this study, we investigated the pollination biology of I. capensis using an integrative identification approach using morphological and molecular tools in four populations of Northwest Poland. We also determined and compared the functional characteristics of the pollinators of the introduced species from the study sites and the native ones reported, for the latter collecting information from bibliographic sources. Visitors were identified using standard morphological keys, including identifying and classifying insect mouthparts. Molecular identification was carried out using mitochondrial DNA's cytochrome oxidase subunit I (COI). We morphologically identified 20 species of visitors constituted by 17 pollinators and three nectar robbers. DNA barcoding of 59 individuals proved the identification of 18 species (also 18 BINs). The frequency of pollinator species was primarily made up of representatives of both Hymenoptera (75%) and Diptera (21%). The morphological traits, such as the chewing and sucking mouthparts, small and big body height, and robber and pollinator behavior explained mainly the native and introduced visitors' arrangements that allow pollination success. However, to understand the process comprehensively, further investigation of other causalities in pollination success and understanding the diversity of pollinators in outer native ranges are necessary. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Background: One of the greatest obstacles to moving ecosystem-based management (EBM) from concept to practice is the lack of a systematic approach to defining ecosystem-level decision criteria, or reference points that trigger management action. Methodology/Principal Findings: To assist resource managers and policymakers in developing EBM decision criteria, we introduce a quantitative, transferable method for identifying utility thresholds. A utility threshold is the level of human-induced pressure (e.g., pollution) at which small changes produce substantial improvements toward the EBM goal of protecting an ecosystem's structural (e.g., diversity) and functional (e.g., resilience) attributes. The analytical approach is based on the detection of nonlinearities in relationships between ecosystem attributes and pressures. We illustrate the method with a hypothetical case study of (1) fishing and (2) nearshore habitat pressure using an empirically-validated marine ecosystem model for British Columbia, Canada, and derive numerical threshold values in terms of the density of two empirically-tractable indicator groups, sablefish and jellyfish. We also describe how to incorporate uncertainty into the estimation of utility thresholds and highlight their value in the context of understanding EBM trade-offs. Conclusions/Significance: For any policy scenario, an understanding of utility thresholds provides insight into the amount and type of management intervention required to make significant progress toward improved ecosystem structure and function. The approach outlined in this paper can be applied in the context of single or multiple human-induced pressures, to any marine, freshwater, or terrestrial ecosystem, and should facilitate more effective management. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The article presents the guidelines for contributors to "The Canadian Field-Naturalist." The publication accepts papers for publication of scientific researches and manuscripts from amateur and professional naturalists and field biologists that are relevant to Canada and its natural history. Contributions must be original and submitted for review at the provided address.

In this paper we explore variation in the predator-prey interaction between mink Mustela vison and muskrat Ondatra zibethicus across Canada based on 25 years of mink (predator) and muskrat (prey) data from the Hudson's Bay Company. We show that predator–prey interactions have stronger signatures in the west of Canada than in the east. In particular, we show that the observed phase plot trajectories of mink and muskrat rotate significantly clock-wise, consistent with predator–prey theory. We also investigate four phases of the mink muskrat interaction sequence (predator crash phase, prey recovery phase, etc.) and show that they are all consistent with a strong coupling in the west, whereas the presence of generalist predators and alternative preys can explain deviations from this pattern in the east. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper draws on a study on the development of medical genetics as a medical specialism in the U.K. and Canada to reflect on how local and national contents affect specialty formation. The paper begins by supporting earlier findings in the literature that stress, first, technological innovations as driving specialty formation, and second, the domination of physicians in the division of medical labour. Beyond this, however, the paper explores the specific circumstances under which geneticists set about turning their work into a medical specialism based on a "genetics-based approach" to illness and how "medical genetics" as a specialism has been assessed and configured to fit national and regional health service requirements. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Presents information on submitting manuscripts to "Canadian Journal of Microbiology."

The parasitoid wasp genus Alphomelon Mason, 1981 is revised, based on a combination of basic morphology (dichotomous key and brief diagnostic descriptions), DNA barcoding, biology (host data and wasp cocoons), and distribution data. A total of 49 species is considered; the genus is almost entirely Neotropical (48 species recorded from that region), but three species reach the Nearctic, with one of them extending as far north as 45° N in Canada. Alphomelon parasitizes exclusively Hesperiinae caterpillars (Lepidoptera: Hesperiidae), mostly feeding on monocots in the families Arecaceae, Bromeliaceae, Cannaceae, Commelinaceae, Heliconiaceae, and Poaceae. Most wasp species parasitize either on one or very few (2–4) host species, usually within one or two hesperiine genera; but some species can parasitize several hosts from up to nine different hesperiine genera. Among species with available data for their cocoons, roughly half weave solitary cocoons (16) and half are gregarious (17); cocoons tend to be surrounded by a rather distinctive, coarse silk (especially in solitary species, but also distinguishable in some gregarious species). Neither morphology nor DNA barcoding alone was sufficient on its own to delimit all species properly; by integrating all available evidence (even if incomplete, as available data for every species is different) a foundation is provided for future studies incorporating more specimens, especially from South America. The following 30 new species are described: cruzi, itatiaiensis, and palomae, authored by Shimbori & Fernandez-Triana; and adrianguadamuzi, amazonas, andydeansi, calixtomoragai, carolinacanoae, christerhanssoni, diniamartinezae, duvalierbricenoi, eldaarayae, eliethcantillanoae, gloriasihezarae, guillermopereirai, hazelcambroneroae, josecortesi, keineraragoni, luciarosae, manuelriosi, mikesharkeyi, osvaldoespinozai, paramelanoscelis, paranigriceps, petronariosae, ricardocaleroi, rigoi, rostermoragai, sergioriosi, and yanayacu, authored by Fernandez-Triana & Shimbori. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Ever since the beginnings of economic entomology in Canada, research in biological control has drawn substantial support from the Federal Department of Agriculture. Enjoying a stable institutional environment with the establishment of the Dominion Parasite Laboratory in Belleville, Ontario, in 1929, biological control has also occupied an important position on the research agenda of the Department until the late sixties. Support from the scientific authorities was nevertheless fraught with important paradoxes. For example, research laboratories in biological control were built at a time when North American economic entomologists relied almost exclusively on synthetic chemical compounds like DDT. For some historians of science, the autonomy of Canadian entomologists explains the growth of this research program in the aftermath of World War II. However, the autonomy of the scientific community is a notion that is taken for granted in these historical explanations. In this article, I will demonstrate the institutional dynamic underlying the autonomy of Canadian entomologists in pursuing a research agenda suited to their interests. I will pay close attention to the role of certain actors -- foreign entomological services and the forest and pulp and paper industries - in the rise of a Canadian expertise in biological control. As well, I will show how their interventions forced a reorganization of research on the biological control of insect pests in agriculture and in forestry, and how this reorganization eventually entailed the dismantling of the Belleville laboratory in 1972.

Nine Fraser River Sockeye Salmon Designatable Units (DUs) were assessed as Threatened or Endangered by the Committee on the Status of Endangered Wildlife in Canada (COSEWIC; 2017), and are currently under consideration for addition to Schedule 1 of the Species at Risk Act (SARA). This document is the second of two parts for the Recovery Potential Assessment (RPA) for these DUs. The first part of the RPA involved quantitative analysis of abundance data and generation of recovery targets, and estimating the probability of achieving these recovery targets under a range of modelled productivities and rates of en route mortality. This second part of the RPA provides an overview of biology and habitat requirements, an assessment of threats and factors potentially limiting recovery, an inventory of potential mitigation activities to increase survival and/or productivity, and a final discussion surrounding allowable harm. The major threats impacting these DUs were assessed in a multi-day workshop, held October 27th to 29th, 2020, with a range of subject-matter experts, and were identified to be climate change, geological events, natural systems modifications, fishing, pollution, and hatchery competition. These threats were subsequently reviewed during this peer-review process and revised according to group consensus. All nine DUs are faced with a unique and complex suite of threats and limiting factors depending on their geographic location, yet all DUs range from a High to Extreme level of threat risk. Based on the threats assessment, over the next three generations (2021-2032) it is expected that there will be a population level decline of 31-70% (High Risk) for DU10 Harrison (U/S)-L, DU16 Quesnel-S, DU21 Takla-Trembleur-S, and DU24 Widgeon-RT; a population level decline of 31-100% (High-Extreme Risk) for DU2 Bowron-ES, DU14 North Barriere-ES, DU17 Seton-L, DU22 Taseko-ES; and population level decline of 71% to 100% (Extreme Risk) for DU20 Takla-Trembleur-EStu. Alleviating the numerous and complex threats to these DUs will be difficult, especially as many of the threats are exacerbated by climate change. It will be critical to ensure that efforts are appropriately coordinated through effective governance to successfully mitigate the cumulative impacts of these diverse threats. Given the information presented in this RPA (Part 1 & 2), it is apparent that all sources of anthropogenic harm should be minimized to give these populations a chance to rebuild. It is our recommendation that the only activities allowed that cause mortality are those that are in support of the recovery, and in some cases survival of the DUs (i.e. DU20 Takla-Trembleur-EStu, DU2 Bowron-ES), and all sources of anthropogenic harm should be reduced to the maximum extent possible. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In 1974, the Liberal government of Pierre Trudeau released a "green paper" known as the Lalonde Report, after the health minister at that time. The report formulated perspectives on health and the main concepts and ideas developed in it, particularly the concept of "lifestyle," which became the foundation of public health policies in many different European countries and the United States. The concept of "lifestyle" connected personal behaviour and habits to the individual health condition; people were not dying due to a lack of access to medical care but because they lived a life prone to personal risk taking. Furthermore, what is seldom discussed is that this report not only propagated the (neo)liberal view of citizens as autonomous rational actors (homo oeconomicus), with personal responsibility for their health, but it was a first step in the transformation of Medicare and went far beyond the question of health promotion. Health was no longer something that happened to a person but was created through personal choice and, therefore, one had to assume responsibility for one's behaviour. Using Foucault's definition of government as the "conduct of conduct," we will demonstrate that the Lalonde report must be understood as a specific "technology of government" and contributed to a neoliberal transformation of health care despite the fact that the Canadian system of Medicare was based on the idea of universality, meaning citizens had equal access to health care independent of their socio‐economic situation. As we will demonstrate, the Lalonde report undermined this foundation and initiated a profound reorientation, not only of the healthcare system, but even more importantly, it radically changed the way we think about our behaviour around health‐related issues. We will also discuss how the making of the report contributed to the redefinition of politics and demonstrated a lack of concern with liberal‐democratic decision‐making processes. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Fibroblasts are stromal cells found in virtually every tissue and organ of the body. For many years, these cells were often considered to be secondary in functional importance to parenchymal cells. Over the past 2 decades, focused research into the roles of fibroblasts has revealed important roles for these cells in the homeostasis of healthy tissue, and has demonstrated that activation of fibroblasts to myofibroblasts is a key step in disease initiation and progression in many tissues, with fibrosis now recognized as not only an outcome of disease, but also a central contributor to tissue dysfunction, particularly in the heart and lungs. With a growing understanding of both fibroblast and myofibroblast heterogeneity, and the deciphering of the humoral and mechanical cues that impact the phenotype of these cells, fibroblast biology is rapidly becoming a major focus in biomedical research. In this review, we provide an overview of fibroblast and myofibroblast biology, particularly in the heart, and including a discussion of pathophysiological processes such as fibrosis and scarring. We then discuss the central role of Canadian researchers in moving this field forwards, particularly in cardiac fibrosis, and highlight some of the major contributions of these individuals to our understanding of fibroblast and myofibroblast biology in health and disease. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Copyright of Canadian Journal of Plant Science is the property of Canadian Science Publishing and its content may not be copied or emailed to multiple sites or posted to a listserv without the copyright holder's express written permission. However, users may print, download, or email articles for individual use. This abstract may be abridged. No warranty is given about the accuracy of the copy. Users should refer to the original published version of the material for the full abstract. (Copyright applies to all Abstracts.)

Copyright of Canadian Studies in Population is the property of Springer Nature and its content may not be copied or emailed to multiple sites or posted to a listserv without the copyright holder's express written permission. However, users may print, download, or email articles for individual use. This abstract may be abridged. No warranty is given about the accuracy of the copy. Users should refer to the original published version of the material for the full abstract. (Copyright applies to all Abstracts.)

The Oil Sands region of northeastern Alberta contains the world’s largest reserves of oil, in the form of tar-sand. In the Oil Sands region, a large number of environmental impact assessments (EIAs) have been completed for approximately 20 oil sands projects in the past two decades. The EIA process here is unique, in that stakeholders in the region (First Nations, industry representatives, scientists, and residents) have selected indicators of ecological health of the area, including biodiversity. This paper discusses the process of biodiversity assessment using the indicators selected by stakeholders in relation to the overall goals to maintain biodiversity in the region [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Background: Neurological disability progression occurs across the spectrum of people living with multiple sclerosis (MS). Although there are a handful of disease-modifying treatments approved for use in progressive phenotypes of MS, there are no treatments that substantially modify the course of clinical progression in MS. Characterizing the determinants of clinical progression can inform the development of novel therapeutic agents and treatment approaches that target progression in MS, which is one of the greatest unmet needs in clinical practice. Canada, having one of the world's highest rates of MS and a publicly-funded health care system, represents an optimal country to achieve in-depth analysis of progression. Accordingly, the overarching aim of the Canadian Prospective Cohort Study to Understand Progression in MS (CanProCo) is to evaluate a wide spectrum of factors associated with the clinical onset and rate of disease progression in MS, and to describe how these factors relate to one another to influence progression.Methods: CanProCo is a prospective, observational cohort study with investigators specializing in epidemiology, neuroimaging, neuroimmunology, health services research and health economics. CanProCo's study design was approved by an international review panel, comprised of content experts and key stakeholders. One thousand individuals with radiologically-isolated syndrome, relapsing-remitting MS, and primary-progressive MS within 10-15 years of disease onset will be recruited from 5 academic MS centres in Canada. Participants will undergo detailed clinical evaluation annually over 5 years (including advanced, app-based clinical data collection). In a subset of participants within 5-10 years of disease onset (n = 500), blood, cerebrospinal fluid, and research MRIs will be collected allowing an integrated, in-depth evaluation of factors contributing to progression in MS from multiple perspectives. Factors of interest range from biological measures (e.g. single-cell RNA-sequencing), MRI-based microstructural assessment, participant characteristics (self-reported, performance-based, clinician-assessed, health-system based), and micro and macro-environmental factors.Discussion: Halting the progression of MS remains a fundamental need to improve the lives of people living with MS. Achieving this requires leveraging transdisciplinary approaches to better characterize why clinical progression occurs. CanProCo is a pioneering multi-dimensional cohort study aiming to characterize these determinants to inform the development and implementation of efficacious and effective interventions. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Determining the cold tolerance of mountain pine beetle, Dendroctonus ponderosae Hopkins (Coleoptera: Curculionidae), is critical for assessing its long-term persistence and eruptive potential in its new habitat, as well as the risk of continued range expansion across Canada's boreal forest. We used supercooling points (SCPs) and mortality assessments with exposure to different temperatures to determine the cold tolerance of pupae. Mountain pine beetle pupae cold tolerance did not increase with chilling and there was little change in the lethal temperature regardless of treatment or sample time. SCPs were reflective of expected mortality due to freezing: the lethal temperature for 50% mortality was –19.3°C and the mean SCP was –18.7°C. However, significant mortality occurred over time at much warmer temperatures (0 and –9°C), indicating that this life stage suffers significant prefreeze mortality. On the basis of our results, it is unlikely that pupae would be able to successfully overwinter in most regions in Canada. This study is part of a larger project aimed at producing a comprehensive assessment of the cold tolerance of all life stages of the mountain pine beetle to feed population models, climatic suitability indices, and spread assessments. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Biodiversity and farming are inextricably linked. Naturally occurring biodiversity supports the ecosystem services that are indispensable for agricultural production. Although the intensification of farming during the twentieth century has resulted in increased yields, this has often been at the expense of biodiversity. At present, farm biodiversity conservation efforts are largely confined to voluntary programs. This research project examined the relationship between pro-biodiversity attitudes, participation in a voluntary stewardship program, and engagement in biodiversity-friendly farming activities among farmers in Nova Scotia, Canada. This investigation was completed through a quantitative survey measuring respondents' attitudes toward, knowledge of, and management of biodiversity. Significant links were found between program participation and increased engagement in two out of six biodiversity-friendly activities the program promotes: (1) modified harvest, such as changes to mowing equipment, timing, pattern or height to reduce animal mortality; and (2) riparian management, such as buffers and fencing. Engagement in other practices could not be traced to program participation. Pro-biodiversity attitudes, however, were linked to some of these other activities, but not linked to the increased uptake of riparian management or modified harvest. The instruction given to participants about riparian and harvest activities was much more detailed and site-specific than instructions for the activities that were linked to pro-biodiversity attitude, however. This suggests that the quantity and quality of instruction provided to stewardship program participants may have an impact on their uptake of conservation activities. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Indigenous communities in Boreal environments rely on locally-harvested wild foods for sustenance. These foods provide many nutritional benefits including higher levels of polyunsaturated fatty acids (PUFAs; such as ω-3) than what is commonly found in store-bought foods. However, wild foods can be a route of exposure to dietary mercury and persistent organic pollutants (POPs) such as polychlorinated biphenyls (PCBs). Here, we show a strong association between the frequency of wild food consumption in adults (N = 72) from two remote First Nations communities of Northern Ontario and environmental contaminants in blood (POPs) and hair (mercury). We observed that POPs and mercury were on average 3.5 times higher among those consuming wild foods more often, with many frequent wild food consumers exceeding Canadian and international health guidelines for PCB and mercury exposures. Contaminants in locally-harvested fish and game from these communities were sufficiently high that many participants exceeded the monthly consumption limits for methylmercury and PCBs. Those consuming more wild foods also had higher proportions of potentially beneficial ω-3 fatty acids including eicosapentaenoic acid (EPA) and docosahexaenoic acid (DHA). These results show that the benefits of traditional dietary choices in Boreal regions of Canada must be weighed against the inherent risks of contaminant exposure from these foods. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The inshore, continental shelf waters of British Columbia (BC), Canada are busy with ship traffic. South coast waters are heavily trafficked by ships using the ports of Vancouver and Seattle. North coast waters are less busy, but expected to get busier based on proposals for container port and liquefied natural gas development and expansion. Abundance estimates and density surface maps are available for 10 commonly seen marine mammals, including northern resident killer whales, fin whales, humpback whales, and other species with at-risk status under Canadian legislation. Ship noise is the dominant anthropogenic contributor to the marine soundscape of BC, and it is chronic. Underwater noise is now being considered in habitat quality assessments in some countries and in marine spatial planning. We modeled the propagation of underwater noise from ships and weighted the received levels by species-specific audiograms. We overlaid the audiogram-weighted maps of ship audibility with animal density maps. The result is a series of so-called “hotspot” maps of ship noise for all 10 marine mammal species, based on cumulative ship noise energy and average distribution in the boreal summer. South coast waters (Juan de Fuca and Haro Straits) are hotspots for all species that use the area, irrespective of their hearing sensitivity, simply due to ubiquitous ship traffic. Secondary hotspots were found on the central and north coasts (Johnstone Strait and the region around Prince Rupert). These maps can identify where anthropogenic noise is predicted to have above-average impact on species-specific habitat, and where mitigation measures may be most effective. This approach can guide effective mitigation without requiring fleet-wide modification in sites where no animals are present or where the area is used by species that are relatively insensitive to ship noise. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Background: Little is known about patterns of physical activity engaged in by youth after they immigrate to a new country. This study aims to investigate relationships between immigrant generation and ethnicity with physical activity, and to determine if the relationship between immigrant generation and physical activity was modified by ethnicity. Methods: The data sources were Cycle 6 (2009–2010) of the Canadian Health Behaviour in School-Aged Children Study and the 2006 Canada Census of Population. Participants (weighted n = 23,124) were young people from grades 6–10 in 436 schools. Students were asked where they were born, how long ago they moved to Canada, their ethnicity, and how many days a week they accumulated at least 60 minutes of moderate-to-vigorous physical activity (MVPA). Results: Youth born outside of Canada were less likely to be active than peers born in Canada; 11% vs 15% reported 7 days/week of at least 60 minutes of MVPA (p = .001). MVPA increased with time since immigration. Compared to Canadian-born youth, youth who immigrated within the last 1–2 years were less likely to get sufficient MVPA on 4–6 days/week (odds ratio: 0.66, 95% confidence interval: 0.53–0.82) and 7 days/week (0.62; 0.43–0.89). East and South-East Asian youth were less active, regardless of time since immigration: 4–6 days/week (0.67; 0.58–0.79) and 7 days/week (0.37; 0.29–0.48). Conclusion: Time since immigration and ethnicity were associated with MVPA among Canadian youth. Mechanisms by which these differences occur need to be uncovered in order to identify barriers to physical activity participation among youth. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Despite highly successful vaccination programs and high vaccine uptake, both endemic pertussis and periodic pertussis outbreaks continue to occur. The under-recognized role of adolescents and adults in disease transmission, due to waning immunity following natural infection and vaccination, and reduced likelihood of correct diagnosis, may contribute to pertussis persistence. We constructed a mathematical model to describe the transmission of pertussis in Southern Ontario in both pre-vaccine and vaccine eras, to estimate the underlying burden of pertussis in the population. The model was well calibrated using the best available data on pertussis in the pre-vaccination (1880–1929) and vaccination (1993–2004) eras in Ontario. Pertussis under-reporting by age group was estimated by comparing model-projected incidence to reported laboratory-confirmed cases for Greater Toronto. Best-fit model estimates gave a basic reproductive number of approximately 10.6, (seasonal range 9.9 to 11.5). Under-reporting increased with age, and approximately >95% of infections in children were caused by infections in persons with waning immunity to pertussis following prior infection or vaccination. A well-calibrated model suggests that under-recognized cases of pertussis in older individuals are likely to be an important driver of ongoing pertussis outbreaks in children. Model projections strongly support enhancement of booster vaccination efforts in adults. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Background: Cohort data examining differences by gender in clinical responses to combination antiretroviral therapy (ART) remain inconsistent and have yet to be explored in a multi-province Canadian setting. This study investigates gender differences by injection drug use (IDU) history in virologic responses to ART and mortality. Methods: Data from the Canadian Observational Cohort (CANOC) collaboration, a multisite cohort study of HIV-positive individuals initiating ART after January 1, 2000, were included. This analysis was restricted to participants with a follow-up HIV-RNA plasma viral load measure and known IDU history. Weibull hazard regression evaluated time to virologic suppression (2 consecutive measures <50 copies/mL), rebound (>1000 copies/mL after suppression), and all-cause mortality. Sensitivity analyses explored the impact of presumed ART use in pregnancy on virologic outcomes. Results: At baseline, women (1120 of 5442 participants) were younger (median 36 vs. 41 years) and more frequently reported IDU history (43.5% vs. 28.8%) (both p<0.001). Irrespective of IDU history, in adjusted multivariable analyses women were significantly less likely to virologically suppress after ART initiation and were at increased risk of viral load rebound. In adjusted time to death analysis, no differences by gender were noted. After adjusting for presumed ART use in pregnancy, observed gender differences in time to virologic suppression for non-IDU, and time to virologic rebound for IDU, became insignificant. Conclusions: HIV-positive women in CANOC are at heightened risk for poor clinical outcomes. Further understanding of the intersections between gender and other factors augmenting risk is needed to maximize the benefits of ART. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The article looks at the history of the series on the biology of Canadian weeds. A series under the title "The Biology of Canadian Weeds" was published by the Agricultural Institute of Canada. The first account was published in October 1973 and it focused on the native weed species sheep-laurel (Kalmia angustifolia L.). A list of accounts on the biology of Canadian weeds published to date is also presented.

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The quest for sustainable communities might be fostered by a new 'place-based' governing approach that engages civil society and other actors in local decision-making processes. In Canada, lessons can be learned from the establishment and maintenance of biosphere reserves by networks of local communities of interests and other organisations. Biosphere reserves are created to promote conservation, biodiversity and sustainable livelihoods. Municipal and public participation in these reserves can be encouraged, promoting a local sense of place as well as sustainable community and regional development. An examination of two Canadian biosphere reserves, Riding Mountain and Long Point, illustrates how local governments and these reserves might assist each other in their mutual goals of long-term sustainability while offering a worthwhile model of local collaborative, place-based governance. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

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We examined basic breeding biology, as well as the effects of parental sex, brood size, nestling age, and nest habitat on foraging distances and parental food delivery rates of snow buntings ( Plectrophenax nivalis) on Devon Island, NT, Canada, in the summers of 2003–2006. Clutch sizes and initiation dates were similar to those found in previous studies, although nest density was much higher. Feeding rates and foraging distances of buntings differed depending on the size and age of the brood, but were similar between nest habitats. Unlike in earlier studies, we found that male buntings made fewer feeding visits, but traveled longer distances to forage for food than females. Whether these differences between the sexes relate to reducing competition for prey, or to differing sex roles in parental care due to the poorly insulated nest cavities of this species, remains to be determined. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

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Standardized survey methods are important for obtaining reliable information on wildlife populations. As a precursor to creating a regional bat-survey (Chiroptera) protocol, we distributed a questionnaire via e-mail to biologists responsible for conducting bat surveys in the United States and Canada. We received 415 responses from 45 states and 7 Canadian provinces or territories. Most of the responses were from western North America. Based on these responses, we characterized the biologists responsible for bat surveys, their objectives and methods, and the habitat types and spatial scales surveyed. Most respondents were government employees, had <5 years of experience working with bats, and had <20% of their professional responsibilities dedicated to bats. Surveys were most likely to occur in forests and at sites ≤ 1 km² in area. The 3 most important objectives identified by respondents for conducting bat surveys, in rank order, were to 1) create a list of species in an area, 2) monitor presence or abundance of a species at a structure, and 3) determine presence of a single species in an area. Experienced (> 10 yr) surveyors tended to employ a wider variety of methods than those with less experience. We discuss how the results of this questionnaire will be used to draft a regional bat-survey protocol to better address the needs of its target audience. Using the Internet to survey the target audience proved to be a very useful step in the development of a standard bat-survey protocol. We believe similar methods should be considered for other taxa as a precursor to creation of standard survey methods. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

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The Truth must dazzle gradually Or every man be blind Emily Dickinson in Margulis & Sagan (1997, p. 1) As time goes by, earlier memories fade and new realities take over (even for heroes of ‘Casablanca’, see Walsh 1998). For these reasons a recorded history is useful, even as I wish there would be no need to write this. It all started when I hesitantly accepted an invitation from a small – by present standards – but a prestigious publishing house in The Hague to start a new journal. (I had just published with them a monograph on my work in Africa – Balon & Coche 1974.). Fearful to commit myself, I was strongly encouraged by several colleagues, among them the late J.C. (Cam) Stevenson, then the editor of the influential periodical the Journal of the Fisheries Research Board of Canada. He convinced me that there was a need for an independent journal, as only publications supported by the government (like his own) or by some professional societies were then available. Editors of these journals, Cam claimed, were not free to publish ideas that contradict government policies or offend ‘mainstream’ beliefs. Thus, much of the new or irritating findings and conclusions were censored (see Balon 2002). ‘Make sure’, Cam advised, ‘that your contract with the commercial publisher incorporates a clause that the content of the journal is solely your responsibility’. The clause was incorporated. The name Environmental Biology of Fishes was proposed by colleagues, and I did not like it very much initially but was convinced by them that, although almost oxymoron, it fulfills an advertizing role similar to something like ‘Nite Club’. The Publisher's winning cover artwork – the naive fish tail up – I hated at first as very undignified but realized soon its attention attracting design on the library shelves and became used to it (later I even played with designing other covers of the hardcover spinoffs Developments in Environmental Biology of Fishes in a similar manner). [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]