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The Port of Rotterdam is expanding to meet the growing demand to accommodate large cargo vessels. The construction of Maasvlakte 2 (MV2) started in September 2008. One of the licensing conditions is the monitoring of the underwater sound produced during its construction, with an emphasis on the establishment of acoustic source levels of the trailing suction hopper dredgers (TSHDs) during their various activities: dredging, transport and discharge of sediment. TNO (Netherlands Organisation for Applied Scientific Research) Sonar and Acoustics carried out measurement and analysis activities for this monitoring. During an initial measurement campaign in September 2008, background measurements were performed in the absence of dredging. Source level and background sound measurements were made in the dredging area while MV2 dredging activities were underway in September 2009. In a final phase of the study, possible effects of underwater sound on marine fauna were considered for scenarios with and without dredgers. In this article, the principal results of the research are described and discussed in the context of the effects predicted in the Environmental Impact Assessment., Hydraulic Engineering, Civil Engineering and Geosciences

rMIT project about the redevelopment of Heijplaat. Divided in two parts: - urban - analysis and new masterplan of Heijplaat - building - analysis and design of the Onderzeebootloods (submarine shed), studio Heijplaat, RMIT, Architecture

The objective of this study is to answer the question: Does small-scale Jatropha production result in changes in the differentiated access to land and which institutional factors account for this? The hypothesis is that Jatropha commercialisation for bio fuel production will generate an increase in land value and will trigger a demand for land. If this occurs, it is expected that people’s access to land will change and that local institutional factors such as ‘indigenousness’, ‘gender’ and ‘seniority’ and national institutional factors such as the Land Laws of 1986 and 2000 might account for this change. This exploratory research was carried out for Mali Biocarburant in six villages in the Koulikoro Region in Mali and has shown that there are important differences in land pressure between the six villages. This study concludes that small-scale Jatropha production has not changed people’s access to land. There are no indications that the introduction or extension of small-scale Jatropha production has worsened the unequal access to land of vulnerable groups, or has led their losing access to land. The study does conclude that there is unequal access to land for founding families and later families, men and women, and older and younger members of the community, and that powerful groups are more involved in Jatropha production than vulnerable groups.

Recent developments in competence-based education have motivated institutions of vocational education and training (VET) to improve the links or connectivity between learning in school and learning in the workplace, which has been a problem for decades. In previous research, a theoretical framework describing the underlying aspects of competence-based education was developed. In this study, three aspects of this framework were used to analyse connectivity between learning in school and learning in the workplace. These aspects were: i) authenticity, ii) selfresponsibility, and iii) the role of the teacher as expert and coach. Three stakeholder groups (i.e., students, teachers, and workplace training supervisors) involved in secondary VET programs in the field of life sciences in the Netherlands were questioned on these aspects. Based on their interviews, it is concluded that these aspects provide information about the process of connectivity. Because stakeholder groups hold different conceptions of workplace learning and often do not communicate adequately about mutual responsibilities, the implementation of these aspects of competence-based education has not significantly improved the connectivity situation. Nevertheless, these aspects of competence-based education can guide stakeholder groups in making clearer agreements about mutual responsibilities, which may improve connectivity in the future

BACKGROUND: Bats are the suspected natural reservoir hosts for a number of new and emerging zoonotic viruses including Nipah virus, Hendra virus, severe acute respiratory syndrome coronavirus and Ebola virus. Since the discovery of SARS-like coronaviruses in Chinese horseshoe bats, attempts to isolate a SL-CoV from bats have failed and attempts to isolate other bat-borne viruses in various mammalian cell lines have been similarly unsuccessful. New stable bat cell lines are needed to help with these investigations and as tools to assist in the study of bat immunology and virus-host interactions. METHODOLOGY/FINDINGS: Black flying foxes (Pteropus alecto) were captured from the wild and transported live to the laboratory for primary cell culture preparation using a variety of different methods and culture media. Primary cells were successfully cultured from 20 different organs. Cell immortalisation can occur spontaneously, however we used a retroviral system to immortalise cells via the transfer and stable production of the Simian virus 40 Large T antigen and the human telomerase reverse transcriptase protein. Initial infection experiments with both cloned and uncloned cell lines using Hendra and Nipah viruses demonstrated varying degrees of infection efficiency between the different cell lines, although it was possible to infect cells in all tissue types. CONCLUSIONS/SIGNIFICANCE: The approaches developed and optimised in this study should be applicable to bats of other species. We are in the process of generating further cell lines from a number of different bat species using the methodology established in this study.

1. An important target for conservation planning is the minimum amount of habitat needed in a landscape to ensure the persistence of a species. Appropriate targets can be determined by identifying thresholds in the amount of habitat, below which persistence, abundance or occupancy declines rapidly. Although some studies have identified habitat thresholds, we currently have little understanding of the extent to which thresholds vary spatially. This is important for establishing whether we can apply the same planning targets across broad geographical regions. 2. We quantified habitat-occupancy relationships for the koala Phascolarctos cinereus (Goldfuss) in three study regions that span much of its geographical range. Standard and piecewise (broken-stick/segmented) logistic regression were used to model linear and threshold habitat-occupancy relationships. We then used an information-theoretic approach to test: (1) whether habitat-occupancy relationships were described better by threshold or linear models and (2) where threshold models were better, whether, and to what extent, threshold points varied among study regions. 3. There was substantially greater support for the threshold than the linear models across a range of habitat qualities and landscape extents. The threshold models generally predicted a rapid decline in occupancy below the threshold points. 4. Estimated threshold points varied, sometimes substantially, among study regions. This may relate to cross-regional differences in habitat quality, demographic rates, and land-use patterns. The role of habitat fragmentation is unclear. 5. Synthesis and applications. Variation in threshold points among study regions suggests that we should be wary of using thresholds derived in one region for setting conservation planning targets in another. Rather, we should aim to set specific targets for individual locations (and species), while acknowledging the inherent uncertainties in these targets. This has implications fo