Species declines and extinctions have been recorded across taxa as evidence of an ongoing global biodiversity crisis. Amphibians are at the forefront of these declines with nearly one third of amphibian species estimated to be at risk of extinction. While many factors contribute to population declines and extinctions, the role...
Vietnam is considered one of the most climate change-vulnerable countries due to its high dependence on agriculture and its coastal location. Increased atmospheric temperatures caused by climate change also significantly threaten one of Vietnam's most important cash crops, robusta coffee (Coffea canephora). Suitable cultivation sites of robusta, which comprises 97%...
A global-scale three dimensional atmospheric transport and chemistry model was applied to simulate transpacific transport of Benzo[a]pyrene (BaP) emitted from Asia. The model results were compared with observations at six monitoring sites. The annual mean and seasonal variation of transport patterns and the contributions of different Asian source regions to...
Using microRNA array analyses of in vitro HIV-1-infected CD4(+) cells, we find that several host microRNAs are significantly up- or downregulated around the time HIV-1 infection peaks in vitro. While microRNA-223 levels were significantly enriched in HIV-1-infected CD4(superscript+)CD8(superscript-) PBMCs, microRNA-29a/b, microRNA-155 and microRNA-21 levels were significantly reduced. Based on the...
Animals can be naturally exposed simultaneously to multiple stressors. These include habitat changes, contaminants, diseases, invasive species, parasitism, and predation. Exposure to various combinations of biotic and abiotic stressors may induce behavioral changes that affect the way an individual interacts within its environment.Like other groups of organisms, amphibians are exposed...
The current rate of global biodiversity loss and extinctions is unparalleled and a major concern. Freshwater organisms are facing particularly rapid rates of biodiversity loss. Amphibians, which require an aquatic environment for part of their life cycle, are one of the most vulnerable vertebrate groups. Amphibians are experiencing population declines,...
Information about named entities (real-world objects) is usually harvested from different sources and organized as a multiple relational directed graph in Knowledge Bases (KBs). KBs play essential roles in many NLP modules including question answering, fact-checking, search engines, etc. KBs are big but still incomplete: relational information among entities is...
Due to threats of secondary salinization caused by increased saltwater intrusion upstream associated with climate change, this thesis examines how salinity affects the development and oviposition site selection habits of three Oregon coastal breeding amphibians, the Roughskin Newt (Taricha granulosa), the Northern Red-legged Frog (Rana aurora) and the Pacific Treefrog...
Biodiversity losses in terrestrial, freshwater, and marine systems are accelerating at a global scale and the most threatened vertebrate taxa are those associated with freshwater habitats. The causes of biodiversity losses are often complex and include synergistic effects of natural and human-induced stressors, such as habitat loss and fragmentation, urbanization,...
Disease acts as a powerful selective force in natural systems, driving the rapid evolution of resistance in the host. In the face of a myriad of pathogenic challenges in natural systems, hosts must balance the energetic needs of maintenance and reproduction with costly resistance mechanisms. In this dissertation I will...