Biodiversity information is made available through numerous databases that each have their own data models, web services, and data types. Combining data across databases leads to new insights, but is not easy because each database uses its own system of identifiers. In the absence of stable and interoperable identifiers, databases...
Understanding the interplay between environmental conditions and phenotypes is a fundamental goal of biology. Unfortunately, data that include observations on phenotype and environment are highly heterogeneous and thus difficult to find and integrate. One approach that is likely to improve the status quo involves the use of ontologies to standardize...
Animals aggregate and interact in nonuniform and nonrandom patterns, which lead to group level characteristics that have important evolutionary and ecological consequences. Network analysis provides a useful conceptual framework for linking animal interactions at all scales from dyads to communities, to populations and ecosystems. Despite exciting theoretical and applied advances...
A multi-year field study was conducted in Oregon and Washington to evaluate the influence of nitrogen fertilization rate and timing on cone quality, nitrate accumulation in cones, severity of powdery mildew (caused by Podosphaera macularis), arthropod pests, and the stability of conservation biological control of the twospotted spider mite (Tetranychus...
Anterior cruciate ligament injuries are common in a wide variety of sports and most frequently occur during activities requiring rapid deceleration such as landing and cutting. Deceleration of the body's center of mass during movement results primarily from eccentric muscle contraction. This type of contraction serves to absorb energy from...
Body size explains much of the interspecific variation in the physiology, behavior, and morphology of birds, such as metabolic rate, diet selection, intake rate, gut size, and bill size. Based on mass-specific metabolic requirements and relative energetic costs of activities, being a certain body size has both advantages and disadvantages....
Grape phylloxera, Daktulosp/iaira vitfoliae (Fitch) development was studied under field and laboratory conditions. The aphid-like insect feeds on Vitis vinfera L. roots producing swellings that decay and lead to vine decline. The only long-term economic solution for control of grape phylloxera (GP) is to plant vines grafted onto a resistant...
As a result of warming temperatures and subsequently declining snowpacks, forest fires are increasing in frequency, intensity and extent across the western USA. In turn, forest fire disturbance affects patterns of snow accumulation and ablation by reducing canopy interception and modifying the snowpack energy balance. Following a 2011, high severity...
As a result of warming temperatures and subsequently declining snowpacks, forest fires are increasing in frequency, intensity and extent across the western USA. In turn, forest fire disturbance affects patterns of snow accumulation and ablation by reducing canopy interception and modifying the snowpack energy balance. Following a 2011, high severity...