Protected areas are widely considered essential for biodiversity conservation. However, few global studies have demonstrated that protection benefits a broad range of species. Here, using a new ...global biodiversity database with unprecedented geographic and taxonomic coverage, we compare four biodiversity measures at sites sampled in multiple land uses inside and outside protected areas. Globally, species richness is 10.6% higher and abundance 14.5% higher in samples taken inside protected areas compared with samples taken outside, but neither rarefaction-based richness nor endemicity differ significantly. Importantly, we show that the positive effects of protection are mostly attributable to differences in land use between protected and unprotected sites. Nonetheless, even within some human-dominated land uses, species richness and abundance are higher in protected sites. Our results reinforce the global importance of protected areas but suggest that protection does not consistently benefit species with small ranges or increase the variety of ecological niches.
Land use and related pressures have reduced local terrestrial biodiversity, but it is unclear how the magnitude of change relates to the recently proposed planetary boundary ("safe limit"). We ...estimate that land use and related pressures have already reduced local biodiversity intactness–the average proportion of natural biodiversity remaining in local ecosystems–beyond its recently proposed planetary boundary across 58.1% of the world's land surface, where 71.4% of the human population live. Biodiversity intactness within most biomes (especially grassland biomes), most biodiversity hotspots, and even some wilderness areas is inferred to be beyond the boundary. Such widespread transgression of safe limits suggests that biodiversity loss, if unchecked, will undermine efforts toward long-term sustainable development.
Human use of the land (for agriculture and settlements) has a substantial negative effect on biodiversity globally. However, not all species are adversely affected by land use, and indeed, some ...benefit from the creation of novel habitat. Geographically rare species may be more negatively affected by land use than widespread species, but data limitations have so far prevented global multi-clade assessments of land-use effects on narrow-ranged and widespread species. We analyse a large, global database to show consistent differences in assemblage composition. Compared with natural habitat, assemblages in disturbed habitats have more widespread species on average, especially in urban areas and the tropics. All else being equal, this result means that human land use is homogenizing assemblage composition across space. Disturbed habitats show both reduced abundances of narrow-ranged species and increased abundances of widespread species. Our results are very important for biodiversity conservation because narrow-ranged species are typically at higher risk of extinction than widespread species. Furthermore, the shift to more widespread species may also affect ecosystem functioning by reducing both the contribution of rare species and the diversity of species' responses to environmental changes among local assemblages.
In the realm of biomedical research, the growing volume, diversity and quantity of data has escalated the demand for statistical analysis as it is indispensable for synthesizing, interpreting, and ...publishing data. Hence the need for accessible analysis tools drastically increased. StatiCAL emerges as a user-friendly solution, enabling researchers to conduct basic analyses without necessitating extensive programming expertise. StatiCAL includes divers functionalities: data management, visualization on variables and statistical analysis. Data management functionalities allow the user to freely add or remove variables, to select sub-population and to visualise selected data to better perform the analysis. With this tool, users can freely perform statistical analysis such as descriptive, graphical, univariate, and multivariate analysis. All of this can be performed without the need to learn R coding as the software is a graphical user interface where all the action can be performed by clicking a button. StatiCAL represents a valuable contribution to the field of biomedical research. By being open-access and by providing an intuitive interface with robust features, StatiCAL allow researchers to gain autonomy in conducting their projects.
Habitat loss and degradation, driven largely by agricultural expansion and intensification, present the greatest immediate threat to biodiversity. Tropical forests harbour among the highest levels of ...terrestrial species diversity and are likely to experience rapid land-use change in the coming decades. Synthetic analyses of observed responses of species are useful for quantifying how land use affects biodiversity and for predicting outcomes under land-use scenarios. Previous applications of this approach have typically focused on individual taxonomic groups, analysing the average response of the whole community to changes in land use. Here, we incorporate quantitative remotely sensed data about habitats in, to our knowledge, the first worldwide synthetic analysis of how individual species in four major taxonomic groups—invertebrates, ‘herptiles’ (reptiles and amphibians), mammals and birds—respond to multiple human pressures in tropical and sub-tropical forests. We show significant independent impacts of land use, human vegetation offtake, forest cover and human population density on both occurrence and abundance of species, highlighting the value of analysing multiple explanatory variables simultaneously. Responses differ among the four groups considered, and—within birds and mammals—between habitat specialists and habitat generalists and between narrow-ranged and wide-ranged species.
Land use has large effects on the diversity of ecological assemblages. Differences among land uses in the diversity of local assemblages (alpha diversity) have been quantified at a global scale. ...Effects on the turnover of species composition between locations (beta diversity) are less clear, with previous studies focusing on particular regions or groups of species. Using a global database on the composition of ecological assemblages in different land uses, we test for differences in the between-site turnover of species composition, within and among land-use types. Overall, we show a strong impact of land use on assemblage composition. While we find that compositional turnover within land uses does not differ strongly among land uses, human land uses and secondary vegetation in an early stage of recovery are poor at retaining the species that characterise primary vegetation. The dissimilarity of assemblages in human-impacted habitats compared with primary vegetation was more pronounced in the tropical than temperate realm. An exploratory analysis suggests that this geographic difference might be caused primarily by differences in climate seasonality and in the numbers of species sampled. Taken together the results suggest that, while small-scale beta diversity within land uses is not strongly impacted by land-use type, compositional turnover between land uses is substantial. Therefore, land-use change will lead to profound changes in the structure of ecological assemblages.
PurposeBecause of atypical response imaging patterns in patients with metastatic non-small cell lung cancer (NSCLC) treated with immune checkpoint inhibitors (ICPIs), new biomarkers are needed for a ...better monitoring of treatment efficacy. The aim of this prospective study was to evaluate the prognostic value of volume-derived positron-emission tomography (PET) parameters on baseline and follow-up 18F-fluoro-deoxy-glucose PET (18F-FDG-PET) scans and compare it with the conventional PET Response Criteria in Solid Tumors (PERCIST).MethodsPatients with metastatic NSCLC were included in two different single-center prospective trials. 18F-FDG-PET studies were performed before the start of immunotherapy (PETbaseline), after 6–8 weeks (PETinterim1) and after 12–16 weeks (PETinterim2) of treatment, using PERCIST criteria for tumor response assessment. Different metabolic parameters were evaluated: absolute values of maximum standardized uptake value (SUVmax) of the most intense lesion, total metabolic tumor volume (TMTV), total lesion glycolysis (TLG), but also their percentage changes between PET studies (ΔSUVmax, ΔTMTV and ΔTLG). The median follow-up of patients was 31 (7.3–31.8) months. Prognostic values and optimal thresholds of PET parameters were estimated by ROC (Receiver Operating Characteristic) curve analysis of 12-month overall survival (12M-OS) and 6-month progression-free survival (6M-PFS). Tumor progression needed to be confirmed by a multidisciplinary tumor board, considering atypical response patterns on imaging.Results110 patients were prospectively included. On PETbaseline, TMTV was predictive of 12M-OS AUC (Area Under Curve) =0.64; 95% CI: 0.61 to 0.66 whereas SUVmax and TLG were not. On PETinterim1 and PETinterim2, all metabolic parameters were predictive for 12M-OS and 6M-PFS, the residual TMTV on PETinterim1 (TMTV1) being the strongest prognostic biomarker (AUC=0.83 and 0.82; 95% CI: 0.74 to 0.91, for 12M-OS and 6M-PFS, respectively). Using the optimal threshold by ROC curve to classify patients into three TMTV1 subgroups (0 cm3; 0–57 cm3; >57 cm3), TMTV1 prognostic stratification was independent of PERCIST criteria on both PFS and OS, and significantly outperformed them. Subgroup analysis demonstrated that TMTV1 remained a strong prognostic biomarker of 12M-OS for non-responding patients (p=0.0003) according to PERCIST criteria. In the specific group of patients with PERCIST progression on PETinterim1, low residual tumor volume (<57 cm3) was still associated with a very favorable patients’ outcome (6M-PFS=73%; 24M-OS=55%).ConclusionThe absolute value of residual metabolic tumor volume, assessed 6–8 weeks after the start of ICPI, is an optimal and independent prognostic measure, exceeding and complementing conventional PERCIST criteria. Oncologists should consider it in patients with first tumor progression according to PERCIST criteria, as it helps identify patients who benefit from continued treatment.Trial registration number2018-A02116-49; NCT03584334.
Proprioception is a critical component for motor functions and directly affects motor learning after neurological injuries. Conventional methods for its assessment are generally ordinal in nature and ...hence lack sensitivity. Robotic devices designed to promote sensorimotor learning can potentially provide quantitative precise, accurate, and reliable assessments of sensory impairments. In this paper, we investigate the clinical applicability and validity of using a planar 2 degrees of freedom robot to quantitatively assess proprioceptive deficits in post-stroke participants. Nine stroke survivors and nine healthy subjects participated in the study. Participants' hand was passively moved to the target position guided by the H-Man robot (Criterion movement) and were asked to indicate during a second passive movement towards the same target (Matching movement) when they felt that they matched the target position. The assessment was carried out on a planar surface for movements in the forward and oblique directions in the contralateral and ipsilateral sides of the tested arm. The matching performance was evaluated in terms of error magnitude (absolute and signed) and its variability. Stroke patients showed higher variability in the estimation of the target position compared to the healthy participants. Further, an effect of target was found, with lower absolute errors in the contralateral side. Pairwise comparison between individual stroke participant and control participants showed significant proprioceptive deficits in two patients. The proposed assessment of passive joint position sense was inherently simple and all participants, regardless of motor impairment level, could complete it in less than 10 minutes. Therefore, the method can potentially be carried out to detect changes in proprioceptive deficits in clinical settings.
Proprioception combines information from cutaneous, joint, tendon, and muscle receptors for maintaining a reliable internal body image. However, it is still a matter of debate, in both ...neurophysiology and psychology, to what extent such body image is modified or distorted by a changing haptic environment. In particular, what is worth investigating is the contribution of external forces on our perception of body and joint configuration. The proprioceptive acuity of fifteen young participants was tested with a Joint Position Matching (JPM) task, performed with the dominant wrist under five different external forces, in order to understand to what extent they affect proprioceptive acuity. Results show that accuracy and precision in target matching do not change in a significant manner as a function of the loading condition, suggesting that the multi-sensory integration process is indeed capable of discriminating different sub-modalities of proprioception, namely the joint position sense and the sense of force. Furthermore, results indicate a preference for target undershooting when movements are performed in a viscous or high resistive force field, rather than passive or null fields in which subjects did not show any predominance for under/over estimation of their position.
Post stroke upper limb rehabilitation is a challenging problem with poor outcomes as 40% of survivors have functionally useless upper limbs. Robot-aided therapy (RAT) is a potential method to ...alleviate the effort of intensive, task-specific, repetitive upper limb exercises for both patients and therapists. The present study aims to investigate how a time matched combinatory training scheme that incorporates conventional and RAT, using H-Man, compares with conventional training toward reducing workforce demands. In a randomized control trial (NCT02188628,
www.clinicaltrials.gov
), 44 subacute to chronic stroke survivors with first-ever clinical stroke and predominant arm motor function deficits were recruited and randomized into two groups of 22 subjects: Robotic Therapy (RT) and Conventional Therapy (CT). Both groups received 18 sessions of 90 min; three sessions per week over 6 weeks. In each session, participants of the CT group received 90 min of 1:1 therapist-supervised conventional therapy while participants of the RT group underwent combinatory training which consisted of 60 min of minimally-supervised H-Man therapy followed by 30 min of conventional therapy. The clinical outcomes Fugl-Meyer (FMA), Action Research Arm Test and, Grip Strength and the quantitative measures (smoothness, time efficiency, and task error, derived from two robotic assessment tasks) were independently evaluated prior to therapy intervention (week 0), at mid-training (week 3), at the end of training (week 6), and post therapy (week 12 and 24). Significant differences within group were observed at the end of training for all clinical scales compared with baseline mean and standard deviation of FMA score changes between baseline and week 6; RT: Δ4.41 (3.46) and CT: Δ3.0 (4.0);
p
< 0.01. FMA gains were retained 18 weeks post-training week 24; RT: Δ5.38 (4.67) and week 24 CT: Δ4.50 (5.35);
p
< 0.01. The RT group clinical scores improved similarly when compared to CT group with no significant inter-group at all time points although the conventional therapy time was reduced to one third in RT group. There were no training-related adverse side effects. In conclusion, time matched combinatory training incorporating H-Man RAT produced similar outcomes compared to conventional therapy alone. Hence, this study supports a combinatory approach to improve motor function in post-stroke arm paresis.
Clinical Trial Registration:
www.ClinicalTrials.gov
, identifier: NCT02188628.
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