Scientific diasporas have been identified as valuable resources to strengthen science, technology, and innovation in their countries of origin. In this context, our paper seeks to contribute by ...addressing the following research questions: What are the main features of the Costa Rican scientific diaspora, and what policy lessons can be extracted from their experiences abroad? Toward this goal, we analyzed ten years of diaspora perspectives as collected by TicoTal, an online database and network of Costa Rican scientists studying and working abroad created by the National Academy of Sciences (ANC) in 2010. Our study reveals the main features of the Costa Rican scientific diaspora using 121 interviews published over a ten-year period: we identified the academic areas in which the diaspora has specialized, the countries where they were trained, their current location, the most frequent funding mechanisms and sources that enabled professional opportunities abroad, the level of engagement and collaboration they maintain with the Costa Rican STI ecosystem, along with the incentives they consider important to support and harness the potential of this community to advance STI goals in the country. Results from this analysis can inform national policies and investment strategies in R&D infrastructure and resources, by providing a roadmap to engage with scientific diasporas and benefit from their training and talent, as well as guide future scholarship and exchange programs.
Science diplomacy is a fast-growing field of research, policy, and practice dedicated to understanding and reinforcing the connections between science and international affairs to tackle national, ...regional, and global issues. By aligning science and diplomacy, countries can attract talent, strengthen their national research ecosystems, provide avenues for participation of scientists in policy, and coordinate integrated solutions to challenges with technical dimensions. While Latin America has a long tradition of bilateral and regional cooperation, science still plays a marginal role in foreign policy, as has become evidenced by the response to the COVID-19 pandemic. With few exceptions, Latin American nations have a relatively immature science, technology, and innovation ecosystem, compounded by low public and private investments in research, coexisting with profound socio-economic inequalities, and large vulnerable populations. Such challenging conditions have created barriers to a fluid relationship between science and diplomacy, fundamentally characterized by inefficient communication between scientists and policymakers, weak collaboration channels, and duplicated roles, which altogether perpetuate siloed mentalities and a lack of trust between the two communities. Over the last decade, a first influential wave of Latin American scientists, diplomats, and other professionals, including five of the co-authors, have undertaken science diplomacy training provided by specialized organizations. Through these experiences, we recognized the need to elevate awareness and build capacities in science diplomacy in our respective countries and overall, across Latin America. Here, we describe emerging efforts and mechanisms to bridge the gap between scientists and policymakers at the national and regional level. Furthermore, we offer recommendations to amplify the impact of those pioneering initiatives toward consolidating a robust science diplomacy practice across the region. The national experiences described from Costa Rica, Mexico, and Panama can serve as a roadmap for other Latin American nations in the early process of developing a science diplomacy strategy, so they can also align themselves to a collective pathway. Most critically, we propose a way forward so that Latin America can leapfrog beyond disjointed training of individuals into integrated institutional strategies that can harness the tools of science diplomacy to enhance science-informed multilateral cooperation and enable more effective science-informed policymaking.
The acoustic environment of two focal Arctic species, bowhead (Balaena mysticetus) and beluga (Delphinapterus leucas) whales, varied among the three core-use regions of the Pacific Arctic examined ...during the months in which both species occur: (1) January-March in the St. Lawrence Island/Anadyr Strait region, (2) November-January in the Bering Strait region, and (3) August-October in the Barrow Canyon region. Biological noise (consisting of the signals of bowhead whales, walrus and bearded seals) dominated the acoustic environment for the focal species in the St. Lawrence Island/Anadyr Strait region, which was covered with ice throughout the months studied. In the Bering Strait region whales were exposed primarily to environmental noise (in the form of wind noise) during November, before the region was ice-covered in December, and biological noise (from bowhead and walrus) again was prevalent. Anthropogenic noise dominated the Barrow Canyon region for the focal species in late summer and fall (August through October); this was also the only region in which the two species did not overlap with sea ice. Under open water conditions both near Barrow Canyon and in Bering Strait, noise levels were tightly correlated with wind. However, with climate-change driven increases in open water leading to rising noise levels across multiple fronts (atmospheric, biological, anthropogenic), the relatively pristine acoustic environment of Arctic cetaceans is changing rapidly. Characterizing the acoustic habitat of these regions before they are further altered should be considered a management and conservation priority in the Arctic.
A portable matched-field processing (MFP) system for tracking marine mammals is presented, constructed by attaching a set of autonomous flash-memory acoustic recorders to a rope to form a ...four-element vertical array, or "insta-array." The acoustic data are initially time-synchronized by performing a matched-field global inversion using acoustic data from an opportunistic source, and then by exploiting the spatial coherence of the ocean ambient noise background to measure and correct for the relative clock drift between the autonomous recorders. The technique is illustrated by using humpback whale song collected off the eastern Australian coast to synchronize the array, which is then used to track the dive profile of the whale using MFP methods. The ability to deploy autonomous instruments into arbitrary "insta-array" geometries with conventional fishing gear may permit nonintrusive array measurements in regions currently too isolated, expensive, or environmentally hostile for standard acoustic equipment
The ocean plays a central role in climate change mitigation and adaptation. However, climate and ocean policies have been historically siloed. After decades of slow convergence, the Ocean and Climate ...Change Dialogue, decided at COP25 and launched online in December 2020, was the first forum for Parties and non-Party stakeholders to the UNFCCC to give their perspectives on how the climate regime should address ocean-related mitigation and adaptation. The Ocean Dialogue was informed by 47 prior open submissions provided by a broad swath of actors from across the UN system and from civil society, including traditional and youth voices. Our analysis of the submissions demonstrates a political evolution towards the nexus among climate, ocean, and biodiversity regimes. The submissions uniformly acknowledge that ocean and climate systems are inextricably linked, and that consideration of ocean-based action will strengthen climate action and vice versa. Salient themes of the submissions include changing ocean impacts, carbon sinks and blue carbon opportunities, and the need for ecosystem resilience, biodiversity management and improved understanding of normative and institutional frameworks. There is a strong call to recognize the interconnectedness of the biophysical world. Similar themes emerged during the actual Ocean Dialogue and the subsequent informal meeting on next steps. The main message conveyed is the dire necessity to implement strong stewardship and good governance of the blue planet in a disrupted climate using cooperative and concrete actions. This analysis highlights the need for a continued transdisciplinary international dialogue on the ocean and climate change which elevates the ocean-climate-biodiversity nexus via collaborative science, finance, and policy.
Ocean and marine ecosystem impacts of climate change were widely acknowledged, and referenced by ninety-one percent of submissions.
After decades of slow integration of ocean into climate policy, the Ocean Dialogue submissions acknowledge that climate policy must address linkages with the ocean and its biodiversity.
Concerns include changing ocean impacts, carbon sinks and blue carbon opportunities, and the need for ecosystem resilience, biodiversity management and increased institutional interactions.
Continuation of this Dialogue, with strengthened collaboration between States and non-state actors, may give rise to multilateral and multilevel decision-making toward sustainable climate, ocean and biodiversity action.
This study assesses effects of airgun sounds on bowhead calling behavior during the autumn migration. In August–October 2007, 35 directional acoustic recorders (DASARs) were deployed at five sites in ...the Alaskan Beaufort Sea. Location estimates were obtained for >137,500 individual calls; a subsample of locations with high detection probability was used in the analyses. Call localization rates (CLRs) were compared before, during, and after periods of airgun use between sites near seismic activities (median distance 41–45 km) and sites relatively distant from seismic activities (median distance >104 km). At the onset of airgun use, CLRs dropped significantly at sites near the airguns, where median received levels from airgun pulses (SPL) were 116–129 dB re 1 μPa (10–450 Hz). CLRs remained unchanged at sites distant from the airguns, where median received levels were 99–108 dB re 1 μPa. This drop could result from a cessation of calling, deflection of whales around seismic activities, or both combined, but call locations alone were insufficient to differentiate between these possibilities. Reverberation from airgun pulses could have masked a small number of calls near the airguns, but even if masking did take place, the analysis results remain unchanged.
Shallow-water airgun survey activities off the North Slope of Alaska generate impulsive sounds that are the focus of much regulatory attention. Reverberation from repetitive airgun shots, however, ...can also increase background noise levels, which can decrease the detection range of nearby passive acoustic monitoring (PAM) systems. Typical acoustic metrics for impulsive signals provide no quantitative information about reverberation or its relative effect on the ambient acoustic environment. Here, two conservative metrics are defined for quantifying reverberation: a minimum level metric measures reverberation levels that exist between airgun pulse arrivals, while a reverberation metric estimates the relative magnitude of reverberation vs expected ambient levels in the hypothetical absence of airgun activity, using satellite-measured wind data. The metrics are applied to acoustic data measured by autonomous recorders in the Alaskan Beaufort Sea in 2008 and demonstrate how seismic surveys can increase the background noise over natural ambient levels by 30-45 dB within 1 km of the activity, by 10-25 dB within 15 km of the activity, and by a few dB at 128 km range. These results suggest that shallow-water reverberation would reduce the performance of nearby PAM systems when monitoring for marine mammals within a few kilometers of shallow-water seismic surveys.
Potential responses of marine mammals to anthropogenic underwater sound are usually assessed by researchers and regulators on the basis of exposure to a single, relatively loud sound source. However, ...marine mammals typically receive sounds from multiple, dynamic sources. We developed a method to aggregate modeled sounds from multiple sources and estimate the sound levels received by individuals. To illustrate the method, we modeled the sound fields of 9 sources associated with oil development and estimated the sound received over 47 d by a population of 10000 simulated bowhead whales Balaena mysticetus on their annual migration through the Alaskan Beaufort Sea. Empirical data were sufficient to parameterize simulations of the distribution of individual whales over time and their range of movement patterns. We ran 2 simulations to estimate the sound exposure history and distances traveled by bowhead whales: one in which they could change their movement paths (avert) in response to set levels of sound and one in which they could not avert. When animals could not avert, about 2% of the simulated population was exposed to root mean square (rms) sound pressure levels (SPL) > or =180 dB re 1 muPa, a level that regulators in the U.S. often associate with injury. When animals could avert from sound levels that regulators often associate with behavioral disturbance (rms SPL >160 dB re 1 muPa), <1% of the simulated population was exposed to levels associated with injury. Nevertheless, many simulated bowhead whales received sound levels considerably above ambient throughout their migration. Our method enables estimates of the aggregated level of sound to which populations are exposed over extensive areas and time periods.
In September and October 2011, a seismic survey took place in Baffin Bay, Western Greenland, in close proximity to a marine protected area (MPA). As part of the mitigation effort, five bottom-mounted ...marine acoustic recording units (MARUs) collected data that were used for the purpose of measuring temporal and spectral features from each impulsive event, providing a high-resolution record of seismic reverberation persistent after the direct impulse. Results were compared with ambient-noise levels as computed after the seismic survey to evidence that as a consequence of a series of repeating seismic impulses, sustained elevated levels create the potential for masking.
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