•Resistance and resilience are distinct components of an ecological response to disturbance.•Identifying drivers of resistance and resilience provides unique insights into ecological change.•These ...insights can inform and guide conservation management in the face of increasing disturbance.
Confronted with increasing anthropogenic change, conservation in the 21st century requires a sound understanding of how ecological systems change during disturbance. We highlight the benefits of recognizing two distinct components of change in an ecological unit (i.e., ecosystem, community, population): ‘resistance’, the ability to withstand disturbance; and ‘resilience’, the capacity to recover following disturbance. By adopting a ‘resistance–resilience’ framework, important insights for conservation can be gained into: (i) the key role of resistance in response to persistent disturbance, (ii) the intrinsic attributes of an ecological unit associated with resistance and resilience, (iii) the extrinsic environmental factors that influence resistance and resilience, (iv) mechanisms that confer resistance and resilience, (v) the post-disturbance status of an ecological unit, (vi) the nature of long-term ecological changes, and (vii) policy-relevant ways of communicating the ecological impacts of disturbance processes.
This guideline updates and replaces the 5th edition of the Standards of Monitoring published in 2015. The aim of this document is to provide guidance on the minimum standards for monitoring of any ...patient undergoing anaesthesia or sedation under the care of an anaesthetist. The recommendations are primarily aimed at anaesthetists practising in the UK and Ireland, but it is recognised that these guidelines may also be of use in other areas of the world. Minimum standards for monitoring patients during anaesthesia and in the recovery phase are included. There is also guidance on monitoring patients undergoing sedation and during transfer. There are new sections specifically discussing capnography, sedation and regional anaesthesia. In addition, the indications for processed electroencephalogram and neuromuscular monitoring have been updated.
A capacity to predict the effects of fire on biota is critical for conservation in fire‐prone regions as it assists managers to anticipate the outcomes of different approaches to fire management. The ...task is complicated because species’ responses to fire can vary geographically. This poses challenges, both for conceptual understanding of post‐fire succession and fire management. We examine two hypotheses for why species may display geographically varying responses to fire. 1) Species’ post‐fire responses are driven by vegetation structure, but vegetation – fire relationships vary spatially (the ‘dynamic vegetation’ hypothesis). 2) Regional variation in ecological conditions leads species to select different post‐fire ages as habitat (the ‘dynamic habitat’ hypothesis). Our case study uses data on lizards at 280 sites in a ∼ 100 000 km² region of south‐eastern Australia. We compared the predictive capacity of models based on 1) habitat associations, with models based on 2) fire history and vegetation type, and 3) fire history alone, for four species of lizards. Habitat association models generally out‐performed fire history models in terms of predictive capacity. For two species, habitat association models provided good discrimination capacity even though the species showed geographically varying post‐fire responses. Our results support the dynamic vegetation hypothesis, that spatial variation in relationships between fire and vegetation structure results in regional variation in fauna–fire relationships. These observations explain how the widely recognised ‘habitat accommodation’ model of animal succession can be conceptually accurate yet predictively weak.
We present the main findings of the 5th National Audit Project (NAP5) on accidental awareness during general anaesthesia (AAGA). Incidences were estimated using reports of accidental awareness as the ...numerator, and a parallel national anaesthetic activity survey to provide denominator data. The incidence of certain/probable and possible accidental awareness cases was ∼1:19 600 anaesthetics (95% confidence interval 1:16 700–23 450). However, there was considerable variation across subtypes of techniques or subspecialities. The incidence with neuromuscular block (NMB) was ∼1:8200 (1:7030–9700), and without, it was ∼1:135 900 (1:78 600–299 000). The cases of AAGA reported to NAP5 were overwhelmingly cases of unintended awareness during NMB. The incidence of accidental awareness during Caesarean section was ∼1:670 (1:380–1300). Two-thirds (82, 66%) of cases of accidental awareness experiences arose in the dynamic phases of anaesthesia, namely induction of and emergence from anaesthesia. During induction of anaesthesia, contributory factors included: use of thiopental, rapid sequence induction, obesity, difficult airway management, NMB, and interruptions of anaesthetic delivery during movement from anaesthetic room to theatre. During emergence from anaesthesia, residual paralysis was perceived by patients as accidental awareness, and commonly related to a failure to ensure full return of motor capacity. One-third (43, 33%) of accidental awareness events arose during the maintenance phase of anaesthesia, mostly due to problems at induction or towards the end of anaesthesia. Factors increasing the risk of accidental awareness included: female sex, age (younger adults, but not children), obesity, anaesthetist seniority (junior trainees), previous awareness, out-of-hours operating, emergencies, type of surgery (obstetric, cardiac, thoracic), and use of NMB. The following factors were not risk factors for accidental awareness: ASA physical status, race, and use or omission of nitrous oxide. We recommend that an anaesthetic checklist, to be an integral part of the World Health Organization Safer Surgery checklist, is introduced as an aid to preventing accidental awareness. This paper is a shortened version describing the main findings from NAP5—the full report can be found at http://www.nationalauditprojects.org.uk/NAP5_home.
Guidelines are presented for safe practice in the use of intravenous drug infusions for general anaesthesia. When maintenance of general anaesthesia is by intravenous infusion, this is referred to as ...total intravenous anaesthesia. Although total intravenous anaesthesia has advantages for some patients, the commonest technique used for maintenance of anaesthesia in the UK and Ireland remains the administration of an inhaled volatile anaesthetic. However, the use of an inhalational technique is sometimes not possible, and in some situations, inhalational anaesthesia is contraindicated. Therefore, all anaesthetists should be able to deliver total intravenous anaesthesia competently and safely. For the purposes of simplicity, these guidelines will use the term total intravenous anaesthesia but also encompass techniques involving a combination of intravenous infusion and inhalational anaesthesia. This document is intended as a guideline for safe practice when total intravenous anaesthesia is being used, and not as a review of the pros and cons of total intravenous anaesthesia vs. inhalational anaesthesia in situations where both techniques are possible.
Summary
The use of cell salvage is recommended when it can be expected to reduce the likelihood of allogeneic (donor) red cell transfusion and/or severe postoperative anaemia. We support and ...encourage a continued increase in the appropriate use of peri‐operative cell salvage and we recommend that it should be available for immediate use 24 h a day in any hospital undertaking surgery where blood loss is a recognised potential complication (other than minor/day case procedures).
The Pluto system was recently explored by NASA's New Horizons spacecraft, making closest approach on 14 July 2015. Pluto's surface displays diverse landforms, terrain ages, albedos, colors, and ...composition gradients. Evidence is found for a water-ice crust, geologically young surface units, surface ice convection, wind streaks, volatile transport, and glacial flow. Pluto's atmosphere is highly extended, with trace hydrocarbons, a global haze layer, and a surface pressure near 10 microbars. Pluto's diverse surface geology and long-term activity raise fundamental questions about how small planets remain active many billions of years after formation. Pluto's large moon Charon displays tectonics and evidence for a heterogeneous crustal composition; its north pole displays puzzling dark terrain. Small satellites Hydra and Nix have higher albedos than expected.
Fire influences the distribution of fauna in terrestrial biomes throughout the world. Use of fire to achieve a mosaic of vegetation in different stages of succession after burning (i.e., patch-mosaic ...burning) is a dominant conservation practice in many regions. Despite this, knowledge of how the spatial attributes of vegetation mosaics created by fire affect fauna is extremely scarce, and it is unclear what kind of mosaic land managers should aim to achieve. We selected 28 landscapes (each 12.6 km
2
) that varied in the spatial extent and diversity of vegetation succession after fire in a 104,000 km
2
area in the semiarid region of southeastern Australia. We surveyed for reptiles at 280 sites nested within the 28 landscapes. The landscape-level occurrence of 9 of the 22 species modeled was associated with the spatial extent of vegetation age classes created by fire. Biogeographic context and the extent of a vegetation type influenced 7 and 4 species, respectively. No species were associated with the diversity of vegetation ages within a landscape. Negative relations between reptile occurrence and both extent of recently burned vegetation (≤10 years postfire, n = 6) and long unburned vegetation (>35 years postfire, n = 4) suggested that a coarse-grained mosaic of areas (e.g. >1000 ha) of midsuccessional vegetation (11-35 years postfire) may support the fire-sensitive reptile species we modeled. This age class coincides with a peak in spinifex cover, a keystone structure for reptiles in semiarid and arid Australia. Maintaining over the long term a coarse-grained mosaic of large areas of midsuccessional vegetation in mallee ecosystems will need to be balanced against the short-term negative effects of large fires on many reptile species and a documented preference by species from other taxonomic groups, particularly birds, for older vegetation.
El fuego influye en la distribución de la fauna en biomas terrestres en todo el mundo. El uso de fuego para obtener un mosaico de vegetación en diferentes etapas sucesionales después de la quema (i.e., quema de mosaico de parches) es una práctica de conservación dominante en muchas regiones. No obstante lo anterior, el conocimiento de la forma en que los mosaicos de vegetación creados por fuego afectan a la fauna es muy escaso, y no es claro el tipo de mosaico que deben tener en cuenta los manejadores de tierras. Seleccionamos 28 paisajes (12.6 km
2
cada uno) que variaron en extensión y diversidad de sucesión vegetal después de fuego en una región semiárida de 104,000 km
2
en el sureste de Australia. Muestreamos reptiles en 280 sitios ubicados en los 28 paisajes. La ocurrencia a nivel paisaje de 9 de las 22 especies modeladas se asoció con la extensión espacial de las clases de edad de la vegetación creadas por el fuego. El contexto biogeográfico y la extensión del tipo de vegetación influyeron en 7 y 4 especies, respectivamente. Ninguna especie se asoció con la diversidad de edades de la vegetación en el paisaje. Las relaciones negativas entre la ocurrencia de reptiles y la extensión de vegetación quemada recientemente (≤10 años postfuego, n = 6) y de vegetación no quemada por largo tiempo (<35 años postfuego, n = 4) sugieren que un mosaico de grano grueso de áreas (e.g., >1,000 ha) con vegetación en etapa sucesional media (11-35 años postfuego) puede soportar a las especies de reptiles sensibles al fuego que modelamos. Esta clase de edad coincide con un pico en la cobertura de spinifex, una estructura clave para reptiles en ambientes semiáridos y áridos de Australia. El mantenimiento a largo plazo del mosaico de grano grueso de áreas con vegetación en etapa sucesional media en ecosistemas de mallee tendrá que balancearse con los efectos negativos a corto plazo de incendios extensivos sobre muchas especies de reptiles y la preferencia documentada de otros grupos taxonómicos, particularmente aves, por vegetación más madura.
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