Llegando al punto crucial de la gestación de la obra, Amando Melón dirigió la tesis doctoral de Germán Bleiberg sobre Alejandro de Humboldt y España en 1958, un año antes de que ambos (maestro y ...discípulo) se encaminaran a Berlín para asistir al encuentro internacional organizado por la Gesellschaft für Erdkunde en el palacio de Tegel (donde Alexander von Humboldt y su hermano Wilhelm pasaron buena parte de su infancia). Al término de su detallado estudio, Amando Melón puede con justicia dejarnos una concluyente valoración: «La dirección y gestión de Humboldt en la «Serie Americana» le acredita como primer americanista de los tiempos modernos, como indiscutible maestro en todo lo referido al Nuevo Mundo, lo mismo en su aspecto natural que en los histórico y geográfico» (p. 221). En resumen, la lectura (o relectura) del libro de Amando Melón nos enriquece, el trabajo de Josefina Gómez Mendoza nos proporciona un retrato ponderado de la figura del ilustre geógrafo y un alegato objetivo y documentado sobre la fundamental relación del sabio alemán con las autoridades, los científicos ilustrados y las modernas instituciones de España tanto en la metrópoli como en América.
What drives academic data sharing? Fecher, Benedikt; Friesike, Sascha; Hebing, Marcel
PloS one,
02/2015, Letnik:
10, Številka:
2
Journal Article
Recenzirano
Odprti dostop
Despite widespread support from policy makers, funding agencies, and scientific journals, academic researchers rarely make their research data available to others. At the same time, data sharing in ...research is attributed a vast potential for scientific progress. It allows the reproducibility of study results and the reuse of old data for new research questions. Based on a systematic review of 98 scholarly papers and an empirical survey among 603 secondary data users, we develop a conceptual framework that explains the process of data sharing from the primary researcher's point of view. We show that this process can be divided into six descriptive categories: Data donor, research organization, research community, norms, data infrastructure, and data recipients. Drawing from our findings, we discuss theoretical implications regarding knowledge creation and dissemination as well as research policy measures to foster academic collaboration. We conclude that research data cannot be regarded as knowledge commons, but research policies that better incentivise data sharing are needed to improve the quality of research results and foster scientific progress.
Global climate change is driving species poleward and upward in high-latitude regions, but the extent to which the biodiverse tropics are similarly affected is poorly known due to a scarcity of ...historical records. In 1802, Alexander von Humboldt ascended the Chimborazo volcano in Ecuador. He recorded the distribution of plant species and vegetation zones along its slopes and in surrounding parts of the Andes. We revisited Chimborazo in 2012, precisely 210 y after Humboldt’s expedition. We documented upward shifts in the distribution of vegetation zones as well as increases in maximum elevation limits of individual plant taxa of >500 m on average. These range shifts are consistent with increased temperatures and glacier retreat on Chimborazo since Humboldt’s study. Our findings provide evidence that global warming is strongly reshaping tropical plant distributions, consistent with Humboldt’s proposal that climate is the primary control on the altitudinal distribution of vegetation.
Humboldt and the reinvention of nature Pausas, Juli G.; Bond, William J.; Sankaran, Mahesh
The Journal of ecology,
20/May , Letnik:
107, Številka:
3
Journal Article
Recenzirano
Odprti dostop
Alexander von Humboldt is a key figure in the history of ecology and biogeography who contributed to shape what is today ecology, as well as the environmentalist movement. His observation that the ...world’s vegetation varies systematically with climate was one of his many contributions to science.
Here, we question to what extent Humboldt’s view biased our vision of nature. The current emphasis on the role of climate and soils in ecological and evolutionary studies, and the emphasis on forests as the potential and most important vegetation, suggests that we still view nature through the eyes of Humboldt.
Over the last 20 years, diverse studies have shown that many open non‐forested ecosystems (savannas, grasslands, and shrublands) cannot be predicted by climate and are ancient and diverse systems maintained by fire and/or vertebrate herbivory. Paleoecological and phylogenetic studies have shown the key role of these plant consumers at geological time scales. This has major implications for how we understand and manage our ecosystems.
Synthesis. We need to consciously probe the long‐standing idea that climate and soils are the only major factors shaping broad‐scale patterns in nature. We propose to move beyond the legacy of Humboldt by embracing fire and large mammal herbivory as additional key factors in explaining the ecology and evolution of world vegetation.
Foreign Language
Resumen
Alexander von Humboldt es una figura clave en la historia de la ecología y la biogeografía, y contribuyó a dar forma a lo que hoy es la ecología y el movimiento ecologista. Su observación de que la vegetación del mundo varía sistemáticamente con el clima fue una de sus muchas contribuciones a la ciencia.
En este artículo cuestionamos hasta qué punto la visión de Humboldt ha sesgado nuestra visión de la naturaleza. El actual énfasis en el papel del clima y el suelo en los estudios ecológicos y evolutivos, y la idea de que los bosques son la vegetación potencial y más importante de muchos lugares, sugiere que aún observamos la naturaleza a través de los ojos de Humboldt.
Durante los últimos 20 años, diversos estudios han demostrado que el clima no puede predecir muchos de los ecosistemas no forestales (sabanas, praderas y matorrales), y que son sistemas antiguos y diversos mantenidos por fuego y por herbívoros vertebrados. Los estudios paleoecológicos y filogenéticos han demostrado el papel clave de estos consumidores de vegetación a la escala geológica. Todo esto tiene importantes implicaciones sobre cómo entendemos y gestionamos actualmente nuestros ecosistemas.
Síntesis: Necesitamos cuestionarnos la idea tradicional de que el clima y el suelo son los únicos factores importantes que generan patrones ecológicos a gran escala. Proponemos ir más allá del legado de Humboldt, y considerar el fuego y la herbivoría por grandes mamíferos como factores clave para explicar la ecología y la evolución de la vegetación a escala global.
One of the contributions of Alexander von Humbondt to science was the description of altitudinal vegetation patterns. And this is his description (1807) for the Chimborazo, the highest mountain in Ecuador. In this paper we question to what extent Humboldt’s view biased our vision of nature, and we propose to move beyond his legacy by embracing fire and large mammal herbivory as key factors in explaining the ecology and evolution of world vegetation.
Peru is among the top ten countries with the highest number of coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) cases worldwide. The aim of the study was to describe the clinical features of hospitalized adult ...patients with COVID-19 and to determine the prognostic factors associated with in-hospital mortality.
We conducted a retrospective cohort study among adult patients with COVID-19 admitted to Hospital Cayetano Heredia; a tertiary care hospital in Lima, Peru. The primary outcome was in-hospital mortality. Multivariate Cox proportional hazards regression was used to identify factors independently associated with in-hospital mortality.
A total of 369 patients (median age 59 years IQR:49-68; 241 (65.31%) male) were included. Most patients (68.56%) reported at least one comorbidity; more frequently: obesity (42.55%), diabetes mellitus (21.95%), and hypertension (21.68%). The median duration of symptoms prior to hospital admission was 7 days (IQR: 5-10). Reported in-hospital mortality was 49.59%. By multiple Cox regression, oxygen saturation (SaO2) values of less than 90% on admission correlated with mortality, presenting 1.86 (95%CI: 1.02-3.39), 4.44 (95%CI: 2.46-8.02) and 7.74 (95%CI: 4.54-13.19) times greater risk of death for SaO2 of 89-85%, 84-80% and <80%, respectively, when compared to patients with SaO2 >90%. Additionally, age >60 years was associated with 1.88 times greater mortality.
Oxygen saturation below 90% on admission is a strong predictor of in-hospital mortality in patients with COVID-19. In settings with limited resources, efforts to reduce mortality in COVID-19 should focus on early identification of hypoxemia and timely access to hospital care.
Y es que los Elementos de Orictognosia tienen unos planteamientos metodológicos que siguen siendo válidos, y aunque como no podía ser de otro modo se ha avanzado mucho en la mejora de las técnicas de ...análisis y en la definición físico-química de los minerales, lo cierto es que la lectura del manual novohispano no chirría al lector actual. El Ensayo Político de Humboldt destaca por ofrecer una amplia selección de datos demográficos y económicos, al tiempo que se presentan al lector de una manera atractiva; sin embargo, al sacar conclusiones o dar explicaciones razonados de esos datos Humboldt se apoya en unos fundamentos teóricos que ya estaban superados en el momento de la publicación del ensayo. Todo el material recopilado por Humbodt para realizar su ensayo y las obras posteriores referidas al Nuevo Mundo formaban un fondo documental del que se hicieron varias copias, una de ellas la utilizaría el propio autor para sus publicaciones, otra se puso al servicio de las autoridades novohispanas (luego en poder de los republicanos mexicanos) y una tercera copia pasó a los vecinos del norte, estaba formada por un conjunto de «mapas y documentos que fueron un instrumento formidable en los planes imperialistas de los estadounidenses, y hasta mediados de siglo tuvieron consideración de documentos de Estado. The Challenge of Creating a Scientific Community in an Underdeveloped Country, Penn State University Press. 236 pp.
Depression is a common comorbidity of tuberculosis (TB) and is associated with poor adherence to treatment of multiple disorders. We conducted a systematic review to synthesize the existing evidence ...on the relationship between depression and negative outcomes of TB treatment.
We systematically reviewed studies that evaluated depressive symptoms (DS) directly or indirectly through psychological distress (PD) and measured negative treatment outcomes of drug-sensitive pulmonary TB, defined as death, loss to follow-up, or non-adherence. Sources included PubMed, Global Health Library, Embase, Scopus and Web of Science from inception to August 2019.
Of the 2,970 studies initially identified, eight articles were eligible for inclusion and two were used for the primary outcome meta-analysis. We found a strong association between DS and negative TB treatment outcomes (OR = 4.26; CI95%:2.33-7.79; I2 = 0%). DS were also associated with loss to follow-up (OR = 8.70; CI95%:6.50-11.64; I2 = 0%) and death (OR = 2.85; CI95%:1.52-5.36; I2 = 0%). Non-adherence was not associated with DS and PD (OR = 1.34; CI95%:0.70-2.72; I2 = 94.36) or PD alone (OR = 0.92; CI95%:0.81-1.05; I2 = 0%).
DS are associated with the negative TB treatment outcomes of death and loss to follow-up. Considerable heterogeneity exists in the definition of depression and outcomes such as non-adherence across the limited number of studies on this topic.
Based on a communication-centered approach, this article examines how researchers approach societal impact, that is, what they think about societal impact in research governance, what their societal ...goals are, and how they use communication formats. Hence, this study offers empirical evidence on a group that has received remarkably little attention in the scholarly discourse on the societal impact of research-academic researchers. Our analysis is based on an empirical survey among 499 researchers in Germany conducted from April to June 2020. We show that most researchers regard societal engagement as part of their job and are generally in favor of impact evaluation. However, few think that societal impact is a priority at their institution, and even fewer think that institutional communication departments reach relevant stakeholders in society. Moreover, we show that researchers' societal goals and use of communication formats differ greatly between their disciplines and the types of organization that they work at. Our results add to the ongoing metascientific discourse on the relationship between science and society and offer empirical support for the hypothesis that assessment needs to be sensitive to disciplinary and organizational context factors.
PDF
