Monitoring wildlife is one of the most costly and difficult aspects of conservation, and often depends on long-term observations in individual species.

But the study reveals a new and effective method.

It focusses on “interactions” between species, such as insects pollinating flowers or birds feeding on plants.

The results show that a small snapshot of interactions is a reliable indicator of the health of an entire community of species. Specifically, the study looked at whether these communities are “persistent” or not — meaning whether all species are fine or if any are declining to extinction.

The study was carried out by the University of Exeter, McGill University, the University of Toronto, Princeton University and MIT.

“All communities of plants and animals are supported by an underlying network of interactions between species,” said Dr Christopher Kaiser-Bunbury, from the Centre for Ecology and Conservation at Exeter’s Penryn Campus in Cornwall.

“Our study — which combines theory, statistics and real-world data — shows that examining a few of these interactions can provide ‘big picture’ conclusions about ecosystem health.

“This information is essential for policymakers, scientists and societies, as we try to tackle the global biodiversity crisis.”

When environmental conditions change, interactions between species often change too — providing an early indicator of wider problems.

As such, the study’s method can identify patterns more quickly than some traditional conservation monitoring — which is vital given the rapid changes being caused by human activity.

“Using minimal resources, we can rapidly assess both the persistence of entire ecological networks and the expected success of restoration,” said Dr Benno Simmons, also from Exeter’s Centre for Ecology and Conservation.

“Our method is especially effective at identifying when an ecological community is not persistent — allowing for rapid detection of extinction risk.”

In a new study in the journal Science Advances, a multidisciplinary team of researchers found the coatings prevented infection in live mice and mapped strain in commercial implants applied to sheep spines to warn of various implant or healing failures.

“This is a combination of bio-inspired nanomaterial design with flexible electronics to battle a complicated, long-term biomedical problem,” said study leader Qing Cao, a U. of I. professor of materials science and engineering.

Both infection and device failure are major problems with orthopedic implants, each affecting up to 10% of patients, Cao said. Several approaches to fighting infection have been attempted, but all have severe limitations, he said: Biofilms can still form on water-repelling surfaces, and coatings laden with antibiotic chemicals or drugs run out in a span of months and have toxic effects on the surrounding tissue with little efficacy against drug-resistant strains of bacterial pathogens.

Taking inspiration from the naturally antibacterial wings of cicadas and dragonflies, the Illinois team created a thin foil patterned with nanoscale pillars like those found on the insects’ wings. When a bacterial cell attempts to bind to the foil, the pillars puncture the cell wall, killing it.

“Using a mechanical approach to killing bacteria allowed us to bypass a lot of the problems with chemical approaches, while still giving us the flexibility needed to apply the coating to implant surfaces,” said pathobiology professor Gee Lau, a coauthor of the study.

On the back side of the nanostructured foil, where it contacts the implant device, the researchers integrated arrays of highly sensitive, flexible electronic sensors to monitor strain. This could help physicians watch the healing progress of individual patients, guide their rehabilitation to shorten the recovery time and minimize risks, and repair or replace devices before they hit the point of failure, the researchers said.

The engineering group then teamed up with veterinary clinical medicine professor Annette McCoy to test their prototype devices. They implanted the foils in live mice and monitored them for any sign of infection, even when bacteria were introduced. They also applied the coatings to commercially available spinal implants and monitored strain to the implants in sheep spines under normal load for device failure diagnosis. The coatings performed both functions well.

The prototype electronics required wires, but the researchers next plan to develop wireless power and data communications interfaces for their coatings, a crucial step for clinical application, Cao said. They also are working to develop large-scale production of the nanopillar-textured bacteria-killing foil.

“These types of antibacterial coatings have a lot of potential applications, and since ours uses a mechanical mechanism, it has potential for places where chemicals or heavy metal ions — as are used in commercial antimicrobial coatings now — would be detrimental,” Cao said.

The National Science Foundation and the U.S. Congressionally Directed Medical Research Programs supported this work.

Because contrasting societal views have created an approach that simultaneously manages horses on the range as wildlife, livestock and pets, current government programs are incapable of succeeding, the researchers argue in the article that appears in the journal BioScience.

“For the federal government to sustain healthy populations, ecosystem health and fiscal responsibility, lawmakers must properly define how feral equids should be labeled,” the scientists wrote. “Each label (wild, livestock, pet) has validity, and management plans can be implemented to optimize equid populations with other land uses. Furthermore, providing a clear definition of feral equids will determine the legal tools that can be applied for their management.”

The lead author of the paper is Jacob Hennig, a former UW Ph.D. student who is now a postdoctoral researcher at Oklahoma State. Hennig’s advisers at UW — Professor Jeff Beck and Associate Professor Derek Scasta, both in the Department of Ecosystem Science and Management — are co-authors of the paper. So are Oklahoma State Professor Sam Fuhlendorf and Assistant Professor Courtney Duchardt, who is a former UW Ph.D. student; Colorado State University research scientist Saeideh Esmaeili, also a former UW Ph.D. student; and Tolani Francisco, of Native Healing LLC in New Mexico.

The researchers note that, while the fossil record shows there were horses in North America previously, they went extinct about 10,000 years ago.

“The equids currently inhabiting North America did not coevolve there; they are descendants of livestock that underwent millennia of domestication and artificial selection,” the paper says. “Most large predators that would help limit their population growth went extinct at the end of the Pleistocene (epoch), and the Anthropocene (current epoch) has led to further predator reductions.”

Because wild horses have no natural predators, cannot be legally hunted under federal law and are no longer slaughtered as livestock in the United States, their numbers on the range have more than doubled in the last decade, the researchers say. They also note that horses removed from the range by the Bureau of Land Management (BLM) and held in government facilities and private lands have grown in number by 33 percent during that time, with the BLM spending over $550 million since 2013 supporting the captive animals.

“The BLM has increased the number of individuals removed from the wild in each of the past four years, leading to decreases in the on-range population,” the paper acknowledges. “However, the total on-range population is still approximately 50,000 individuals above the maximum (appropriate management level), and the recent moderate decrease in on-range individuals is directly correlated with an increase in the off-range population and subsequent expenditures.”

Removing wild horses from Western rangelands and placing them in long-term holding is not a solution, the researchers say. Doing so “simply exports the issue elsewhere — including the imperiled tallgrass prairie ecosystem — with unknown ecological effects,” they wrote, noting that there are now about 23,500 wild horses on private lands in Oklahoma, five times more than the number on open range in Wyoming.

Additionally, the paper contends that wild horses have a comparatively large impact on the range, as they consume more forage and water than ruminants such as cattle, per capita.

The scientists credit the BLM for basing recent management on science, including better population estimates of wild horses and deploying measures to keep them from reproducing. But there are too many animals on the range for this approach to work.

“Although the BLM has admirably increased fertility control research and application, if they are unable to also remove tens of thousands of equids, this process is doomed to be a Sisyphean task,” the researchers wrote.

The federal Wild and Free-Roaming Horses and Burros Act of 1971 essentially calls for wild horses to freely roam like wild animals, but they are treated differently from wild animals because the act prohibits hunting. At the same time, the BLM’s practice of gathering and removing wild horses from the range “more closely resemble livestock operations than wildlife management, whereas adoption programs, sales restrictions and the abolition of slaughter have resulted in feral equids effectively serving as society’s pets,” the paper says.

Choosing one of the labels — wild, livestock or pets — offers the best hope for the federal government to succeed in wild horse management, the scientists wrote.

“As a wild species that lacks sufficient predation to keep most populations in check, a hunting or culling program, like those for other wild ungulates, could slow their population growth,” the paper says. “As livestock, gathers and removals that lead to sale or slaughter would limit growth and give the animals the monetary value they currently lack. As pets, simultaneously conducting large-scale removals and administering fertility control, including permanent sterilization (and potentially euthanasia), could reduce population sizes and slow growth.”

The researchers’ conclusion?

“The current state of feral horse and burro management in the United States is unsustainable and will continue to be a painful resource sink without fundamental changes to the law. We recommend that the U.S. federal government should officially declare the status of feral equids as either wild, livestock or pets and should provide the BLM and (U.S. Forest Service) the legal latitude and funding to develop and implement respective management options.”

Second in a series on lesser-known impacts of climate change (see part 1).

If Earth came with a warning label, like the one the Surgeon General puts on cigarette packages, it might say something like:

“Warning: Climate change contributes to many well-known phenomena that negatively impact human health, including heat stress, extreme events, food insecurity, and poor air quality.”

Of course, not all the health impacts of climate change are as obvious or dramatic as those examples. Some are subtler, quite literally lurking under our skin. Here are a few.

Ticked Off

Cases of Lyme disease are on the rise in the United States and other parts of the world, and scientists believe climate change is a contributing factor. Lyme disease is a blood-borne illness transmitted by ticks to humans. It is found on all continents except Antarctica, but is most prevalent in parts of North America, Europe, and Asia. The disease causes headaches, fever, fatigue, and skin rashes. Untreated, it can affect the heart, joints, and central nervous system. The U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention officially reports about 30,000 cases of Lyme disease each year.

Researchers recently found that the risk of Lyme disease is expanding north in Canada. This is happening as global temperatures warm and areas become more habitable to ticks. The scientists combined NASA satellite data with field data of tick surveillance and weather station data to predict habitats suitable to deer ticks.

Previous research demonstrated how NASA/U.S. Geological Survey Landsat satellite data can help predict the risk of Lyme disease in high-exposure areas. Scientists at NASA’s Ames Research Center and New York Medical College combined Landsat imagery with geographic information system technology that helps manage, analyze, and visualize geographic data. They found residential areas covered by plants and trees and located adjacent to woodlands had a higher risk of Lyme disease transmission.

Mosquito Miseries

Mosquitoes can transmit deadly diseases to humans, like malaria, dengue, Zika, West Nile virus, and chikungunya. As climate warms, the reach of some mosquito-borne diseases is expanding.

A 2014 study in the journal Science found changing climate conditions are allowing mosquitoes to migrate to higher altitudes and latitudes. Climate-related droughts and extreme weather events are creating new mosquito breeding grounds. Warmer temperatures are also allowing mosquitoes to breed more quickly and for longer periods of time.

Scientists are using NASA satellite data to track vegetation health, rainfall, and temperatures and monitor environmental conditions favorable to mosquitoes. This allows them to predict where mosquitoes may breed and spread illness.

As reported in 2017, NASA-funded researchers partnered with the Peruvian government to help forecast and prevent malaria outbreaks. They used the Land Data Assimilation System (LDAS), a land-surface modeling effort supported by NASA and other organizations that provides data and analysis on rain and snow, temperature, soil moisture, and vegetation. LDAS helped researchers identify where mosquito breeding grounds were likely to form.

Nothing to Sneeze At

Climate change appears to be making seasonal allergies worse.

The U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention estimates 24 million Americans suffer from hay fever and about 10 million suffer from asthma. Each year, weeds, grasses, and trees release massive amounts of tiny pollen spores into the air to allow the plants to reproduce. That pollen gets into our eyes, ears, noses, and throats, which makes lots of us sneeze and itch, and can make breathing especially difficult for asthma sufferers.

Warmer temperatures and increased carbon dioxide levels are causing plants to bloom earlier and produce pollen longer each year. This is leading to more pollen in the air and a longer allergy season. A 2012 study found longer growing seasons may cause U.S. pollen levels to more than double by 2040.

A University of Maryland-led team investigated how changes in the timing of spring’s arrival affected asthma hospitalizations. They used the Normalized Difference Vegetation Index, derived from NASA satellite observations, to determine the arrival of spring by showing the relative “greenness” of vegetation. The early onset of spring (10 days early) was linked with a 17% increase in Maryland asthma hospitalizations from 2001 to 2012.

Zombie Superbugs

“Superbugs” are viruses and bacteria immune to antibiotics and antiviral medications. They’re a nightmare for microbiologists and doctors, but especially so for the patients infected with them.

As our planet warms, scientists are concerned that the thawing of frozen Arctic soils (permafrost) may re-introduce diseases from ancient microorganisms that have been locked away in a frozen, dormant state for a million years or longer. A single gram of permafrost soil can contain thousands of microbial species. Some of these viruses, microbes, and bacteria could be resistant to antibiotics. Scientists worry antibiotic-resistant permafrost organisms could exchange genetic material with modern bacteria, creating superbugs.

Recent NASA-led research has cataloged these potential hazards. A study led by Kimberley Miner of NASA’s Jet Propulsion Laboratory examined the biological, chemical, and radioactive materials stored in ice, snow, and permafrost. The researchers noted that re-introducing ancient microorganisms back into the Arctic environment could disrupt ecosystems, kill wildlife, and put human health at risk.

Studies show about two-thirds of permafrost near the Arctic land surface may thaw by 2100. More than three million people live on permafrost in Earth’s high northern latitudes, and Arctic commerce, resource extraction, tourism, and populations are rising. This increases the risk humans may be exposed to emerging hazards and then transport them globally.

Food production accounts for 26% of global greenhouse gas emissions. For Americans, meat is about 80% of our foodprint. Among meats, beef is second only to lamb in carbon emissions per kilogram. But we eat much more beef than lamb. Eating beef is bad for the environment, but does it have to be? A different approach to raising cattle is slowly taking hold, and it could make your burger’s carbon emissions bite-sized.

Beef’s Outsized Hoofprint

Unlike other meat production systems, beef is not vertically integrated, and practices can vary a lot, even within the U.S. Generally, beef production involves four phases: breeding, growing, finishing, and slaughter. Beef cattle live in a breeding herd for 6-10 months until they are weaned. Then they move to another herd on rangeland where they graze until between 12-16 months old. “Finishing” takes place for three to six months in a feedlot. These can range in size from a couple dozen animals to industrial CAFOs. In the feedlot, cattle bulk up on a grain diet before being sent to the slaughterhouse.

Consumer concern about concentrated animal feeding operations (CAFOs), combined with increased interest in lean meat, has encouraged some growers to eliminate the feedlot in favor of a longer grazer period. Cattle produced this way are called grass-finished or grass-fed.

The environmental impacts of CAFOs are significant. Feedlots concentrate and store manure, generating high levels of local air and water pollution. Runoff from nitrogen-rich manure can contribute to algal blooms and coastal “dead zones.” CAFOs are associated with the spread of pathogens such as E. coli, as well as exposure to growth hormones, antibiotics, and a host of chemicals used at the facilities. Further afield, feedlots contribute to deforestation through the conversion of land to agriculture to produce silage. Some people argue that feedlot finishing is more sustainable than grass finishing, citing a decrease in industry impacts over the time period when feedlots came to dominate production. However, many other changes took place during the same period, including a major shift in grazing practices on public land.

Grazing

Beef has an outsized impact even before it reaches the finishing stage. All cattle spend the majority of their life grazing. And even though grazing is better regulated than it was in generations past, there is still much room for improvement.

Pasture, or rangeland, is the single largest land use in the United States, occupying roughly a third of the contiguous states. About a quarter of that land, mostly in the Western states, is federally owned. Rangeland includes grasslands, as well as savannas, wetlands, some deserts, tundra, and shrub-dominated scrubland like chaparral. This last makes up much of the rangeland of the Western United States. It is much different from farm pastures and from the grasslands that once supported huge populations of grazing buffalo. Drier ecosystems are more fragile and prone to desertification from overgrazing, which was widespread from the period of Western expansion until the late 20^th century.

Today, at least half of grazing operations still practice continuous grazing, in which cattle remain in the same area at low density for an entire year or growing season. There are several different approaches to rotational grazing, which allows pastures some period of rest. But variations in herd density, rotation frequency, and duration of fallow period can make a big difference in how sustainable a grazing operation is.

Adaptive Grazing

Many in the agriculture industry resist even weak rules and regulations protecting natural ecosystems. But some conservation-minded ranchers and academics are applying a philosophy of regenerative agriculture to rangeland management. Regenerative grazing systems can be called adaptive grazing, managed grazing, or holistic management. Regardless of nomenclature, sustainable grazing mimics the natural grazing patterns of native migratory herds. This involves carefully controlling livestock density and rotation schedules in response to local conditions rather than proscribed guidelines.



When managed correctly, regenerative grazing can build soil health and reduce nutrient loss. In March 2018, BLM selected 11 demonstration projects in six states to test regenerative grazing. These projects helped inform the new BLM rule guiding rangeland management that is open for public comment through June 20, 2023. This is BLM’s first real attempt to use the rulemaking process to put conservation on “equal footing” with other land uses.

Buying Better Beef

Shopping for sustainably grown meat isn’t easy, and unfortunately, the introduction of regenerative grazing adds a new layer of consumer research. Organic and humane certifications are compatible with regenerative grazing but may not require it. The American Grassfed Association requires beef producers to employ a regenerative approach to farm/ranch management. In 2018, the Regenerative Organic Alliance led by the Rodale Institute, Patagonia, and Dr. Bronner’s, introduced the Regenerative Organic Certification.

As always, whenever possible it is best to buy directly from the farmer. If you can’t find beef at your local farmers market, the website eatWild maintains a state-by-state directory of local farmers who sell their pastured products directly to consumers. Find one near you and give them a call. Farmers who work to leave the land better than they found it are happy to explain their practices to people who care about their food.

“For me it was an inconvenience, but for some people it could be life-threatening,” said Casey, now an assistant professor in the University of Washington’s Department of Environmental and Occupational Health Sciences. “If you had an uncle that had an electric heart pump, basically, his heart wouldn’t work without power. You could use a backup battery for eight hours, but after that, if you don’t have access to electricity, you have to go to the emergency room. This is a really dangerous situation.”

Years later, Casey has answers. A study published April 29 in the journal Nature Communications analyzed three years of power outages across the U.S., finding that Americans already bearing the brunt of climate change and health inequities are clustered in four regions — Louisiana, Arkansas, central Alabama and northern Michigan — and that they are most at risk of impact by a lengthy blackout.

The findings could help shape the future of local energy infrastructure, especially as climate change intensifies and the American power grid continues to age. Last year’s Inflation Reduction Act included billions of dollars to revamp energy systems, and Casey hopes federal agencies will consult the newly published findings to target energy upgrades.

The study is the first county-level analysis of power outages, which the federal government reports only at the state level. That poses a problem for researchers: a federally reported outage in Washington state could occur in Seattle, Spokane, or somewhere in between, making it difficult to understand specifically which population is affected.

Casey and her team found that between 2018 and 2020, more than 231,000 power outages lasting more than an hour occurred nationwide. Of those, 17,484 stretched at least eight hours — a duration widely viewed as medically relevant.

Most counties that experienced an electrical outage had at least one event lasting more than eight hours. These counties were most concentrated in the South, Northeast and Appalachia.

Next, researchers looked at how power outages overlapped with severe weather. They wanted to know which weather events are most likely to cause an outage, and which parts of the U.S. are most often hit with a blackout-causing storm.

They found that heavy precipitation in a given area makes a power outage five times more likely. Tropical cyclones, storms with high winds that originate over tropical oceans, make a power outage 14 times more likely. And a tropical cyclone with heavy precipitation on a hot day — like the hurricanes that each fall hit the Gulf Coast? They make power outages 52 times more likely.

“We look at weather reports and decide whether or not to bring an umbrella or stay home,” Casey said. “But thinking about being prepared for an outage when one of these events is rolling through is a new element to consider.”

Then came questions of equity. Incorporating a combination of socioeconomic and medical factors, Casey’s team identified communities that would likely be especially vulnerable during a long power outage. Using that data, the researchers were able to identify communities that experienced both high social vulnerability and frequent power outages.

A map of those counties shows a bright cluster in Louisiana and Arkansas, with more clusters in central Alabama and northern Michigan. In those places especially, the country’s inevitable change in energy infrastructure provides the greatest opportunity to improve public health.

“Any time we can identify another factor that we can intervene on to get closer to health equity, it’s exciting,” Casey said. “I think we’re going to see tremendous change, especially in the way our energy systems are set up, in the next couple decades. It’s this huge opportunity to get equity into every conversation and talk about what we’re going to do to make two decades from now look different from where we are.”

This study began while Casey was a professor in Columbia University’s Mailman School of Public Health. Other authors are Vivian Do (first author), Heather McBrien, Nina Flores, Alexander Northrop and Jeffrey Schlegelmilch at Columbia University and Mathew Kiang at Stanford University. The research was funded by the National Institute on Aging and the National Institute of Environmental Health Sciences.

Many states have seen rapid growth of community solar energy projects. By eliminating many traditional barriers to using renewable energy, these solar farms enable a larger segment of the population to take advantage of solar energy, including low to moderate-income households, renters, condominium owners, and homeowners with shaded roofs.

As of 2022, there were 5.6 gigawatts of community solar installations in the United States, enough to power about 4.2 million homes. Community solar projects give members many of the benefits of solar energy without having an on-site rooftop solar system.

A given community solar farm generates renewable energy for hundreds or even thousands of homes, organizations, and small businesses. Households and companies join a community solar project by subscribing to a portion of the solar farm’s monthly output. Typically, there is no fee for joining or canceling, and you must give around 60 or 90 days’ notice to terminate.

Although 41 states, plus Washington D.C. have at least one project online, community solar farms are not evenly dispersed throughout the United States. Instead, the growth of community solar has been highly concentrated in specific states with supportive policies.

Also, electric rates vary across the country, making solar energy more competitive in certain markets. The greater the energy bill savings, the more popular the program. As a result, some states have become hotbeds for community solar farms, while others have experienced sluggish growth.

Currently, 22 states plus Washington D.C. have policies supporting community solar: California, Colorado, Connecticut, Delaware, Hawaii, Illinois, Massachusetts, Maryland, Maine, Minnesota, North Carolina, New Hampshire, New Jersey, New Mexico, Nevada, New York, Oregon, Rhode Island, South Carolina, Virginia, Vermont, and Washington. However, some of these programs are new and just getting off the ground or have limited capacity.

Leading States in Community Solar

Some states have had numerous community solar farms for years, including Colorado, New York, Massachusetts, and Minnesota. These states were some of the pioneers of the movement and helped pave the way for others to follow. However, several states have recently created policies encouraging community solar farms’ development.

Colorado

Colorado passed the Community Solar Gardens Act in 2010 and became the first state with a community solar program, paving the way for others to follow. It was designed to include low-income households, and the program remains a leader today.

Illinois

This state is a relative newcomer to the community solar energy movement and recently passed the Climate and Equitable Jobs Act which aims to create a carbon-free power sector by 2045. Not only does it make utilities accountable, but it also increases funding for renewable energy. In addition, Illinois Shines, a state-administered incentive program, has made this market well primed for significant growth.

Maine

In 2019, legislators passed An Act to Promote Solar Energy Projects and Distributed Generation Resources in Maine. This eliminated some obstacles to community solar development, and the concept is gaining popularity. As a result, Maine has become a substantial market for community solar, with numerous projects under construction or recently completed.

Maryland

The state began a seven-year community solar pilot program in 2017 for residential and commercial community solar projects. Then, the Clean Energy Jobs Act set a goal to generate 50% of Maryland’s electricity from renewable sources by 2030. The combination has helped encourage development.

Massachusetts

It passed the first version of its community solar program back in 2013 and has had several iterations since. Although it was an early adopter of community solar, it continues to add capacity and subscribers by constructing more solar projects.

Minnesota

It is currently a leading market for community solar installations, with 848 megawatts of installed capacity as of December 2022. Although this ownership structure is not new here, there are a lot of projects under development, giving households more options than ever before.

New Jersey

Legislation passed in 2018 that created the state’s first community solar program, and this pilot program is now in its second year. Combined with a strong Renewable Portfolio Standard, the Garden State is primed for substantial growth in this market.

New York

The community solar movement started with the Shared Renewables program in 2015. Later, the NY-Sun initiative and Reforming the Energy Vision plan have helped make this a leading state for community solar energy development, with 731 megawatts of installed community solar capacity.

Rhode Island

The creation of the community virtual net metering policy in 2016 set this market into motion. As a result, there are now numerous community solar farms either in operation or in the pipeline.

How To Find a Community Solar Farm

Because development has been uneven, some states have no community solar farms or only a few that are already fully enrolled. However, if you live in certain states, you might have your pick of community solar farms to join.

One of the best resources for finding a project in your area is the EnergySage community solar database. You can enter your location to find out about available projects within your utility district.

This article was originally published on September 1, 2022.