The indirect paths to cascading effects of extinctions in mutualistic networks

Climate change has increased the temperature and altered the mixing regime of high-value lakes in the subalpine region of Northern Italy. Remote sensing of chlorophyll-a can help provide a time series to allow an assessment of the ecological implications of this. Non-parametric multiplicative regression (NPMR) was used to visualize and understand the changes that have occurred between 2003–2018 in Lakes Garda, Como, Iseo, and Maggiore. In all four deep subalpine lakes, there has been a disruption from a traditional pattern of a significant spring chlorophyll-a peak followed by a clear water phase and summer/autumn peaks. This was replaced after 2010–2012, with lower spring peaks and a tendency for annual maxima to occur in summer. There was a tendency for this switch to be interspersed by a two-year period of low chlorophyll-a. Variables that were significant in NPMR included time, air temperature, total phosphorus, winter temperature, and winter values for the North Atlantic Oscillation. The change from spring to summer chlorophyll-a maxima, relatively sudden in an ecological context, could be interpreted as a regime shift. The cause was probably cascading effects from increased winter temperatures, reduced winter mixing, and altered nutrient dynamics. Future trends will depend on climate change and inter-decadal climate drivers.

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Cascading effects of composts and cover crops on soil chemistry, bacterial communities and the survival of foodborne pathogens

Journal of Applied Microbiology ◽

10.1111/jam.15054 ◽

2021 ◽

Author(s):

N. Devarajan ◽

J.A. McGarvey ◽

K. Scow ◽

M.S. Jones ◽

S. Lee ◽

...

Keyword(s):

Foodborne Pathogens ◽

Cover Crops ◽

Bacterial Communities ◽

Soil Chemistry ◽

Cascading Effects

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Disaster Management in Smart Cities

Smart Cities ◽

10.3390/smartcities4020042 ◽

2021 ◽

Vol 4 (2) ◽

pp. 819-839

Author(s):

Luís B. Elvas ◽

Bruno Miguel Mataloto ◽

Ana Lúcia Martins ◽

João C. Ferreira

Keyword(s):

Disaster Management ◽

Smart City ◽

Smart Cities ◽

Practical Implication ◽

Data Availability ◽

Critical Infrastructures ◽

Cascading Effects ◽

Data Driven Approach ◽

New Research ◽

The City

The smart city concept, in which data from different systems are available, contains a multitude of critical infrastructures. This data availability opens new research opportunities in the study of the interdependency between those critical infrastructures and cascading effects solutions and focuses on the smart city as a network of critical infrastructures. This paper proposes an integrated resilience system linking interconnected critical infrastructures in a smart city to improve disaster resilience. A data-driven approach is considered, using artificial intelligence and methods to minimize cascading effects and the destruction of failing critical infrastructures and their components (at a city level). The proposed approach allows rapid recovery of infrastructures’ service performance levels after disasters while keeping the coverage of the assessment of risks, prevention, detection, response, and mitigation of consequences. The proposed approach has the originality and the practical implication of providing a decision support system that handles the infrastructures that will support the city disaster management system—make the city prepare, adapt, absorb, respond, and recover from disasters by taking advantage of the interconnections between its various critical infrastructures to increase the overall resilience capacity. The city of Lisbon (Portugal) is used as a case to show the practical application of the approach.

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Long Term Interactions of Native and Invasive Species in a Marine Protected Area Suggest Complex Cascading Effects Challenging Conservation Outcomes

Diversity ◽

10.3390/d13020071 ◽

2021 ◽

Vol 13 (2) ◽

pp. 71

Author(s):

Charalampos Dimitriadis ◽

Ivoni Fournari-Konstantinidou ◽

Laurent Sourbès ◽

Drosos Koutsoubas ◽

Stelios Katsanevakis

Keyword(s):

Invasive Species ◽

Native Species ◽

High Performance ◽

Marine Protected Area ◽

Habitat Degradation ◽

Population Increase ◽

Rocky Reef ◽

Cascading Effects ◽

High Level

Understanding the interactions among invasive species, native species and marine protected areas (MPAs), and the long-term regime shifts in MPAs is receiving increased attention, since biological invasions can alter the structure and functioning of the protected ecosystems and challenge conservation efforts. Here we found evidence of marked modifications in the rocky reef associated biota in a Mediterranean MPA from 2009 to 2019 through visual census surveys, due to the presence of invasive species altering the structure of the ecosystem and triggering complex cascading effects on the long term. Low levels of the populations of native high-level predators were accompanied by the population increase and high performance of both native and invasive fish herbivores. Subsequently the overgrazing and habitat degradation resulted in cascading effects towards the diminishing of the native and invasive invertebrate grazers and omnivorous benthic species. Our study represents a good showcase of how invasive species can coexist or exclude native biota and at the same time regulate or out-compete other established invaders and native species.

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Impact Assessment Analysis of Sea Level Rise in Denmark: A Case Study of Falster Island, Guldborgsund

Sustainability ◽

10.3390/su13137503 ◽

2021 ◽

Vol 13 (13) ◽

pp. 7503

Author(s):

Alexander Boest-Petersen ◽

Piotr Michalak ◽

Jamal Jokar Arsanjani

Keyword(s):

Climate Change ◽

Impact Assessment ◽

Sea Level Rise ◽

Sea Level ◽

Alternative Methods ◽

Projection Data ◽

Storm Events ◽

Cascading Effects ◽

Local Levels

Anthropogenically-induced climate change is expected to be the contributing cause of sea level rise and severe storm events in the immediate future. While Danish authorities have downscaled the future oscillation of sea level rise across Danish coast lines in order to empower the coastal municipalities, there is a need to project the local cascading effects on different sectors. Using geospatial analysis and climate change projection data, we developed a proposed workflow to analyze the impacts of sea level rise in the coastal municipalities of Guldborgsund, located in Southeastern Denmark as a case study. With current estimates of sea level rise and storm surge events, the island of Falster can expect to have up to 19% of its landmass inundated, with approximately 39% of the population experiencing sea level rise directly. Developing an analytical workflow can allow stakeholders to understand the extent of expected sea level rise and consider alternative methods of prevention at the national and local levels. The proposed approach along with the choice of data and open source tools can empower other communities at risk of sea level rise to plan their adaptation.

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