University of Aberdeen

About: University of Aberdeen is a education organization based out in Aberdeen, United Kingdom. It is known for research contribution in the topics: Population & Health care. The organization has 21174 authors who have published 49962 publications receiving 2105479 citations. The organization is also known as: Aberdeen University.

The ecological coherence of high bacterial taxonomic ranks

Abstract: The species is a fundamental unit of biological organization, but its relevance for Bacteria and Archaea is still hotly debated. Even more controversial is whether the deeper branches of the ribosomal RNA-derived phylogenetic tree, such as the phyla, have ecological importance. Here, we discuss the ecological coherence of high bacterial taxa in the light of genome analyses and present examples of niche differentiation between deeply diverging groups in terrestrial and aquatic systems. The ecological relevance of high bacterial taxa has implications for bacterial taxonomy, evolution and ecology.

A new approach to the measurement of quality of life. The Patient-Generated Index.

Abstract: Quality of life has been defined as "the extent to which our hopes and ambitions are matched by experience." To improve a patient's quality of life through medical care would be to "narrow the gap between a patient's hopes and expectations and what actually happens." Using the above definition as a conceptual basis, we produced a self-administered, Patient-Generated Index (PGI) of quality of life. The PGI was completed by 359 patients presenting with low back pain. The validity of the measure was assessed by correlating patients' PGI scores with a well-validated health profile, the Short-Form 36-item Health Survey (SF-36), and with their scores on a clinical back pain questionnaire. Stepwise multiple regression was then used to model the relationship between the PGI score and the SF-36. Patients' PGI scores showed a high correlation with SF-36 scales measuring pain, social functioning, and role limitations attributable to physical problems, and with the clinical questionnaire. Together with whether a person was retired or not, these health variables were able to explain 25% of the variance in PGI scores. Patient generated index scores were significantly lower in patients referred to hospital compared with those managed solely in general practice and tended to reflect the general practitioner's assessment of symptom severity. We conclude that it is possible to construct a questionnaire that quantifies the effect of a medical condition on patients' quality of life in a way that has meaning and relevance in the context of their daily lives. The PGI has considerable potential for routine use in a wide range of clinical conditions for which the measurement of outcome has hitherto proved very difficult.

Accelerated increase in plant species richness on mountain summits is linked to warming

Abstract: Globally accelerating trends in societal development and human environmental impacts since the mid-twentieth century 1–7 are known as the Great Acceleration and have been discussed as a key indicator of the onset of the Anthropocene epoch 6 . While reports on ecological responses (for example, changes in species range or local extinctions) to the Great Acceleration are multiplying 8, 9 , it is unknown whether such biotic responses are undergoing a similar acceleration over time. This knowledge gap stems from the limited availability of time series data on biodiversity changes across large temporal and geographical extents. Here we use a dataset of repeated plant surveys from 302 mountain summits across Europe, spanning 145 years of observation, to assess the temporal trajectory of mountain biodiversity changes as a globally coherent imprint of the Anthropocene. We find a continent-wide acceleration in the rate of increase in plant species richness, with five times as much species enrichment between 2007 and 2016 as fifty years ago, between 1957 and 1966. This acceleration is strikingly synchronized with accelerated global warming and is not linked to alternative global change drivers. The accelerating increases in species richness on mountain summits across this broad spatial extent demonstrate that acceleration in climate-induced biotic change is occurring even in remote places on Earth, with potentially far-ranging consequences not only for biodiversity, but also for ecosystem functioning and services.