University of East Anglia

About: University of East Anglia is a education organization based out in Norwich, Norfolk, United Kingdom. It is known for research contribution in the topics: Population & Climate change. The organization has 13250 authors who have published 37504 publications receiving 1669060 citations. The organization is also known as: UEA.

Antarctic climate change during the last 50 years

Abstract: The Reference Antarctic Data for Environmental Research (READER) project data set of monthly mean Antarctic nearsurface temperature, mean sea-level pressure (MSLP) and wind speed has been used to investigate trends in these quantities over the last 50 years for 19 stations with long records. Eleven of these had warming trends and seven had cooling trends in their annual data (one station had too little data to allow an annual trend to be computed), indicating the spatial complexity of change that has occurred across the Antarctic in recent decades. The Antarctic Peninsula has experienced a major warming over the last 50 years, with temperatures at Faraday/Vernadsky station having increased at a rate of 0.56 °C decade −1 over the year and 1.09 °C decade −1 during the winter; both figures are statistically significant at less than the 5% level. Overlapping 30 year trends of annual mean temperatures indicate that, at all but two of the 10 coastal stations for which trends could be computed back to 1961, the warming trend was greater (or the cooling trend less) during the 1961–90 period compared with 1971–2000. All the continental stations for which MSLP data were available show negative trends in the annual mean pressures over the full length of their records, which we attribute to the trend in recent decades towards the Southern Hemisphere annular mode (SAM) being in its high-index state. Except for Halley, where the trends are constant, the MSLP trends for all stations on the Antarctic continent for 1971–2000 were more negative than for 1961–90. All but two of the coastal stations have recorded increasing mean wind speeds over recent decades, which is also consistent with the change in the nature of the SAM. Copyright  2005 Royal Meteorological Society.

Vulnerability of national economies to the impacts of climate change on fisheries

Abstract: Anthropogenic global warming has significantly influenced physical and biological processes at global and regional scales. The observed and anticipated changes in global climate present significant opportunities and challenges for societies and economies. We compare the vulnerability of 132 national economies to potential climate change impacts on their capture fisheries using an indicator-based approach. Countries in Central and Western Africa (e.g. Malawi, Guinea, Senegal, and Uganda), Peru and Colombia in north-western South America, and four tropical Asian countries (Bangladesh, Cambodia, Pakistan, and Yemen) were identified as most vulnerable. This vulnerability was due to the combined effect of predicted warming, the relative importance of fisheries to national economies and diets, and limited societal capacity to adapt to potential impacts and opportunities. Many vulnerable countries were also among the world’s least developed countries whose inhabitants are among the world’s poorest and twice as reliant on fish, which provides 27% of dietary protein compared to 13% in less vulnerable countries. These countries also produce 20% of the world’s fish exports and are in greatest need of adaptation planning to maintain or enhance the contribution that fisheries can make to poverty reduction. Although the precise impacts and direction of climate-driven change for particular fish stocks and fisheries are uncertain, our analysis suggests they are likely to lead to either increased economic hardship or missed opportunities for development in countries that depend upon fisheries but lack the capacity to adapt.

The Jasmonate Signal Pathway

Abstract: Plant responses to many biotic and abiotic stresses are orchestrated locally and systemically by signaling molecules known as the jasmonates (JAs). JAs also regulate such diverse processes as pollen maturation and wound responses in Arabidopsis. Here we review recent advances in our understanding of

Arabidopsis Mutants Selected for Resistance to the Phytotoxin Coronatine Are Male Sterile, Insensitive to Methyl Jasmonate, and Resistant to a Bacterial Pathogen.

Abstract: The phytotoxin coronatine and the plant growth regulator methyl jasmonate (MeJA) caused similar growth-inhibitory effects on Arabidopsis seedlings. To test whether these two compounds have similar action, 14 independent coi1 (coronatine-insensitive) mutants of Arabidopsis were selected. The mutants segregated as single recessive Mendelian markers, and all were alleles at the coi1 locus. All coi1 mutants were also insensitive to MeJA and were male sterile. Both coronatine and MeJA inhibited root growth, stimulated anthocyanin accumulation, and increased the level of two proteins of ~31 and ~29 kD detected in SDS-polyacrylamide gels of wild-type Arabidopsis but caused none of these effects in the coi1 mutant. Coronatine and MeJA also induced the systemic appearance of proteinase inhibitor activity in tomato. The male-sterile flowers of the coi1 mutant produced abnormal pollen and had reduced level of an ~31-kD protein, which was abundant in the wild-type flowers. A coronatine-producing strain of Pseudomonas syringae grew in leaves of wild-type Arabidopsis to a population more than 100 times greater than it reached in the coi1 mutant. We conclude that coronatine mimics the action of MeJA and that coi1 controls a step in MeJA perception/response and in flower development.

Mitochondrial pseudogenes: evolution's misplaced witnesses

Abstract: Nuclear copies of mitochondrial DNA (mtDNA) have contaminated PCR-based mitochondrial studies of over 64 different animal species. Since the last review of these nuclear mitochondrial pseudogenes (Numts) in animals, Numts have been found in 53 of the species studied. The recent evidence suggests that Numts are not equally abundant in all species, for example they are more common in plants than in animals, and also more numerous in humans than in Drosophila. Methods for avoiding Numts have now been tested, and several recent studies demonstrate the potential utility of Numt DNA sequences in evolutionary studies. As relics of ancient mtDNA, these pseudogenes can be used to infer ancestral states or root mitochondrial phylogenies. Where they are numerous and selectively unconstrained, Numts are ideal for the study of spontaneous mutation in nuclear genomes.