University of Stirling

About: University of Stirling is a education organization based out in Stirling, Stirling, United Kingdom. It is known for research contribution in the topics: Population & Context (language use). The organization has 7722 authors who have published 20549 publications receiving 732940 citations. The organization is also known as: Stirling University.

Quantifying and comparing bumblebee nest densities in gardens and countryside habitats

Abstract: Summary 1. Bumblebees provide an important pollination service to both crops and wild plants. Many species have declined in the UK, particularly in arable regions. While bumblebee forage requirements have been widely studied, there has been less consideration of whether availability of nesting sites is limiting. It is important to know which habitats contain the most bumblebee nests per unit area in order to guide conservation and management options; particularly in the light of current emphasis on environmental stewardship schemes for farmed landscapes. However, it is extremely difficult to map the distribution of bumblebee nests. 2. We describe the findings of the National Bumblebee Nest Survey, a structured survey carried out by 719 volunteers in the UK during early summer 2004. The surveyors used a defined protocol to record the presence or absence of bumblebee nests in prescribed areas of gardens, short grassland, long grassland and woodland, and along woodland edge, hedgerows and fence lines. The records allowed us to estimate the density of bumblebee nests in each of these habitats for the first time. 3. Nest densities were high in gardens (36 nests ha ‐1 ), and linear countryside habitats (fence lines, hedgerows, woodland edge: 20‐37 nests ha ‐1 ), and lower in non-linear countryside habitats (woodland and grassland: 11‐15 nests ha ‐1 ). 4. Findings on nest location characteristics corroborate those of an earlier survey carried out in the UK (Fussell & Corbet 1992). 5. Synthesis and applications . Gardens provide an important nesting habitat for bumblebees in the UK. In the countryside, the area occupied by linear features is small compared with that of non-linear features. However, as linear features contain high densities of nests, management options affecting such features may have a disproportionately large effect on bumblebee nesting opportunities. Current farm stewardship schemes in the UK are therefore likely to facilitate bumblebee nesting, because they provide clear guidance and support for ‘sympathetic’ hedgerow and field margin management.

Set points, settling points and some alternative models: theoretical options to understand how genes and environments combine to regulate body adiposity.

Abstract: The close correspondence between energy intake and expenditure over prolonged time periods, coupled with an apparent protection of the level of body adiposity in the face of perturbations of energy balance, has led to the idea that body fatness is regulated via mechanisms that control intake and energy expenditure. Two models have dominated the discussion of how this regulation might take place. The set point model is rooted in physiology, genetics and molecular biology, and suggests that there is an active feedback mechanism linking adipose tissue (stored energy) to intake and expenditure via a set point, presumably encoded in the brain. This model is consistent with many of the biological aspects of energy balance, but struggles to explain the many significant environmental and social influences on obesity, food intake and physical activity. More importantly, the set point model does not effectively explain the ‘obesity epidemic’ – the large increase in body weight and adiposity of a large proportion of individuals in many countries since the 1980s. An alternative model, called the settling point model, is based on the idea that there is passive feedback between the size of the body stores and aspects of expenditure. This model accommodates many of the social and environmental characteristics of energy balance, but struggles to explain some of the biological and genetic aspects. The shortcomings of these two models reflect their failure to address the gene-by-environment interactions that dominate the regulation of body weight. We discuss two additional models – the general intake model and the dual intervention point model – that address this issue and might offer better ways to understand how body fatness is controlled.

The Mutual Influence of Gaze and Head Orientation in the Analysis of Social Attention Direction

Abstract: Three experiments are reported that investigate the hypothesis that head orientation and gaze direction interact in the processing of another individual's direction of social attention. A Stroop-type interference paradigm was adopted, in which gaze and head cues were placed into conflict. In separate blocks of trials, participants were asked to make speeded keypress responses contingent on either the direction of gaze, or the orientation of the head displayed in a digitized photograph of a male face. In Experiments 1 and 2, head and gaze cues showed symmetrical interference effects. Compared with congruent arrangements, incongruent head cues slowed responses to gaze cues, and incongruent gaze cues slowed responses to head cues, suggesting that head and gaze are mutually influential in the analysis of social attention direction. This mutuality was also evident in a cross-modal version of the task (Experiment 3) where participants responded to spoken directional words whilst ignoring the head/gaze images. It is argued that these interference effects arise from the independent influences of gaze and head orientation on decisions concerning social attention direction.

Advancing energy justice: The triumvirate of tenets

Abstract: This paper proposes a new research agenda in "energy justice". It challenges researchers to address justice-based concerns within energy systems, from production to consumption. Justice is a combination of ensuring and recognising the basic equal worth of all human beings together with a commitment to the "distribution of good and bad things" (Campbell, 2010). Theoretical debates on justice have developed since the time of Aristotle. Indeed, a key distinction in Book V of Nicomachean Ethics between distributive and corrective justice endures today as social and legal justice. Adam Smith, Karl Marx and John Rawls have all sought to debate what justice is and should be. The discussion on justice below begins with a more contemporary, relevant and under-studied set of literature that sheds light on environmental pollution and justice, namely environmental justice (Dryzek et al, Schlosberg, 2013; Walker, 2012). In an age of resource depletion and fuel poverty, researchers need to pay greater attention to justice concerns in energy policy.

Lignans and isoflavonoids in plasma and prostatic fluid in men: Samples from Portugal, Hong Kong, and the United Kingdom

Abstract: BACKGROUND Chinese men have lower incidences of prostate cancer compared to men from Europe and North America. Asians consume large quantities of soya, a rich source of isoflavanoids phyto-oestrogens and have high plasma and urinary levels of these compounds. The mammalian lignans, enterolactone and enterodiol, are another group of weak plant oestrogens and are derived from seeds, cereals and grains. Vegetarians have high plasma and urinary concentrations of lignans. METHODS The concentrations lignans and isoflavonic phyto-oestrogens were determined by gas chromatography-mass spectrometry (GC-MS) in plasma and prostatic fluid from Portuguese, Chinese and British men consuming their traditional diets. RESULTS In prostatic fluid the mean concentrations of enterolactone wer 31, 162 and 20.3ng/ml for Hong Kong, Portugal and Britain respectively. Very high levels of enterolactone (〉600ng/ml) were observed in the prostatic fluid of some of the men fromPortugal. High concentrations of equol (3270 ng/ml) and daidzein (532 ng/ml) were found in a sample of prostatic fluid from Hong Kong. Higher mean levels of daidzein were observed in prostatic fluid from Hong Kong at 70ng/ml, compared to 4.6 and 11.3ng/ml in samples from Portugal and Britain respectively. Mean levels of daidzein were higher in the plasma samples from Hong Kong (31.3ng/ml) compared to those from Portugal (1.3ng/ml) and Britain (8.2ng/ml). In general, the mean plasma concentrations of enterolactone from the three centres were similar, at 6.2, 3.9 and 3.9ng/ml in samples from Hong Kong, Portugal and Britain respectively. CONCLUSIONS Higher concentrations of the isoflavanoid phyto-oestrogens, daidzein and equol, were found in the plasma and prostatic fluid of men from Hong Kong, compared to those from Britain and Portugal. However, the levels of the lignan, enterolactone, were very much higher in prostatic fluid of Portuguese men. Isoflavanoids and lignans have many interesting properties and may, in part, be responsible for lower incidences of prostate cancer in men from Asia and also some Mediterranean countries. The isoflavanoids from soya, which are present in high concentrations in the prostatic fluid of Asian men, may be protective against prostate disease. Prostate 32:122–128, 1997. ©1997 Wiley-Liss, Inc.