Geography

An unprecedented 85 harbour porpoises stranded freshly dead along approximately 100 km of Danish coastline from 7-15 April, 2005. This total is considerably above the mean weekly stranding rate for the whole of Denmark, both for any time of year, 1.23 animals/week (ranging from 0 to 20 during 2003-2008, excluding April 2005), and specifically in April, 0.65 animals/week (0 to 4, same period). Bycatch was established as the cause of death for most of the individuals through typical indications of fisheries interactions, including net markings in the skin and around the flippers, and loss of tail flukes. Local fishermen confirmed unusually large porpoise bycatch in nets set for lumpfish (Cyclopterus lumpus) and the strandings were attributed to an early lumpfish season. However, lumpfish catches for 2005 were not unusual in terms of season onset, peak or total catch, when compared to 2003-2008. Consequently, human activity was combined with environmental factors and the variation in Danish fisheries landings (determined through a principal component analysis) in a two-part statistical model to assess the correlation of these factors with both the presence of fresh strandings and the numbers of strandings on the Danish west coast. The final statistical model (which was forward selected using Akaike information criterion; AIC) indicated that naval presence is correlated with higher rates of porpoise strandings, particularly in combination with certain fisheries, although it is not correlated with the actual presence of strandings. Military vessels from various countries were confirmed in the area from the 7th April, en route to the largest naval exercise in Danish waters to date (Loyal Mariner 2005, 11-28 April). Although sonar usage cannot be confirmed, it is likely that ships were testing various equipment prior to the main exercise. Thus naval activity cannot be ruled out as a possible contributing factor.

ABSTRACT Rias are incised valleys where the estuarine area can move according to environmental changes; the estuarine zone is a biogeochemical active area where trace elements (TEs) from lithogenic sources are transported by rivers and partially sedimented. There may be also accumulated TEs from anthropogenic origin. The aim of this study is to determine the temporal variations and main sources of eight elements, As, Cd, Cr, Cu, Ni, Pb, V and Zn from sediment estuarine cores of five different rias. In the northwestern coast of Galicia are located the Rias of Cedeira, Ferrol, Ares, Betanzos and Coruña surrounded by different lithogenic domains and anthropogenic influences.

Concentrations of trace metals found in rivers are derived from a variety of anthropogenic and natural sources. Although river transport is a major mechanism for metal removal from continental land masses, little information is available regarding about the pristine small rivers and how their patterns may vary in contaminated conditions. The aim is to characterize metals concentrations in fluvial output waters toward a Galician Ria. The chosen fluvial system comprises Condomiñas (with a sewage treatment plant and a small industrial area), Das Mestas (pristine) and Ferreira (reservoir water for urban uses) rivers, which drain to the Ria of Cedeira (NW of Iberian Peninsula).

Rias are incised valleys where the estuarine area can move according to environmental changes; the estuarine zone is a biogeochemical active area where trace elements (TEs) from lithogenic sources are transported by rivers and partially sedimented. There may be also accumulated TEs from anthropogenic origin. The aim of this study is to determine the temporal variations and main sources of eight elements, As, Cd, Cr, Cu, Ni, Pb, V and Zn from sediment estuarine cores of five different rias. In the northwestern coast of Galicia are located the Rias of Cedeira, Ferrol, Ares, Betanzos and Coruña surrounded by different lithogenic domains and anthropogenic influences.

Thorium levels and their association with Fe, Sc, Ca, and Particulate Organic Carbon (POC) were researched in sediments of the Vigo Ria in order to assess the influence of radioactive gneisses from the neighbouring continental Galiñeiro Complex. Sediment of 50 surface samples and 1 core was analysed by ICP-MS and the results were validated with certificate reference material from marine sediment. It was found that Th accumulates in the middle Ria zone (9-15 mg kg(-1)) as a result of the terrestrial source. The thorium concentration in the Ria (average: 9.4+/-5.1 mg kg(-1)) is not anthropogenically impacted in accordance with its own regional background level (11.4+/-3.5 mg kg(-1)), which is two times higher than the content in earth's crust. Throughout the relationship Th/Fe, Th may be associated with the iron cycle in the Ria, probably through iron oxy-hydroxide scavenging.

Contamination of the coastal environment of small island countries is of concern because people's livelihoods in these countries are intimately linked to the resources of the coastal zone. The Lami estuary in Fiji is located downstream of an industrial area and is used extensively for fishing and other recreational activities. Sediment samples from twenty-nine sites within the area were analysed

Despite some serious past efforts to clarify its multiple dimensions and meanings, access to health care has remained a rather elusive concept, hampering the work of health care policymakers and professionals as they endeavor to effect meaningful health care reform. This article provides perhaps the most detailed clarification of the access concept, especially the crucial linkages among the various access dimensions, and presents a comprehensive conceptual framework for evaluation and planning activities as they relate to people's access to health care services. The proposed conceptual model recognizes access as the outcome of a process involving the interplay between the characteristics of the health care service system and of potential users in a specified area, and moderated by health care related public policy and planning efforts. An elaborate typology of access, incorporating four pairs of access dimensions, is also derived. This atomization of the concept allows us to focus on specific aspects of the access to health care problem, and to develop precise outcome indicators of health system performance for evaluative purposes. Further, it enables the access concept and its pertinent dimensions to be put into proper perspective when assessing the health care access situation in a specific national or regional context. The relevance of the proposed access model and the typology to health care planning in general, and to spatial planning of health care service systems in particular, is also discussed.

Cyanobacteria of the Synechococcus and Prochlorococcus genera are important contributors to photosynthetic productivity in the open oceans. Recently, core photosystem II (PSII) genes were identified in cyanophages and proposed to function in photosynthesis and in increasing viral fitness by supplementing the host production of these proteins. Here we show evidence for the presence of photosystem I (PSI) genes in the genomes of viruses that infect these marine cyanobacteria, using pre-existing metagenomic data from the global ocean sampling expedition as well as from viral biomes. The seven cyanobacterial core PSI genes identified in this study, psaA, B, C, D, E, K and a unique J and F fusion, form a cluster in cyanophage genomes, suggestive of selection for a distinct function in the virus life cycle. The existence of this PSI cluster was confirmed with overlapping and long polymerase chain reaction on environmental DNA from the Northern Line Islands. Potentially, the seven proteins encoded by the viral genes are sufficient to form an intact monomeric PSI complex. Projection of viral predicted peptides on the cyanobacterial PSI crystal structure suggested that the viral-PSI components might provide a unique way of funnelling reducing power from respiratory and other electron transfer chains to the PSI.

Vibrio spp. are naturally occurring bacteria in marine and estuarine environments around the world. The genus includes several human and animal pathogens that can negatively impact human health, seafood and aquaculture. Vibrio spp. populations are capable of rapid adaptation in response to changing environmental conditions, making them dynamic over short-term and seasonal scales. Temperature, vertical mixing, tidal flushing, climate, precipitation and nutrient loading can change the estuarine environment and subsequently alter microbial community structure, including Vibrio spp., affecting estuarine water quality and public health. To describe these dynamics, Vibrio spp. concentrations and a range of microbial, physical and chemical measures were monitored every 2 weeks and after storm events for 19 months in the Neuse River Estuary (NRE). Results showed clear seasonal and geographic trends in Vibrio spp. abundance. Multiple regression analysis revealed a strong relationship to temperature and salinity, with additional minor influences of chlorophyll a and dissolved organic carbon. Similar models based on easily measured environmental parameters should be pursued for individual Vibrio species in the NRE and other estuarine environments. Predictive models provide useful information for managers, researchers and modellers of estuarine ecosystems.

1492 Expulsion, Inquisition, Balfour Declaration and the European question!
"The Balfour Declaration is the triumph of Europe's Inquisition over inclusion and equality."
http://sabahdai.ly/G8KWSf

The combination of the 1492 Expulsion and Inquisition of Muslims and Jews may seem out of place at a first glance when the Balfour Declaration is discussed and added to the list. For sure, all these three are monumental events, but while in the case of the Expulsion and Inquisition the consequences were immediate and discernable with hundreds of thousands effected, the Balfour Declaration is only a letter that had far reaching consequences but is less understood from an epistemological and historical perspective. In my view, what brings these distinct and historically separate occurrences is Europe's relations, past and present, with the constructed other is that Europe has had a permanent problem with the other and it has been the hallmark of the past 500 years of history in the region. In 1492, Europe-and particularly starting in Spain-embarked on crafting a " pure " racial and religious identity which required the forceful expulsion and conversion to Christianity of both Muslims and Jews. Achieving this " pure " or, if I may, the " pure " European to the " source " meant the Expulsion for those who challenged the newly self-crafted cantors of identity, White and Christian. Understanding and accepting that race is a socially constructed category does not mean it was not vested with meaning and mobilized by power to effect those ascribed with inferior racial characteristics. Setting aside the actual invention of Whiteness and Europe as distinct categories, the " purity " of European blood and race was constructed on externalizing and otherizing Muslims and Jews. Consequently, the constructed European identity meant the negation of Muslims and Jews being part of the " us " , forever to be the despised and otherized as " them " , which meant an epistemic and structural exclusion from 1492 onward (some theorize an earlier demarcation). If to be a European meant to be White and Christian then the Muslim and Jewish subjects couldn't be true Europeans to the " source " , since they failed on both counts. This raises even more complicated questions concerning the Inquisition itself. Could a Muslim or Jewish person become European by means of a conversion since the identity has two elements that are infused epistemologically? The European White Christian identity is constructed with theological line of argumentation, which means that " purity " of blood i.e. the foundation of modern racism is theologically constructed that precludes the inclusion of the Muslim and Jew even after conversion. The Inquisition becomes not only a function of ascertaining correct conversion, but also a system of violence intended to control and marginalize if not to totally eliminate the theologically constructed inferiors. " God " himself demands purification of space, time and bodies from the defilement of the inferior being in proximity to the divinely ascribed superior race, the European White Christian person to the exclusion of all other. This brings us to the European Question-Europe's inability on an ontological and epistemological basis to accept inclusivity and equality of all members of the human family. The inherent superiority or, if you may, the European White Supremacy is incapable of emerging out of its paradigmatic box of racial purity despite claims to the contrary that were articulated in the enlightenment and modern period. The foundational basis of European identity has not shifted much and racial superiority has been codified into domestic and international legal structures that obfuscate the reality deeply embedded into the racial system. At this point you may ask what is the connection that is implied in the title of the essay and if we can put these three items together. In 1492, Queen Isabella I of Castilla and Ferdinand II of Aragon decreed the Expulsion of Jews first and then Muslims from Andalusia as well as setting in motion the Inquisition to guarantee the authenticity of conversion by both communities. For all intended purposes, the Inquisition managed to economically, politically and socially dispossess Muslims and Jews while structurally constituting them as the impure other, so that an orthodoxy of race and blood could be constituted. The consolidation of European White and Christian identity occurred by means of the Inquisition tormenting those who were deemed to be insufficiently Christian and for sure non-White. What began with the Expulsion in 1492, followed by forced conversion and the Inquisition, was concluded with a second round of massive expulsion and removal of Moriscos in 1609 and afterward. Thus, Europe's achievement of purity of " race " and " religion " was achieved by means of genocide, torture and transfer of Muslims and Jews to the outside.