Proporciona los pasos y procedimientos para acceder al recurso Journal of Travel Research.

The greater sage-grouse (Centrocercus urophasianus; sage-grouse) has been a species of conservation concern since the early 20th century due to range-wide population declines. To contribute to knowledge of the ecology of sage-grouse populations that inhabit the Box Elder Sage Grouse Management Area (SGMA) in northwestern Utah and quantify their responses to landscape scale habitat manipulations, I monitored vital rates and habitat selection of 45 female sage-grouse from 2014 to 2015. Using telemetry locations of female sage-grouse with known nest and brood fates, I created Generalized Linear Mixed Models to estimate the influence of proximity to pinyon (Pinus spp.) and juniper (Juniperus spp.; conifer) encroachment, and removal projects may have on sagegrouse reproductive fitness in the Box Elder SGMA. The best fit model suggested that for every 1 km a nest was located away from a conifer removal area, probability of nest success was reduced by 9.1% (β = -0.096, P < 0.05). Similarly, for every 1 unit increase in the log-odds of selection for distance to treatment, probability of brood success declined by 52.6% (P = 0.09). The probability of brood success declined by 77.2% (P < 0.05) as selection for conifer canopy cover increased. To evaluate sage-grouse habitat use, I used fecal pellet surveys to estimate relative pellet density in conifer encroachment, removal, and undisturbed sagebrush areas. Sage-grouse pellet densities were estimated at 4.6 pellets/ha (95% CI = 1.2, 10.9), 8.6 pellets/ha (95% CI = 3.8, 15.2), and 50.6 pellets/ha (95% CI = 36.8, 69.6), in conifer encroachment, removal, and undisturbed sagebrush areas respectively. Density estimates did not statistically differ between conifer encroachment and removal areas. To determine if vegetation micro-site characteristics at sage-grouse use sites influenced nest or brood fate, I recorded standard vegetation measurements for all radio-marked sage-grouse nests and a stratified random sample of brood-use sites from 2014- 2015 and compared them to random sites. Micro-site vegetation characteristics measured did not differ for successful and unsuccessful nests. Many characteristics differed between micro-sites used by successful broods and those used by unsuccessful broods. Sites used by successful broods also differed from random sites.

Greater sage-grouse (Centrocercus urophasianus) populations have declined throughout the western United States over the past 3 decades. Habitat loss within the sagebrush steppe ecosystem is a major factor leading to sage-grouse population decline. Hen sage-grouse were captured, marked, and tracked during the summer of 2012 in southwestern and south-central Wyoming. I performed vegetation surveys, and avian point counts were performed at 1 early-season brood location, 1 late-season brood location, and an accompanying random location for each marked hen regardless of reproductive status. Multinomial models were run to determine what habitat variables were most informative in predicting site selection by hen sage-grouse. During early-brood season, hen sage-grouse with chicks selected sites that had high total shrub cover density; these areas also exhibited high densities of American kestrels (Falco sparverius). They did not avoid areas with common ravens (Corvus corax). Hen sage-grouse not accompanied by a brood selected sites with high total shrub cover and low densities of common ravens and American kestrels. During late-brood season, hen sage-grouse that were accompanied by a brood selected sites with high shrub cover and low densities of small avian predators, such as black-billed magpies (Pica hudsonia) and American kestrels as well as medium-sized predators, such as common ravens, buteo hawks (Buteo spp.), and northern harriers (Circus cyaneus). Hens that were not accompanied by broods were more often found in sites with high total shrub cover and low densities of small avian predators, but selected sites with higher densities of medium-sized predators. Hen sage-grouse select areas with high total shrub cover during early and late-brood season regardless of their reproductive status. By avoiding predators and selecting areas with cover, hens with broods can reduce the risk of their chicks being depredated.

The particular purpose of this study was to determine the effects of large-scale sagebrush reseeding projects on sage grouse populations and whether such effects were partly or entirely beneficial, neutral, or detrimental to the survival of such populations. During two seasons of field work, the studies initiated on a short-time basis had the following specific objectives: To compare the utilization by sage grouse of reseeded and non-reseeded lands for the seasonal activities of mating, nesting, raising a brood, fall coveying, and wintering. To compare the utilization by sage grouse of reseeded and non-reseeded lands for daily activities of feeding, watering, resting, hiding, and roosting. To determine fall and winter movements of the grouse in relation to reseeded lands. To determine the food and cover available to grouse on randomly selected sample plots To arrive at an index to food preferences through comparison of stomach analysis and food availability studies. To determine the effect of livestock grazing of reseeded lands on sage grouse. To determine the effect of plant succession on availability of food and cover within reseeded lands.

Proporciona los pasos y procedimientos para acceder al recurso Clothing and Textiles Research Journal.

Proporciona los pasos y procedimientos para acceder al recurso Cornell Hospitality Quarterly.

This dissertation describes enhancements made to the finite element program, SAGE, and research on the performance of deep excavations. SAGE was developed at Virginia Tech for analysis of soil-structure interaction problems (Morrison, 1995). The purpose of the work described in this text with SAGE was to increase the capabilities of the program for soil-structure analysis. The purpose of the research on deep excavations was to develop a deeper understanding of the behavior of excavation support systems. The significant changes made to SAGE during this study include implementation of Biot Consolidation, implementation of axisymmetric analysis, and creation of a steady state seepage module. These changes as well as several others are described. A new manual for the program is also included. A review of published studies of deep excavation performance and recent case histories is presented. Factors affecting the performance of excavation support systems are examined, and performance data from recent published case histories is compared to data from Goldberg et al.'s 1976 report to the Federal Highway Administration. The design, construction, and performance of the deep excavation for the Dam Number 2 Hydroelectric Project is described. Finite element analyses of the excavation that were performed with SAGE are presented and discussed. / Ph. D.

This dissertation examines the operation of neoliberal environmentality through the instrumentalization of the Greater Sage-grouse (Centrocercus urophasianus) in Wyoming. It treats technological interventions within environmental construction as generating biotic-machinic entanglements termed technonature. I present the formation and operation of the Wyoming Conservation Exchange as a case study of technonatural territorialization connected to global trona and hydrocarbon commodity flows. The theoretical framework elaborates how "the environment" is constructed and governed through tactical instrumental deployments connected to technocratic management allowing economically powerful actors to inscribe their desires within Wyoming's landscape, politics and biota as a function of environmental security related to commodity development. The question motivating this work is "Whose environment is the Environmental Defense Fund defending?" The Greater Sage-grouse has become an object of U.S. Federal environmental governance since the late 1990's. It has experienced significant population declines due to anthropogenic disturbance and habitat loss through industrial action across its range. Wyoming's Sagebrush Steppe contains 37.5% of the remaining range wide population. The grouse was listed as a candidate species under the 1973 U.S. Endangered Species Act triggering responses from Federal, State, and international wildlife management agencies, as well as environmental non-governmental organizations. Wyoming could lose nearly a quarter of its surface should Federal regulations require the designation of critical sage-grouse habitat. Governor Dave Freudenthal signed Executive Order 2008-2 into law in response to the regulatory threat to Wyoming's hydrocarbon and mineral based economy. The grouse, in response was de-listed as a candidate species in 2015 by the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service. EO 2008-2 established the Wyoming Core Area Strategy as a statewide conservation umbrella and laid the framework for a habitat mitigation economy allowing industrial activity to continue within sage-grouse habitat. This incentivized the Environmental Defense Fund (EDF) to test a market-based instrument – a habitat exchange – within Wyoming. The Greater Sage-grouse is a test species as it is highly sensitive to changes in its environment and this dissertation examines how the habitat mitigation economy advanced by EDF is drawing the grouse into global commodity networks as a territorialization process for global flows of hydrocarbons and minerals. At stake is the ability to write the history of the species, land, and the global environment as EDF develops conservation technologies prioritizing flows critical to the hydrocarbon environment through the technology of the Wyoming Conservation Exchange. / Doctor of Philosophy / The Greater Sage-grouse (Centrocercus urophasianus) entered Euro-American scientific study as early as the Lewis and Clark expedition as they explored the Intermountain region of Western North America. The first thorough scientific study of the sage-grouse in the 20th Century, The Sage Grouse in Wyoming, by Dr. Robert Lansing Patterson included the effects of anthropogenic disturbance on grouse populations. Since the 1952 publication of Patterson's study, Greater Sage-grouse numbers have been declining as the bird loses its home to encroachments such as urbanization, agriculture, grazing, mining, and fossil fuel extraction. The last stronghold of the grouse is the Sagebrush Steppe within Wyoming containing nearly 40% of the remaining population. Known for its flamboyant mating displays, the ground-dwelling avian species has become a political flashpoint in conservation, land management, and environmental circles as its numbers declined steadily since the 1990's due to an accelerating energy boom threatening its habitat. The bird became a threat to extractive industry in Wyoming at the turn of the Millennium as environmentally concerned groups petitioned the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service (UFWS) to evaluate its populations under the Endangered Species Act (ESA). Nearly a quarter of Wyoming's surface would be strictly policed as critical habitat were the grouse listed as endangered or threatened under the ESA. Wyoming and its partners created the Wyoming Core Area Protection Strategy (CAP) as a wildlife management framework through Executive Order 2008-2. The Wyoming CAP includes the foundation of a habitat mitigation economy allowing industry to trade surface disturbances within critical sage-grouse habitat for modified land purportedly to the benefit of the species. The Nature Conservancy invited the Environmental Defense Fund to form the Wyoming Conservation Exchange – a market-based conservation instrument tailored to trading in habitat mitigation credits. This dissertation studies the Wyoming Conservation Exchange as an instrument connected to larger networks of wildlife management agencies, non-governmental organizations, and mining and fossil fuel interests. It evaluates the effects of the Wyoming Conservation Exchange and the economy it seeks to establish as changing how the environment is managed across the Sagebrush Steppe. Environmental Defense Fund's conservation instrument is reviewed through the economy created for and through the Greater Sage-grouse as an object of environmental governance. Habitat offsetting can, has and will change the physical, and political environment of Wyoming allowing powerful actors to write the rules of how the environment should be managed. As such, this dissertation questions whose environment the Environmental Defense Fund is defending as it explores sage-grouse management within the state.

Estudos recentes demonstraram que a variação de expressão alelo-específica é mais comum do que se imaginou, podendo chegar, em humanos, a 50% dos genes. Identificar os genes submetidos ao controle de expressão alelo-específica é muito importante para o entendimento de várias doenças, incluindo o câncer. A identificação dos alvos desse tipo de regulação diferencial é difícil, principalmente devido à dificuldade de se avaliar a expressão de cada alelo individualmente. Neste trabalho, abordamos este problema com uma estratégia de análise in-silico, fundamentada na integração de dados públicos do genoma humano, dados de expressão (como cDNAs, SAGE e MPSS) e dados sobre polimorfismos (SNPs). Desenvolvemos um banco de dados de polimorfismos de base única (Single-Nucleotide Polymorphism - SNPs) associados a etiquetas alternativas de SAGE (Serial Analysis of Gene Expression) e MPSS (massively parallel signature sequencing). SAGE e MPSS são técnicas desenvolvidas para análise da expressão de genes em larga escala. Ambas as técnicas têm como princípio a produção de pequenas seqüências marcadoras (etiquetas), adjacentes aos sítios de enzimas de restrição que estiverem mais próximo da cauda poli-A do RNA mensageiro. Tais etiquetas são seqüenciadas em grande escala e a quantidade de etiquetas é usada para medir a abundância relativa dos RNAs mensageiros correspondentes. A presença de SNPs nos sítios de restrição ou nas seqüências das etiquetas pode gerar etiquetas distintas para alelos do mesmo gene, que denominamos etiquetas alternativas. Neste trabalho, empregamos o banco de dados de etiquetas alternativas associadas a SNPs para identificar genes com expressão alélica diferencial. Usando esta estratégia, identificamos 812 genes com expressão monoalélica, Estudos anteriores comprovaram que, dentre os 812 genes identificados, cinco estão sujeitos ao fenômeno de imprinting genômico. Durante o decorrer deste estudo, trabalhos realizados por outros grupos apontaram outros 73 genes do nosso repertório como genes que apresentam variação no nível de expressão dos alelos em heterozigotos. Com objetivo de confirmar a expressão alélica diferencial dos nossos candidatos, selecionamos 29 genes para validação experimental. Para 12 destes genes não achamos indivíduos heterozigotos, impossibilitando a análise da expressão dos alelos. Dentre os outros 17 genes, três apresentaram expressão bialélica e 14 apresentaram expressão alélica diferencial nos indivíduos heterozigotos, sendo que 3 deles apresentaram expressão monoalélica. Estes resultados sugerem que nossa estratégia pode contribuir significativamente na identificação de genes com expressão alélica diferencial. / Recent studies have shown that variation of allelic-specific gene expression is more common than previously thought, reaching up to 50% of human genes. To identify genes displaying differential expression among alleles it is important for the understanding of several diseases, including the cancer. Identification of genes submitted to allelic-specific differential expression is hard, mostly due to the difficulty in evaluating the expression levels of each allele independently. In this work, we developed an in-silico approach, based on the integration of public data about the human genome, gene expression data (such as cDNAs, SNPs, SAGE and MPSS) and data on polymorphisms (SNPs). We developed a database of Single Nucleotide Polymorphisms (SNPs) associated to alternative SAGE (Serial Analysis of Gene Expression) and MPSS (Massively Parallel Signature Sequencing) tags. SAGE and MPSS are genome-wide techniques developed for analysis of gene expression. Both techniques rely on the production of short marker sequences (known as tags), adjacent to restriction sites closer to the poly-A tail of messenger RNAs. Such tags are sequenced in a large scale and tag counts are used to measure the relative abundance of their corresponding transcripts. The presence of SNPs in the restriction sites or in the tag sequences might generate allelic-specific tags for the same gene, which we call alternative tags. In this work, we used the database of SNPs and associated alternative tags to identify genes submitted to allelic-specific differential gene expression. Using this approach, we identified 812 genes showing allelic-specific differential gene expression. Previous studies have shown that, among the 812 candidates, five genes are targets for genomic imprinting. While this study was being performed, work done by other groups suggested other 73 genes in our candidates list to have different expression levels for alleles in heterozygous. Aiming to verify whether variations in the expression levels of alleles existed among our candidate genes, we submitted 29 genes for experimental validation. For 12 genes, we couldnt find heterozygous individuals, thus rendering it impossible to ascertain whether the supposed expression variation was true. Among the other 17 genes analyzed, three genes presented bi-allelic expression and 14 genes have shown clear differential expression among alleles, three of the last ones displaying strict mono-allelic expression. These results suggest that our approach may contribute significantly to the identification of genes with allelic-specific differential expression.

Estudos recentes demonstraram que a variação de expressão alelo-específica é mais comum do que se imaginou, podendo chegar, em humanos, a 50% dos genes. Identificar os genes submetidos ao controle de expressão alelo-específica é muito importante para o entendimento de várias doenças, incluindo o câncer. A identificação dos alvos desse tipo de regulação diferencial é difícil, principalmente devido à dificuldade de se avaliar a expressão de cada alelo individualmente. Neste trabalho, abordamos este problema com uma estratégia de análise in-silico, fundamentada na integração de dados públicos do genoma humano, dados de expressão (como cDNAs, SAGE e MPSS) e dados sobre polimorfismos (SNPs). Desenvolvemos um banco de dados de polimorfismos de base única (Single-Nucleotide Polymorphism - SNPs) associados a etiquetas alternativas de SAGE (Serial Analysis of Gene Expression) e MPSS (massively parallel signature sequencing). SAGE e MPSS são técnicas desenvolvidas para análise da expressão de genes em larga escala. Ambas as técnicas têm como princípio a produção de pequenas seqüências marcadoras (etiquetas), adjacentes aos sítios de enzimas de restrição que estiverem mais próximo da cauda poli-A do RNA mensageiro. Tais etiquetas são seqüenciadas em grande escala e a quantidade de etiquetas é usada para medir a abundância relativa dos RNAs mensageiros correspondentes. A presença de SNPs nos sítios de restrição ou nas seqüências das etiquetas pode gerar etiquetas distintas para alelos do mesmo gene, que denominamos etiquetas alternativas. Neste trabalho, empregamos o banco de dados de etiquetas alternativas associadas a SNPs para identificar genes com expressão alélica diferencial. Usando esta estratégia, identificamos 812 genes com expressão monoalélica, Estudos anteriores comprovaram que, dentre os 812 genes identificados, cinco estão sujeitos ao fenômeno de imprinting genômico. Durante o decorrer deste estudo, trabalhos realizados por outros grupos apontaram outros 73 genes do nosso repertório como genes que apresentam variação no nível de expressão dos alelos em heterozigotos. Com objetivo de confirmar a expressão alélica diferencial dos nossos candidatos, selecionamos 29 genes para validação experimental. Para 12 destes genes não achamos indivíduos heterozigotos, impossibilitando a análise da expressão dos alelos. Dentre os outros 17 genes, três apresentaram expressão bialélica e 14 apresentaram expressão alélica diferencial nos indivíduos heterozigotos, sendo que 3 deles apresentaram expressão monoalélica. Estes resultados sugerem que nossa estratégia pode contribuir significativamente na identificação de genes com expressão alélica diferencial. / Recent studies have shown that variation of allelic-specific gene expression is more common than previously thought, reaching up to 50% of human genes. To identify genes displaying differential expression among alleles it is important for the understanding of several diseases, including the cancer. Identification of genes submitted to allelic-specific differential expression is hard, mostly due to the difficulty in evaluating the expression levels of each allele independently. In this work, we developed an in-silico approach, based on the integration of public data about the human genome, gene expression data (such as cDNAs, SNPs, SAGE and MPSS) and data on polymorphisms (SNPs). We developed a database of Single Nucleotide Polymorphisms (SNPs) associated to alternative SAGE (Serial Analysis of Gene Expression) and MPSS (Massively Parallel Signature Sequencing) tags. SAGE and MPSS are genome-wide techniques developed for analysis of gene expression. Both techniques rely on the production of short marker sequences (known as tags), adjacent to restriction sites closer to the poly-A tail of messenger RNAs. Such tags are sequenced in a large scale and tag counts are used to measure the relative abundance of their corresponding transcripts. The presence of SNPs in the restriction sites or in the tag sequences might generate allelic-specific tags for the same gene, which we call alternative tags. In this work, we used the database of SNPs and associated alternative tags to identify genes submitted to allelic-specific differential gene expression. Using this approach, we identified 812 genes showing allelic-specific differential gene expression. Previous studies have shown that, among the 812 candidates, five genes are targets for genomic imprinting. While this study was being performed, work done by other groups suggested other 73 genes in our candidates list to have different expression levels for alleles in heterozygous. Aiming to verify whether variations in the expression levels of alleles existed among our candidate genes, we submitted 29 genes for experimental validation. For 12 genes, we couldnt find heterozygous individuals, thus rendering it impossible to ascertain whether the supposed expression variation was true. Among the other 17 genes analyzed, three genes presented bi-allelic expression and 14 genes have shown clear differential expression among alleles, three of the last ones displaying strict mono-allelic expression. These results suggest that our approach may contribute significantly to the identification of genes with allelic-specific differential expression.