Ecological world

Physical fitness is a popular topic today. and its popularity has been a major factor in motivating college students to pursue careers in physical edu-cation, physiology of exercise, health education, nutrition, physical therapy, and medicine. The Public Health Service listed "physical fitness and exercise- as one of fifteen areas of concern related to improving the country's overall health (N).  While this might appear to be an unprecedented event. similar interests and concerns about physical fit-ness existed in this country over one hundred years ago. Between the Civil War and the First World War (WW 1), physical education was primarily concerned with the development and maintenance of fitness, and many of the leaders in physical education were trained in medicine For example, Dr. Dudley Sargent, hired by Harvard University in 1879, set up a physical training program with individual exercise prescriptions to improve a person's structure and function to achieve &q

T housands of chemical reactions occur throughout the body during each minute of the day. Collec-tively, these reactions are called metabolism. Metab-olism includes chemical pathways that result in the synthesis of molecules (anabolic reactions) as well as the breakdown of molecules (catabolic reactions). Since energy is required by all cells, it is not sur-prising that cells possess chemical pathways that are capable of converting foodstuffs (i.e., fats, proteins, carbohydrates) into a biologically usable form of energy .  This metabolic process is termed bioenergetics. In order for you to run, jump, or swim, skeletal muscle cells must be able to continuously extract energy from food nutrients. In fact, the inability to transform energy contained in foodstuffs into usable biological energy would limit performance in endurance activities. The explanation for this is simple. To continue to contract, muscle cells must have a continuous source of energy. When energy is not rea

W e find it ironic that so much effort and so many resources are put into the exploration of outer space, at a time when humans are progressively using resources to depletion and when so little is known about the biological diversity of the earth. Why is there all this publicity about ancient life discovered on the planet Mars when there are regions of the Earth where life has yet to be explored? Life at the extremes of environmental conditions are to be found on the Earth. For example, studies of life atgreat depths in the oceans has hardly begun. Recently, an entire new kingdom of deep organisms, the Archaea, has been recognised; although discovered some decades ago, genetic analysis has shown them to be quite unlike any other kind of life (Earle, 1996). We have been concerned to read of proposals for using deep oceans for disposal of global  waste that is inert or rich in metals or even in organic compounds (but not industrial organic compounds). Quite rightly, some prop

      H ow often have you seen those wonderful advertisements inviting you to have a holiday on a tropical island ( Fig. )What is it about islands, whether in the tropics or polar regions, that suggests romance, excitement and adventure? Is it because of a sense of escape from the pressures and stress of a bustling way of life, or the opportunity to savour sun-soaked beaches, or the adventure of rocky unexplored shores, or perhaps the chance of seeing unique island wildlife? It is for all these reasons that there is a growing tourist industry for many islands around the world. The wildlife of islands, especially oceanic islands , has long been of special significance in biology , ecology , conservation and biogeography. Studies of island species have also been of historical significance for evolutionary biology. Many of the world's islands have high levels of endemic flora and fauna; that is, taxa found only on a particular island and no other place.  Island biota has o

    B iogeography has had a very important role to play in the development of our understanding of biology. For example it was biogeography that was the key to developing the theory of the evolution of life.  Today, not only does biogeographical research have important applications in a world of rapidly increasing human population densities and diminishing resources, it has crucial applications for conservation and sustainable use of many levels of biological diversity. If we are to make the best uses of limited resources for conservation we must know much more about the geography and ecology of the many kinds of biological diversity. Some questions in biogeography may seem rather academic.  For example, why are certain species and certain groups of organisms foundinrid scale? localities and nowhere else? What has caused these patterns on a world Why is it that for many groups of organisms there are fewer and fewer species in the north and in the south compared to the tropic

E cology and biogeography  In 1870, the German biologist Ernst Haeckel (1834-1919) first coined the term 'ecology' and defined it as 'the total relations of the animal both to its inorganic and organic environment'. In some ways that encapsulated what ecology is today; the study of the interactions between organisms and their environment; but also including (1) the study of the abundance of organisms in space and time and (2) the processes in biological communities. Early in the 20th century, ecology emerged from natural history and wildlife manage-ment as a science.  Developments in early ecology occurred simultaneously in both North America and Europe. Landmarks in early animal ecology text-books included Arthur Pearse's Animal Ecology (published by McGraw-Hill in 1926) and the work of Charles Elton (Animal Ecology, published by Sidgwick & Jackson in 1927).  Much of the stimulus for the emergence of plant community studies came from the work of Tansle

T here are approximately million named species of living oganisms. The total number of living species is of course not known and we can only estimate what the figure might be. Estimates range from about 11 to 30 million or more. What is certain is that human impacts are causing species to become extinct faster than they can be named. Also of concern is our lack of knowledge about the named species. Scientists have intensively investigated only 10 per cent of plant species and a far smaller proportion of animal species (information from the World Commission in Environment and Develop-ment 198- publication Our common Future, Oxford University Press).  There are many terms used to refer to different groups of animals, plants and other kinds of living organism such as fungi, bacteria and viruses. The classification of biota (living organisms) has been reviewed and changed many times as a result of new information. In 1969, R. H. Whittaker of Cornell University suggested fiv

P rotection focuses on fundamentals upon prevention of wood damage by fungi, and protection and preservation of wood (e.g., Willeitner and Liese 1992; Eaton and Hale 1993; Palfreyman et al. 1996; Murphy and Dickinson 1997; Zujest 2003; Goodell et al. 2003; Muller 2005).  Protection in the broader sense comprises non-chemical methods like organizational measures and measures by design, use of naturally durable woods, application of antagonisms, or wood modifications that do not affect the environment. Preservation predominantly stands for chemical measures.   The conditions for the development of wood fungi and protection principles that can be deduced from them. The principle of the wood protection consists of changing at least one of the three life prerequisites of fungi in wood in such a way that the development of fungi is impossible or at least inhibited. Fungal attack can be prevented   (Willeitner and Schwab 1981; Erler 2002; Willeitner 2000, 2003; Goodell et al. 2

The term " soft rot " was originally used by Findlay and Savory (1954) to describe a specific type of wood decay caused by Ascomycetes and Deuteromycetes which typically produce chains of cavities within the S2 layer of soft- and hardwoods in terrestrial and aquatic environments (Liese 1955), for example when the wood-fill  in cooling towers became destroyed despite water saturation, and when poles broke, although they were protected against Basidiomvcetes.  About 300 species (Seehann et al. 1975) to some 1,600 examples of ascomvcete and deuteromvcete fungi (Eaton and Hale 1993) cause soft rot, e.g., Chaeromium globosurn (Takahashi 1978), Hurnicola spp., Lecythophora hoffrnannii, Monodictys putredinis, Paecilornyces spp., and Thielavia terrestris. Soft-rot fungi differ from brown-rot and white-rot Basidiomycetes by grow-ing mainly inside the woody cell wall trate, starting from the tracheidal lumina., by means of thin perforation hyphae of less than 0.5 pm thickne

W hite-rot research has been reviewed by Ericksson et al. (1990) and Mess-ner et al. (2003). White rot means the degradation of cellulose, hemicellu-loses, and lignin usually by Basidiomycetes and rarely by Ascomycetes, e.g., Kretzschmaria deusta and Xylaria hypoxylon.  White rot has been classified by macroscopic characteristics into white-pocket, white-mottled, and white-stringy, the different types being affected by the fungal species, wood species, and ecological conditions. From microscopic and ultrastructural investiga-tions, two main types of white rot have been distinguished (Liese 1970).  In the simultaneous white rot ("corrosion rot"), carbohydrates and lignin are almost uniformly degraded at the same time and at a similar rate during all decay stages. Typical fungi with simultaneous white rot are Fomes fomentar-ws, Phellinus igniarius, Phellinus robustus, and Trametes versicolor in standing trees and stored hardwoods (Blanchette 1984a).  Wood decay

B rown Ro t is caused by Basidiomvcetes, which metabolize the carbohydrates cellulose and hemicelluloses of the woody cell wall by non-enzymatic and enzymatic action and leave the lignin almost unaltered , whereby the brown color develops.  Brown-rot fungi do not produce lignin-degrading enzymes. There are how-ever reports of lignin peroxidase and manganese peroxidase in some brown-rot fungi, and lignin loss or metabolization by brown-rot fungi have been reported. Particularly in later stages of decay, the highly lignified middle lamella/primary walls were observed to undergo attack. Also, the penetration of the wood cell wall by bore holes removes lignin in the process, all suggesting that low molec-ular weight lignin degrading agents and potentially even lignin degrading enzymes max occur in some brown-rot fungi, at least with localized activity (Goodell 2003).  Laccase activity was also found in Coniophora puteana (Lee et. al. 2004), and in Glocophyllum trabeum and Olig

There are three types of fungal wood rot: brown, white, and soft rot . Further terms are either older names (e.g., destruction rot = brown rot), specifications (red rot = white rot by Heterobasidion annosum) or terms used in practice ( marble rot = white rot with black demarcation lines) or false names (blue rot = blue stain).  According to the classical school of thought a fungal species causes only one type of decay, and species causing different rots shall not be grouped in the same genus [e.g.: Lentinus lepideus: brown rot ; Lentinula (in former times Lentinus) edodes: white rot].  Regarding the delineation between the three decay types, there are, however, exceptions: The brown-rot fungus Coniophora puteana produced cavities to be typical of soft-rot fungi and erosion and thinning of the cell wall to be charac-teristic of white-rot fungi (Kleist and Schmitt 2001; Lee et al. 2004).  Fistulina hepatica revealed the soft-rot mode in cell walls rich in syringyl lignin,

To avoid microbial wood discoloration, the generally suitable measures against fungi (e.g., Liese et al. 1973; Liese and Peek 1987; Grog et al. 1991; Yang and Beauregard 200 1) are listed in Table. Felling in the cold season and fast processing of the stems through well coordination between forestry and wood industry reduces microbial activity during storage of the stems in the forest. Cool, shady, and ventilated storage without ground contact and with unhurt bark to maintain high wood moisture content and to prevent lateral infections are favorable. Lumber discoloration can be prevented by prompt air-drying in well-ventilated stacks protected against rain by a roof, or by kiln-drying. Wet storage of stemwood by sprin-kling or ponding protects against fungi and insects. Currently, stem storage is performed in a N 2 /CO 2  atmosphere (Mahler 1992; Bues and Weber 1998; Maier at al. 1999). Table : reventive measures to avoid microbial wood discolorations and decay - fell

B iogeography : the nature of the subject, its history and its applications  In 1994, an article in the journal New Scientist proclaimed that 'Since biogeography holds the key to the survival of life, it deserves more attention' (Bowman, 1994). That statement is a very fitting opening to this first chapter. Biogeography is about the geography of plants, animals and other or-ganisms, that is, the study of the geographical distribution of plants, animals and other organisms.  Biogeographical research helps us to understand the patterns and processes of distribution and the factors that cause and maintain those patterns and processes. The patterns of distribution that we find today amongst living organisms have been determined by many things, including the following: Evolution Physiological and behavioural adaptations Dispersal mechanisms and levels of dispersal abilities Competition between species Ecological succession Climate change Sea level changes Moving contin

Red Streaking Red-streaking discoloration (known as "Rotstreifigkeit" in Germany) is one of the most common and important damage in seasoning logs and sawn lumber, occurring only in conifers (spruce, pine, fir) and recognized as a distinct con-dition in continental Europe.  The stripe-shaped to spotted yellow to reddish-brown discoloration extends in logs from both their bark-covered faces and from their cut ends (Butin 1995; Baum and Bariska 2002) . Stems that are not debarked show a rather flat discoloration and debarked stems exhibit a streakier staining (v. Pechmann et al. 1967). Causal agents are several white-rot Basidiomycetes, in spruce particularly Stereum sanguinolentum (Kleist and Seehann 1997) and Amylostereum areola-turn. In south Germany, Amylostereum chailettii is common (Zycha and Knopf 1963; v. Pechmann et al. 1967).  In pine, red streaking is mainly due to Trichap-turn abietinum (Butin 1995). According to Kreisel (1961), S. sanguinolentum and T

B lue stain (synonymous sap stain) is a blue,grey or black, radially striped dially stri wood discoloration of sapwood, which can be caused by about 100 to 250 (Kaarik 1980) fungi belonging to the Ascomycetes and De (1999) and others differentiated three uteromycetes.  Seifert groups of blue-stain fungi: - Cerato-cystis, Ophiostoma and Ceratocystiopsis species (Upadhyay 1981; Perry 1991; Gibbs 1999), - black yeasts such as Hormonema dematioides, Aureobasidium pullulans, Rhinocladiella atrovirens, and Phialophora species, - dark molds such as Alternaria alternata, Cladosporium sphaerospermum, and C. cladospo-rioides. Yang (1999) differentiated dark staining fungi, such as Ophiostoma piliferum on jack pine, Ceratocystis minor on white pine, and C. coerulescens on white spruce, and light staining fungi, such as 0. piceae, C. adiposa and Leptographium sp.  Frequently, like in the Ophiostoma species, the teleomorph is a perithecium . Blue stain occurs in conifers, particularly i