Ecological world

This post features three manuscripts which look at reducing human–wildlife conflicts and managing species. First, Toshifumi Minamoto discusses his paper ‘ A basin-scale application of environmental DNA assessment for rare endemic species and closely related exotic species in rivers: a case study of giant salamanders in Japan ‘ by Sou Fukumoto, Atushi Ushimaru and Toshifumi Minamoto. The identification of DNA fragments sampled from water samples (environmental DNA: eDNA) has become a popular technique for rapidly determining the distribution of underwater macro-organisms. In this study we presented basin-scale eDNA surveys for the Japanese giant salamander ( Andrias japonicas ), which is endemic to Japan, and the Chinese giant salamander ( A. davidianus ), an exotic species, in Katura River in Japan. Four seasonal surveys at 37 sites were conducted, and the DNA of endemic and exotic species was detected at 25 and 9 sites, respectively. The overall eDNA detection sites corres...

                                                 Major economies outside  Japan  Japan (50th) continues to be affected by the consequences of the Fukushima nuclear accident and in particular by the high costs of energy imports and increased CO2 emissions. Japan also demonstrates the challenges that nations can face from sudden supply disruption and the need for greater diversification in the power supply. The country’s CO2 emissions from electricity production have increased by 25% to 562 gCO2/kWh since 2008, while the share of alternatives and nuclear energy dropped from 17% in 2008 to 5% last year. Despite the introduction of aggressive feed-in tariffs for renewable energy in July 2012 (15), the contribution of renewable energy is still too limited to reverse this trend. Japan’s government is now seeking to restart some nuclear reactors t...