This report explains the concepts and field methods to be used by the U.S. Geological Survey's National Water-Quality Assessment (NAWQA) Program for evaluating contaminants in tissues of biological organisms. Laboratory methods for analysis of these contaminants will be detailed in a future report. Part 1 explains the rationale for analyzing contaminants in tissues and gives an overview of the approach. Part 2 describes the tissue-contaminant strategies of other agencies and compares them to the strategy used in NAWQA. Part 3 details the approach for the use of tissue analysis as an aid to interpreting quality of water in NAWQA study units. Concentrations of contaminants in tissues will complement measures of water and sediment chemistry, and ecological surveys in NAWQA, providing multiple lines of evidence for waterquality assessments. Individual sections in Part 3 provide detailed discussions of target contaminants, target taxa, and field procedures. Suggestions for interpretation of data are presented to facilitate consistency among NAWQA study units. Purpose and Scope This document describes the rationale, objectives, approach, and procedures to be used in the NAWQA Program for determining the occurrence, distribution, and trends in concentrations of trace elements and synthetic organic compounds in tissues (termed here tissue-contaminant studies). It is recognized that at least some of these approaches will evolve as additional experience is gained and as measurement and analysis techniques advance.

This review recollects literature data on sensitivity and dynamic range for the most commonly used colorimetric and fluorescent dyes for general protein staining, and summarizes procedures for the most common PTM-specific detection methods. It also compiles some important points to be considered in imaging and evaluation. In addition to theoretical considerations, examples are provided to illustrate differential staining of specific proteins with different detection methods. This includes a large body of original data on the comparative evaluation of several pre-and post-electrophoresis stains used in parallel on a single specimen, horse serum run in 2-DE (IPG-DALT). A number of proteins/protein spots are found to be over-or under-revealed with some of the staining procedures.

Despite calls for performance-oriented and evidence-based planning, the outcomes of land use and environmental plans are rarely monitored or assessed ex post facto (that is, post implementation). As a result, planners cannot know whether or why plans achieve their goals, or learn from the results of past interventions to improve planning practice. This evaluation gap is caused by a lack of methodology to evaluate the outcomes of plans and the difficulty of attributing changes to planning activities. We address this gap by proposing and testing a plan-outcome evaluation (POE) methodology. We demonstrate its broad applicability and usefulness in the context of local plans in New Zealand. The POE methodology will be useful to practitioners and academics seeking to assess the outcomes of plans in countries with western planning traditions.

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