This work shows the applicability of a set of protocols that can be widely applied to assess the impacts of global change drivers on species, communities and ecosystems.

Land use and climate changes induce shifts in plant functional diversity and community structure, thereby modifying ecosystem processes. This is particularly true for litter decomposition, an essential process in the biogeochemical cycles of carbon and nutrients. In this study, we asked whether changes in functional traits of living leaves in response to changes in land use and climate were related to rates of litter potential decomposition, hereafter denoted litter decomposability, across a range of 10 contrasting sites. To disentangle the different control factors on litter decomposition, we conducted a microcosm experiment to determine the decomposability under standard conditions of litters collected in herbaceous communities from Europe and Israel. We tested how environmental factors (disturbance and climate) affected functional traits of living leaves and how these traits then modified litter quality and subsequent litter decomposability. Litter decomposability appeared proximately linked to initial litter quality, with particularly clear negative correlations with lignin-dependent indices (litter lignin concentr tion, lignin:nitrogen ratio, and fiber component). Litter quality was directly related to community-weighted mean traits. Lignin-dependent indices of litter quality were positively correlated with community-weighted mean leaf dry matter content (LDMC), and negatively correlated with community-weighted mean leaf nitrogen concentration (LNC). Consequently, litter decomposability was correlated negatively with community-weighted mean LDMC, and positively with community-weighted mean LNC. Environmental factors (disturbance and climate) influenced community-weighted mean traits. Plant communities experiencing less frequent or less intense disturbance exhibited higher community-weighted mean LDMC, and therefore higher litter lignin content and slower litter decomposability. LDMC therefore appears as a powerful marker of both changes in land use and of the pace of nutrient cycling across 10 contrasting sites.

Early MRI and EEG can help to identify the infants with cerebral infarction who are likely to develop hemiplegia.

Summary 1.Many studies have identified relationships between plant reproductive behaviour and environmental conditions. However, they have all been based on cross-species analysis and take no account of the relative abundance of species with vegetation. 2. Using two reproductive traits -seed mass and dispersal vector -as examples, a range of previously identified relationships were tested using both unweighted and weighted-by-abundance data collected from land-use transitions at 12 sites across Europe. 3. Seed mass was correlated positively with most measures of temperature (stronger relationships for unweighted data) and declined against measures of disturbance (stronger relationships with weighted data). It was not related consistently to measures of water availability. 4. There was some evidence that endozoochory was associated with damper environments, hoarding with drier ones and exozoochory with more fertile habitats. 5. Weighting reduced the slope of relationships between seed mass and environmental variables, possibly indicating that dominance within vegetation is determined by land use after the operation of a climatic filter. Fewer significant relationships were detected for weighted dispersal mechanisms compared to unweighted ones, indicating less difference of the dominants from other species with regard to this trait. 6. Synthesis . This analysis shows that weighting by abundance in the vegetation (compared to unweighted analysis) has a significant impact on the relationships between key species traits and a range of environmental parameters related to climate and land use, and that this impact was not consistent in its effects.

Several management actions are applied to restore ecosystem services in degraded Mediterranean rangelands, which range from adjusting the grazing pressure to the removal of grazers and pine plantations. Four such actions were assessed in Quercus coccifera L. shrublands in northern Greece:(1) moderate grazing by goats and sheep, (2) no grazing, (3) no grazing plus pine (Pinus pinaster Aiton) plantation in forest gaps (gap reforestation), and (4) no grazing plus full reforestation of shrubland areas, also with P. pinaster. In addition, heavy grazing was also assessed to serve as a control action. We comparatively assessed the impact of these actions on key provisioning, regulating and supporting ecosystem services by using ground-based indicators. Depending on the ecosystem service considered, the management actions were ranked differently. However, the overall provision of services was particularly favored under moderate and no grazing management options, with moderate grazing outranking any other action in provisioning services, and the no grazing action presenting the most balanced provision of services. Pine reforestations largely contributed to water and soil conservation and C sequestration, but had a negative impact on plant diversity when implemented at the expense of removing natural vegetation in the area. Heavy grazing had the lowest provision of ecosystem services. It is concluded that degraded rangelands can be restored by moderating the grazing pressure rather than completely banning livestock grazing or converting them into pine plantations.

Neurological examination and magnetic resonance imaging were performed in the neonatal period in 58 full-term infants who presented with hypoxic-ischaemic encephalopathy. The aim of this study was to evaluate the patterns of neurological abnormalities and their correlation to brain lesions on MRI. The prognostic value of the neurological examination performed at different times in the neonatal period was also evaluated. Our results showed that specific clinical patterns can be observed in infants with HIE and these can be related to the pattern of lesion on brain MRI. In particular, while infants with normal MRI or minimal changes tend to show only minor tone abnormalities after the first week of life, infants with more severe lesions such as basal ganglia lesions show persistent and diffuse neurological abnormalities. Infants with white matter changes but intact basal ganglia show a different clinical pattern with improved sucking reflex and behaviour and less severe tone abnormalities. Our results also suggested that the neurological examination performed after the second week of life is a reliable indicator of outcome in these infants.

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This paper focuses on the effect of merger on university efficiency. In a first stage analysis efficiency scores of English universities are derived for a 17-year period using the frontier estimation method data envelopment analysis. A second stage analysis explores the effect of merger and other factors on efficiency. We find that mean efficiency for the sector has varied from around 60% to 70%, but that the efficiency levels of the vast majority of individual higher education institutions (HEIs) are not significantly different from each other. Merged HEIs have efficiency which is around 5 percentage points higher postmerger than non-merging HEIs holding all else constant; but we find that the efficiency impact of merger does not last long (not more than a year) after the merger. The transitory nature of the efficiency gain is an important finding which should be noted by politicians and managers considering a policy of merger.