Titel Deelnemers "Korte inhoud" "The green economy as plantation ecology" "Vijay Krishnan Kolinjivadi, Jean-François Bissonnette, Laura Valencia, Daniel Leguizamon Alejo, Gert Van Hecken" "The green economy is proposed as a solution to address growing and potentially irreversible ecological crises. But what happens when environmental solutions are premised on the same logics of brutal simplification and dehumanization that sustain and reinforce systems of oppression and ecological breakdown? In this article, we describe the transformation of the biophysical landscape of the planet into replicable blueprints of the plantation plot. The plantation as a colonial-era organizational template is an ongoing ecological process premised on disciplining bodies and landscapes into efficient, predictable, calculable, and controllable plots to optimize commodity production and is dependent on racialized and gendered processes of dehumanization. The visible cultural, physical, aesthetic, and political singularity of the plot, under the guise of objectivity and neutrality, permits a tangible depiction of the way ecological breakdown takes place. We interrogate the notion of ""greening"" as a strategy to combat the unintended impacts of colonial plantation ecology, arguing that such tactics further reinforce the template of plantation ecology rather than dismantle it. We first conceptualize the historical plantation and its biophysical, cognitive, and corporeal organizational principles. We then offer examples of ""greening"" as new, more inclusive (but equally detrimental) forms of plantation logics, and crucially identify how these extensions of plantation logic get co-opted by resistance agents, from social movements to disease and pestilence. We consider sustainability certifications of palm oil through the Roundtable on Sustainable Palm Oil (RSPO) in Colombia and compensatory afforestation programs designed to offset forest destruction through monoculture plantations in India. We conclude by highlighting how abolition ecologies can serve as an antidote to plantation logic and highlight necessary relationships of self-reflexivity, repair and collective solidarity required to disinvest in plantation ecology." "Ecology, systematics and evolutionary biology of frog blood parasites in northern KwaZulu-Natal" "Edward Charles Netherlands" "Blood parasites have been recorded in a variety of vertebrate and invertebrate hosts, inhabiting both aquatic and terrestrial environments. Until this study, only a few blood parasite surveys had been carried out on frogs in sub-Saharan Africa. Thus information on the diversity of these parasites remained limited. To increase our knowledge of frog blood parasites, a large multi-approach study on the diversity, evolutionary biology, and ecology of frog blood parasites was undertaken. The majority of the fieldwork took place in northern KwaZulu-Natal (KZN), South Africa, focussing specifically on the area adjacent to the Phongolo River and its associated floodplain. However, samples also included those collected from frogs in the southern regions of the Kruger National Park, South Africa, and from frogs in Belgium. The latter was fortuitous, as Europe is the type locality for many frog blood parasite species and genera. These samples provided essential data for phylogenetic comparisons between the African and European species. Presently this is the largest multi-species, generic and family amphibian blood parasite survey to be completed, including a total of 643 anurans of 38 species, 20 genera and 13 families. The study was divided into three main components for the collection, analysis and reporting of data. The first component was to determine the frog blood parasite diversity, the second to determine phylogenetic relationships in conjunction with the former component, and lastly the ecological and host-vector-parasite relationships. Blood samples were drawn from the femoral artery of each frog and thin blood smears prepared for screening and morphometrics; the remaining blood fixed in 70% molecular grade EtOH for later molecular analysis. Giemsa stained blood smears were screened microscopically for the presence of any blood inhabiting organisms. Positive infections were then further analysed according to the aims of the respective chapters. Analyses included both morphological and molecular aspects. Morphology was used for the description and identification of species, and molecular analyses were used to assist with the morphology-based descriptions, as well as to allow for phylogenetic relationship comparisons of the blood parasites with one another. In the present study, three new species of Hepatozoon were described from hyperoliid frogs (Afrixalus fornasini, Hyperolius argus, and Hyperolius marmoratus), namely Hepatozoon involucrum Netherlands, Cook & Smit, 2018; Hepatozoon tenuis Netherlands, Cook & Smit, 2018; and Hepatozoon thori Netherlands, Cook & Smit, 2018. Phylogenetic relationships show that species of Hepatozoon isolated from African frogs form as a monophyletic group, separate from the species of Hepatozoon isolated from European and North American frogs. Two species of Dactylosoma Labbé, 1894, were found parasitising three species of frogs namely, Ptychadena anchietae and Sclerophrys gutturalis from South Africa, as well as Pelophylax lessonae from Belgium. Based on morphometrics and molecular findings a new dactylosomatid, Dactylosoma sp. 1, is described form Pty. anchietae and Scl. gutturalis. The species of Dactylosoma isolated from Pel. lessonae conforms morphologically with Dactylosoma splendens Labbé 1894, thus placing in question the validity of D. splendens synonymy with D. ranarum (Kruse, 1890). Phylogenetic analysis shows species of anuran Dactylosoma as a monophyletic group, separate from the other haemogregarine groups. Five species of frogs from South Africa and two from Belgium were found parasitised with haemococcidia. Based on morphological, morphometric and molecular findings Lankesterella minima (Chaussat 1850) is redescribed from Pelophylax kl. esculentus (Linnaeus, 1758) and Pel. lessonae (Camerano, 1882) from Belgium. Additionally, two new species of Lankesterella were described, namely Lankesterella sp. 1 in Pel. lessonae from Belgium, and Lankesterella sp. 2 in Afr. delicates and Afr. fornasini from South Africa. Furthermore, a new genus of haemococcidia, with a new species combination, is described from Phr. mababiensis, Pty. anchietae, and Pyx. edulis from South Africa; as well as a new species, haemococcidia sp. 2, described from Afr. fornasini from South Africa. This is the first study to provide molecular data for species of haemococcidia from African and European anurans.A new species of amphibian filarial nematode (Onchocercidae: Waltonellinae) was described from the toads Scl. gutturalis and Scl. garmani. The life history of this nematode was elucidated from its natural mosquito vectors Uranotaenia (Pseudoficalbia) mashonaensis and Uranotaenia (Pfc.) montana. All stages of development were characterised using morphological and molecular methods. This study is the first to elucidate the life history of an amphibian filarial nematode from southern Africa, and provide data on its phylogenetic placement within the Onchocercidae. In addition to the taxonomic and phylogenetic perspective of this study, this study also aimed at exploring the potential of frog blood parasites as indicators of environmental health. For this, blood parasites infecting grass frogs (Ptychadena Boulenger, 1917) from the Phongolo River system in South Africa were used as a case study. In general, findings indicate that frogs from more impacted sites harboured more blood parasites than from less-impacted sites. In summary, this study explored the efficacy of a large multi-species, multi-approach survey on the diversity of frog blood parasites from northern KwaZulu-Natal, South Africa. Based on the results several new species of frog blood parasites from different taxa were discovered and described, greatly contributing to knowledge and species records on the overall diversity of frog blood parasites from South Africa. Furthermore, this study provides the first molecular data for species of Dactylosoma and Lankesterella for frogs from Africa, as well as the first molecular data for a filarial nematode for frogs from South Africa. The phylogenetic relationships of species of Hepatozoon, Dactylosoma, Lankesterella, and the filarial nematode were also characterised based on comparisons to other available molecular data. From an ecological perspective, blood parasites from this study adhere to several criteria of what is considered a good indicator and thus demonstrate potential as indicators for healthy ecosystems and intact food webs. The results of this study establish a foundation for future research into the blood parasite biodiversity in northern KZN, an area that this study has highlighted as not only rich in anuran diversity, but also rich in anuran blood parasite diversity. Furthermore, this study provides a baseline for future taxonomic and ecological studies on these parasite groups, not only in South Africa but globally as well." "Ecology and molecular biology of bacterial adaptation to pesticides" "Harry Lerner" "Pesticides are indispensable for ensuring a stable food supply chain and their world-wide use is increasing. However, they are a major environmental concern due to their recalcitrant nature and toxicity towards non-target organisms. Despite increasingly stringent regulations, pesticides continue to exceed mandated threshold levels in ground and surface waters. To address this persistence issue, a better understanding of the environmental fate of pesticides and their residues is essential. Bacterial biodegradation is an important factor governing the environmental fate of pesticides and the only route for their complete removal from the environment. The bacterial biodegradation of pesticides has been extensively studied and yet the true degradative potential in complex environments such as soil remains poorly understood. The same applies to the apparently rapid evolutionary trajectories that lead to the dedicated pathways that allow bacteria to use pesticides as growth substrate. The overall aim of this thesis was to improve our understanding of the bacterial ecology of pesticide removal and of bacterial adaptation towards pesticide degradation in soil and in on-farm biopurification systems (BPSs) used for the treatment of pesticide contaminated wastewater at farmyards. In the first part of the study, the objective was to examine whether the previous exposure of an agricultural soil to the phenylurea herbicide linuron, resulted in a genetic memory for linuron degradation within the resident bacterial community. Moreover, we examined whether linuron degraders belonging to the genus Variovorax, isolated and identified in that soil in previous studies, are instrumental for that genetic memory or mere artifacts of a biased isolation procedure. Therefore, the in situ degraders of linuron were determined for the first time by cultivation independent DNA stable isotope probing (DNA-SIP) in combination with 16S rRNA gene amplicon sequencing, in addition to classical cultivation dependent enrichment and isolation. Both approaches resulted in the assignment of Variovorax as the key linuron degrader and hence as key for maintaining the genetic memory of linuron degradation in the soil, despite periods without linuron application. The results thereby confirmed the conclusions of the previous studies and corroborated the hypothesized importance of this genus for in situ linuron removal. Nevertheless, the two novel linuron-degrading Variovorax isolates represented genotypes that were different from those identified through DNA-SIP and exemplified the potential bias of current isolation approaches. The second part of the study aimed at identifying the in situ linuron degraders in a BPS environment. As in the first part, to this end, DNA-SIP was used and in parallel, from the same material, BPS material-free enrichment cultures were studied to explore cultivation-based biases in recovering information on the linuron-degrading organisms. The DNA-SIP analysis identified, in addition to Variovorax, Ramlibacter as key in in situ linuron degradation. Orgamisms of the Ramlibacter genus were previously never associated with linuron degradation. The material-free enrichment, on the other hand, revealed vastly different degrader communities that rather resembled those previously retrieved from soil by cultivation, dominated by Variovorax but not containing Ramlibacter. This clearly showed the effect of enrichment bias. Additionally, the results showed the clear involvement of several genes previously linked to linuron catabolism in Variovorax in in situ linuron degradation, as well as their likely embedding in IS1071 composite transposons on IncP-1 plasmids. In the final part of the study, the adaptation of linuron preconditioned bacterial communities towards the degradation of the structurally similar compounds chlorpropham and chlorotoluron was explored to determine the role of a genetic memory for linuron degradation in adaptation, for instance by exchange of complementary catabolic gene modules. The linuron preconditioned BPS material studied in part two was used as the model system because of its confirmed genetic memory for linuron degradation. In addition, non-linuron preconditioned BPS material and a home-prepared BPS material never exposed to pesticides (denominated OF/O) functioned as controls. The three materials were regularly dosed with chlorpropham, chlorotoluron or pesticide-free water for up to 17 months and monitored for the mineralization of the respective pesticide, while the organisms/gene functions involved in degradation were identified by DNA-SIP and cultivation dependent enrichment. The results revealed a positive effect of linuron preconditioning for mineralization of chlorpropham and chlorotoluron. However, the observed effects were explained by an already existing ability to degrade these compounds by a subset of linuron degraders rather than by genetic exchange-mediated adaptation. This was confirmed by the delayed mineralization activity for both compounds in the OF/O material and the occurrence of the same degraders in all materials. The DNA-SIP analyses further identified previously unknown degraders for all tested compounds and suggested that the substrate range of the linuron hydrolase LibA includes chlorpropham. In conclusion, this thesis expands the existing knowledge regarding in situ pesticide biodegradation in both soil and BPS environments, particularly with regard to linuron, chlorpropham and chlorotoluron degradation. For all studied compounds, previously unknown degraders were identified by using the cultivation-independent DNA-SIP approach, while demonstrating the inherent biases associated with classical enrichment methodologies. Finally, this dissertation contributed to expanding our knowledge regarding the bacterial adaptation to pesticides and the role of genetic memory therein. This information is important for a better understanding of the environmental fate of pesticides and the underlying mechanisms of pesticide biodegradation in soil and dedicated bioremediation systems such as BPS." "Nothing in modern biology makes sense except in the light of ecology and biodiversity conservation" "David Costantini" "Bridging economy and ecology in European heathlands" "H. Diemont, Gerrit De Blust, W. Heijman, H. Siepel, N. Webb" "GPS-tracking and colony observations reveal variation in offshore habitat use and foraging ecology of breeding Sandwich Terns" "Ruben Fijn, Job de Jong, Wouter Courtens, Hilbran Verstraete, Eric Stienen, Martin Poot" "Breeding success of seabirds critically depends on their foraging success offshore.However, studies combining atsea tracking and visual provisioning observations are scarce, especially for smaller species of seabirds. This study is the first in which breeding Sandwich Terns were tracked with GPS-loggers to collect detailed data on foraging habitat use in four breeding seasons. Themaximumhomerange of individual Sandwich Terns comprised approximately 1900 km2 and the average foraging range was 27 km. Trip durations were on average 135 min with average trip lengths of 67 km. Actual foraging behaviour comprised 35% of the time budget of a foraging trip. Substantial year-to-year variation was found in habitat use and trip variables, yet with the exception of 2012, home range size remained similar between years. Food availability, chick age and environmental conditions are proposed as the main driving factors between inter- and intra-annual variations in trip variables. Our multi-method approach also provided geo-referenced information on prey presence and we conclude that future combining of colony observations and GPS-loggers deployments can potentially provide a near complete insight into the feeding ecology of breeding Sandwich Terns, including the behaviour of birds at sea." "Validation of the modified Bosniak classification system to risk stratify pediatric cystic renal masses : an international, multi-site study from the pediatric urologic oncology working group of the societies for pediatric urology" "Leslie Peard, Patricio Gargollo, Campbell Grant, Andrew Strine, Manon De Loof, Céline Sinatti, Anne-Françoise Spinoit, Nicholas G. Cost, Alexandra Rehfuss, Seth A. Alpert, Will Cranford, Adam J. Dugan, Amanda F. Saltzman" "How landscape ecology can promote the development of sustainable landscapes in Europe: the role of the European Association for Landscape Ecology (IALE-Europe) in the twenty-first century" "Marc Antrop, Jesper Brandt, Isabel Loupa-Ramos, Emilio Padoa-Schioppa, Jonathan Porter, Veerle Van Eetvelde, Teresa Pinto-Correia" "Studio or/on Stage? From Ecology of Learning to Learning Ecology" "Helena Gutmane, Jan Schreurs" "This paper is drawn from two creative interventions into the traditionally linear profile of professional education: an initiative of a multidisciplinary team of practitioners in planning, architecture, landscape architecture, transport engineers and academics Create RIGA! and the strategic spatial planning studio in the University of Leuven. The first, which is a number of innovative workshops undertaken in 2011–2012 in Riga, Latvia, introduce an integrated three-dimensional format of continuing professional education, amalgamating lifelong learning, urban action and implementation-aimed outcome. The other – a planning studio (fall semester of 2012) as a part of post-graduate programs in the University of Leuven, Belgium - creatively transforms academic educational process, approaching it by game based learning. Both cases - the program of continuous professional education and the academic course for master students - demonstrate how hybrid forms of professional education, having creativity at the bottom, can serve as open source and co-creation platform for urban landscape." "Foraging ecology of green turtles (Chelonia mydas) in Peru : relationships with ontogeny and environmental variability" "Javier Quiñones, Evelyn Paredes Coral, Jeffrey A. Seminoff" "Feeding strategies in sea turtles are among the most important aspects of their life history, influencing demographic parameters such as growth, age-at-maturity, and reproductive migrations. However, studying sea turtle diet is often challenging and knowledge about foraging ecology is lacking for most populations worldwide. We studied green turtles (Chelonia mydas) at two disparate sites in Peru: La Aguada (similar to 14 degrees S), an area with upwelling conditions, and Virrila Estuary (similar to 5 degrees S) with year-round warm conditions. We conducted (1) in-water capture to assess population size structure and (2) esophageal lavages to recover diet components from turtles at both sites. Diet composition and feeding strategy were evaluated using several analytical approaches, and environmental influence on diet was assessed in relation to the Peruvian Oscillation Index. Our results indicate substantially different life stages and diets at the two study sites. Green turtles at La Aguada were mostly juveniles consuming animal matter, whereas turtles at Virrila Estuary were mainly sub-adults with a diet dominated by vegetal matter. Our results suggest a life-history-based habitat use model for green turtles in the southeastern Pacific Ocean. We propose that juvenile green turtles initially recruit to more southern neritic habitats of Peru, feed on high-caloric animal matter, then as individuals grow, they transition northwards to feed on lower-caloric, but abundant, vegetal matter. Our data provide a framework for ontogenic-based developmental migrations by green turtles in this portion of the southeastern Pacific Ocean, helping policymakers on the need to implement management strategies."