Matching Items (5)
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- All Subjects: Institutional Analysis
- All Subjects: Chytridiomycosis
- Creators: Anderies, John M
- Creators: Abbott, Joshua K
Description
Epidemiological theory normally does not predict host extinction from infectious disease because of a host density threshold below which pathogens cannot persist. However, host extinction can occur when a biotic or abiotic pathogen reservoir allows for density-independent transmission. Amphibians are facing global population decline and extinction from the emerging infectious disease chytridiomycosis, caused by the fungus Batrachochytrium dentrobatidis (Bd). I use the model species Eleutherodactylus coqui to assess the impact of Bd on terrestrial direct-developing frog species, a common life history in the tropics. I tested the importance of two key factors that might influence this impact and then used laboratory experiments and published field data to model population-level impacts of Bd on E. coqui. First, I assessed the ontogenetic susceptibility of E. coqui by exposing juvenile and adult frogs to the same pathogen strain and dose. Juveniles exposed to Bd had significantly lower survival rates compared with control juveniles, while adult frogs often cleared infection. Second, I conducted experiments to determine whether E. coqui can become infected with Bd indirectly from contact with zoospores shed onto vegetation by an infected frog and from direct exposure to an infected frog. Both types of transmission were observed, making this the first demonstration that amphibians can become infected indirectly in non-aquatic habitats. Third, I tested the hypothesis that artificially-maintained cultures of Bd attenuate in pathogenicity, an effect known for other fungal pathogens. Comparing two cultures of the same Bd strain with different passage histories revealed reduced zoospore production and disease-induced mortality rates for a susceptible frog species (Atelopus zeteki) but not for the less-susceptible E. coqui. Finally, I used a mathematical model to project the population-level impacts of chytridiomycosis on E. coqui. Model analysis showed that indirect transmission, combined with either a high rate of zoospore production or low rate of zoospore mortality, is required for Bd to drive E. coqui populations below an extinction threshold. High rates of transmission plus frequent re-infection could lead to poor recruitment of infected juveniles and population decline. My research adds further insight into how emerging infectious disease is contributing to the loss of amphibian biodiversity.
ContributorsLanghammer, Penny F. (Author) / Collins, James P. (Thesis advisor) / Brooks, Thomas M (Committee member) / Burrowes, Patricia A. (Committee member) / Anderies, John M (Committee member) / Escalante, Ananias A (Committee member) / Smith, Andrew T. (Committee member) / Arizona State University (Publisher)
Created2013
Description
Energy is a central concern of sustainability because how we produce and consume energy affects society, economy, and the environment. Sustainability scientists are interested in energy transitions away from fossil fuels because they are nonrenewable, increasingly expensive, have adverse health effects, and may be the main driver of climate change. They see an opportunity for developing countries to avoid the negative consequences fossil-fuel-based energy systems, and also to increase resilience, by leap-frogging-over the centralized energy grid systems that dominate the developed world. Energy transitions pose both challenges and opportunities. Obstacles to transitions include 1) an existing, centralized, complex energy-grid system, whose function is invisible to most users, 2) coordination and collective-action problems that are path dependent, and 3) difficulty in scaling up RE technologies. Because energy transitions rely on technological and social innovations, I am interested in how institutional factors can be leveraged to surmount these obstacles. The overarching question that underlies my research is: What constellation of institutional, biophysical, and social factors are essential for an energy transition? My objective is to derive a set of "design principles," that I term institutional drivers, for energy transitions analogous to Ostrom's institutional design principles. My dissertation research will analyze energy transitions using two approaches: applying the Institutional Analysis and Development Framework and a comparative case study analysis comprised of both primary and secondary sources. This dissertation includes: 1) an analysis of the world's energy portfolio; 2) a case study analysis of five countries; 3) a description of the institutional factors likely to promote a transition to renewable-energy use; and 4) an in-depth case study of Thailand's progress in replacing nonrenewable energy sources with renewable energy sources. My research will contribute to our understanding of how energy transitions at different scales can be accomplished in developing countries and what it takes for innovation to spread in a society.
ContributorsKoster, Auriane Magdalena (Author) / Anderies, John M (Thesis advisor) / Aggarwal, Rimjhim (Committee member) / Van Der Leeuw, Sander (Committee member) / Arizona State University (Publisher)
Created2013
Description
Sustainability depends in part on our capacity to resolve dilemmas of the commons in Coupled Infrastructure Systems (CIS). Thus, we need to know more about how to incentivize individuals to take collective action to manage shared resources. Moreover, given that we will experience new and more extreme weather events due to climate change, we need to learn how to increase the robustness of CIS to those shocks. This dissertation studies irrigation systems to contribute to the development of an empirically based theory of commons governance for robust systems. I first studied the eight institutional design principles (DPs) for long enduring systems of shared resources that the Nobel Prize winner Elinor Ostrom proposed in 1990. I performed a critical literature review of 64 studies that looked at the institutional configuration of CIS, and based on my findings I propose some modifications of their definitions and application in research and policy making. I then studied how the revisited design principles, when analyzed conjointly with biophysical and ethnographic characteristics of CISs, perform to avoid over-appropriation, poverty and critical conflicts among users of an irrigation system. After carrying out a meta-analysis of 28 cases around the world, I found that particular combinations of those variables related to population size, countries corruption, the condition of water storage, monitoring of users behavior, and involving users in the decision making process for the commons governance, were sufficient to obtain the desired outcomes. The two last studies were based on the Peruvian Piura Basin, a CIS that has been exposed to environmental shocks for decades. I used secondary and primary data to carry out a longitudinal study using as guidance the robustness framework, and different hypothesis from prominent collapse theories to draw potential explanations. I then developed a dynamic model that shows how at the current situation it is more effective to invest in rules enforcement than in the improvement of the physical infrastructure (e.g. reservoir). Finally, I explored different strategies to increase the robustness of the system, through enabling collective action in the Basin.
ContributorsRubinos, Cathy (Author) / Anderies, John M (Thesis advisor) / Abbott, Joshua K (Committee member) / Janssen, Marcus A (Committee member) / Arizona State University (Publisher)
Created2017
Description
Batrachochytrium dendrobatidis (Bd), the amphibian chytrid fungus causing chytridiomycosis, is the cause of massive amphibian die-offs. As with any host-pathogen relationship, it is paramount to understand the growth and reproduction of the pathogen that causes an infectious disease outbreak. The life-cycle of the pathogen, Bd, is strongly influenced by temperature; however, previous research has focused on Bd isolated from limited geographic ranges, and may not be representative of Bd on a global scale. My research examines the relationship between Bd and temperature on the global level to determine the actual thermal maximum of Bd. Six isolates of Bd, from three continents, were incubated at a temperature within the thermal range (21°C) and a temperature higher than the optimal thermal range (27°C). Temperature affected the growth and zoosporangium size of all six isolates of Bd. All six isolates had proliferative growth at 21°C, but at 27°C the amount and quality of growth varied per isolate. My results demonstrate that each Bd isolate has a different response to temperature, and the thermal maximum for growth varies with each isolate. Further understanding of the difference in isolate response to temperature can lead to a better understanding of Bd pathogen dynamics, as well as allow us the ability to identify susceptible hosts and environments before an outbreak.
ContributorsWoodland, Laura Elizabeth (Author) / Collins, James (Thesis director) / Davidson, Elizabeth (Committee member) / Roberson, Robert (Committee member) / School of Politics and Global Studies (Contributor) / School of Molecular Sciences (Contributor) / Barrett, The Honors College (Contributor)
Created2016-12
Description
Anderies (2015); Anderies et al. (2016), informed by Ostrom (2005), aim to employ robust
feedback control models of social-ecological systems (SESs), to inform policy and the
design of institutions guiding resilient resource use. Cote and Nightingale (2012) note that
the main assumptions of resilience research downplay culture and social power. Addressing
the epistemic gap between positivism and interpretation (Rosenberg 2016), this dissertation
argues that power and culture indeed are of primary interest in SES research.
Human use of symbols is seen as an evolved semiotic capacity. First, representation is
argued to arise as matter achieves semiotic closure (Pattee 1969; Rocha 2001) at the onset
of natural selection. Guided by models by Kauffman (1993), the evolution of a symbolic
code in genes is examined, and thereon the origin of representations other than genetic
in evolutionary transitions (Maynard Smith and Szathmáry 1995; Beach 2003). Human
symbolic interaction is proposed as one that can support its own evolutionary dynamics.
The model offered for wider dynamics in society are “flywheels,” mutually reinforcing
networks of relations. They arise as interactions in a domain of social activity intensify, e.g.
due to interplay of infrastructures, mediating built, social, and ecological affordances (An-
deries et al. 2016). Flywheels manifest as entities facilitated by the simplified interactions
(e.g. organizations) and as cycles maintaining the infrastructures (e.g. supply chains). They
manifest internal specialization as well as distributed intention, and so can favor certain
groups’ interests, and reinforce cultural blind spots to social exclusion (Mills 2007).
The perspective is applied to research of resilience in SESs, considering flywheels a
semiotic extension of feedback control. Closer attention to representations of potentially
excluded groups is justified on epistemic in addition to ethical grounds, as patterns in cul-
tural text and social relations reflect the functioning of wider social processes. Participatory
methods are suggested to aid in building capacity for institutional learning.
feedback control models of social-ecological systems (SESs), to inform policy and the
design of institutions guiding resilient resource use. Cote and Nightingale (2012) note that
the main assumptions of resilience research downplay culture and social power. Addressing
the epistemic gap between positivism and interpretation (Rosenberg 2016), this dissertation
argues that power and culture indeed are of primary interest in SES research.
Human use of symbols is seen as an evolved semiotic capacity. First, representation is
argued to arise as matter achieves semiotic closure (Pattee 1969; Rocha 2001) at the onset
of natural selection. Guided by models by Kauffman (1993), the evolution of a symbolic
code in genes is examined, and thereon the origin of representations other than genetic
in evolutionary transitions (Maynard Smith and Szathmáry 1995; Beach 2003). Human
symbolic interaction is proposed as one that can support its own evolutionary dynamics.
The model offered for wider dynamics in society are “flywheels,” mutually reinforcing
networks of relations. They arise as interactions in a domain of social activity intensify, e.g.
due to interplay of infrastructures, mediating built, social, and ecological affordances (An-
deries et al. 2016). Flywheels manifest as entities facilitated by the simplified interactions
(e.g. organizations) and as cycles maintaining the infrastructures (e.g. supply chains). They
manifest internal specialization as well as distributed intention, and so can favor certain
groups’ interests, and reinforce cultural blind spots to social exclusion (Mills 2007).
The perspective is applied to research of resilience in SESs, considering flywheels a
semiotic extension of feedback control. Closer attention to representations of potentially
excluded groups is justified on epistemic in addition to ethical grounds, as patterns in cul-
tural text and social relations reflect the functioning of wider social processes. Participatory
methods are suggested to aid in building capacity for institutional learning.
ContributorsBožičević, Miran (Author) / Anderies, John M (Thesis advisor) / Bolin, Robert (Committee member) / BurnSilver, Shauna (Committee member) / Arizona State University (Publisher)
Created2017