Browse
Submit Data
Databases
API
Help

Dataset Information

0 Views

0 Connections

0 Citations

0 Reanalyses

0 Downloads

Omics score: 0

The temporal evolution of income polarization in Canada's largest CMAs.

ABSTRACT: Income polarization is a pressing issue which is increasingly discussed by academics and policymakers. The present research examines income polarization in Canada's eight largest Census Metropolitan Areas (CMAs) using data at the census-tract (CT) level between 1971 and 2016. Generally, there are significant decreasing trends in the middle-income population with simultaneously increasing trends in low-income groups. The high-income groups have been relatively stable with fewer significant increasing population trends. Using conventional mapping and cartograms, patterns of the spatial evolution of income inequality are illustrated. Every CMA examined contains an increasing trend of spatial fragmentation at the patch level within each CMA's landscape mosaic. The results of a spatial autocorrelation analysis at the sub-patch, CT level, exhibit significant spatial clustering of high-income CTs as one process that dominates the increasingly fragmented landscape mosaic.

SUBMITTER: Ilic L

PROVIDER: S-EPMC8186789 | biostudies-literature | 2021

REPOSITORIES: biostudies-literature

ACCESS DATA

Json Xml

Publications

The temporal evolution of income polarization in Canada's largest CMAs.

Ilic Lazar L Sawada M M

PloS one 20210608 6

Income polarization is a pressing issue which is increasingly discussed by academics and policymakers. The present research examines income polarization in Canada's eight largest Census Metropolitan Areas (CMAs) using data at the census-tract (CT) level between 1971 and 2016. Generally, there are significant decreasing trends in the middle-income population with simultaneously increasing trends in low-income groups. The high-income groups have been relatively stable with fewer significant increa ...[more]

PMID: 34101744

Similar Datasets

Modelling the impacts of climate change on riverine thermal regimes in western Canada's largest Pacific watershed.

Project description:Quantification of climate change impacts on the thermal regimes of rivers in British Columbia (BC) is crucial given their importance to aquatic ecosystems. Using the Air2Stream model, we investigate the impact of both air temperature and streamflow changes on river water temperatures from 1950 to 2015 across BC's 234,000 km2 Fraser River Basin (FRB). Model results show the FRB's summer water temperatures rose by nearly 1.0 °C during 1950-2015 with 0.47 °C spread across 17 river sites. For most of these sites, such increases in average summer water temperature have doubled the number of days exceeding 20 °C, the water temperature that, if exceeded, potentially increases the physiological stress of salmon during migration. Furthermore, river sites, especially those in the upper and middle FRB, show significant associations between Pacific Ocean teleconnections and regional water temperatures. A multivariate linear regression analysis reveals that air temperature primarily controls simulated water temperatures in the FRB by capturing ~80% of its explained variance with secondary impacts through river discharge. Given such increases in river water temperature, salmon returning to spawn in the Fraser River and its tributaries are facing continued and increasing physical challenges now and potentially into the future.

| S-EPMC6684650 | biostudies-literature

Evolution of the Largest Mammalian Genome.

Project description:The genome of the red vizcacha rat (Rodentia, Octodontidae, Tympanoctomys barrerae) is the largest of all mammals, and about double the size of their close relative, the mountain vizcacha rat Octomys mimax, even though the lineages that gave rise to these species diverged from each other only about 5 Ma. The mechanism for this rapid genome expansion is controversial, and hypothesized to be a consequence of whole genome duplication or accumulation of repetitive elements. To test these alternative but nonexclusive hypotheses, we gathered and evaluated evidence from whole transcriptome and whole genome sequences of T. barrerae and O. mimax. We recovered support for genome expansion due to accumulation of a diverse assemblage of repetitive elements, which represent about one half and one fifth of the genomes of T. barrerae and O. mimax, respectively, but we found no strong signal of whole genome duplication. In both species, repetitive sequences were rare in transcribed regions as compared with the rest of the genome, and mostly had no close match to annotated repetitive sequences from other rodents. These findings raise new questions about the genomic dynamics of these repetitive elements, their connection to widespread chromosomal fissions that occurred in the T. barrerae ancestor, and their fitness effects-including during the evolution of hypersaline dietary tolerance in T. barrerae.

| S-EPMC5569995 | biostudies-literature

Evolution of Canada's Boreal Forest Spatial Patterns as Seen from Space.

Project description:Understanding the development of landscape patterns over broad spatial and temporal scales is a major contribution to ecological sciences and is a critical area of research for forested land management. Boreal forests represent an excellent case study for such research because these forests have undergone significant changes over recent decades. We analyzed the temporal trends of four widely-used landscape pattern indices for boreal forests of Canada: forest cover, largest forest patch index, forest edge density, and core (interior) forest cover. The indices were computed over landscape extents ranging from 5,000 ha (n = 18,185) to 50,000 ha (n = 1,662) and across nine major ecozones of Canada. We used 26 years of Landsat satellite imagery to derive annualized trends of the landscape pattern indices. The largest declines in forest cover, largest forest patch index, and core forest cover were observed in the Boreal Shield, Boreal Plain, and Boreal Cordillera ecozones. Forest edge density increased at all landscape extents for all ecozones. Rapidly changing landscapes, defined as the 90th percentile of forest cover change, were among the most forested initially and were characterized by four times greater decrease in largest forest patch index, three times greater increase in forest edge density, and four times greater decrease in core forest cover compared with all 50,000 ha landscapes. Moreover, approximately 18% of all 50,000 ha landscapes did not change due to a lack of disturbance. The pattern database results provide important context for forest management agencies committed to implementing ecosystem-based management strategies.

| S-EPMC4934904 | biostudies-literature

An updated look at petroleum well leaks, ineffective policies and the social cost of methane in Canada's largest oil-producing province.

Project description:Temporarily plugged or "suspended" wells pose environmental and economic risks due to the large volume of methane gas leaked. In the Canadian Province of Alberta, which, by far, has the largest number of petroleum wells in Canada, there are no regulations stipulating the maximum length of time a well can be left suspended. In recent years, an increasing number of wells have been put into the suspended state by owners. We show using a large data set obtained from the Alberta Energy Regulator that leak spells have increased between 1971 and 2019. For the same time period, the probability of an unresolved leak has also increased, and the amount of methane emitted per leak has substantially gone up. Lastly, we provide simple social-cost-of methane computations indicating that responsible policies can incentivize well owners towards remediation and reclamation and support efforts to fight climate change and improve upon economic expedience.Supplementary informationThe online version contains supplementary material available at 10.1007/s10584-021-03044-w.

| S-EPMC7908523 | biostudies-literature

Qualitative Examination of Shared Decision-Making in Canada's Largest Health System: More Work to be Done : Shared Decision-Making-More Work to be Done.

Project description:Background: Shared Decision-Making (SDM) is an inclusive approach where patients and providers work in partnership to make health care decisions that are grounded in clinical best practice and align with patient preferences and values. Despite a growing recognition that SDM can lead to improved outcomes and reductions in unnecessary health investigations, tensions exist between patient agency and a historically paternalistic model of health care. As an evolving ideology, the Research Team sought to better understand the current state, challenges, and implementation opportunities of SDM practices across the health system. Methods: This study used a cross-sectional quality improvement design utilizing semistructured interviews to gather information from focus group participants. Five open-ended, qualitative questions were used to generate discussion on the perceptions of SDM and its role in clinical appropriateness in a variety of clinical contexts in our health system. A total of 12 focus groups (n = 95 participants) representative of patients and families, leaders, physicians, and frontline clinicians were engaged in the study. Results: Through a consensus-based approach, study results identified 4 recommendations based on 4 themes: Time, Communication, System Design, and Clinical Appropriateness. Conclusion: There are no easy solutions to the challenges of enabling SDM; however, success will be dependent upon recognizing the importance of patient agency, while maintaining an inclusive and continuous stakeholder engagement with both patients and providers. Implementation of the 4 recommendations at the organizational level highlighted in this study can serve as a road map for other health care institutions and will require a gradual approach to transform the general principles of SDM into tangible solutions to meet the emerging needs at both the local and system level.

| S-EPMC8652304 | biostudies-literature

Evolution of ultraviolet vision in the largest avian radiation - the passerines.

Project description:BACKGROUND: Interspecific variation in avian colour vision falls into two discrete classes: violet sensitive (VS) and ultraviolet sensitive (UVS). They are characterised by the spectral sensitivity of the most shortwave sensitive of the four single cones, the SWS1, which is seemingly under direct control of as little as one amino acid substitution in the cone opsin protein. Changes in spectral sensitivity of the SWS1 are ecologically important, as they affect the abilities of birds to accurately assess potential mates, find food and minimise visibility of social signals to predators. Still, available data have indicated that shifts between classes are rare, with only four to five independent acquisitions of UV sensitivity in avian evolution. RESULTS: We have classified a large sample of passeriform species as VS or UVS from genomic DNA and mapped the evolution of this character on a passerine phylogeny inferred from published molecular sequence data. Sequencing a small gene fragment has allowed us to trace the trait changing from one stable state to another through the radiation of the passeriform birds. Their ancestor is hypothesised to be UVS. In the subsequent radiation, colour vision changed between UVS and VS at least eight times. CONCLUSIONS: The phylogenetic distribution of SWS1 cone opsin types in Passeriformes reveals a much higher degree of complexity in avian colour vision evolution than what was previously indicated from the limited data available. Clades with variation in the colour vision system are nested among clades with a seemingly stable VS or UVS state, providing a rare opportunity to understand how an ecologically important trait under simple genetic control may co-evolve with, and be stabilised by, associated traits in a character complex.

| S-EPMC3225180 | biostudies-literature

The largest hoplophonine and a complex new hypothesis of nimravid evolution.

Project description:Nimravids were the first carnivorans to evolve saberteeth, but previously portrayed as having a narrow evolutionary trajectory of increasing degrees of sabertooth specialization. Here I present a novel hypothesis about the evolution of this group, including a description of Eusmilus adelos, the largest known hoplophonine, which forces a re-evaluation of not only their relationships, but perceived paleoecology. Using a tip-dated Bayesian analysis with sophisticated evolutionary models, nimravids can now be viewed as following two paths of evolution: one led to numerous early dirk-tooth forms, including E. adelos, while the other converged on living feline morphology, tens of millions of years before its appearance in felids.

| S-EPMC8548586 | biostudies-literature

Morphodynamic evolution following sediment release from the world's largest dam removal.

Project description:Sediment pulses can cause widespread, complex changes to rivers and coastal regions. Quantifying landscape response to sediment-supply changes is a long-standing problem in geomorphology, but the unanticipated nature of most sediment pulses rarely allows for detailed measurement of associated landscape processes and evolution. The intentional removal of two large dams on the Elwha River (Washington, USA) exposed ~30 Mt of impounded sediment to fluvial erosion, presenting a unique opportunity to quantify source-to-sink river and coastal responses to a massive sediment-source perturbation. Here we evaluate geomorphic evolution during and after the sediment pulse, presenting a 5-year sediment budget and morphodynamic analysis of the Elwha River and its delta. Approximately 65% of the sediment was eroded, of which only ~10% was deposited in the fluvial system. This restored fluvial supply of sand, gravel, and wood substantially changed the channel morphology. The remaining ~90% of the released sediment was transported to the coast, causing ~60 ha of delta growth. Although metrics of geomorphic change did not follow simple time-coherent paths, many signals peaked 1-2 years after the start of dam removal, indicating combined impulse and step-change disturbance responses.

| S-EPMC6125403 | biostudies-literature

The largest known cowrie and the iterative evolution of giant cypraeid gastropods.

Project description:Based on the fossil record, we explore the macroevolutionary relationship between species richness and gigantism in cowries (Cypraeidae), the best-studied family of gastropods, with a global diversity distribution that parallels that of tropical corals, mangroves and seagrasses. We introduce Vicetia bizzottoi sp. nov. based on a Priabonian fossil found in northeastern Italy, the largest documented cowrie found so far and the youngest of a lineage of Eocene Gisortiinae species. The Gisortiinae stratigraphic record in western Europe indicates that species selection favoured large size and armouring of the shell. Palaeoecology and per-stage species richness suggest that gigantism occurred in peripheral habitats with respect to diversity hotspots, where smaller species were favoured. The Eocene-Oligocene boundary was marked by a turnover and the Chattian global warming favoured small-sized species of derived clades. Species selection leading to gigantism is further documented in Miocene lineages of Zoila and Umbilia, in the southern hemisphere, two extant genera distributed at the periphery of modern diversity hotspots, suggesting that the negative relationship between size and diversity is a recurring pattern in the evolutionary history of cowries. This palaeontological evidence is projected onto the existing hypotheses that explain analogous biogeographic patterns in various other taxa. Likewise, body size-species richness negative relationship was possibly driven in cowries by physiological, ecological and life history constraints.

| S-EPMC7736312 | biostudies-literature

Ending Canada's HIV trials.

Project description: Not available

| S-EPMC3273519 | biostudies-literature