Alleviation of thermal limitations on Pc growth rates increased the predicted Pc risk in an 470 000 km2 area for the high emissions scenario with a projected mean increase of 0.08. For the low emissions scenario, Pc risks increase over a 390 000 km2 area for the low emissions scenario, with an average 0.05 increase in the Pc risk. Overall, the total area where Pc risks exceed 0.5 declines to approximately 164 000 km2 or 13% of the study region for the B1 scenario. The decline in spatial extent under a high emissions scenario is actually slightly less pronounced, with the predicted Pc range being 170 000 km2 or 13.7% of the region. This occurs even though the area where there is sufficient water for high spring Pc activity declines more for the high emissions scenario than for a low emissions scenario. The results reflect the importance of a trade off between increased winter survival range and decreased spring water availability. At the scale of the Bay Area, future climate projections contain considerable uncertainty associated with climatic down scaling. Broadly, however, the B1 scenario represents a case with warmer spring temperatures but without considerable reduction in rainfall,while the A2 scenario represents a situation with reduced rainfall and warmer temperatures. As shown in Fig. 3, cut flower transport bucket the effects are quite striking: an increase in temperature without a large decrease in rainfall results in an increase in the area that is vulnerable to Pc by approximately 20% .
Conversely, a decline in rainfall and increase in temperature result in a large decline in Pc risk, to approximately 3800 km2 , about half of its contemporary range.The modeling study indicated four different controls on modeled Pc range, which interacted to generate complex spatial patterns of Pc response to projected climatic changes. The first control was the proportion of soil organic carbon, which provided a static template of areas in which Pc would not establish. The second control was winter temperatures which impede pathogen over-winter survival. The range over which the pathogen survived winter expanded sequentially from contemporary conditions to the B1 and then A2 climate scenarios. The third and fourth controls on pathogen range lay in spring temperature and rainfall which together controlled spring Pc activity. The implications of drier climatic conditions in the study area varied depending on the absolute local Pc risk in a given area. Thus, little change in Pc risk was predicted in wet regions such as the northern coast, where drier spring conditions under B1 and A2 climate futures were still wet enough to support Pc activity. In the driest limits of the current Pc range, contemporary rainfall was too limited to support Pc activity, and further drying of the climate under B1 and A2 scenarios did not alter the pathogen risk. In mesic regions, progressively dry springs reduced overall Pc risk under the B1 scenario, relative to contemporary conditions.
Despite further reductions in rainfall under the A2 scenario, however, only minor further decreases in Pc spring risk were predicted compared to the B1 scenario. This we attribute to increasing spring temperatures enhancing the rate of Pc expansion during spring, which increased disease risk over part of the model range. The spatial locations where warmer spring temperatures under the B1 and A2 scenarios caused increases in Pc risk were spatially separated from the locations where decreases in rainfall reduced Pc risk, so the overall pattern of Pc risk during spring under contemporary, B1 and A2 scenarios differs: the B1 case primarily reflects reductions in the contemporary area of high risk, while the A2 scenario continues this reduction but also leads to expanded regions of moderate Pc risk in the north-eastern part of the study region. The interactions of these controls lead to a decrease in Pc range under both B1 and A2 scenarios compared to contemporary conditions, but, surprisingly, less of a reduction in total Pc range under the more extreme warming scenario. The modeling study ignored several factors that impact dynamic Pc risk – that is, the risk of Pc developing in uninfected areas. It has not considered pathways of introduction of Pc into natural communities. Proximity to roads, streams, soil disturbance, innoculum sources, and high vehicle or pedestrian traffic are highly likely to impact these risks. Similarly, the diversity of Californian vegetation and its variable sensitivity to Pc has not been considered: higher resolution studies considering differentials of vegetation susceptibility could provide a far more nuanced picture of the spatial extent of Pc, and could, for instance, eliminate areas of risk in primarily urbanized environments in the San Francisco Bay Area.
However, in the absence of improved data regarding host–pathogen interactions for dominant vegetation types in the area, there is limited basis on which to make such a high-resolution suite of assumptions about vegetation susceptibility. Despite this missing information, the damped sensitivity of Pc range relative to changes in assumed host resistance across the region in conjunction with field observations confirming that a wide range of regional species are susceptible to Pc, suggests that the overall conclusions of the modeling study regarding climate sensitivity should be robust. Finally, we have assumed that the local environmental conditions experienced by Pc are determined solely by climate, which is not true in the irrigated agricultural areas in California’s Central and Imperial Valleys. In these regions, irrigation regimes that are sufficiently frequent to sustain high water potentials in the root zone would alleviate the environmental water stress, as indicated by the observation of Pc occurrence within the Imperial Valley. If water stress is alleviated in these regions, temperatures are warm enough in both winter and spring to support high levels of Pc activity. Thus, irrigated agricultural land should be considered at risk of Pc infestation under both present and future scenarios. Overall, the modeling analysis suggests that Pc has a much larger potential range in the US southwest than could be inferred purely from current observations of the locations of infected sites. At present, despite the high awareness of Phytophthora ramorum and sudden oak death in the US southwest, there is limited public awareness, policy or scientific attention given to Pc . Sources of Pc are known to exist in agricultural and nursery settings in California , and appear to be the source of Pc infection in native ecosystems in several cases . However, no current phytosanitation certification programs, protocols for reducing soil movement from infected to clean sites, or recognized successful spot treatment approaches to minimizing Pc spread are in place in California . While the number of native species in California that are susceptible to Pc remains unclear, estimates in comparably biodiverse southwestern Australia suggest that over 3000 of the 5700 indigenous plant species are susceptible . Pc has already demonstrated its potential to reshape plant communities and entire ecologies . In the absence of detailed information about host susceptibility in California, the large ranges that appear to be supported by contemporary climates in conjunction with the severe effects of Pc in comparable ecosystems point to a critical need to improve risk assessment, procona flower transport containers phytosanitation and awareness of Pc disease. Despite its relatively simple ecology, Pc nonetheless displays non-monotonic responses to climatic warming at regional and local scales, with spatially distinct regions having opposite trends in Pc risk. Although the modeling framework presented accounts for many different aspects of climate, other changes including carbon fertilization due to enhanced atmospheric [CO2], changing land use and ecological thresholds have been neglected, and linking disease risk models to ecosystem outcomes remains challenging. For example, in Western Australia a 40 year drying trend has reduced Pc activity, but with the effect of replacing Pc induced mortality with drought stress stress . Considering that Pc mortality is linked to periods of drought stress that follow wet periods in which Pc causes root damage , limitation of Pc range due to drying, while beneficial for limiting expansion of the pathogen, may come at the expense of increased mortality for infected ecosystems.
The idea that one should be eating healthy to stay healthy is not a debate. Numerous studies show how particular foods individualistically effect human health, but none thus far, to our knowledge, have investigated about the combined impact of a specific diet on the human body as a whole. It is critical for us to understand which kinds of things we should eat and the ways in which their collective consumption will impact our bodies. According to Dr. Tomas J. Carlson, a distinguished pediatrician and ethnobotany researcher, choosing foods from every color in the rainbow is the key to good health. Each fruit and vegetable gets its natural color from the chemical composition of the exclusive phytonutrient in it. Interestingly, the presence of one molecule in one fruit/ vegetable does not necessarily reflect the same color in another type of fresh produce. For instance, although the rich red color in most red fruits and vegetables is naturally derived from the phytonutrient lycopene, most berries such as strawberries and raspberries do not contain lycopene. Instead, they contain brightly colored chemicals called anthocyanins, which are made in plants during ripening season through the joining of a molecule of a sugar with a molecule of their colorless “anthocyanidin” precursors. Anthocyanins are also found in raspberries, which are high in dietary fiber and vitamin C and have a low glycemic index because they contain 6% fiber and only 4% sugar per total weight. Higher quantities of fiber in the fruit, when consumed, helps lower the levels of low-density lipoprotein or the ‘unhealthy’ cholesterol to enhance the functionality of our heart and potentially induce weight loss. The exact pigment that anthocyanins reflect is partly dependent on the variance in acidity or alkalinity in different plants. Because of the relatively high pH of the tissues in blueberry plants, these chemicals turn blue in color during the ripening process of the fruit. Recent research in the Journal of Nutrition suggests that the abundant antioxidant properties in wild blueberries contributes to the reduction in the development of such disorders as Alzheimer’s Dementia and cognitive loss. A type of antioxidants selectively found in yellow and orange colored foods are called cryptoxanthins. In a study conducted by Bovier et al., it is shown that the combination of the beta form of these carotenoids with other sources of nutrients such as lutein and zeaxanthin in carrots, oranges, and corn leads to improved visual processing speed with regular consumption in young healthy subjects.10, 18While green produce mainly derives its pigmentation from chlorophyll, its white counterparts get their natural color from anthoxanthins, favonoid pigments that exhibit antioxidant properties. Among green fruits and vegetables, broccoli stands apart as the most nutritious because of the special combination in which its 3 glucosinolate phytonutrients are found. This “dynamic trio” makes what are called Isothiocyanates , the detox-regulating molecules in broccoli that enhance vitamin A in the form of beta-carotene. Many recent studies claim that the antioxidants in ITCs not only regulate metabolism and cholesterol levels when consumed but also act as cancer chemopreventive phytochemicals. Fruits that are on the same level as broccoli with regards to health in the white-produce family are bananas. Japanese Scientists reveal that the high amounts of vitamin B6, manganese, potassium and fiber in the ripened versions of these fruits can help prevent high blood pressure, protect against atherosclerosis, and improve immunity levels in regular eaters. Despite an enormous amount of scientific knowledge and evidence for the overall beneficial effect of a single fruit/vegetable and/or phytonutrient at a time on human health, no study so far, to our knowledge, has been able to conclusively link the validity of these claims to the whole human body. This offers the opportunity for one to test the combined impact of eating a colorful diet on humans through a systematic study. The purpose of our investigation is to apply a more holistic approach to the study of how the human body is effected as a result of a diet that is composed of all the colors of the rainbow. In other words, in addition to exploring the individual food stuf’s role in improving health, we want to analyze the outcome of the regular incorporation of a whole pack of colorful foods into one’s meals.