Analyzing the Impacts of Climate Change on Water Level Fluctuations of Tashk and Bakhtegan Lakes and Its Role in Environmental Sustainability

Climate changes are the main motivation for destruction of ecosystems;in fact the effects of these changes on biodiversity and ecosystems are considered as the most challenging cases in present century. Therefore, since the lakes are the most important services and functions of ecosystems, the effect of climate change on water level fluctuations of Tashk and Bakhtegan Lakes was analyzed as a natural ecosystem in this essay. For this purpose, the data related to six parameters of temperature, precipitation, evaporation, sunshine hours and snowy days were selected during 25-year statistical period (1985-2010), and Mann-Kendall test was used to determine the trend of changes in each time series. Inflow system of the lake, the volume of evaporation and area of water were simulated and fluctuation of lake was also assessed by using dynamic analysis method and to achieve to lake level and analysis of its fluctuations in period under study, the satellite images of Landsat 7 and ETM 5-1 were used in two high waters of April 1987 and April 2010. Results indicate that the lake level has been dropped 6 meters in 2010 compared to the similar period of 1986;in wet years that the rainfall is more than 618/5 mm, high water level is the lake conditions in all months of the year;unlike in most years when rainfall occurred under average of 365.4 mm, lake is faced with dry condition that is mainly due to the reduce of icemaker area, rainfall reduction, increase in evaporation and temperature. These conditions show the extent to which the lake is fragile and affected by climatic conditions that the most obvious evidence of it is decline of genetic storages such as Tashk and Bakhtegan lakes and subsequently instability of the region and reducing of services and ecosystems’ functions.

Relationship Between Land Use Changes and the Production of Dust Sources in Kermanshah Province,Iran

Recognizing land use changes(LUC)and evaluating their relationship with producing dust sources are considered effective to manage the environment.Taking Kermanshah Province,Iran as study area,dusty days from 2008 to 2015 were selected and dust sources were identified applying thermal-infrared dust index(TDI),hybrid single-particle lagrangian integrated trajectory(HYSPLIT),false color composite(FCC)and true color composite(TCC)of MODerate resolution Imaging Spectroradiometer(MODIS)images.Afterwards,the land use change map was produced using Landsat images in 2000 and 2015.Then,the distribution and frequency of the sources in each land-use change class and important dust production areas were specified.Eventually,two non-parametric tests including Chisquare and Kruskal-Wallis were applied to examine the relationship between LUC and dust sources.Results indicated that the distribution of dust sources was not identical in the study area,and the sources were mainly generated in the areas where land-use change had occurred.In fact,different classes of LUC have different contributions to dust production,and the highest contribution refers to the deflation in gentle slope areas and lowlands where the rangeland has been converted into agriculture land.The findings from this study are useful to manage and control dust in the identified sources.

Determinants of Adaptation to Climate Change:A Case Study of Rice Farmers in Western Province,Iran

The decisions made by agricultural households to adjust to climate change(CC)in Iran are not well known.This study is intended to investigate the influence of perceptions and socioeconomic,institutional features on farmers’adaptation decisions about CC,which constitute the hypothetical statements of the study.We undertook a survey of 200 farm householders from 31 villages of Ilam Province,situated in the western Iran,as randomly selected.The result discloses that the proposed discriminant model matches the dataset well,with a strong effect size of partial eta-squared(η^(2)=0.38).The analysis further signals that adapters are younger and more welleducated than non-adapters.Adapters are also knowledgeable about CC risks and institutional policy barriers.The adapters have subsidiary work,better access to credit,and have good contacts with expansion agents and specialists.The paper concludes that government authorities should provide farmers with the enriched capabilities and competencies enabling them to adapt to CC.

Investigating the Relationship between Responsibility-Taking and Identity Crisis among One-Child Students

The present study has investigated the relationship between responsibility-taking and identity crisis among one-child students. This research is a descriptive-correlational study and the target population comprised all one-child female students of Mashhad secondary schools in the academic year 2014-2015. In this study, multistage cluster sampling method was applied and finally, Region 4, 6 and 7 were randomly selected and 150 students were also randomly chosen according to Morgan table. The research data was collected through California Psychological Inventory (CPI) and Ahmadi identity crisis questionnaire. The obtained information was analyzed by Pearson correlation test and regression. The achieved results indicated that the relationship between responsibility-taking and identity crisis among students is statistically reverse and significant at the level of p < 0.01. In other words, with reducing the identity crisis in students, their responsibility-taking increases. As a result, the main research hypothesis indicating the relationship between responsibility-taking and identity crisis among one-child students of Mashhad secondary schools was confirmed.

Exercise preconditioning exhibits neuroprotective effects on hippocampal CA1 neuronal damage after cerebral ischemia

Recent evidence has suggested the neuroprotective effects of physical exercise on cerebral ischemic injury. However, the role of physical exercise in cerebral ischemia-induced hippocampal damage remains controversial. The aim of the present study was to evaluate the effects of pre-ischemia treadmill training on hippocampal CA1 neuronal damage after cerebral ischemia. Male adult rats were randomly divided into control, ischemia and exercise ＋ ischemia groups. In the exercise ＋ ischemia group, rats were subjected to running on a treadmill in a designated time schedule（5 days per week for 4 weeks）. Then rats underwent cerebral ischemia induction th rough occlusion of common carotids followed by reperfusion. At 4 days after cerebral ischemia, rat learning and memory abilities were evaluated using passive avoidance memory test and rat hippocampal neuronal damage was detected using Nissl and TUNEL staining. Pre-ischemic exercise significantly reduced the number of TUNEL-positive cells and necrotic cell death in the hippocampal CA1 region as compared to the ischemia group. Moreover, pre-ischemic exercise significantly prevented ischemia-induced memory dysfunction. Pre-ischemic exercise mighct prevent memory deficits after cerebral ischemia through rescuing hippocampal CA1 neurons from ischemia-induced degeneration.