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The European Red List is a review of the status of European species according to IUCN regional Red Listing guidelines. It identifies those species that are threatened with extinction at the regional level — in order that appropriate conservation action can be taken to improve their status. This publication is a summary of the conservation status of the European species of mosses, liverworts and hornworts, collectively known as bryophytes. It provides the first comprehensive, region-wide assessment of bryophytes and it identifies those species that are threatened with extinction at a European level, so that appropriate policy measures and conservation actions, based on the best available evidence, can be taken to improve their status. The geographical scope is continentwide, extending from Iceland in the west to the Urals in the east, and from Franz Josef Land in the north to the Canary Islands in the south. The Caucasus region is not included.

Five species of mosses (Bryophyta: Oncophorus demetrii, Oncophorus integerrimus, Oxyrrhynchium speciosum, Sphagnum divinum and Sphagnum medium) and one of liverworts (Marchantiophyta: Kurzia trichoclados) are presented as new for Finland. Seligeria calcarea and Seligeria pusilla, previously thought to be regionally extinct from Finland, are reported to being found again. New records in biogeographical provinces for 74 species of mosses and 36 species of liverworts are listed. Finally, 17 occurrences in provinces are removed due to misidentifications or missing specimens. nonPeerReviewed

Human-computer interaction (HCI) is an integral part of modern society. Since the number of technical devices around us is increasing, the way of interacting is changing as well. The systems of the future should be proactive, so that they can adapt and adjust to people’s movements and actions without requiring any conscious control. Visual information plays a vital role in this kind of implicit human-computer interaction due to its expressiveness. It is therefore obvious that cameras equipped with computing power and computer vision techniques provide an unobtrusive way of analyzing human intentions. Despite its many advantages, use of computer vision is not always straightforward. Typically, every application sets specific requirements for the methods that can be applied. Given these motivations, this thesis aims to develop new vision-based methods and systems that can be utilized in proactive applications. As a case study, the thesis covers two different proactive computer vision applications. Firstly, an automated system that takes care of both the selection and switching of the video source in a distance education situation is presented. The system is further extended with a pan-tilt-zoom camera system that is designed to track the teacher when s/he walks at the front of the classroom. The second proactive application is targeted at mobile devices. The system presented recognizes landscape scenes which can be utilized in automatic shooting mode selection. Distributed smart cameras have been an active area of research in recent years, and they play an important role in many applications. Most of the research has focused on either the computer vision algorithms or on a specific implementation. There has been less activity on building generic frameworks which allow different algorithms, sensors and distribution methods to be used. In this field, the thesis presents an open and expendable framework for development of distributed sensor networks with an emphasis on peer-to-peer networking. From the methodological point of view, the thesis makes its contribution to the field of multi-object tracking. The method presented utilizes soft assignment to associate the measurements to the objects tracked. In addition, the thesis also presents two different ways of extracting location measurements from images. As a result, the method proposed provides location and trajectories of multiple objects which can be utilized in proactive applications. Tiivistelmä Ihmisen ja eri laitteiden välisellä vuorovaikutuksella on keskeinen osa nyky-yhteiskunnassa. Teknisten laitteiden lisääntymisen myötä vuorovaikutustavat ovat myös muuttumassa. Tulevaisuuden järjestelmien tulisi olla proaktiivisia, jotta ne voisivat sopeutua ihmisten liikkeisiin ja toimintoihin ilman tietoista ohjausta. Ilmaisuvoimansa ansiosta visuaalisella tiedolla on keskeinen rooli tällaisessa epäsuorassa ihminen-tietokone -vuorovaikutuksessa. Tämän vuoksi on selvää, että kamerat yhdessä laskentaresurssien ja konenäkömenetelmien kanssa tarjoavat huomaamattoman tavan ihmisten toiminnan analysointiin. Lukuisista eduistaan huolimatta konenäön soveltaminen ei ole aina suoraviivaista. Yleensä jokainen sovellus asettaa erikoisvaatimuksia käytettäville menetelmille. Tästä syystä väitöskirjassa on päämääränä kehittää uusia kuvatietoon perustuvia menetelmiä ja järjestelmiä, joita voidaan hyödyntää proaktiivisissa sovelluksissa. Tässä väitöskirjassa esitellään kaksi proaktiivista sovellusta, jotka molemmat hyödyntävät tietokonenäköä. Ensimmäinen sovellus on etäopetusjärjestelmä, joka valitsee ja vaihtaa kuvalähteen automaattisesti. Järjestelmään esitellään myös ohjattavaan kameraan perustava laajennus, jonka avulla opettajaa voidaan seurata hänen liikkuessaan eri puolilla luokkahuonetta. Toinen proaktiivisen tekniikan sovellus on tarkoitettu mobiililaitteisiin. Kehitetty järjestelmä kykenee tunnistamaan maisemakuvat, jolloin kameran kuvaustila voidaan asettaa automaattisesti. Monissa sovelluksissa on tarpeen käyttää useampia kameroita. Tämän seurauksena eri puolille ympäristöä sijoitettavat älykkäät kamerat ovat olleet viime vuosina erityisen kiinnostuksen kohteena. Suurin osa kehityksestä on kuitenkin keskittynyt lähinnä eri konenäköalgoritmeihin tai yksittäisiin sovelluksiin. Sen sijaan panostukset yleisiin ja helposti laajennettaviin ratkaisuihin, jotka mahdollistavat erilaisten menetelmien, sensoreiden ja tiedonvälityskanavien käyttämisen, ovat olleet vähäisempiä. Tilanteen parantamiseksi väitöskirjassa esitellään hajautettujen sensoriverkkojen kehitykseen tarkoitettu avoin ja laajennettavissa oleva ohjelmistorunko. Menetelmien osalta tässä väitöskirjassa keskitytään useiden kohteiden seurantaan. Kehitetty seurantamenetelmä yhdistää saadut paikkamittaukset seurattaviin kohteisiin siten, että jokaiselle mittaukselle lasketaan todennäköisyys, jolla se kuuluu jokaiseen yksittäiseen seurattavaan kohteeseen. Seurantaongelman lisäksi työssä esitellään kaksi erilaista tapaa, joilla kohteiden paikka kuvassa voidaan määrittää. Esiteltyä kokonaisuutta voidaan hyödyntää proaktiivisissa sovelluksissa, jotka tarvitsevat usean kohteen paikkatiedon tai kohteiden kulkeman reitin.

Two holm oak (Quercus ilex L.) sites in Tuscany, Central Italy, were studied in July 2000. One of the sites (Cala Violina) was xeric with low ozone concentration (daily hourly mean for July–August 2000 13.3 nmol mol–1). The other site (Colognole) was mesic with a higher ozone concentration (daily hourly mean for July–August 2000 54.2 nmol mol–1). Leaf morphological characteristics (area, dry weight, specific dry weight, water content, epicuticular wax amount, stomatal density) and leaf fluorescence were measured. Ozone flux into the leaves was calculated on a stomatal conductance basis. Among the measured parameters, only stomatal density and wax amount significantly differed between the sites. Despite they are usually reported to increase with water stress, both were higher at the mesic and more polluted site than at the xeric one. This response might indicate an adaptation to air pollutants, of which ozone might be of the greatest importance – as also stressed by the higher ozone flux into the leaves at the mesic site – even if other not measured parameters, such as nitrogen deposition, may also have contributed to the result.

The increasing tropospheric ozone (O3) concentration constitutes a potential threat to nature. Plants are known to react to O3, but knowledge of the sensitivity and type of responses of different species and plant communities is widely lacking. This review focuses on the ecological effects of O3 on northern wild field layer plant species. Most of the 65 species examined thus far have proven to be quite tolerant of O3. Visible symptoms were observed in 54% of the 61 species studied, and growth reduction in 31% of the 55 species studied for growth. There were no signs to suggest that certain families or vegetation types are more sensitive or tolerant than others. There were, however, clear differences in sensitivity between the different species. It seems that forbs are usually more sensitive than grasses. It should be kept in mind, however, that we still lack knowledge on the responses of many common and abundant key species. The long-term effects are also far from clear. Hardly any field examinations have been carried out on the effects of O3 on plant communities.

The pattern and the genetic basis of variation in courtship song of D. virilis were studied using three different approaches: a candidate gene, a biometrical and a quantitative trait locus (QTL) method. Nucleotide variation in a candidate song gene, no-on-transientA, was analysed both within the species (D. virilis and D. littoralis) and between the species of the D. virilis group. Nucleotide variation showed no signs of selection and there was no association between the nucleotide or repeat length variation in nonA gene region and the song characters of the D. virilis group species. Molecular markers (microsatellites) were isolated for D. virilis and their cross-species amplification was tested in all members of the D. virilis group. Intraspecific variation in D. virilis was studied at the phenotypic level in male song characters and at the genetic level in microsatellites. Significant geographic variation was detected in both levels, grouping the strains according to the main continents of the species’ distribution range: America, Asia, Europe and Japan. The strains with most extreme song phenotypes were chosen for further analysis. The inheritance of two courtship song characters, the number of pulses in a pulse train (PN) and the length of a pulse train (PTL) was studied by analysing the means and variances of these characters between parental and reciprocal F₁, F₂ and backcross males. This biometrical analysis showed the genetic basis of these song characters to be polygenic with significant dominance, epistatic and Y-chromosomal effects on both characters. A subset of these data (F₂ generation males) were used to conduct a QTL study with the aid of a recombination linkage map constructed for the microsatellites. Composite interval mapping (CIM) revealed significant QTLs, which were shared in both characters. Altogether, significant QTLs, located on the X, 2nd, 3rd and 4th chromosome, were found to affect PN, whereas only QTLs on the 3rd chromsome was found to affect PTL. The effect of the same QTL on the 3rd chromosome on both characters accounted for 31.8% and 49.1% of the mean difference between the parental strains in PN and PTL, respectively. These results suggest the genetic basis for these song characters is caused mainly by autosomal QTLs with a relatively large effect.

The effectiveness of intrauterine insemination (IUI) combined with controlled ovarian hyperstimulation (COH) in the treatment of subfertility was investigated in the present study. For this purpose the prognostic factors associated with success of clomiphene citrate (CC)/human menopausal gonadotrophin (HMG)/IUI were identified in 811 treatment cycles. Furthermore, a long gonadotrophin-releasing hormone agonist (GnRHa)/HMG stimulation protocol was compared with a standard CC/HMG protocol. In addition, the usefulness of alternative insemination techniques including fallopian tube sperm perfusion (FSP) and intrafollicular insemination (IFI) was investigated. Finally, the obstetric and perinatal outcome of pregnancies after COH/IUI was examined and compared with those of matched spontaneous and in vitro fertilization(IVF) pregnancies. Female age, duration of infertility, aetiology of infertility, number of large preovulatory follicles and number of the treatment cycle were predictive as regards pregnancy after CC/HMG/IUI. The highest pregnancy rate (PR) was obtained in women of