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The article focuses on the development of a comprehensive space medical training facility, SMMAARTE, aimed at preparing astronauts for long-term space missions. Topics include the creation of innovative space medicine practices, the expansion of the Mars Medics Training Program, and the integration of novel technologies and protocols for space healthcare.

Not sliced or speared by machine but chunked like a lush cheddar, good-sized and saw-toothed as a grin, cool cukes carved by the widow's own hand, wielding her steely blade, [...]

Long ago, the word 'weed' crept into our vocabulary. It identified plants that grew where we didn't want them. Little did we realize, when we were young, that everything we [...]

An increasing threat to U.S. waterways is the establishment and spread of invasive and injurious fishes. A species may be designated by the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service (USFWS) as federally "injurious" under the Lacey Act (18 U.S.C. 42) either if that species causes harm (injury) without establishing and spreading (not invasive), or if that species causes harm after establishment and spread (invasive). Species designated as injurious are prohibited from being imported, which is a highly effective way of preventing invasions by nonnative species. We developed a decision-support, riskassessment system to aid USFWS's prioritization of species for injuriousness. Our system is based on USFWS's evaluation criteria of a species' potential injuriousness and consists of a semi-quantitative, rapid-assessment procedure called the Ecological Risk Screening Summary (ERSS) and a quantitative probability network model called the Freshwater Fish Injurious Species Risk Assessment Model (FISRAM). ERSS provides information on a species' history of invasiveness elsewhere in the world, and on its biology and ecology, potential or known effects of introduction, global and domestic distribution, and climate associations, and provides conclusions on potential risk of invasiveness. FISRAM calculates expected probability of injuriousness as a function of species potential establishment, spread, and harm, based on probable effects on native species and ecosystems, suitability of climate and habitat in introduced areas, ease of dispersal and transport, and harm to humans. FISRAM is used to assess risk probability when ERSS categorizes invasion risk as uncertain. We calibrated and updated the probability structure of FISRAM using a data set of 50 species with known invasiveness outcomes. We demonstrate the use of these two models for risk assessment and decision-support in identifying and documenting species for potential risk management actions, such as listing wildlife as injurious under the Lacey Act. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Grasslands Meeting Grasslands stretch from Canada to Mexico, and many of the species that inhabit them are declining. Instead of each country tackling each species individually for conservation actions, the [...]

The 30th anniversary of Earth Day was celebrated with great enthusiasm on the Mall in Washington, D.C. On April 22, several hundred thousand conservation-minded people joined Vice President Gore to [...]

After stabilizing species that are headed for extinction, the ultimate goal of the Endangered Species Act is to recover endangered and threatened plants and animals to a secure status. Once [...]

Long ago, the word 'weed' crept into our vocabulary. It identified plants that grew where we didn't want them. Little did we realize, when we were young, that everything we [...]

Earth Day 2000 The 30th anniversary of Earth Day was celebrated with great enthusiasm on the Mall in Washington, D.C. On April 22, several hundred thousand conservation-minded people joined Vice [...]

After stabilizing species that are headed for extinction, the ultimate goal of the Endangered Species Act is to recover endangered and threatened plants and animals to a secure status. Once [...]

Every spring, millions of birds wing their way from Mexico and the United States to settle on nests in the forests, plains, tundras, and coasts of Canada. Bats and butterflies [...]

Imagine being driven hundreds of miles from your home, a land of temperate climate with fertile hills and valleys and bountiful game, into a steamy, subtropical world of water, muck, [...]

Among the many challenges facing wildlife managers in North America is the fact that political and biogeographical boundaries rarely coincide. For example, the border separating the United States and Canada [...]

International Outreach The Canadian Wildlife Service and the FWS Endangered Species Program have completed a 28-page joint publication, 'Conserving Borderline Species--A Partnership Between the United States and Canada.' The booklet [...]

Flying, running, hopping, and swimming-back and forth daily or annually, they pay no heed to that imaginary line we know as the U.S.-Mexican border. That describes many species of birds, [...]

Biologists have learned that trying to save the planet species-by-species is not working. In too many cases, restoring habitat for one endangered species has encroached on the habitat of another. [...]

I read with interest "Walking Boston's Historic Freedom Trail" (October 2007), but the article mistakenly credited the poem "The Midnight Ride of Paul Revere" to William Wadsworth Longfellow. The true [...]

Reports on the U.S. Plant Conservation Alliance's celebration of its tenth anniversary in 2004. Support for native plant conservation across the U.S.; Operation of the alliance as a public-private partnership; Titles of journals published by the Alien Plant Working Group; Chicago Botanical Garden's hosting the Janet Meakin Poor Symposium to honor the anniversary.