We examined changes in rangeland health in the semi-arid woodlands of eastern Australia at fixed sites between 1989 and 1999. Over the 11-year period there were significant declines in the quality of the vegetation, and changes in plant species were driven largely by seasonality, and to a lesser extent, amount of rainfall. Three indices of rangelands health (composition, function and stability)...

Application of existing and novel management techniques can alter traditional livestock grazing patterns and significantly improve the sustainability of arid rangelands. Livestock often congregate and heavily graze riparian areas and other sensitive rangeland, while abundant forage remains in other areas. Increasing the uniformity of grazing can help protect fisheries, wildlife habitat, and oth...

Some endemic shrubs in arid and semiarid ecosystems are in danger of extinction, and yet they can play useful roles in maintaining or restoring these ecosystems, thus practical efforts are needed to conserve them. The shrubs Amygdalus pedunculata Pall., Amygdalus mongolica (Maxim.) Ricker and Ammopiptanthus mongolicus (Maxim. ex Kom.) Cheng f. are endemic species in arid and semiarid regions of...

Microbial communities in soils may change in accordance with distance, season, climate, soil texture and other environmental parameters. Microbial diversity patterns have been extensively surveyed in temperate regions, but few such studies attempted to address them with respect to spatial and temporal scales and their correlations to environmental factors, especially in arid ecosystems. In orde...

Coccidioidomycosis is caused by a dimorphic fungus species endemic to the arid and semi-arid regions of the Americas. The species have a terranean habitat producing a primary pulmonary infection by inhalation of arthroconidia. We describe a case of extrapulmonary coccidioidomycosis presenting with extensive lymphadenopathy, splenomegaly, and florid cutaneous lesions. This case is intended to he...

The most important impacts of climate change relate to temperature and precipitation. Precipitation is particularly important, because changes in precipitation patterns may lead to floods or droughts in different areas. Also, precipitation is a major factor in agriculture and in recent years interest has increased in learning about precipitation variability for periods of months to annual and s...

Lichen Endocarpon pusillum is a highly desiccation-tolerant and dominant species in biological soil crusts in arid and semi-arid regions. We report the draft genome sequence of a lichen-forming fungus, E. pusillum strain KoLRILF000583. The draft genome assembly has a size of 37,173,200 bp with a GC content of 49.71%, consisting of 40 scaffolds.

Semi-arid ecosystems play a key role in global agricultural production, seasonal carbon cycle dynamics, and longer-run climate change. Because semi-arid landscapes are heterogeneous and often sparsely vegetated, repeated and large-scale ecosystem assessments of these regions have to date been impossible. Here, we assess the potential of high-spatial resolution visible band imagery for semi-arid...