Enactment of any environmental policy should be followed by an evaluation of its efficacy to ensure optimal utilization of limited resources, yet measuring the success of these policies can be a challenging task owing to a dearth of data and confounding factors. We examine the efficacy of ballast water policies enacted to prevent biological invasions in the Laurentian Great Lakes. We utilize fo...

The rapid growth of rural enterprises has transformed the Chinese countryside. Although rural industrialisation has resulted in increased financial well-being, it has also contributed to decreased environmental quality. While China has strong environmental protection laws, this paper will demonstrate that they are not being effectively implemented in a rural region in Zhejiang Province. This is...

The role of science in policy making, specifically in the management of complex sociotechnical systems, has been increasing in the past three decades. Particularly in the case of permit processes requiring environmental impact assessment for new projects, such as those covered under the 1969 National Environmental Protection Act (NEPA), science has been the main criteria for sound decision maki...

OBJECTIVE This article describes the personal experience and perspective of the authors, who had primary responsibility for drafting the initial health-based regulation limiting lead content of gasoline during the early 1970s while employed by the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA). DATA SOURCE Information used by the U.S. EPA in developing the initial health-based regulation limiting...

UCSF follows the University of California Policy on Reporting and Investigating Allegations of Suspected Improper Governmental Activities (Whistleblower Policy [3]) and the University of California Policy for Protection of Whistleblowers from Retaliation and Guidelines for Reviewing Retaliation Complaints (Whistleblower Protection Policy [4].) This policy supplements and provides local procedur...

Urban growth management in New South Wales (NSW) has had a patchy history. Deficiencies have existed at the State level for example, in the policies and mechanisms for the management of the impact of development on natural resource values and environmental quality. Included in this scenario are various market-based instruments, the utilisation of which have been part of the Australian policy an...

UCSF follows the University of California Policy on Reporting and Investigating Allegations of Suspected Improper Governmental Activities (Whistleblower Policy [3]) and the University of California Policy for Protection of Whistleblowers from Retaliation and Guidelines for Reviewing Retaliation Complaints (Whistleblower Protection Policy [4].) This policy supplements and provides local procedur...

BACKGROUND As sharing and secondary research use of biospecimens increases, IRBs and researchers face the challenge of protecting and respecting donors without comprehensive regulations addressing the human subject protection issues posed by biobanking. Variation in IRB biobanking policies about these issues has not been well documented. METHODS This paper reports on data from a survey of IRB...

This brief commentary will argue that whether hormesis is considered in regulatory risk assessment is a matter less of science than of science policy. I will first discuss the distinction between science and science policy and their roles in regulatory risk assessment. Then I will focus on factors that influence science policy, especially as it relates to the conduct of risk assessments to info...

Most governments have developed, or are developing, national biosafety frameworks to enable them to address known and potential risks associated with the introduction of GMOs into their territories, and these regulatory systems may have a great impact on biotechnology research – not only at the stage of environmental testing, but also during laboratory studies. These national systems are in tur...