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The National Ocean Biodiversity Strategy

President Biden has been clear that the ocean is central to life on Earth. As he has proclaimed, “the ocean powers millions of jobs; feeds and sustains us; and is a rejuvenating source of inspiration, exploration, and recreation.” The Biden-Harris Administration has worked hard to fulfill the President’s goal to protect and conserve at least 30% of U.S. waters by 2030. The ocean faces increased th
Authors
Gabrielle Canonico, J. Emmett Duffy, Masha Edmonson, Katie Fillingham, Abigail Benson, Kelsey Bisson, Amanda Demopoulos, Beth Hinchey, Katsumi Matsumoto, Chris Meyer, James Price, Elaine Shen, Woody Turner, Mike Weise, Andrea Vander Woude, Lauren Wenzel

Projected sea-level rise and high tide flooding at De Soto National Memorial, Florida

IntroductionNational parks and preserves in the South Atlantic-Gulf Region contain valuable coastal habitats such as tidal wetlands and mangrove forests, as well as irreplaceable historic buildings and archeological sites located in low-lying areas. These natural and cultural resources are vulnerable to accelerated sea-level rise and escalating high tide flooding events. Through a Natural Resource
Authors
Hana R. Thurman, Nicholas M. Enwright, Michael J. Osland, Davina L. Passeri, Richard H. Day, Bethanie M. Simons

Visualizing wading bird optimal foraging decisions with aggregation behaviors using individual-based modeling

Foragers on patchy landscapes must efficiently balance time between searching for and consuming resources to meet their daily energetic requirements. Spatial aggregation foraging behaviors may improve foraging efficiency by sharing information on locations of resource hotspots. Wading birds are an example of patch foragers that form colonial aggregations during the breeding season to obtain suffic
Authors
Simeon Yurek, Donald L. DeAngelis, Hyo Won Lee, Stephen Tennenbaum

National Aquatic Environmental DNA Strategy

Aquatic life is the engine of ecosystems and economies. In environments ranging from freshwater through marine, this biodiversity underpins the health, culture, opportunities, and economic wellbeing of the Nation -- from local communities to the entire country. The ability to evaluate the status, trends, and future projections of nature is key to maintaining national prosperity, and this requires
Authors
Kelly D Goodwin, Christina M. Aiello, Mike Weise, Masha Edmondson, Katie Fillingham, Dee Allen, Alicia Amerson, Meredith L. Barton, Abby Benson, Gabrielle Canonico, Zachary Gold, Jennifer Gumm, Margaret Hunter, Nina Joffe, Richard Lance, Alyse Larkin, Ricardo Letelier, Christine Lipsky, Dana McCoskey, Cheryl Morrison, Karen Clark, John A. Darling, Amelia-Juliette Demery, Meredith Everett, Colette Fletcher-Hoppe, Krista M. Nichols, Kim M. Parsons, James Price, Kimberly Puglise, Katie Scholl, Mike K Schwartz, Adam Sepulveda, Janet Shannon, Woody Turner, Timothy White

Temporal habitat use of mule deer in the Pueblo of Santa Ana, New Mexico

Mule deer (Odocoileus hemionus) are important economically, culturally, and recreationally to the Pueblo of Santa Ana in central New Mexico, USA. Studies of habitat selection improve our understanding of mule deer ecology in central New Mexico and provide the Tribe with valuable information for management of mule deer. We used global positioning system telemetry-collar data collected on mule deer
Authors
Daniel E. Bird, Laura D'Acunto, Daniel Ginter, Glenn Harper, Patrick A. Zollner

Systematic assessment of long-read RNA-seq methods for transcript identification and quantification

The Long-read RNA-Seq Genome Annotation Assessment Project Consortium was formed to evaluate the effectiveness of long-read approaches for transcriptome analysis. Using different protocols and sequencing platforms, the consortium generated over 427 million long-read sequences from complementary DNA and direct RNA datasets, encompassing human, mouse and manatee species. Developers utilized these da
Authors
Francisco J. Pardo-Palacios, Dingjie Wang, Fairlie Reese, Mark Diekhans, Sílvia Carbonell-Sala, Brian Williams, Jane E. Loveland, Maite De María, Matthew S. Adams, Gabriela Balderrama-Gutierrez, Amit K. Behera, Jose M. Gonzalez Martinez, Toby Hunt, Julien Lagarde, Cindy E. Liang, Haoran Li, Marcus Jerryd Meade, David A. Moraga Amador, Andrey D. Prjibelski, Inanc Birol, Hamed Bostan, Ashley M. Brooks, Muhammed Hasan Çelik, Ying Chen, Mei R.M. Du, Colette Felton, Jonathan Göke, Saber Hafezqorani, Ralf Herwig, Hideya Kawaji, Joseph Lee, Jian-Liang Li, Matthias Lienhard, Alla Mikheenko, Dennis Mulligan, Ka Ming Nip, Mihaela Pertea, Matthew E. Ritchie, Andre D. Sim, Alison D. Tang, Yuk Kei Wan, Changqing Wang, Brandon Y. Wong, Chen Yang, If Barnes, Andrew E. Berry, Salvador Capella-Gutierrez, Alyssa Cousineau, Namrita Dhillon, Jose M. Fernandez-Gonzalez, Luis Ferrández-Peral, Natàlia Garcia-Reyero, Stefan Götz, Carles Hernández-Ferrer, Liudmyla Kondratova, Tianyuan Liu, Alessandra Martinez-Martin, Carlos Menor, Jorge Mestre-Tomás, Jonathan M. Mudge, Nedka G. Panayotova, Alejandro Paniagua, Dmitry Repchevsky, Xingjie Ren, Eric Rouchka, Brandon Saint-John, Enrique Sapena, Leon Sheynkman, Melissa Laird Smith, Marie-Marthe Suner, Hazuki Takahashi, Ingrid A. Youngworth, Piero Carninci, Nancy D. Denslow, Roderic Guigó, Maggie Hunter, Rene Maehr, Yin Shen, Hagen U. Tilgner, Barbara J. Wold, Christopher Vollmers, Adam Frankish, Kin Fai Au, Gloria M. Sheynkman, Ali Mortazavi, Ana Conesa, Angela N. Brooks

Projected sea-level rise and high tide flooding at Timucuan Ecological and Historic Preserve, Florida

IntroductionNational parks and preserves in the South Atlantic-Gulf Region contain valuable coastal habitats such as tidal wetlands and mangrove forests, as well as irreplaceable historic buildings and archeological sites located in low-lying areas. These natural and cultural resources are vulnerable to accelerated sea-level rise and escalating high tide flooding events. Through a Natural Resource
Authors
Hana R. Thurman, Nicholas M. Enwright, Michael J. Osland, Davina L. Passeri, Richard H. Day, Bethanie M. Simons

Enhancing assessments of coastal wetland migration potential with sea-level rise: Accounting for uncertainty in elevation data, tidal data, and future water levels

Sea-level rise rates are predicted to surpass rates of wetland vertical adjustment in the coming decades in many areas, increasing the potential for wetland submergence. Information on where wetland migration is possible can help natural resource managers for planning land acquisition or enhancing habitat connectivity to bolster adaptation of coastal wetlands to rising seas. Elevation-based models
Authors
Nicholas Enwright, Michael Osland, Hana R. Thurman, Claire E. McHenry, William C. Vervaeke, Brett Patton, Davina Passeri, Jason M. Stoker, Richard Day, Bethanie M. Simons

Realizing the potential of eDNA biodiversity monitoring tools in the marine environment with application to offshore renewable energy

The U.S. Geological Survey (USGS) researches the biological diversity and distribution of species to support management, conservation, and resource use decisions. USGS scientists advance detection and monitoring technologies to assess changes in fish and wildlife populations, biodiversity, and the health of ecosystems. The United States is planning to install 30 gigawatts of offshore marine and wi
Authors
Adam Sepulveda, Cheryl Morrison, Maggie Hunter, Mona Khalil

Deep vs shallow: GPS tags reveal a dichotomy in movement patterns of loggerhead turtles foraging in a coastal bay

BackgroundIndividual variation in movement strategies of foraging loggerhead turtles have been documented on the scale of tens to hundreds of kilometers within single ocean basins. Use of different strategies among individuals may reflect variations in resources, predation pressure or competition. It is less common for individual turtles to use different foraging strategies on the scale of kilomet
Authors
Margaret Lamont, Daniel Slone, James P. Reid, Susan M. Butler, Joseph A. Alday

Best practices for genetic and genomic data archiving

Genetic and genomic data are collected for a vast array of scientific and applied purposes. Despite mandates for public archiving, data are typically used only by the generating authors. The reuse of genetic and genomic datasets remains uncommon because it is difficult, if not impossible, due to non-standard archiving practices and lack of contextual metadata. But as the new field of macrogenetics
Authors
Deborah M. Leigh, A. G. Vandergast, Maggie Hunter, Eric D. Crandall, W. Chris Funk, Colin J Garroway, Sean M. Hoban, Sara J. Oyler-McCance, Christian Rellstab, Gernot Segelbacher, Chloe Schmidt, Ella Vázquez-Domínguez, Ivan Paz-Vinas

Environmental DNA

The widespread adoption of environmental DNA (eDNA) detection tools for biodiversity monitoring has led to the need for universal data standards to inform principled eDNA data applications. Improvements in understanding the meaning and possible uncertainty of eDNA data can minimize erroneous conclusions, increase confidence in eDNA data, and maximize conservation outcomes. -Environmental DNA (eDN
Authors
Maggie Hunter, Kristian Meissner, Catherine Abbott, Florien Leese, Gernot Segelbacher