Search Results (39)

Mechanical traps are widely used for urban rat surveillance and management, including the brown rat, Rattus norvegicus (Berkenhout). However, relatively few studies have examined the effects of environment, placement, and trap type on trapping outcomes in residential buildings. In this study, we deployed 50 pairs of snap traps and live cage traps for five nights (500 trap nights) in concrete-covered basements in Brooklyn and dirt-covered crawlspaces in Queens, New York City, USA. Capture success differed by site, with Brooklyn yielding higher overall success (38%) than Queens (13%) (p < 0.001). Capture success in Brooklyn was lower in compactor rooms than in other areas (vertical infrastructure, open-floor travel corridors, and burrow entrances). In Queens, success was similar at different placement areas. The two trap types had similar overall capture success (p = 0.090). Cage traps produced more female-biased samples (90% females), while snap traps yielded more balanced sex ratios (53% females) (p < 0.001). In addition, median body mass distributions also differed, with snap traps capturing heavier rats than cage traps at both sites. These findings demonstrate that both placement and trap design are important considerations for urban rat surveillance and urban rat management. Full article

We present a concise methodology to model and visualise mole-rat burrows by integrating 3D ground-penetrating radar (GPR) volumes, high-resolution 3D surface texture, and interpretative 3D visualisation with open-code software, such as Blender and Houdini. The workflow shows the processing and conversion steps for converting surface and subsurface raw datasets into point clouds, then the amalgamation of those 3D objects into a voxelised volume. The voxelisation script creates a text file, a *.CSV file, that masks the voxels with the values of 0 and 1 depending on whether they are inside or outside a burrow. This parametrisation resulted in a total of 7,730,587 voxels generated, of which 48,952 have a value of 1 within them. This indicates the presence of one burrow system, in which there were about 60–80 burrow segments that were initially identified by GPR but remained rather interpretative than a verified geometry. The entire process enables handling and combining different, complex, 3D datasets into a simple text file and thus enables merging with covariates for further spatial modelling of burrow systems from incomplete, indirect, noisy measurements. Full article

The AVIF (AV1 Image File Format) is a modern, royalty-free image format that leverages the AV1 video codec for superior compression efficiency, supporting both lossy and lossless modes. Its entropy encoding relies on a multi-symbol context-adaptive arithmetic coder (range coding with adaptive cumulative distribution functions (CDFs)), which is effective for general imagery but may not optimally exploit the repetitive structures common in Geographic Information System (GIS) maps/data. This paper proposes replacing AVIF’s entropy encoder with the Burrows–Wheeler Transform (BWT), a reversible preprocessing algorithm that rearranges data to create runs of similar symbols, enhancing subsequent compression. We detail the technical steps for modification, drawing from AV1’s open-source implementation, and explain why BWT is advantageous for GIS raster maps/data, which often feature large uniform areas, limited color palettes, and spatial redundancies. Empirical evidence from related studies on BWT-based image compression shows improvements in lossless scenarios, potentially considerably reducing file sizes over standard methods while preserving data integrity critical for geospatial analysis. This swap could improve storage, transmission, and processing efficiency in GIS applications, such as remote sensing and cartography. The discussion includes challenges like computational overhead and compatibility, with recommendations for implementations. The resulting BWT-AVIF hybrid produces a non-standard AV1 bit-stream that is not compliant with the AV1 or AVIF specifications and therefore requires custom decoders. It is presented here as a research prototype for GIS-specific compression rather than a compliant AVIF extension. Full article

Wireless medical sensor networks (WMSNs) have evolved alongside the development of communication systems, and the integration of cloud computing has enabled scalable and efficient medical data management. However, since the messages in WMSNs are transmitted over open channels, they are vulnerable to eavesdropping, replay, impersonation, and other various attacks. In response to these security concerns, Keshta et al. suggested an authentication protocol to establish secure communication in the cloud-assisted WMSNs. However, our analysis reveals their protocol cannot prevent session key disclosure, impersonation of the user and sensor node, and denial of service (DoS) attacks. Moreover, Keshta et al.’s protocol cannot support user untraceability due to fixed hidden identity. To address these weaknesses, we propose a physical unclonable function (PUF) based secure authentication protocol for cloud-assisted WMSNs. The protocol uses lightweight operations, provides mutual authentication between user, cloud server, and sensor node, and supports user anonymity and untraceability. We validate the proposed protocol’s security through informal analysis on various security attacks and formal analysis including “Burrows–Abadi–Needham (BAN) logic”, “Real-or-Random (RoR) model” for session key security, and “Automated Validation of Internet Security Protocols and Application (AVISPA) simulations”. Performance evaluation demonstrates lower communication cost and computation overhead compared with existing protocols, making the proposed protocol suitable for WMSN environments. Full article

Gopher tortoises (Gopherus polyphemus) are threatened burrowing keystone ecosystem engineers indigenous to open uplands in the Southeastern United States. Perils to the species include habitat degradation and fragmentation, anthropogenic disturbances, predation, parasites, and disease. Problems are severe in the SE Florida study area due to coastal urban sprawl, confining the tortoises in small, scattered, unnatural pockets subject to novel stresses. The annual South Florida February to ca. late May dry season became a severe drought in 2025. The present project centered on the broad question of foodplant resilience through the drought. The tortoise-grazed areas host three dominant groundcover species, in order of abundance: non-native Richardia grandiflora, native grass Paspalum setaceum, and non-native sedge Fimbristylis cymosa. Key findings were as follows: 1. The most abundant and most-often grazed species, Richardia grandiflora, when tortoises were excluded, expanded despite the drought (from 39% to 49.5% mean coverage). Under combined drought and grazing, that species cover decreased slightly (42.5% to 39.4%). Tortoise-free, Paspalum setaceum declined slightly during the drought (32.7% to 27.1% mean coverage), and showed mixed results with little net effect exposed to drought and to grazing. Never observed to be grazed during the study, Fimbristylis cymosa formed a nearly monospecific lawn in a sizeable portion of the study area. During the drought, it mostly browned, retaining green rosette centers, and tortoise exclusion showed no discernable effect. With transition to late spring, however, with increased rainfall, tortoise exclusion allowed rapid competition from grasses among the Fimbristylis rosettes. Adjacent unenclosed grazing, by contrast, maintained the Fimbristylis lawn without increase in grass coverage. Conclusions are that the two chief “fodder” species, Richardia grandiflora and Paspalum setaceum, were robust to drought and grazing. The introduced Fimbristylis cymosa appears to be facilitated by selective grazing-suppressing grass competitors. Full article

Farmers face increasing pressure to maintain vital populations of the critically endangered field hamster (Cricetus cricetus) while managing crop damage caused by field mice. This challenge is linked to the UN Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) 2 and 15, addressing food security and biodiversity. Consequently, the reliable detection of hamster activity in agricultural fields is essential. While remote sensing offers potential for wildlife monitoring, commonly used RGB imagery has limitations in detecting small burrow entrances in vegetated areas. This study investigates the potential of drone-based Light Detection and Ranging (LiDAR) data for identifying field hamster burrow entrances in agricultural landscapes. A geostatistical method was developed to detect local elevation minima as indicators of burrow openings. The analysis used four datasets captured at varying flight altitudes and spatial resolutions. The method successfully detected up to 20 out of 23 known burrow entrances and achieved an F1-score of 0.83 for the best-performing dataset. Detection was most accurate at flight altitudes of 30 m or lower, with performance decreasing at higher altitudes due to reduced point density. These findings demonstrate the potential of UAV-based LiDAR to support non-invasive species monitoring and habitat management in agricultural systems, contributing to sustainable conservation practices in line with the SDGs. Full article

The role of the sand prawn, Kraussillichirus kraussi (Stebbing, 1900), as an ecosystem engineer was evaluated through a two-and-a-half-month caging experiment conducted during a prolonged drought in the lower reaches of the temporarily open/closed Kasouga Estuary along South Africa’s eastern seaboard. Findings indicate that at intermediate densities, the burrowing activities of K. kraussi significantly enhanced microphytobenthic algal concentrations, leading to an increase in macrobenthic abundance and biomass (H(3) = 12.772, p < 0.0001; H(3) = 11.305, p = 0.001; H(3) = 13.787, p < 0.0001, respectively). This response was largely driven by elevated densities of the gastropod Nassarius kraussianus (Dunker, 1847), which benefited from the increased microphytobenthic biomass. These results highlight the critical role of K. kraussi as an ecosystem engineer, demonstrating its ability to locally enhance biological productivity even under environmental stress, such as prolonged drought conditions. Full article

Intelligent precision agriculture incorporates a number of Internet of Things (IoT) devices and drones to supervise agricultural activities and surroundings. The collected data are then forwarded to processing centers to facilitate crucial decisions. This can potentially help optimize the usage of agricultural resources and thwart disasters, enhancing productivity and profitability. To facilitate monitoring and decision, the smart devices in precision agriculture must exchange massive amounts of data across the open wireless communication channels. This inadvertently introduces a number of vulnerabilities, exposing the collected data to numerous security and privacy threats. To address these issues, massive security solutions have been introduced to secure the communication process in precision agriculture. However, most of the current security solutions either fail to offer perfect protection or are inefficient. In this paper, a scheme deploying efficient cryptographic primitives such as hashing, exclusive OR and random number generators is presented. We utilize the Burrows–Abadi–Needham (BAN) logic to demonstrate the verifiable security of the negotiated session keys. In addition, we execute an extensive semantic analysis which reveals the robustness of our scheme against a myriad of threats. Moreover, comparative performance evaluations demonstrate its computation overheads and energy consumption efficiency. Full article

The Internet of Vehicles (IoV) is an emerging technology that enables vehicles to communicate with their surroundings, provide convenient services, and enhance transportation systems. However, IoV networks can be vulnerable to security attacks because vehicles communicate with other IoV components through an open wireless channel. The recent related work suggested a two-factor-based lightweight authentication scheme for IoV networks. Unfortunately, we prove that the related work cannot prevent various security attacks, such as insider and ephemeral secret leakage (ESL) attacks, and fails to ensure perfect forward secrecy. To address these security weaknesses, we propose an anonymous and efficient authentication scheme with conditional privacy-preserving capabilities in IoV networks. The proposed scheme can ensure robustness against various security attacks and provide essential security features. The proposed scheme ensures conditional privacy to revoke malicious behavior in IoV networks. Moreover, our scheme uses only one-way hash functions and XOR operations, which are low-cost cryptographic operations suitable for IoV. We also prove the security of our scheme using the “Burrows–Abadi–Needham (BAN) logic”, “Real-or-Random (ROR) model”, and “Automated Validation of Internet Security Protocols and Applications (AVISPA) simulation tool”. We evaluate and compare the performance and security features of the proposed scheme with existing methods. Consequently, our scheme provides improved security and efficiency and is suitable for practical IoV networks. Full article

We conducted a habitat suitability assessment for two burrowing rodents, Anatolian or Nehring’s blind mole rat (Nannospalax xanthodon) and Harting’s vole (Microtus hartingi), on the island of Lesvos using a niche-based approach. We collected data on the presence of the two species across the island and selected several environmental variables, including land cover, geology, and habitat topography, to assess their influence on habitat suitability. We used the Maxent species distribution modelling algorithm to predict suitable habitats. The results showed that both species preferred habitats with low slopes and specific geological substrates, i.e., alluvial deposits and volcanic rocks. M. hartingi showed a preference for open habitats such as saltmarshes and non-irrigated arable land, while N. xanthodon preferred non-irrigated arable land, pastures, and discontinuous urban fabric. The model predicted a wider area of suitable habitats for Microtus hartingi compared to N. xanthodon. Interestingly, the two species are absent from the southeastern part of the island despite our model predicting high suitability; this indicates that a natural barrier of hilly terrain, extensive pine forests, and limestone rock formations may exist that impedes dispersal. Our study provides valuable insights into the habitat preferences of these two burrowing rodents on the island of Lesvos, which can inform biodiversity conservation and ecosystem management strategies. Full article

Intertidal macroinvertebrates, such as crabs and mud shrimps, are invertebrates inhabiting the intertidal zone that are sufficiently large to be identified with the naked eye. Most intertidal macroinvertebrates typically construct burrows of various shapes in sediment to protect themselves from environmental extremes, with surface openings that reflect features of their species and body size. Especially circular burrow openings correlate with an organism’s body size; thus, measuring these openings can provide estimates of the organism’s size, weight, growth rate, and biomass. Traditional studies of these organisms have relied on field surveys, which are constrained by time, cost, and logistical limitations. This study introduces an innovative method for measuring the burrow opening diameters of intertidal macroinvertebrates using high-resolution optical images from a portable drone system. By leveraging the reflectance disparity between the sediment and burrow openings, this method facilitates the extraction and sizing of burrow openings. Our methodology was applied to three crab species known for their circular burrow opening: the red-clawed fiddler, the milky fiddler, and the ghost crab. Validation was confirmed through field data from the Mageumri and Sinduri tidal flats, South Korea. The method achieved a correlation coefficient (R²) of 0.94 and a root mean squared error (RMSE) of 1.68 mm across a diameter range of 6.21–33.59 mm. These findings suggest the potential of drone remote sensing systems as a non-invasive and efficacious approach for quantifying burrow sizes over extensive intertidal areas, thereby facilitating more accurate biomass estimations and surmounting the limitations of conventional field surveys. Future research could extend this method to additional species and further refine its precision. Full article

Crocodilians are considered to be “ecosystem engineers” because their modification of habitats provides opportunities for feeding, drinking, breeding, and other vital life activities to a wide variety of other animals. One such habitat modification is the construction of nest mounds during the breeding season by most crocodilian species, including American alligators (Alligator mississippiensis). While many reports exist describing wildlife associated with alligator nests, no studies have quantified faunal associates and their corresponding behaviors while visiting nests. To address this data gap, we used automated game cameras to monitor wildlife and their behaviors at alligator nests during the egg incubation period (June–September) in coastal South Carolina, USA (2016–2021). We documented a total of 81 species (79 vertebrates and 2 invertebrates) at 78 alligator nests representing six taxonomic groups, including 48 birds (59.2%), 9 mammals (11.1%), 19 reptiles (23.4%), 3 amphibians (3.7%), 1 malacostracan (1.2%), and 1 insect (1.2%). Collectively, faunal associates primarily used alligator nests for feeding/foraging (51.8%), traveling (29.3%), and loafing (19.9%) and to a much lesser extent basking, burrowing/shelter, breeding, and nesting. However, trends in alligator nest use varied among faunal associate groups (birds, mammals, reptiles, amphibians, etc.), subgroups (e.g., passerines, raptors, wading birds, and waterfowl), and species. Several novel behaviors by some nest associates were also noted during the study, including the first observations of Virginia oppossum (Didelphis virginiana) opening and predating nests, bobcat (Lynx rufus) consuming alligator hatchlings, and Carolina wren (Thryothorus ludovicianus) feeding on the contents of a recently predated alligator egg. The results of this study indicate that a diverse assemblage of vertebrates (and some invertebrates) use alligator nest sites in coastal South Carolina for a variety of life activities during the egg incubation period, and the proportion of the behaviors exhibited varies among animal groups and species. This study provides a first step for investigations regarding the net impacts of alligator nest-faunal associate interactions and ultimately the greater ecological role of alligators and other crocodilians. Full article

A paradigm that combines cloud computing and the Internet of Things (IoT) allows for more impressive services to be provided to users while addressing storage and computational resource issues in the IoT environments. This cloud-based IoT environment has been used in various industries, including public services, for quite some time, and has been researched in academia. However, various security issues can arise during the communication between IoT devices and cloud servers, because communication between devices occurs in open channels. Moreover, issues such as theft of a user’s IoT device or extraction of key parameters from the user’s device in a remote location can arise. Researchers interested in these issues have proposed lightweight mutual authentication key agreement protocols that are safe and suitable for IoT environments. Recently, a lightweight authentication scheme between IoT devices and cloud servers has been presented. However, we found out their scheme had various security vulnerabilities, vulnerable to insider, impersonation, verification table leakage, and privileged insider attacks, and did not provide users with untraceability. To address these flaws, we propose a provably secure lightweight authentication scheme. The proposed scheme uses the user’s biometric information and the cloud server’s secret key to prevent the exposure of key parameters. Additionally, it ensures low computational costs for providing users with real-time and fast services using only exclusive OR operations and hash functions in the IoT environments. To analyze the safety of the proposed scheme, we use informal security analysis, Burrows–Abadi–Needham (BAN) logic and a Real-or-Random (RoR) model. The analysis results confirm that our scheme is secure against insider attacks, impersonation attacks, stolen verifier attacks, and so on; furthermore, it provides additional security elements. Simultaneously, it has been verified to possess enhanced communication costs, and total bit size has been shortened to 3776 bits, which is improved by almost 6% compared to Wu et al.’s scheme. Therefore, we demonstrate that the proposed scheme is suitable for cloud-based IoT environments. Full article

Microtus thomasi (Rodentia: Arvicolinae), a fossorial vole endemic to the SW Balkans, uses a variety of substrates but its underground behavior remains poorly understood. This study examines the architecture and utilization of M. thomasi burrow systems in NW Peloponnese, Greece. In particular, eight burrow systems were meticulously excavated and studied, with comprehensive measurements taken of key characteristics, including length, depth, soil mounds, and surface openings. Key coordinates were recorded using a differential GPS device for detailed mapping and fractal dimension analysis using the box-counting method was employed to assess burrow system complexity. Soil samples were analyzed for particle size and chemical composition, and vegetation types at each site were identified. We did not find statistically significant correlations between size and complexity of the burrow systems and soil composition, altitude, or specific soil components. On the other hand, we did observe statistically significant differences in tunnel diameter between two burrow systems and in tunnel depth between more. Moreover, our study showed that more than one same-sex individual can occupy a single burrow system and not just an adult male-female pair, that was previously recorded, indicating the need for further study of the social behavior of this vole species. This study provides valuable insights into the underground behavior of M. thomasi by providing information on the features of its burrow systems, thus contributing to our understanding of its biology. Full article

Vertical embankments and mounds serve as suitable habitats for burrowing birds, such as the Sand Martin (Riparia riparia). Sand Martins have decreased in many countries during the last two decades, possibly because of the decline in suitable nest sites. Therefore, it is important to understand the factors affecting nest burrowing and nest hole characteristics for the Sand Martin. A smaller entrance hole would be beneficial for regulating the internal environment of the nest, whereas deeper nests are more advantageous against nest predators and parasites. We examined the general structure of Sand Martin colonies and determined if particle size, pH, or electrical conductivity (EC) of the soil and the location of the colony affects the morphology of Sand Martin nest holes. We hypothesized that the climate of near lakeshore and non-lakeshore differs; consequently, we predicted that Sand Martins would construct wider nest tunnel entrances in more humid environments near the lakeshore than further from the lake. We also hypothesized that a lower pH of clay loam soil would result in an increasing level of exchangeable aluminum (Al) and acidity, which in turn would promote soil aggregation. Because soils with a low EC are more stable and less prone to flooding or erosion, we predicted that Sand Martins in such soils would have deeper nesting burrows. A total of four colonies were located in the study area in Turkey. They contained 2510 burrows, of which 91.83% were used for breeding. The mean colony size was 627. We measured the soil and the nest burrow characteristics from the 80 nest bottoms used for breeding by the Sand Martin. The mean pH was 8.8, and the mean EC was 171. Tunnel depth was longer in nests with greater pH and EC and in lakeshore than in non-lakeshore colonies. The distance between nest holes increased with the EC, and nests were located nearer to each other in the lakeshore colonies than in non-lakeshore colonies. The width of the entrance opening increased with soil particle size and was wider in nests located at the lakeshore areas. Our results indicated that Sand Martins will avoid sites with too compact or loose soils for nesting, probably to avoid nest collapses. Vertical lakeshore embankments offer good nesting sites for Sand Martins and should, therefore, be protected. Because soil particle size, pH, EC, and distance from the lakeshore influenced the nest hole characteristics of the Sand Martin, conservation and management efforts should take these variables into account when maintaining or establishing suitable soil conditions for the Sand Martin. Full article