Institut de l’environnement - Publications // Institute of the Environment - Publications

Permanent URI for this collectionhttps://hdl.handle.net/10393/32546

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The Impact of Exposure to Ambient Air Pollution on Educational Outcomes
(Université d'Ottawa / University of Ottawa, 2017) Zhang, Yanjiao; Rivers, Nicholas
In this study, I examine if higher levels of ambient air pollution impact educational outcomes. According to the literature review, CO, O3, PM10 and PM2.5 are found to be four pollutants that could have an impact on cognitive ability, so I focus on these air pollutants. I analyze provincial test results for the province of British Columbia, and Secondary School Literacy Test results from the province of Ontario (OSSLT) with air pollution and weather data corresponding to the locations and dates in which tests took place. A longitudinal approach is used, in which test results are compared within a school over time with a fixed effects model chosen to control for school and year fixed effects. Correlations are found among the four pollutants in the two provinces, therefore, an integrated Air Quality Index (AQI) is calculated to further examine the relationship between air pollution and educational outcomes. In British Columbia, I find that there is a negative impact of ambient air pollution on student’s test results: a one standard deviation increase in AQI leads to a 0.23 percentage points decrease in student average grade. Furthermore, I find that in BC, air pollution’s impact on students with special needs experience about 3.4 times of the average impact of other students. In Ontario, I do not find significant association between OSSLT results and the AQI, and this might be because of not having enough observations in Ontario school dataset and lots of missing data in air pollution dataset. However, the association between ambient air pollution and OSSLT results is found to be negative overall, congruent with results from BC.
A Study of the Effects of Diet on Human Gut Microbial Community Structure and Mercury Metabolism
(Université d'Ottawa / University of Ottawa, 2017) Saha, Ria; Poulain, Alexandre; Chan, Laurie
Background: Recent research showing how dietary interventions substantially influence the potential presence of widespread and stable bacterial core phyla in the human colon has garnered a considerable amount of attention. Because the human gut can play a major role in host health, there is currently some interest in observing how diet influences human gut microbial composition and how changes in diet affect the potential for gut microbiota to transform mercury. This study aims to discover how different kinds of diet affect the nature and magnitude of microbial Hg transformations in the human gut environment. Methods: Fecal samples have been collected from 5 human male individuals at University of Ottawa and stored at -80ºC for further investigation. Using high throughput DNA amplicon sequencing targeting the 16s rRNA V4 region, we investigated the microbial community structure of the gut in 5 healthy male. Mercury biotransformations in the pooled fecal sample have been carried out using stable isotopes of mercury (198HgCl2 and Me199HgCl) and analysis was conducted by using inductively coupled plasma mass spectrometry (ICP-MS). Results and conclusions: We were not able to detect any significant Hg methylation or MeHg demethylation. We suspect this is due to Enterobacteria dominating the microbial community structure after 96h; Although Enterobacteria are part of the typical microbiota of a healthy individual, they do not possess genes required for Hg methylation. As such, our microbial data support our chemical analyses. We were not able to identify whether a change in diet affected Hg transformations in the human gut environment.
Understanding Small-Scale Fisheries in Thailand: Ecological Change and Local Governance Systems
(Université d'Ottawa / University of Ottawa, 2016) Kehoe, Courtney; Marschke, Melissa
With the state of the world’s marine fisheries in decline and an ever increasing global demand for seafood products, there is rising concern for the future of both our oceans and the more than 180 million people living in the developing world who depend on fisheries for their livelihood. In a country like Thailand, where approximately 3.3 million individuals are working within the fishing industry either full-time or part-time and where catch per unit effort has decreased significantly over the years, understanding ecological change (especially as perceived by fishers whose knowledge is derived and continually updated through everyday lived experience) is paramount. At the same time, recognizing management schemes that realize local realities and acknowledge not only the resource system but the actors that depend on it and the interactions therein is also of great importance. By adopting Ostrom’s general framework for analyzing the sustainability of socio-economic systems the following research explores how ecological, social, and institutional factors are affecting small-scale fishers in the village of Khan Kradai, Prachuap Khiri Khan province. In doing so it contributes towards a deeper understanding of the reasons why small-scale fishers choose to either exploit local resources or use them in a more sustainable way.

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