Refugia featured prominently in shaping evolutionary trajectories during repeated cycles of glaciation in the Quaternary, particularly in the Northern Hemisphere. The Southern Hemisphere instead experienced cycles of severe aridification but little is known about the temporal presence and role of refugia for arid-adapted biota. Isolated mountain ranges located in the Australian arid zone likely...

Food deserts (FD) have attracted attention after the post-COVID-19 pandemic, primarily due to adverse health and other implications of living in areas designated as food deserts. Most studies focused on various aspects impact deserts, including nutritional risks FDs. Spatial integration analysis GIS data provide a powerful way expose issues creating how they change over space time. This study a...

Deserts confuse, fogging memory and electrifying the imagination. In 1853, on Utah’s Sevier River, a ritualized killing spawned folklore of deserts that lives to this day. Captain John W. Gunnison, an engineer, had detoured into ambush. Dismembered, decapitated, his heart torn from chest, he died, it was said, by order Mormon prophet Latter-day Saints. Fabulized over decades, tale contorted wit...

Although microplastics (MPs) are ubiquitous environmental contaminants, little is known about their occurrence and behavior in the terrestrial setting. In this study, MPs have been isolated from soils collected various geomorphological features (yardangs, sand dunes, moving sands, seasonal lakes) of Kavir Lut Deserts on Iranian plateau. The number identified 300 g samples ranged zero (not detec...

The deserts of the world are hottest places, very less rainfall, almost clear skies throughout the year. These deserts receive highest direct normal irradiance which is most suitable for concentrating solar power plants. With the technological developments and their innovations in concentrating solar power, thermal storage and hybridization/ back up, the sunniest countries expects that CSP shou...

The ant species list of Iran is far from complete. So far, only 110 species belonging to 26 genera have been recorded from Iran. For this study, we collected the majority of ant material in two periods of field work in spring and summer of 2007 and 2008. In total, we checked more than 35,000 specimens, and recorded 32 species and six genera new to Iran: Dolichoderus, Myrmecina, Proformica, Pyra...

Purpose – The last ten years have seen a gradual withdrawal of retail facilities from many local areas and the consequent growth of ‘shopping deserts’, resulting in social and health disbenefits. This paper examines the potential for e-shopping to fill the vacuum and to assist disadvantaged shoppers. Design/methodology/approach – The paper uses prior published research to comment on the extent ...