Knowledge of the status of ecosystems is vital to help develop and implement conservation strategies. This is particularly relevant to the Arctic where the need for biodiversity conservation and monitoring has long been recognised, but where issues of local capacity and logistic barriers make surveys challenging. This paper demonstrates how long-term monitoring programmes outside the Arctic can contribute to developing composite trend indicators, using monitoring of annual abundance and population-level reproduction of species of migratory Arctic-breeding waterbirds on their temperate non-breeding areas. Using data from the UK and the Netherlands, countries with year-round waterbird monitoring schemes and supporting relevant shares of Arctic-breeding populations of waterbirds, we present example multi-species abundance and productivity indicators related to the migratory pathways used by different biogeographical populations of Arctic-breeding wildfowl and wader species in the East Atlantic Flyway. These composite trend indicators show that long-term increases in population size have slowed markedly in recent years and in several cases show declines over, at least, the last decade. These results constitute proof of concept. Some other non-Arctic countries located on the flyways of Arctic-breeding waterbirds also annually monitor abundance and breeding success, and we advocate that future development of “Arctic waterbird indicators” should be as inclusive of data as possible to derive the most robust outputs and help account for effects of current changes in non-breeding waterbird distributions. The incorporation of non-Arctic datasets into assessments of the status of Arctic biodiversity is recognised as highly desirable, because logistic constraints in monitoring within the Arctic region limit effective population-scale monitoring there, in effect enabling “monitoring at a distance”.

Gestational diabetes mellitus (GDM) is the most common medical complication of pregnancy and a severe threat to pregnant people and offspring health. The molecular origins of GDM, and in particular the placental responses, are not fully known. The present study aimed to perform a comprehensive characterisation of the lipid species in placentas from pregnancies complicated with GDM using high-resolution MS lipidomics, with a particular focus on sphingolipids and acylcarnitines in a semi-targeted approach. The results indicated that despite no major disruption in lipid metabolism, placentas from GDM pregnancies showed significant alterations in sphingolipids, mostly lower abundance of total ceramides. Additionally, very long-chain ceramides and sphingomyelins with twenty-four carbons were lower, and glucosylceramides with sixteen carbons were higher in placentas from GDM pregnancies. Semi-targeted lipidomics revealed the strong impact of GDM on the placental acylcarnitine profile, particularly lower contents of medium and long-chain fatty-acyl carnitine species. The lower contents of sphingolipids may affect the secretory function of the placenta, and lower contents of long-chain fatty acylcarnitines is suggestive of mitochondrial dysfunction. These alterations in placental lipid metabolism may have consequences for fetal growth and development.