Nutrient Density

Dan Kittredge has been an organic farmer for more than 30 years and is the founder and executive director of the Bionutrient Food Association (BFA), a non-profit whose mission is to “increase quality in the food supply.” Known as one of the leading proponents of “nutrient density,” Dan works to demonstrate the connections between soil health, plant health, and human health. We will cover current research on nutrient density and the vision for how this exciting work could serve to profoundly disrupt the dynamics of the food supply. Can agriculture meaningfully reverse climate imbalances, and be used to reverse chronic disease as well? We think so

The Functional Fitness of the Community Dwelling Older Adults in Shan Dong of Mainland China in Comparison with the Population in Hong Kong

Purpose: To compare the functional fitness (FF) of the community dwelling older adults in Shan Dong (SD) of mainland China with their peers in Hong Kong (HK). Methods: 1887 older adults living in SD were measured with Senior Fitness Test (SFT) One sample T test was used to determine the age grooup difference in each FF component between the population of SD and HK. Results: Compared with their HK peers, SD older adults showed higher performance in the task of 30s arm curl, but lower abilities in 30s chair stand, back scratch, chair sit & reach, and 8 ft up & go for all the four age groups. In 2 min test, SD older males demonstrated lower capacity at the age of 75-79 years, females exhibited higher and lower ability at 65-69 & 70-74 and 80-84 years, respectively. In addition, higher BMI was seen in the SD old males at 65-69 years and in females at 65-69, 70-74 and 75-79 years. The changing trends of SD-HK disparities with aging vary in gender and different FF parameters, and notably, the disadvantage in motor abilities of the SD old females tend to increase with aging, which results in relative larger gaps at 80-84 years. Conclusions: There are great disparities in functional fitness between the older adults of Shan Dong and Hong Kong. Age stratified and gender specific intervention focusing more on the motor abilities of lower extremity strength, upper and lower body flexibility and agility & balance control should be established for the SD old residents, especially for the females

Dataset for Oxygen and Hydrogen Isotope Compositions in Dentine Collagen Correlate Strongly with Oxygen Isotope Compositions of Enamel Carbonate

The isotopic composition of tooth and bone has long been exploited in ecological, environmental, and archaeological studies. Increasingly, hydrogen and oxygen isotopes in collagen are used as tracers of environment and diet. However, the isotopic relationship between hydrogen and oxygen in collagen and oxygen in tooth enamel is poorly described. A new investigation of varied wild large herbivores shows that δ18O and δ2H in collagen are both strongly correlated to δ18O in tooth enamel carbonate, with a d18O collagen vs. δ18O carbonate slope ~0.8 and a δ2H collagen vs. δ18O carbonate slope ~6. Given that enamel carbonate δ18O generally reflects environmental water isotopic composition, δ2H and δ18O in collagen also reflect isotopic compositions in environmental water and may be used analogously to tooth enamel for environmental or dietary studies

Dataset for Snow Cover Time Series Analysis for 200 Glaciers in Western North America (2013–2023)

This dataset contains analyses of approximately weekly snow cover time series for 200 glaciers in western North America from 2013 to 2023. Snow cover was classified using the glacier-snow-cover-mapping package applied to Landsat 8/9 and Sentinel-2 imagery. Key analyses include climate cluster assignments, minimum snow cover statistics, uncertainty assessments of glacier accumulation area ratios snowline altitudes, and comparisons between remotely-sensed snow cover and modeled glacier snowlines and surface mass balance from PyGEM. The dataset includes geospatial files of study sites, time series of snow cover metrics, climate variables, and uncertainty estimates. All analysis code is openly available on Zenodo and GitHub

Associations of Parental Perceived Health with Child Movement Behaviors within Two-Parent Households

This study aimed to examine how perceived parental mental and physical health status was associated with child physical activity, screen time, and sleep. Participants were 6- to 17-year-old minors (N = 20,156; 47.9% female) from the 2022 US National Survey of Children’s Health. Dependent variables were children’s physical activity frequency, screen time, and sleep. Independent variables were parents’ physical and mental health status. Using the Actor-Partner Interdependence Model, two adjusted path models were constructed. One for parent mental health associating with parental physical health, another for parent physical health associating with parental mental health–both further associating with child movement behaviors. Path models also examined the covariance within parental dyads. Approximately 20.1% of children adhered to physical activity recommendations, 61.2% to screentime recommendations, and 66.4% to sleep recommendations. Parental physical health status mediated the association of parents\u27 mental health status on child movement behaviors, and vice-versa. Mediated associations represented 20.1% to 50.5% of the total associations. Dyadic correlations were moderate (r = 0.52 – 0.60). Most of the dyadic correlations and covariance were explained by actor-driven effects, suggesting that the mediated parental association with child behaviors may be due to health perceptions related to the individual parent and not the other parent

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Students\u27 Perceived Value and Emotions in Turkish Physical Education: Testing Moderation by Gender and Sports Involvement

Physical Education (PE) has been recognized as a key element in developing student enjoyment for physical activity and healthy lifestyle habits. Student emotions may dictate learning and motivation, but less is known regarding the perceptions of value and control that shape these emotions. Specifically, within certain K-12 PE national curriculums and cultures, the goals and objectives of PE, along with its emphasis on physical activity and sport, may influence the emotional response of students and their perceived value of PE. If students feel a lack of value, negative emotions, and marginalized by the content then it is unlikely their experiences in PE will lead to lifetime physical activity. This study aimed to explore one culture and how students’ perceived values for PE affects their emotions and the potential moderating role of gender and sports. Turkish middle school students (N=469) completed a survey regarding their value beliefs, PE emotions, and their involvement in sport outside of PE. The findings revealed that the value placed on PE was significantly associated with positive and negative emotions. Gender and sports involvement had no moderating role in this effect despite the importance of sport in the local PE curriculum. In conclusion, higher perceived value of PE corresponded to increases in positive emotions and decreases negative emotions, thereby emphasizing the importance of raising the value students place on PE. The value and emotional experience of students in PE is likely to be influenced by the content and this study speaks to the importance of not limiting curriculum to sport and other gendered activities

Biological and Environmental Factors Associated with the Autumn Migration Timing of North American Raptors

Migration is an energetically expensive and risky event in the life cycles of many organisms, and migration impacts survival and reproductive success through direct and carry-over effects. The timing of migration departure from the summer breeding grounds is important for determining the probability of survival and physical condition upon arrival at wintering sites. Many internal and external factors contribute to departure timing. It is important to study these factors across species, populations, and individuals to determine which traits and conditions are most important for shaping departure timing and its variability. Improving our understanding of the factors that affect organisms’ phenological cycles, particularly the understudied events in those cycles, is necessary to predict how populations, and the communities they are a part of, may be affected by environmental change. I studied the life history correlates and weather conditions associated with the timing of departure for North American raptor species. In the first chapter, I used data from eBird to calculate spatially-explicit autumn departure timing for 15 migratory raptor species across the United States and Canada from 2011 to 2021. Using these departure dates as a response variable and accounting for the uncertainty involved in these estimates, I then examined the relative importance of five life history traits and latitude in explaining departure timing between species and the effect of three life history traits on variation in departure timing within species across space and over time. I found that an interaction between migration distance and latitude affected departure timing. The negative effect of latitude (northern birds departing before southern birds) was stronger in short-distance migrants compared to long-distance migrants. Further, socially migrating species tended to depart earlier than species that migrate alone, and larger-bodied species tended to depart later than smaller species. Finally, long-distance migrants, diet-specialists, and social migrants had more consistent departure timing compared to short-distance migrants, diet generalists, and solitary migrants who were more variable in timing. In the second chapter, I selected the four raptor species (Broad-winged Hawk, Osprey, Swainson’s Hawk, and Turkey Vulture) with the greatest eBird data availability and assessed their departure timing within a latitudinal band across the northern US from 2002 to 2021. Using weather data from Daymet and a sliding window analysis, I determined the most likely periods of sensitivity to four weather variables for each species\u27 departure timing. I then combined these season-specific weather variables to build a full weather model for each species. Maximum temperature was important for determining the departure timing of all species, but the direction of effect varied (some advancing or delaying departure) depending on the time of year and species. Minimum temperature and precipitation was important for determining the departure time of several species, and snow-water-equivalent only explained the departure of Broad-winged Hawks. Finally, I used the full weather models for each species and data from NA-CORDEX to forecast departure timing of all four species to 2075. The forecast analysis showed that over the next 50 years, Swainson’s Hawks will advance their departure timing (depart earlier in the year) and Turkey Vultures will delay departure (depart later in the year). There were no significant temporal trends for the timing of Broad-winged Hawk autumn migration, and Osprey departure timing is expected to advance very slightly. Combined, these analyses provide insight into the biological and environmental factors affecting raptor autumn migration timing in North America. This information furthers our understanding of the relationships between life history traits and departure timing and provides new insight into factors associated with annual variation in departure timing, which may underlie vulnerability to changing environmental conditions. Additionally, it identifies unique environmental factors related to the timing of autumn departure for four common species and provides estimates of future changes in an important part of their full annual cycles

Exploring Creative Economy Policy Change in United States Cities: An Interconnected Theoretical Approach Framing an Emerging Field and Practice

The creative economy is a relatively new policy arena focusing on the consumption and production of culture and cultural products, urban development and placemaking, intellectual property protection, entrepreneurship and innovation, tourism, sustainability, and social impact. Despite its documented growth in U.S. cities in the past twenty years, we know very little about how these policy innovations spread, or about who advocates for them. To contribute to public policy research and the creative economy sector, I ask the following overarching question: How are emerging creative economy policy innovations spread, adopted and implemented in cities identified as highly creative in the United States? To expand on this foundational question, I ask a series of supporting questions aiming to explore related problems, policy solutions, policy actors, barriers, and implementation methods. I deploy a qualitative methodology, conducting semi-structured interviews with 27 purposefully selected cultural and creative economy leaders in 13 U.S. cities. Using NVivo coding software I analyze the data through the theoretical lenses of Diffusion Theory, Multiple Streams Framework and Complexity Theory. I find that no single theory is sufficient to explain how creative economy policy is made, although they each theory capture some aspects. I present 4 primary findings with supportive sub-findings. My research project contributes to the public policy field by extending the application of theories in a sector where they have not previously been applied together. It contributes to the creative economy field by exploring how multiple theories contribute to understanding the ways policy innovations spread and are adopted in this sector

Narratives on Homelessness: Investigating the Connections Between Organizational Language and Learning

The increasing privatization of government and the associated growth of the nonprofit sector means that the delivery of public services is increasingly taking place outside of the traditional domain of government. Variation between nonprofits now significantly shapes the range of public experiences with ‘government’. The type of feedback process that a nonprofit employs with a particular stakeholder group may shape that group’s experiences in an organization’s “action situation” - the “social spaces where individuals interact, exchange goods and services, solve problems, dominate one another, or fight” (Ostrom, 2011, p.11). Nonprofits with poor feedback processes, and accordingly poor conceptions of client needs and characteristics, are expected to face difficulty in representing their clients effectively or equitably (Guo & Musso, 2007). Few studies have explicitly looked at the connection between organizational narratives and structures. To best examine this connection, this study employs a comparative case study of 46 homelessness service nonprofit organizations across a clustered sample of cities similar to Boise, Idaho. The Narrative Policy Framework is used to identify key narrative areas in which organizations may vary, including prevailing descriptions of the setting/context that the organization operates within, the key characters at play, the nature of the problem being addressed, the solution for that problem, and the plot (the perceived relationship between the other elements) (Jones & McBeth, 2010). This study considers these elements and their impact, through feedback processes, on client representation