Resetting Global Awareness during the Global Pandemic

During this session, four female presenters from diverse academic and service backgrounds spoke about the global pandemic of the past two years as a catalyst to raise awareness on global concerns about human rights, education, environment, immigration, and racism. Panelists were Dr. Corinne Brion, a professor in the department of Education; Dr. Satang Nabaneh, Director of Programs at the University of Dayton Human Rights Center; Dr. Joann Wright Mawasha, deputy director at the city of Dayton Human Rights Council; and Dr. Maria Vivero, a professor in the department of Economics and Finance. Together, they spoke about how the pandemic has revealed the depths of our mutual dependence.https://ecommons.udayton.edu/global_voices_5/1008/thumbnail.jp

"On the Spot": travelling artists and Abolitionism, 1770-1830

Until recently the visual culture of Atlantic slavery has rarely been critically scrutinised. Yet in the first decades of the nineteenth century slavery was frequently represented by European travelling artists, often in the most graphic, sometimes voyeuristic, detail. This paper examines the work of several itinerant artists, in particular Augustus Earle (1793-1838) and Agostino Brunias (1730–1796), whose very mobility along the edges of empire was part of a much larger circulatory system of exchange (people, goods and ideas) and diplomacy that characterised Europe’s Age of Expansion. It focuses on the role of the travelling artist, and visual culture more generally, in the development of British abolitionism between 1770 and 1830. It discusses the broad circulation of slave imagery within European culture and argues for greater recognition of the role of such imagery in the abolitionist debates that divided Britain. Furthermore, it suggests that the epistemological authority conferred on the travelling artist—the quintessential eyewitness—was key to the rhetorical power of his (rarely her) images. Artists such as Earle viewed the New World as a boundless source of fresh material that could potentially propel them to fame and fortune. Johann Moritz Rugendas (1802-1858), on the other hand, was conscious of contributing to a global scientific mission, a Humboldtian imperative that by the 1820s propelled him and others to travel beyond the traditional itinerary of the Grand Tour. Some artists were implicated in the very fabric of slavery itself, particularly those in the British West Indies such as William Clark (working 1820s) and Richard Bridgens (1785-1846); others, particularly those in Brazil, expressed strong abolitionist sentiments. Fuelled by evangelical zeal to record all aspects of the New World, these artists recognised the importance of representing the harsh realities of slave life. Unlike those in the metropole who depicted slavery (most often in caustic satirical drawings), many travelling artists believed strongly in the evidential value of their images, a value attributed to their global mobility. The paper examines the varied and complex means by which visual culture played a significant and often overlooked role in the political struggles that beset the period

Selectivity of natural, synthetic and environmental estrogens for zebrafish estrogen receptors.

International audience: Zebrafish, Danio rerio, is increasingly used as an animal model to study the effects of pharmaceuticals and environmental estrogens. As most of these estrogens have only been tested on human estrogen receptors (ERs), it is necessary to measure their effects on zebrafish ERs. In humans there are two distinct nuclear ERs (hERα and hERβ), whereas the zebrafish genome encodes three ERs, zfERα and two zfERβs (zfERβ1 and zfERβ2). In this study, we established HeLa-based reporter cell lines stably expressing each of the three zfERs. We first reported that estrogens more efficiently activate the zfERs at 28°C as compared to 37°C, thus reflecting the physiological temperature of zebrafish in wildlife. We then showed significant differences in the ability of agonist and antagonist estrogens to modulate activation of the three zfER isotypes in comparison to hERs. Environmental compounds (bisphenol A, alkylphenols, mycoestrogens) which are hER panagonists and hERβ selective agonists displayed greater potency for zfERα as compared to zfERβs. Among hERα selective synthetic agonists, PPT did not activate zfERα while 16α-LE2 was the most zfERα selective compound. Altogether, these results confirm that all hER ligands control in a similar manner the transcriptional activity of zfERs although significant differences in selectivity were observed among subtypes. The zfER subtype selective ligands that we identified thus represent new valuable tools to dissect the physiological roles of the different zfERs. Finally, our work also points out that care has to be taken in transposing the results obtained using the zebrafish as a model for human physiopathology

PART is part of Alzheimer disease

It has been proposed that tau aggregation confined to entorhinal cortex and hippocampus, with no or only minimal Aβ deposition, should be considered as a 'primary age-related tauopathy' (PART) that is not integral to the continuum of sporadic Alzheimer disease (AD). Here, we examine the evidence that PART has a pathogenic mechanism and a prognosis which differ from those of AD. We contend that no specific property of the entorhinal-hippocampal tau pathology makes it possible to predict either a limited progression or the development of AD, and that biochemical differences await an evidence base. On the other hand, entorhinal-hippocampal tau pathology is an invariant feature of AD and is always associated with its development. Rather than creating a separate disease entity, we recommend the continued use of an analytical approach based on NFT stages and Aβ phases with no inference about hypothetical disease processes.SCOPUS: ar.jinfo:eu-repo/semantics/publishe

Desarrollo temprano del roble (Nothofagus obliqua): un análisis arquitectural de procedencias de Argentina = Early development of roble (Nothofagus obliqua): an architectural analysis of provenances from Argentina

Se estudió el desarrollo arquitectural en tres años de plántulas de Nothofagus obliqua bajo condiciones de vivero. Las plántulas derivaron de semillas de cinco procedencias dentro del área de distribución natural de esta especie en Argentina. En no menos de 40 plantas por procedencia se registraron: longitud, número de nudos y diámetro basal de los brotes anuales del eje vertical principal. El brote del primer año de todas las plántulas consistió en una sola unidad de alargamiento (UA), el del segundo año en una o dos UA y el del tercero en una, dos o tres UA. El desarrollo de dos o tres UA resultó invariablemente de la muerte del meristema apical luego de la primera UA. Las consecuencias más evidentes de la existencia de más de un evento de alargamiento en un año fueron: (a) mayores longitud y número de nudos en ese año, (b) mayor engrosamiento del tronco al nivel del suelo y (c) un período de alargamiento más largo. Plantas de diferente procedencia difirieron en la longitud del brote del primer año y en las proporciones de brotes de los años siguientes con una o varias UA.The architectural development of three-year-old seedlings of Nothofagus obliqua under nursery conditions was studied. The seedlings were grown from seeds collected from five provenances within the natural distribution area of this species in Argentina. The length, number of nodes and basal diameter of the main axis’ annual shoots were registered for 40 or more seedlings per provenance. The first-year shoot of all seedlings consisted on one extension unit (EU); second-year shoots had one or two EU and third-year shoots one, two or three EU. The development of a second or a third EU always resulted from the death of the apex of the first or second EU respectively. The most evident consequences of the existence of more than one EU in one year were: (a) greater length and number of nodes per shoot in that year, (b) a thicker stem at ground level and (c) a longer extension period. Plants from different provenances differed in the length of the first-year shoot and the proportion of second- and third-year shoots with one or more than one EU.EEA BarilocheFil: Puntieri, Javier. Consejo Nacional de Investigaciones Científicas y Técnicas; Argentina. Universidad Nacional del Comahue. Departamento de Botánica; ArgentinaFil: Grosfeld, Javier Edgardo. Consejo Nacional de Investigaciones Científicas y Técnicas; Argentina. Universidad Nacional del Comahue. Departamento de Botánica; ArgentinaFil: Stecconi, Marina. Consejo Nacional de Investigaciones Científicas y Técnicas; Argentina. Universidad Nacional del Comahue. Departamento de Botánica; ArgentinaFil: Brion, Cecilia. Consejo Nacional de Investigaciones Científicas y Técnicas; Argentina. Universidad Nacional del Comahue. Departamento de Botánica; ArgentinaFil: Azpilicueta, Maria Marta. Instituto Nacional de Tecnología Agropecuaria (INTA). Estación Experimental Agropecuaria Bariloche. Unidad de Genética Forestal; ArgentinaFil: Gallo, Leonardo Ariel. Instituto Nacional de Tecnología Agropecuaria (INTA). Estación Experimental Agropecuaria Bariloche. Unidad de Genética Forestal; Argentin

Volcanic impacts on peatland microbial communities: A tephropalaeoecological hypothesis-test

Volcanic eruptions affect peatlands around the world, depositing volcanic ash (tephra) and a variety of chemicals including compounds of sulphur. These volcanic impacts may be important for many reasons, in particular sulphur deposition has been shown to suppress peatland methane flux, potentially reinforcing climatic cooling. Experiments have shown that sulphur deposition also forces changes in testate amoeba communities, potentially relating to the reduced methane flux. Large volcanic eruptions in regions with extensive peatlands are relatively rare so it is difficult to assess the extent to which volcanic eruptions affect peatland microbial communities; palaeoecological analyses across tephra layers provide a means to resolve this uncertainty. In this study, testate amoebae were analysed across multiple monoliths from a peatland in southern Alaska containing two tephras, probably representing the 1883 eruption of Augustine Volcano and a 20th Century eruption of Redoubt Volcano. Results showed relatively distinct and often statistically significant changes in testate amoeba community coincident with tephra layers which largely matched the response found in experimental studies of sulphur deposition. The results suggest volcanic impacts on peatland microbial communities which might relate to changes in methane flux

What are the causal effects of breastfeeding on IQ, obesity and blood pressure? Evidence from comparing high-income with middle-income cohorts

Background A novel approach is explored for improving causal inference in observational studies by comparing cohorts from high-income with low- or middle-income countries (LMIC), where confounding structures differ. This is applied to assessing causal effects of breastfeeding on child blood pressure (BP), body mass index (BMI) and intelligence quotient (IQ)