\u27O wiki\u27d wit and gift, that have the power / So to seduce!\u27: Creating a Public Collaborative Digital Space for a Special Collections Environment

(with apologies to the Bard: quote modified from Hamlet, 1.5.4950.) The Folger Shakespeare Library’s wiki, Folgerpedia, performs a number of functions for the institution and its community: it makes visible scholarly activities, maintains institutional history, and serves as a site of research on Shakespeare and early modern topics. Primary audiences for the Folger—and thus, for Folgerpedia—include scholars, students (K12 and college level), generalpublic enthusiasts, and library professionals. Folgerpedia’s mission is to create and support the collaborative generation of information surrounding our collection, Library, institution, programming, and education initiatives. One of the challenges facing Folgerpedia is to foster a space that provides scholars, students, and enthusiasts with quality information while ensuring that contributors, including invited scholars and Folger staff, find both a sense of community and are ensured credit for their contributions. Generalpublic and student users have full reading access to the content of Folgerpedia, while scholars and Folger staff are invited to contribute articles. Finally, material is being ingested and archived from the former version of folger.edu, with staff serving as editors. The Folger’s academic profile and reputation, coupled to the folger.edu domain, makes the wiki highly discoverable by search engines and highly credible to student researchers. In many ways, Folgerpedia functions as a discovery space for our collections and early modern topics, allowing scholars of many levels to connect with new aspects of our holdings. This talk will present the challenges, techniques, and (hopefully) triumphs of the Folger’s first year of facilitating collaboration in a public wiki space

The genomes of two key bumblebee species with primitive eusocial organization

Background: The shift from solitary to social behavior is one of the major evolutionary transitions. Primitively eusocial bumblebees are uniquely placed to illuminate the evolution of highly eusocial insect societies. Bumblebees are also invaluable natural and agricultural pollinators, and there is widespread concern over recent population declines in some species. High-quality genomic data will inform key aspects of bumblebee biology, including susceptibility to implicated population viability threats. Results: We report the high quality draft genome sequences of Bombus terrestris and Bombus impatiens, two ecologically dominant bumblebees and widely utilized study species. Comparing these new genomes to those of the highly eusocial honeybee Apis mellifera and other Hymenoptera, we identify deeply conserved similarities, as well as novelties key to the biology of these organisms. Some honeybee genome features thought to underpin advanced eusociality are also present in bumblebees, indicating an earlier evolution in the bee lineage. Xenobiotic detoxification and immune genes are similarly depauperate in bumblebees and honeybees, and multiple categories of genes linked to social organization, including development and behavior, show high conservation. Key differences identified include a bias in bumblebee chemoreception towards gustation from olfaction, and striking differences in microRNAs, potentially responsible for gene regulation underlying social and other traits. Conclusions: These two bumblebee genomes provide a foundation for post-genomic research on these key pollinators and insect societies. Overall, gene repertoires suggest that the route to advanced eusociality in bees was mediated by many small changes in many genes and processes, and not by notable expansion or depauperation

Secondary attack rates in primary and secondary school bubbles following a confirmed case: Active, prospective national surveillance, November to December 2020, England.

BACKGROUND: Following the full re-opening of schools in England and emergence of the SARS-CoV-2 Alpha variant, we investigated the risk of SARS-CoV-2 infection in students and staff who were contacts of a confirmed case in a school bubble (school groupings with limited interactions), along with their household members. METHODS: Primary and secondary school bubbles were recruited into sKIDsBUBBLE after being sent home to self-isolate following a confirmed case of COVID-19 in the bubble. Bubble participants and their household members were sent home-testing kits comprising nasal swabs for RT-PCR testing and whole genome sequencing, and oral fluid swabs for SARS-CoV-2 antibodies. RESULTS: During November-December 2020, 14 bubbles were recruited from 7 schools, including 269 bubble contacts (248 students, 21 staff) and 823 household contacts (524 adults, 299 children). The secondary attack rate was 10.0% (6/60) in primary and 3.9% (4/102) in secondary school students, compared to 6.3% (1/16) and 0% (0/1) among staff, respectively. The incidence rate for household contacts of primary school students was 6.6% (12/183) and 3.7% (1/27) for household contacts of primary school staff. In secondary schools, this was 3.5% (11/317) and 0% (0/1), respectively. Household contacts were more likely to test positive if their bubble contact tested positive although there were new infections among household contacts of uninfected bubble contacts. INTERPRETATION: Compared to other institutional settings, the overall risk of secondary infection in school bubbles and their household contacts was low. Our findings are important for developing evidence-based infection prevention guidelines for educational settings

The Fragmented Armada: The Transmission of an Armada News Pamphlet (pp 107-130)

William Cecil’s Copie of a Letter (STC 15412 – 15414.6), consisting of a Letter, its postscript, its printer’s epistle and an additional pamphlet, Certaine Advertisements Ovt of Ireland, was produced in stages in the fall of 1588, an accumulative production attested to by both bibliographical evidence and governmental correspondence. The texts describe England’s military preparations, political climate, and the events of the summer in the form of an epistolary news letter addressed to Don Bernardino de Mendoza, the Spanish Ambassador to France. This attempt to spread the news of Spanish defeat, to delegitimize Catholic news sources, and to dissuade Catholic support for another convoy grew and developed as the political situation unfolded over the summer and early autumn of 1588. This paper examines the production and transmission of Cecil’s propaganda pamphlet to explore the interpretive frameworks that textual producers, both authors and publishers, used to package early modern news

Ritual economy and ancient Maya bloodletting: Obsidian blades from Actun Uayazba Kab (Handprint Cave), Belize

Ancient Maya material culture can be investigated from the perspective of ritual economy as a means to interpret the dynamic interrelationships between economic processes and the use of objects in ritual activities. Such interrelationships include access to raw materials, control of production and consumption, and the legitimate use of objects in various activities, including rites and performances, as constituted through a culture’s worldview. This paper presents an exploration of the relationship between obsidian blades and bloodletting in Maya ritual contexts from the perspective of ritual economy, highlighting the use of blades in Actun Uayazba Kab (Handprint Cave) in Western Belize. The roles of producers, consumers, practitioners, and observers are examined in terms of gender, status, and power by tracing the functional and ideological characteristics of obsidian blades, as both objects used to let blood and as symbols of bloodletting, based on evidence derived from microscopic use-wear analysis and iconography. Ethnographic and ethnohistoric information is employed to assist in contextualizing ancient Maya ritual activity in caves and to provide a cultural lens to reconstruct how bloodletting was connected to resource production and consumption, the creation and maintenance of identity, and the allocation of power among Maya participants through ritual