Women Farmers and E-Commerce Opportunities for 21st Century Marketing

Adding the Internet to your Business Recipe: Opportunity for Marketing in the 21st Century. In the fall of 2006, the Center for Rural Studies (CRS) and Women’s Agricultural Network (WAgN) piloted a curriculum for agricultural entrepreneurs interested in incorporating e-commerce features – e.g. email lists, Web sites, online marketing, online ordering – into their operations. This broad definition of e-commerce reflects the integration of information technology and the Internet into business and marketing planning. The workshops were held from 2006 to 2009. Each of the cycles provided insight into how to make future sessions more beneficial to participants. Offering the course even once/year during a period of rapid change in the available technology guaranteed that significant adjustments had to be made to the content each session. This working paper addresses why we took on this challenge, why women farmers became the target audience, how the course was structured, and an overview of the results of the classes to date. Also included are lessons learned from the experience and next steps

Hubble Space Telescope Observations of M32: The Color-Magnitude Diagram

We present a V-I color-magnitude diagram for a region 1'-2' from the center of M32 based on Hubble Space Telescope WFPC2 images. The broad color-luminosity distribution of red giants shows that the stellar population comprises stars with a wide range in metallicity. This distribution cannot be explained by a spread in age. The blue side of the giant branch rises to M_I ~ -4.0 and can be fitted with isochrones having [Fe/H] ~ -1.5. The red side consists of a heavily populated and dominant sequence that tops out at M_I ~ -3.2, and extends beyond V-I=4. This sequence can be fitted with isochrones with -0.2 < [Fe/H] < +0.1, for ages running from 15 Gyr to 5 Gyr respectively. We do not find the optically bright asymptotic giant branch stars seen in previous ground-based work and argue that the majority of them were artifacts of crowding. Our results are consistent with the presence of the infrared-luminous giants found in ground-based studies, though their existence cannot be directly confirmed by our data. There is little evidence for an extended or even a red horizontal branch, but we find a strong clump on the giant branch itself. If the age spread is not extreme, the distribution of metallicities in M32 is considerably narrower than that of the closed-box model of chemical evolution, and also appears somewhat narrower than that of the solar neighborhood. Overall, the M32 HST color-magnitude diagram is consistent with the average luminosity-weighted age of 8.5 Gyr and [Fe/H] = -0.25 inferred from integrated spectral indices.Comment: 22 pages, AASTeX, aaspp4 and flushrt style files included, 11 postscript figures, figures 1,2,5,7, and 8 available at ftp://bb3.jpl.nasa.gov/pub/m32 . Submitted to the Astronomical Journa

The Luminosity Function and Mass Function in the Galactic Bulge

We present deep photometry obtained with the Hubble Space Telescope (HST) in a field in Baade's Window in the Galactic bulge. We derive a luminosity function down to I ~ 24.3, or V ~ 27.5, corresponding to M ~ 0.3 Msun. The luminosity function from the turnoff down to this level appears remarkably similar to that observed in the solar neighborhood. We derive a mass function using both an empirical local mass-luminosity relation and a mass-luminosity relation from recent stellar model calculations, allowing for the presence of binaries and photometric errors. The mass function has a power law form with dN/dM proportional to M^{-2.2} for M >~ 0.7 Msun. However, we find strong evidence for a break in the mass function slope around 0.5-0.7 Msun, with a significantly shallower slope at lower masses. The value of the slope for the low masses depends on the assumed binary fraction and the accuracy of our completeness correction. This mass function should directly reflect the initial mass function.Comment: 26 pages, 9 figures, to be published in the Astronomical Journa

KATP channels are necessary for glucose-dependent increases in amyloid-β and Alzheimer\u27s disease-related pathology

Elevated blood glucose levels, or hyperglycemia, can increase brain excitability and amyloid-β (Aβ) release, offering a mechanistic link between type 2 diabetes and Alzheimer\u27s disease (AD). Since the cellular mechanisms governing this relationship are poorly understood, we explored whether ATP-sensitive potassium (KATP) channels, which couple changes in energy availability with cellular excitability, play a role in AD pathogenesis. First, we demonstrate that KATP channel subunits Kir6.2/KCNJ11 and SUR1/ABCC8 were expressed on excitatory and inhibitory neurons in the human brain, and cortical expression of KCNJ11 and ABCC8 changed with AD pathology in humans and mice. Next, we explored whether eliminating neuronal KATP channel activity uncoupled the relationship between metabolism, excitability, and Aβ pathology in a potentially novel mouse model of cerebral amyloidosis and neuronal KATP channel ablation (i.e., amyloid precursor protein [APP]/PS1 Kir6.2-/- mouse). Using both acute and chronic paradigms, we demonstrate that Kir6.2-KATP channels are metabolic sensors that regulate hyperglycemia-dependent increases in interstitial fluid levels of Aβ, amyloidogenic processing of APP, and amyloid plaque formation, which may be dependent on lactate release. These studies identify a potentially new role for Kir6.2-KATP channels in AD and suggest that pharmacological manipulation of Kir6.2-KATP channels holds therapeutic promise in reducing Aβ pathology in patients with diabetes or prediabetes

Dynamic analysis of amyloid β-protein in behaving mice reveals opposing changes in ISF versus parenchymal Aβ during age-related plaque formation

Growing evidence supports the hypothesis that soluble, diffusible forms of the amyloid β-peptide (Aβ) are pathogenically important in Alzheimer’s disease (AD) and thus have both diagnostic and therapeutic salience. To learn more about the dynamics of soluble Aβ economy in vivo, we sampled by microdialysis the brain interstitial fluid (ISF), which contains the most soluble Aβ species in brain at steady state, in >40 wake, behaving APP transgenic mice before and during the process of Aβ plaque formation (age 3–28 months). Diffusible forms of Aβ, especially Aβ(42), declined significantly in ISF as mice underwent progressive parenchymal deposition of Aβ. Moreover, radiolabeled Aβ administered at physiological concentrations into ISF revealed a striking difference in the fate of soluble Aβ in plaque-rich (vs. -free) mice: it clears more rapidly from the ISF and becomes more associated with the TBS-extractable pool, suggesting that cerebral amyloid deposits can rapidly sequester soluble Aβ from the ISF. Likewise, acute γ-secretase inhibition in plaque-free mice showed a marked decline of Aβ(38), Aβ(40) and Aβ(42), whereas in plaque- rich mice, Aβ(42) declined significantly less. These results suggest that most of the Aβ(42) that populates the ISF in plaque-rich mice is derived not from new Aβ biosynthesis but rather from the large reservoir of less soluble Aβ(42) in brain parenchyma. Together, these and other findings herein illuminate the in vivo dynamics of soluble Aβ during the development of AD-type neuropathology and after γ-secretase inhibition and help explain the apparent paradox that cerebrospinal fluid Aβ(42) levels fall as humans develop AD

Smaller Is Better: Associations Between Personality and Demographics Are Improved by Examining Narrower Traits and Regions

19 pagesThe personality of individuals is clustered by geographic regions; a resident of a region is more similar to another resident than to a random non-resident. Research in geographical psychology often has focused on this clustering effect in broad regions, such as countries and states, using broad domains of personality, such as the Big Five. We examined the extent to which (a) a narrower geographic unit, the U.S. ZIP Code, accounted for more variance explained in aggregating personality than a broader region, the U.S. state; and (b) progressively narrower personality traits (domains, facets, and nuances, respectively) provided more specificity in describing personality-demographic relationships. Results from this study (nparticipants = 39,886, nzipcodes = 2,074) indicated that the variance explained by aggregating personality was multiple times as large for U.S. ZIP Codes than for states (median = 4.4). At the level of personality domains, ZIP Code population density and income disparity were positively correlated with Openness and negatively correlated with Conscientiousness and Agreeableness. Facets within each domain were differentially correlated with each demographic, which demonstrated that facets added specificity to the personality-demographic relationships beyond that of domains. Item-level analysis revealed the most specific finding: higher population density and income disparity were associated with politically liberal attitudes and beliefs of self-exceptionalism, while lower density and income disparity were associated with authoritarian attitudes and concern for abiding by rules and laws. Findings suggest that future studies in geographical and personality psychology could benefit from using the narrowest feasible unit of analysis.Preparation of this manuscript was funded in part by grant SMA-1419324 from the National Science Foundation

The Hubble Constant from Observations of the Brightest Red Giant Stars in a Virgo-Cluster Galaxy

The Virgo and Fornax clusters of galaxies play central roles in determining the Hubble constant H_0. A powerful and direct way of establishing distances for elliptical galaxies is to use the luminosities of the brightest red-giant stars (the TRGB luminosity, at M_I = -4.2). Here we report the direct observation of the TRGB stars in a dwarf elliptical galaxy in the Virgo cluster. We find its distance to be 15.7 +- 1.5 Megaparsecs, from which we estimate a Hubble constant of H_0 = 77 +- 8 km/s/Mpc. Under the assumption of a low-density Universe with the simplest cosmology, the age of the Universe is no more than 12-13 billion years.Comment: 12 pages, LaTeX, with 2 postscript figures; in press for Nature, July 199