Social science for conservation in working landscapes and seascapes

Biodiversity is in precipitous decline globally across both terrestrial and marine environments. Therefore, conservation actions are needed everywhere on Earth, including in the biodiversity rich landscapes and seascapes where people live and work that cover much of the planet. Integrative landscape and seascape approaches to conservation fill this niche. Making evidence-informed conservation decisions within these populated and working landscapes and seascapes requires an in-depth and nuanced understanding of the human dimensions through application of the conservation social sciences. Yet, there has been no comprehensive exploration of potential conservation social science contributions to working landscape and seascape initiatives. We use the Smithsonian Working Land and Seascapes initiative – an established program with a network of 14 sites around the world – as a case study to examine what human dimensions topics are key to improving our understanding and how this knowledge can inform conservation in working landscapes and seascapes. This exploratory study identifies 38 topics and linked questions related to how insights from place-based and problem-focused social science might inform the planning, doing, and learning phases of conservation decision-making and adaptive management. Results also show how conservation social science might yield synthetic and theoretical insights that are more broadly applicable. We contend that incorporating insights regarding the human dimensions into integrated conservation initiatives across working landscapes and seascapes will produce more effective, equitable, appropriate and robust conservation actions. Thus, we encourage governments and organizations working on conservation initiatives in working landscapes and seascapes to increase engagement with and funding of conservation social science

Children, Social Media, and the Trouble with “Bullying”: A Child-Centred Investigation of Definitions

Bullying troubles parents, teachers, and children themselves. The emergence of bullying in children’s use of social media, often referred to as cyberbullying, has heightened concern for children’s social and emotional wellbeing. Bullying is troublesome in the context of how it is defined and identified in children’s social interactions with peers. The “trouble” with bullying for this thesis is that the common definitions and models of bullying are adult-generated and children’s perspectives are often missing in existing bullying literature. I have developed a child-centred approach to deconstruct assumptions in adult-generated definitions of bullying. I argue that marginalisation of children’s perspectives is a problem and present one approach to redressing the balance. This thesis examines how children define bullying as a sense-making activity in the context of talking about their experiences of social media. It focuses on 11 – 13 year olds as a distinct social and emotional developmental stage, and a cohort for whom social media is becoming normal in their social world. Drawing on standpoint theory, social work theories, and childhood studies as a foundation, I developed a modified child-centred standpoint theory to critique the existing literature. The integrative research design I developed, including theoretical and analytic framework, supported an analysis of children’s methods for defining bullying to address this gap. The rich multimodal data set for this study was recorded at three schools in Wellington, New Zealand, designed to be consistent with ordinary classroom activities. The T-shaped analytic framework applies constructivist grounded theory for cross-sectional analysis of the data set, and ethnomethodology and membership categorisation analysis for granular analysis at key points. My analysis revealed a distinctive interactional approach to making sense of bullying in participants’ accounts, in contrast with existing adult-generated definitions focused on behaviour or personality. Out of this analysis, I have developed a child-centred interactional model for defining bullying. This emergent model demonstrates the orderliness in children’s methods for defining bullying in the broader context of interactions that range from the playful to the conflictual and hurtful. This thesis offers new theoretical and methodological contributions to understanding this complex social phenomenon by placing children’s knowledges at the centre

iFire Automated Fire Suppression System

Residential fires kill over 3000 people per year in the United States in addition to significant, if not total, loss of property and possessions. Present fire suppression systems delay the spread of the fire until the rescue personnel can fully evacuate the building and begin a secondary deluge of water. The iFire system aims to enhance current fire suppression systems by actively engaging the fire to prevent harm to life and property by augmenting a motorized system with fire detection sensors. This will allow for localized fire control in a particular room and alert firefighters where the main fires are located. One type of sensor that could be used in the system is a near Infrared sensor capable of detecting flame phenomena. In the market of low-cost fire sprinklers, the near Infrared sensors have an advantage of being inexpensive and easy to manufacture. This project chose to use near Infrared sensors with a specific wavelength detection of 940 nm and substituted near Infrared LED emitters for an actual fire. Combined with the sensors is a pan and tilt system to direct the water jet at the LED emitters. With the majority of fire suppression systems being simple deluge systems, the iFire team found that the market for automated systems was untapped and so research and development in this area could lead to new breakthroughs in fire suppression

iFire Automated Fire Suppression System

Residential fires kill over 3000 people per year in the United States in addition to significant, if not total, loss of property and possessions. Present fire suppression systems delay the spread of the fire until the rescue personnel can fully evacuate the building and begin a secondary deluge of water. The iFire system aims to enhance current fire suppression systems by actively engaging the fire to prevent harm to life and property by augmenting a motorized system with fire detection sensors. This will allow for localized fire control in a particular room and alert firefighters where the main fires are located. One type of sensor that could be used in the system is a near Infrared sensor capable of detecting flame phenomena. In the market of low-cost fire sprinklers, the near Infrared sensors have an advantage of being inexpensive and easy to manufacture. This project chose to use near Infrared sensors with a specific wavelength detection of 940 nm and substituted near Infrared LED emitters for an actual fire. Combined with the sensors is a pan and tilt system to direct the water jet at the LED emitters. With the majority of fire suppression systems being simple deluge systems, the iFire team found that the market for automated systems was untapped and so research and development in this area could lead to new breakthroughs in fire suppression

The trouble with bullying : deconstructing the conventional definition of bullying for a child-centred investigation into children's use of social media

This article deconstructs the conventional definition of bullying through analysis of its historical context, and identifies blind spots using lenses of gender, culture and setting. We explore theoretical and methodological problems associated with the conventional definition and its axiomatic use in bullying research, with particular reference to online bullying. We argue that because children may use ‘bullying’ to mean many different practices not captured in the conventional definition, using this definition often obscures the very phenomena researchers are aiming to describe. As a result, adults risk missing these practices in research and for interventions that use these studies as their evidence base

The molecular structure of human tissue type XV presents a unique conformation among the collagens

Establishing the structure of the non-fibrillar collagens has provided a unique perspective to understanding their specialized functions in the extracellular matrix. These proteins exhibit very diverse conformations and supramolecular assemblies. Type XV collagen is a large macromolecule distinguished by a highly interrupted collagenous domain and many utilized sites of attachment for CS (chondroitin sulfate) and HS (heparan sulfate) glycosaminoglycan chains. It is present in most basement membrane zones of human tissues, where it is found closely associated with large collagen fibrils. To determine the molecular shape and organization of type XV, the protein was purified from human umbilical cords by salt extraction, and by ion-exchange and antibody-affinity chromatography. The representation of type XV in one of its most abundant tissue sources is estimated at only (1–2)×10−4% of dry weight. The molecules examined by transmission electron microscopy after rotary shadowing were visualized in multiple forms. Relatively few type XV monomers appeared elongated and kinked; most molecules were found in a knot/figure-of-eight/pretzel configuration not previously described for a collagen. Collective measurements of these populations revealed an average length of 193±16 nm. At the N-terminal end, identified by C-terminal antibody binding, were three 7.7 nm-diameter spheres, corresponding to TSPN-1 (N-terminal module of thrombospondin-1) modules, and attached to the collagen backbone by a short linker. The type XV monomers show the ability to self-assemble into higher-order structures. Some were arranged in complex clusters, but simpler oligomers, which may represent intermediates, were observed in a cruciform pattern with intermolecular binding sites that probably originate in the interruption sequences. The morphology of type XV is thus the antithesis of the fibrillar collagens, and the shape attains the required flexibility to form the spectrum of interconnecting links between banded fibrils at the basement membrane/interstitial border. These type XV structures may act as a biological ‘spring’ to stabilize and enhance resilience to compressive and expansive forces, and the multimers, in particular, with selective complements of many localized CS and HS chains, may be instrumental in spatial and temporal recruitment of modulators in growth, development and pathological processes