Wheat Landrace Cultivation in Turkey: Household Land-use Determinants and Implications for On-Farm Conservation of Crop Genetic Resources

The continued cultivation of landraces by household farms in centers of domestication and diversity is considered to be an in situ means of conservation of crop genetic resources. However, because in situ conservation has continued into the present does not ensure that this de facto strategy for conserving crop genetic resources will continue into the future. Whether or not traditional varieties continue to be cultivated rests primarily on factors influencing the crop decisions of these household farms. This paper focuses on two questions: 1) what are the significant determinants influencing the household cultivation of traditional wheat varieties; and 2) how do those determinants affect on-farm levels of diversity and the stability of on-farm conservation? To address these questions, we incorporate socioeconom ic/household characteristics, as well as information on agroecological heterogeneity, market access, and perceptions of variety attributes into a household land-use decision model to examine plot-level decisions to cultivate wheat landraces. The results of this research have policy implications at several levels. If policy makers support in situ conservation, information on the househo lds most likely to continue to cultivate landraces, as well as the landraces cultivated by those households, can provide an idea of the likelihood of maintaining the current in situ conservation of crop genetic resources without intervention. Information on these households and on the significant determinants of their landrace cultivation can also provide guidance on the types and levels of intervention necessary, as well as the potential costs.Crop Production/Industries, Land Economics/Use,

Dopamine D(2 )receptors mediate two-odor discrimination and reversal learning in C57BL/6 mice

BACKGROUND: Dopamine modulation of neuronal signaling in the frontal cortex, midbrain, and striatum is essential for processing and integrating diverse external sensory stimuli and attaching salience to environmental cues that signal causal relationships, thereby guiding goal-directed, adaptable behaviors. At the cellular level, dopamine signaling is mediated through D(1)-like or D(2)-like receptors. Although a role for D(1)-like receptors in a variety of goal-directed behaviors has been identified, an explicit involvement of D(2 )receptors has not been clearly established. To determine whether dopamine D(2 )receptor-mediated signaling contributes to associative and reversal learning, we compared C57Bl/6J mice that completely lack functional dopamine D(2 )receptors to wild-type mice with respect to their ability to attach appropriate salience to external stimuli (stimulus discrimination) and disengage from inappropriate behavioral strategies when reinforcement contingencies change (e.g. reversal learning). RESULTS: Mildly food-deprived female wild-type and dopamine D(2 )receptor deficient mice rapidly learned to retrieve and consume visible food reinforcers from a small plastic dish. Furthermore, both genotypes readily learned to dig through the same dish filled with sterile sand in order to locate a buried food pellet. However, the dopamine D(2 )receptor deficient mice required significantly more trials than wild-type mice to discriminate between two dishes, each filled with a different scented sand, and to associate one of the two odors with the presence of a reinforcer (food). In addition, the dopamine D(2 )receptor deficient mice repeatedly fail to alter their response patterns during reversal trials where the reinforcement rules were inverted. CONCLUSIONS: Inbred C57Bl/6J mice that develop in the complete absence of functional dopamine D(2 )receptors are capable of olfaction but display an impaired ability to acquire odor-driven reinforcement contingencies. Furthermore, the ability of dopamine D(2 )receptor deficient mice to adjust their responding to a previously reinforced stimulus when unexpected outcomes are encountered is significantly impaired. These findings suggest that signaling mediated by the dopamine D(2 )receptor is important for regulating associative and reversal learning and may have implications for the treatment of human attention disorders

Increasing student evaluation capacity through a collaborative community-based program evaluation teaching model

The evaluation literature reflects a long-standing interest in ways to provide practical hands-on training experience in evaluation courses. Concomitantly, some funders have shown rising expectations for increased accountability on the part of Community-Based organizations (CBOs), even though agencies often lack the associated funding and expertise required. This paper describes a training evaluation model, developed and refined over the past ten years, that partners student needs for real-world evaluation experience with CBOs needs for technical expertise and assistance in conducting evaluation activities that support program improvement. The process of developing and implementing the model is presented, and content analysis of ten years of student feedback is summarized

Parents’ Perspectives on Family-centered Care in Juvenile Justice Institutions

Family-centered care during adolescent detention aims to increase parental participation in an attempt to optimize treatment outcomes. However, little is known about parents’ needs in family-centered care. To fill this gap, we interviewed 19 purposefully selected parents of detained adolescents using a semi-structured topic list. Although needs differed between parents, they were generally interested in activities that included spending time with their child. It is important for parents to receive timely information about their child's condition and treatment, detention procedures, and activities in the facility. The outcomes demonstrated that parents expected a two-way communication based on respect and reliability

Evidence for Habitual and Goal-Directed Behavior Following Devaluation of Cocaine: A Multifaceted Interpretation of Relapse

BACKGROUND:Cocaine addiction is characterized as a chronically relapsing disorder. It is believed that cues present during self-administration become learned and increase the probability that relapse will occur when they are confronted during abstinence. However, the way in which relapse-inducing cues are interpreted by the user has remained elusive. Recent theories of addiction posit that relapse-inducing cues cause relapse habitually or automatically, bypassing processing information related to the consequences of relapse. Alternatively, other theories hypothesize that relapse-inducing cues produce an expectation of the drug's consequences, designated as goal-directed relapse. Discrete discriminative stimuli signaling the availability of cocaine produce robust cue-induced responding after thirty days of abstinence. However, it is not known whether cue-induced responding is a goal-directed action or habit. METHODOLOGY/PRINCIPAL FINDINGS:We tested whether cue-induced responding is a goal-directed action or habit by explicitly pairing or unpairing cocaine with LiCl-induced sickness (n = 7/group), thereby decreasing or not altering the value of cocaine, respectively. Following thirty days of abstinence, no difference in responding between groups was found when animals were reintroduced to the self-administration environment alone, indicating habitual behavior. However, upon discriminative stimulus presentations, cocaine-sickness paired animals exhibited decreased cue-induced responding relative to unpaired controls, indicating goal-directed behavior. In spite of the difference between groups revealed during abstinent testing, no differences were found between groups when animals were under the influence of cocaine. CONCLUSIONS/SIGNIFICANCE:Unexpectedly, both habitual and goal-directed responding occurred during abstinent testing. Furthermore, habitual or goal-directed responding may have been induced by cues that differed in their correlation with the cocaine infusion. Non-discriminative stimulus cues were weak correlates of the infusion, which failed to evoke a representation of the value of cocaine and led to habitual behavior. However, the discriminative stimulus-nearly perfectly correlated with the infusion-likely evoked a representation of the value of the infusion and led to goal-directed behavior. These data indicate that abstinent cue-induced responding is multifaceted, dynamically engendering habitual or goal-directed behavior. Moreover, since goal-directed behavior terminated habitual behavior during testing, therapeutic approaches aimed at reducing the perceived value of cocaine in addicted individuals may reduce the capacity of cues to induce relapse

Dietary intake, dietary quality, and prevalence of obesity among HIV-infected and HIV-uninfected adolescents and young adults in the REACH study

Objective: To examine dietary quality and weight status among HIV-infected and HIV-uninfected youth. Methods: A cross-sectional dietary intake study was conducted with 264 HIV-infected and 127 HIV-uninfected youth from the REACH cohort study (67% black/non-Hispanic; 75% female). Dietary intake was collected using the Block Food Frequency Questionnaire (98.2). The REACH study provided additional clinical, biochemical, and demographic data. Logistic and linear regression models were used for the analyses. Results: Dietary quality: HIV was associated with a mixed effect on dietary intake; however, differences in macro- and micronutrient intakes were noted only among males. HIV-infected males had higher energy, fat, saturated fat, and cholesterol intakes than HIV-uninfected males. Although HIV-infected males had higher intakes of vitamin E, almost 40% of all participants had vitamin E intakes below the Estimated Average Requirements (EAR). A modified USDA's Healthy Eating Index (HEI) was used to look at overall dietary quality. The HEI was lower (indicating poor dietary quality) among HIV-infected compared to HIV-uninfected participants. Increased television watching was also associated with a lower HEI. Being female and having a higher self-perceived health was associated with a higher HEI. Obesity: Half of the HIV-infected (50.4%) and HIV-uninfected (54.3%) were overweight or obese. Prevalence of obesity decreased once CD4+ T-cells were <500 cells/[Mu]L. HIV did not modulate the effect of factors that increased the risk of obesity (female, living independently from parents/family, watching television [Greater than or equal to]3 hours/d, previous dieting, and being from the Northeast or South). Summary: These results demonstrate two important areas of health concern among HIV-infected adolescents. First, the dietary quality is poor, intakes of energy and dietary fat components are excessive, and the prevalence of obesity is high. Overweight and obese individuals with HIV infection may be at greater risk of developing metabolic abnormalities associated with HIV and antiretroviral therapy, such as hyperlipidemia, lipodystrophy, and insulin resistance. Second, the high prevalence of inadequacy in vitamin E intake may place individuals at increased oxidative stress associated with HIV infection. Nutrition educators should focus on developing individualized behavioral goals emphasizing improved dietary quality and physical activity to improve health and quality of life for these adolescents.</p