American Marten Denning Behavior in Michigan

Female American marten (Martes americana) produce litters of 1-5 kits between late March and early May. Kits remain with their mother for the duration of their first summer in a series of den structures. We located these den structures using radio-telemetry and placed remotetriggered cameras at the entrances to capture information on litter size, female activity patterns, and den visits by males and potential predators. From the summer of 2012 to the summer of 2014 we tracked 13 individual female marten (8 in the Lower Peninsula, 5 in the Upper Peninsula) with 17 litters to 75 unique den sites (60 in the Lower Peninsula, 15 in the Upper Peninsula). We found 58 dens in live trees, 11 in snags, 5 in hollow logs, and 1 subterranean. Of the tracked marten we were able to collect camera activity data for 14 litters produced by 11 female marten at 59 dens. We found that den trees in both the Lower and Upper Peninsulas were significantly larger than the trees surrounding them in a 30-m diameter circular plot. In the Lower Peninsula we found that den trees were in areas with a higher basal area than was found in randomly selected areas. Average litter size was 2.5 ± 0.25 kits (range 1-4, n=14). We recorded 858 activity periods, 68 occurrences of the female delivering prey to kits, 72 instances of males visiting dens, and two instances of potential predators at dens. We found no relationship between litter size and den relocation patterns, documented den reuse four times, and found a range of distances between successive dens (5–3382m, median 407m, n=60 relocations). These findings indicate that den-switching behavior is very complex and is likely due to a combination of outgrowing den space, pest buildup at the den, predator avoidance, and relocation to areas of higher prey density. The retention of large structures that are hollow or contain cavities is essential to maintaining suitable denning habitat for marten

Interview of Diana Regan, M.A.

Diana Regan was born in Philadelphia, on an undisclosed date, and grew up in Bryn Mawr, where she has spent her entire life with the exception of a brief time in the 1960s when she lived in New York City. Her father had his own business distributing home heating fuel oil, and her mother worked with him. She had one brother who is now deceased. Regan attended St. Thomas Aquinas elementary school in South Philadelphia, followed by high school at Mater Misericordiae Academy (now Merion Mercy Academy) in Merion, Pennsylvania. In pursuing her higher education, Regan first attended Immaculata College for one year, before receiving a Bachelor’s degree from Rosemont College in 1963, and a Master’s degree in French from Temple University in 1969. Regan has been teaching French since 1963, starting as a high school teacher at George Washington High School, Frankford High School, John Bartram High School, Masterman Demonstration High School, and Olney High School, where she also served as the head of the Foreign Language Department. She began teaching at the college-level in 1997, first as an adjunct at Chestnut Hill College, followed by a position as a French adjunct at La Salle University, starting in 1999, where she continues to teach today. Aside from teaching, Regan also devotes time to several organizations, including the American Association of Teachers of French, the Alliance Francaise de Philadelphie, and the Chestnut Hill women’s committee for the Philadelphia Orchestra, as well as organizes a travel study program through La Salle University, in which she takes students to France for ten days in a course titled ‘France in WWII, Under German Occupation’. Currently, Regan teaches at La Salle as a part-time adjunct professor, and continues her involvement in her professional organizations

Charter-School Management Organizations: Diverse Strategies and Diverse Student Impacts

Examines the growth of charter school management organizations, characteristics of students served, and use of resources; CMO practices; impact on students, including middle school test scores; and structures and practices linked to positive outcomes

Associations of Premenopausal Hysterectomy and Oophorectomy With Breast Cancer Among Black and White Women: The Carolina Breast Cancer Study, 1993–2001

Black women experience higher rates of hysterectomy than other women in the United States. Although research indicates that premenopausal hysterectomy with bilateral oophorectomy decreases the risk of breast cancer in black women, it remains unclear how hysterectomy without ovary removal affects risk, whether menopausal hormone therapy use attenuates inverse associations, and whether associations vary by cancer subtype. In the population-based, case-control Carolina Breast Cancer Study of invasive breast cancer in 1,391 black (725 cases, 666 controls) and 1,727 white (939 cases, 788 controls) women in North Carolina (1993–2001), we investigated the associations of premenopausal hysterectomy and oophorectomy with breast cancer risk. Compared with no history of premenopausal surgery, bilateral oophorectomy and hysterectomy without oophorectomy were associated with lower odds of breast cancer (for bilateral oophorectomy, multivariable-adjusted odds ratios = 0.60, 95% confidence interval: 0.47, 0.77; for hysterectomy without oophorectomy, multivariable-adjusted odds ratios = 0.68, 95% confidence interval: 0.55, 0.84). Estimates did not vary by race and were similar for hormone receptor–positive and hormone receptor–negative cancers. Use of estrogen-only menopausal hormone therapy did not attenuate the associations. Premenopausal hysterectomy, even without ovary removal, may reduce the long-term risk of hormone receptor–positive and hormone receptor–negative breast cancers. Varying rates of hysterectomy are a potentially important contributor to differences in breast cancer incidence among racial/ethnic groups

Archaeological Monitoring and Test Excavations at the 1722 Presidio San Antonio de Bexar (Plaza de Armas Buildings), San Antonio, Bexar County, Texas

From April 2013 to November 2014, the Center for Archaeological Research (CAR) at The University of Texas at San Antonio (UTSA) conducted archaeological monitoring and test excavations at the site of the 1722 Presidio San Antonio de Bexar, also known in the nineteenth and twentieth centuries as the Plaza de Armas Buildings (Vogel Belt Complex) within Military Plaza in San Antonio, Bexar County, Texas. The project was performed for Ford, Powell and Carson, Architects and Planners, Inc. under contract with the City of San Antonio in anticipation of renovations and improvements to the Plaza de Armas Buildings (Vogel Belt Complex) to serve as offices and studios for the City of San Antonio. The complex is listed as contributing to the Main and Military Plaza National Register of Historic Places District, with the buildings listed individually on the National Register of Historic Places (NRHP). In addition to the above, the property is owned by the City of San Antonio. Compliance with the Antiquities Code of Texas was required. As such, the State Antiquities Code and Chapter 35 of the San Antonio Local Government Code that require coordination with the City Office of Historic Preservation and the Texas Historical Commission Divisions of Archaeology and Architecture govern the undertakings. CAR, therefore, conducted the work under Texas Antiquities Committee Permit No. 6526. Dr. Steve A. Tomka served as the Principal Investigator for the majority of the fieldwork, the initial analysis, and the description of materials collected. Kristi Nichols served as the Project Archaeologist during this initial monitoring and testing, assisted by Lindy Martinez. Both Dr. Tomka and Ms. Nichols left UTSA in 2014, and Dr. Raymond Mauldin assumed the Principal Investigator role for the project. Clinton McKenzie and Leonard Kemp were the Project Archaeologists for the final phases of monitoring, as well as for assembling the final report. Leonard Kemp oversaw additional test excavation. Trinomial 41BX2088 was assigned to the location. Principal activities during the project included monitoring trenches on the complex’s exterior, monitoring soil removal in sections of the interior, and hand excavations of a series of units in the basement. These basement excavations produced a variety of materials. CAR staff documented eight features, including several trash pits, recovered a variety of Spanish Colonial, Native American, and European/English ceramics, along with faunal material, chipped stone tools and debitage, and construction related items. It was concluded that much of this material was intact, and that additional features and midden deposits are present. The project provides direct evidence of materials associated with the Presidio de Bexar, built by the Spanish at this general location in 1722, as well as occupation in this area through the early twentieth century. CAR recommends that prior to any impacts in the basements, or any external impacts greater than 2.0 m in depth at the rear of the Plaza de Armas Buildings (Vogel Belt Complex), a comprehensive, systematic effort to recover significant data be initiated

Experimental Validation of ARFI Surveillance of Subcutaneous Hemorrhage (ASSH) Using Calibrated Infusions in a Tissue-Mimicking Model and Dogs

Acoustic radiation force impulse (ARFI) Surveillance of Subcutaneous Hemorrhage (ASSH) has been previously demonstrated to differentiate bleeding phenotype and responses to therapy in dogs and humans, but to date, the method has lacked experimental validation. This work explores experimental validation of ASSH in a poroelastic tissue-mimic and in vivo in dogs. The experimental design exploits calibrated flow rates and infusion durations of evaporated milk in tofu or heparinized autologous blood in dogs. The validation approach enables controlled comparisons of ASSH-derived bleeding rate (BR) and time to hemostasis (TTH) metrics. In tissue-mimicking experiments, halving the calibrated flow rate yielded ASSH-derived BRs that decreased by 44% to 48%. Furthermore, for calibrated flow durations of 5.0 minutes and 7.0 minutes, average ASSH-derived TTH was 5.2 minutes and 7.0 minutes, respectively, with ASSH predicting the correct TTH in 78% of trials. In dogs undergoing calibrated autologous blood infusion, ASSH measured a 3-minute increase in TTH, corresponding to the same increase in the calibrated flow duration. For a measured 5% decrease in autologous infusion flow rate, ASSH detected a 7% decrease in BR. These tissue-mimicking and in vivo preclinical experimental validation studies suggest the ASSH BR and TTH measures reflect bleeding dynamics

Associations among personal care product use patterns and exogenous hormone use in the NIEHS Sister Study

It is hypothesized that certain chemicals in personal care products may alter the risk of adverse health outcomes. The primary aim of this study was to use a data-centered approach to classify complex patterns of exposure to personal care products and to understand how these patterns vary according to use of exogenous hormone exposures, oral contraceptives (OCs) and post-menopausal hormone therapy (HT). The NIEHS Sister Study is a prospective cohort study of 50,884 US women. Limiting the sample to non-Hispanic blacks and whites (N = 47,019), latent class analysis (LCA) was used to identify groups of individuals with similar patterns of personal care product use based on responses to 48 survey questions. Personal care products were categorized into three product types (beauty, hair, and skincare products) and separate latent classes were constructed for each type. Adjusted prevalence differences (PD) were calculated to estimate the association between exogenous hormone use, as measured by ever/never OC or HT use, and patterns of personal care product use. LCA reduced data dimensionality by grouping of individuals with similar patterns of personal care product use into mutually exclusive latent classes (three latent classes for beauty product use, three for hair, and four for skin care. There were strong differences in personal care usage by race, particularly for haircare products. For both blacks and whites, exogenous hormone exposures were associated with higher levels of product use, especially beauty and skincare products. Relative to individual product use questions, latent class variables capture complex patterns of personal care product usage. These patterns differed by race and were associated with ever OC and HT use. Future studies should consider personal care product exposures with other exogenous exposures when modeling health risks