Social-ecological Heterogeneity Shapes Resilience of Small-scale Fisheries: An Interdisciplinary Analysis of the Mexican Chocolate Clam Fishery in Loreto, Mexico

All benefits provided by natural systems are embedded within coupled social-ecological systems (SESs). Fisheries are clear examples of SESs: through fishing, humans affect ecosystem structure and functioning, and in turn, receive benefits, including sustenance, employment, and cultural value. Resilience, the ability to maintain structure and function in the face of change, is key to sustaining the social and ecological components of fisheries-related SESs and their interactions. Many factors contribute to resilience, including heterogeneity. By identifying heterogeneity in these complex systems, we are better able to understand the capacity of fishery-related SESs to adapt to change, and contribute to management that protects valuable services. In this dissertation, I ask: 1) How are SESs associated with marine fisheries shaped by environmental, social, and institutional heterogeneity, and 2) what are the implications of this variation for resilience and adaptive capacity of fishers and the SES, in the face of changing environmental and socioeconomic conditions? To answer these questions, I employ an interdisciplinary approach focused on the chocolate clam (Megapitaria squalida) fishery in Loreto, Baja California Sur, Mexico. I conducted biological field studies, household surveys, interviews, ethnographic conversations, and developed fisheries models from my empirical work. Together, my results illustrate that management aligned with the biology of target populations and stakeholders’ goals is critical to sustainable fisheries. Heterogeneity among fishers affects their individual capacities to adapt to change. Maintaining a diversity of adaptive strategies is essential for individual adaptive capacity. Likewise, maintaining fishery heterogeneity, by ensuring all fishers are equipped to adapt, will strengthen community adaptive capacity. The chocolate clam provides diverse cultural and provisioning values to communities, and management that considers all benefits will be better equipped to account for the needs and knowledge of diverse stakeholders. Both formal and informal institutions shape fishing practices, and integrating them, via collaborative governance, would increase community participation in management and enhance fishery resilience. My interdisciplinary approach acknowledges the intricate web of human-resource interactions shaping fisheries and reveals how heterogeneity shapes SES resilience. Management that supports diversity in all forms will be better equipped to contribute to the resilience of these highly valuable and dynamic systems

DIG Social Media Manager Guidebook: Strategy Guide

The social media strategy guide is a framework for the DIG directors and the Social Media Manager to get the most out of DIG social media pages. The use of social media should be intentional, and this guide is an important step in creating a consistent, engaging social media presence. Social media pages, when managed well, can be powerful tools to communicate stories and garner support. In 2019, 72% of adults used at least one social media site (PEW). This means that social media is an incredibly powerful tool to reach a large network of donors and partners. It can be used to maintain and build relationships with DIG’s current and potential donors, supporters, and partners

DIG Social Media Manager Guidebook: Responsibilities Guide

The Social Media Manager Responsibilities Guide clarifies the responsibilities of the Social Media Manager on a monthly, weekly, and daily basis. Previously, the expectations of the Social Media Manager were not thoroughly documented. This document should enhance the organization of the content-sharing process by providing clear timelines and tools for managing DIG’s social media pages. It should be referred to by the Social Media Manager when they take on the role, as well as when they go through the posting process, to ensure no steps are missed

DIG Social Media Manager Guidebook: Style Guide

DIG does not currently have an established Social Media Style Guide. A style guide establishes consistent brand messaging across all public communication channels and allows DIG to communicate more consistently and effectively with its current and target audiences. This consistent brand messaging will build loyalty and trust, both of which are important in growing DIG’s donor base and establishing strong partnerships. The style guide will also serve to guide Social Media Managers in crafting captions for posts on social media

DIG Program Manager Digital Storytelling Resource

Serves as a resource for Program Managers to capture quality images and share detailed captions for effective digital storytelling

Temperature-related differences in the calcium transient between Atlantic cod (Gadus morhua) and steelhead trout (Oncorhynchus mykiss) cardiomyocytes

The Atlantic cod, Gadus morhua, differs from many teleosts in that its heart does not respond to adrenergic stimulation, and is more capable of maintaining function during acute temperature changes. To examine if differences in intracellular calcium mobilization are associated with these atypical responses, confocal microscopy was used to study the calcium handling of cardiac cells from Atlantic cod vs. steelhead trout at their acclimation temperature (10ºC), or subjected to acute temperature changes (to 4 and 16ºC), while being stimulated across a range of frequencies (10 – 110 min⁻¹). In addition, cells were tested with and without tonic (10 nM) levels of adrenaline at 10ºC, and pharmacological blockers were used to study the relative contributions of the L-type Ca²⁺ channel, sarcoplasmic reticulum and Na+/Ca²⁺ exchanger to the Ca²⁺ transient. Consistent with previous in vitro and in situ studies, there were few significant effects of adrenaline on the Ca²⁺ transient of cod cardiomyocytes, yet adrenaline had significant positive inotropic effects on trout cardiomyocytes. At 10ºC, peak Ca²⁺ (F/F₀) only differed between the two species at low stimulation frequencies (10, 30 min-1), with trout F/F₀ 25-35% higher. In contrast, the time to peak Ca²⁺ and the time to half relaxation were both shorter (by 10 – 35% across frequencies) in cod. Acute temperature changes caused a shift in the Ca²⁺ - frequency relationship in both species, with F/F₀ values higher for trout at low frequencies (< 70 min⁻¹) at 4ºC, whereas this parameter was greater at all frequencies except 10 min⁻¹ in cod at 16ºC. Unfortunately, these experiments did not highlight clear species differences in the relative contributions of the L-type Ca²⁺ channels, sarcoplasmic reticulum and Na+/Ca²⁺ exchange to the Ca²⁺ transient

Mathematical approaches to the study of cellular heterogeneity, treatment design, and immune response in cancer

One of the complicating factors in treating cancer patients is the different levels of heterogeneity involved. In this thesis, we use a combination of mathematical methods (in silico experiments) and experimental data (in vitro and ex vivo experiments) to study cellular heterogeneity, treatment design, and immune response in cancer. This thesis demonstrates the importance and value of interdisciplinary communication and collaboration. In Chapter 2, we develop a framework that uses in vitro and in silico experiments to characterize cancer cell lines and investigate the cellular dynamics during early cancer development for specific cancer cell lines. We demonstrate this process with the breast cancer cell line, MCF-7, and present evidence that progenitor cells are the significant cancer subpopulation during early cancer development for MCF-7 cells. In Chapter 3, we modify and build on the agent-based model of Chapter 2 to characterize the effect of pressure on mammosphere formation with and without the presence of a chemotherapy drug. Our results suggest that pressure induces phenotypic plasticity. In Chapter 4, we identify the Hsp90 protein network as a means by which drug resistance can be overcome in a drug-tolerant cell. We construct a minimal in silico model of this network to design a treatment schedule for docetaxel and radicicol. In silico experiments are used to show that radicicol can overcome the development of drug resistance to docetaxel with the proper treatment sequence, which can be accomplished with a nanoparticle formulation. We present evidence that the intake rate and the decay rate of radicicol are drug formulation properties that will have the greatest impact on increasing the efficacy of the docetaxel-radicicol treatment sequence. In Chapter 5, we investigate the variability in immune system response to anti-PD-1 immunotherapy. In this work, we construct a systems biology model and use sensitivity analysis to identify potential biomarkers for a positive response to anti-PD-1 immunotherapy. We present evidence of the importance of two interaction networks with regards to response to anti-PD-1 immunotherapy: 1) the interaction between cancer cells and CD8+ cytotoxic Tc cells, and 2) the balance between CD4+ Th1 and Th2 helper cells. In each of the chapters, we investigate heterogeneity at a different level: cellular heterogeneity with and without the cell microenvironment, variability in protein expression, and variability in immune system response. By developing an in silico model to describe the biological phenomena, we can investigate the underlying mechanisms at work and provide potential biomarkers and potential improvements that can be tested further

Studies in theory and method in sociolinguistics

PhD ThesisProblems raised in a pilot linguistic survey of a street in Newcastle upon Tyne (Pellowe 1967) are here treated positively. An informal normative model of the hearer's treatment of the speaker's output is developed in terms both of psychological processing and of social interpretation. This model is then interpreted methodologically and used to generate an analytical framework and a set of mete-interpretive procedures. These are tested in various ways on samples of speech from members of the Tyneside speech community, on experimental groups of hearers and speakers, and on various miscellaneous data. The generality, replicability and accountability of the methods are examined, and the consequences of the model and its techniques are contrasted with those of other studies

Measuring and predicting graded reader difficulty

This study used many-faceted Rasch measurement to investigate the difficulty of graded readers using a 3-item survey. Book difficulty was compared with Kyoto Level, Yomiyasusa Level, Lexile Level, book length, mean sentence length, and mean word frequency. Word frequency and Kyoto Level were found to be ineffective in predicting students' perceptions of book difficulty. Book length was found to be highly predictive of perceived book difficulty, with the Yomiyasusa Levels predicting 68% of variance, while the Lexile measure of mean sentence length was moderately predictive, with 40% of variance explained. These results show that current headword levelling of graded readers is ineffective and that publishers' book levels do not provide useful guidance in selection of books to read. It is therefore recommended that students use book length as their primary consideration in choosing books and that reading recommendations and purchasing decisions be based on Yomiyasusa Levels rather than publishers' levels

Novel Nanoparticulate and Ionic Titanium Antigens for Hypersensitivity Testing

Titanium is used in a wide variety of materials ranging from medical devices to materials used in everyday life. Adverse biological reactions that could occur in patients, consumers, and workers should be monitored and prevented. There is a lack of available agents to test and predict titanium-related hypersensitivity. The aim of this study was to develop two bioavailable titanium substances in ionic and nanoparticulate form to serve as antigens for hypersensitivity testing in vitro. Peripheral blood mononuclear cells from 20 test subjects were stimulated with the antigens and secretion of monocytic and lymphatic cytokines and chemokines were measured by a multiplex bead assay. Lymphocyte stimulation indices were also determined in a subset of test subjects by measuring CD69 and HLA-DR expression by flow cytometry. Cytokine profiling revealed that both antigens increased production of typical monocyte and macrophage secreted cytokines after 24 h, with significant increases in IL-1β, IL-7, IL-10, IL-12, IL-2R, IL-6, GM-CSF, TNF-α, IL-1RA, MIP-1α, MIP-1β, IFN-α, and IL-15. Lymphatic cytokines and chemokines were not significantly induced by activation. After seven days of stimulation, ionic-Ti (2.5 μg/mL) caused proliferation (stimulation index > 2) of CD4+ cells and CD8+ cells in all persons tested (N = 6), while titanium dioxide nanoparticles (50 μg/mL) only caused significant proliferation of CD4+ cells. Our preliminary results show that the experimental titanium antigens, especially the ionic form, induce a general inflammatory response in vitro. A relevant cohort of test subjects is required to further elucidate their potential for predictive hypersensitivity testing.publishedVersio