The Merlin Trust

In 1990, the renowned plantswoman Valerie Finnis VMH founded the Merlin Trust, a charity that awards travel grants to young horticulturists. Ten years after her death in 2006, the Merlin Trust remains true to her vision, and the ever-growing band of ‘Merlins’ enrich the horticultural world with the knowledge and skills they have gained on their travels. Many of these horticulturists havegone on to work in botanic and physic gardens and this paper gives some examples of these

The Art Of Friendship: Solidifying Resettled Communities In Philadelphia

Written by two unlikely friends, this article discusses a project, Friends, Peace, and Sanctuary (FPS), that brought together professional book artists and recently resettled families from Syria and Iraq to co-create works together over the course of two years, and culminated in a series of exhibitions in Swarthmore, Philadelphia, and New York. Friendship and building intercultural relationships was at the heart of FPS, which we argue exemplifies the ways in which community-based, socially engaged art can function as a pathway to peace and social justice in local communities. The project, which formally ended in 2019, has had ripple effects in the resettled community of Philadelphia, and project collaborators continue to work closely together to promote peace in the City through arts and culture initiatives

Friends, Peace and Sanctuary: A Case Study

We are proposing a presentation session on a case study. Swarthmore College Libraries and the College’s Lang Center for Civic and Social Responsibility is engaged in a two year project, Friends Peace, and Sanctuary, that seeks to bring historical narratives of migration and displacement into conversation with current experiences of Iraqi and Syrian refugees through the medium of the book arts. Five established book artists have been invited to work with a group of around fifteen recently resettled Iraqis and Syrians to collaborate on new artistic works through a series of ten workshops. Given that the project was conceived to be as fully bilingual (Arabic and English) as possible, we have hired students to translate archival materials on migration and refugees into Arabic so that all of our collaborators may have access to these materials. In parallel to the project work, Katie Price and Peggy Seiden are teaching a class (Spring 2018) that engages students in the Project’s work through observation, interviews, reflection and research utilizing a variety of disciplinary methods. The students’ final project is a piece of public scholarship that brings together their experiences in the workshops, interviews, and research findings. In this presentation, Price, Seiden, and Seesman will discuss the project findings to date and share what they’ve learned from collaborating with refugee resettlement organizations, libraries, civic engagements centers, students, faculty, and staff

Influencers of COVID-19 Vaccine Acceptance in the Deep South

Background: Within the Deep South, vaccine ratings fall between 48.5-58% of the state’s population being fully vaccinated against COVID-19. Therefore, half of the population is at risk for the negative mortality and morbidity outcomes associated with COVID-19.Purpose: The aim of this study was to describe key influencers for accepting the COVID-19 vaccine for individuals living within the Deep South region of the US.Methods: A descriptive, secondary analysis of quantitative data was conducted from an online survey entitled COVID-19 Vaccine Acceptance Survey. A total of 421 participants identified as living in the Deep South, were ≥ 18 years of age, and English speaking and thus were included in the analysis. Descriptive statistics and mean frequency scores were calculated.Results: The highest means were identified among the social responsibility influencers for participants regardless of gender, race, or age. Healthcare influencers, particularly the option of a doctor, healthcare provider, nurse, also positively influenced male and female participants who were ≥25 years old. Public figure influencers had little to no influence on the overall sample.Conclusions: With the current pandemic impacting those who are unvaccinated, an increase in targeted strategies and interventions to increase vaccine acceptance in the Deep South is warranted

Effects of Urbanization on Stream Flashiness in the I-85 Corridor of the Southeastern Piedmont

The metro areas of the southeastern Piedmont are rapidly expanding, bringing changes to the hydrology of the watersheds within them. Increased urbanization can have significant effects on stream hydrology within a watershed, including large fluctuations of flow in streams referred to as “stream flashiness”. Increased stream flashiness has numerous consequences, including water quality degradation, flooding, and destruction of aquatic habitats. This thesis quantifies stream flashiness in urban and rural streams and investigates the relationship between flashiness and watershed land cover, particularly the amount and spatial distribution of impervious surfaces. Results show a strong relationship between urbanization and peak flows, but indicate that the underlying geology and other natural/anthropogenic factors complicate the relationship between R-B index and percent impervious surface cover. Results also indicate regional patterns within the southeastern Piedmont, most notably flashier streams in North Carolina compared to Georgia

The Leishmania major BBSome subunit BBS1 is essential for parasite virulence in the mammalian host

Bardet–Biedl syndrome (BBS) is a human genetic disorder with a spectrum of symptoms caused by primary cilium dysfunction. The disease is caused by mutations in one of at least 17 identified genes, of which seven encode subunits of the BBSome, a protein complex required for specific trafficking events to and from the primary cilium. The molecular mechanisms associated with BBSome function remain to be fully elucidated. Here, we generated null and complemented mutants of the BBSome subunit BBS1 in the protozoan parasite, Leishmania. In the absence of BBS1, extracellular parasites have no apparent defects in growth, flagellum assembly, motility or differentiation in vitro but there is accumulation of vacuole-like structures close to the flagellar pocket. Infectivity of these parasites for macrophages in vitro is reduced compared with wild-type controls but the null parasites retain the ability to differentiate to the intracellular amastigote stage. However, infectivity of BBS1 null parasites is severely compromised in a BALB/c mouse footpad model. We hypothesize that the absence of BBS1 in Leishmania leads to defects in specific trafficking events that affect parasite persistence in the host. This is the first report of an association between the BBSome complex and pathogen infectivity