Agency and empowerment on women-owned farms: A Vermont agricultural case study

When examining data from the most recent US Census of Agriculture (2012), I noticed a distinct imbalance between the percentages of male and female farmers, both in the country and in Vermont. Sales from women-owned farms represent only 3.3 percent of the total of U.S. agricultural sales, and in Vermont, women were the principal operators of 22.38 percent of farms. I wanted to examine the factors that led to these imbalances, and also understand from women farmers themselves what strategies they used to overcome these obstacles. The theories of agency and empowerment can be used in explaining women’s inequality in agricultural spheres: agency, usually referencing decision-making power, leads into the process of empowerment. Empowerment is often a “fuzzy” term, or difficult to define, but it revolves around the ability to make choices, access to resources, as well as the subcomponent of achievement. I hoped to find with my research how women farmers went about the processes of agency and empowerment on their farms. I interviewed nineteen women farmers in Vermont from nine different counties about how they started farming, the structure and mission of their farm businesses, employment and management structures, use of support networks and organizations, necessary skills for farming, and whether they felt that their experiences in the world of agriculture were different due to their gender. In their answers to these questions, I teased out what barriers they perceived to their equality in agriculture, how they tried to surmount them as individuals, and also how they used support systems and other collectives to their advantage in the pursuit of both increased agency and empowerment. Although I did hear some stories of overt sexism and unfairness due to gender from some women, my overall findings were less negative/pessimistic and more focused towards an optimistic, equal future than I had expected to find. Many of the women I interviewed had diversification strategies in place on their farms, and many also combined farming with agritourism ventures. Both of these strategies offered an opportunity for agency and empowerment. Women tended to require hands-on instruction in order to comfortably learn new farming skills. Many women noted the importance of informal support networks of other female farmers as a factor of their successes both in learning these skills and in terms of emotional support, and stressed the importance of the Internet in forming and sustaining such networks. These results can be useful to Extension and other agricultural programs who interact with women farmers on a regular basis, as some women felt that these formal networks and organizations did not adequately serve their needs

Record Drilling Depth Struck in Greenland

On July 1, 1993, after 5 years of drilling, the Greenland Ice Sheet Project (GISP2) penetrated several meters of silty ice and reached bedrock at a depth of 3053.4 m. It then penetrated 1.5 m into the bedrock, producing the deepest ice core ever recovered (Figure 1). In July 1992, a nearby European ice coring effort, the Greenland Ice Core Project (GRIP), reached an ice depth of 3028.8 m, providing more than 250,000 years of record. Comparisons between these ice core records have already demonstrated the remarkable reproducibility of the upper ∼90% of the records unparalleled view of climatic and environmental change

Knockdown of L1CAM significantly reduces metastasis in a xenograft model of human melanoma: L1CAM is a potential target for anti-melanoma therapy

<div><p>Finding additional functional targets for combination therapy could improve the outcome for melanoma patients. In a spontaneous metastasis xenograft model of human melanoma a shRNA mediated knockdown of L1CAM more than sevenfold reduced the number of lung metastases after the induction of subcutaneous tumors for two human melanoma cell lines (MeWo, MV3). Whole genome expression arrays of the initially L1CAM high MeWo subcutaneous tumors revealed unchanged or downregulated genes involved in epithelial to mesenchymal transition (EMT) except an upregulation of Jagged 1, indicating a compensatory change in Notch signaling especially as Jagged 1 expression showed an increase in MeWo L1CAM metastases and Jagged 1 was expressed in metastases of the initially L1CAM low MV3 cells as well. Expression of 17 genes showed concordant regulation for L1CAM knockdown tumors of both cell lines. The changes in gene expression indicated changes in the EMT network of the melanoma cells and an increase in p53/p21 and p38 activity contributing to the reduced metastatic potential of the L1CAM knockdowns. Taken together, these data make L1CAM a highly interesting therapeutic target to prevent further metastatic spread in melanoma patients.</p></div

Verification of gene expression array data by immunohistochemical analysis of Jagged 1 and Notch 1 expression in subcutaneous tumors and lung metastases from a human melanoma (MeWo) xenograft experiment.

<p>Immunohistochemical staining for Jagged 1 (JAG1) expression (red) in subcutaneous (s.c.) tumors (upper left and upper right panel) and lung metastases (lower left and lower right panel) of melanoma cells (MeWo) with unchanged L1CAM expression (Luc, upper and lower left panels) and L1CAM knockdown (L1 kd, upper and lower right panels). All scale bars: 50 μm. Stainings show a tendency towards increased Jagged 1 for L1 kd tumors and metastases (A). Immunohistochemical staining for Notch1 expression (red) in subcutaneous tumors (upper left and upper right panel) and lung metastases (lower left and lower right panel) of melanoma cells (MeWo) with unchanged L1CAM expression (Luc, upper and lower left panels) and L1CAM knockdown (L1 kd, upper and lower right panels). All scale bars: 50 μm. Stainings show a tendency towards increased Notch 1 for L1 kd tumors and metastases (B). Immunohistochemical staining for Jagged 1 (JAG1) expression (red) in subcutaneous tumors (big panel) and lung metastases (smaller panel, lower left) of MV3 melanoma cells with unchanged L1CAM expression (Luc, left panels) and L1CAM knockdown (L1 kd, right panels). All scale bars: 50 μm. Stainings show no tendency towards altered Jagged 1 for L1 kd tumors and metastases (C).</p

Genes with the same regulation (up or down respectively) in MV3 and MeWo subcutaneous tumors with L1CAM knockdown (L1 kd) compared with their respective Luc control counterparts with unaltered L1CAM (Luc) expression.

<p>Included are only fold changes at least +/- 1.5; ANOVA and adjusted p-values <0.05, both for MV3 and MeWo tumors.</p

Gene expression with the same regulation (up or down respectively) in MeWo and MV3 subcutaneous tumors with L1CAM knockdown compared with their respective Luc control counterparts with unaltered L1CAM expression.

<p>Analysis using Pathway Studio software: Gene expression upregulated in L1CAM knockdown tumors compared with Luc control tumors with unaltered L1CAM; upregulated expression is given in red, downregulated expression in blue, potentially affected factors / processes in grey.</p

In vitro experiments yielded inconclusive results for predicting in vivo metastatic potential of L1CAM knockdown melanoma cells.

<p>Statistics: All numbers n represent the total number of individual samples (each from one individual animal) of the respective experiment. All values of P are derived from linear models. If P_{Group X Line} is below 0.05 (i.e. if L1CAM knockdown displays different effects for cells from the two lines), a separate P_{Luc vs. L1kd} is given for each cell line. Flow Cytometry: Staining of MeWo Luc and L1CAM knockdown (L1 kd) (left panel) and MV3 Luc and L1 kd (right panel) for L1CAM. In contrast to the Luc controls, surface L1CAM1 is reduced by more than 85% (MeWo) and apporoximately 75% (MV3) on the L1 kd cells (A). Proliferation assay: 5 X 10⁴ cells seeded per well and incubation for 48 h: Significant increase in proliferation for MeWo with L1CAM knockdown (L1 kd) compared with the MeWo Luc controls with unchanged surface L1CAM and significant decrease for MV3 L1 kd compared with MV3 Luc (B). Invasion assay: 1 X 10⁵ cells were seeded per well and incubated for 24 h: No significant change in the L1 kd knockdown cells’ ability for invasion (C). Colony forming assay: Cells were seeded in matrigel / culture medium in a 96-well plate; colonies were counted and evaluated using a light microscope after 14 days: Significant increase in colony numbers for MeWo L1 kd cells against MeWo Luc and no significant difference in colony numbers between MV3 L1 kd cells and MV3 Luc controls was observed (n = 48, each) (D). Laminar flow adhesion assay on activated endothelium: Interactions of melanoma cells suspended in culture medium with a HUVEC monolayer under laminar flow. The number of events (only adherence and tethering, no rolling events) increased significantly for MeWo L1 kd against MeWo Luc cells and decreased significantly for MV3 L1 kd against MV3 Luc cells (E).</p