Advancing Social Equity and Promoting Black Self-determination: A Community Garden Opportunity Plan for Richmond, VA

Urban agriculture provides a variety of economic, environmental, and social benefits. Recognizing these benefits, the City of Richmond administers a community garden program known as “Richmond Grows Gardens.” Through this program, underutilized city properties are permitted for use as community gardens. However, an emerging concern is the potential for community gardens to perpetuate underlying structures of social and racial inequality through displacement and social exclusion. Considering these concerns, this plan investigates the implementation of community gardens in Richmond and establishes a methodology for ranking existing and available community garden sites based on the social and racial demographics of their surrounding communities. Furthermore, interviews with garden stewards reveal how decisions are made on the design, infrastructure, and process of community garden sites in Richmond, Va. Ultimately, this plan reinforces the idea that community gardens provide important opportunities to advance social equity and promote black self-determination. Community gardens are community assets that demonstrate collective power and, when implemented with intentionality, give communities the tools they need to define themselves. Accordingly, this plan establishes a credible vision for the future of community gardens in the city and provides pertinent recommendations and implementation strategies to ensure that community gardens advance social equity and black self-determination by anchoring community power

Where Images Make Their Wonder: An Introduction

The essay is an introduction to "Image / Images: A Debate between Philosophy and Visual Studies", the third issue of the Journal for the Philosophy of Language, Mind and the Arts. It draws a brief account of how images have been considered by key authors in the framework of both analytic philosophy and visual studies

Characteristics of some Phytophthora species isolated from oak forest soils in central and northern Italy.

Four Phytophthora species, P. citricola, P. megasperma, P. quercina and P. syringae, were isolated during a systematic survey of oak forests (Quercus cerris and Q. robur) in Tuscany (central Italy), and in the Po Valley and the Venetian Plain (northern Italy) from 22 out of 54 soil samples. The main morphological characteristics of the isolates and their growth rates on different substrates and at different temperatures are reported

Fusarium oxysporum f. sp. vasinfectum 5.8s rRNA gene and adjacent ITS1 and ITS2 regions

Fusarium oxysporum, Schlecht ex Fr. is a phytopathogenic fungus causing wilting or yellows disease on a variety of plant species throughout the world. It is categorized in formae speciales according to pathotypic variation and physiological character (Messiaen and Cassini, 1981 Fusarium:- Diseases, Biology and Taxonomy pp.427-445). The F. oxysporum forma specialis vasinfectum (Atk.) Snyder and Hansen is pathogenic on cotton (Gossypium spp.) on which it causes severe damage to susceptible races. We report here the DNA sequence of the 5.8S rRNA gene and flanking intergenic transcribed spacers of F. oxysporum forma specialis vasinfectum. DNA was isolated from mycelial cultures from three virulent isolates collected from single cotton plants from geographically distant sites in Bié, Cuanza Norte and Cuanza Bul regions of Angola (Ragazzi, 1992 J. Pl. Disease Protect. 99:499-504)

Species- and organ-specificity in endophytes colonizing healthy and declining Mediterranean oaks

The specificity of fungal endophytes to trees has generally been investigated on allopatric populations. In the present study, specificity was investigated on Quercus cerris and Quercus pubescens growing in sympatry at the same site, to examine host-endophyte interactions without interference from habitat-specific selective pressure. In a two-year study, 4800 samples were obtained from photosynthetic and non-photosynthetic tissue (leaves and twigs) both of healthy and declining trees. Endophytes were isolated from surface-sterilized samples and identified by traditional or molecular methods. Twenty-two endophyte species in 19 genera were identified. Some taxa in the Sordariomycetes, Dothideomycetes and Leotiomycetes colonized both species, but quantitative differences were evident. Water shortages and extended droughts may have impacted more severely on Q. cerris, which exhibited a more diverse endophytic assemblage and greater infection levels than Q. pubescens. In both species, more isolates were recovered from twigs than from leaves, and more from declining than from healthy trees. Endophytes tended to be specific to each host, and to the organs of that host. Interaction between plant species and the environment and continued competitive interaction between endophyte species may have led to niche diversification, with selection favouring host-specific and organ-specific endophytes. This study advances understanding of the role of some pathogenic fungal endophytes in Mediterranean oak forests