The Supply Of Community Supported Agriculture

Community Supported Agriculture (CSA) has undergone both a rapid increase in growth and interest over the last two decades.  As such, the amount of literature on the subject has also increased.  However, there are few, if any, theoretical models of supply for CSA memberships (shares) that have been developed from CSA farm data.  This paper uses both survey and anecdotal data from the Roxbury Biodynamic Farm, one of the largest CSA in the United States, to present a theory of supply for CSA membership.  Included in the discussion is the consideration that CSA farms are not profit maximizing and that the farmers (i.e. the suppliers) knowingly take on the responsibilities and earnings associated with a CSA

The Demand For Community Supported Agriculture

Community Supported Agriculture (CSA) has undergone both a rapid increase in growth and interest over the last decade.  As such, the amount of literature on the subject has also increased.  However, there are few, if any, theoretical models of demand on CSA that have been developed from membership data. This paper uses both survey and anecdotal data of members of the Roxbury Biodynamic Farm, the second largest CSA in the United States, to present a theory of demand for CSA membership. Included in the discussion is consideration of the evidence that there is a direct relationship between production method and demand, usually a shibboleth in traditional economic analysis. Further exploration considers the possibility that over time participation influences the very nature of demand for CSA membership, and hypothesizes that this dynamic demand is a necessary but insufficient condition for the sustainability of CSA

A global phylogeny of butterflies reveals their evolutionary history, ancestral hosts and biogeographic origins

Butterflies are a diverse and charismatic insect group that are thought to have evolved with plants and dispersed throughout the world in response to key geological events. However, these hypotheses have not been extensively tested because a comprehensive phylogenetic framework and datasets for butterfly larval hosts and global distributions are lacking. We sequenced 391 genes from nearly 2,300 butterfly species, sampled from 90 countries and 28 specimen collections, to reconstruct a new phylogenomic tree of butterflies representing 92% of all genera. Our phylogeny has strong support for nearly all nodes and demonstrates that at least 36 butterfly tribes require reclassification. Divergence time analyses imply an origin similar to 100 million years ago for butterflies and indicate that all but one family were present before the K/Pg extinction event. We aggregated larval host datasets and global distribution records and found that butterflies are likely to have first fed on Fabaceae and originated in what is now the Americas. Soon after the Cretaceous Thermal Maximum, butterflies crossed Beringia and diversified in the Palaeotropics. Our results also reveal that most butterfly species are specialists that feed on only one larval host plant family. However, generalist butterflies that consume two or more plant families usually feed on closely related plants

The human body at cellular resolution: the NIH Human Biomolecular Atlas Program

Abstract: Transformative technologies are enabling the construction of three-dimensional maps of tissues with unprecedented spatial and molecular resolution. Over the next seven years, the NIH Common Fund Human Biomolecular Atlas Program (HuBMAP) intends to develop a widely accessible framework for comprehensively mapping the human body at single-cell resolution by supporting technology development, data acquisition, and detailed spatial mapping. HuBMAP will integrate its efforts with other funding agencies, programs, consortia, and the biomedical research community at large towards the shared vision of a comprehensive, accessible three-dimensional molecular and cellular atlas of the human body, in health and under various disease conditions

Effects of the reader's schema at different points in time

Bibliography : leaves 22-24Supported in part by the National Institute of Educatio

The reading group : an experimental investigation of a labyrinth

Running title: The reading group.Includes bibliographical references (leaves 83-89)Supported by the National Institute of Education under contract no. US-NIE-C-400-76-011

Conservation opportunities across the world's anthromes

Aim: Biologists increasingly recognize the roles of humans in ecosystems. Subsequently, many have argued that biodiversity conservation must be extended to environments that humans have shaped directly. Yet popular biogeographical frameworks such as biomes do not incorporate human land use, limiting their relevance to future conservation planning. 'Anthromes' map global ecological patterns created by sustained direct human interactions with ecosystems. In this paper, we set to understand how current conservation efforts are distributed across anthromes. Location: Global. Methods: We analysed the global distribution of IUCN protected areas and biodiversity hotspots by anthrome. We related this information to density of native plant species and density of previous ecological studies. Potential conservation opportunities in anthromes were then identified through global analysis and two case studies. Results: Protected areas and biodiversity hotspots are not distributed equally across anthromes. Less populated anthromes contain a greater proportion of protected areas. The fewest hotspots are found within densely settled anthromes and wildlands, which occur at the two extremes of human population density. Opportunities for representative protection, prioritization, study and inclusion of native species were not congruent. Main conclusions: Researchers and practitioners can use the anthromes framework to analyse the distribution of conservation practices at the global and regional scale. Like biomes, anthromes could also be used to set future conservation priorities. Conservation goals in areas directly shaped by humans need not be less ambitious than those in 'natural areas'