Healing Through Mother Earth

This thesis deals with mental health, with a focus on Black women. Historically, Black women are often so compromised, being constant caregivers and helping everyone else, that they forget to help themselves, not having the time and financial means to do so. If we go back in the time of slavery, many Black women were taking care of slave owners\u27 children and suckling the white women’s babies instead of their own. By the time they got home and after diligently caring for other people’s children they were focused on their own children, who they had been away from for hours on end, in turn having no time to focus on themselves. During the times of slavery, women were abused physically and sexually, which created a lot of mental illnesses, crazed behavior, and post-traumatic stress, leading to death or their slave owners killing them. In today’s society, we still see similar instances of how women put on a façade, hiding what is truly happening to them. The history of strength and survival of Black people perpetuates ludicrous attitudes within the Black community of not needing help for psychological issues, including the stereotype that psychological therapy and natural healing are only for white women. However, natural healing is a part of Black history, as Black women healed through natural ways using the herbs that they had access to in the fields. This thesis will not only discuss healing wholly but healing through Mother Earth and the breaking of attitudes within the identity of the Black community that limit opportunities for healing

Poliomyelitis and Polioencephalitis

Abstract Not Provided

Modifications to the Aesop's Fable paradigm change New Caledonian crow performances

While humans are able to understand much about causality, it is unclear to what extent non-human animals can do the same. The Aesop's Fable paradigm requires an animal to drop stones into a water-filled tube to bring a floating food reward within reach. Rook, Eurasian jay, and New Caledonian crow performances are similar to those of children under seven years of age when solving this task. However, we know very little about the cognition underpinning these birds' performances. Here, we address several limitations of previous Aesop's Fable studies to gain insight into the causal cognition of New Caledonian crows. Our results provide the first evidence that any non-human animal can solve the U-tube task and can discriminate between water-filled tubes of different volumes. However, our results do not provide support for the hypothesis that these crows can infer the presence of a hidden causal mechanism. They also call into question previous object-discrimination performances. The methodologies outlined here should allow for more powerful comparisons between humans and other animal species and thus help us to determine which aspects of causal cognition are distinct to humans.Publisher PDFPeer reviewe

The mixed problem in Lipschitz domains with general decompositions of the boundary

This paper continues the study of the mixed problem for the Laplacian. We consider a bounded Lipschitz domain $\Omega\subset \reals^n$, $n\geq2$, with boundary that is decomposed as $\partial\Omega=D\cup N$, $D$ and $N$ disjoint. We let $\Lambda$ denote the boundary of $D$ (relative to $\partial\Omega$) and impose conditions on the dimension and shape of $\Lambda$ and the sets $N$ and $D$. Under these geometric criteria, we show that there exists $p_0>1$ depending on the domain $\Omega$ such that for $p$ in the interval $(1,p_0)$, the mixed problem with Neumann data in the space $L^p(N)$ and Dirichlet data in the Sobolev space $W^ {1,p}(D)$ has a unique solution with the non-tangential maximal function of the gradient of the solution in $L^p(\partial\Omega)$. We also obtain results for $p=1$ when the Dirichlet and Neumann data comes from Hardy spaces, and a result when the boundary data comes from weighted Sobolev spaces.Comment: 36 page

Trajectory mapping: A tool for validation of trace gas observations

We investigate the effectiveness of trajectory mapping(TM) as a data validation tool. TM combines a dynamical model of the atmosphere with trace gas observations to provide more statistically robust estimates of instrument performance over much broader geographic areas than traditional techniques are able to provide. We present four detailed case studies selected so that the traditional techniques are expected to work well. In each case the TM results are equivalent to or improve upon the measurement comparisons performed with traditional approaches. The TM results are statistically more robust than those achieved using traditional approaches since the TM comparisons occur over a much larger range of geophysical variability. In the first case study we compare ozone data from the Halogen Occultation Experiment (HALOE) with Microwave Limb Sounder(MLS). TM comparisons appear to introduce little to no error as compared to the traditional approach. In the second case study we compare ozone data from HALOE with that from the Stratospheric Aerosol and Gas Experiment TT(SAGE TT). TM results in differences of less than 5% as compared to the traditional approach at altitudes between 18 and 25 km and less than 10% at altitudes between 25 and 40 km.In the third case study we show that ozone profiles generated from HALOE data using TM compare well with profiles from five European ozonesondes. In the fourth case study we evaluate the precision of MLS H20 using TM and find typical precision uncertainties of 3-7% at most latitudes and altitudes. The TM results agree well with previous estimates but are the result of a global analysis of the data rather than an analysis in the limited latitude bands in which traditional approaches work. Finally, sensitivity studies using the MLS H20 data show the following: (1) a combination of forward and backward trajectory calculations minimize uncertainties in isentropic TM; (2) although the uncertainty of the technique increases with trajectory duration,TM calculations of up to 14 days can provide reliable information for use in data validation studies; (3) a correlation coincidence criterion of 400 km produces the best TM results under most circumstances; (4) TM performs well compared to (and sometimes better than) traditional approaches at all latitudes and in most seasons and; (5) TM introduces no statistically significant biases at altitudes between 22 and 40 km

Deep Retrofit System Solution Assessment for Philadelphia Navy Yard Office Buildings

Initial assessments of economically attractive integrated building energy system solutions that can substantially reduce energy consumption in two medium-sized office buildings in the Philadelphia Navy Yard are presented. These sites were selected because they are the current and future headquarters of the DOE Energy Efficient Buildings Hub (EEB HUB). Energy efficient retrofit solutions involving integrated building systems with 40-60% site- and source-energy reduction potential relative to selected baseline energy consumption configurations are identified. The scope of retrofit options explored and integrated involve the building envelope, lighting and HVAC systems as well as the related control systems, providing a spectrum of retrofit options that range from low-/no-cost options to relatively higher capital cost options that involve significant capital upgrades and facility renovations. The energy savings estimates are based on combining multiple energy conservation measures (ECMs) that are tailored to the building use type and climate conditions. Energy performance (energy savings potential) and economic impact (NPV, IRR, and simple payback) of these retrofit system solution recommendations are assessed for two office buildings – Building 101 and Building 661, at the Philadelphia Navy Yard. A suite of retrofit system packages is presented for each building with a range of initial investments and economic returns to assist the investment decision making process, by stakeholders such as the building owner and operator. Results of the cost benefit analyses will be presented in light of incentives for high performance office buildings in the Philadelphia ten-county region

Mental template matching is a potential cultural transmission mechanism for New Caledonian crow tool manufacturing traditions

Cumulative cultural evolution occurs when social traditions accumulate improvements over time. In humans cumulative cultural evolution is thought to depend on a unique suite of cognitive abilities, including teaching, language and imitation. Tool-making New Caledonian crows show some hallmarks of cumulative culture; but this claim is contentious, in part because these birds do not appear to imitate. One alternative hypothesis is that crows' tool designs could be culturally transmitted through a process of mental template matching. That is, individuals could use or observe conspecifics' tools, form a mental template of a particular tool design, and then reproduce this in their own manufacture - a process analogous to birdsong learning. Here, we provide the first evidence supporting this hypothesis, by demonstrating that New Caledonian crows have the cognitive capacity for mental template matching. Using a novel manufacture paradigm, crows were first trained to drop paper into a vending machine to retrieve rewards. They later learnt that only items of a particular size (large or small templates) were rewarded. At test, despite being rewarded at random, and with no physical templates present, crows manufactured items that were more similar in size to previously rewarded, than unrewarded, templates. Our results provide the first evidence that this cognitive ability may underpin the transmission of New Caledonian crows' natural tool designs.Tis study was supported by the NZ Marsden fund (RDG), a Rutherford Discovery Fellowship and the 2015 Prime Ministers MacDiarmid Emerging Scientist prize (AHT). SAJ thanks the ERC (Grant Agreement No. 3399933) for funding

The Drosophila genome nexus: a population genomic resource of 623 Drosophila melanogaster genomes, including 197 from a single ancestral range population.

Hundreds of wild-derived Drosophila melanogaster genomes have been published, but rigorous comparisons across data sets are precluded by differences in alignment methodology. The most common approach to reference-based genome assembly is a single round of alignment followed by quality filtering and variant detection. We evaluated variations and extensions of this approach and settled on an assembly strategy that utilizes two alignment programs and incorporates both substitutions and short indels to construct an updated reference for a second round of mapping prior to final variant detection. Utilizing this approach, we reassembled published D. melanogaster population genomic data sets and added unpublished genomes from several sub-Saharan populations. Most notably, we present aligned data from phase 3 of the Drosophila Population Genomics Project (DPGP3), which provides 197 genomes from a single ancestral range population of D. melanogaster (from Zambia). The large sample size, high genetic diversity, and potentially simpler demographic history of the DPGP3 sample will make this a highly valuable resource for fundamental population genetic research. The complete set of assemblies described here, termed the Drosophila Genome Nexus, presently comprises 623 consistently aligned genomes and is publicly available in multiple formats with supporting documentation and bioinformatic tools. This resource will greatly facilitate population genomic analysis in this model species by reducing the methodological differences between data sets

Conservation of a crystallographic interface suggests a role for β-sheet augmentation in influenza virus NS1 multifunctionality

The structure of a monomeric effector domain from influenza A virus NS1 is presented from diffraction data extending to 1.8 Å resolution. Comparison of this and other NS1 effector-domain structures shows conformational changes at a strand–strand packing interface, hinting at a role for β-strand augmentation in NS1 function