“Raw juicing” – an online study of the home manufacture of anabolic androgenic steroids (AAS) for injection in contemporary performance and image

Background: New evidence with regard to an under documented practice – the home manufacture of anabolic androgenic steroids (AAS) for injection, known as ‘homebrewing’ – in contemporary injecting performance and image enhancing drug (PIED) culture is the subject of this paper. Methods: Data was collected from five publicly accessible internet discussion forums and coded using NVivo software. For the purposes of this study, threads in relation to homebrewing (n = 14) were extracted from the final set of records for ethnographic content analysis. Results: Motivation to perform homebrewing was largely grounded in the circumnavigation of unreliable online sourcing routes for AAS products, financial losses and potential harms associated with contaminated and counterfeit injectables. Instructions on how to perform homebrewing were found within discussion threads. Identified areas of concern included potential for sterility and dosing issues, injecting harms, isolation from health services. Conclusion: This study provides a snapshot of online communal activity around practice of homebrewing AAS amongst individuals who inject AAS. Further research in this area is warranted, and will be of benefit to healthcare workers, treatment providers and policy makers particularly as this relates to evidence informed and targeted harm reduction policies and effective public health interventions

Luminescence Dating and Palynology of the Soda Lake Clay Dune Complex, Carrizo Plain, San Luis Obispo County, California

The extensive clay dune system developed around Soda Lake and smaller pans on the floor of the Carrizo Plain contain a climate change record spanning the last ~10 ka. Lake levels and dune activity are inversely correlated. Increased precipitation raises groundwater and lake levels, inhibiting deposition on the dunes. Samples of the aeolian sediment have been dated through optically stimulated luminescence. Pollen contained in the same samples were extracted and identified, with plant taxa being similar to those found on the plain today. Although diversity is low, dominant forms include insect-pollinated composites, chenopods, and pines. A sample (coded BDRP) collected near the middle of the dune ridge fringing the largest (North Basin) pan was dated at 9.62 +/- 0.70 ka (the oldest date obtained thus far). The BDRP pollen sample contained pine and oak and bore many large clusters of composite pollen, suggesting that the pollen did not travel far and probably accumulated where the plants grew, i.e. the dune was partially vegetated. Another sample from the base of the dune surrounding the second largest (South Basin) pan (SB1-11.25) yielded a date of 9.17 +/- 0.68 ka. These dates establish that the two largest units in the Soda Lake clay dune system existed and were active soon after the end of the Younger Dryas. Active deposition on the clay dune system continued throughout much of the Mid-Holocene. An additional date at 6.17 +/- 0.45 ka from the South Basin dune (SB1-9.55) yields an average vertical accretion rate of about 5 cm / 100 yr of compacted sediment on the dune. A thermal luminescence date on the North Basin dune (3.3 +/- 0.20) is evidence that the dunes remained active until a high stand of Soda Lake near the end of the Iron Age Neoglacial (based on radiocarbon dates of seeds obtained from lake cores at 2.85 +/-0.7 to 2.24 +/- 0.9 ka). Morphologic evidence(compound and complex dune forms) show that parts of the dune were reactivated when the water level fell. More than 90% of the modern dune complex is stabilized or undergoing active erosion

Field Experiences for Undergraduates at Georgia Southern University: Opportunities and Challenges of a Coastal Plain Setting

Work published in Geological Society of America Abstracts with Programs

Water quality in a tropical montane cloud forest watershed, Monteverde, Costa Rica

Study of the impact of population and commercial development within the town of Monteverde on the Rio Guacimal watershed. Estudio del impacto de la población y el desarrollo comercial dentro del pueblo de Monteverde en la cuenca del Río Guacimal.https://digitalcommons.usf.edu/sustainable_futures/1327/thumbnail.jp

Water quality in a tropical montane cloud forest watershed, Costa Rica

Study of the impact of population and commercial development within the town of Monteverde on the Rio Guacimal watershed.https://digitalcommons.usf.edu/sustainable_futures/1327/thumbnail.jp

Evidence for a Long-Lived Pleistocene Lake, Carrizo Plain, California

Two recently obtained cores provide evidence of a long-lived lake that occupied the Carrizo Plain during the Pleistocene. Both cores come from an elevation of 584 masl on a portion of the former lake floor that was abandoned during the Holocene. The longer of the two cores (~42 m) has been sampled for a variety of analytical studies (e.g., palynology, isotopic chemistry, environmental magnetism, and SEM-petrography). The magnetic susceptibility signal contains two notable features corresponding to lithologies consistent with reducing conditions. The higher of these features occurs near the surface, the lower at ~18 m depth. A 14C date on charcoal from the upper reduced zone places the top of this zone at no older than 17.74 0.330 14C ka (20.24-22.00 cal ka). This date is consistent with OSL dates on geomorphic features associated with a highstand at 595 masl. The youngest age of the highstand shoreline was constrained by an OSL date of 16.7 ka from the top of the corresponding clay dune. Assuming that reducing conditions correspond to deep water, the new 14C date suggests that the upper reduced zone represents a Stage 2 pluvial maximum lake in the Carrizo Plain. If the lower reduced zone has a similar origin, then the Carrizo Plain has held a lake since well before Stage 6 time. This implication substantially extends the time interval of lacustrine deposition on the floor of the Carrizo Plain and, therefore, the time since the basin lost external drainage. The present lake floor is tilted due to deformation likely associated with the nearby San Andreas Fault. The lake sediment cores were taken from a surface above the present lake (582 masl) presumably abandoned by this tilting sometime after the maximum highstand. Thus, any record of Holocene deposition, if it ever existed at either core site, has been lost, probably by deflation