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The Changing Lives of Amish Women: Surprising Findings from My PhD Research
No full textIn the foreword to Plain Women(Reynolds, 2001), the ethnographer Simon Bronner writes, “In fact we know far more about Amish men than about Amish women.” His statement prompted me to want to know more about Amish women. My research into how life has changed for Amish women fulfilled both my own intellectual curiosity and fills a gap in the understanding of the lives of Amish women in the wider academic field, although a thorough treatment of the lives of Amish women was subsequently published, which both supports and contrasts with my findings (Johnson-Weiner, 2020). After an initial introduction to Amish women via a gatekeeper, I used snowball sampling to find other Old Order and New Order Amish women, first in Holmes County, Ohio, and later in various communities in Pennsylvania. My fieldwork was based on an ethnographic approach whereby I lived with Amish families as well as interviewed New Order and Old Order women in Ohio and Old Order women in Pennsylvania during visits in 2012 and 2014. This article describes changes identified by those women in homes and gardens, household technology, travel, and vacation habits in their lifetimes
Availability and Characteristics of Hemp-Derived Psychoactive Cannabis Products: A Pilot Study in Cleveland, Ohio
No full textBackground: Hemp-derived psychoactive cannabis products (HDPCPs), such as delta-8 tetrahydrocannabinol (THC), emerged onto the market as an alternative to cannabis following the 2018 US Farm Bill which legalized hemp. Research on HDPCPs remains limited. The purpose of this research was to evaluate the availability, placement, and consumption modality of HDPCPs as well as to identify potential defining characteristics of consumers.
Methods: Between October 2022 and January 2023, researchers visited a random sample of 82 tobacco retailers in Cleveland, Ohio, to evaluate the availability of HDPCPs marketed as delta THC (eg, delta-8 or delta-10). Information was captured on where the HDPCPs were placed (eg, behind the counter, on the counter, by candy, or elsewhere) as well as the consumption modality (eg, edible or inhaled). Among retailers who stocked these products, clerks were asked who typically buys these products and how often they are purchased.
Results: Over two-fifths (41.5%) of retailers carried HDPCPs. Most retailers (97.1%) carried delta THC products behind the counter and carried products as inhaled (82.4%), edible (70.6%). More than half of retailers (55.9%) carried both inhaled and edible forms of HDPCP. Retail clerks reported on a range of ages of consumers from younger to older or “everyone.”
Conclusion: Hemp-derived psychoactive cannabis products are prevalent in this pilot study sample. These findings necessitate additional research to better quantify the population health impact of these products to determine if regulatory action may be necessary to protect public health
Development and Delivery of a Novel Interdisciplinary Online Course Focused on Pandemics and COVID-19
No full textMisinformation regarding COVID-19 has clouded the judgment and perspectives of many individuals. At Ohio Northern University, an interdisciplinary online elective course was developed to allow students the opportunity to gain evidence-based insight about the far-reaching implications of pandemics, with a specific focus on COVID-19. This course is open to any undergraduate student at the university without any prerequisites; however the majority of enrolled students come from the pharmacy and nursing programs. This paper describes the development, delivery, and assessment methods of this course. Course evaluation and modifications have allowed this course to evolve over time and remain a well-enrolled course at Ohio Northern University
Exploring the Distribution of Phylogenetic Networks Generated Under a Birth-Death-Hybridization Process
No full textGene-flow processes such as hybridization and introgression play important roles in shaping diversity across the tree of life. Recent studies extending birth-death models have made it possible to investigate patterns of reticulation in a macroevolutionary context. These models allow for different macroevolutionary patterns of gene flow events that can either add, maintain, or remove lineages—with the gene flow itself possibly being dependent on the relatedness between species—thus creating complex diversification scenarios. Further, many reticulate phylogenetic inference methods assume specific reticulation structures or phylogenies belonging to certain network classes. However, the distributions of phylogenetic networks under reticulate birth-death processes are poorly characterized, and it is unknown whether they violate common methodological assumptions. We use simulation techniques to explore phylogenetic network space under a birth-death-hybridization process where the hybridization rate can have a linear dependence on genetic distance. Specifically, we measured the number of lineages through time and role of hybridization in diversification along with the proportion of phylogenetic networks that belong to commonly used network classes (e.g., tree-child, tree-based, or level-1 networks). We find that the growth of phylogenetic networks and class membership are largely affected by assumptions about macroevolutionary patterns of gene flow. In accordance with previous studies, a lower proportion of networks belonged to these classes based on type and density of reticulate events. However, under a birth-death-hybridization process, these factors form an antagonistic relationship; the type of reticulation events that cause high membership proportions also lead to the highest reticulation density, consequently lowering the overall proportion of phylogenies in some classes. Further, we observed that genetic distance–dependent gene flow and incomplete sampling increase the proportion of class membership, primarily due to having fewer reticulate events. Our results can inform studies if their biological expectations of gene flow are associated with evolutionary histories that satisfy the assumptions of current methodology and aid in finding phylogenetic classes that are relevant for methods development
Species and Speciation in the Termite-Cultivated Fungus Termitomyces.
No full textTermitomyces is a genus of basidiomycete fungi cultivated by termites of the subfamily Macrotermitinae. This symbiosis originated in central Africa, and subsequently, the fungus-growing termites have colonized almost the entire African continent including Madagascar as well as significant parts of Asia. Around 40 species of Termitomyces have been described based on morphology of the sexual fruit bodies, which are associated with some 330 species of fungus-growing termites distributed over 11 genera. However, the total number of fungal species may be higher as not all species regularly produce mushrooms, and morphological variation does not seem to be a reliable criterion for species delimitation in this group. In this study we estimated the total number of species based on ITS-barcode criteria and assessed host specificity and geographic differentiation to infer patterns of speciation. We estimated the total number of phylogenetic species using two methods of DNA sequence-based species delimitation; Automatic Barcode Gap Discovery (ABGD) and the Generalized Mixed Yule Coalescent (GMYC) model on a large dataset of over 1,500 ITS sequences from laboratory cultures, fungarium specimens and the public database NCBI Genbank. This resulted in an estimated 87 species hypotheses using ABGD and 94 species hypotheses using the GMYC model. A phylogenetic reconstruction was performed on representative sequences of the 87 species hypotheses identified by ABGD (the most conservative estimate) constrained by a well-supported phylogeny based on whole-genome data to address host specificity and geographical differentiation. Five main clades were recovered which generally were associated with species of one or two host genera, except for samples collected from the genera Microtermes and Ancistrotermes, which formed two separate non-sister clades. We did not find any evidence for long-term host fidelity as would be expected for species with strict uniparental vertical symbiont transmission. We found strict geographic separation between African and Asian species of Termitomyces and infer a minimum of seven inter-continental migrations. We show that epigeous fruiting of the T. microcarpus group has a single evolutionary origin in Africa and that fruiting in species of this group likely is induced by the fungus rather than by the host-termite species. In contrast, fruiting in the symbionts of some species of Microtermes and Macrotermes may be suppressed by the host-termite species, since mushrooms of certain fungal species are found when those species are associated with some termite-host genera, but never when associated with other host genera. We discuss some examples of incongruence between morphological and phylogenetic species concepts and give suggestions to improve the taxonomy of the genus Termitomyces
Phylogeography of the Island Leaf Warbler (Aves: Phylloscopus Poliocephalus) in Northern Melanesia Reveals Rapid Secondary Sympatry or Ecological Speciation on Kolombangara Island, Solomon Islands
No full textIsland archipelagos are well known for promoting geographic and adaptive radiations in terrestrial animals. Sympatry of closely related species in island systems has been thought to occur primarily through double-invasions from the same continental source population. Alternatively, this process can occur on a smaller geographic scale where divergent populations isolated from one another within an archipelago may come back into contact via intra-archipelago dispersal. Depending on degree of divergence and the development of reproductive isolating barriers, the result of this secondary contact could be gene flow between isolated populations, exclusion or extirpation of one population via competition, or the establishment of reproductively isolated sympatric species. Here, we provide strong evidence for intra-archipelago secondary sympatry within a radiation of Phylloscopus warblers in the Solomon and Bismarck archipelagos by presenting the first well-sampled phylogeny of Phylloscopus warbler populations in the region. By using genome-wide genetic data and complete mitochondrial genomes we also present evidence for a complex history of mitochondrial-nuclear discordance within this radiation, particularly in the only pair of sympatric populations east of Wallace’s Line, located on Kolombangara Island in the Solomon Islands. Our genomic data suggest that the divergent single-island endemic species on Kolombangara (Phylloscopus amoenus) is not a relic resulting from a double invasion from outside the Bismarck and Solomon archipelagos as previously thought. Rather, the sympatry on Kolombangara Island between the widespread P. poliocephalus and the endemic P. amoenus appears to result from recent intra-archipelago diversification, either via sympatric speciation or the rapid establishment of secondary sympatry. These novel genomic data provide insights into the evolutionary history of Phylloscopus warblers in Melanesia and improve our general understanding of how biodiversity accumulates in island systems
The Impact of Model Misspecification on Phylogenetic Network Inference
No full textThe development of statistical methods to infer species phylogenies with reticulations (species networks) has led to many discoveries of gene flow between distinct species. These methods typically assume only incomplete lineage sorting and introgression. Given that phylogenetic networks can be arbitrarily complex, these methods might compensate for model misspecification by increasing the number of dimensions beyond the true value. Herein, we explore the effect of potential model misspecification, including the negligence of gene tree estimation error (GTEE) and assumption of a single substitution rate for all genomic loci, on the accuracy of phylogenetic network inference using both simulated and biological data. In particular, we assess the accuracy of estimated phylogenetic networks as well as test statistics for determining whether a network is the correct evolutionary history, as opposed to the simpler model that is a tree.
We found that while GTEE negatively impacts the performance of test statistics to determine the “treeness” of the evolutionary history of a data set, running those tests on triplets of taxa and correcting for multiple-testing significantly ameliorates the problem. We also found that accounting for substitution rate heterogeneity improves the reliability of full Bayesian inference methods of phylogenetic networks, whereas summary statistic methods are robust to GTEE and rate heterogeneity, though currently require manual inspection to determine the network complexity
Hidradenitis Suppurativa-Induced Breast Abscess and Congenital Nipple Inversion Mimicking Inflammatory Breast Cancer with Review of the Literature
No full textInflammatory breast cancer (IBC) is an aggressive, but rare, malignancy that may present cutaneously, so dermatologists may be some of the first providers to observe the initial clinical signs. A number of benign conditions may mimic the cutaneous and radiographic features of IBC. We present a case of a patient with hidradenitis suppurativa of the breast complicated by abscess formation with cutaneous findings mimicking IBC, including abrupt erythema, edema, nipple retraction, and peau d’orange changes. This case highlights dermatologic findings that should prompt an urgent evaluation for IBC, features that differentiate clinical mimickers from IBC, and potential pitfalls in diagnosing IBC if an improper or incomplete workup is pursued. We also present a review of the literature regarding mimickers of IBC