University of Wyoming Open Journals
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Fishing for a Career: Alternative Livelihoods and the Hardheaded Art of Academic Failure
No full textCharting the course: The world of alternative livelihood research brings a heavy history of paternalistic colonial intervention and moralising. In particular, subsistence fishers in South East Asia are cyclical attractors of project funding to help them exit poverty and not ‘further degrade the marine ecosystem’ (Cinner et al. 2011), through leaving their boats behind and embarking on non-oceanic careers. What happens, then, when we turn an autoethnographic eye on the livelihood of the alternative livelihood researcher? What lexicons of lack and luck may we borrow from the fishers in order to ‘render articulate and more systematic those feelings of dissatisfaction’ (Young 2002) of an academic’s life’s work and our work-life? What might we learn from comparing small-scale fishers to small-scale scholars about how to successfully ‘navigate’ the casualised waters of the modern university? Does this unlikely course bring any ideas of ‘possibilities glimmering’ (Young 2002) for ‘exiting’ poverty in Academia
Spatio-temporal ecological and evolutionary dynamics in natural butterfly populations
No full textLong term studies of wild populations indicate that natural selection can cause rapid and dramatic changes in traits, with spatial and temporal variation in the strength of selection a critical driver of genetic variation in natural populations. In 2012, we began a long term study of genome-wide molecular evolution in populations of the butterfly Lycaeides ideas in the Greater Yellowstone Area (GYA). We aimed to quantify the role of environment-dependent selection on evolution in these populations. Building on previous work, in 2017 we collected new samples, incorporated distance sampling, and surveyed the insect community at each site. We also defined the habitat boundary at anew, eleventh site. Our preliminary analyses suggest that both genetic drift and selection are important drivers in this system.
Featured photo from Figure 1 in report
Projective partitions of vector spaces
No full textGiven infinite-dimensional real vector spaces with , it is shown that there exists a collection of subspaces of that are isomorphic to , mutually intersect only at 0, and altogether cover
Eventual Cone Invariance
No full textEventually nonnegative matrices are square matrices whose powers become and remain (entrywise) nonnegative. Using classical Perron-Frobenius theory for cone preserving maps, this notion is generalized to matrices whose powers eventually leave a proper cone K â R^n invariant, that is, A^mK â K for all sufficiently large m. Also studied are the related notions of eventual cone invariance by the matrix exponential, as well as other generalizations of M-matrix and dynamical system notions
Refined Inertia of Matrix Patterns
No full textThis paper explores how the combinatorial arrangement of prescribed zeros in a matrix affects the possible eigenvalues that the matrix can obtain. It demonstrates that there are inertially arbitrary patterns having a digraph with no 2-cycle, unlike what happens for nonzero patterns. A class of patterns is developed that are refined inertially arbitrary but not spectrally arbitrary, making use of the property of a properly signed nest. The paper includes a characterization of the inertially arbitrary and refined inertially arbitrary patterns of order three, as well as the patterns of order four with the least number of nonzero entries
Shrinkage function and its applications in matrix approximation
No full textThe shrinkage function is widely used in matrix low-rank approximation, compressive sensing, and statistical estimation. In this article, an elementary derivation of the shrinkage function is given. In addition, applications of the shrinkage function are demonstrated in solving several well-known problems, together with a new result in matrix approximation
Establishing a long-term monitoring network for assessing potential climatic refugia in cold alpine streams
No full textManaging landscapes to maintain climate refugia is likely the best strategy to promote persistence of temperature-sensitive species with limited dispersal capacity. Rare, cold-stenothermic taxa occupy mosaic mountain stream networks due largely to hydrological source heterogeneity. We collected environmental and biological data from alpine streams in the Teton Range, Wyoming representing runoff from snowpack (N=3), glaciers (N=4) and subterranean ice (N=4), every summer from 2015-2017. We quantified differences in habitat among the streams according to a glaciality index that included bed stability, suspended solids, temperature and conductivity, and by comparing annual water temperature profiles for each stream. We measured to what degree macroinvertebrate and diatom assemblages varied by stream type. Abiotic and biotic characteristics appeared to differ among sources. Notably, streams fed by subterranean ice (icy seeps) maintained extremely low (mean <2°C) and stable water temperature. Rare, cold-stenothermic stonefly species (Zapada glacier and Lednia tetonica) were indicators for, although not exclusive to, icy seeps. Icy seeps and their sources may be refugia for temperature-sensitive taxa, as the subsurface ice is more insulated from warmer air temperatures.
Featured photo by Nicole Y-C on Unsplash. https://unsplash.com/photos/9XixVlnUCb
Environmental noise influences song frequency of Yellow Warblers (Dendroica petechia) in Grand Teton National Park
No full textWe explored how Yellow Warblers (Dendroica petechia) alter their songs when encountering noise in Grand Teton National Park. Different strategies for avoiding signal masking are used by other species of birds, yet there is a lack of information of birds’ responses to higher noise levels–above 65 dB; such levels are often found in National Parks that have many visitors. In this study, we investigated singing behavior of Yellow Warblers when facing noise that ranged from 30 dB to 80 dB. In these preliminary results, we found that some features of Yellow Warblers did not appear to change with background noise level, including mean minimum frequency, bandwidth and song length. Other song features we studied did show small but statistically significant changes with higher background noise, including the peak frequency and the mean minimum frequency, both of which were significantly negatively correlated with the level of background noise. This result is different from the positive correlations that are typically observed. We speculate that this difference is due to the very high dB levels of background noise that we observed.
Featured photo bywagon16 on Flickr. https://flic.kr/p/G2W6B
