Digital Commons Network^™

Adaptation And Utilization Of Three Legume In China, Huang Wenhui

IGC Proceedings (1977-2023)

China is a vast territory with extremely varied climates, soil, and topography, and it is very rich in pasture grass resources. The main legumes for forage are Alfalfa (Medicago sativa L.), yellow alfalfa (Medicago folcata L.) and shadawang (Astragalis adsurgent Pall.)

Preliminary Evaluation Of Legume Germ Plasm In The Cerrados Of Brazil, D Thomas, R P. De Andrade

IGC Proceedings (1977-2023)

In 1978 an evaluation program was initiated to select legumes that (1) grow and produce seed on acid soils under aluminum and water stress, (2) persist under grazing, and (3) tolerate pests and diseases. The work is being conducted at the Cerrados Agricultural Research Center, near Brasilia, at lat 15°S and altitude 1,000 to 1, 100 m . Annual rainfall is 1,500 mm, mostly distributed in a 6-month wet season, and mean annual temperature is 21°C. Nine hundred legume accessions from thirteen genera have now been established as spaced plants on the 2 major soil types of the region. The …

Genetics And Utilization Of Apomixis For The Improvement Of Guineagrass (Panicum Maximum Jacq.), Y H. Savidan

IGC Proceedings (1977-2023)

Natural polymorphism in guineagrass (Panicum maximumjacq.) has been stabilized in tetraploid biotypes by apomixis. Sex­ual diploids were found in East African populations. Our objective was to determine whether apomixis could be related with a simple genetic background and manipulated in an improvement program. Apomicts of guineagrass are characterized by a 4-nucleate embryo sac structure, and this trait was used in genetical analyses to differentiate apomictic from sexual hybrids. Progeny tests were also conducted as controls. Ten different types of progenies were analyzed: tetraploid sexual (from colchicine treatment of diploids) x apomictic F1 hybrids; selfed and backcrossed progenies of sexual F1 …

Breeding Challenges In Apomictic Warm-Season Grasses, E C. Bashaw, P W. Voigt, B L. Burson

IGC Proceedings (1977-2023)

Efforts to breed apomictic grasses met with little success in the past, but results of more recent research show significant progress with some species and new prospects for improving apomicts. Early research uncovered the cytological basis for apospory and diplospory, found the common apomictic mechanisms in grasses, and showed that apomixis is transmitted from pannt to offspring. Discovery of sexual or partially sexual (facultative apomicts) plants in several species formerly considered obligate apomicts allowed for hybridization and genetic studies. Results of subsequent research confirmed inheritance of apomixis, and data from the more conclusive studies indicate that method of reproduction …

An Underrecognized Mechanism Of Spontaneous Pneumomediastinum: The Macklin Effect Following Valsalva Maneuvers, Ripudaman Singh, Fatimah Bello

Research Symposium

Background: Spontaneous pneumomediastinum (SPM) is a rare clinical condition characterized by the presence of free air in the mediastinum without preceding trauma, surgery, or invasive procedures. It predominantly affects young adults and commonly presents with acute retrosternal chest pain that is pleuritic in nature and may radiate to the neck, shoulders, or arms. Although often idiopathic, SPM is associated with conditions that increase intra-alveolar pressure, including asthma exacerbations, respiratory infections, forceful coughing or vomiting, and less commonly, Valsalva maneuvers related to intense physical activity. We report a case of uncomplicated SPM in a previously healthy young adult associated with Valsalva …

When Lupus Begins In The Heart: New-Onset Lupus Perimyocarditis Presenting As Acute Dilated Cardiomyopathy, Ripudaman Singh, Cesar Gutierrez

Research Symposium

Background: Acute decompensated dilated cardiomyopathy (DCM) in a middle-aged patient without traditional cardiovascular risk factors presents a diagnostic and therapeutic challenge. While acute coronary syndrome (ACS) and pulmonary embolism must be rapidly excluded, a systematic evaluation is required to identify less common etiologies. Systemic lupus erythematosus (SLE) is a multisystem autoimmune disease commonly presenting as pericarditis. Lupus myocarditis is a life-threatening complication with high morbidity and mortality that can present as DCM. Presentation of previously undiagnosed SLE as heart failure with reduced ejection fraction due to DCM is rare and occasionally reported. We describe a case of new-onset SLE initially …

Acquired Left Ventricular Noncompaction Physiology In Lupus Myocarditis: An Unclassified Cardiomyopathy Phenotype, Ripudaman Singh, Eduardo D. Flores Md, Facc

Research Symposium

Background: Left ventricular noncompaction (LVNC) is a rare structural abnormality of the left ventricular myocardium, characterized by prominent trabeculations and deep intertrabecular recesses due to incomplete compaction during embryogenesis. Clinical presentation is highly variable, ranging from asymptomatic cases to arrhythmias, thromboembolism, heart failure, and sudden cardiac death. Diagnosis is primarily imaging-based, with transthoracic echocardiography (TTE) using the Jenni criteria as standard. These criteria include excessive apical or midventricular trabeculations with a noncompacted-to-compacted ratio >2:1 at end-systole, a thin compacted epicardial layer (≤8.1 mm), and color Doppler flow within the recesses. When echocardiography is inconclusive, cardiovascular magnetic resonance (CMR) is recommended. …

Abiraterone-Induced Resistant Hypokalemia And Hypertension: A Preventable Complication, Ripudaman Singh, Seokwon Choi, Aramide Tijani, Fatimah Bello

Research Symposium

Background: Abiraterone, a cytochrome P17 (17a-hydroxylase/C17,20-lyase) inhibitor used in metastatic castration-resistant prostate cancer (CRPC), suppresses androgen and cortisol synthesis, leading to elevated ACTH and accumulation of mineralocorticoid precursors such as 11-deoxycorticosterone and corticosterone, both possessing potent mineralocorticoid activity^1,2,3. Concomitant prednisone is recommended to prevent this cascade, as its omission can lead to clinically significant mineralocorticoid excess manifesting as severe hypokalemia, hypertension, and fluid retention⁴. This preventable complication remains underrecognized, particularly in elderly patients who are frequently exposed to polypharmacy. Here, we report a patient with metastatic CRPC on abiraterone therapy who presented with acute wrist pain, …

Severe Ldl-C Elevation With Negative Monogenic Familial Hypercholesterolemia Testing: A Case Of Polygenic Hypercholesterolemia, Ripudaman Singh, Daniela Hernandez

Research Symposium

Background: Severe hypercholesterolemia, defined as a low-density lipoprotein cholesterol (LDL-C) level ≥190 mg/dL, is most often attributed to familial hypercholesterolemia (FH), a monogenic autosomal dominant disorder caused by pathogenic variants in genes essential for LDL-C catabolism, including the low-density lipoprotein receptor (LDLR), apolipoprotein B (APOB), proprotein convertase subtilisin/kexin type 9 (PCSK9), and LDL receptor adaptor protein 1 (LDLRAP1). Clinically, FH is characterized by markedly elevated LDL-C levels and an increased risk of premature atherosclerotic cardiovascular disease (ASCVD). Homozygous individuals typically present in childhood, while heterozygous individuals are more commonly diagnosed in adulthood. However, a substantial proportion of patients with an …

Official Closing, Dgs Committee

Dublin Gastronomy Symposium

Official Closing

Topic for 2028 - chosen by symposiasts - Elaine Mahon and Anke Klitzing

Closing Remarks - Máirtín Mac Con Iomaire

Food, Crisis And Hope: Three Conflicts, Three Approaches, Johanna Mendelson Forman, Michael Shaikh, Joan Nathan, Yeheniia Yemshenetska, Andrea Borghini

Dublin Gastronomy Symposium

Plenary Session: Food, Crisis and Hope: Three Conflicts, Three Approaches

Panel hosted by Johanna Mendelson Forman

Michael Shaikh - "Saving Cuisine Is the Same As Saving a People"

Joan Nathan - "The Edible DNA: Jewish Food as a Bond through Crisis and War"

Johanna Mendelson Forman and Yevheniia Yemshenetska - "Hope and Crisis in War: Ukraine’s Deployment of Food as Soft Power during Conflict"

Andrea Borghini - "Food in Times of Crisis: A Leadership Perspective"

After Meat: Ruin, Decomposition, And The Epistemic Collapse Of Industrial Food Systems, Alexandra Kenefick

Dublin Gastronomy Symposium

The contemporary crisis of industrial meat is typically framed in environmental, ethical, or technological terms. This paper argues instead that the crisis is fundamentally epistemic, exposing the conceptual limits of modern food systems organized around abstraction, purification, efficiency, and control. Drawing on critical theories of modernity, political ecology, and design, it reframes meat not as food but as a designed industrial artefact. Through the lens of ruin, industrial breakdown is read as material disclosure, rendering visible the violences, dependencies, and exclusions that sustained modern abundance. Against technological solutionism and post-meat futurism, the paper develops decomposition as an alternative epistemic and …

Migration And Settlement: Nation, Diaspora, And Culinary Geographies In Izmir’S Culinary Culture, Betül Öztürk

Dublin Gastronomy Symposium

The study explores the historical formation of Izmir as a port city shaped by waves of migration, examining how these dynamics contributed to the emergence of a hybrid culinary culture. The present study draws on historical sources and literature on migration to trace Izmir’s transformation from a small Ottoman settlement to a cosmopolitan Mediterranean city. The study highlights the role of diasporic communities including Rums, Sephardic Jews, Armenians, Levantines and later internal migrants in shaping daily life. The manner in which cohabitation patterns, neighbourhood-based settlements, and shared economic spaces have served to facilitate continuous cultural interaction among ethnic minorities is …

Climate Change And The Upending Of Food Heritage: Fugu In Japan, Voltaire Cang

Dublin Gastronomy Symposium

Japan is a country with hundreds of food products and traditions tied to regional pride and identity. However, rising temperatures and extreme weather patterns attributed to climate change have caused unstable, decreasing, and lower-quality yields of many foods in regions where these have traditionally thrived or been sourced, thereby threatening the continuity and very existence of regional heritage foods and related traditions and, thus, identity. This paper employs the case of fugu (pufferfish), the highly poisonous seafood delicacy from Shimonoseki (Yamaguchi Prefecture), to illustrate the ways climate change is upending food heritage in Japan. Until 30 years ago, the seas …

Beyond Populist Resistance: Food, Democracy, And Hope In The Age Of Climate Crisis, Dorota Koczanowicz, Leszek Koczanowicz

Dublin Gastronomy Symposium

The climate crisis brings rising global temperatures, extreme weather events, and biodiversity loss. At its root lies what and how we eat. Food systems, especially those dominated by industrial meat and dairy production, are among the most significant drivers of greenhouse gas emissions, deforestation, species extinction, and the depletion of freshwater resources. Therefore, a transformation of diets toward more plant-based, local, and sustainable models is essential if humanity is to secure a livable future. Yet despite this clear necessity, changing eating habits is one of the most contested aspects of climate action.

Food is never purely biological; it is also …

Bonding Through Boucherie: Strengthening Social Ties Through Butchery, Evelyn Lambeth

Dublin Gastronomy Symposium

“La boucherie de quartier” is a Cajun phrase referring to a neighbourhood pig slaughter. One such annual event, the Lâche Pas Boucherie in southern Louisiana, brings multiple generations and many traditions together with the goal of sharing and celebrating music, food and culture. Boudin, crackling, andouille sausage, and hogshead cheese are but a few of the unique offerings from this melting pot of shared flavours. I was born and raised in southern Louisiana but rarely appreciated the novelty of Cajun cuisine until I moved to Australia. The flavours and spices of my former home add a certain piquancy that is …

Daily Bread And Divine Providence: Scarcity Sermons In England, 1795–1817, Natalia Giza

Dublin Gastronomy Symposium

This paper examines the role of printed fast-day sermons in England during the subsistence crises of 1795–1817, arguing that the pulpit functioned as a key interpretive space for understanding food scarcity. Delivered during nationally proclaimed fasts and widely circulated in print, these sermons framed dearth not only as a social problem but as a moral and providential crisis. Preachers such as William Vincent, Samuel Horsley, Thomas Rennell, and Edward Pearson employed a shared theological language of divine chastisement, repentance, and providence, presenting hunger as a consequence of national sin while reinforcing social order and discouraging unrest. At the same time, …

Borsch Is Ukrainian: Food And Cultural Resistance In Ukraine, Todd Armstrong

Dublin Gastronomy Symposium

The 2022 invasion of Ukraine by the Russian Federation under Putin marks a pivotal moment in the cultural history of Eastern Europe. Russian aggression is driven in part by the longstanding Russian imperial project to subsume Ukrainian culture as part of the Russian grand narrative of civilizational unity. This ambition is made explicit in Putin’s 2021 speech “On the Historical Unity of Russians and Ukrainians,” where he asserts that “Russians and Ukrainians [are] one people – a single whole.” Ukraine’s rejection of this Russian colonizing and anti-European narrative, however, has been clear and unambiguous, as demonstrated in the now more …

Hands To Work, Hearts To Hope: Mutual Aid And The Re- Embodiment Of Care In An Age Of Crisis, April Mcgreger

Dublin Gastronomy Symposium

Mutual aid and charity groups often pay attention to the tangible results of their work for the groups serviced but too often ignore the benefits of the work to the workers themselves. Using the experience of the People’s Kitchen in Philadelphia, the author details the diversity of experiences of kitchen workers and some of the benefits of volunteering. Methodology uses surveys and self- ethnology and contributes to new areas of research.

A Crisis Of Blood – The Slow Death Of Ireland’S Fresh Blood Black Pudding Tradition, Kate Ryan

Dublin Gastronomy Symposium

Fresh blood black pudding is one of the oldest foods of Ireland, yet rapidly declining access to fresh animal blood means this is a food under threat of extinction. Underpinning this crisis is the shuttering of abattoirs capable or willing to collect blood at slaughter. However, this is a crisis hidden from view of the consumer as proliferation of cheap mass-made puddings reliant on imported dried blood obfuscates the issue. The result is that this is a food crisis experienced only by those who persist – by obligation to recipe, legacy and tradition – in keeping the practice alive. This …

Food As Freedom In The 1798 Rebellion, Lorna Carney

Dublin Gastronomy Symposium

This paper draws out the tension between the well-fed leadership of the 1798 rebellion versus reports of hungry reality for poorer rebels. Readers of the unabridged diaries of Theobald Wolfe Tone must be struck by how often the man talks about what he ate, when he ate it and who he ate it with. Emerging from the coffee houses and dining clubs of Dublin and Belfast, the prosperous members of the professional classes and minor gentry who made up the leadership of the United Irishmen spent a good deal of their time around the table discussing the application of the …

Feeding A Colony: Crisis, Adaptation, And The Making Of A Wartime Food Economy In Cyprus (1939-1945), Evangelia Matthopoulou, Petroula Hadjittofi

Dublin Gastronomy Symposium

The outbreak of the WWII severely disrupted Mediterranean maritime transport, curtailing the inflow of foodstuffs and processed commodities to small import- dependent economies. This paper examines British Cyprus as a case study, arguing that wartime supply chain crisis prompted both policy and entrepreneurial shifts that not only safeguarded subsistence, but also laid foundations for postwar development. Colonial emergency measures (rationing, price controls, and food campaigns) sought to manage trade bottlenecks, while British policy actively redirected demand toward locally processed food products. This turn to import substitution was reinforced by Cyprus’s incorporation into the Middle East Supply Center in Cairo, which …

Superman And Coca-Cola, Karen Pepper

Dublin Gastronomy Symposium

One crisis we currently face is the rising incidence of diabetes worldwide, arguably due to the inclusion of sugar, in one form or another, in nearly all processed foods. Superman and Coca Cola, two symbols prominent in the American cultural landscape, suggest an association of sugar consumption and power. Indeed, sweetness appeals to us both as a taste and as a concept, and sugar, accordingly, is often marketed not as nourishing but as empowering. Superman may seem far removed from discussions of food. However, the possibility of acquiring greater-than-human strength was apparently uppermost in the minds of mid-twentieth century Americans, …

Toddy, Tea, And Tapioca: Food, Famine, And The Moral Reordering Of Public Space In Malabar (Kerala), 1900- 1965, Mallory Rose Cerkleski

Dublin Gastronomy Symposium

This paper examines how public food and drink spaces in early twentieth-century Malabar functioned as critical infrastructures of everyday subsistence as well as sociability. It argues that toddy shops, beyond sites of intoxication, might have provided low-cost nutrition, informal credit, and cross-caste interaction for segments of the labouring poor. Colonial excise policies and temperance movements progressively narrowed these spaces, contributing to the rise of tea shops aligned with reformist ideals of respectable public consumption. While tea shops fostered political discussion and vernacular modernity, they could have been less reliable as nutritional buffers, especially during the food crises of the 1940s. …

The Taste Of Resilience In Bread, Beer And Ashes At Tell Bazi (Syria), Marie Hopwood

Dublin Gastronomy Symposium

Nuances of ancient life choices do not leave traces that can be excavated and quantified. Even with written language, not all thoughts made it to tablet, and not all tablets survive. What archaeologists can see from millennia past are points of intense change, sometimes resulting from crisis. People cope with crisis through traditions and rituals designed to help them transition through the upheaval and loss into a new future when happiness can be found. Around 1350BCE the people of Tell Bazi (Syria) faced annihilation likely from the Hittites who left a swath of ravaged towns and displaced populations in their …

Unspeakable Sacred Things Made Of Dough: Vermicelli And Pre-Christian Serpentine Symbolism In Southern Italian Ritual Foods, Anthony F. Buccini

Dublin Gastronomy Symposium

It is commonplace to debunk the tale of Saint Patrick driving the snakes out of Ireland: zoologists say he could not have done so, as there were no snakes in Ireland during his time. This tale is, however, a myth, and quite true if one views it symbolically. The snakes symbolise pagan beliefs and Patrick symbolises Catholic teachings, which, starting in the fifth century A.D. with Patrick as a key missionary, did indeed drive out the “pagan snakes” from Ireland. The Jewish story of the wily serpent deceiving Eve and Adam and bringing about their banishment from paradise was taken …

“You Are Needed In The Fields!”: Representing The “Land Girls” In Second World War Britain, Tricia Cusack

Dublin Gastronomy Symposium

As German submarines targeted merchant ships bringing food to Britain in the Second World War, home production had to be increased. During this period, the government maintained a condition of “total war,” that is, everyone was required to contribute to keeping the country going and to achieving victory. According to the historian Guy de la Bédoyère, “the British people experienced unprecedented Government intervention. Every aspect of daily life was regulated.” In theory, this push for national solidarity involved a levelling of class and gender differences. Certainly, it brought women into new prominence. When male labourers on farms, in orchards and …

The Pub “Crisis” And The Future Of Alcohol-Related “Third Spaces”: A Cross-National Survey, Perry Share

Dublin Gastronomy Symposium

Across a range of countries, pubs and cognate drinking venues are shrinking in number and being reimagined in function. This paper examines the contemporary “pub crisis” in Ireland, Britain, Hungary, Japan, South Korea, the Netherlands and Australia, drawing on academic, policy, media and industry materials gathered during late 2025 and early 2026. It argues that, despite different national histories and drinking cultures, similar pressures recur: rising costs, labour shortages, changing alcohol consumption, weakened after-work drinking norms, and redevelopment pressures, with rural and peripheral areas often most exposed. The paper treats pubs not simply as licensed businesses, but as contested forms …

The Eradication Of Manual Hop Picking As A Rural Tradition Due To The Brewing And Economic Crisis In Post-War Britain, Judith Boyle

Dublin Gastronomy Symposium

Manual hop-picking during the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries represented far more than a form of agricultural labour; it constituted a significant seasonal activity that connected urban working-class communities with rural economies. In the hop-growing regions of Kent, in particular, hop-picking developed into an important cultural tradition that served simultaneously as seasonal employment, a temporary escape from urban life, a working holiday, and a source of supplementary income for working-class families. However, the rationalisation and mechanisation of agriculture, combined with the brewing industry’s increasing emphasis on efficiency and cost reduction within a changing British economic and consumer environment, contributed …

Tables Of Power: Ritualised Feasting And Political Negotiation In Irish History, Elizabeth Waters, Elaine Mahon

Dublin Gastronomy Symposium

This paper examines feasting in two specific contexts: the sagas of the early Irish medieval period, and the diplomatic history of the Irish state. Far from being decorative or incidental, feasting is shown to be a system of commensal politics that converts uncertainty into opportunity as well as symbolic capital. In the examples explored, the shared meal is shown to be not just a convivial gathering but a means through which authority is demonstrated, crises negotiated or averted, and relationships renewed.