Physical Sciences and Mathematics Commons^™

Host-Pathogen Interactions In A Changing World: Microbes, Mucosal Defenses, And Multiple Hosts, Brandon C. Labumbard

Graduate Doctoral Dissertations

As fungal diseases continue to emerge, research increasingly focuses on host-microbiome interactions and links to disease. Certain skin-associated microbes may benefit hosts by protecting them from invading pathogens. Seasonal changes in the host environment can also result in shifts in the microbial community and pathogen virulence – potentially influencing disease dynamics. I investigated how cutaneous microbial communities differ across hosts, seasons, and Batrachochytrium dendrobatidis (Bd) infection status by sequencing the microbial communities of 1,100 leopard frogs at five locations across the US. Percent anti-Bd function varied seasonally and with Bd infection status. Bacterial communities also varied across locations and time. …

Climate Change Impacts On Groundwater In Mapc Communities, Jayne F. Knott, Paul Kirshen, Ellen Douglas

School for the Environment Publications

Groundwater is important for human health and the environment but has often been overlooked in the development of climate change adaptation strategies. This is because groundwater is rarely visible, and because changes in groundwater levels are not as dramatic as extreme flooding events, coastal storms, and storm surge. The importance of groundwater for drinking water, natural resources, and streamflow is well documented. Groundwater levels are also important considerations in the design of pavements, underground infrastructure, foundations, on-site wastewater treatment systems, and in the remediation of hazardous waste disposal areas. Groundwater is especially important in the wet northeast, where groundwater levels …

Editor's Note, Padraig O'Malley

New England Journal of Public Policy

Stephanie Heckman is a visual artist who attended the Glasgow conference. “I attended COP26 as a visual storyteller,’ she says. “Visual storytelling (known also as graphic recording) involves the use of graphics, drawings and hand lettering to capture the essence of collective conversation. It is a tool for live notetaking and sense-making; it stimulates participants to engage with each other and complex subject matter, and makes the outcomes more memorable, engaging and accessible to others not present at these conversations.”

Stephanie was an accredited observer delegate at COP26 and a “civic participant” in the many events happening around Glasgow at …

Visual Report Of Cop26, Stéphanie Heckman

New England Journal of Public Policy

As a visual practitioner my job is to draw people’s thoughts, and in so doing, help people make sense of them. The visual summaries I create live during conferences aim to capture more than just the dry content, but also the dynamic, the mood and the unspoken. It is a tool more aligned with how our associative, sensory-fed brains work, for coping with the deluge of information that faces us these days. And it’s a tool that can help overcome language, learning and other barriers to access.

When I discovered in January 2020 that the next Conference of the Parties, …

Reimagining Community Engagement To Increase Resilience To Climate Change In El Punto Neighborhood, Salem, Massachusetts, Elizabeth Sweet, Fabián Torres-Ardila, Daniela Bravo, Leandra Jara

Gastón Institute Publications

In November 2021, the Mauricio Gastón Institute at the University of Massachusetts Boston partnered with the Woods Hole Group (WHG) to develop a community outreach strategy for the Climate Change Deep Dive Model, Alternative Analysis, and Targeted Outreach & Engagement project in the Point/Palmer Cove neighborhood (El Punto), in the city of Salem, MA. El Punto, including its residents, workers, infrastructure, and development areas, is particularly vulnerable to climate change impacts (such as sea level rise, storm surge, precipitation, and heat waves). Researchers from the Gaston institute engaged El Punto residents to:

• Increase the community’s knowledge of current and future …

Participatory Science In Boston Harbor: Bridging Research And Outreach, Anne E. O'Connell

Graduate Masters Theses

Participatory science programs are becoming effective mechanisms to provide members of the public opportunities to be involved in scientific research worldwide. In the city of Boston, coastal resilience research is of particular interest to researchers, policy makers, and members of the public due to the threat of up to two meters of sea level rise by the year 2100. As part of the outreach and education initiative at the Stone Living Lab, community members were trained to use the Emery method of beach profiling and conducted measurements at twelve different sites around Boston harbor. The sites were visited during the …

Climate Change Impacts And Projections For The Greater Boston Area: Findings Of The Greater Boston Research Advisory Group Report, Ellen Douglas, Paul Kirshen

School for the Environment Publications

During the writing of the inaugural Boston Research Advisory Group (BRAG) report both NASA and NOAA announced that 2015 was the warmest year on record, beating the previous record set in 2014, by 0.29 °F. Just five years later (during the writing of this report), NASA announced that 2020 had tied 2016 for the warmest year, breaking the previous record by a stunning 1.84 °F, and that the last seven years have been the warmest seven-year period on record.

These observations support the assertion made in the sixth and most recent assessment by the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change , …

Damming Sustainability: How Social And Environmental Networks Influence The Construction And Management Of Large Dams In The Amazon Basin, V. Miranda Chase

Graduate Doctoral Dissertations

,p>Dams are powerful structures that engender a flood of controversies. These projects face great criticism from numerous groups, many of whom succeed in influencing such enterprises. This research is an in-depth study on dam-related social and environmental movements in the Amazon: how they are created and internally organized; how members share information and resources, how they identify alternatives; and how they design strategies and implement agendas. Social movements include, but are not limited to, domestic and international nongovernmental organizations (NGOs), academic researchers, journalists, religious organizations, grassroots associations, and large private foundations. They create formal or informal coalitions and design …

Understanding Environmental Justice Instruction In Higher Education: Activist Epistemic Orientations And A Continuum Of Community Engaged Curricular And Pedagogical Practice, Christopher James Rabe

Graduate Doctoral Dissertations

Starting in the early 1980’s, the environmental justice (EJ) movement was critical in drawing much needed attention to how communities of color, low-income groups, Indigenous peoples, and other marginalized groups have experienced a disproportionate burden of environmental and ecological harms. The EJ movement sparked the birth of the EJ field of study. While originally focused on quantitative and distributional understandings of toxic waste in communities of color, the EJ field of study has since expanded to comprise community-based methodologies and new ways to understand justice, including participatory, recognition, and transformational approaches. The EJ field now represents multiple areas such as …