Leadership for Action: Wedding Adult Education and Social Change

This paper presents an initial model of transformative education with adult women in a community setting designed to foster personal growth and the development of leadership capacities as a pathway to working for social change

Spatial Ecology, Genetic Diversity and Population Structure of Armenian Vipers, Montivipera raddei, in Two Different Landscapes

In an effort to gain a better understanding of the impact that human-modified landscapes are having on snake populations I studied the spatial ecology, gene diversity and population structure of the Armenian Viper, Montivipera raddei in two different landscapes in Armenia. We first examined the spatial ecology and habitat use of Armenian Vipers in a human-modified landscape with a combination of agricultural fields and overgrazed native steppe habitat. While there were no differences in movement rates for either sex through croplands compared to steppe, we did find that males had larger home ranges during the spring if it included cropland. While the mosaic of steppe and croplands does not appear to impede seasonal movements in this human-modified landscape, vipers overwhelmingly prefer steppe to cropland. We were then interested in how the spatial use of vipers in this heavily altered habitat compared to a population inhabiting a recovered-natural habitat. The home range size and mean movements were significantly smaller and the abundance of small mammals was significantly higher in the recovered-natural landscape. However, we found no correlation between body condition and home range size. In fact, snakes inhabiting the two landscapes had equivalent body condition. These data suggest that snakes in the human-modified landscape have larger home ranges in order to find enough prey over the course of an active season. While the radiotelemetry data provided insight into the spatial ecology of Armenian Vipers in these two landscapes, we were also interested in examining their genetic diversity and population structure. We collected genetic samples from two locations within each of the two landscapes. At the local scale there was no significant differentiation between sampling locations, but on the regional scale we found the two geographically separated populations to be significantly differentiated from one another. The focus of conservation efforts for the Armenian Viper in altered habitat should be on maintaining corridors with high quality habitat that allow for seasonal movements, shelter, foraging and gene flow. Due to the strong genetic differentiation between the two populations we also recommend that regional populations be managed as independent conservation units

Exploring the use of a general equilibrium method to assess the value of a malaria vaccine: an application to Ghana

BACKGROUND: Malaria is an important health and economic burden in sub-Saharan Africa. Conventional economic evaluations typically consider only direct costs to the healthcare system and government budgets. This paper quantifies the potential impact of malaria vaccination on the wider economy, using Ghana as an example METHODS: We used a computable general equilibrium model of the Ghanaian economy to estimate the macroeconomic impact of malaria vaccination in children under the age of five, with a vaccine efficacy of 50% against clinical malaria and 20% against malaria mortality. The model considered changes in demography and labor productivity, and projected gross domestic product (GDP) over a time frame of 30 years. Vaccine coverage ranging from 20% to 100% was compared with a baseline with no vaccination. RESULTS: Malaria vaccination with 100% coverage was projected to increase the GDP of Ghana over 30 years by US$6.93 billion (in 2015 prices) above the baseline without vaccination, equivalent to an increase in annual GDP growth of 0.5%. Projected GDP per capita would increase in the first year due to immediate reductions in time lost from work by adults caring for children with malaria, then decrease for several years as reductions in child mortality increase the number of dependent children, then show a sustained increase after Year 11 due to long-term productivity improvements in adults resulting from fewer malaria episodes in childhood. CONCLUSION: Investing in improving childhood health by vaccinating against malaria could result in substantial long-term macroeconomic benefits when these children enter the workforce as adults. These macroeconomic benefits are not captured by conventional economic evaluations and constitute an important potential benefit of vaccination

Different Algorithms (Might) Uncover Different Patterns: A Brain-Age Prediction Case Study

Machine learning is a rapidly evolving field with a wide range of applications, including biological signal analysis, where novel algorithms often improve the state-of-the-art. However, robustness to algorithmic variability - measured by different algorithms, consistently uncovering similar findings - is seldom explored. In this paper we investigate whether established hypotheses in brain-age prediction from EEG research validate across algorithms. First, we surveyed literature and identified various features known to be informative for brain-age prediction. We employed diverse feature extraction techniques, processing steps, and models, and utilized the interpretative power of SHapley Additive exPlanations (SHAP) values to align our findings with the existing research in the field. Few of our models achieved state-of-the-art performance on the specific data-set we utilized. Moreover, analysis demonstrated that while most models do uncover similar patterns in the EEG signals, some variability could still be observed. Finally, a few prominent findings could only be validated using specific models. We conclude by suggesting remedies to the potential implications of this lack of robustness to model variability