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This article follows the academic literacy learning trajectory of Farah, an undergraduate anthropology major at the American University in Cairo. In charting her path from the Egyptian public schooling system to a Western-based transnational university, this study offers a perspective in which a writer created and navigated a challenging trajectory and adapted Western-based literacies to aid in the development of an academic and professional agenda based in personal and national interests. This article draws on frameworks in composition studies and transnational literacy studies to suggest that theorizing such trajectories may require new concepts that can account for literacy learning trajectories for writers like Farah.

Understanding the epidemiology and transmission dynamics of transboundary animal diseases (TADs) among wild pigs (Sus scrofa) will aid in preventing the introduction or containment of TADs among wild populations. Given the challenges associated with studying TADs in free-ranging populations, a surrogate pathogen system may predict how pathogens may circulate and be maintained within wild free-ranging swine populations, how they may spill over into domestic populations, and how management actions may impact transmission. We assessed the suitability of Torque teno sus virus 1 (TTSuV1) to serve as a surrogate pathogen for molecular epidemiological studies in wild pigs by investigating the prevalence, persistence, correlation with host health status and genetic variability at two study areas: Archbold's Buck Island Ranch in Florida and Savannah River Site in South Carolina. We then conducted a molecular epidemiological case study within Archbold's Buck Island Ranch site to determine how analysis of this pathogen could inform transmission dynamics of a directly transmitted virus. Prevalence was high in both study areas (40%, n = 190), and phylogenetic analyses revealed high levels of genetic variability within and between study areas. Our case study showed that pairwise host relatedness and geographic distance were highly correlated to pairwise viral genetic similarity. Molecular epidemiological analyses revealed a distinct pattern of direct transmission from pig to pig occurring within and between family groups. Our results suggest that TTSuV1 is highly suitable for molecular epidemiological analyses and will be useful for future studies of transmission dynamics in wild free-ranging pigs. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This essay turns to the writing of William James in “A Word of Pure Experience” as a methodological framework for reading The Souls of Black Folk. While most readings of Souls emphasize the unfolding of black consciousness, or the mind, this essay brings the body into critical focus, specifically in tracing the ways in which Du Bois appeals to the plasticity of bodies—their ability to affect and to be affected—as a creative textual means of redressing racial strife and crisis. To this end, I argue that Souls both diagnoses what I am calling a “gothic” ontology of racial division (after James) and appeals to moments of vital affect which overspill and thus critically challenge the boundaries of such racial disjuncture endemic to modernity and race relations at the dawn of the twentieth century. My reading thus resituates Souls in a literary-philosophical genealogy running from James to Du Bois, yet one that emphasizes their convergence via James’s “radical empiricism” rather than his more familiar pragmatism. Keywords: James; Du Bois; Ontology; Affect; Racism; Radical empiricism.

Animals living underground deal with multiple physiological challenges, such as hypoxia and hypercarbia, but may have reduced thermoregulation demands because of the more stable underground microclimate. Southeastern pocket gophers (Geomys pinetis Rafinesque) occur in the fire-adapted, open-pine forests of the southeastern Atlantic Coastal Plain where prescribed fire is commonly used to manage understory vegetation. They are almost exclusively fossorial. and their tunnels provide ecological services, including shelter, for a suite of commensal vertebrates and invertebrates. To quantify potential thermoregulation benefits of southeastern pocket gopher tunnels, we compared temperatures in active tunnels (n = 31) to aboveground temperatures during winter (December 2018-February 2019), and to aboveground temperatures during prescribed fire events (n = 16) occurring in spring (March-May 2019). During winter, tunnels provided a more stable thermal environment (average range = 6.5 [+ or -] 0.8 C; mean [+ or -] SE) relative to aboveground (average range = 24.8 [+ or -] 1.8 C) temperatures. Similarly, mean tunnel temperature range (2.05 [+ or -] 0.5 C) was significantly narrower than aboveground temperature range associated with fire events (497.0 [+ or -] 101.4 C). Clearly, tunnels provide a stable thermal environment for pocket gophers and commensals that use their tunnel systems., INTRODUCTION Pocket gophers (family Geomyidae) are almost exclusively fossorial, except for occasional aboveground dispersal movements (Baker et al, 2003; Warren et al, 2017; Pynne et al, 2019). They form tunnels [...]

Environmental gradients have the potential to influence genetic differentiation among populations ultimately leading to allopatric speciation. However, environmental gradients can also facilitate hybridization between closely related taxa. We investigated a putative hybrid zone in western Ecuador, involving two polytypic wren species (Aves: Troglodytidae), Campylorhynchus zonatus and C. fasciatus. Our study addressed two primary questions: (1) Is there evidence of population structure and genetic admixture between these taxa in western Ecuador? and (2) What are the relative contributions of isolation by distance and isolation by the environment to the observed genetic differentiation along the environmental gradient in this region? We analyzed 4409 single‐nucleotide polymorphisms (SNPs) from 112 blood samples sequenced using ddRadSeq and a de novo assembly. The optimum number of genetic clusters ranged from 2 to 4, aligning with geographic origins, known phylogenetics, and physical or ecological constraints. We observed notable transitions in admixture proportions along the environmental gradient in western Ecuador between C. z. brevirostris and the northern and southern genetic clusters of C. f. pallescens. Genetic differentiation between the two C. f. pallescens populations could be attributed to an unreported potential physical barrier in central western Ecuador, where the proximity of the Andes to the coastline restricts lowland habitats, limiting dispersal and gene flow, especially among dry‐habitat specialists. The observed admixture in C. f. pallescens suggests that this subspecies may be a hybrid between C. z. brevirostris and C. fasciatus, with varying degrees of admixture in western Ecuador and northwestern Peru. We found evidence of isolation by distance, while isolation by the environment was less pronounced but still significant for annual mean precipitation and precipitation seasonality. This study enhances our understanding of avian population genomics in tropical regions. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The goal of this study was to evaluate the efficacy of phenotypic traits and two genetic assays to distinguish between Mercenaria mercenaria, an important aquaculture species, and Mercenaria campechiensis, a conspecific species that is partially sympatric, but that has not been successfully farmed. The objectives were to evaluate (1) four established diagnostic phenotypic traits (lunule shape, thickness of concentric shell ridges, prominence of anterior side of the concentric ridges, and presence of purple nacre inside of the shells) to distinguish between species, (2) size polymorphism of PCR fragments from four genes [16S rRNA, 18S rRNA, Internal Transcribed Spacer genes (ITS1 and ITS2)], and (3) PCR-restriction fragment length polymorphism (RFLP) on three of these genes (16S, ITS1, and ITS2). Phenotypic traits correctly distinguished two geographically distant conspecific populations (two locations in Maine for M. mercenaria and in Bradenton, FL, for M. campechiensis); however, among all other locations, both species had overlapping phenotypic trait values. Although PCR fragments were obtained for all genes tested, size polymorphism was not identified between the two species. Restriction enzyme digestion of PCR fragments resulted in diagnostic fragments distinguishing the two species for 16S. ITS1, and ITS2. Although phenotypic scores failed to delineate between the two species in most locations, PCR-RFLP results failed to identify hybrids in wild or hatchery samples. Further investigation is needed to apply the PCR-RFLP assays on known hybrid offspring from crosses of M. mercenaria and M. campechiensis. Results have elucidated the difficulties in confidently detecting hybridization in quahogs; however, determining effective methods for species identification and hybrid detection will be important to address issues such as the prevalence and distribution of hybridization in aquaculture and in wild populations, and to determin the presence of M. campechiensis which are currently difficult to find. KEY WORDS: phenotypic score, species identification. PCR-RFLP, northern quahog, Mercenaria mercenaria, southern quahog, Mercenaria campechiensis, INTRODUCTION The northern quahog Mercenaria mercenaria (family Veneridae) is an important aquaculture and fishery species that is naturally distributed along the Atlantic west coast from the Gulf of St. Lawrence, [...]