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Over the last fifty years, science education and prison education have moved in different directions, one expanding and the other contracting. This book brings these educational endeavors into cooperative engagement. Democratic citizenship opens opportunities for all people, irrespective of civil status, to study science. The book presents student narratives and case studies emphasizing the achievements of STEM education behind prison walls. STEM education equity can help address the deep social inequities that mass incarceration creates and magnifies.
Contributors are: Cassandra Barrett, Andrew Bell, George Bogner, Adrian Borealis, Drew Bush, Kelli Bush, Sandy Chang, Kelle Dhein, Amalia Handler, Steven Hart, Steven Henderson, Tiffany Hensley-McBain, Paul Kazelis, Joe Lockard, Edward Mei, Tsafrir Mor, Rob Scott, Laura Taylor, Joslyn Rose Trivett and Emily Webb.
Over the last fifty years, science education and prison education have moved in different directions, one expanding and the other contracting. This book brings these educational endeavors into cooperative engagement. Democratic citizenship opens opportunities for all people, irrespective of civil status, to study science. The book presents student narratives and case studies emphasizing the achievements of STEM education behind prison walls. STEM education equity can help address the deep social inequities that mass incarceration creates and magnifies.
Contributors are: Cassandra Barrett, Andrew Bell, George Bogner, Adrian Borealis, Drew Bush, Kelli Bush, Sandy Chang, Kelle Dhein, Amalia Handler, Steven Hart, Steven Henderson, Tiffany Hensley-McBain, Paul Kazelis, Joe Lockard, Edward Mei, Tsafrir Mor, Rob Scott, Laura Taylor, Joslyn Rose Trivett and Emily Webb.
Abstract
Seed dispersal influences the survival and distribution of plant species and is an important mechanism for maintaining floristic diversity. Bushpigs (Potamochoerus larvatus) are large mammals of indigenous forests and well-wooded areas of eastern and southern Africa and may play an important role as seed dispersers. However, the diversity of fruits consumed and the effect of digestion on seeds remains poorly understood. This study was conducted from October 2018 to January 2019 and gives first insights into seed dispersal by bushpigs in the Soutpansberg Mountain range, South Africa. Here, we collected bushpig faeces and assessed the number of seeds and seed species found. Furthermore, germination experiments with digested and nondigested seeds and fruits were conducted. Our results show that bushpigs are omnivorous, consuming fruits and seeds of 126 different plant species. The proportion of seeds per plant species found in faeces was unhomogeneously distributed with a few hyperabundant species, in particular Searsia chirindensis (55%). The germination experiments showed that gut passage did, overall, not influence germination or seedling growth rates. However, seeds remaining within fruits showed reduced growth, pointing to a high importance of fruit consumption for seed fate. Our results suggest that bushpigs are major seed dispersers of a large variety of fruiting plant species in wooded areas of Africa.
Abstract
A phylogenetic reassessment of the Sceloporus torquatus species complex is presented using a multilocus approach. Topological conflicts related to a clade belonging to disjunct southern populations of S. madrensis are resolved, confirming the identity of such populations as distinct from the nominal populations of S. madrensis located 175 kilometres to the north. We describe this southern clade as a new species distributed in the Sierra Madre Oriental based on its phylogenetic distinctiveness and a combination of morphological characters and measurements, increasing the number of recognised species in the S. torquatus complex to seven.