ScholarWorks@UMassAmherst

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Featured Items

Women in Medicine Digital Choice Board

Maloy, Robert; Trust, Torrey

This choice board invites students to write a news story about the first American Indian woman to receive a medical degree; create an Instagram-style video showcasing the Blackwell Sisters’ achievements in the field of medicine; Create a graphic novel or picture book about an African American medical pioneer during the Civil War, and much more.

2025-12

Pesticide residues in honey: Agricultural landscapes and commercial wax foundation sheets as potential routes of chronic exposure for honey bees

Munoz Agudelo, Deicy Carolina; Adler, Lynn; Whitehead, Hannah; Figueroa, Laura

Pesticides pose significant threats to pollinators, and honey bees are frequently exposed through foraging and beekeeping practices. We assessed honey bee pesticide exposure by analyzing 92 pesticide residues in honey from 30 hobbyist apiaries across Massachusetts, along with store-bought honey and commercial wax foundation. For all samples, we calculated the risk of multiresidue toxicity to honey bees and assessed the role of landscape composition in predicting pesticides in local honey. Both honey and wax contained multiple pesticides, particularly neonicotinoids and piperonyl butoxide. Store-bought honey accumulated at least two times more residues than local but did not differ significantly in toxicity. Overall, honey toxicity levels remained below thresholds of concern for bees and human consumption. Although our study had low agricultural land (~6 %), croplands were positively correlated with pesticides in honey, while wetlands (~ 15 %) were negatively correlated. Additionally, our study suggests that commercial wax exacerbates pesticide exposure.

2025-04-15

Recent Submissions

Open Access
Effect of floral bloom timing on the transmission of the bumble bee pathogen Crithidia bombi (Trypanosomatida: Trypanosomatidae)
(2026) Pinilla-Gallego, Mario; Adler, Lynn
The CSV files and R scripts contained the data and code associated with the paper "Effect of floral bloom timing on the transmission of the bumble bee pathogen Crithidia bombi (Trypanosomatida: Trypanosomatidae)".
Metadata only
Price Stabilization and Policy Innovation in Mexico: Systemically Significant Prices During COVID-19 Inflation
(2026) Lara Jauregui, Jesús; Matamoros, Guillermo; Weber, Isabella Maria
This paper examines Mexico’s COVID-19 pandemic price stabilization policy, emphasizing its originality and departure from conventional approaches. Unlike previous administrations that heavily relied on peso overvaluation, AMLO’s government adopted a diverse range of heterodox measures. These included a price agreement to establish a cap on the price of a basket of essential products, strategic stabilization subsidies, emergency buffer stocks, targeted tariff reductions, and a targeted communication strategy. The paper then simulates price shocks using an input-output model of the Mexican economy to identify industries that were systemically significant during the pandemic inflation period (2021–2023). Subsequently, it evaluates the policy’s effectiveness by comparing pass-through estimates across recent inflation periods, revealing evidence that the policy contributed to curbing pandemic inflation.
Open Access
Electro-excitation of some bound states of ¹⁵N and ³⁹K
(1973-04) Fleming, Donald M.
Bound states in ¹⁵N and ³⁹K have been studied by inelastic electron scattering experiments performed at the Kelvin Laboratory and at the Mark III electron linear accelerator at Stanford University. For the nitrogen experiment, inelastic spectra were measured for incident electron energies between 59 and 110 MeV and scattering angles between 97.5° and 155°. The data were taken at fixed momentum transfer and variable scattering angle so that a model-independent separation of the square of the inelastic form factor into its longitudinal and transverse components could be performed. The range of momentum transfers spanned by the data was 0.47 fm-¹ to 0.87 fm-¹. A heavy-liquid ammonia target was used in this experiment. Reduced transition probabilities and transition radii were extracted for the levels at 5.27 MeV C5/2+), 6.32 MeV (3/2-), 7.30 MeV (3/2+), 7.56 MeV C7/2+), 9.16 MeV (3/2-), and 9.76 MeV (5/2-). The data were analyzed in the Plane-Wave Born-Approximation. For the potassium experiment, the incident electron energy was 150 MeV and inelastic spectra were measured for scattering angles from 50° to 110° in 5° intervals. This corresponds to a momentum transfer range of 0.6 fm-¹ to 1.28 fm-¹ Reduced transition probabilities and transition radii were extracted for the first four excited states in at 2.53 MeV (1/2+), 2.82 MeV (7/2-), 3.02 MeV (3/2-), and 3.60 MeV (9/2-). The data were analyzed by using a Distorted-Wave Born-Approximation calculation. The applicability of the weak-coupling model to excited states in ¹⁵N and ³⁹K was investigated. For the case of ¹⁵N , the experimental evidence was not consistent with the predictions of the weak-coupling model. Since two of the states in the weak-coupling multiplet in ³⁹K were not resolved from nearby levels, it was concluded that additional experimental data was required before any definite conclusions could be drawn as to whether the weak-coupling model applied to the states in ³⁹K.
Open Access
Pesticide residues in honey: Agricultural landscapes and commercial wax foundation sheets as potential routes of chronic exposure for honey bees
(Elsevier, 2025-04-15) Munoz Agudelo, Deicy Carolina; Adler, Lynn; Whitehead, Hannah; Figueroa, Laura
Pesticides pose significant threats to pollinators, and honey bees are frequently exposed through foraging and beekeeping practices. We assessed honey bee pesticide exposure by analyzing 92 pesticide residues in honey from 30 hobbyist apiaries across Massachusetts, along with store-bought honey and commercial wax foundation. For all samples, we calculated the risk of multiresidue toxicity to honey bees and assessed the role of landscape composition in predicting pesticides in local honey. Both honey and wax contained multiple pesticides, particularly neonicotinoids and piperonyl butoxide. Store-bought honey accumulated at least two times more residues than local but did not differ significantly in toxicity. Overall, honey toxicity levels remained below thresholds of concern for bees and human consumption. Although our study had low agricultural land (~6 %), croplands were positively correlated with pesticides in honey, while wetlands (~ 15 %) were negatively correlated. Additionally, our study suggests that commercial wax exacerbates pesticide exposure.
Open Access
Time-Inconsistent Policy with Distributional Conflict and Costly Wage Adjustment
(2026-01) Razmi, Arslan
This paper develops a dynamic model of inflation in which discretionary monetary policy interacts with distributional conflict between workers and firms. Unlike the canonical Barro-Gordon framework, inflation is socially costly not only because of volatility but also because it redistributes income when nominal wages adjust sluggishly. Policy makers face time-inconsistent incentives to generate inflation in order to stimulate employment, but also internalize the costs of wage adjustment, while workers attempt to defend their real wage subject to bargaining costs. The interaction between policy incentives, wage-setting frictions, and expectation formation renders the optimal inflation rate time-varying and sensitive to institutional features of the labor market. Inflation may be higher or lower than in the absence of distributional conflict, depending on policy priorities over employment versus real wages, the cyclicality of real wages, and the horizon over which wage contracts are reset. When workers possess perfect foresight, stronger real-wage defense dampens inflation and improves welfare by reducing volatility. When prohibitively high information collection costs result in static expectations, however, the same mechanisms reverse the welfare ranking. The framework nests the standard Barro-Gordon outcome as a special case and connects modern policy debates to classical themes concerning wage bargaining, income distribution, policy credibility, and Kalecki's "threat of the sack." By explicitly incorporating distributional considerations into policy optimization, the paper offers a unified approach to understanding inflation persistence and the political economy of macroeconomic stabilization.

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