College As Capability Enhancement, Cristina Lee

CMC Senior Theses

In this thesis I wanted to apply the Sen’s framework in Development as Freedom to college campuses. In my experience at Claremont McKenna College, I have seen how some students are able to take advantage of the resources better than others. Given that we were all accepted by the same admissions office, I always questioned why did some students know how to take advantage of the system. In order to explore this, I first discuss Sen’s capability approach. Then, I show how the capability approach is more comprehensive than social networking theory and William Deresiewicz’s account on elite colleges. Finally, …

Setting:Home, Adrienne Cole

CGU MFA Theses

I look at the world graphically, seeing people as objects, objects as shapes and shapes as lines. I develop these elements into textural abstractions and patterned representations. Sometimes my work is almost entirely abstract while at other times traces of visual references can be seen. I am interested in intersections and in-between; my works fill space with disorder allowing the audience to see through my scattered, confusing and often times mysterious lens.

Understanding Huntington's Disease Using Machine Learning Approaches, Sonali Lokhande

KGI Theses and Dissertations

Huntington’s disease (HD) is a debilitating neurodegenerative disorder with a complex pathophysiology. Despite extensive studies to study the disease, the sequence of events through which mutant Huntingtin (mHtt) protein executes its action still remains elusive. The phenotype of HD is an outcome of numerous processes initiated by the mHtt protein along with other proteins that act as either suppressors or enhancers of the effects of mHtt protein and PolyQ aggregates. Utilizing an integrative systems biology approach, I construct and analyze a Huntington’s disease integrome using human orthologs of protein interactors of wild type and mHtt protein. Analysis of this integrome …

All Glory Is Fleeting, Steven Beswick

CGU MFA Theses

The statement is specifically linked to my MFA thesis exhibition.

"Some Kinda Alchemy", Chelsea Boxwell

CGU MFA Theses

Multiple pieces and paintings come together in “Some kinda Alchemy” to create one large-scale painting environment that increases your interaction and perception of two- dimensional painting. The sculptural aspect is solely a means to an end, to allow the viewer to see more. I want everyone to see as much as possible- as much of the physical painting as possible and as much of the process and actions as possible. There’s more than just a front and 4 sides to my paintings. This structure also inhabits the space the way it does in order to direct you all the way …

Drug Repurposing Using The Anthrax Toxin Internalization Pathway, Leeor Zilbermintz

KGI Theses and Dissertations

Pathogens and pathogenic agents such as lethal toxin, exploit host proteins for their success. Antibiotic discovery efforts have been focused on developing drugs that selectively target pathogens, despite the potential for drug resistance and providing no guarantee of fewer side effects for the patient. This dissertation describes the systematic efforts to identify drugs that alter those host proteins that are involved in the anthrax toxin internalization pathway. Anthrax is a rare and lethal disease caused by the toxin producing, gram-positive bacterium, Bacillus anthracis. The lethality of anthrax is largely attributed to the toxins that circulate within the host, destroying host …

Artist Statement, Chaoyi Wu

CGU MFA Theses

I make my work to create an experience for the viewer, so that they can have their own experience of their world. Their bodies interact with my pieces to re-recognize themselves and their lives. In this experience their body is independent of everything else but their awareness. Their sense of movement, their vision and their tactile sensations come together into my artwork for them to have their own experience. This is what I call self-body awareness.

Hardcore Frivolity, Dixie Lyn Boswell

CGU MFA Theses

I believe in experiencing the world and truth through all the senses. Digging beneath the surface and not stopping at the first thing that flutters through my head. My art installations work with light, abstract imagery, reflective surfaces, and motion, to manipulate spaces creating multi-sensory experiences that encourage a heightened awareness of being in one's body.

Laura Myntti 2017, Laura J. Myntti

CGU MFA Theses

This work is about the actual making of a painting, not subject matter. It's about use of materials as a means and a sense of space to a dynamic end.

Tony Larson: 2017 Mfa Thesis Exhibition, Tony Larson

CGU MFA Theses

I am interested in altering the modes of communication to which I am subjugated. I am open to participating fully in the world around me, especially in the arms of technology. With every new media channel directed at changing consumer behavior and every new gadget at its dedicated servitude, there are new cracks and chasms to inhabit. These spaces are where new propositions are made. I discover and expand these empty spaces by sticking to a regimented set of processes and self imposed limitations to the way I approach painting. My work proposes that the space of art is uniquely …

Everything, Everything Seemed Once-Upon-A-Time, Denisse Leung Liu

CGU MFA Theses

The pleasant feeling of being relaxed is what I want the viewer to feel with my work. The art I make is the source of peacefulness and tranquility I treasure, in a way that there is tranquility and absence of noise, yet it whispers quietly to the viewer.

Everything, Everything Seemed Once-Upon-A-Time, Denisse Leung Liu

CGU MFA Theses

The pleasant feeling of being relaxed is what I want the viewer to feel with my work. The art I make is the source of peacefulness and tranquility I treasure, in a way that there is tranquility and absence of noise, yet it whispers quietly to the viewer.

Temp Permit, Zhaoyang Zheng

CGU MFA Theses

My work focus on the isolation and alienation between society and individual. As an artist, I also regard myself as a tourist, tourists are people who would like to explore and find special things which are not familiar to them. Usually a tourist is isolated from others because of his unfamiliarity with culture and language. It is hard for a tourist to fit into society which is same for artists: they like to explore different and most of the time they are isolated from main stream society.

Letian Luo Thesis Statement, Letian Luo

CGU MFA Theses

My work started out originating from my dreams, but recently it has moved away from that source. To make the cut outs, I would scribble on the back of a small sheet of scarp paper. Then I discovered that if I cut out the scribble, it become more interesting than the dream work. So I developed the scribbles further. I enlarged them, made them more complex and gestural, and then cut them out, meticulously and with painstaking attentiveness. The process allowed me to draw with knife. I very enjoy the process of me making the cut outs. It got increasingly …

Badlands, Meghan B. Augustine

CGU MFA Theses

Badlands is a project that invites a viewer to be present and still. It

asks a viewer for their time, and requires contemplation, introspection

and awareness.

My work is a translation of the color made on a specific place. It

investigates the marks that we leave on the physical and psychological

landscapes, and what is left behind.

There is a rhythm to this project that touches upon process and

metaphor. Process permits metaphor, and ultimately the paintings

embody their own beings. Dirt, light, space and energy. Energy never

dies. It is only recycled.

This project veils and unveils time with …

Aesthetic Survival, Adrienne Devine

CGU MFA Theses

I am a mixed media artist and my creative process is guided by cultural memory, the materials I use, and the pleasure I find in the activity of making. My compulsion to make things is accompanied by a propensity for scholarship, hence, my thesis exhibition incorporates Index Obscura; a growing visual and text-based corpus of research into the history and presence of African American artists in the tapestry of American art and culture. I work with a variety of materials and techniques, and consider wide-ranging themes, connected by recurring motifs, gestures, and attributes. Abstraction creates space wherein viewers can …

Finding The Surface, Rafaella F. Suarez

CGU MFA Theses

I find the relationship of pool structures and water fascinating. The architecture of pools is often hard edged and geometric while water is a fluid and formless, an organic substance that takes the shape of whatever contains it. I am drawn to that paradox. Rather than pulling them apart because of their conflicting existences, they create a space that’s cohesive but inexplicable, a space that’s both reciprocally intertwined and interdependent. My work is set up within the idea of creating a conflicting yet cohesive space. Visually, corporally and conceptually, it creates experiences that are disorienting.

My work serves as a …

I Promise, Maya Luque

CGU MFA Theses

This exhibition is about Chinese burial sites and the practices that accompany the loss of a loved one. The Chinese have a practice where they build large earthen mounds as burial sites; they then visit the sites of their ancestors once a year. I have made my own burial site out of beeswax-dipped paper, which I have then stitched together, like a quilt, to form a hollow version of this mound. In traditional Western home economics quilt making is important; in my installation I use the stitch work to represent a home. In this installation my aim is for the …

She-Ra, Jennifer King

CGU MFA Theses

Painting primarily in oils on canvas, my work confronts themes of femininity and power in contemporary life. I create images through a mix of the imagined and the observed, focusing on the female form. The figures I paint exude feelings of uncertainty, unease, disconnect, but also strength and heightened awareness. There exists a sense of longing and desire to break out of her confined space, to be a strong female individual, ignoring anyone's expectations. Subtle expressions are contrasted with vibrant, sensual colors; her way of grabbing your attention. My goal is to portray a female perspective regarding identity in an …

My Flesh Is Your Pasture, Dakota Noot

CGU MFA Theses

Painting my body frees it from the limits of reality. My body exists in a collaged state between man and woman, human and animal, abstract and figurative. By embracing my body’s power as an object, it isn’t limited to being a representation of myself. My painted body can be owned or identified with. It can be feared, hated, and lusted after. I submit my body, blasting it with horror, humor, and a sheer sense of enjoyment.

Fugitive Fragment, Diana Campuzano

CGU MFA Theses

My work explores the fugitive beauty around us and tries to capture and embody it. For my work IC5070 I began with an image of a nebula IC5070, I created a work that hung from the ceiling and was 27 feet square and hung down 8 feet to just above the viewers. I explore the micro and the macro worlds with many of my works crossing back and forth between

Frankenstein's Onion, Chien Tai

CGU MFA Theses

Gas Lamps, Laura Wilde

CGU MFA Theses

My work investigates the role and dynamic of society, culture, and familial influence on the masculinity and femininity within our individuality. It specifically deals with my on going discovery of the masculine side of my personality, and how the feminine roll is influenced, or not influenced, by this. I have been applying Jungian psychology and the theory of individuation, archetypes, and so forth, to my process. I have made several bodies of work in a quest to understand the fundamental roles that femininity and masculinity have affected my choices and individual understanding. Documenting old and new relationships, I make puppets, …

Leveraging Sound, Space And Visual Art In An Installation, Ryan Karle

CMC Senior Theses

Because of my distrust for self-expression through verbal language, my pursuit thus far in art has been to discover a satisfactory means of self-expression. In study of the work I’ve created across all mediums, through poetry, music and visual art, this desire for a satisfactory outlet of self-expression has resulted in a drive to create meaning through combining mediums. Throughout this semester, my interest in mixed mediums has resulted largely in experimentation with the combination of music and visual art, as well as exploring the standalone merit of each. This also entails a study of their overlaps, cooperative influence, and …

Voice And Agency In William Shakespeare's The Tempest And Aimé Césaire's Une Tempête, Sophie Fahey

Scripps Senior Theses

This thesis explores how Prospero’s power is conveyed through voice in The Tempest, as well as how Shakespeare frames the relationship between Prospero, Ariel, and Caliban, primarily in Act 1, Scene 2 of the play. Then, it examines how in Une Tempête Césaire gives a more active role to Ariel and Caliban in and how giving these characters more space to speak gives them more agency and power.

Dynamics And Clustering In Locust Hopper Bands, Jialun Zhang

HMC Senior Theses

In recent years, technological advances in animal tracking have renewed interests in collective animal behavior, and in particular, locust swarms. These swarms pose a major threat to agriculture in northern Africa, the Middle East, and other regions. In their early life stages, locusts move in hopper bands, which are huge aggregations traveling on the ground. Our main goal is to understand the underlying mechanisms for the emergence and organization of these bands. We construct an agent-based model that tracks individual locusts and a continuum model that tracks the evolution of locust density. Both these models are motivated by experimental observations …

Random Tropical Curves, Magda L. Hlavacek

HMC Senior Theses

In the setting of tropical mathematics, geometric objects are rich with inherent combinatorial structure. For example, each polynomial $p(x,y)$ in the tropical setting corresponds to a tropical curve; these tropical curves correspond to unbounded graphs embedded in $\R^2$. Each of these graphs is dual to a particular subdivision of its Newton polytope; we classify tropical curves by combinatorial type based on these corresponding subdivisions. In this thesis, we aim to gain an understanding of the likeliness of the combinatorial type of a randomly chosen tropical curve by using methods from polytope geometry. We focus on tropical curves corresponding to quadratics, …

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Complexity Of Linear Summary Statistics, Micah G. Pedrick

HMC Senior Theses

Families of linear functionals on a vector space that are mapped to each other by a group of symmetries of the space have a significant amount of structure. This results in computational redundancies which can be used to make computing the entire family of functionals at once more efficient than applying each in turn. This thesis explores asymptotic complexity results for a few such families: contingency tables and unranked choice data. These are used to explore the framework of Radon transform diagrams, which promise to allow general theorems about linear summary statistics to be stated and proved.

Incorporating The Centers For Disease Control And Prevention Into Vaccine Pricing Models, Dina Sinclair

HMC Senior Theses

The American vaccine pricing market has many actors, making it a complex system to model. Because of this, previous papers have chosen to model only vaccine manufacturers while leaving out the government. However, the government is also an important actor in the market, since it buys over half of vaccines produced. In this work, we aim to introduce the government into vaccine pricing models to better recommend pricing strategies to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.

The Effect Of The Chromoshadow Domains Of Hhp1, Hpl1, And Hpl2 On Heterochromatin Protein Localization In Tetrahymena Thermophila, Claire Bagnani

Scripps Senior Theses

In the nucleus, post-translational modifications on histone N-terminal tails can determine how local DNA is packaged. In one case, T. thermophila proteins Hhp1, Hpl1, and Hpl2, all related to the Heterochromatin Protein 1 (HP1) family, are associated with heterochromatin and thus gene silencing. They may do this by binding to trimethylated lysine 9 and lysine 27, located on the tail of histone H3. One distinct region of these proteins, the chromodomain (CD), may bind these marks, while another region, the chromoshadow domain (CSD) homodimerizes to interact with other proteins. This study explores what effect, if any, the CSD has on …