Digital Commons Network^™

Exploring The Connection Between Acid Exposure And Virulence In Listeria Monocytogenes, Minghao Li

All Graduate Theses and Dissertations, Spring 1920 to Summer 2023

Listeria monocytogenes is a gram-positive food-borne pathogen that is widely dispersed in the environment and can cause listeriosis with high fatality rates when consumed in contaminated food products. They are capable of growing over a wide range condition. Listeria is also able to tolerate adverse conditions which allows the bacterium to survive in unfavorable environments. The ubiquitous nature of L. monocytogenes makes it difficult to eliminate from food systems. One major problem in the food industry is the survival of L. monocytogenes under sublethal low pH-environment since organic acids are widely used as food decontaminants. Prior research has suggested that …

Evaluation Of Oocyte Developmental Competence And Potential Strategies To Improve Oocyte Quality, Min Yang

All Graduate Theses and Dissertations, Spring 1920 to Summer 2023

Assisted reproductive technologies (ARTs) have now been extensively used to promote reproductive efficiency as a fertility treatment not only in human medicine but also animal reproduction. ARTs serve as an important tool to advance the fundamental knowledge of reproductive processes. The quality of female’s eggs defines its ability to undergo maturation, fertilization, and development. This quality is determined by various factors and is crucial for the success of ARTs. Any alternations happening during the egg growth and maturation process can result in the decreased quality, which could have long-lasting effects on development. Improving the developmental efficiency of the egg is …

Annotation Tools For Multivariate Gene Set Testing Of Non-Model Organisms, Russell K. Banks

All Graduate Theses and Dissertations, Spring 1920 to Summer 2023

Microarray chip technology enables researchers to obtain measures of gene activity for essentially all genes in an organism. After grouping genes into biologically meaningful sets, researchers employ certain statistical tests to identify which gene sets (biological processes) show different levels of activity across different treatment groups. The idea is to identify which biological processes are significantly affected by a certain treatment/condition in a given organism.

Non-model organisms (such as sheep) are not widely studied so gene set membership information is not always readily accessible. This thesis work utilizes two microarray studies involving sheep to provide researchers with working examples of …

Identification Of Factors Affecting Bovine Somatic Cell Nuclear Transfer Efficiency And Characterization Of Transcriptional Profiles Of Nuclear Transfer Embryos And Cotyledons, Kenneth Ivan Aston

All Graduate Theses and Dissertations, Spring 1920 to Summer 2023

Since the production of the first sheep by somatic cell nuclear transfer a great deal of effort has been made to improve efficiency and to understand nuclear reprogramming mechanisms. Unfortunately efficiency remains low, and nuclear reprogramming mechanisms remain uncharacterized. The objectives of this research were to identify factors associated with somatic cell nuclear transfer efficiency and to analyze the transcriptome of blastocyst-stage clone and control embryos and cotyledonary tissue in an effort to elucidate mechanisms responsible for the low developmental efficiency and high post-implantation losses.

The experiments reported here identify factors including oocyte source and timing of activation following nuclear …