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Enhancement Of Cancer Vaccine Efficacy Via Nanoparticle Or Molecular-Based Adjuvants, Myunggi An

Wayne State University Theses

Adjuvants are immunomodulators which enhance immune responses to vaccines. However, parenteral administration of unformulated adjuvants fails to reach lymph nodes (LNs), the anatomic organ where the primary functions of immune cells are orchestrated. The LN-targeting delivery plays the key roles in promoting immune activation and has the great potential to transform disease treatment. The main goal of this thesis is to develop efficient vaccine delivery systems to target therapeutics into draining lymph nodes (dLNs) for ensuring their immunostimulatory activity. We introduced therapeutic applications of activating TLR9 with synthetic CpG oligodeoxynucleotide (ODN) agonists in nanoparticle or molecular form to activate immune …

Disaster Preparedness And Response: A Survey Of U.S. Dental Hygienists, Brenda T. Bradshaw, Ann P. Bruhn, Tara L. Newcomb, Bridget T. Giles, Kathryn Simms

Dental Hygiene Faculty Publications

Purpose: The purpose of this study was to assess dental hygienists’ interests, current involvement, formal education, views, comfort levels, and intentions for involvement with disaster preparedness and response.

Methods: Dental hygienists (n=400) were asked to respond to a 21-item online survey. Data was analyzed using descriptive statistics, chi-square goodness-of-fit tests, and a paired-samples t-test. Common themes were identified and categorized from open-ended questions.

Results: A response rate of 84% (n=334) was obtained. Most respondents (97%) reported no involvement with disaster preparedness and response; however, a majority (86%) reported interest. Of those who indicated an interest in disaster preparedness and response, …

Inhibition Of Bacterial Growth And Prevention Of Bacterial Adhesion With Localized Nitric Oxide Delivery, Julia Osborne

Dissertations, Master's Theses and Master's Reports

Bacterial infections continue to be a problem at the site of an indwelling medical device, and over the years, various bacterial strains have become more resistant to current antibiotic treatments. Bacterial infection at an indwelling medical device can be dangerous and affect the performance of the medical device which can ultimately lead to the failure of the device due to bacterial resistance to treatment.

Nitric Oxide (NO) has been shown to possess antibacterial properties to prevent and inhibit bacterial growth. NO releasing coatings on indwelling medical devices could provide a reduction in bacterial infections that occur at the device site …

Total Value Of Phosphorus Recovery, Brooke K. Mayer, Lawrence A. Baker, Treavor H. Boyer, Pay Drechsel, Mac Gifford, Munir A. Hanjra, Prathap Parameswaran, Jared Stoltzfus, Paul Westerhoff, Bruce E. Rittmann

Civil and Environmental Engineering Faculty Research and Publications

Phosphorus (P) is a critical, geographically concentrated, nonrenewable resource necessary to support global food production. In excess (e.g., due to runoff or wastewater discharges), P is also a primary cause of eutrophication. To reconcile the simultaneous shortage and overabundance of P, lost P flows must be recovered and reused, alongside improvements in P-use efficiency. While this motivation is increasingly being recognized, little P recovery is practiced today, as recovered P generally cannot compete with the relatively low cost of mined P. Therefore, P is often captured to prevent its release into the environment without beneficial recovery and reuse. However, additional …

Rubber Roads For The Rubber City: Testing The Suitability Of Rubberized Asphalt For Roads In Northeast Ohio, Jessica M. Fraser

Williams Honors College, Honors Research Projects

This research paper explores the benefits of using rubberized asphalt concrete (RAC) versus normal asphalt concrete (NAC) and why it is environmentally important. New road construction and repair of roadways due to potholes are always occurring in Northeast Ohio. Recently, the city of Akron’s transportation budget has increased, which includes projects such as reconstructing asphalt and resurfacing pavements throughout the city of Akron. Using rubberized asphalt may improve the quality of our roads and reduce roadway degradation which will likely save cities money.

Using rubberized asphalt recycles old tires, which do not decompose, and creates a positive use for them …

Student Absenteeism And The Comparisons Of Two Sampling Procedures For Culturable Bioaerosol Measurement In Classrooms With And Without Upper Room Ultraviolet Germicidal Irradiation Devices, Chunxiao Su, Josephine Lau, Shawn G. Gibbs

Durham School of Architectural Engineering and Construction: Faculty Publications

Upper room ultraviolet germicidal irradiance (UVGI) has been shown to reduce the concentration of bioaerosols in controlled chambers. However, there is a lack of experimental results on the reduction of bioaerosol concentrations by UVGI devices in actual uncontrolled buildings. This study was carried out in an American elementary school in the Midwest. Two sampling procedures were carried out in six selected classrooms with similar dimensions that were separated into two groups: (1) UVGI exposure group and (2) non-UVGI control group. Two-stage Tisch culturable impactors were utilized to collect airborne culturable bacteria and fungi. Monthly samples were collected during unoccupied period …

Knowledge-Empowered Probabilistic Graphical Models For Physical-Cyber-Social Systems, Pramod Anantharam

Browse all Theses and Dissertations

There is a rapid intertwining of sensors and mobile devices into the fabric of our lives. This has resulted in unprecedented growth in the number of observations from the physical and social worlds reported in the cyber world. Sensing and computational components embedded in the physical world constitute a Cyber-Physical System (CPS). Current science of CPS is yet to effectively integrate citizen observations in CPS analysis. We demonstrate the role of citizen observations in CPS and propose a novel approach to perform a holistic analysis of machine and citizen sensor observations. Specifically, we demonstrate the complementary, corroborative, and timely aspects …

Purification And Recovery Of Infectious Virus Particles Using Osmolyte Flocculation, Ashish Saksule

Dissertations, Master's Theses and Master's Reports

Viral infectious diseases cause millions of deaths and severe illness all around the world affecting public health and economics. Viral vaccines are helping to fight against viral diseases, but current vaccines are expensive and unavailable, especially in poor and developing countries. When measuring the entire manufacturing processing, the downstream processing of vaccines is the major cost of production. Our goal for this research is to develop a low-cost alternative downstream processing platform for new vaccine manufacturing infrastructures. We have developed a novel osmolyte flocculation method for viral particles. To create a platform purification for several types of viral particles, we …

Bioactive Poly(Beta-Amino Ester) Biomaterials For Treatment Of Infection And Oxidative Stress, Andrew L. Lakes

Theses and Dissertations--Chemical and Materials Engineering

Polymers have deep roots as drug delivery tools, and are widely used in clinical to private settings. Currently, however, numerous traditional therapies exist which may be improved through use of polymeric biomaterials. Through our work with infectious and oxidative stress disease prevention and treatment, we aimed to develop application driven, enhanced therapies utilizing new classes of polymers synthesized in-house. Applying biodegradable poly(β-amino ester) (PBAE) polymers, covalent-addition of bioactive substrates to these PBAEs avoided certain pitfalls of free-loaded and non-degradable drug delivery systems. Further, through variation of polymer ingredients and conditions, we were able to tune degradation rates, release profiles, cellular …

Smartphone Microendoscopy For High Resolution Fluorescence Imaging, Xiangqian Hong, Vivek K. Nagarajan, Dale H. Mugler, Bing Yu

Biomedical Engineering Faculty Research and Publications

High resolution optical endoscopes arc increasingly used in diagnosis of various medical conditions of internal organs, such as the cervix and gastrointestinal (GI) tracts, but they are too expensive for use in resource-poor settings. On the other hand, smartphones with high resolution cameras and Internet access have become more affordable, enabling them to diffuse into most rural areas and developing countries in the past decade. In this paper, we describe a smartphone microendoscope that can take fluorescence images with a spatial resolution of 3.1 μm. Images collected from ex vivo, in vitro and in vivo samples using the device …

Self-Powered Microfluidic Device For Rapid Assay Of Antiplatelet Drugs, Bincy Jose, Peter Mccluskey, Niamh Gilmartin, Martin Somers, Dermot Kenny, Antonio J. Ricco, Nigel Kent, Lourdes Basabe-Desmonts

Articles

We report the development of a microfluidic device for the rapid assay in whole blood of platelet-protein interactions indicative of the efficacy of antiplatelet drugs—e.g., aspirin and Plavix, two of the world’s most widely used drugs—in cardiovascular patients. Because platelet adhesion to surface-confined protein matrices is modulated by fluid shear rates at the blood/protein interface, and because such binding is a better indicator of platelet function than platelet self-aggregation, we designed, fabricated, and characterized the performance of a family of disposable, self-powered microfluidic chips with well-defined flow and interfacial shear rates suitable for small blood volumes (≤ 200 µL). We …

Biodegradable Electronic And Optical Devices Toward Temporary Implants, Md Shihab Adnan

Masters Theses

"Implantable biomedical devices have a high potential to revolutionize health care technologies in near future. Implantable devices can be classified as permanent prosthetic devices such as pacemakers or nerve stimulants and temporary devices for intermediate monitoring and control scenario which are still in research phase. In contrast to permanent device, temporary implants lose functionality and become unnecessary after intended operational lifetime which may pose serious electromagnetic and biomedical safety concern, latent complications at the implanted sites and possible ethical issues if not removed from body by an additional surgical operation.

The first paper of this thesis focuses on exploring the …

Biofilm Microbial Community Structure In An Urban Lake Utilizing Reclaimed Water, Tianzhi Wang, Yunkai Li, Tingwu Xu, Naiyang Wu, Mingchao Liang, Paul Hynds

Articles

Analyses of biofilm community structure may potentially be employed for aquatic ecosystem health assessment, however, to date, biofilm diversity within urban lakes using reclaimed water has not been examined. Accordingly, the microbial community diversity and structure of biofilms from the surface of multiple matrices with varying roughness (0.1, 1.0 and 10.0 μm) were characterized using a suite of molecular techniques including scanning electron microscopy, genetic fingerprinting and phospholipid-derived fatty acid analyses. Samples were largely comprised of inorganic particles, algae and numerous bacterial species; 12 phospholipid-derived fatty acid (PLFA) types were identified, significantly less than typically associated with sewage. Both growth …

An Examination Of Microbial Community Composition At Tba-Degrading Versus Non-Degrading Sites, Courtney Thompson

All Theses

Understanding how fuel oxygenates interact with microorganisms in the subsurface is important for the remediation of contaminated sites and designing and optimizing remedial strategies. The current understanding of methyl tertiary butyl ether (MTBE) and tertiary butyl alcohol (TBA) degradation in the environment has been developed primarily through gas chromatography GC analysis and culture-based laboratory studies. Microbial communities can be very diverse, and while microcosm studies provide valuable data, few metagenomic studies have been performed. To elucidate the significant microorganisms and pathways involved in the breakdown of MTBE and TBA, the compositions of entire indigenous microbial populations must be investigated and …

Synthesis And Functional Evaluation Of Peptide Modified Poly (Lactic-Co-Glycolic Acid) Nanoparticles To Inhibit Porphyromonas Gingivalis Biofilm Formation., Paridhi Kalia

Electronic Theses and Dissertations

Periodontal disease is an oral inflammatory disorder that afflicts roughly 46% of the adults in the U.S. Currently, treatment of periodontal disease involves the removal of plaque from the gingival pocket (with possible antibiotic treatment) and if necessary, gingival surgery. To our knowledge, no therapeutic approach exists that promotes host-biofilm homeostasis by limiting pathogen recolonization of the oral cavity after prophylaxis or treatment. The interaction of the pathogen Porphyromonas gingivalis with commensal streptococci is critical for initiation of periodontitis and represents a target for limiting P. gingivalis colonization of the oral cavity. Previous studies showed that a synthetic peptide …

Controlling Biofilm And Persister Cells By Targeting Cell Membranes, Ali Adem Bahar

Dissertations - ALL

The rapid increase in antibiotic resistant infections and the slowing pace of antibiotic development emphasize the need for alternative therapeutic agents to cure infectious diseases especially those caused by multidrug-resistant (MDR) strains. Bacteria obtain resistance to antibiotics through multiple mechanisms. One of intrinsic mechanisms of drug resistance is persister formation, by which bacterial cells enter a metabolically inactive stage and become highly tolerant to essentially all antibiotics, even at the concentrations that are hundreds of times higher than the lethal dose required to kill normal planktonic cells of the same strain. Persister cells in biofilms are even more difficult to …

Self-Assembly Directs Enamel Formation And Regeneration, Malcolm Snead

Composites at Lake Louise (CALL 2015)

Enamel is a unique bioceramic tissue covering our teeth, which by improving feeding and nutrition fueled an explosion in vertebrate evolution. Enamel is also the tissue affected by the most prevalent infectious disease of humankind, caries. While enamel is the hardest tissue in the vertebrate body it develops as a soft extracellular protein matrix precursor synthesized by ameloblast cells that is composed mainly of the proteins amelogenin and ameloblastin. Amelogenins are small-, hydrophobic-, inherently disordered proteins that self-assembly to form nanospheres through the interaction of two domains located at opposite molecular ends, whereas, ameloblastin self-assembles through but a single N’-terminal …

The Impact Of Municipal Waste Water In Neredime River, Kosovo, Bekim Selimi

UBT International Conference

Today, environmental protection is of great concern in Kosovo. Almost all waste water effluents from the localities are discharging in surface water and groundwater without being significantly treated deterioning water quality in Kosovo’s rivers. The aim of this paper is to analyze the level of pollution in the Neredime river created from municipal wastewater as well as to identify pollutants and their impact on the river. An attempt has been made to present the situation of the waters defining physicochemical water qualities of Neredime river from the source to the outskirts of town in the south-west of Ferizaj; this includes …

Flight Physician - November, 2015, Civil Aviation Medical Association

Browse all Civil Aviation Medical Association Newsletters

A twenty-one page newsletter of the Civil Aviation Medical Association. The newsletter provided news about civil aviation medicine and information related to the organization.

Department Of Biological Systems Engineering Newsletter, Fall 2015

BSE Department Magazine

No abstract provided.

Mattrack: A Matlab-Based Quantitative Image Analysis Platform For Investigating Real-Time Photo-Converted Fluorescent Signals In Live Cells, Jane Courtney, Elena Woods, Dimitri Scholz, William Hall, Virginie Gautier

Articles

We introduce here MATtrack, an open source MATLAB-based computational platform developed to process multi-Tiff files produced by a photo-conversion time lapse protocol for live cell fluorescent microscopy. MATtrack automatically performs a series of steps required for image processing, including extraction and import of numerical values from Multi-Tiff files, red/green image classification using gating parameters, noise filtering, background extraction, contrast stretching and temporal smoothing. MATtrack also integrates a series of algorithms for quantitative image analysis enabling the construction of mean and standard deviation images, clustering and classification of subcellular regions and injection point approximation. In addition, MATtrack features a simple user …

Measuring The Potential Impact Of Combination Hiv Prevention In Sub-Saharan Africa, Amin Khademi, Sunanth Anand, David Potts

Publications

A public health approach to combination HIV prevention is advocated to contain the epidemic in sub-Saharan Africa. We explore the implications of universal access to treatment along with HIV education scale-up in the region. We develop an HIV transmission model to investigate the impacts of universal access to treatment, as well as an analytical framework to estimate the effects of HIV education scale-up on the epidemic. We calibrate the model with data from South Africa and simulate the impacts of universal access to treatment along with HIV education scale-up on prevalence, incidence, and HIV-related deaths over a course of 15 …

Characterization Of Electrophorectic Separations On A Cellulose Paper-Microfluidic Chip, Kyle Robert Fast

Master's Theses

The purpose of this thesis project is to demonstrate the ability to utilize electrophoresis in a cellulose paper microfluidic chip to manipulate charged particles. Materials were selected and a manufacturing protocol was created to successfully apply the electric field onto the paper chip. Experiments were performed to characterize the separation rates for charged, colorimetric dye, Orange G in the membrane as a function of an applied electric field, dye concentration, and distance traveled. The experiments confirmed that the electric field can be applied to the chip and particle separation rates were characterized. Next, the determined rates results were used to …

Airborne Infection In Healthcare Environments: Implications To Hospital Corridor Design, Ehsan Mousavi

Department of Construction Engineering and Management: Dissertations, Theses, and Student Research

Several studies have linked nosocomial transmission airborne diseases to airflow in healthcare settings. Quasi-experimental methods are developed to observe the aerodynamic transport behavior of synthetic respiratory particles in corridors of a hospital. Computational models, validated by experimental results, are then developed to explore the spatial relationships of supply-exhaust air ventilation in patient corridors. The aim of this study is to determine optimal HVAC design strategies to contain and remove airborne contaminants in healthcare environments.

In addition to occupant comfort, hospital HVAC systems are designed to provide ventilation and directional airflow to contain, dilute and remove contaminants including airborne disease. Of …

Skyport: Payload: Medical Cooler For The Skyport Uav, Madison Gee, Hector Lopez, Victor Magaña

Mechanical Engineering Senior Theses

Access to basic healthcare is a major persisting problem around the globe, especially in rural parts of the world. One of the many facets of this problem is access to vaccine treatment. The transportation and storage of vaccines at the proper temperature is an issue that is still being solved and improved upon today. One of the common solutions to this problem is the use of passive coolers such as ice packs and other refrigerants. The potential issue with passive cooling is that the temperature cannot be actively controlled. This is evident, as many vaccines are wasted due to incorrect …

Simulation-Based Optimization Of Mitigation Strategies For Pandemic Influenza., Arsalan Paleshi

Electronic Theses and Dissertations

Millions of people have been infected and died as results of influenza pandemics in human history. In order to prepare for these disasters, it is important to know how the disease spreads. Further, intervention strategies should be implemented during the pandemics to mitigate their ill effects. Knowledge of how these interventions will affect the pandemic course is paramount for decision makers. This study develops a simulation-based optimization model which aims at finding a combination of strategies that result in the best value for an objective function of defined metrics under a set of constraints. Also, a procedure is presented to …

Flight Physician - May, 2015, Civil Aviation Medical Association

Browse all Civil Aviation Medical Association Newsletters

A seventeen page newsletter of the Civil Aviation Medical Association. The newsletter provided news about civil aviation medicine and information related to the organization.

Synthesis, Functionalization, And Characterization Of Metallic And Organic Nanoparticles For Biomedical Applications, Christopher Brian Sylvester

Honors Capstones

No abstract provided.

Multiplexed Microfluidic Loop-Mediated Isothermal Amplification Of The 16s Rrna Gene For The Diagnosis Of Neonatal Sepsis In Resource-Limited Environments, Griffin Thomas Sonaty

Biomedical Engineering Undergraduate Honors Theses

Bacterial infection, or sepsis, places a disproportionately high burden on newborns in developing countries. This is due in part to a lack of diagnostic tools suitable for sustainable use in resource-limited nurseries. One potential vehicle for a new diagnostic assay is loop-mediated isothermal amplification (LAMP), a high-yield DNA amplification method. LAMP has been used to detect single genes from bacteria in blood serum samples to aid in sepsis diagnosis. While specific, this approach can only provide detection for one species at a time. LAMP could be adapted to detect a broader set of bacteria, while retaining a degree of specificity …

Expression Of Ha1 Fragment Of H1n1 Swine Influenza Viral Protein, Hemagglutinin, On The Surface Of Yeast Saccharomyces Cerevisiae Using Pyd5 Shuttle Vector, Ismael Mojica

Biological and Agricultural Engineering Undergraduate Honors Theses

Influenza viruses are enveloped viruses with segmented RNA genome surrounded by a helical symmetry shell. Due to genetic reassortment between avian, swine, and human influenza viruses, a global pandemic may emerge, calling for new methods of mass vaccine production. Yeast is an ideal organism to express viral antigens (e.g. hemagglutinin) because of its natural adjuvant activity, making the expressed proteins more immunogenic when administered to the human body [1,2]. In addition to the purpose of vaccination, yeast is economically convenient by expressing proteins in a fast, inexpensive manner [3,4]. In this study, the goal is to express the HA1 fragment …