Digital Commons Network^™

Rooting Out Genetic Structure Of Invasive Wild Pigs In Texas, Anna M. Mangan, Antoinette J. Piaggio, Michael J. Bodenchuk, Courtney F. Pierce, Timothy J. Smyser

United States Department of Agriculture Wildlife Services: Staff Publications

Invasive wild pigs (Sus scrofa), also called feral swine or wild hogs, are recognized as among the most destructive invasive species in the world. Throughout the United States, invasive wild pigs have expanded rapidly over the past 40 years with populations now established in 38 states. Of the estimated 6.9 million wild pigs distributed throughout the United States, Texas supports approximately 40% of the population and similarly bears disproportionate ecological and economic costs. Genetic analyses are an effective tool for understanding invasion pathways and tracking dispersal of invasive species such as wild pigs and have been used recently …

Wildlife Responses To Livestock Guard Dogs And Domestic Sheep On Open Range, Daniel Kinka, Jeffrey T. Schultz, Julie K. Young

United States Department of Agriculture Wildlife Services: Staff Publications

Domestic sheep (Ovis aries) are an attractant to carnivores; however, sheep are often accompanied by humans and livestock guardian dogs (LGDs; Canis familiaris), which defend sheep from depredation. Sheep also compete directly with wildlife for grazing resources. Although practiced for millennia in much of the world outside North America, the effect that transhumance has on wildlife is poorly understood. To test the effect of sheep bands (sheep, humans, and LGDs) on wildlife, we modeled the detection probability of wild mammals relative to the presence of sheep bands in the Northwestern United States. Sheep band presence was associated …

Mongooses (Urva Auropunctata) As Reservoir Hosts Of Leptospira Species In The United States Virgin Islands, 2019–2020, Hannah M. Cranford, A. Springer Browne, Karen Lecount, Tammy Anderson, Camila Hamond, Linda Schlater, Tod Stuber, Valicia J. Burke-France, Marissa Taylor, Cosme J. Harrison, Katia Y. Matias, Alexandra Medley, John Rossow, Nicholas Wiese, Leanne Jankelunas, Leah De Wilde, Michelle Mehalick, Gerard L. Blanchard, Keith R. Garcia, Alan S. Mckinley, Claudia D. Lombard, Nicole F. Angeli, David Horner, Thomas Kelley, David J. Worthington, Jennifer Valiulis, Bethany Bradford, Are Berentsen, Johanna S. Salzer, Renee Galloway, Ilana J. Schafer, Kristine Bisgard, Joseph Roth, Brett R. Ellis, Esther M. Ellis, Jarlath E. Nally

United States Department of Agriculture Wildlife Services: Staff Publications

During 2019–2020, the Virgin Islands Department of Health investigated potential animal reservoirs of Leptospira spp., the bacteria that cause leptospirosis. In this cross-sectional study, we investigated Leptospira spp. exposure and carriage in the small Indian mongoose (Urva auropunctata, syn: Herpestes auropunctatus), an invasive animal species. This study was conducted across the three main islands of the U.S. Virgin Islands (USVI), which are St. Croix, St. Thomas, and St. John. We used the microscopic agglutination test (MAT), fluorescent antibody test (FAT), real-time polymerase chain reaction (lipl32 rt-PCR), and bacterial culture to evaluate serum and kidney specimens and compared the …

Effects Of Sesame Consumption On Inflammatory Biomarkers In Humans: A Systematic Review And Meta-Analysis Of Randomized Controlled Trials, Shabnam Rafiee, Roghaye Faryabi, Mohammad Ali Zareian, Jessie Hawkins, Nitin Shivappa Mbbs, Mph, Ph.D., Laila Shirbeigi

Faculty Publications

Objectives. Existing evidence produces conflicting findings regarding the effect of sesame intake on inflammatory biomarkers; thisknowledge gap has yet to be met through systematic review and meta-analysis. )is meta-analysis of randomized, controlledclinical trials (RCTs) was conducted to evaluate the effects of sesame consumption on markers of inflammation in humans. Methods. PubMed, Scopus, and the Cochrane Database of Systematic Reviews were searched through August 2020 to identify relevant papers for inclusion. Using the random-effects model, data were evaluated as weighted mean differences (WMD) with 95% confidence intervals (CI). Cochrane’s Q and I-squared (I2) tests were used to …

A Mathematical Analysis Of An In-Vivo Ebola Virus Transmission Dynamics Model, Seleman Ismail, Adeline Peter Mtunya

Tanzania Journal of Science

Ebola virus (EBOV) infection is a hemorrhagic and hazardous disease, which is among the most shocking threats to human health causing a large number of deaths. Currently, there are no approved curative therapies for the disease. In this study, a mathematical model for in-vivo Ebola virus transmission dynamics was analyzed. The analysis of the model mainly focused on the sensitivity of basic reproductive number,  pertaining to the model parameters. Particularly, the sensitivity indices of all parameters of  were computed by using the forward normalized sensitivity index method. The results showed that a slight change in the infection rate immensely influences …

Rangelands And Pastoralism In Central Asia And Mongolia: Challenges And Perspectives, T. Ulambayar

IGC Proceedings (1977-2023)

Livestock herding contributes 10-45% of national GDPs across the Central Asia and Mongolia (CAM) region while supporting the livelihood of nearly one-third of the region’s population. Over 171 million herds graze the region's rangelands, occupying 65-73% of the territories in Central Asia (CA) and Mongolia. Traditional pastoralism has been affected dramatically by climate change. For the last decades, the annual mean air temperature has risen two to three times higher than the global average in CA and Mongolia respectively. Annual precipitation has a decreasing trend over the same period, causing increased aridity, a decline in lakes and rivers leading to …

Detection Of Dental Apical Lesions Using Cnns On Periapical Radiograph, Chun-Wei Li, Szu-Yin Lin, He-Sheng Chou, Tsung-Yi Chen, Yu-An Chen, Sheng-Yu Liu, Yu-Lin Liu, Chiung-An Chen, Yen-Cheng Huang, Shih-Lun Chen, Yi-Cheng Mao, Patricia Angela R. Abu, Wei-Yuan Chiang, Wen-Shen Lo

Department of Information Systems & Computer Science Faculty Publications

Apical lesions, the general term for chronic infectious diseases, are very common dental diseases in modern life, and are caused by various factors. The current prevailing endodontic treatment makes use of X-ray photography taken from patients where the lesion area is marked manually, which is therefore time consuming. Additionally, for some images the significant details might not be recognizable due to the different shooting angles or doses. To make the diagnosis process shorter and efficient, repetitive tasks should be performed automatically to allow the dentists to focus more on the technical and medical diagnosis, such as treatment, tooth cleaning, or …

Management Strategies For Enhanced Beef Production On Suckler Cow Farms, Lief J. Asheim, L. Aass, B. Åby

IGC Proceedings (1977-2023)

While around two thirds the Norwegian beef is produced on dairy cow farms, meat production on specialized beef farms has increased in recent years. The specialized beef industry consists of suckler cow herds producing calves, and farm operations that purchase weaned calves for fattening. A linear programming (LP) model of suckler cow herds, selling weaned calves at 200 days, was developed to study the influence of certain management strategies on profitability. The data were derived from the records of 31 suckler cow herds from three Norwegian regions. The feed costs for silage (roughly half of the feed), NH3-treated straw, concentrate …

Virus Propagation And System Simulation Based On Cellular Automata Model, Lijuan Zhang, Fuchang Wang, Zhengang Li

Journal of System Simulation

Abstract: A susceptible-latent-infected-cured-immune virus spreading model is established according to the characteristics of epidemic transmission and the actual urban spatial map model. Individuals in the environment are regarded as agents, and the spreading mechanism is established according to the principle of cellular. The effects of different strategies and different characteristics of virus spreading on epidemic have been studied. The role and effect of important factors on epidemic prevention and control method are discussed, and the model is validated taking Shijiazhuang epidemic as an example . The results show that the number of initial latent, the infectivity of disease, vaccination proportion …

Epidemic Conditions With Temporary Link Deactivation On A Network Sir Disease Model, Hannah Scanlon, John Gemmer

Spora: A Journal of Biomathematics

The spread of an infectious disease depends on intrinsic properties of the disease as well as the connectivity and actions of the population. This study investigates the dynamics of an SIR type model which accounts for human tendency to avoid infection while also maintaining preexisting, interpersonal relationships. Specifically, we use a network model in which individuals probabilistically deactivate connections to infected individuals and later reconnect to the same individuals upon recovery. To analyze this network model, a mean field approximation consisting of a system of fourteen ordinary differential equations for the number of nodes and edges is developed. This system …

Mitigating The Externality Of Diseases Of Poverty Through Health Aid, Kamal Jnawali, Michael G. Tyshenko, Tamer Oraby

School of Mathematical & Statistical Sciences Faculty Publications

Externality exists in healthcare when an individual benefits from others being healthy as it reduces the probability of getting sick from illness. Healthy workers are considered to be the more productive labourers leading to a country’s positive economic growth over time. Several research studies have modelled disease transmission and its economic impact on a single country in isolation. We developed a two-country diseaseeconomy model that explores disease transmission and crossborder infection of disease for its impacts. The model includes aspects of a worsening and rapid transmission of disease juxtaposed by positive impacts to the economy from tourism. We found that …

A Roadmap For Building Data Science Capacity For Health Discovery And Innovation In Africa, Joseph Beyene, Solomon W. Harrar, Mekibib Altaye, Tessema Astatkie, Tadesse Awoke, Ziv Shkedy, Tesfaye B. Mersha

Statistics Faculty Publications

Technological advances now make it possible to generate diverse, complex and varying sizes of data in a wide range of applications from business to engineering to medicine. In the health sciences, in particular, data are being produced at an unprecedented rate across the full spectrum of scientific inquiry spanning basic biology, clinical medicine, public health and health care systems. Leveraging these data can accelerate scientific advances, health discovery and innovations. However, data are just the raw material required to generate new knowledge, not knowledge on its own, as a pile of bricks would not be mistaken for a building. In …

Professional Responsibility, Legal Malpractice, Cybersecurity, And Cyber-Insurance In The Covid-19 Era, Ethan S. Burger

St. Mary's Journal on Legal Malpractice & Ethics

In response to the COVID-19 outbreak, law firms conformed their activities to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC), Occupational Safety and Health Administration (OSHA), and state health authority guidelines by immediately reducing the size of gatherings, encouraging social distancing, and mandating the use of protective gear. These changes necessitated the expansion of law firm remote operations, made possible by the increased adoption of technological tools to coordinate workflow and administrative tasks, communicate with clients, and engage with judicial and governmental bodies.

Law firms’ increased use of these technological tools for carrying out legal and administrative activities has implications …

Globe Mosquito Habitat Mapper Citizen Science Data 2017–2020, Russanne Low, Rebecca Boger, Peder Nelson, Matteo Kimura

Publications and Research

The GLOBE Program's GLOBE Observer application is a free citizen science mobile data collection and visualization tool compatible with iOS and Android operating systems. Citizen scientists armed with the app can report the mosquito larval habitats they identify using the GLOBE Mosquito Habitat Mapper tool. This data can complement the climate, weather, and land cover data obtained from satellite measurements by scientists who develop risk models for mosquito-borne diseases. Public participation in mosquito surveillance research provides the opportunity to obtain the volume, velocity and variety of data needed to fight the threat of vector-borne diseases, especially in under-resourced communities with …

Murrells Inlet Assessment 2021, Bailie Willis, Amanda Giambi, Anastasia Gluth, Julia Angell, Cain Rullo

Goal 11: Sustainable Cities and Communities

No abstract provided.

A Comparative Study On Feature Extraction And Classification/Clustering Of Fake News And Conspiracy Theories From Twitter Data, Deb Shana

Theses and Dissertations

Fake news and conspiracy theories have become largely abundant in the expanding world of social media. They predominantly affect the beliefs and thoughts of the public, resulting in chaos. They have always existed throughout the last few decades. They have been linked to prejudice, revolutions and genocide across history. They have also been known to have propelled people to reject mainstream medicines to an extent where some diseases are recurring in some parts of the world. They impose a serious impact since they are capable of spreading very fast Thus, it is very important to find suitable ways to detect …

An Opportunistic Survey Reveals An Unexpected Coronavirus Diversity Hotspot In North America, Hon S. Ip, Kathryn M. Griffin, Jeffrey D. Messer, Megan E. Winzeler, Susan A. Shriner, Mary Lea Killian, Mia Kim Torchetti, Thomas J. Deliberto, Brian R. Amman, Caitlin M. Cossaboom, R. Reid Harvey, Natalie M. Wendling, Hannah Rettler, Dean Taylor, Jonathan S. Towner, Casey Barton Behravesh, David S. Blehert

United States Department of Agriculture Wildlife Services: Staff Publications

In summer 2020, Severe Acute Respiratory Syndrome Coronavirus 2 (SARS-CoV-2) was detected on mink farms in Utah. An interagency One Health response was initiated to assess the extent of the outbreak and included sampling animals from on or near affected mink farms and testing them for SARS-CoV-2 and non-SARS coronaviruses. Among the 365 animals sampled, including domestic cats, mink, rodents, raccoons, and skunks, 261 (72%) of the animals harbored at least one coronavirus. Among the samples that could be further characterized, 127 alphacoronaviruses and 88 betacoronaviruses (including 74 detections of SARS-CoV-2 in mink) were identified. Moreover, at least 10% (n …

Medical Outcomes, Quality Of Life, And Family Perceptions For Outpatient Vs Inpatient Neutropenia Management After Chemotherapy For Pediatric Acute Myeloid Leukemia, Kelly D Getz, Julia E Szymczak, Yimei Li, Rachel Madding, Yuan-Shung V Huang, Catherine Aftandilian, Staci D Arnold, Kira O Bona, Emi Caywood, Anderson B Collier, M Monica Gramatges, Meret Henry, Craig Lotterman, Kelly Maloney, Amir Mian, Rajen Mody, Elaine Morgan, Elizabeth A Raetz, Jeffrey Rubnitz, Anupam Verma, Naomi Winick, Jennifer J Wilkes, Jennifer C Yu, Brian T Fisher, Richard Aplenc

Department of Medicine Faculty Papers

Importance: Pediatric acute myeloid leukemia (AML) requires multiple courses of intensive chemotherapy that result in neutropenia, with significant risk for infectious complications. Supportive care guidelines recommend hospitalization until neutrophil recovery. However, there are little data to support inpatient over outpatient management.

Objective: To evaluate outpatient vs inpatient neutropenia management for pediatric AML.

Design, setting, and participants: This cohort study used qualitative and quantitative methods to compare medical outcomes, patient health-related quality of life (HRQOL), and patient and family perceptions between outpatient and inpatient neutropenia management. The study included patients from 17 US pediatric hospitals with frontline chemotherapy start dates ranging …

Variations, Validations, Degradations, And Noninvasive Determination Of Pregnancy Using Fecal Steroid Metabolites In Free-Ranging Pronghorn, Cole A. Bleke, Eric M. Gese, Susannah S. French

United States Department of Agriculture Wildlife Services: Staff Publications

Pregnancy status is a key parameter used to assess reproductive performance of a species as it represents a starting point for measuring vital rates. Vital rates allow managers to determine trends in populations such as neonate survival and recruitment; two important factors in ungulate population growth rates. Techniques to determine pregnancy have generally involved capture and restraint of the animal to obtain blood samples for determining serum hormone levels. Non-invasive pregnancy assessment, via feces, eliminates any hazards between handler and animal, as well as removes handling-induced physiological biases. Using noninvasive fecal sampling, we conducted hormone validations, investigated pregnancy rates, and …

Cytoarchitectural Characteristics Associated With Cognitive Flexibility In Raccoons, Joanna Jacob, Molly Kent, Sarah Benson-Amram, Suzana Herculano-Houzel, Mary Ann Raghanti, Emily Ploppert, Jack Drake, Bilal Hindi, Nick R. Natale, Sarah Daniels, Rachel Fanelli, Anderson Miller, Tim Landis, Amy Gilbert, Shylo Johnson, Annie Lai, Molly Hyer, Amanda Rzucidlo, Chris Anchor, Stan Gehrt, Kelly Lambert

United States Department of Agriculture Wildlife Services: Staff Publications

With rates of psychiatric illnesses such as depression continuing to rise, additional preclinical models are needed to facilitate translational neuroscience research. In the current study, the raccoon (Procyon lotor) was investigated due to its similarities with primate brains, including comparable proportional neuronal densities, cortical magnification of the forepaw area, and cortical gyrification. Specifically, we report on the cytoarchitectural characteristics of raccoons profiled as high, intermediate, or low solvers in a multiaccess problem-solving task. Isotropic fractionation indicated that high-solvers had significantly more cells in the hippocampus (HC) than the other solving groups; further, a nonsignificant trend suggested that this …

Satellite-Detected Ammonia Changes In The United States: Natural Or Anthropogenic Impacts, Yaqian He, Rongting Xu, Stephen A. Prior, Di Yang, Anni Yang, Jian Chen

United States Department of Agriculture Wildlife Services: Staff Publications

Ammonia (NH3) is the most abundant alkaline component and can react with atmospheric acidic species to form aerosols that can lead to numerous environmental and health issues. Increasing atmospheric NH3 over agricultural regions in the US has been documented. However, spatiotemporal changes of NH3 concentrations over the entire US are still not thoroughly understood, and the factors that drive these changes remain unknown. Herein, we applied the Atmospheric Infrared Sounder (AIRS) monthly NH3 dataset to explore spatiotemporal changes in atmospheric NH3 and the empirical relationships with synthetic N fertilizer application, livestock manure production, and climate factors across the entire US …

Adaptation Of An Artificial Bait To An Automated Aerial Delivery System For Landscape-Scale Brown Treesnake Suppression, Rafael A. Garcia, Thomas W. Mcauliffe, Lorelie P. Bumanlag, Shane R. Siers, Bruce A. Kimball

United States Department of Agriculture Wildlife Services: Staff Publications

Dead neonatal mice are currently used as bait for delivery of toxin to invasive brown treesnakes (Boiga irregularis) on Guam; once deployed in the field the mice are highly attractive to the snakes but only for about four days. An artificial bait containing a mixture of fats mimicking those in skin of the mice is also highly attractive to the snakes and remains attractive 2–3 times longer. The artificial bait, however, costs more than the mice, and is more difficult to attach to the capsules of a novel aerial bait delivery system. This paper describes a reformulation of the bait …

Movement, Space-Use And Resource Preferences Of European Golden Jackals In Human-Dominated Landscapes: Insights From A Telemetry Study, Skye Fenton, Paul R. Moorcroft, Duško Ćirović, József Lanszki, Miklós Heltai, Francesca Cagnacci, Stewart Breck, Neda Bogdanović, Ilija Pantelić, Kornél Ács, Nathan Ranc

United States Department of Agriculture Wildlife Services: Staff Publications

During the last half-century, the distribution of golden jackals (Canis aureus) has rapidly increased throughout Europe. Today, golden jackals are thriving in human-dominated landscapes across Southeastern and Central Europe. Most studies on golden jackals have focused on large-scale distribution patterns; to date, little is known about the species’ fine-scale spatial ecology. In this study, we analyzed the movement behavior, space-use and resource selection of six golden jackals fitted with GPS-GSM collars in two study areas in Hungary and Serbia. Two of the jackals were a breeding pair. We found that home range size averaged 11.2 km² (90% …

Effects Of Translocation On Survival Of Nuisance Bears, Javan Bauder, D. Ruid, N. M. Roberts, B. Kohn, M. L. Allen

United States Department of Agriculture Wildlife Services: Staff Publications

Effective mitigation of human–wildlife conflict should aim to reduce conflicts while also minimizing wildlife mortality. Translocation is often used to mitigate human–wildlife conflict but translocated individuals may have reduced survival, which could negatively affect population growth and social acceptance of translocation as a management tool. Yet, non-translocated nuisance individuals may also have low survival due to inherent risks associated with nuisance behavior. We used a 38-year dataset of 1233 marked and translocated nuisance American black bears (Ursus americanus) as a model system with which to evaluate the impacts of translocation on nuisance bear survival. We used multi-state mark-recapture models to …

Threading The Needle: How Humans Influence Predator–Prey Spatiotemporal Interactions In A Multiple-Predator System, Asia Murphy, Duane R. Diefenbach, Mark Ternent, Matt Lovallo, David Miller

United States Department of Agriculture Wildlife Services: Staff Publications

Perceived predation risk and the resulting antipredator behaviour varies across space, time and predator identity. Communities with multiple predators that interact and differ in their use of space, time of activity and hunting mode create a complex landscape for prey to avoid predation. Anthropogenic presence and disturbance have the potential to shift interactions among predators and prey and the where and when encounters occur. We examined how white-tailed deer Odocoileus virginianus fawn spatiotemporal antipredator behaviour differed along an anthropogenic disturbance gradient that had black bears Ursus americanus, coyotes Canis latrans, bobcats Lynx rufus and humans present. We quantified (a) spatial …

Covid-19 One Year On: Security And Privacy Review Of Contact Tracing Mobile Apps, Wei Yang Ang, Lwin Khin Shar

Research Collection School Of Computing and Information Systems

The ongoing COVID-19 pandemic caused 3.8 million deaths since December 2019. At the current vaccination pace, this global pandemic could persist for several years. Throughout the world, contact tracing (CT) apps were developed, which play a significant role in mitigating the spread of COVID-19. This work examines the current state of security and privacy landscape of mobile CT apps. Our work is the first attempt, to our knowledge, which provides a comprehensive analysis of 70 CT apps used worldwide as of year Q1 2021. Among other findings, we observed that 80% of them may have handled sensitive data without adequate …

Reinvigorating A Technical Countering Weapons Of Mass Destruction Distance Learning Graduate Certificate Program, James C. Petrosky, Gaiven Varshney, Jeremy Slagley, Sara Shaghaghi

Faculty Publications

Current Countering Weapons of Mass Destruction (CWMD) demands can be divided broadly into policy and science. The science of chemical, biological, and radiological/nuclear weapons informs the limits of development, production, employment, operation, detection, risk characterization, human and material protection, and medical intervention. In short, the science of weapons of mass destruction (WMD) should precede and inform the development of policy. It is to this end that the Air Force Institute of Technology (AFIT) CWMD program was re-established, providing a technical educational option for practitioners to understand the science behind a very technically challenging subject.

The Labyrinth Of Data Collection For Humanitarian Project Funding And Implementation, Maria Alejandra Pulido

Independent Study Project (ISP) Collection

My research concentrates on four NGOs: IOM, IDMC, JIPS, and OCHA which use different tools to collect data and translate the information into evidence for data-driven decision making (DDDM) for the implementation of humanitarian assistance projects. I focus on the importance, advantages, and various data collection tools which help ameliorate the humanitarian sector since it does not have a current professionalized path to enter the workforce. I incorporated four interviews, attended two conferences and analyzed multiple online sources during my project.

Synthesis And Complexation Of Monotosylated 4-Aminopyridine With Nickel (Ii) And Iron (Ii) Ions, Kingsley John Orie, Remy Ukachukwu Duru, Raphael I-Oro Ngochindo

Makara Journal of Science

Tosylated 4-aminopyridine and other sulfonylated compounds of amines comprise a substantial class of pharmaceutical drugs used as antibiotics in the field of medicine. This research aimed at the synthesis of tosylated 4-aminopyridine and the complexation of the tosyated 4-aminopyridine with Ni(II) and Fe(II) ions. The sulfonamide was prepared by the action of tosyl chloride on 4-aminopyridine in an aqueous alkaline medium. The complexes were synthesized by the reaction of Ni(NO₃)_2.6H₂O /Fe(NO₃)_2.6H₂O with sulfonamide derivative. These compounds were characterized through Ultraviolet Visible spectroscopy (UV–Vis), Fourier Transform Infer-Red (FTIR) spectroscopy, …

Recognition And Screening For Chagas Disease In The Usa, Rachel Marcus, Andres F. Henao-Martinez, Melissa Nolan Ph.D., Mph, Elizabeth Livingston, Stephen A. Klotz, Robert H. Gilman, Monica Miranda-Schaeubinger, Sheba Meymandi

Faculty Publications

Chagas disease (CD), caused by the protozoan Trypanosoma cruzi, is a public health concern, mainly among countries in South and Central America. However, despite the large number of immigrants from endemic countries living in the USA, awareness of CD is poor in the medical community, and therefore it is significantly underdiagnosed. To avoid the catastrophic cardiac complications of CD and to prevent maternal–fetal transmission, widespread educational programs highlighting the need for diagnosis are urgently needed.