Digital Commons Network^™

Probing Small Heat Shock Protein Chaperoning Activity Through The Interaction Between Myoglobin And Guanidine Hydrochloride, Jacob Mcdowell

Celebration of Research

Myoglobin is a small biological protein found in most muscle tissues. When in the proper form (native/folded), myoglobin can serve its primary function: binding oxygen. However, like all proteins, myoglobin can denature through a variety of processes into a form that no longer binds oxygen. One denaturant, guanidine hydrochloride (GuHCl), is the biological product of protein metabolism. Another class of biological proteins is small heat shock proteins (sHSPs), which have the function of chaperoning other proteins to prevent the denaturing process. Previously, in physical chemistry lab, we explored the GuHCl-induced denaturing of myoglobin. Former Northwestern students used fluorescence correlation spectroscopy …

Impact Of Athletics On Academic Performance At Nwc, Matthew Scott, Brant Vermeer

Celebration of Research

In this paper, we study the impact of athletics on academic performance at Northwestern College. Using data from 2006-08 and 2013-17, we show average ACT score for athletes is lower compared to non-athletes. Additionally, athletes typically earn lower GPAs in their first year, even after controlling for past academic performance. This negative relationship between athletics and first-year GPA is most prevalent among students entering college with a low composite ACT score. The data show mandatory meetings with coaches for struggling students do not have a statistically significant impact on average team GPA, but this requirement may have a positive impact …

Building A Better College: Estimating The Effects Of New Athletic Facilities On The Enrollment Decisions Of Student-Athletes, Alex Vander Stoep

Celebration of Research

In 2015, Northwestern College opened the Juffer Fieldhouse, a $3.3M indoor sports facility complex, with hopes of advancing the athletic programs at the college and capturing the interest of prospective student-athletes. Based on prospective student data from 2006-08 and 2013-17, this study identifies the impact that the Juffer Fieldhouse had on the enrollment decisions of prospective student-athletes. I show that the opening of this new indoor facility is associated with a 8.54% increase in the probability of enrollment for prospective students with an athletic interest compared to non-athletes. Furthermore, student athletes who expressed interest in sports directly supported by the …

Intuitions About God And Satan: The Relationship Of Mentalizing And Imagination With The Experience Of Supernatural Good And Evil, Paige Boote, Ethan Husbands, Taelor Lamansky, Rebekah Muilenburg, Hannah Paauw, Bailey Swain

Celebration of Research

Believers in relational deities conceptualize god(s) as agents with mental states. The ability to imagine other minds may be one of the cognitive foundations of religious belief. Research on this relationship is mixed, however. This study tests this relationship across experiences of supernatural good and evil rather than abstract beliefs.

Previous research has demonstrated that mentalizing significantly predicted prayer type (Edman et al., 2015; 2017). However, a multi-site replication study failed to replicate the initial results, indicating that perhaps mode of prayer is more complexly related to mentalizing than initially hypothesized. Edman (2015; 2018) extended this research by including measures …