Digital Commons Network^™

Fibroblast Growth Factor 21, Adiposity, And Macronutrient Balance In A Healthy, Pregnant Population With Overweight And Obesity, Elizabeth F. Sutton, Christopher D. Morrison, Jacqueline M. Stephens, Leanne M. Redman

Faculty Publications

© 2018, © 2018 Taylor & Francis. Aim of the study: The regulation and actions of fibroblast growth factor 21 (FGF21) are responsive to energy status and macronutrient balance, and investigations of FGF21 in normal pregnancy, which could be informative for FGF21 biology, are seldom. The goal of our study was to examine FGF21 levels in a contemporary healthy, pregnant population. Methods: We phenotyped 43 women with overweight and obesity during pregnancy for weight, body composition, and fasting blood. Serum FGF21 was measured during the first and third trimesters. Placentas were collected at delivery. Results: Maternal FGF21 concentrations were positively …

Microbial Community Structure And Functional Potential Of Lava-Formed Gotjawal Soils In Jeju, Korea, Jong Shik Kim, Dae Shin Kim, Keun Chul Lee, Jung Sook Lee, Gary M. King, Sanghoon Kang

Faculty Publications

© 2018 Kim et al. This is an open access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License, which permits unrestricted use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided the original author and source are credited. The Gotjawal areas of Jeju Island, Korea, are comprised of unmanaged forests growing on volcanic soils. They support unique assemblages of vascular plants from both northern and southern hemispheres, but are threatened by human disturbance. The health and ecosystem function of these assemblages likely depends in part on the diversity and community structure of soil microbial communities, about which little is …

3d Mri Modeling Of Thin And Spatially Complex Soft Tissue Structures Without Shrinkage: Lamprey Myosepta As An Example, Bradley M. Wood, Guang Jia, Owen Carmichael, Kevin Mcklveen, Dominique G. Homberger

Faculty Publications

© 2018 Wiley Periodicals, Inc. 3D imaging techniques enable the nondestructive analysis and modeling of complex structures. Among these, MRI exhibits good soft tissue contrast, but is currently less commonly used for nonclinical research than X-ray CT, even though the latter requires contrast-staining that shrinks and distorts soft tissues. When the objective is the creation of a realistic and complete 3D model of soft tissue structures, MRI data are more demanding to acquire and visualize and require extensive post-processing because they comprise noncubic voxels with dimensions that represent a trade-off between tissue contrast and image resolution. Therefore, thin soft tissue …

Spreading The News About The Novel Conjugation Mechanism In Streptomyces Bacteria, Gregg S. Pettis

Faculty Publications

© 2018 Society for Applied Microbiology and John Wiley & Sons Ltd The hallmark of mycelial spore-forming bacteria of the genus Streptomyces is their prolific production of antibiotics and other bioactive secondary metabolites as part of a complex morphological and physiological developmental program. They are further distinguished by a conjugation mechanism that differs substantially from the single-strand mode of DNA transfer via Type IV secretion, which is exhibited by numerous unicellular Gram-negative and Gram-positive bacteria. At the crux of the novel intermycelial transfer event in Streptomyces spp. is a membrane pore composed of a single plasmid protein (TraB), which also …

Lsu Research Fall 2018, Louisiana State University And Agricultural & Mechanical College

Research Magazine

LSU Research is published annually by the Office of Research & Economic Development, Louisiana State University.

Particulate Matter Containing Environmentally Persistent Free Radicals Induces Ahrdependent Cytokine And Reactive Oxygen Species Production In Human Bronchial Epithelial Cells, Ashlyn C. Harmon, Valeria Y. Hebert, Stephania A. Cormier, Balamurugan Subramanian, James R. Reed, Wayne L. Backes, Tammy R. Dugas

Faculty Publications

© 2018 Harmon et al. This is an open access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License, which permits unrestricted use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided the original author and source are credited. Particulate matter (PM) is emitted during the combustion of fuels and wastes. PM exposure exacerbates pulmonary diseases, and the mechanism may involve oxidative stress. At lower combustion temperatures such as occurs in the cool zone of a flame, aromatic compounds chemisorb to the surface of metal-oxide-containing PM, resulting in the formation of surface-stabilized environmentally persistent free radicals (EPFR). Prior studies showed …

Louisiana Agriculture Fall, 2018, Lsu Agcenter

Louisiana Agriculture

No abstract provided.

Louisiana Agriculture Fall, 2018, Lsu Agcenter

Louisiana Agriculture

No abstract provided.

Class Specific Discrimination Of Volatile Organic Compounds Using A Quartz Crystal Microbalance Based Multisensor Array, Stephanie R. Vaughan, Nicholas C. Speller, Pratap Chhotaray, Kevin S. Mccarter, Noureen Siraj, Rocío L. Pérez, Yue Li, Isiah M. Warner

Faculty Publications

© 2018 Elsevier B.V. The use of quartz crystal microbalance (QCM) sensor arrays for analyses of volatile organic compounds (VOC) has attracted significant interest in recent years. In this regard, a group of uniformed materials based on organic salts (GUMBOS) has proven to be promising recognition elements in QCM based sensor arrays due to diverse properties afforded by this class of tunable materials. Herein, we examine the application of four novel phthalocyanine based GUMBOS as recognition elements for VOC sensing using a QCM based multisensor array (MSA). These synthesized GUMBOS are composed of copper (II) phthalocyaninetetrasulfonate (CuPcS4) anions coupled with …

Community Phylogeny Of The Globally Critically Imperiled Pine Rockland Ecosystem, Lauren B. Trotta, Benjamin Baiser, Jennifer Possley, Daijiang Li, James Lange, Sarah Martin, Emily B. Sessa

Faculty Publications

© 2018 Botanical Society of America Premise of the Study: Community phylogenetic methods incorporate information on evolutionary relationships into studies of organismal assemblages. We used a community phylogenetic framework to investigate relationships and biogeographic affinities and to calculate phylogenetic signal of endemism and invasiveness for the flora of the pine rocklands—a globally critically imperiled ecosystem with a significant portion of its distribution in South Florida, United States. Methods: We reconstructed phylogenetic relationships of 538 vascular plant taxa, which represent 92.28% of the vascular flora of the pine rocklands. We estimated phylogenetic signal for endemism and invasiveness using phylogenetic generalized linear …

Fertilization Influences The Nutrient Acquisition Strategy Of A Nomadic Vine In A Lowland Tropical Forest Understory, Carrie L. Woods, Saara J. Dewalt, Catherine L. Cardelús, Kyle E. Harms, Joseph B. Yavitt, S. Joseph Wright

Faculty Publications

© 2018, Springer Nature Switzerland AG. Aims: Tropical tree and lianas in the understory are limited by soil nutrients despite growing in extremely low light. It is not known if nomadic vines are also limited by nutrients in low light conditions. Methods: We measured differences in root architecture and mycorrhizal colonization, and leaf nutrients of a nomadic vine, Philodendron fragrantissimum (Araceae), in nitrogen (N) and phosphorus (P) fertilization plots in a lowland tropical moist forest in central Panama to measure potential nutrient limitation. Results: Relative to plants in control plots, leaf P concentration was 54% higher and leaf N concentration …

Using A Phic31 "Disintegrase" To Make New Attp Sites In The Drosophila Genome At Locations Showing Chromosomal Position Effects, Mukesh Maharjan, Robert K. Maeda, François Karch, Craig M. Hart

Faculty Publications

© 2018 Maharjan et al. This is an open access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License, which permits unrestricted use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided the original author and source are credited. An engineered phiC31 "Disintegrase" able to make an attP site in Drosophila out of an attRattL pair is described. This was used to generate attP sites at genomic locations where a mini-white (mini-w) transgene was subject to chromosomal position effects (CPE). The first step was random genomic integration of a P-element-based transposon with an insulated mini-w transgene. We then removed the …

Trans-Allelic Mutational Effects At The Peg3 Imprinted Locus, Corey L. Bretz, Joomyeong Kim

Faculty Publications

© 2018 Bretz, Kim. This is an open access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License, which permits unrestricted use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided the original author and source are credited. How one allele interacts with the other for the function of a gene is not well understood. In this study, we tested potential allelic interaction at the Peg3 imprinted locus with several mutant alleles targeting an Imprinting Control Region, the Peg3-DMR. According to the results, maternal deletion of the Peg3-DMR resulted in 2-fold up-regulation of two paternally expressed genes, Peg3 and Usp29. …

Design And Cost Analysis Of A Self-Contained Mobile Laboratory For Commercial-Scale Aquatic Species Cryopreservation, William M. Childress, Rex H. Caffey, Terrence R. Tiersch

Faculty Publications

© Copyright by the World Aquaculture Society 2018 Although aquatic species cryopreservation protocols have been studied around the world over the past 60 yr., germplasm repository development efforts and commercialization have begun only recently. The goal of this project was to develop a self-contained mobile laboratory for on-site high-throughput cryopreservation of aquatic species. The objectives of this study were to: (1) identify how a mobile laboratory would function in different operational scenarios, (2) customize an enclosed cargo trailer to function as a mobile laboratory, (3) evaluate the laboratory layout and ability of cryopreservation equipment to operate from generator power, and …

Social Class Divergence In Family Transitions: The Importance Of Cohabitation, Heather M. Rackin, Christina M. Gibson-Davis

Faculty Publications

Objective: This study examined trends in familial transitions by maternal education and whether transitions rose because of changes in prevalence (the share of children exposed to a relationship state, either marriage or cohabitation) or churning (the number of entrances and exits conditional on being exposed to a relationship state). Background: Children's experiences of transitions, an important predictor of well-being, have leveled off in recent decades. Plateauing in transitions may reflect heterogeneity by socioeconomic status. Method: Data came from the National Survey of Family Growth on firstborn children observed from ages 0 to 5 among mothers aged 15 to 34 at …

Measurement And Modeling Of The Spatiotemporal Dynamics Of Beach Surface Moisture Content, Phillip P. Schmutz, Steven L. Namikas

Faculty Publications

The spatiotemporal dynamics of surface moisture exert a significant influence on the operation of aeolian transport systems at many beaches. However, we currently lack the detailed understanding of variability in surface moisture required to incorporate it into aeolian models. This problem is addressed here through direct measurements and simulation modeling of beach surface moisture over a twelve-day period, and through quantification of the relative contributions of evaporation, condensation and groundwater inputs to surface moisture. It was found that the beach surface can be characterized spatially in terms of three moisture zones: a consistently dry zone (40%). The relative influence of …

Sediment Accumulation And Bioturbation An A Tropical-Carbonate Mangrove Forest On A Pacific Atoll: Ouvéa, New Caledonia, Ryder Myers

Honors Capstones

No abstract provided.

The Effect Of Acute, Static Stretching On The Gastrocnemius’ Plantarflexion Torque Across Selected Knee And Ankle Combinations, Emile Jeunesse

Honors Capstones

No abstract provided.

Development Of A Self-Healing And Rejuvenating Mechanisms For Asphalt Mixtures Containing Recycled Asphalt Shingle, Marwa Hassan

Publications

The objective of this study was to test the hypothesis that hollow-fibers encapsulating a rejuvenator product could improve both self-healing, rejuvenation, and mechanical properties of asphalt mixtures. Hollow-fibers containing a rejuvenating product were synthesized via a wet spinning procedure with sodium-alginate polymer as the encapsulating material. An optimization of the production parameters for the synthesis of fibers was performed to develop fibers suitable for high-temperature and shear stress environment typical of asphalt mixture production. A self-healing experiment was conducted to evaluate the healing/rejuvenation capabilities of sodium-alginate fibers in asphalt mixtures with varying types of binders and recycled materials. Based on …

Chemically Modified Cellulosic Materials As Multi-Functional Agents In Polymer Composites, Jinlong Zhang

LSU Doctoral Dissertations

Comparative flame retardancy of micro wood fiber plastic composites (WPCs) with fire retardants (1,2-bis(pentabromophenyl) ethane, metal hydroxides and nanoclay) was studied. The fire additives (1,2-bis(pentabromophenyl) ethane as well as magnesium hydroxide) obviously enhanced the fire retarding properties of WPCs. Especially, 1,2-bis(pentabromophenyl) ethane significantly reduced the total heat release as well as heat release rate. In addition, a synergistic effect of 1,2-bis(pentabromophenyl) and nanoclay was achieved for the enhanced fire retarding performance of WPCs.

A copolymer of cellulose nanocrystals (CNCs) and poly(N-vinylcaprolactam) (PVCL) (PVCL-g-CNCs) for use as thermally-responsive polymers with low critical solution temperatures (LCSTs) was synthesized via atom transfer radical …

Bfd, A New Class Of [2fe-2s] Protein That Functions In Bacterial Iron Homeostasis, Requires A Structural Anion Binding Site, Harshani Wijerathne, Huili Yao, Yan Wang, Scott Lovell, Kevin P. Battaile, Mario Rivera

Faculty Publications

Copyright © 2018 American Chemical Society. Mobilization of iron from bacterioferritin (BfrB) requires specific interactions with a [2Fe-2S] ferredoxin (Bfd). Blocking the BfrB:Bfd interaction results in irreversible iron accumulation in BfrB and iron deficiency in the cytosol [Eshelman, K., et al. (2017) Metallomics 9, 646-659]. The only known Bfd structure, which was obtained in complex with BfrB (Protein Data Bank entry 4E6K), indicated a new fold and suggested that the stability of Bfd is aided by an anion binding site consisting of R26, R29, and K46. We investigated the Bfd fold using site-directed mutagenesis, X-ray crystallography, and biochemistry in solution. …

Quality Of United States And Bangladesh Shrimp Due To Growth And Post-Harvest Practices, Murshida Khan

LSU Doctoral Dissertations

Shrimp is one of the most consumed and traded seafood, and due to its high demand, consumers depend on both wild caught and farmed products. Post-harvest practices can greatly affect health, safety, and quality, and the goal of this project was to study the effects of chemicals, bacteria, and antibiotics on shrimp from Louisiana and Bangladesh. Quality changes (proximate composition, color, texture and total plate count of bacteria) in shrimp from Louisiana (Farfantepenaeus aztecus and Litopenaeus setiferus) and Bangladesh (Penaeus monodon and Macrobrachium rosenbergii) were determined due to the application of melanosis preventing compounds (sulfite powder, …

Comparison Of Thermally Actuated Retro-Diels-Alder Release Groups For Nanoparticle Based Nucleic Acid Delivery, Mohammad Abu-Laban, Raju R. Kumal, Jonathan Casey, Jeff Becca, Daniel Lamaster, Carlos N. Pacheco, Dan G. Sykes, Lasse Jensen, Louis H. Haber, Daniel J. Hayes

Faculty Publications

© 2018 Elsevier Inc. The present study explores alternate pericyclic chemistries for tethering amine-terminal biomolecules onto silver nanoparticles. Employing the versatile tool of the retro-Diels-Alder (rDA) reaction, three thermally-labile cycloadducts are constructed that cleave at variable temperature ranges. While the reaction between furan and maleimide has widely been reported, the current study also evaluates the reverse reaction kinetics between thiophene-maleimide, and pyrrole-maleimide cycloadducts. Density Functional Theorem (DFT) calculations used to model and plan the experiments, predict energy barriers for the thiophene-maleimide reverse reaction to be greatest, and the pyrrole-maleimide barriers the lowest. Based on the computational analyses, it is projected …

Genomic Sequence Of A Novel Endornavirus From Phaseolus Vulgaris And Occurrence In Mixed Infections With Two Other Endornaviruses, Ryo Okada, Ricardo Iván Alcalá-Briseño, Cesar Escalante, Sead Sabanadzovic, Rodrigo A. Valverde

Faculty Publications

The Endornaviridae family includes viruses with ssRNA genome that infect plants, fungi, and oomycetes. Plant endornaviruses do not cause visible symptoms and are transmitted only vertically. Many common bean (Phaseolus vulgaris) genotypes have been reported to be infected by Phaseolus vulgaris endornavirus 1 and Phaseolus vulgaris endornavirus 2. Using next-generation sequencing, we obtained the RNA sequence of a third common bean endornavirus, which we named Phaseolus vulgaris endornavirus 3 (PvEV3). The complete sequence consisted of 15,205nt in length with a single open reading frame (ORF) coding for a polyprotein of 4932 aa, and untranslated regions of 344önt and 62önt at …

More Than A Pretty Interface: The Louisiana Digital Library As A Data Hub, Scott Ziegler, Cara M. Key

Faculty Publications

The Louisiana Digital Library (LDL) is an online platform for libraries, museums, archives, and historical organizations across the state. The books, manuscripts, oral histories, maps, and photographs held in the LDL showcase the cultural resources of Louisiana.

The metadata about these items is also a great asset. When explored in their entirety, the data held in the LDL is as valuable as the digital facsimiles. This talk will explore the LDL as a data hub, a place to gather and share the metadata of the participating institutions. Open data is a growing trend in archives and special collections, enabling new …

The Distinctive Regulatory Mechanisms Of Bacterial Acetyl-Coa Carboxylase, Alexandra Leigh Evans

LSU Doctoral Dissertations

Metabolic Regulation is a complex system used to control cellular metabolism in response to conditions in the cell’s environment. For most enzymes, the cell can rely upon a minimal amount of regulation; however, critical enzymes, such as acetyl-CoA carboxylase, must be regulated at multiple levels. Acetyl-CoA carboxylase catalyzes the first committed step in fatty acid synthesis. In bacteria, acetyl-CoA carboxylase forms a complex of three subunits–biotin carboxylase, biotin carboxyl carrier protein, and carboxyltransferase–which catalyze the carboxylation of acetyl-CoA to form malonyl-CoA via two half-reactions. In the first half-reaction, biotin covalently linked to biotin carboxyl carrier protein is carboxylated by biotin …

Edwardsiella Ictaluri Type Iii Secretion System (T3ss) Effector Esen Is A Phosphothreonine Lyase That Inactivates Erk1/2, Lidiya P. Dubytska, Ronald L. Thune

Faculty Publications

© The authors 2018. EseN is a type III secretion system (T3SS) effector that is encoded on the Edwardsiella ictaluri chromosome and is homologous to a family of T3SS effector proteins with phosphothreonine lyase (PTL) activity, including OspF from Shigella and SpvC from Salmonella. A yeast-2-hybrid system was used to identify the major vault protein (MVP) as a specific host-cell binding partner for EseN, and the proximity ligation assay (PLA) confirmed the interaction. Similar to other pathogens, E. ictaluri invasion activates extracellular signal-regulated kinases 1 and 2 (ERK1/2) early in the infection, which are subsequently inactivated by EseN. Structurally, EseN …

Managing The Risks And Rewards Of Death In Eusocial Insects, Qian Sun, Kenneth F. Haynes, Xuguo Zhou

Faculty Publications

Eusocial insects frequently face death of colony members as a consequence of living in large groups where the success of the colony is not dependent on the fate of the individual. Whereas death of conspecifics commonly triggers aversion in many group-living species due to risk of pathogens, eusocial insects perform cooperative corpse management. The causes and social context of the death, as well as feeding and nesting ecology of the species, influence the way that corpses are treated. The corpse itself releases cues that dictate the colony's response. As a result, social insects exhibit behavioural responses that promote disease resistance, …

Spatial Distribution And Contamination Assessment Of Surface Heavy Metals Off The Western Guangdong Province And Northeastern Hainan Island, Qian Ge, Zuo George Xue, Fengyou Chu

Faculty Publications

Surface sediments collected from the continental shelf off the western Guangdong Province and northeastern Hainan Island are analyzed for selected heavy metals contents including Cd, Cr, Cu, Pb, Zn, and As to determine spatial distribution, potential ecological risks, and sources. In addition, some of the controlling factors of heavy metals distribution are also discussed. The average heavy metals contents decrease in the order of Zn > Cr > Pb > Cu > As > Cd. The averaged pollution degree, as shown by the index of geo-accumulation (Igeo), decreases in the order of Zn > Cu > Pb > Cr > Cd > As. Due to the barrier of islands, the …

Transgene-Assisted Genetic Screen Identifies Rsd-6 And Novel Genes As Key Components Of Antiviral Rna Interference In Caenorhabditis Elegans, Tianyun Long, Fei Meng, Rui Lu

Faculty Publications

© 2018 American Society for Microbiology. RNA interference (RNAi) is a widespread antiviral mechanism triggered by virus-produced double-stranded RNAs (dsRNAs). In Caenorhabditis elegans, antiviral RNAi involves a RIG-I-like RNA helicase, termed DRH-1 (dicer related RNA helicase 1), that is not required for classical RNAi triggered by artificial dsRNA. Currently, whether antiviral RNAi in C. elegans involves novel factors that are dispensable for classical RNAi remains an open question. To address this question, we designed and carried out a genetic screen that aims to identify novel genes involved in worm antiviral RNAi. By introducing extra copies of known antiviral RNAi genes …