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Predicted Structure And Functional Roles Of Alphaherpesvirus Tegument Protein Ul37 In Virion Morphogenesis And Innate Immunity, Therese Marie Collantes

LSU Doctoral Dissertations

Several members of the Family Herpesviridae are clinically significant pathogens, affecting humans and a wide range of animals. Alphaherpesviruses infect epithelial cells at the primary site of infection and subsequently invade adjacent sensory neurons. Infectious bovine rhinotracheitis (IBR) is an economically important disease caused by bovine herpesvirus 1 (BoHV-1), which belongs to the subfamily Alphaherpesvirinae, genus Varicellovirus. To date, vaccination is the only preventive measure against IBR. Understanding determinants of herpesvirus replication and innate immune regulation is important to help further develop vaccines that are efficacious and incapable of establishing latency in the host nervous system. The alphaherpesvirus …

Advancements In Middle School Agricultural Education: An Examination Of Emerging Trends And Exemplary Programs, Jacob P. Englin

LSU Master's Theses

Recent trends in agricultural education have demonstrated that the number of middle school programs and students has been increasing. Despite this, middle school agricultural education students, teachers, and programs often have been considered to be underserved. For example, teachers at this level have expressed that they often lacked the training and resources to meet the needs of this diverse learning population. Even so, middle school agricultural education teachers have continued to provide quality learning experiences for their students. In response, this investigation’s purpose was to examine current trends of middle school agricultural education and the quality of learning conducted by …

Development And Testing Of A Mapcheck3-Based Patient-Specific Qa Method For Prime Intensity Modulators Used With Bolus Electron Conformal Therapy, James T. Crist

LSU Master's Theses

Purpose: Irregular surfaces in bolus electron conformal therapy (BECT) create target volume dose inhomogeneity, which off-axis intensity modulation (IM) can reduce. This research developed and tested a patient-specific clinical quality assurance (QA) procedure for fabricated Passive Radiotherapy Intensity Modulation for Electrons (PRIME) devices used for IM-BECT delivery.

Methods: To evaluate MapCheck3 (MC3) diode array accuracy, electron dose measurements beneath PRIME devices were compared with scanned measurements in a water phantom. Lateral dose profile comparisons were made for 35 combinations of five beam energies (7-20MeV) and seven PRIME devices - converging and diverging island blocks (pins) having 100-68.8% intensities. To evaluate …

Sportsman's Paradox: Conservationism And Social Progress In Modern Louisiana, Jacob T. Gautreaux

LSU Doctoral Dissertations

Over the nineteenth and early twentieth centuries, sportsmen increasingly identified Louisiana as a destined paradise due to the abundant flora and fauna. Confirmed in the legendary visits of Theodore Roosevelt in the early 1900s, the conception soon served a dual purpose as individuals like the Tabasco Sauce patriarch, E. A. McIlhenny, coopted the visualization as a lure for business investment into the nascent industrial interests within the coastal region of the state. However, it should be noted that in the 1930s and beyond, cultural conservationists like McIlhenny and Caroline Dormon preserved elements of under-documented cultures throughout the state, although usually …

Learning Dynamic Information Of High-Dimensional Signal Time-Series Using Advanced Machine Learning/Artificial Intelligence, Guannan Liu

LSU Doctoral Dissertations

In this dissertation, we propose a novel simulation-based device-free indoor localization and tracking system using the received signal strength indicators (RSSIs) of WiFi signals as the input features. The Feko channel-propagation simulation software is used to process the RSSI maps of the given arbitrary indoor geometry. In order to learn the dynamic information of high-dimensional RSSI time-series, we propose three procedures for the localization and dynamic tracking system.

First, The indoor geometry is partitioned into several equi-size zones and the localization problem is treated as the typical \multi-classification" problem. The advanced machine-learning techniques such as decision tree (DT) classifier, random …

Characterizing Wind-Wave Flow Physics And Loading Effects On Power Transmission Systems And Offshore Wind Turbines, Tianqi Ma

LSU Doctoral Dissertations

Recent extreme hurricanes caused extensive damage to critical civil infrastructure. Accurate modeling of the extreme complex wind fields and coupled wind-wave fields is essential to quantify the single wind or combined wind-wave loading effects on the structures. This research aims to characterize wind and wind-wave flow physics to quantify the loading effect on power transmission systems and offshore wind turbines.

First, a microscale (∼km) high-fidelity high-resolution computational model is developed to simulate hurricane wind fields with detailed physics. The generated wind field is applied to analyze the structural response of a power transmission system. The proposed hurricane boundary layer (HBL) …

Residential Building Flood Risk Assessment And The Benefits Of Home Elevation, Ayat Al Assi

LSU Doctoral Dissertations

Evaluating flood risk is an essential component of understanding and increasing community resilience. A robust approach for quantifying flood risk in terms of average annual loss (AAL) in dollars is needed to provide valuable information for stakeholder decision-making inside and outside the special flood hazard area (SFHA, which corresponds to the 100-year floodplain). To further inform flood mitigation strategies, quantifying flood risk reduction with home elevation above an initial first-floor height (FFH₀) and the cost effectiveness of federal mitigation assistance for elevation are important steps to enhance awareness of the effect of elevation in reducing flood risk. …

Regulation Of Nucleotide Excision Repair, Wenzhi Gong

LSU Doctoral Dissertations

Nucleotide excision repair (NER), a “cut and patch” mechanism, has two subpathways, namely transcription coupled repair (TCR) and global genome repair (GGR). TCR rapidly removes UV photoproduct (UV PP) in the transcribed strand (TS) of an actively transcribed gene, whereas GGR removes those DNA lesions throughout the genome. This dissertation mainly focused on identifying novel factors that function in NER and investigating the potential molecular mechanisms underlying initial damage recognition and downstream processes in NER. We identified Rpb7, a subunit of RNA polymerase II, represses TCR via its multiple regions. Specifically, the conserved region of Rpb7 that interacts with the …

A Systematic Literature Review Of Cleanroom Ventilation And Air Distribution Systems, Arup Bhattacharya, Mohammad Saleh Nikoopayan Tak, Shervin Shoai-Naini, Fred Betz, Ehsan Mousavi

Faculty Publications

Cleanroom ventilation systems are well-established; however, the advantages and limitations of current practices need to be examined and explained further. This study begins by looking over the history of cleanroom ventilation systems that creates the basis for understanding ventilation rate specifications, terminologies employed in ventilation effectiveness, and recognizing scientific studies that correlate ventilation effectiveness with air change rates. This systematic review includes a comprehensive summary that contains a set of historical data and evidence that may be used to specify ventilation requirements in cleanrooms. Scientific articles are classified in terms of laboratory experiments, simulations/numerical analysis, or hybrid. HVAC designers and …

Louisiana Agriculture Magazine, Summer 2023

Louisiana Agriculture

Rice, alligators and sugarcane are quintessential Louisiana products, and LSU AgCenter researchers and extension agents devote themselves to helping the producers who grow them. Economists are finding ways to improve the market for alligators while specialists focus on innovation in the sugar industry and creating new varieties of rice.

AgCenter researchers also have an eye on the natural world. They are protecting the roseau cane that thrives on the coast and the ironwood trees of Guam. All these efforts are detailed in this issue of Louisiana Agriculture magazine.

Extended Sentinel Monitoring Of Helicoverpa Zea Resistance To Cry And Vip3aa Toxins In Bt Sweet Corn: Assessing Changes In Phenotypic And Allele Frequencies Of Resistance, Galen P. Dively, Tom P. Kuhar, Sally V. Taylor, Helene Doughty, Kristian Holmstrom, Daniel O. Gilrein, Brian A. Nault, Joseph Ingerson-Mahar, Anders Huseth, Dominic Reisig, Shelby Fleischer, David Owens, Kelley Tilmon, Francis Reay-Jones, Pat Porter, Jocelyn Smith, Julien Saguez, Jason Wells, Caitlin Congdon, Holly Byker, Bryan Jensen, Chris Difonzo, William D. Hutchison, Eric Burkness, Robert Wright, Michael Crossley, Heather Darby, Tom Bilbo, Nicholas Seiter, Christian Krupke, Craig Abel, Brad S. Coates, Bradley Mcmanus

Faculty Publications

Transgenic corn and cotton that produce Cry and Vip3Aa toxins derived from Bacillus thuringiensis (Bt) are widely planted in the United States to control lepidopteran pests. The sustainability of these Bt crops is threatened because the corn earworm/bollworm, Helicoverpa zea (Boddie), is evolving a resistance to these toxins. Using Bt sweet corn as a sentinel plant to monitor the evolution of resistance, collaborators established 146 trials in twenty-five states and five Canadian provinces during 2020–2022. The study evaluated overall changes in the phenotypic frequency of resistance (the ratio of larval densities in Bt ears relative to densities in non-Bt ears) …

Substantially Enhanced Landscape Carbon Sink Due To Reduced Terrestrial-Aquatic Carbon Transfer Through Soil Conservation In The Chinese Loess Plateau, Lishan Ran, Nufang Fang, Xuhui Wang, Shilong Piao, Chun Ngai Chan, Siliang Li, Yi Zeng, Zhihua Shi, Mingyang Tian, Yi Jun Xu, Junyu Qi, Boyi Liu

Faculty Publications

Soil conservation is of global importance, as accelerated soil erosion by human activity is a primary threat to ecosystem viability. However, the significance and role of soil conservation in reshaping landscape carbon (C) accounting has not been comprehensively integrated in the terrestrial C sink. Here, we present the first integrated assessment of the modified terrestrial C sink and aquatic C transport due to soil conservation for the semiarid Chinese Loess Plateau (CLP), the world's most vulnerable region to soil erosion. We show a surprisingly low terrestrial-aquatic C transfer that offset the terrestrial net ecosystem productivity by only 7.5%, which we …

A Modified-Herringbone Micromixer For Assessing Zebrafish Sperm (Mags), Jorge A. Belgodere, Mustafa Alam, Valentino E. Browning, Jason Eades, Jack North, Julie A. Armand, Yue Liu, Terrence R. Tiersch, W. Todd Monroe

Faculty Publications

Sperm motility analysis of aquatic model species is important yet challenging due to the small sample volume, the necessity to activate with water, and the short duration of motility. To achieve standardization of sperm activation, microfluidic mixers have shown improved reproducibility over activation by hand, but challenges remain in optimizing and simplifying the use of these microdevices for greater adoption. The device described herein incorporates a novel micromixer geometry that aligns two sperm inlet streams with modified herringbone structures that split and recombine the sample at a 1:6 dilution with water to achieve rapid and consistent initiation of motility. The …

Gene Editing Provides A Tool To Investigate Genes Involved In Reproduction Of Pigs, Rodney D. Geisert, Destiny N. Johns, Caroline A. Pfeiffer, Riley M. Sullivan, Caroline G. Lucas, Constantine A. Simintiras, Bethany K. Redel, Kevin D. Wells, Thomas E. Spencer, Randall S. Prather

Faculty Publications

CRISPR-Cas9 gene editing technology provides a method to generate loss-of-function studies to investigate, in vivo, the specific role of specific genes in regulation of reproduction. With proper design and selection of guide RNAs (gRNA) designed to specifically target genes, CRISPR-Cas9 gene editing allows investigation of factors proposed to regulate biological pathways involved with establishment and maintenance of pregnancy. The advantages and disadvantages of using the current gene editing technology in a large farm species is discussed. CRISPR-Cas9 gene editing of porcine conceptuses has generated new perspectives for the regulation of endometrial function during the establishment of pregnancy. The delicate orchestration …

Economic Viability Of Implementing Structural Health Monitoring Systems On The Support Structures Of Bottom-Fixed Offshore Wind, Mario Vieira, Brian Snyder, Elsa Henriques, Craig White, Luis Reis

Faculty Publications

Offshore wind (OSW) energy is a renewable source with strong prospects of development that may decisively contribute towards energy independence. Offshore wind is, however, not yet ubiquitously cost competitive, and frequently requires support schemes to finance its extensive capital requirements. Therefore, cost reduction strategies are necessary for the future development of offshore wind technologies. Even if structural health monitoring (SHM) systems are currently applied for the inspection of critical mechanical structures, they have not been the focus of research from offshore wind stakeholders. The main goal of this study is to evaluate the viability of SHM systems on the support …

Effects Of Alkylation On Potency Of Benz[A]Anthracene For Ahr2 Transactivation In Nine Species Of Freshwater Fish, Justin Dubiel, Hunter Johnson, Andreas N.M. Eriksson, A. Hontela, Jon A. Doering, Steve Wiseman

Faculty Publications

Polycyclic aromatic hydrocarbons (PAHs) are naturally occurring or anthropogenic organic chemicals that can activate the aryl hydrocarbon receptor 2 (AhR2) and induce toxicity in fishes. Alkyl PAHs are more abundant than nonalkylated PAHs in certain environmental matrices and there is growing evidence that alkylation can increase potency, dependent on the position of alkylation. However, it is unknown if the effect of alkylation on potency is conserved across species. In addition, relatively little is known regarding the extent of interspecies variation in sensitivity to PAHs and alkyl PAHs. Therefore, objectives of the present study were to characterize potency of benz[a]anthracene (BAA) …

Transcription Factor Pecs Mediates Agrobacterium Fabrum Fitness And Survival, George C. Nwokocha, Prava Adhikari, Asif Iqbal, Hannah Elkholy, William T. Doerrler, John C. Larkin, Anne Grove

Faculty Publications

The transcriptional regulator PecS is encoded by select bacterial pathogens. For instance, in the plant pathogen Dickeya dadantii, PecS controls a range of virulence genes, including pectinase genes and the divergently oriented gene pecM, which encodes an efflux pump through which the antioxidant indigoidine is exported. In the plant pathogen Agrobacterium fabrum (formerly named Agrobacterium tumefaciens), the pecS-pecM locus is conserved. Using a strain of A. fabrum in which pecS has been disrupted, we show here that PecS controls a range of phenotypes that are associated with bacterial fitness. PecS represses flagellar motility and chemotaxis, which are processes that are …

Population-Specific Responses In Eastern Oysters Exposed To Low Salinity In The Northern Gulf Of Mexico, Kyle A. Sirovy, Sandra M. Casas, Jerome F. La Peyre, Morgan W. Kelly

Faculty Publications

Eastern oysters, Crassostrea virginica, are facing rapid environmental changes in the northern Gulf of Mexico and can respond to these changes via plasticity or evolution. Plastic responses can immediately buffer against environmental changes, although this buffering may impact the organism’s ability to evolve in subsequent generations. While plasticity and evolution are not mutually exclusive, the relative contribution and interaction between them remains unclear. In this study, we investigated the roles of plastic and evolved responses of C. virginica acclimated to low salinity using a common garden experiment with four populations exposed to two salinities. We used three transcriptomic analyses (edgeR, …

Computational Materials Design For Ceramic Nuclear Waste Forms Using Machine Learning, First-Principles Calculations, And Kinetics Rate Theory, Jianwei Wang, Dipta B. Ghosh, Zelong Zhang

Faculty Publications

Ceramic waste forms are designed to immobilize radionuclides for permanent disposal in geological repositories. One of the principal criteria for the effective incorporation of waste elements is their compatibility with the host material. In terms of performance under environmental conditions, the resistance of the waste forms to degradation over long periods of time is a critical concern when they are exposed to natural environments. Due to their unique crystallographic features and behavior in nature environment as exemplified by their natural analogues, ceramic waste forms are capable of incorporating problematic nuclear waste elements while showing promising chemical durability in aqueous environments. …

Laminar Flame Speed Measurements Of A Gasoline Surrogate And Its Mixtures With Ethanol At Elevated Pressure And Temperature, Yousef M. Almarzooq, Ingmar Schoegl, Eric L. Petersen

Faculty Publications

Laminar Flame speed measurements of a gasoline surrogate and mixtures of it with ethanol were conducted using a heated, constant-volume vessel. A spherical propagating flame was observed using a high-speed camera, and laminar flame speed was determined therefrom. The gasoline surrogate, which serves as the baseline for the current study, consisted of four components, namely, iso-octane, n-heptane, toluene, and 1-hexene. Different mixtures of the gasoline surrogate and ethanol were studied, governed by the ethanol percentage in the mixture. That is, E0, E30, E50, and E85 mixtures represent 0%, 30%, 50%, and 85% ethanol in the gasoline surrogate mixture by liquid …

Three-Dimensional Scaffolds For Bone Tissue Engineering, Harish Chinnasami, Mohan Kumar Dey, Ram Devireddy

Faculty Publications

Immobilization using external or internal splints is a standard and effective procedure to treat minor skeletal fractures. In the case of major skeletal defects caused by extreme trauma, infectious diseases or tumors, the surgical implantation of a bone graft from external sources is required for a complete cure. Practical disadvantages, such as the risk of immune rejection and infection at the implant site, are high in xenografts and allografts. Currently, an autograft from the iliac crest of a patient is considered the “gold standard” method for treating large-scale skeletal defects. However, this method is not an ideal solution due to …

Developing Sustainable Asphalt Mixtures Using High-Density Polyethylene Plastic Waste Material, Ibrahim Elnaml, Jun Liu, Louay N. Mohammad, Nazimuddin Wasiuddin, Samuel B. Cooper, Samuel B. Cooper

Faculty Publications

There is growing interest in sustainable road pavement technologies to protect the environment and provide economic benefits. Post-consumer recycled (PCR) plastics are considered for construction to address the threat of plastic waste materials (PWM) and to improve sustainability. Asphalt pavement construction is highly considered for PWM recycling due to its large daily production. The purpose of this study is to investigate the performance of asphalt mixture containing PWM, specifically high-density polyethylene (HDPE), and compare its performance with two conventional mixtures. Three asphalt mixtures were considered: (1) mixture with asphalt binder PG 76-22 (SBS-modified); (2) mixture with asphalt binder PG 70-22 …

Measuring Resilience To Sea-Level Rise For Critical Infrastructure Systems: Leveraging Leading Indicators, Lamis Amer, Murat Erkoc, Rusty A. Feagin, Sabarethinam Kameshwar, Katharine J. Mach, Diana Mitsova

Faculty Publications

There has been a growing interest in research on how to define and build indicators of resilience to address challenges associated with sea-level rise. Most of the proposed methods rely on lagging indicators constructed based on the historical performance of an infrastructure sub-system. These indicators are traditionally utilized to build curves that describe the past response of the sub-system to stressors; these curves are then used to predict the future resilience of the sub-system to hypothesized events. However, there is now a growing concern that this approach cannot provide the best insights for adaptive decision-making across the broader context of …

Every Step You Take, I'Ll Be Tracking You: Forensic Analysis Of The Tile Tracker Application, Lauren R. Pace, La Sean A. Salmon, Christopher J. Bowen, Ibrahim Baggili, Golden G. Richard

Faculty Publications

The rise in popularity of personal Bluetooth trackers has incited a need for forensic analysis tools that aid law enforcement in artifact recovery. With 40 million Tile devices reportedly sold at the time of writing, Tile trackers are one of the most popular personal Bluetooth trackers. This growth has not been without consequence, as reports of Bluetooth trackers being used for malicious activities have also escalated. Our work presents a forensic analysis of the Tile ecosystem and the Tile application on iOS, Android, and Windows. This analysis revealed valuable forensic artifacts that contained a diverse set of sensitive user data, …

Crgb_Mem: At The Intersection Of Memory Forensics And Machine Learning, Aisha Ali-Gombe, Sneha Sudhakaran, Ramyapandian Vijayakanthan, Golden G. Richard

Faculty Publications

Mobile malware's alarming sophistication and pervasiveness have continued to draw the attention of many cybersecurity researchers. Particularly on the Android platform, malware trojans designed to steal user PIIs, crypto miners, ransomware, and on-device fraud continue to infiltrate the primary Google store market and other secondary markets. While much effort has been put in place by the research community and industry to curb this menace since 2012, malware authors have consistently found ways to circumvent the existing detection and prevention mechanisms. Largely this remains so because of the restrictiveness of the feature set used in building the current classification models. Thus, …

Flammability Properties Of The Pyrolysis Gas Generated From Willow Wood, Maria Mitu, Domnina Razus, Dorin Boldor, Cosmin Marculescu

Faculty Publications

Willow wood presents a real interest for biomass pyrolysis due to its fast growth, renewability, and high energy density. Following the pyrolysis of willow wood in an inert atmosphere, a multi-fuel gaseous mixture was obtained, with the following composition (by volume): 38.20% CO/21.87% H2/17.44% CH4/1.15% O2/17.15% CO2/4.19% N2. The propagation of laminar premixed flames in these multifuel mixtures with air was investigated numerically for initial temperatures from 298 to 500 K, initial pressures from 1 to 20 bar, and fuel equivalence ratios between 0.60 and 2.00. The combustion of these gaseous mixtures as free laminar premixed flames was simulated by …

Communicating Nature-Society Relationships In Coastal Louisiana: An Evaluation Of The Ecosystem Services Framework, Vanessa Van Heerden

LSU Doctoral Dissertations

The ecosystem services (ES) framework is a tool to communicate the value of natural environments to human well-being by monetizing services that natural environments provide to humans. The Louisiana Coastal Master Plan uses the ecosystem services provided by the Mississippi River Delta as rationale for why coastal Louisiana should be protected. Here, I am interested in determining how the ecosystem services framework is used to communicate nature-society relationships in coastal Louisiana. I conducted a meta-analysis and spatial analysis to understand the spatial relationships of ecosystem services in the wetlands of coastal Louisiana. I then conducted a survey of residents of …

Automated Reinforcement In Construction 3d Printing: An Investigation Of Mechanical And Macrostructural Performance Of Reinforced 3d-Printed Structures, Hassan Ahmed

LSU Master's Theses

Conventional construction with steel reinforcement is widely accepted and utilized worldwide for its proven strength, durability, design flexibility, cost-effectiveness, and due to available standards and design codes. Integration of reinforcement in construction 3D printing, however, presents multi-faceted challenges that may influence the structural properties of printed components and have hindered the widespread adoption of reinforced 3D-printed structures. This study explored two complementary reinforcement techniques, namely, steel fibers and threaded reinforcement, to reinforce 3D-printed structures. This study explored both the fresh and hardened properties of 3D-printed mixtures that contain very high steel fiber dosages of up to 2.5% by volume. Additionally, …

Adaptive Quantum Information Processing In Non-Equilibrium Environments, Arshag Danageozian

LSU Doctoral Dissertations

Solid state and condensed matter systems, such as diamond impurities, superconductors, quantum dots, and ion traps, constitute important physical platforms for various applications in quantum information processing (QIP). However, it has consistently been shown that all such modern platforms suffer from non-equilibrium behavior on timescales that are relevant for many important QIP tasks. The causes range from intrinsic non-equilibrium dynamics (e.g. in diamond) to the presence of various impurities with their own internal dynamics (e.g. in superconductors and quantum dots) or variations in the control fields used to stabilize the quantum matter (e.g. in ion traps). When reserving degrees of …

Empowering Student Success: Unlocking The Potential Of Project-Based Steel Design Education, Aly Mousaad Aly

Faculty Publications

In the pursuit of student success, it is essential to acknowledge that a singular teaching style does not universally cater to all students. The educator's crucial role lies in creating an optimal learning environment that fosters students' endeavors to excel. This endeavor transcends mere classroom success or employment prospects, encompassing a broader impact on societal well-being. An experiential learning approach, where students actively engage in practical tasks, emerges as the most effective mode of instruction. Integrating project-based learning activities into the curriculum holds immense potential for enhancing student learning. Additionally, the utilization of analysis software tools like FTool and STAAD …