Digital Commons Network^™

Political Piety: Evangelicals And The American Revolution In South Carolina And Georgia, David E. Hollingsworth

University of Kentucky Doctoral Dissertations

The study of southern evangelicals during the late colonial and revolutionary eras of American history has focused primarily on the social antagonisms that separated evangelicals from southern elites and has concluded that the rapid growth of post-war evangelicalism came as a result of evangelical acquiescence to southern gentry mores. Most study of southern evangelicals has concentrated on the upper South missing important developments in the Deep South which contradict historical assumptions of Separate triumph and the subsequent subversion of radical evangelicalism by evangelical leaders eager for societal acceptance. Evangelicals were not a monolithic movement. Key doctrines, primarily the need for …

Assessing Factors Influencing Participation And Dissemination In Community-Based Public Health Coalitions: An Exploration Of Social Change, Chad Tyler Morris

University of Kentucky Doctoral Dissertations

The community-based public health coalition has proliferated in public health practice since the 1970‘s as a favored means of achieving community participation in public health promotion. There is concern, however, that many contemporary coalitions are not particularly inclusive, and that population health indicators fail to demonstrate significant improvement in health outcomes resultant from coalition practice. This dissertation research was designed to critically examine participation and dissemination of coalition-derived ideas through ethnographic study of five community-based participatory public health coalitions in the United States. The research answers calls from public health scholars to improve upon the coalition theory base and to …

Lipid-Based Paclitaxel And Doxorubicin Nanoparticles To Overcome P-Gp-Mediated Drug Resistance In Solid Tumors, Xiaowei Dong

University of Kentucky Doctoral Dissertations

Multidrug resistance (MDR) is a major obstacle limiting chemotherapeutic efficacy. The purpose of these studies was to investigate the potential application of injectable paclitaxel (PX) and doxorubicin (Dox)-loaded nanoparticles (NPs) engineered from oil-in-water microemulsion precursors for overcoming P-glycoprotein (P-gp)- mediated drug resistance in solid tumors.

An in-vitro study was performed to test whether the oil (stearyl alcohol and cetyl alcohol) used to make lipid nanoparticles could be metabolized. The results showed that the concentrations of the fatty alcohols within nanoparticles, which were quantitatively determined over time by gas chromatography, decreased to only 10-20% of the initial concentration after 15-24 h …

The Prevalence Of Nutritional Issues In African American Woment Living In Low-Income Housing, Jessica Renee Coffie

University of Kentucky Master's Theses

African Americans have more disease, disability, and early death than whites. The leading causes of death for African American women are heart disease, cancer, stroke, diabetes, and kidney disease. Several reasons for these differences, including racism, poverty, cultural differences, lack of knowledge about the importance of screening or testing to prevent health problems, inability to get to the doctor, or lack of trust in the medical system. Healthy eating habits are less evident among lower class neighborhoods because of the lack of availability and education about healthy foods. Although African Americans have a healthy acceptance of a wider range of …

Effects Of Mindfulness And Meditation Experience On Cognitive And Emotional Functioning And Ego Depletion, Emily Lauren Brown Lykins

University of Kentucky Doctoral Dissertations

Mindfulness is increasingly recognized as an important phenomenon both clinically and empirically, with mindfulness-based interventions demonstrated to be efficacious across a wide variety of patient populations and disorders (i.e., Baer, 2003). Though debate regarding the exact definition of mindfulness continues, generally accepted definitions involve the common elements of intentionally directing attention toward the present moment and adopting an accepting, nonjudgmental, and/or nonreactive orientation, intent, or attitude (i.e., Baer et al., 2006; Bishop et al., 2004). Several testable predictions in the cognitive and emotional domains were derived from the operational definition of mindfulness provided by Bishop et al. (2004). Recent empirical …

Identification And Characterization Of The Glucagon-Like Peptide-2 Hormonal System In Ruminants, Christina C. Taylor Edwards

University of Kentucky Doctoral Dissertations

The hormone glucagon-like peptide-2 (GLP-2) is important in the regulation of intestinal growth and blood flow in nonruminant animals. However, no research reports the existence of GLP-2 in ruminants. Therefore, this dissertation examined the existence of GLP-2 and its receptor, their response to physiological stimuli, and its ability to induce gastrointestinal growth and intestinal blood flow in ruminants.

Experiments 1 and 2 established the gastrointestinal distribution of mRNA for proglucagon (the GLP-2 precursor) and the GLP-2 receptor. Furthermore, these experiments determined the effects of changing dietary energy intake on plasma GLP-2 concentrations and proglucagon and GLP-2 receptor mRNA expression. Experiment …

Bootstrap Enhanced N-Dimensional Deformation Of Space With Acoustic Resonance Spectroscopy, David John Link

University of Kentucky Doctoral Dissertations

Acoustic methods can often be used with limited or no sample preparations making them ideal for rapid process analytical technologies (PATs). This dissertation focuses on the possible use of acoustic resonance spectroscopy as a PAT in the pharmaceutical industry. Current good manufacturing processes (cGMP) need new technologies that have the ability to perform quality assurance testing on all products. ARS is a rapid and non destructive method that has been used to perform qualitative studies but has a major drawback when it comes to quantitative studies. Acoustic methods create highly non linear correlations which usually results in high level computations …

Examining The Construct Of Perfectionism: A Factor-Analytic Study, Agnes Mariann Stairs

University of Kentucky Doctoral Dissertations

The construct of perfectionism is related to many important outcome variables. However, the term “perfectionism” has been defined in many different ways, and items comprising the different existing scales appear to be very different in content. The overarching aim of the present set of studies was to help clarify the specific unidimensional constructs underlying what is called “perfectionism”. First, trained raters reliably sorted items from existing measures of perfectionism into nine dimensions. An exploratory factor analysis, followed by a confirmatory factor analysis on an independent sample, resulted in a 9 scale, 61 item measure, called the Measure of Constructs Underlying …

The Interaction Between Personality Traits And Contextual Disadvantage On Criminal Behavior: A Longitudinal Study Of High Risk-Females, Lauren C. Gudonis

University of Kentucky Doctoral Dissertations

This investigation examined several dimensions of personality functioning in a longitudinal sample of females. These data are part of an existing project evaluating female development across 3 different time points starting in adolescence and transitioning into adulthood. Subjects were categorized into a clinical group (females with a high degree of psychiatric comorbidity) and a normal control group. All participants were initially recruited when they were between 14-18 years of age, and were followed up twice when they were 19-23, and 24-28. In an attempt to explore possible heterogeneity in personality trait development, the research is presented as three separate studies …

Studies On The Role Of Acid Sphingomyelinase And Ceramide In The Regulation Of Tace Activity And Tnfα Secretion By Macrophages, Krasimira Rozenova

University of Kentucky Doctoral Dissertations

Acid Sphingomyelinase (ASMase) activity has been proposed to mediate LPS signaling in various cell types. This study shows that in macrophages, ASMase is a negative regulator of LPS-induced TNFα secretion. ASMasedeficient (asm^-/-) mice and isolated peritoneal macrophages produce several fold more TNFα than their wild-type (asm^+/+) counterparts when stimulated with LPS. The mechanism for these differences however is not transcriptional but post-translational.

The TNFα converting enzyme (TACE) catalyzes the maturation of the 26kD precursor (proTNFα) to the active 17kD form (sTNFα). In mouse peritoneal macrophages, the activity of TACE rather than the rate of TNFα mRNA …

Preparation And Characterization Of Blackberry Extracts And Their Anticancer And Anti-Inflammatory Properties, Jin Dai

University of Kentucky Doctoral Dissertations

Blackberries are rich in polyphenols including anthocyanins. Polyphenols are hypothesized to have biological activities that impact positively on human health. The purpose of these studies was to develop phenolic extracts from selected cultivars of blackberries currently grown in Kentucky as potential Botanical Drug Products for the treatment and prevention of cancer and inflammatory diseases.

An ultrasound-assisted ethanol extraction method was employed to obtain anthocyanin-containing extracts (ACEs) from puree or powder (lyophilized puree) of blackberries. ACEs were analyzed for total anthocyanin and phenolics content, polymeric color, and total antioxidant capacity (TAC). The influence of water content in the extraction system was …

Experimental And Molecular Dynamics Simulation Studies Of Partitioning And Transport Across Lipid Bilayer Membranes, Ravindra Wadhumal Tejwani

University of Kentucky Doctoral Dissertations

Most drugs undergo passive transport during absorption and distribution in the body. It is desirable to predict passive permeation of future drug candidates in order to increase the productivity of the drug discovery process. Unlike drug-receptor interactions, there is no receptor map for passive permeability because the process of transport across the lipid bilayer involves multiple mechanisms. This work intends to increase the understanding of permeation of drug-like molecules through lipid bilayers.

Drug molecules in solution typically form various species due to ionization, complexation, etc. Therefore, species specific properties must be obtained to bridge the experiment and simulations. Due to …

Pattern Recognition Integrated Sensing Methodologies (Prisms) In Pharmaceutical Process Validation, Remote Sensing And Astrobiology, Thaddaeus S. Hannel

University of Kentucky Doctoral Dissertations

Modern analytical instrumentation is capable of creating enormous and complex volumes of data. Analysis of large data volumes are complicated by lengthy analysis time and high computational demand. Incorporating real-time analysis methods that are computationally efficient are desirable for modern analytical methods to be fully utilized. The use of modern instrumentation in on-line pharmaceutical process validation, remote sensing, and astrobiology applications requires real-time analysis methods that are computationally efficient.

Integrated sensing and processing (ISP) is a method for minimizing the data burden and sensing time of a system. ISP is accomplished through implementation of chemometric calculations in the physics of …

Investigation Of Surface Fine Grained Laminae, Streambed, And Streambank Processes Using A Watershed Scale Hydrologic And Sediment Transport Model, Joseph Paul Russo

University of Kentucky Doctoral Dissertations

Sediment transport at the watershed scale in the Bluegrass Region of Kentucky is dominated by surface fine grained laminae, streambed, and streambank erosion; high instream sediment storage; and surface erosion processes. All these processes can be impacted by agricultural, urban, and suburban land-uses as well as hydrologic forcing. Understanding sediment transport processes at the watershed scale is a need for budgeting and controlling sediment pollution, and watershed modeling enables investigation of the cumulative effect of sediment processes and the parameters controlling these processes upon the entire sediment budget for a watershed. Sediment transport is being modeled by coupling the hydrologic …

The Interplay Between The Expression And Functions Of Wnt13 Isoforms During Apoptosis In Bovine Aortic Endothelial Cells, Tao Tang

University of Kentucky Doctoral Dissertations

Wnt proteins are crucial for development/homeostasis by controlling cell fate including apoptosis (Moon RT et al. 1997). Three humanWnt13 isoforms were identified: the secreted Wnt13A, mitochondrial Wnt13B, and nuclear Wnt13C forms; and nuclear Wnt13 had an increased sensitivity to LPS/TNF-induced apoptosis in primary endothelial cells (EC); both Wnt13B and C mRNA contain two start codons (AUG+1 and +74), but the same protein encoded from AUG+74 by Wnt13C was expressed lower than Wnt13B (Struewing IT et al.2006). We hypothesize that during EC apoptosis, the nuclear Wnt13C expression is regulated translationally; nuclear Wnt13 favors apoptosis through regulating the activity/expression of apoptosis-related factors; …

Alterations Of Zinc Transporters In Alzheimer's Disease, Ganna Lyubartseva

University of Kentucky Doctoral Dissertations

Alzheimer’s disease (AD), one of the major causes of disability and mortality in Western societies, is a progressive age-related neurodegenerative disorder. Increasing evidence suggests the etiology of AD may involve disruptions of zinc (Zn) homeostasis. We hypothesize that disruption of Zn homeostasis leads to alterations of Zn transporter (ZnT) proteins, resulting in increased production of neurotoxic amyloid beta (Aβ) peptide in AD brain. To address this hypothesis we carried out the following studies.

1. We characterized alterations of ZnT-1, ZnT-4 and ZnT-6 in the brain of preclinical AD (PCAD) subjects, who show no overt clinical manifestations of AD but demonstrate …

How Efficient Are Military Hospitals? A Comparison Of Technical Efficiency Using Stochastic Frontier Analysis, Linda Gail Kimsey

University of Kentucky Doctoral Dissertations

Attainment of greater efficiency in hospital operations has become a goal highly sought after as a result of several factors including skyrocketing costs. The possibility that the different incentives associated with ownership type might affect efficiency has been covered thoroughly in the literature. There are numerous studies comparing for-profit to not-for-profit hospitals or public to private hospitals. Analysis of federal ownership, however, has been less studied. In particular, comparisons involving military hospitals are non-existent, attributed to data availability and an assumption that military hospitals are too different from civilian facilities.

This dissertation employs a cross-sectional Stochastic Frontier Analysis (“SFA”) of …

Computational Design Of 3-Phosphoinositide Dependent Kinase-1 Inhibitors As Potential Anti-Cancer Agents, Mohamed Diwan Mohideen Abdulhameed

University of Kentucky Doctoral Dissertations

Computational drug design methods have great potential in drug discovery particularly in lead identification and lead optimization. 3-Phosphoinositide dependent kinase-1 (PDK1) is a protein kinase and a well validated anti-cancer target. Inhibitors of PDK1 have the potential to be developed as anti-cancer drugs. In this work, we have applied various novel computational drug design strategies to design and identify new PDK1 inhibitors with potential anti-cancer activity. We have pursued novel structure-based drug design strategies and identified a new binding mode for celecoxib and its derivatives binding with PDK1. This new binding mode provides a valuable basis for rational design of …

Roles Of Emx2 In Odorant Receptor Gene Expression And Olfactory Sensory Neuron Axon Growth, Jeremy Colin Mcintyre

University of Kentucky Doctoral Dissertations

The sense of smell relies upon the detection of odorants by neurons located in the nasal cavity. These neurons, referred to as olfactory sensory neurons (OSNs), line the olfactory epithelium and extend axons that make synaptic connections with mitral/tufted cells in the olfactory bulb. The mechanisms by which these synaptic connections form remain largely unknown. The development of these synaptic connections relies on the axons of immature OSNs innervating the olfactory bulb. The primary goal of this dissertation was to identify components of the mechanisms used by immature OSN axons to innervate the olfactory bulb. To accomplish this goal, a …

Role Of Aryl Hydrocarbon Receptor In Chronic Inflammatory Diseases, Violeta Arsenescu

University of Kentucky Doctoral Dissertations

Aryl Hydrocarbon Receptor (AhR) is a ligand-actviated receptor known as the dioxin receptor. Environmental pollutants called dioxin-like toxicants are found in food, cigarette smoke, automobile exhaust and air. Therefore, they could chronically amplify the pathology of numerous chronic inflammatory diseases. AhR is a well known target of these environmental chemicals that disrupt endocrine signaling. By the year 2020, the number of people older than 60 years is expected to top 1 billion. The burden of treating chronic disease is significant both in dollars spent and in lost productivity. The need to identify risk factors for chronic diseases must be evaluated …

Post Discharge Nausea And Vomiting In Ambulatory Surgical Patients: Incidence And Management Strategies, Jan Odom Forren

University of Kentucky Doctoral Dissertations

Approximately 65% of all surgeries are conducted in the outpatient surgery setting involving more than 35 million patients. Thirty-five to fifty percent of these outpatients will experience post discharge nausea and vomiting (PDNV), nausea and vomiting that occurs after discharge from the health care facility after surgery. A dearth of literature details the problems associated with nausea and vomiting experienced by patients after discharge home from outpatient surgery.

The purposes of this dissertation were to (1) review the current knowledge in the area of post discharge nausea and vomiting; (2) present results of an integrative review of the research literature …

Synthesis And Evaluation Of Prouteolysis Taurgeting Chimeras (Protacs): A Potential Chemical Genetic Approach To Breast Cancer Therapy, Kedra C. Cyrus

University of Kentucky Doctoral Dissertations

The use of small molecules to probe the function of proteins is referred to as chemical genetics. The Proteolysis Targeting Chimera (PROTAC) is a chemical genetic tool that contains the ligand for a target protein of interest and the recognition motif for an E3 ubiquitin ligase attached by a linker. The PROTAC is capable of binding to and recruiting specific target proteins to the intracellular degradation system, the ubiquitin proteasome system (UPS). While the approach has had success it has not been optimized to be used on a broader scale.

Optimization efforts focused on elucidating the ideal linker length between …

Studies On Drug Solubilization Mechanism In Simple Micelle Systems, Shaoxin Feng

University of Kentucky Doctoral Dissertations

Poor aqueous solubilities of drug candidates limit the biopharmaceutical usefulness in either oral or parenteral dosage forms. Lipid assemblies, such as micelles, may provide a means of enhancing solubility. Despite their usefulness, little is known about the means by which micelles accomplish this result. The goal of the current dissertation is to provide the molecular level understanding of the mechanism by which simple micelle systems solubilize drugs. Specifically, the location, orientation and amount of the drug molecules in micelle systems are the focuses of the work.

Three series of model drugs, steroids, benzodiazepines and parabens, in three surfactant systems with …

Regulation Of Low Density Lipoprotein Receptor Splicing Efficiency, I-Fang Ling

University of Kentucky Doctoral Dissertations

Low density lipoprotein receptor (LDLR) is an apolipoprotein E (apoE) receptor and may play a role in Alzheimer’s disease (AD) development. A single nucleotide polymorphism (SNP), rs688, that has been identified to modulate the splicing efficiency of LDLR exon 12 and is associated with higher cholesterol and AD in some case-control populations. The exon 12 deleted mRNA is predicted to produce a soluble form of LDLR that fails to mediate apoE uptake. To gain additional insights, in this study, I seek to understand the regulation of LDLR splicing efficiency. To identify functional cis-elements within LDLR exon 12, I mutated several …

Lipid Signaling In Brain Aging And Alzheimer's Disease: Pharmacologically Targeting Cholesterol Synthesis, Transport And Metabolism, James Lucas Searcy

University of Kentucky Doctoral Dissertations

The role cholesterol plays in the brain has long been underappreciated even though the brain contains a disproportionately high percentage of body cholesterol. Recent studies have found a link between the dysregulation of lipid metabolism and the risk of acquiring Alzheimer’s disease (AD) as well as a predisposition to cognitive decline. The goal of these studies was to elucidate the possible role lipid metabolism plays in pathological and normal brain aging by pharmacologically manipulating lipid metabolism and determining effects on key hippocampal biomarkers of AD and age-related cognitive decline. One series of experiments used an agonist (TO901317) to the liver …

Linking Service Encounters To Financial Performance: An Extended Approach To Valuation, Carla Yvonne Childers

University of Kentucky Doctoral Dissertations

Managers and researchers have become increasingly interested in linking marketing activities to firm financial performance. That is, they desire to make marketing more financially accountable. One approach to achieving this goal has been to “valuate” customers to determine their degrees of profitability over the lifetime of their relationships with firms. However, traditional customer valuation techniques are largely based on quantitative factors and do not account for softer measures such as a customer’s behavior and performance both during and after service encounters.

Additionally, while customer profitability is commonly valuated, employees are not generally assessed in this manner in profit linkage frameworks. …

The Nature And Meaning Of Culture In Primary Care Medicine: Implications For Education, Clinical Practice, And Stereotypes, Madison Lamar Gates

University of Kentucky Doctoral Dissertations

The medical profession in recent decades has made culture and cross-cultural competence an issue for patient – physician relationships. Many in the profession attribute the necessity of cross-cultural competence to increased diversity, globalization, and health disparities; however, a historical analysis of medicine indicates that culture’s relevancy for health care and outcome is not new. The rise of clinics, which can be traced to 17th century France, the professionalization of physicians in 18th century U.S., and the civil rights movement of the 20th century illustrate that medicine, throughout its history, has grappled with culture and health. While medicine has a history …

Content Relevance Centric Theory: An Investigation Of Content Relevance's Ability To Predict Learning Outcomes In A Training Environment, E. Patrick Leddin

University of Kentucky Doctoral Dissertations

After three decades of research, instructional communication scholars find themselves facing several key challenges. These range from an overemphasis in past studies on variable-analytic, atheoretical research to a lack of connection to learning outcomes. Many in the field contend that the time has come for instructional communication researchers to define instructional communication theories, test hypotheses, tie research efforts to learning outcomes, and clarify key terms. The present study addressed these shortcomings by proposing the Content Relevance Centric Theory and testing related hypotheses.

The research occurred in a professional training environment and involved the use of a modified content relevance instrument …

Protesting Liberalization In India: An Examination Of Discursive Strategies Used By Street-Vendors, Squatters, And Small-Retailers To Create And Universalize Resistance Narratives, Rajesh Gaur

University of Kentucky Doctoral Dissertations

The retail sector in India is experiencing a shift from an industry dominated by small grocers serving the needs of local markets to one characterized by chain retailers, both national and international. The liberalization of the retail sector in the last decade has edged the street-vendors, squatters, and small retailers from the prime business spaces to marginalized peripheries, which had led to widespread localized protests by the small retailers all over the country.

The Aminabad Market in a metro city in northern India provided a unique opportunity to study ongoing resistance against chain retailing. The retailers of Aminabad were at …

Pathogenesis Of Influenza A Virus: Inhibition Of Monocyte Differetiation Into Dendritic Cell, Saikat Boliar

University of Kentucky Doctoral Dissertations

Dendritic cells (DC) are a heterogeneous population of hematopoietic cells that play a versatile role in orchestrating immune responses against an array of invading pathogens, including influenza virus. These cells reside in lymphoid organs as well as in non-lymphoid tissues such as mucosal surfaces of respiratory and gastro-intestinal system. Recent investigations have suggested that in the steady state, dendritic cells are derived mainly from bone marrow precursor cells without a monocytic intermediate whereas during inflammation or infection, monocytes readily differentiate to generate monocyte derived dendritic cells (MoDC). The ability of virus infected monocytes to differentiate into MoDC was investigated and …