Digital Commons Network^™

Investigating The Role Of Gold Nanoparticle Shape And Size In Their Toxicities To Fungi, Kangze Liu, Zhonglei He, Hugh Byrne, James Curtin, Furong Tian

Articles

Gold nanoparticles (GNPs) are increasingly being used in a wide range of applications, and such they are being released in greater quantities into the environment. Consequently, the environmental effects of GNPs, especially toxicities to living organisms, have drawn great attention. However, their toxicological characteristics still remain unclear. Fungi, as the decomposers of the ecosystem, interact directly with the environment and critically control the overall health of the biosphere. Thus, their sensitivity to GNP toxicity is particularly important. The aim of this study was to evaluate the role of GNP shape and size in their toxicities to fungi, which could help …

Stock Market Manipulation And Its Regulation, Merritt B. Fox, Lawrence R. Glosten, Gabriel Rauterberg

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More than eighty years after federal law first addressed stock market manipulation, the federal courts remain fractured by disagreement and confusion concerning manipulation law's most foundational issues. There remains, for example, a sharp split among the federal circuits concerning manipulation law's central question: Whether trading activity alone can ever be considered illegal manipulation under federal law? Academics have been similarly confused-economists and legal scholars cannot agree on whether manipulation is even possible in principle, let alone on how to properly address it in practice.

Improving Microbiological Safety And Quality Characteristics Of Wheat And Barley By High Voltage Atmospheric Cold Plasma Closed Processing, Agatha Los, Dana Ziuzina, Simen Akkermans, Daniela Boehm, Patrick J. Cullen, Jan Van Impe

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Contamination of cereal grains as a key global food resource with insects or microorganisms is a persistent concern for the grain industry due to irreversible damage to quality and safety characteristics and economic losses. Atmospheric cold plasma presents an alternative to conventional grain decontamination methods owing to the high antimicrobial potential of reactive species generated during the treatment, but effects against product specific microflora are required to understand how to optimally develop this approach for grains. This work investigated the influence of ACP processing parameters for both cereal grain decontamination and grain quality as important criteria for grain or seed …

Translation Of Plasma Technology From The Lab To The Food Industry, Patrick J. Cullen, James Lalor, Laurence Scally, Daniela Boehm, Vladimir Milosavljevic, Paula Bourke, Kevin Keener

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The potential of cold plasma as a food processing aid has been demonstrated for a range of processes and products. The potential applications of plasma technology are extensive and include microbial decontamination, pest control, toxin elimination, food and package functionalisation and many others. However, studies reported to date have principally been at laboratory scale. This paper discusses the status and challenges of transferring the technology to the industry. The major challenges discussed for adoption of atmospheric plasma as a food processing tool by industry are (1) demonstration of product/process specific efficacies; (2) development of process compatible technology designs and scale‐up; …

Using Moocs To Promote Digital Accessibility And Universal Design, The Moocap Experience, John Gilligan, W. Chen, J. Darzentas

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The recently completed Massive Open Online Course for Accessibility Partnership project (MOOCAP), had the twin aims of establishing a strategic partnership around the promotion of Universal Design and Accessibility for ICT professionals and of developing a suite of Open Educational resources (OERs) in this domain. MOOCAP's eight university partners from Germany, Norway, Greece, Ireland, the UK and Austria have a significant history in developing and providing courses in the domains of Universal Design and Accessibility, as well as leading research and advocacy roles within Europe. The MOOCAP project consisted of two phases: the development of an introductory MOOC on Digital …

Relating Group Size And Posting Activity Of An Online Community Of Financial Investors: Regularities And Seasonal Patterns, P. Racca, R. Casarin, Pierpaolo Dondio, F. Squazzoni

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Group size can potentially affect collective activity and individual propensity to contribute to collective goods. Mancur Olson, in his Logic of Collective Action, argued that individual contribution to a collective good tends to be lower in groups of large size. Today, online communication platforms represent an interesting ground to study such collaborative dynamics under possibly different conditions (e.g., lower costs related to gather and share information). This paper examines the relationship between group size and activity in an online financial forum, where users invest time in sharing news, analysis and comments with other investors. We looked at about 24 million …

Examining The Effects Of A Virtual Character On Learning And Engagement In Serious Games, Vihanga Gamage, Cathy Ennis

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Virtual characters have been employed for many purposes including interacting with players of serious games, with a purpose to increase engagement. These characters are often embodied conversational agents playing diverse roles, such as demonstrators, guides, teachers or interviewers. Recently, much research has been conducted into properties that affect the realism and plausibility of virtual characters, but it is less clear whether the inclusion of interactive agents in serious applications can enhance a user’s engagement with the application, or indeed increase efficacy. In a first step towards answering these questions, we conducted a study where a Virtual Learning Environment was used …

Significance Of A Non-Thermal Plasma Treatment On Ldpe Biodegradation With Pseudomonas Aeruginosa, Laurence Scally, Miroslav Gulan, Lars Weigang, Vladimir Milosavljević, Patrick J. Cullen

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The use of plastics has spanned across almost all aspects of day to day life. Although their uses are invaluable, they contribute to the generation of a lot of waste products that end up in the environment and end up polluting natural habitats such as forests and the ocean. By treating low-density polyethylene (LDPE) samples with non-thermal plasma in ambient air and with an addition of ≈4% CO2, the biodegradation of the samples can be increased due to an increase in oxidative species causing better cell adhesion and acceptance on the polymer sample surface. It was, however, found that the …

Cognitive Load Reduces The Effects Of Optic Flow On Gait And 2 Electrocortical Dynamics During Treadmill Walking 3, Brenda Malcolm, John J. Foxe, John Butler, Sophie Molholm, Pierfilippo De Sanctis

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While navigating complex environments the brain must continuously adapt to both external demands such as fluctuating sensory inputs, as well as internal demands, such as engagement in a cognitively demanding task. Previous studies have demonstrated changes in behavior and gait with increased sensory and cognitive load, but the underlying cortical mechanisms remain largely unknown. Here, in a Mobile Brain/Body Imaging (MoBI) approach sixteen young adults walked on a treadmill with high-density EEG while 3D motion capture tracked kinematics of the head and feet. Visual load was manipulated with the presentation of optic flow with and without continuous mediolateral perturbations. The …

Introduction To Laser Induced Breakdown Spectroscopy Imaging In Food: Salt Diffusion In Meat, Yash Dixit, Carl Sullivan, Patrick J. Cullen

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This study illustrates the ability of laser induced breakdown spectroscopy (LIBS) to detect and map 22 minerals in food. A LIBS system was used to spatially collect spectra of beef samples. Samples were 23 brined in a 6% salt solution for 2h and 24h along with a control sample. Samples were measured by 24 scanning the cross-section of each sample in a 90 X 90 square grid. Sodium (Na) distribution images 25 with respect to emission peak at 589.05 nm were generated after pre-processing the spectral data which 26 directly corresponds to salt levels. As expected, the control sample showed …

Climate Change Challenges For Land Conservation: Rethinking Conservation Easements, Strategies, And Tools, Jessica Owley, Federico Cheever, Adena R. Rissman, M. Rebecca Shaw, Barton H. Thompson Jr., W. William Weeks

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No abstract provided.

Pseudorehearsal In Actor-Critic Agents With Neural Network Function Approximation, Vladimir Marochko, Leonard Johard, Manuel Mazzara, Luca Longo

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Catastrophic forgetting has a significant negative impact in reinforcement learning. The purpose of this study is to investigate how pseudorehearsal can change performance of an actor-critic agent with neural-network function approximation. We tested agent in a pole balancing task and compared different pseudorehearsal approaches. We have found that pseudorehearsal can assist learning and decrease forgetting.

Three Decades Of Universal Design - Defining Moments, Margaret Kinsella

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This paper contributes to the growing research on incorporating Universal Design in the Higher Education landscape by presenting a Practitioner's Perspective on Universal Design as delivered in the Institute of Technology, Blanchardstown (ITB) in the first year of a creative digital media degree as part of the first year experience. This first year experience is a transition time for many students and has many complexities; while being an exciting and fulfilling time, the transition can also be challenging and isolating. Through Universal Design, the aim is to enable students to 'Get connected' and 'Stay connected'. Universal Design for Learning is …

Transborder Speech, Ronald J. Krotoszynski Jr.

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In an increasingly globalized marketplace of ideas First Amendment theory and practice must recognize that the freedom of speech does not end at the water's edge The foreign or domestic origin of speech and speakers alike cannot serve as a constitutionally permissible basis for government censorship of speech because as Alexander Meiklejohn explained "to be afraid of ideas any idea is to be unfit for selfgovernment" Thus the locus of expressive activity should not prefigure the government's ability to engage in censorship Nevertheless under current First Amendment law and practice the accident of geography can and does serve as a …

Rodrigo And Ressentiment: I Don't Want It If You Are Going To Get It, Too - Why Classical Economic And Political Theory Fails To Explain The Obamacare Vote, But Legal Realism And Cls Can, Richard Delgado

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No abstract provided.

Legal Realism And The Controversy Over Campus Speech Codes, Richard Delgado

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No abstract provided.

A Fresh Start To Bankruptcy Exemptions, Gary E. Sullivan

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Bankruptcy has broadly failed to deliver "fresh starts" to debtors Too often debtors return to states of financial distress following bankruptcy Although bankruptcy delivers a clean slate through the discharge of debts the efficacy of a fresh start depends on a second factor property exemptions While discharge frees a debtor from her existing debts property exemptions determine what property the debtor retains upon exiting bankruptcy For many debtors insufficient and suboptimal property exemption laws undermine fresh starts In fact under current bankruptcy law each state can reject federal bankruptcy exemptions by opting out Bankrupt debtors in "optout" states are forced …

Current And Future Technologies For Microbiological Decontamination Of Cereal Grains, Agatha Los, Dana Ziuzina, Paula Bourke

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Cereal grains are the most important staple foods for mankind worldwide. The constantly increasing annual production and yield is matched by demand for cereals, which is expected to increase drastically along with the global population growth. A critical food safety and quality issue is to minimize the microbiological contamination of grains as it affects cereals both quantitatively and qualitatively. Microorganisms present in cereals can affect the safety, quality, and functional properties of grains. Some molds have the potential to produce harmful mycotoxins and pose a serious health risk for consumers. Therefore, it is essential to reduce cereal grain contamination to …

The Potential Of Cold Plasma For Safe And Sustainable Food Production, Paula Bourke, Dana Ziuzina, Daniela Boehm, Patrick J. Cullen, Kevin Keener

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In-package decontamination of foods using cold plasma has advanced this technology as a unit process for fresh foods decontamination and shelf-life extension.

Chemical residues of agricultural pesticides of varying structure can be degraded to safe or less-toxic structures using cold plasma.

Cold-plasma-mediated control of contaminants, along with the promotion of seed germination and plant growth, offers alternatives to current pesticides and fertilizers for agriculture.

Controlling plasma reactive species formulations in dry and liquid delivery formats advances the potential for understanding and successful translation to multiple points along the agriculture and food sectors.

Employing predictive microbiology, process optimization tools and a …

Anti-Biofilm Activity Of Antibody Directed Against Surface Antigen Complement Receptor 3-Related Protein-Comparison Of Candida Albicans And Candida Dubliniensis, Jaroslava Chupáčová, Elisa Borghi, Giulia Morace, Agata Los, Helena Bujdáková

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Candida species (spp.) are a part of the normal human microbiota. Candida dubliniensis mostly colonizes the oral cavity and/or respiratory tract (Mahelová and Růžička 2017), especially in HIV-infected individuals (Coleman et al.1997; Sullivan et al.2004; Wahab et al.2014), while Candida albicans is a common inhabitant of the gastrointestinal tract, urogenital tract and oral cavity (Sardi et al.2013; Höfs, Mogavero and Hube 2016). Candidiasis is the most common global fungal infection (Sardi et al.2013). Candida albicans has been isolated in more than 50% of candidiasis; however, the number of non-albicans spp. able to cause serious candidiasis has increased in recent years …

Application Of Box-Behnken Experimental Design For The Formulation And Optimisation Of Selenomethionine-Loaded Chitosan Nanoparticles Coated With Zein For Oral Delivery., Giuliana Vozza, Hugh Byrne, Jesus Maria Frias, Minna Khalid Danish, Sinéad M. Ryan

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Selenomethionine is an essential amino acid with a narrow therapeutic index and susceptibility to oxidation. Here it was encapsulated into a nanoparticle composed of chitosan cross-linked with tripolyphosphate for oral delivery. The formulation was optimised using a three-factor Box-Behnken experimental design. The chitosan:tripolyphosphate ratio, chitosan solvent pH, and drug load concentration were independently varied. The dependent variables studied were encapsulation efficiency, particle size, polydispersity index and zeta potential. For optimisation, encapsulation efficiency and zeta potential were maximised, particle diameter was set to 300 nm and polydispersity index was minimised. A 0.15 mg/mL concentration of selenomethionine, chitosan solvent pH of 3, …

Multi-Drug Resistant Escherichia Coli In Diarrhoeagenic Foals: Pulsotyping, Phylotyping, Serotyping, Antibiotic Resistance And Virulence Profiling, C.A. Kennedy, Ciara Walsh, M. Karczmarczyk, S. O'Brien, N. Akasheh, M. Quirke, S. Farrell-Ward, T. Buckley, U. Fogherty, K. Kavanagh, C.T. Parker, T. Sweeney, S. Fanning

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Extraintestinal pathogenic E. coli (ExPEC) possess the ability to cause extraintestinal infections such as urinary tract infections, neonatal meningitis and sepsis. While information is readily available describing pathogenic E. coli populations in food-producing animals, studies in companion/sports animals such as horses are limited. In addition, many antimicrobial agents used in the treatment of equine infections are also utilised in human medicine, potentially contributing to the spread of antibiotic resistance determinants among pathogenic strains. The aim of this study was to phenotypically and genotypically characterise the multidrug resistance and virulence associated with 83 equine E. coli isolates recovered from foals with …

The Flipside Of Michigan V. Epa: Are Cumulative Impacts Centrally Relevant?, Sanne H. Knudsen

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This Article explores the flipside of Michigan--where the Court's logic can just as well support agencies in their public health and environmental protection efforts. In particular, taking Michigan as a blueprint, this Article argues that cumulative impacts are centrally relevant to environmental regulation and--like cost--deserve a systemic and meaningful role in agency decisionmaking, including in the threshold decision of when to regulate.

In doing so, this Article serves as a counterbalance to the weight of cost benefit rhetoric that would reduce environmental law off to a line item in a strained budget. In support of that thesis, this Article …

Socioeconomic Status Discrimination, Danieli Evans

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This Article makes the case for protecting socioeconomic status (SES) under discrimination statutes that govern employment, housing, education, voting, public accommodations, and credit/lending. While others have argued that poverty should be a protected class under the Fourteenth Amendment, the courts have rejected this idea. The possibility of protecting SES under discrimination statutes has received little consideration. I argue that this idea deserves more serious attention. I advance four arguments in favor of adding SES to the list of protected traits. Two moral, one political, and one legal.

First and most straightforward, the values animating discrimination law apply to poverty: Existing …

Sodium Caprate Enables The Blood Pressure-Lowering Effect Of Ile- Pro-Pro And Leu-Lys-Pro In Spontaneously Hypertensive Rats By Indirectly Overcoming Pept1 Inhibition, John Gleeson, Jesus Maria Frias, Sinead Ryan, David J. Braydon

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The tripeptides, Ile-Pro-Pro (IPP) and Leu-Lys-Pro (LKP), inhibit angiotensin-converting enzyme (ACE) resulting in lowered blood pressure. Our hypothesis was that the medium chain fatty acid permeation enhancer, sodium caprate (C10), may prevent the decrease in permeability of the tripeptides when PepT1 is inhibited by glycyl-sarcosine (Gly-Sar), a situation that may occur in the presence of food hydrolysates. Using Caco-2 monolayers and isolated rat jejunal tissue, the apparent permeability coefficients (Papp) of [3H]-IPP and [3H]- LKP were assessed in the presence of Gly-Sar with and without C10. Gly-Sar decreased the Papp of both tripeptides across monolayers and isolated jejunal tissue, but …

Nano-Strategies To Fight Multidrug Resistant Bacteria—“A Battle Of The Titans", Pedro V. Baptista, Matthew P. Mccusker, Andreia Carvalho, Daniela A. Ferreira, Niamh M. Mohan, Marta Martins, Alexandra R. Fernandez

Articles

Infectious diseases remain one of the leading causes of morbidity and mortality worldwide. The WHO and CDC have expressed serious concern regarding the continued increase in the development of multidrug resistance among bacteria. Therefore, the antibiotic resistance crisis is one of the most pressing issues in global public health. Associated with the rise in antibiotic resistance is the lack of new antimicrobials. This has triggered initiatives worldwide to develop novel and more effective antimicrobial compounds as well as to develop novel delivery and targeting strategies. Bacteria have developed many ways by which they become resistant to antimicrobials. Among those are …

Quality Of Fresh And Stored Mares’ Milk, Grażyna Czyżak-Runowska, Jacek Wójtowski, Alicja Niewiadomska, Maria Markiewicz-Keszycka

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Mares’ milk is characterised by unique nutritional profile. In this study, the microbiological analysis of mares’ milk was performed. The presence of total bacteria, total lactic bacteria, Lactobacillus spp., Streptococcus lactis, Salmonella spp. and coliforms was investigated. Moreover, the influence of refrigerated and frozen storage on the total bacteria count, vitamin C, acidity and colour of milk was examined. Pathogenic Salmonella spp. and coliforms were not detected in the raw milk. It was revealed that mares’ milk can be stored for 72 hours under refrigeration at a temperature of +4 °C without reducing its microbiological quality. Most of the physicochemical …

Effects Of Nonthermal Plasma Technology On Functional Food Components, Aliyu Idris Muhammad, Xinyu Liao, Patrick J. Cullen, Donghong Liu, Qisen Xiang, Jun Wang, Shiguo Chen, Xingqian Ye, Tian Ding

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Understanding the impact of nonthermal plasma (NTP) technology on key nutritional and functional food components is of paramount importance for the successful adoption of the technology by industry. NTP technology (NTPT) has demonstrated marked antimicrobial efficacies with good retention of important physical, chemical, sensory, and nutritional parameters for an array of food products. This paper presents the influence of NTPT on selected functional food components with a focus on low-molecular-weight bioactive compounds and vitamins. We discuss the mechanisms of bioactive compound alteration by plasma-reactive species and classify their influence on vitamins and their antioxidant capacities. The impact of NTP on …

Lactic Acid Fermentation Of Arthrospira PlatensisIs (Spirulina) Biomass For Probiotic-Based Products, Alberto Niccolai, Emer Shannon, Nissreen Abu-Ghannam, Natascia Biondi, Liliana Rodolfi, Mario R. Tredici

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The first objective of this study was to evaluate the use of lyophilised biomass of the cyanobacterium Arthrospira platensis F&M-C256 as the sole substrate for lactic acid fermentation by the probiotic bacterium Lactobacillus plantarum ATCC 8014. After 48 h of fermentation, the bacterial concentration was 10.6 log CFU mL−1 and lactic acid concentration reached 3.7 g L−1. Lyophilised A. platensis F&M-C256 biomass was shown to be a suitable substrate for L. plantarum ATCC 8014 growth. The second objective of the study was to investigate whether lactic acid fermentation could enhance in vitro digestibility and antioxidant activity of A. platensis biomass. …

Chlorate And Other Oxychlorine Contaminants Within The Dairy Supply Chain, William P. Mccarthy, Tom F. O'Callaghan, Martin Danaher, David Gleeson, Christine O'Connor, Mark A. Fenelon, John Tobin

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The presence of chlorate in milk and dairy products can arise from the use of chlorinated water and chlorinated detergents for cleaning and sanitation of process equipment at both farm and food processor level. Chlorate and other oxychlorine species have been associated with inhibition of iodine uptake in humans and the formation of methemoglobin, with infants and young children being a high‐risk demographic. This comprehensive review of chlorate and chlorine derivatives in dairy, highlights areas of concern relative to the origin and/or introduction of chlorate within the dairy supply chain. This review also discusses the associated health concerns, regulations, and …