Digital Commons Network^™

Streamlined Extract Preparation For Escherichia Coli-Based Cell-Free Protein Synthesis By Sonication Or Bead Vortex Mixing, Prashanta Shrestha, Troy Michael Holland, Bradley Charles Bundy

Faculty Publications

Escherichia coli-based cell extract is a vital component of inexpensive and high-yielding cell-free protein synthesis reactions. However, effective preparation of E. coli cell extract is limited to high-pressure (French press-style or impinge-style) or bead mill homogenizers, which all require a significant capital investment. Here we report the viability of E. coli cell extract prepared using equipment that is both common to biotechnology laboratories and able to process small volume samples. Specifically, we assessed the low-capital-cost lysis techniques of: (i) sonication, (ii) bead vortex mixing, (iii) freeze-thaw cycling, and (iv) lysozyme …

Global Environmental Change Effects On Plant Community Composition Trajectories Depend Upon Management Legacies, Michael P. Perring, Markus Bernhardt-Römermann, Lander Baeten, Gabriele Midolo, Haben Blondeel, Leen Depauw, Dries Landuyt, Sybryn L. Maes, Emiel De Lombaerde, Maria Mercedes Carón, Mark Vellend, Jörg Brunet, Markéta Chudomelová, Guillaume Decocq, Martin Diekmann, Thomas Dirnböck, Inken Dörfler, Tomasz Durak, Pieter De Frenne, Frank S. Gilliam, Radim Hédl, Thilo Heinken, Patrick Hommel, Bogdan Jaroszewicz, Keith J. Kirby, Martin Kopecký, Jonathan Lenoir, Daijiang Li, František Máliš, Fraser J.G. Mitchell, Tobias Naaf, Miles Newman, Petr Petřík

Faculty Publications

© 2017 John Wiley & Sons Ltd The contemporary state of functional traits and species richness in plant communities depends on legacy effects of past disturbances. Whether temporal responses of community properties to current environmental changes are altered by such legacies is, however, unknown. We expect global environmental changes to interact with land-use legacies given different community trajectories initiated by prior management, and subsequent responses to altered resources and conditions. We tested this expectation for species richness and functional traits using 1814 survey-resurvey plot pairs of understorey communities from 40 European temperate forest datasets, syntheses of management transitions since the …

Stem Cell Factor In Combination With Granulocyte Colony-Stimulating Factor Reduces Cerebral Capillary Thrombosis In A Mouse Model Of Cadasil, Suning Ping, Xuecheng Qiu, Maria E. Gonzalez-Toledo, Xiaoyun Liu, Li Ru Zhao

Faculty Publications

Cerebral autosomal dominant arteriopathy with subcortical infarcts and leucoencephalopathy (CADASIL) is a cerebral small vascular disease caused by NOTCH3 mutation-induced vascular smooth muscle cell (VSMC) degeneration, leading to ischemic stroke and vascular dementia. Our previous study has demonstrated that repeated treatment with a combination of stem cell factor (SCF) and granulocyte colony-stimulating factor (G-CSF) reduces VSMC degeneration and cerebral endothelial cell (EC) damage and improves cognitive function in a mouse model of CADASIL (TgNotch3R90C). This study aimed to determine whether cerebral thrombosis occurs in TgNotch3R90C mice and whether repeated SCF+G-CSF treatment reduces cerebral thrombosis in TgNotch3R90C mice. Using the approaches …

P62 As A Therapeutic Target For Inhibition Of Autophagy In Prostate Cancer, Lei Wang, Donghern Kim, James T.F. Wise, Xianglin Shi, Zhuo Zhang, Robert S. Dipaola

Faculty Publications

Background: To test the hypothesis that p62 is an optimal target for autophagy inhibition and Verteporfin, a clinically available drug approved by FDA to treat macular degeneration that inhibits autophagy by targeting p62 protein, can be developed clinically to improve therapy for advanced prostate cancer. Methods: Forced expression of p62 in PC-3 cells and normal prostate epithelial cells, RWPE-1 and PZ-HPV7, were carried out by transfection of these cells with pcDNA3.1/p62 or p62 shRNA plasmid. Autophagosomes and autophagic flux were measured by transfection of tandem fluorescence protein mCherry-GFP-LC3 construct. Apoptosis was measured by Annexin V/PI staining. Tumorigenesis was measured by …

Coupled Effects Of Oil Spill And Hurricane On Saltmarsh Terrestrial Arthropods, Wokil Bam, Linda M. Hooper-Bui, Rachel M. Strecker, Puspa L. Adhikari, Edward B. Overton

Faculty Publications

Terrestrial arthropods play an important role in saltmarsh ecosystems, mainly affecting the saltmarsh’s primary production as the main consumers of terrestrial primary production and decomposition. Some of these arthropods, including selected insects and spiders, can be used as ecological indicators of overall marsh environmental health, as they are differentially sensitive to ecological stressors, such as land loss, erosion, oil spills, and tropical storms. In the present study, we used terrestrial arthropods collected from seven (three lightly-oiled, four heavily-oiled) sites in Barataria Bay and from three unoiled reference sites in Delacroix, Louisiana, to determine the impacts of the distribution and re-distribution …

Emerging Roles For The Nucleolus 2017, Susan J. Baserga, Patrick J. Dimario

Faculty Publications

No abstract provided.

Genomic-Enabled Prediction Kernel Models With Random Intercepts For Multi-Environment Trials, Jaime Cuevas, Italo Granato, Roberto Fritsche-Neto, Osval A. Montesinos-Lopez, Juan Burgueño, Massaine Bandeira Sousa, José Crossa

Faculty Publications

In this study, we compared the prediction accuracy of the main genotypic effect model (MM) without G×E interactions, the multi-environment single variance G×E deviation model (MDs), and the multienvironment environment-specific variance G×E deviation model (MDe) where the random genetic effects of the lines are modeled with the markers (or pedigree). With the objective of further modeling the genetic residual of the lines, we incorporated the random intercepts of the lines (l) and generated another three models. Each of these 6 models were fitted with a linear kernel method (Genomic Best Linear Unbiased Predictor, GB) and a Gaussian Kernel (GK) method. …

Making A Market For Corporate Disclosure, Kevin S. Haeberle, M. Todd Henderson

Faculty Publications

It has long been said that market forces alone will result in a problematic under-sharing of information by public companies. Since the 1930s, the main regulatory response to this market failure has come in the form of the massive mandatory-disclosure regime that sits at the foundation of modern securities law. But this regime—especially when viewed along with its speech-chilling antifraud overlay—no doubt leaves society without all the corporate information from which it would benefit. The typical fix offered to the problem has been more of the same: add to the 100-plus-page list of what firms must disclose, often based on …

Reassessing Prosecutorial Power Through The Lens Of Mass Incarceration, Jeffrey Bellin

Faculty Publications

No abstract provided.

A Legal Perspective On The Trials And Tribulations Of Ai: How Artificial Intelligence, The Internet Of Things, Smart Contracts, And Other Technologies Will Affect The Law, Iria Giuffrida, Fredric Lederer, Nicolas Vermeys

Faculty Publications

No abstract provided.

“Get The Mexican”: Attending To The Moral Work Of Teaching In Fraught Times, Grinell Smith, Colette Rabin

Faculty Publications

This article details a four-faceted approach we developed to help structure discourse about topics in partisan arenas, many of which intersect with issues of equity and social justice. The article’s narrative centers on challenging and emotionally charged discussions that unfolded in a classroom management class in our teacher preparation program on November 9, 2016, the day following the election of Donald Trump. We offer the approach, which centers on addressing cognitive biases common in partisan discourse, as a robust, straightforward, and nontechnocratic way to help teachers (both teacher preparation instructors and teachers of children) mediate partisan discussions among their students …

Editing Life: Modern Biology And Biblical Principles, Peter J. Lyons

Faculty Publications

No abstract provided.

Differences In The Electrophysiological Properties Of Mouse Somatosensory Layer 2/3 Neurons In Vivo And Slice Stem From Intrinsic Sources Rather Than A Network-Generated High Conductance State, Fernando R. Fernandez, Bahar Rahsepar, John A. White

Faculty Publications

No abstract provided.

A Plant-Produced Vaccine Protects Mice Against Lethal West Nile Virus Infection Without Enhancing Zika Or Dengue Virus Infectivity, Huafang Lai, Amber M. Paul, Haiyan Sun, Junyun He, Ming Yang, Fengwei Bai

Faculty Publications

West Nile virus (WNV) has caused multiple global outbreaks with increased frequency of neuroinvasive disease in recent years. Despite many years of research, there are no licensed therapeutics or vaccines available for human use. One of the major impediments of vaccine development against WNV is the potential enhancement of infection by related flaviviruses in vaccinated subjects through the mechanism of antibody-dependent enhancement of infection (ADE). For instance, the recent finding of enhancement of Zika virus (ZIKV) infection by pre-exposure to WNV further complicates the development of WNV vaccines. Epidemics of WNV and the potential risk of ADE by current vaccine …

The Aspergillus Flavus Spermidine Synthase (Spds) Gene, Is Required For Normal Development, Aflatoxin Production, And Pathogenesis During Infection Of Maize Kernels., Rajtilak Majumdar, Matthew D. Lebar, Brian M. Mack, Rakesh Minocha, Subhash C. Minocha, Carol H. Carter-Wientjes, Christine M. Sickler, Kanniah Rajasekaran, Jeffrey W. Cary

Faculty Publications

Aspergillus flavus is a soil-borne saprophyte and an opportunistic pathogen of both humans and plants. This fungus not only causes disease in important food and feed crops such as maize, peanut, cottonseed, and tree nuts but also produces the toxic and carcinogenic secondary metabolites (SMs) known as aflatoxins. Polyamines (PAs) are ubiquitous polycations that influence normal growth, development, and stress responses in living organisms and have been shown to play a significant role in fungal pathogenesis. Biosynthesis of spermidine (Spd) is critical for cell growth as it is required for hypusination-mediated activation of eukaryotic translation initiation factor 5A (eIF5A), and …

Does Body Size Affect Fitness The Same Way In Males And Females? A Test Of Multiple Fitness Components, Ashlee N. Smith, Mark C. Belk

Faculty Publications

Body size generally has an important relationship with fitness, whereby larger body size leads to an increase in fitness through competition, reproductive output and survivorship. However, the traits through which body size increases fitness often differ between the sexes. We tested for the effects of body size on fitness in both sexes using three separate experiments on competitive ability, reproductive output and starvation resistance in the burying beetle Nicrophorus marginatus. Results varied between sexes as follows: (1) larger body size increased competitive ability differentially between sexes; (2) female body size, but not male body size, significantly affected reproductive output …

Characterizing The Phylogenetic Specialism-Generalism Spectrum Of Mammal Parasites, A. W. Park, M. J. Farrell, J. P. Schmidt, S. Huang, T. A. Dallas, P. Pappalardo, J. M. Drake, P. R. Stephens, R. Poulin, C. L. Nunn, T. J. Davies

Faculty Publications

© 2018 The Author(s) Published by the Royal Society. All rights reserved. The distribution of parasites across mammalian hosts is complex and represents a differential ability or opportunity to infect different host species. Here, we take a macroecological approach to investigate factors influencing why some parasites show a tendency to infect species widely distributed in the host phylogeny (phylogenetic generalism) while others infect only closely related hosts. Using a database on over 1400 parasite species that have been documented to infect up to 69 terrestrialmammal host species,we characterize the phylogenetic generalism of parasites using standard effect sizes for three metrics: …

Public Knowledge Of Monarchs And Support For Butterfly Conservation, Jerrod Penn, Hannah Penn, Wuyang Hu

Faculty Publications

© 2018 by the authors. Pollinator populations in North America are in decline, including the iconic monarch butterfly. In order to determine if public knowledge of monarchs informs opinions on butterfly conservation, we surveyed the public to assess their knowledge of monarchs. We also asked participants about their attitudes towards general butterfly conservation and if they believe that butterfly gardens contribute to conservation. Respondents generally had some knowledge of monarchs but were unaware of monarch population declines and the necessity of milkweed to their life cycle. Respondent knowledge was correlated with more positive attitudes about butterfly conservation. Furthermore, membership in …

Oregon Shakespeare Festival: Changing The Social Order, Daniel Pollack-Pelzner

Faculty Publications

Daniel Pollack-Pelzner views the first four plays of the Oregon Shakespeare Festival's 2018 season (Karen Zacarías's Destiny of Desire, Kate Hamill's adaptation of Sense and Sensibility, Othello, and Henry V) as expressions of social change.

Biomarkers Of Rehabilitation Therapy Vary According To Stroke Severity, Erin Burke Quinlan, Lucy Dodakian, Jill See, Alison Mckenzie, Jill Campbell Stewart Pt,Phd, Steven C. Cramer

Faculty Publications

Biomarkers that capture treatment effects could improve the precision of clinical decision making for restorative therapies. We examined the performance of candidate structural, functional, and angiogenesis-related MRI biomarkers before and after a 3-week course of standardized robotic therapy in 18 patients with chronic stroke and hypothesized that results vary significantly according to stroke severity. Patients were 4.1 ± 1 months poststroke, with baseline arm Fugl-Meyer scores of 20–60. When all patients were examined together, no imaging measure changed over time in a manner that correlated with treatment-induced motor gains. However, when also considering the interaction with baseline motor status, treatment-induced …

Spatial Extinction Date Estimation: A Novel Method For Reconstructing Spatiotemporal Patterns Of Extinction And Identifying Potential Zones Of Rediscovery, Colin J. Carlson, Kevin R. Burgio, Tad Dallas, Alexander L. Bond

Faculty Publications

1. The estimation of extinction dates from limited and incomplete sighting records

is a key challenge in conservation (when experts are uncertain whether a species has

gone extinct) and historical ecology (when the date and mechanism of extinction is

controversial).

2. We introduce a spatially-explicit method of interpolating extinction date estima8 tors, allowing users to estimate spatiotemporal surfaces of population persistence 9 from georeferenced sighting data of variable quality.

3. We present the R package spatExtinct, which produces spatially-explicit extinction date surfaces from geolocated sightings, including options for custom randomization schemes to improve accuracy with limited datasets. We use simulations …

Environmentally Persistent Free Radicals: Insights On A New Class Of Pollutants, Eric P. Vejerano, Guiying Rao, Lavrent Khachatryan, Stephania A. Cormier, Slawo Lomnicki

Faculty Publications

© 2018 American Chemical Society. Environmentally persistent free radicals, EPFRs, exist in significant concentration in atmospheric particulate matter (PM). EPFRs are primarily emitted from combustion and thermal processing of organic materials, in which the organic combustion byproducts interact with transition metal-containing particles to form a free radical-particle pollutant. While the existence of persistent free radicals in combustion has been known for over half-a-century, only recently that their presence in environmental matrices and health effects have started significant research, but still in its infancy. Most of the experimental studies conducted to understand the origin and nature of EPFRs have focused primarily …

Jak/Stat3 Regulated Global Gene Expression Dynamics During Late-Stage Reprogramming Process, Ling Wang, Zongliang Jiang, Delun Huang, Jingyue Duan, Chang Huang, Shannon Sullivan, Kaneha Vali, Yexuan Yin, Ming Zhang, Jill Wegrzyn, Xiuchun Cindy Tian, Young Tang

Faculty Publications

© 2018 The Author(s). Background: The generation of induced pluripotent stem cells (iPSCs) has underdefined mechanisms. In addition, leukemia inhibitory factor (LIF) activated Janus kinase/signal transducer and activator of transcription 3 (JAK/STAT3) pathway is the master regulator for naïve-state pluripotency achievement and maintenance. However, the regulatory process to attain naïve pluripotent iPSCs is not well understood. Results: We performed transcriptome analysis to dissect the genomic expression during mouse iPSC induction, with or without blocking the JAK/STAT3 activity. We describe JAK/STAT3 signaling-specific biological events such as gametogenesis, meiotic/mitotic cell cycle, and DNA repair, and JAK/STAT3-dependent expression of key transcription factors such …

Transcriptomics Reveal Transgenerational Effects In Purple Sea Urchin Embryos: Adult Acclimation To Upwelling Conditions Alters The Response Of Their Progeny To Differential Pco2 Levels, Juliet M. Wong, Kevin M. Johnson, Morgan W. Kelly, Gretchen E Hofmann

Faculty Publications

© 2018 John Wiley & Sons Ltd Understanding the mechanisms with which organisms can respond to a rapidly changing ocean is an important research priority in marine sciences, especially in the light of recent predictions regarding the pace of ocean change in the coming decades. Transgenerational effects, in which the experience of the parental generation can shape the phenotype of their offspring, may serve as such a mechanism. In this study, adult purple sea urchins, Strongylocentrotus purpuratus, were conditioned to regionally and ecologically relevant pCO2 levels and temperatures representative of upwelling (colder temperature and high pCO2) and nonupwelling (average temperature …

Cd Obesity-Prone Rats, But Not Obesity-Resistant Rats, Robustly Ferment Resistant Starch Without Increased Weight Or Fat Accretion, Diana Obanda, Ryan Page, Justin Guice, Anne M. Raggio, Claudia Husseneder, Brian Marx, Rhett W. Stout, David A. Welsh, Christopher M. Taylor, Meng Luo, Eugene E. Blanchard, Zach Bendiks, Diana Coulon, Michael J. Keenan

Faculty Publications

© 2018 The Obesity Society Objective: This study used CD obesity-prone (OP) and obesity-resistant (OR) rats to examine how weight gain and fat accretion relate to fermentation levels and microbiota composition after feeding resistant starch (RS). Methods: After feeding OP rats and OR rats a high-fat (HF) diet for 4 weeks, rats were stratified into three groups: they were fed either an HF diet (group 1: HF-HF) or were switched to a low-fat (LF) diet (group 2: HF-LF) or an LF diet supplemented with 20% RS by weight for 4 weeks (group 3: HF-LFRS). Energy intake, body weight, fermentation variables, …

Cd Obesity-Prone Rats, But Not Obesity-Resistant Rats, Robustly Ferment Resistant Starch Without Increased Weight Or Fat Accretion, Diana Obanda, Ryan Page, Justin Guice, Anne M. Raggio, Claudia Husseneder, Brian Marx, Rhett W. Stout, David A. Welsh, Christopher M. Taylor, Meng Luo, Eugene E. Blanchard, Zach Bendiks, Diana Coulon, Michael J. Keenan

Faculty Publications

© 2018 The Obesity Society Objective: This study used CD obesity-prone (OP) and obesity-resistant (OR) rats to examine how weight gain and fat accretion relate to fermentation levels and microbiota composition after feeding resistant starch (RS). Methods: After feeding OP rats and OR rats a high-fat (HF) diet for 4 weeks, rats were stratified into three groups: they were fed either an HF diet (group 1: HF-HF) or were switched to a low-fat (LF) diet (group 2: HF-LF) or an LF diet supplemented with 20% RS by weight for 4 weeks (group 3: HF-LFRS). Energy intake, body weight, fermentation variables, …

First Impressions—The Potential Of Altering Initial Host-Virus Interactions For Rational Design Of Herpesvirus Vaccine Vectors, Paul J.F. Rider, Farhana Musarrat, Rafiq Nabi, Shan Naidu, Konstantin G. Kousoulas

Faculty Publications

© 2018, Springer International Publishing AG, part of Springer Nature. Purpose of Review: The earliest host-virus interactions occur during virus attachment and entry into cells. These initial steps in the virus lifecycle influence the outcome of infection beyond delivery of the viral genome into the cell. Herpesviruses alter host signaling pathways and processes during attachment and entry to facilitate virus infection and modulate innate immune responses. We suggest in this review that understanding these early events may inform the rational design of therapeutic and prevention strategies for herpesvirus infection, as well as the engineering of viral vectors for immunotherapy purposes. …

Work Engagement In Nonprofit Organizations: A Conceptual Model, Sunyoung Park, Junghwan Kim, Jiwon Park, Doo Hun Lim

Faculty Publications

Using the revised job demands–resources (JD-R) model as a theoretical framework, our article aims to develop a conceptual model of the work engagement of paid workers in nonprofit organizations (NPOs) by identifying its antecedents and outcomes discussed in the literature. We found that job resources are prevalent antecedents for work engagement, while three categories of the JD-R model are all significant with work engagement. Although some findings are similar with existing studies for for-profit organizations, others implied that we need a different approach to work engagement of NPO workers. We finally offer a proposed JD-R model of work engagement in …

Detection Of Antibiotic Resistance Toxigenic Clostridium Difficile In Processed Retail Lettuce, Yi Han, Joan King, Marlene E. Janes

Faculty Publications

Objectives: Clostridium difficile is the major cause of infectious diarrhoea in humans after antimicrobial treatment. Clostridium difficile has been isolated from food animals and meat. The main purpose of this study was to characterize C. difficile isolated from retail lettuce and determine the antibiotic resistance using five common clinical-selected antibiotics (metronidazole, vancomycin, clindamycin, erythromycin, and cefotaxime). Materials and Methods: Lettuce samples (grown in California, Arkansas, and Louisiana) were purchased from retail stores. Results: Toxigenic C. difficile was isolated from 13.8 per cent (41/297) of the lettuce samples. Among the toxigenic isolates, only 82.9 per cent (34/41) produced toxin B, 17.1 …

Physico-Chemical Characteristics Of Evaporating Respiratory Fluid Droplets, Eric P. Vejerano, Linsey C. Marr

Faculty Publications

The detailed physico-chemical characteristics of respiratory droplets in ambient air, where they are subject to evaporation, are poorly understood. Changes in the concentration and phase of major components in a droplet—salt (NaCl), protein (mucin) and surfactant (dipalmitoylphosphatidylcholine)—may affect the viability of any pathogens contained within it and thus may affect the efficiency of transmission of infectious disease by droplets and aerosols. The objective of this study is to investigate the effect of relative humidity (RH) on the physico-chemical characteristics of evaporating droplets of model respiratory fluids. We labelled these components in model respiratory fluids and observed evaporating droplets suspended on …