Digital Commons Network^™

Induction Of Energy Expenditure By Sitagliptin Is Dependent On Glp-1 Receptor, Felicia Goldsmith, Michael J. Keenan, Anne M. Raggio, Xin Ye, Zheng Hao, Holiday Durham, James Geaghan, Weiping Jia, Roy J. Martin, Jianping Ye

Faculty Publications

Sitagliptin (SG) increases serum GLP-1 (Glucagon-like peptide-1) through inhibition of the hormone degradation. Resistant starch (RS) induces GLP-1 expression by stimulating L-cells in the intestine. Sitagliptin and resistant starch may have a synergistic interaction in the induction of GLP-1. This possibility was tested in current study in a mouse model of type 2 diabetes. Hyperglycemia was induced in the diet-induced obese mice by a signal injection of streptozotocin (STZ). Sitagliptin (0.4g/100g diet) was tested in the mice (n = 55) with dietary RS (HAM-RS2) at three dosages (0, 15, or 28g/100g diet). Energy and glucose metabolism were monitored in the …

Expansion Of Brucellosis Detection In The Country Of Georgia By Screening Household Members Of Cases And Neighboring Community Members, Lia Sanodze, Christian T. Bautista, Natalia Garuchava, Svetlana Chubinidze, Ekaterine Tsertsvadze, Mariam Broladze, Nazibrola Chitadze, Ketevan Sidamonidze, Shota Tsanava, Tamar Akhvlediani, Robert G. Rivard, Rupal Mody, Matthew J. Hepburn, Philip H. Elzer, Mikeljon P. Nikolich, Nino Trapaidze

Faculty Publications

© 2015 Sanodze et al.; licensee BioMed Central. Background: Brucellosis is considered as endemic zoonotic disease in the country of Georgia. However, the burden of the disease on a household level is not known. Therefore, this study sought to determine the benefits of active surveillance coupled to serological screening for the early detection of brucellosis among close contacts of brucellosis cases. Methods: We used an active surveillance approach to estimate the rate of seropositivity among household family members and neighboring community members of brucellosis index cases. All participants were screened using the serum tube agglutination test (SAT). Blood cultures were …

Plant Neighborhood Effects On Herbivory: Damage Is Both Density And Frequency Dependent, Tania N. Kim, Nora Underwood, J. T. Cronin

Faculty Publications

© 2015 by the Ecological Society of America. Neighboring plants can affect the likelihood that a focal plant is attacked by herbivores. Both the density of conspecific neighbors (resource concentration or dilution effects) and the relative density of heterospecific neighbors (associational effects or effects of neighbor frequency) within the local neighborhood can affect herbivore load and plant damage. Understanding how these neighborhood effects influence processes such as plant competition or natural selection on plant resistance traits will require knowing how both plant density and frequency affect damage, but previous studies have generally confounded density and frequency effects. In this study, …

Deflating Trees: Improving Bayesian Branch-Length Estimates Using Informed Priors, Bradley J. Nelson, John J. Andersen, Jeremy M. Brown

Faculty Publications

© 2015 © The Author(s) 2015. Published by Oxford University Press, on behalf of the Society of Systematic Biologists. All rights reserved. For Permissions, please email: [email protected]. Prior distributions can have a strong effect on the results of Bayesian analyses. However, no general consensus exists for how priors should be set in all circumstances. Branch-length priors are of particular interest for phylogenetics, because they affect many parameters and biologically relevant inferences have been shown to be sensitive to the chosen prior distribution. Here, we explore the use of outside information to set informed branch-length priors and compare inferences from these …

A Second Corticotropin-Releasing Hormone Gene (Crh2) Is Conserved Across Vertebrate Classes And Expressed In The Hindbrain Of A Basal Neopterygian Fish, The Spotted Gar (Lepisosteus Oculatus), Brian P. Grone, Karen P. Maruska

Faculty Publications

© 2015 Wiley Periodicals, Inc. To investigate the origins of the vertebrate stress-response system, we searched sequenced vertebrate genomes for genes resembling corticotropin-releasing hormone (CRH). We found that vertebrate genomes possess, in addition to CRH, another gene that resembles CRH in sequence and syntenic environment. This paralogous gene was previously identified only in the elephant shark (a holocephalan), but we find it also in marsupials, monotremes, lizards, turtles, birds, and fishes. We examined the relationship of this second vertebrate CRH gene, which we name CRH2, to CRH1 (previously known as CRH) and urocortin1/urotensin1 (UCN1/UTS1) in primitive fishes, teleosts, and tetrapods. …

Patterns Of Survival And Roost Switching In An African Insectivorous Bat, A. Monadjem, R. A. Mccleery, B. Collier

Faculty Publications

Variation in survival over time and among age and sex classes drives population dynamics for a large majority of long-lived species and is critical to understanding species demography. For highly mobile species that actively move among potential breeding locations, coupling survival information with estimates of locational fidelity provides the basis for our understanding of species population dynamics. We studied the effect of time, age and sex class and climatic variables on survival and roost transition probabilities on a population of Egyptian slit-faced bats in Swaziland from 1450 marked individuals from 16 roosts over a 10-year period. We then used variance …

The Importance Of Glp-1 And Pyy In Resistant Starch's Effect On Body Fat In Mice, June Zhou, Roy J. Martin, Anne M. Raggio, Li Shen, Kathleen Mccutcheon, Michael J. Keenan

Faculty Publications

Resistant starch (RS) is a dietary fermentable fiber that decreases body fat accumulation, and stimulates the secretion of glucagon-like peptide-1 (GLP-1) and peptide YY (PYY) in rodents. GLP-1 and PYY are gut-secreted hormones with antiobesity effect. Thus, blocking the signals of increased GLP-1 and PYY may also block the effect of dietary RS on body fat. In a 10-week study, C57BL/6J and GLP-1 receptor null (GLP-1R KO) mice were fed control or 30% RS diet, and received daily intraperitoneal injection of either saline or PYY receptor antagonist (BIIE0246, 20 μg/kg body weight). Dietary RS significantly decreased body fat accumulation only …

Biocontrol And Plant Growth-Promoting Activity Of Rhizobacteria From Chinese Fields With Contaminatd Soils, Xuefie Wang, Dmitri V. Mavrodi, Linfeng Ke, Olga V. Mavrodi, Mingming Yang, Linda S. Thomashow, Na Zheng, David M. Weller, Jibin Zhang

Faculty Publications

The aim of this study was to inventory the types of plant growth‐promoting rhizobacteria (PGPR) present in the rhizosphere of plants grown in soils contaminated with heavy metals, recalcitrant organics, petroleum sewage or salinity in China. We screened 1223 isolates for antifungal activity and about 24% inhibited Rhizoctonia solani or Sclerotinia sclerotiorum. Twenty‐four strains inhibitory to R. solani, Gaeumannomyces graminis var. tritici and/or S. sclerotiorum and representing the dominant morphotypes were assayed for PGPR activity. Seven strains contained phlD, prnD, pltC or phzF genes and produced the antibiotics 2,4‐diacetylphloroglucinol, pyrrolnitrin, pyoluteorin and phenazines respectively. Six strains contained acdS, which encodes …

Going With The Flow Or Against The Grain? The Promise Of Vegetation For Protecting Beaches, Dunes, And Barrier Islands From Erosion, Rusty A. Feagin, Jens Figlus, Julie C. Zinnert, Jake Sigren, Marisa L. Martínez, Rodolfo Silva, William K. Smith, Ashley Cox, Daniel Cox, Donald R. Young, Gregory A. Carter

Faculty Publications

Coastlines have traditionally been engineered to maintain structural stability and to protect property from storm‐related damage, but their ability to endure will be challenged over the next century. The use of vegetation to reduce erosion on ocean‐facing mainland and barrier island shorelines – including the sand dunes and beaches on these islands – could be part of a more flexible strategy. Although there is growing enthusiasm for using vegetation for this purpose, empirical data supporting this approach are lacking. Here, we identify the potential roles of vegetation in coastal protection, including the capture of sediment, ecological succession, and the building …

The Tower Of Babel Account: A Linguistic Consideration, Dallin D. Oaks

Faculty Publications

The biblical account of the Tower of Babel has generally not been taken seriously by scholars in historical linguistics, but what are regarded by some as problematic aspects of the account may actually relate to claims that have been incorrectly attributed to the account. In fact, the account may not be reporting a sudden· and immediate confusion of languages, or even a sequence in which a confusion of languages led to a scattering of the people. Indeed, a close examination of the account seems to allow an interpretation of events that is compatible with what linguists have observed about [how …

First Opinion: From Heartbreak To Triumph, Clayton A. Copeland Phd

Faculty Publications

No abstract provided.

The Gospel According To Mormon, Noel B. Reynolds

Faculty Publications

Although scholarly investigation of the Book of Mormon has increased significantly over the last three decades, only a tiny portion of that effort has been focused on the theological or doctrinal content of this central volume of Latter-day Saints (LDS) scripture. This article identifies three inclusios which promise definitions of the doctrine or gospel of Jesus Christ and proposes a cumulative methodology to explain how these definitions work. This approach reveals a consistently presented, six-part formula defining ‘the way’ by which mankind can qualify for eternal life. In this way the article provides a starting point for scholarly examinations of …

Retrotransposon-Derived Promoter Of Mammalian Aebp2, Hana Kim, Arundhati Bakshi, Joomyeong Kim

Faculty Publications

© 2015 Kim et al. Variable DNA methylation in promoter regions has been implicated in altering transcriptional regulation. The current study analyzed the evolutionary origin and DNA methylation pattern of one of the promoters of Aebp2 . According to the results, the first promoter of Aebp2 has been derived from retrotransposons independently in the primate and rodent lineages. DNA methylation analyses revealed that this promoter is unmethylated in sperm, methylated in mature oocytes, and partially methylated at embryonic day 10.5 (78.3%) and 14.5 (58.3%). This promoter also shows variable levels of DNA methylation among adult organs, ranging from the highest …

Topographical Emphases In Hugh Glass Narratives, 1825-2015, Thomas Simmons

Faculty Publications

This paper was presented at the 47th Annual Dakota Conference: Where the West Begins? Geography, Identity and Promise at the Center for Western Studies, Augustana College, Sioux Falls, South Dakota on April 24, 2015 and was lightly updated in 2016. It summarizes the life of Hugh Glass and examines the evolving role of topography, landscape and environment in the fictional retellings of the Hugh Glass saga spanning the years 1825 to 2015.

The Complicity Of Silence: Race And The Hamilton Holt/Corra Harris Friendship, 1899-1935, Jack C. Lane

Faculty Publications

From the perspective of the large race issue in the early twentieth century America, this article closely examines the perplexed personal relationship between Hamilton Holt, 8th president of Rollins College (1925-1949) and Corra Harris, one of Holt's original "Golden Personality" faculty members who carried the unique title of "Professor of Evil" at Rollins.

The Physics Of Proton Therapy, Wayne D. Newhauser, Rui Zhang

Faculty Publications

The physics of proton therapy has advanced considerably since it was proposed in 1946. Today analytical equations and numerical simulation methods are available to predict and characterize many aspects of proton therapy. This article reviews the basic aspects of the physics of proton therapy, including proton interaction mechanisms, proton transport calculations, the determination of dose from therapeutic and stray radiations, and shielding design. The article discusses underlying processes as well as selected practical experimental and theoretical methods. We conclude by briefly speculating on possible future areas of research of relevance to the physics of proton therapy.

Is Corporate Patriotism A Virtue?, David Yosifon

Faculty Publications

American social and political discourse attests to widespread concern about whether domestic corporations can be counted on to serve the national interest. This issue is especially pressing in an era of international corporate operations, in which firms can send jobs and tax revenues overseas, devastating local communities even as they boost the prospects of workers in a foreign land, and the interests of capital spread across the globe. Firms founded in America can also disperse across the border productive resources that could otherwise be nationalized or made available to the homeland in times of crisis or war. Indeed, the shareholder …

Quantifying Land Cover Change Due To Petroleum Exploration And Production In The Haynesville Shale Region Using Remote Sensing, Daniel Unger, I-Kuai Hung, Kenneth W. Farrish, Darinda Dans

Faculty Publications

The Haynesville Shale lies under areas of Louisiana and Texas and is one of the largest gas plays in the U.S. Encompassing approximately 2.9 million ha, this area has been subject to intensive exploration for oil and gas, while over 90% of it has traditionally been used for forestry and agriculture. In order to detect the landscape change in the past few decades, Landsat Thematic Mapper (TM) imagery for six years (1984, 1989, 1994, 2000, 2006, and 2011) was acquired. Unsupervised classifications were performed to classify each image into four cover types: agriculture, forest, well pad, and other. Change detection …

Glowing Seashells: Diversity Of Fossilized Coloration Patterns On Coral Reef-Associated Cone Snail (Gastropoda: Conidae) Shells From The Neogene Of The Dominican Republic, Jonathan R. Hendricks

Faculty Publications

The biology of modern Conidae (cone snails)—which includes the hyperdiverse genus Conus—has been intensively studied, but the fossil record of the clade remains poorly understood, particularly within an evolutionary framework. Here, ultraviolet light is used to reveal and characterize the original shell coloration patterns of 28 species of cone snails from three Neogene coral reef-associated deposits from the Cibao Valley, northern Dominican Republic. These fossils come from the upper Miocene Cercado Fm. and lower Pliocene Gurabo Fm., and range in age from about 6.6-4.8 Ma. Comparison of the revealed coloration patterns with those of extant species allow the taxa to …

Biogeography Of A Plant Invasion: Plant-Herbivore Interactions, James T. Cronin, Ganesh P. Bhattarai, Warwick J. Allen, Laura A. Meyerson

Faculty Publications

© 2015 by the Ecological Society of America. Theory predicts that native plant species should exhibit latitudinal gradients in the strength of their interactions with herbivores. We hypothesize that if an invasive plant species exhibits a different latitudinal gradient in response to herbivores (e.g., a nonparallel gradient), it can create large-scale heterogeneities in community resistance/susceptibility to the invasive species. We conducted a study of latitudinal variation in the strength of herbivory and defenses of native genotypes of Phragmites australis in North America (NA) and Europe (EU) and European invasive genotypes in NA. Within NA, we tested whether (1) invasive genotypes …

Recycling Antibiotics Into Gumbos: A New Combination Strategy To Combat Multi-Drug-Resistant Bacteria, Marsha R. Cole, Jeffery A. Hobden, Isiah M. Warner

Faculty Publications

© 2015 by the authors; licensee MDPI. The emergence of multi-drug-resistant bacteria, coupled with the lack of new antibiotics in development, is fast evolving into a global crisis. New strategies utilizing existing antibacterial agents are urgently needed. We propose one such strategy in which four outmoded β-lactam antibiotics (ampicillin, carbenicillin, cephalothin and oxacillin) and a well-known antiseptic (chlorhexidine di-acetate) were fashioned into a group of uniform materials based on organic salts (GUMBOS) as an alternative to conventional combination drug dosing strategies. The antibacterial activity of precursor ions (e.g., chlorhexidine diacetate and β-lactam antibiotics), GUMBOS and their unreacted mixtures were studied …

Motoneuron Axon Pathfinding Errors In Zebrafish: Differential Effects Related To Concentration And Timing Of Nicotine Exposure, Evdokia Menelaou, Latoya T. Paul, Surangi N. Perera, Kurt R. Svoboda

Faculty Publications

© 2015 Elsevier Inc. Nicotine exposure during embryonic stages of development can affect many neurodevelopmental processes. In the developing zebrafish, exposure to nicotine was reported to cause axonal pathfinding errors in the later born secondary motoneurons (SMNs). These alterations in SMN axon morphology coincided with muscle degeneration at high nicotine concentrations (15-30. μM). Previous work showed that the paralytic mutant zebrafish known as sofa potato exhibited nicotine-induced effects onto SMN axons at these high concentrations but in the absence of any muscle deficits, indicating that pathfinding errors could occur independent of muscle effects.In this study, we used varying concentrations of …

Interspecific Competition Affects Evolutionary Links Between Cavity Nesting, Migration And Clutch Size In Old World Flycatchers (Muscicapdae), Sahas Barve, Nicholas A. Mason

Faculty Publications

© 2015 British Ornithologists' Union. The ecology of cavity nesting in passerine birds has been studied extensively, yet there are no phylogenetic comparative studies that quantify differences in life history traits between cavity- and open-nesting birds within a passerine family. We test existing hypotheses regarding the evolutionary significance of cavity nesting in the Old World flycatchers (Muscicapidae). We used a multi-locus phylogeny of 252 species to reconstruct the evolutionary history of cavity nesting and to quantify correlations between nest types and life history traits. Within a phylogenetic generalized linear model framework, we found that cavity-nesting species are larger than open-nesting …

Drivers Of Observed Biotic Homogenization In Pine Barrens Of Central Wisconsin, Daijiang Li, Donald Waller

Faculty Publications

© 2015 by the Ecological Society of America. Fire suppression throughout the 20th century greatly altered plant communities in fire-dominated systems across North America. Our ability to assess these effects over the long term, however, is handicapped by the paucity of baseline data. Here, we used detailed baseline data from the 1950s to track changes in the over- and understory composition of pinebarrens vegetation growing on sandy, glacial lake-bed sediments in central Wisconsin. We expected fire suppression to favor succession to closed-canopy conditions, leading to decreases in shade-intolerant and fire-Adapted species and consequent reductions in alpha and gamma diversity. We …

Impact Of Westernization On Fibroblast Growth Factor 23 Levels Among Individuals Of African Ancestry, Karl Eckberg, Holly Kramer, Myles Wolf, Ramon Durazo-Arvizu, Bamidele Tayo, Amy Luke, Richard Cooper

Faculty Publications

IntroductionThe Western diet is associated with high consumption of processed foods preserved with phosphate. Higher dietary phosphate consumption stimulates production of fibroblast growth factor 23 (FGF23), which heightens risk for cardiovascular disease and mortality. We hypothesized that adults living in a more westernized society have higher levels of FGF23 due to increased phosphate consumption as measured by urinary phosphate excretion. MethodsWe measured plasma C-terminal FGF23 levels and urinary phosphate and creatinine levels in timed urine collections among 100 African adults living in the rural area of Igbo-Ora, Nigeria (52 women, 48 men), and 100 African Americans (32 women, 68 men) …

Effect Of Blueberry Extract From Blueberry Pomace On The Microencapsulated Fish Oil, Juan Li, Kevin Mis Solval, Luis Alfaro, Jie Zhang, Arranee Chotiko, Jose Luis Brandao Delgado, Alexander Chouljenko, David Bankston, Peter J. Bechtel, Subramaniam Sathivel

Faculty Publications

The effect of the addition of blueberry extract (BE) obtained from blueberry pomace on lipid oxidation of pollock liver oil (PO) during microencapsulation was evaluated. An emulsion containing PO and BE (EBE) was prepared and spray dried in a pilot scale spray dryer. Thiobarbituric acids (TBARS) of EBE were lower (0.41mmol/kg oil) than that of control without BE (ENBE) (0.47mmol/kg oil). Also, TBARS value of 0.49mmol/kg oil for microencapsulated PO with BE (MBE) after spray drying was lower than that of microencapsulated PO without BE (MNBE) (0.57mmol/kg oil). MBE also had a lower TBARS value than that of MNBE after …

"Stand Your Ground" And Self Defense, Cynthia Ward

Faculty Publications

No abstract provided.

Sertraline Effects On Cerebrospinal Fluid Monoamines And Species-Typical Socioemotional Behavior Of Female Cynomolgus Monkeys, Carol A. Shively, Thomas C. Register, James Dee Higley, Stephanie L. Willard

Faculty Publications

Rationale—Although widely prescribed, little is known about selective serotonin reuptake inhibitors (SSRIs) effects on social behavior and cerebrospinal fluid (CSF) monoamines in female primates.

Objective—To determine the effects of sertraline on agonistic and affiliative behavior.

Methods—21 adult female cynomolgus monkeys were housed in small, stable social groups, trained to participate in oral dosing, and began a 5-week cumulative dose response study. Serial doses of 0, 5, 10, 15, and 20 mg/kg of sertraline were administered orally for one week each. Behavior was recorded daily during 10-minute observations before and 4 hours after dosing. On the 7th day of dosing, circulating …

Tort, Speech, And The Dubious Alchemy Of State Action, Cristina Carmody Tilley

Faculty Publications

Plaintiffs have historically used private law torts like defamation, privacy, and intentional infliction of emotional distress to vindicate their dignitary interests. But fifty years ago in New York Times v. Sullivan, the Supreme Court took an unprecedented approach to state action doctrine in order to recast these causes of action as public-private law hybrids that explicitly privileged speech over dignity. In constitutional challenges to private law disputes, the Court had for decades defined the state action under review to include just the contested verdict at issue. In Sullivan, it broke with that practice and defined the relevant state action to …

Biblical Worldview And The Business Curriculum: The Scriptural Foundations For Business Series, Bruce Wrenn, Michael E. Cafferky

Faculty Publications

Business faculty at Christian Colleges take seriously the obligation and privilege of integrating faith and learning in their courses. Providing students with a biblical worldview (BW) of the business disciplines gives them an understanding of how the discipline covered in their courses can be comprehended — and eventually practiced — within the context of biblical truth. To date, faculty have had few resources that integrate a systematic, rigorous presentation of a BW across the curriculum. A new series is now available to help business faculty accomplish that goal.