Digital Commons Network^™

Sharing Credit: Public Historians And Scientists Reflecting On Collaboration, Allison C. Marsh

Faculty Publications

No abstract provided.

Molecular Characterization And Functional Significance Of The Vti Family Of Snare Proteins In Tick Salivary Glands, Ashley M. Villarreal, Steven W. Adamson, Rebecca E. Browning, Khemraj Budachetri, Muhammad Sohail Sajid, Shahid Karim

Faculty Publications

Exocytosis involves membrane fusion between secretory vesicles and the plasma membrane. The Soluble N-ethylmaleimide-sensitive factor attachment proteins (SNAPs) and their receptor proteins (SNAREs) interact to fuse vesicles with the membrane and trigger the release of their sialosecretome out of the tick salivary gland cells. In this study, we examined the functional significance of the Vti family of SNARE proteins of blood-feeding Amblyomma maculatum and Amblyomma americanum. Vti1A and Vti1B have been implicated in multiple functional roles in vesicle transport. QRT-PCR studies demonstrated that the highest transcriptional expression of vti1a and vti1b genes occurs in unfed salivary glands, suggesting that …

Socio-Ecology Of The Marsh Rice Rat (Oryzomys Palustris) And The Spatio-Temporal Distribution Of Bayou Virus In Coastal Texas, Tyla S. Holsomback, Christopher J. Van Nice, Rachel N. Clark, Alisa A. Abuzeineh, Jorge Salazar-Bravo

Faculty Publications

Along the southeastern coast of the United States of America (USA), the marsh rice rat (Oryzomys palustris) is the primary host for the hantavirus genotype Bayou. According to the socio-ecological model for a territorial, polygamous species, females should be distributed across space and time by habitat resources and predation risks, whereas males should space themselves according to the degree of female aggregation and reproductive synchrony. To investigate how females affect the male-male transmission paradigm of Bayou virus, rodents were captured, marked, released, and re-captured in two macrohabitat types across a 30-month period. Microhabitat cover variables were quantified around …

“Short Tempers And Long Knives: Hostilities Between The Blackfeet Confederacy And American Fur Trappers From 1806 To 1840.”, Jay H. Buckley

Faculty Publications

Next to grizzly bears and Mother Nature, the most feared enemy of American fur trappers traveling along the upper Missouri River were the Niitsftapi or Blackfeet, the "Original People" or "Prairie People." The Blackfeet Confederacy comprised the dominant military power on the northwestern plains. Blackfeet sought to maintain their hegemony by preventing American traders and trappers from trading with and strengthening the Shoshones, Crows, Flatheads (Salish), and Nez Perces. They accomplished this by harassing and attacking American trappers and stealing their horses and furs. Blackfeet enmity toward the Americans and their determination to keep them out of their neighborhood instilled …

Context-Driven Image Annotation Using Imagenet, George E. Noel, Gilbert L. Peterson

Faculty Publications

Image annotation research has demonstrated success on test data for focused domains. Unfortunately, extending these techniques to the broader topics found in real world data often results in poor performance. This paper proposes a novel approach that leverages WordNet and ImageNet capabilities to annotate images based on local text and image features. Signatures generated from ImageNet images based on WordNet synonymous sets are compared using Earth Mover's Distance against the query image and used to rank order surrounding words by relevancy. The results demonstrate effective image annotation, producing higher accuracy and improved specificity over the ALIPR image annotation system. Abstract …

Toxicologic Assessment Of A Commercial Decolorized Whole Leaf Aloe Vera Juice, Lily Of The Desert Filtered Whole Leaf Juice With Aloesorb, Inder Sehgal, Wallace D. Winters, Michael Scott, Andrew David, Glenn Gillis, Thaya Stoufflet, Anand Nair, Konstantine Kousoulas

Faculty Publications

Aloe vera, a common ingredient in cosmetics, is increasingly being consumed as a beverage supplement. Although consumer interest in aloe likely stems from its association with several health benefits, a concern has also been raised by a National Toxicology Program Report that a nondecolorized whole leaf aloe vera extract taken internally by rats was associated with intestinal mucosal hyperplasia and ultimately malignancy. We tested a decolorized whole leaf (DCWL) aloe vera, treated with activated charcoal to remove the latex portion of the plant, for genotoxicity in bacteria, acute/subacute toxicity in B6C3F1 mice, and subchronic toxicity in F344 rats. We found …

Eight Weeks Of Supplementation With A Multi-Ingredient Weight Loss Product Enhances Body Composition, Reduces Hip And Waist Girth, And Increases Energy Levels In Overweight Men And Women, Hector L. Lopez, Tim N. Ziegenfuss, Jennifer E. Hofheins, Scott M. Habowski, Shawn M. Arent Ph.D., Cscs*D, Fissn, Facsm, Fnak, Joseph P. Weir, Arny A. Ferrando

Faculty Publications

Background: Numerous natural products are marketed and sold claiming to decrease body weight and fat, but few undergo finished product-specific research demonstrating their safety and efficacy.Objective: To determine the safety and efficacy of a multi-ingredient supplement containing primarily raspberry ketone, caffeine, capsaicin, garlic, ginger and Citrus aurantium (Prograde Metabolism™ [METABO]) as an adjunct to an eight-week weight loss program.Methods: Using a randomized, placebo-controlled, double-blind design, 70 obese but otherwise healthy subjects were randomly assigned to METABO or a placebo and underwent 8 weeks of daily supplementation, a calorie restricted diet, and exercise training. Subjects were tested for changes in body …

Differential Undertaking Response Of A Lower Termite To Congeneric And Conspecific Corpses, Qian Sun, Kenneth F. Haynes, Xuguo Zhou

Faculty Publications

Undertaking behaviour is an essential activity in social insects. Corpses are often recognized by a postmortem change in a chemical signature.Reticulitermes flavipesresponded to corpses within minutes of death. This undertaking behaviour did not change with longer postmortem time (24 h); however,R.flavipes exhibited distinctively different behaviours toward dead termites from various origins. Corpses of the congeneric species, Reticulitermes virginicus,were buried onsite by workers with a large group of soldiers guarding the burial site due to the risk of interspecific competition; while dead conspecifics, regardless of colony origin, were pulled back into the holding chamber for nutrient recycling and hygienic purposes. The …

Chelation Therapy For The Management Of Diabetic Complications: A Hypothesis And A Proposal For Clinical Laboratory Assessment Of Metal Ion Homeostasis In Plasma, Norma Frizzell, John W. Baynes

Faculty Publications

No abstract provided.

Early Prenatal Food Supplementation Ameliorates Thenegative Association Of Maternal Stress With Birth Size In A Randomised Trial, Amy L. Frith, Ruchira T. Naved, Lars Ake Persson, Edward A. Frongillo Jr.

Faculty Publications

Low birthweight increases the risk of infant mortality, morbidity and poor development. Maternal nutrition and stress influence birth size, but their combined effect is not known.We hypothesised that an early-invitation time to start a prenatal food supplementation programme could reduce the negative influence of prenatal maternal stress on birth size, and that effect would differ by infant sex. A cohort of 1041 pregnant women, who had delivered an infant, June 2003–March 2004, was sampled from among 3267 in the randomised controlled trial, Maternal Infant Nutritional Interventions Matlab, conducted in Matlab, Bangladesh. At 8 weeks gestation, women were randomly assigned an …

Cyclosporin A Reduces Matrix Metalloproteinases And Collagen Expression In Dermal Fibroblasts From Regenerative Foxn1 Deficient (Nude) Mice, Barbara Gawronska-Kozak, Heather Kirk-Ballard

Faculty Publications

Background: Cyclosporin A (CsA), an immunosuppressive agent modifies the wound healing process through an influence on extracellular matrix metabolism. We have compared the effects of CsA on dermal fibroblasts from nude (FOXN1 deficient) mice, a genetic model of skin scarless healing, and from control (C57BL/6 J (B6) mice to evaluate metabolic pathways that appear to have important roles in the process of scarless healing/regeneration.Results: High levels of matrix metalloproteinases (MMPs) and collagen III expression in dermal fibroblasts from nude (regenerative) mice were down-regulated by CsA treatment to the levels observed in dermal fibroblasts from B6 (non-regenerative) mice. In contrast, dermal …

Entorhinal Stellate Cells Show Preferred Spike Phase-Locking To Theta Inputs That Is Enhanced By Correlations In Synaptic Activity., Fernandez Fr, Malerba P, Bressloff Pc, White Ja

Faculty Publications

No abstract provided.

Rampant Polyphyly Indicates Cryptic Diversity In A Clade Of Neotropical Flycatchers (Aves: Tyrannidae), Frank E. Rheindt, Andrés M. Cuervo, Robb T. Brumfield

Faculty Publications

Polyphyletic arrangements in DNA phylogenies are often indicators of cryptic species diversity masked by erroneous taxonomic treatments that are frequently based on morphological data. Although mitochondrial (mt)DNA polyphyly is detected relatively rarely in phylogenetic studies, it has recently been found in a variety of tyrant-flycatcher (Tyrannidae) groups. In the present study, we provide a DNA phylogeny for a mitochondrial and a nuclear locus with a complete species sampling in Zimmerius flycatchers, showing that the genus is characterized by multiple mtDNA polyphyly. Based on phylogenetic and life-history information, we suggest the elevation of a number of taxa to species status, leading …

Improved Tolerance To Salt And Water Stress In Drosophila Melanogaster Cells Conferred By Late Embryogenesis Abundant Protein, Matthew R. Marunde, Dilini A. Samarajeewa, John Anderson, Shumin Li, Steven C. Hand, Michael A. Menze

Faculty Publications

Mechanisms that govern anhydrobiosis involve the accumulation of highly hydrophilic macromolecules, such as late embryogenesis abundant (LEA) proteins. Group 1 LEA proteins comprised of 181 (AfLEA1.1) and 197 (AfLEA1.3) amino acids were cloned from embryos of Artemia franciscana and expressed in Drosophila melanogaster cells (Kc167). Confocal microscopy revealed a construct composed of green fluorescent protein (GFP) and AfLEA1.3 accumulates in the mitochondria (AfLEA1.3-GFP), while AfLEA1.1-GFP was found in the cytoplasm. In the presence of mixed substrates, oxygen consumption was statistically identical for permeabilized Kc167 control and Kc167-AfLEA1.3 cells. Acute titrations of permeabilized cells with NaCl up to 500mM led to …

Intercellular And Intracellular Signalling Systems That Globally Control The Expression Of Virulence Genes In Plant Pathogenic Bacteria, Jong Hyun Ham

Faculty Publications

Plant pathogenic bacteria utilize complex signalling systems to control the expression of virulence genes at the cellular level and within populations. Quorum sensing (QS), an important intercellular communication mechanism, is mediated by different types of small molecules, including N-acyl homoserine lactones (AHLs), fatty acids and small proteins. AHL-mediated signalling systems dependent on the LuxI and LuxR family proteins play critical roles in the virulence of a wide range of Gram-negative plant pathogenic bacteria belonging to the Alphaproteobacteria, Betaproteobacteria and Gammaproteobacteria. Xanthomonas spp. and Xylella fastidiosa, members of the Gammaproteobacteria, however, possess QS systems that are mediated by fatty acid-type diffusible …

Two Truths And A Lie: Stories At The Juncture Of Teen Sex And The Law, Michelle Oberman

Faculty Publications

Laws governing adolescent sexuality are incoherent and chaotically enforced, and legal scholarship on the subject neither addresses nor remedies adolescents’ vulnerability in sexual encounters. To posit a meaningful relationship between the criminal law and adolescent sexual encounters, one must examine what we know about adolescent sexuality from both the academic literature and the adults who control the criminal justice response to such interactions. This article presents an in-depth study of In re John Z., a 2003 rape prosecution involving two seventeen-year-olds. Using this case, I explore the implications of the prosecution by interviewing a variety of experts and analyzing the …

Diel Vertical Movements Of A Scalloped Hammerhead, Sphyrna Lewini, In The Northern Gulf Of Mexico, Eric R. Hoffmayer, James S. Franks, William B. Driggers, Paul W. Howey

Faculty Publications

Despite the circumglobal distribution of scalloped hammerheads, Sphyrna lewini (Griffith and Smith, 1834), little information is available regarding fine-scale movement and habitat use patterns for this species. Over a 27-d period, data were collected on diel habitat use and environmental preferences of a 240 cm (total length) female S. lewini. The shark exhibited a consistent and repeated diel vertical movement pattern, making more than 76 deep nighttime dives; the maximum depth reached was 964 m, where the temperature was 5.8 degrees C. The purpose of the nightly oscillatory deep diving pattern is unknown but could possibly represent feeding behavior. These …

Diet Of Juvenile Alabama Shad (Alosa Alabamae) In Two Northern Gulf Of Mexico Drainages, Paul F. Mickle, Jacob F. Schaefer, Donald A. Yee, Susan B. Adams

Faculty Publications

Understanding food-web ecology is valuable to conservation by linking interactions of multiple species together and illustrating the functionality of trophic exchange. Alosa alabamae (Alabama Shad), an anadromous species, reproduces in northern Gulf of Mexico drainages from February through May, and for this study, the Pascagoula and Apalachicola rivers were chosen to sample juvenile Alabama Shad. The age-0 fish mature within these rivers and have the potential to impact the food web of the systems in which maturation occurs. The focus was to determine if diet changes as Alabama Shad mature, and to identify diet differences between drainages. Diets of Alabama …

Using The Globe Program To Educate Students On The Interdependence Of Professional Development?, Sherry S. Herron, Jennifer L. Robertson

Faculty Publications

We present how we have used GLOBE protocols and programs in a college undergraduate English course for science and non-science majors, “Writing in the Sciences”, and in a graduate-level field course for in-service teachers. Collecting land cover data and determining biomass in conjunction with a series of writing assignments allowed the English students to connect their work to research done in ecosystems throughout the world, and to specific environmental concerns such as carbon sequestration, biodiversity, and the impact of controlled burning on ecosystems. Teachers demonstrated increased knowledge of ecology, natural histories of various organisms, and awareness of environmental resources. A …

Conservative Principles For Environmental Reform, Jonathan H. Adler

Faculty Publications

The nation’s environmental regulatory architecture may not have changed significantly over the past few decades, but the range of environmental problems has. Regulatory measures designed to address the industrial pollution of the twentieth century are poorly suited to address the more complex and difficult challenges of the twenty-first.

There is an urgent need to debate the future of environmental protection in this country. If the debate is to be productive, it needs to span the political spectrum. Therein lies a problem: It is unclear whether many on the political right are prepared to engage in serious policy discussion about the …

Dealing With Doctrinal Issues In The Church: Part 2, Richard M. Davidson, Paul S. Ratsara

Faculty Publications

Acts 15 reveals that the church, inits assembly of representative members, may indeed speak with binding authority upon the whole church, as that authority is based upon the Written Word. This chapter also provides a paradigm for dealing with doctrinal controversy, a paradigm that the Seventh-day Adventist Church may well follow when facing controversial issues.

The Dual Standard Of Review In Contracts Clause Jurisprudence, Brenner M. Fissell

Faculty Publications

It seems obvious that there is something suspicious about a state entering into a contract only to later use its legislative power to escape from fulfilling that obligation. When the government enters into contracts, it binds itself according to the dictates of private law but, nevertheless, remains the sovereign. How can a space be preserved wherein a legislature can exercise its authority for the common good while simultaneously being bound to abide by agreements it made at an earlier time? This is the dilemma posed in a narrow band of Contracts Clause jurisprudence that culminates in United States Trust Co. …

Expansion Of Breast Cancer Stem Cells With Fibrous Scaffolds, Sheng Feng, Pang-Kuo Lo, Shou Liu, Xinfeng Liu, Hexin Chen, Qian Wang

Faculty Publications

Cancer stem cells (CSCs) are hypothesized as tumor-initiating cells within tumors and main contributors of tumor growth, metastasis and recurrence. Mammary cancer cells, MCF-7 cells, were cultured on 3D polycaprolactone (PCL) fibrous scaffolds, showing an increased proportion of CSCs. The expression of stem cell markers, including OCT3/4 and SOX2, and breast CSC-specific markers, SOX4 and CD49f, was significantly upregulated, and the mammosphere-forming capability in cells cultured on PCL fibrous scaffolds increased. The fibrous scaffolds also induced the elongation of MCF-7 cells and extended cell proliferation. The increase of CSC properties after being cultured on fibrous scaffolds was further confirmed with …

Sugar Promotes Vegetative Phase Change In Arabidopsis Thaliana By Repressing The Expression Of Mir156a And Mir156c, Li Yang, Mingli Xu, Yeonjong Koo, Jia He, R. Scott Poethig

Faculty Publications

Nutrients shape the growth, maturation, and aging of plants and animals. In plants, the juvenile to adult transition (vegetative phase change) is initiated by a decrease in miR156. In Arabidopsis, we found that exogenous sugar decreased the abundance of miR156, whereas reduced photosynthesis increased the level of this miRNA. This effect was correlated with a change in the timing of vegetative phase change, and was primarily attributable to a change in the expression of two genes, MIR156A and MIR156C, which were found to play dominant roles in this transition. The glucose-induced repression of miR156 was dependent on the …

Corpse Management In Social Insects, Qian Sun, Xuguo Zhou

Faculty Publications

Undertaking behavior is an essential adaptation to social life that is critical for colony hygiene in enclosed nests. Social insects dispose of dead individuals in various fashions to prevent further contact between corpses and living members in a colony. Focusing on three groups of eusocial insects (bees, ants, and termites) in two phylogenetically distant orders (Hymenoptera and Isoptera), we review mechanisms of death recognition, convergent and divergent behavioral re-sponses toward dead individuals, and undertaking task allocation from the perspective of division of labor. Distinctly different solutions (e.g., corpse removal, burial and cannibalism) have evolved, independently, in the holometabolous hymenopterans and …

Snp Discovery And Chromosome Anchoring Provide The First Physically-Anchored Hexaploid Oat Map And Reveal Synteny With Model Species, Rebekah E. Oliver, Nicholas A. Tinker, Gerard R. Lazo, Shiaoman Chao, Eric N. Jellen, Martin L. Carson, Howard W. Rines, Donald E. Obert, Joseph D. Lutz, Irene Shackelford, Abraham B. Korol, Charlene P. Wight, Kyle M. Gardner, Jiro Hattori, Aaron D. Beattie, Åsmund Bjørnstad, J. Michael Bonman, Jean Luc Jannink, Mark E. Sorrells, Gina L. Brown-Guedira, Jennifer W. Mitchell Fetch, Stephen A. Harrison, Catherine J. Howarth, Amir Ibrahim, Frederic L. Kolb, Michael S. Mcmullen, J. Paul Murphy, Herbert W. Ohm, Brian G. Rossnagel, Weikai Yan, Kelci J. Miclaus, Jordan Hiller, Peter J. Maughan

Faculty Publications

A physically anchored consensus map is foundational to modern genomics research; however, construction of such a map in oat (Avena sativa L., 2n = 6x = 42) has been hindered by the size and complexity of the genome, the scarcity of robust molecular markers, and the lack of aneuploid stocks. Resources developed in this study include a modified SNP discovery method for complex genomes, a diverse set of oat SNP markers, and a novel chromosome-deficient SNP anchoring strategy. These resources were applied to build the first complete, physically-anchored consensus map of hexaploid oat. Approximately 11,000 high-confidence in silico SNPs were …

Effect Of Cd44 Binding Peptide Conjugated To An Engineered Inert Matrix On Maintenance Of Breast Cancer Stem Cells And Tumorsphere Formation, Xiaoming Yang, Samaneh Kamali Sarvestani, Seyedsina Moeinzadeh, Xuezhong He, Esmaiel Jabbari

Faculty Publications

Introduction: As cancer cells are affected by many factors in their microenvironment, a major challenge is to isolate the effect of a specific factor on cancer stem cells (CSCs) while keeping other factors unchanged. We have developed a synthetic inert 3D polyethylene glycol diacrylate (PEGDA) gel culture system as a unique tool to study the effect of microenvironmental factors on CSCs response. We have reported that CSCs formed in the inert PEGDA gel by encapsulation of breast cancer cells maintain their stemness within a certain range of gel stiffness. The objective was to investigate the effect of CD44 binding peptide …

Long Prereproductive Selection And Divergence By Depth In A Caribbean Candelabrum Coral, Carlos Prada, Michael E. Hellberg

Faculty Publications

Long-lived corals, the foundation of modern reefs, often follow ecological gradients, so that populations or sister species segregate by habitat. Adaptive divergence maintains sympatric congeners after secondary contact or may even generate species by natural selection in the face of gene flow. Such ecological divergence, initially between alternative phenotypes within populations, may be aided by immigrant inviability, especially when a long period separates larval dispersal and the onset of reproduction, during which selection can sort lineages to match different habitats. Here, we evaluate the strength of one ecological factor (depth) to isolate populations by comparing the genes and morphologies of …

Optical Dissection Of Odor Information Processing In Vivo Using Gcamps Expressed In Specified Cell Types Of The Olfactory Bulb., Wachowiak M, Economo Mn, Díaz-Quesada M, Brunert D, Wesson Dw, White Ja, Rothermel M

Faculty Publications

No abstract provided.

Vitronectin Inhibits Efferocytosis Through Interactions With Apoptotic Cells As Well As With Macrophages, Hong Beom Bae, Jean Marc Tadie, Shaoning Jiang, Dae Won Park, Celeste P. Bell, Lawrence C. Thompson, Cynthia B. Peterson, Victor J. Thannickal, Edward Abraham, Jaroslaw W. Zmijewski

Faculty Publications

Effective removal of apoptotic cells, particularly apoptotic neutrophils, is essential for the successful resolution of acute inflammatory conditions. In these experiments, we found that whereas interaction between vitronectin and integrins diminished the ability of macrophages to ingest apoptotic cells, interaction between vitronectin with urokinase-type plasminogen activator receptor (uPAR) on the surface of apoptotic cells also had equally important inhibitory effects on efferocytosis. Preincubation of vitronectin with plasminogen activator inhibitor-1 eliminated its ability to inhibit phagocytosis of apoptotic cells. Similarly, incubation of apoptotic cells with soluble uPAR or Abs to uPAR significantly diminished efferocytosis. In the setting of LPSinduced ALI, enhanced …