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Comparative Analysis Of Body Composition And Reference Values Of Visceral Adipose Tissues In Various American Collegiate Sports, Eshan M. Dandekar

Master's Theses

Background: Currently, body composition (BC) assessment is usually performed to diagnose disease states and accurately estimate certain types of tissues. In athletes, performing BC assessments helps gauge training and nutrition programs to see if they are adequately meeting the athlete’s needs to improve performance. Annual Dual Energy X-ray Absorptiometry (DXA) scans before the start of an athlete’s season can help identify an athlete’s preparedness or health before training begins.

Objective: To assess the preseason BC of four collegiate sports: Men’s basketball, men’s baseball, women’s volleyball, and women’s soccer, for Fat Mass (FM), bone mineral density BMD), Fat-Free Mass …

Microfluidic Electrical Impedance Spectroscopy, John J. Foley

Master's Theses

The goal of this study is to design and manufacture a microfluidic device capable of measuring changes in impedance valuesof microfluidic cell cultures. Tocharacterize this, an interdigitated array of electrodes was patterned over glass, where it was then bonded to a series of fluidic networks created in PDMS via soft lithography. The device measured ethanol impedance initially to show that values remain consistent over time. Impedance values of water and 1% wt. saltwater were compared to show that the device is able to detect changes in impedance, with up to a 60% reduction in electrical impedance in saltwater. Cells were …

Subject-Specific Finite Element Predictions Of Knee Cartilage Pressure And Investigation Of Cartilage Material Models, Michael G. Rumery

Master's Theses

An estimated 27 million Americans suffer from osteoarthritis (OA). Symptomatic OA is often treated with total knee replacement, a procedure which is expected to increase in number by 673% from 2005 to 2030, and costs to perform total knee replacement surgeries exceeded $11 billion in 2005. Subject-specific modeling and finite element (FE) predictions are state-of-the-art computational methods for anatomically accurate predictions of joint tissue loads in surgical-planning and rehabilitation. Knee joint FE models have been used to predict in-vivo joint kinematics, loads, stresses and strains, and joint contact area and pressure. Abnormal cartilage contact pressure is considered a risk factor …

The Impact Of Cleft Lip And Palate Repair Surgery On Cognitive And Academic Outcomes For Teens In India, R Jeremiah Maller

Master's Theses

India has a backlog of nearly one million patients in need of cleft lip and palate repair. Unrepaired cleft results in social stigma and diminished health, psychological wellbeing, and academic functioning. Cleft repair surgery has the potential to restore functioning in these domains. However, the magnitude of the social, educational, and economic impact of cleft repair surgery has not been evaluated using statistically rigorous methods. An estimation of the academic and educational impact of cleft repair has implications for the appropriate allocation of public health resources. We analyze original data gathered from teenagers in West Bengal, India using the difference-in-differences …

The Effects Of Poor Maternal Nutrition On Offspring Muscle Metabolism, Dominique Martin

Master's Theses

Poor maternal nutrition during gestation alters offspring muscle composition, fiber number, postnatal growth, and stem cell function. Additionally, poor maternal nutrition impacts offspring whole body and stem cell metabolism. We hypothesized that over- or restricted-feeding during gestation would alter muscle myoblast metabolism as well as offspring Longissimus dorsi muscle (LD) metabolome. Pregnant Western White-faced ewes (n = 47) were individually fed 60% (RES), 100% (CON), or 140% (OVER) of NRC requirements starting at d 30.2 ± 0.2 of gestation. At d 90 and 135 of gestation, ewes were euthanized for fetal muscle collection. Another group of ewes were allowed to …

Substance Use, Hiv Serostatus Disclosure, And Sexual Risk Behavior In People Living With Hiv: An Event-Level Analysis, Matthew Sullivan

Master's Theses

Objective. Sexually active people living with HIV (PLWH) face difficult decisions about disclosing their HIV status to sexual partners. Alcohol and other drug use are prevalent in medically engaged PLWH, and could impact these decision-making processes. We sought to examine the event-level relationships between substance use, HIV disclosure, and condom use in PLWH.

Method. Adult PLWH were recruited from care settings in a southeastern US city. Participants reported psychosocial and health information at baseline, and reported their sexual behavior for 28 consecutive days via text message prompts. Multi-level modeling was employed to examine event-level associations between substance use, HIV disclosure, …

Improving Diet & Physical Activity Behaviors Through Tailored Mhealth Messages: Application To Childhood Obesity Prevention In A Pediatric Emergency Department, Samantha Oldman

Master's Theses

No abstract provided.

Understanding How The Costimulatory Molecule Ox40 Engagement On T Cells Can Boost Immune Responses For Vaccine Applications And Immunotherapy., Archibald Agyekum-Yamoah, Archibald Agyekum-Yamoah

Master's Theses

No abstract provided.

The Importance Of Normative Civility Expectations For The Employee Experience: A Time-Lagged Analysis, Taylor Barr

Master's Theses

Previous research regarding the influence of normative workplace civility expectations on psychological health outcomes has often been cross-sectional and analyzed at only an individual-level. Furthermore, there is little knowledge of how these normative expectations may act to reduce the impact of experienced incivility. This study extends the research by conducting a daily diary study that examines longitudinal psychological health outcomes of experienced incivility using a multi-level framework. The additional focus of the study involves identifying the separate influence of supervisor civility expectations vs. workgroup civility expectations, which we test as both direct-effect predictors of daily experienced incivility. We also test …

Epigenetic Profiling Of Active Enhancers In Mouse Retinal Ganglion Cells, Jian Xing

Master's Theses

Retinal ganglion cells (RGCs) are projection neurons of the eye, which process and pass visual information collected in the eyes to the brain. However, epigenetic regulation of RGC fate specification remains poorly understood, in large part due to the technical challenges associated with purifying RGCs, which comprise only 1% of all retinal cells, and performing ChIP-seq profiling on a small number of cells. To overcome these limitations, we have purified RGCs from multiple mice by immunoppanning for Thy1, a surface marker on RGCs, and analyzed pulled chromatin by ChIP-seq for histone 3 acetylated at K27 (H3K27ac), which is an epigenetic …

A Semi-Supervised Feature Engineering Method For Effective Outlier Detection In Mixed Attribute Data Sets, Girish Srivatsa Rentala

Master's Theses

Outlier detection is one of the crucial tasks in data mining which can lead to the finding of valuable and meaningful information within the data. An outlier is a data point that is notably dissimilar from other data points in the data set. As such, the methods for outlier detection play an important role in identifying and removing the outliers, thereby increasing the performance and accuracy of the prediction systems. Outlier detection is used in many areas like financial fraud detection, disease prediction, and network intrusion detection.

Traditional outlier detection methods are founded on the use of different distance measures …

Plant And Soil Carbon Responses To Invasive Typha Management In Great Lakes Coastal Wetlands, Olivia Johnson

Master's Theses

We quantified how control of a ubiquitous Great Lakes region invasive (Typha × glauca) shifts plant-mediated C cycling and belowground properties and processes. Two field experiments implemented large scale treatment plots (~1-ha to 3-ha) of harvesting (i.e., cut above water surface, removed biomass), crushing (i.e., ran over biomass), and creating connectivity channels (i.e., cut at the soil surface, created open-water within Typha-dominated stands). In one experiment, we observed immediate C release via gas flux and aqueous C; harvesting and crushing caused net emission of carbon dioxide (CO₂)_, and crush increased dissolved organic carbon in …

Improving Communication: Huddling For Change, Harnoor Chahal

Master's Theses

The purpose of this communication improvement project is to incorporate huddles between interdisciplinary departments within a microsystem in order to improve customer satisfaction by decreasing the number of grievances. Based on the increasing number of grievances due to delayed hospital discharge, which results from a lack of communication between team members, there is an increased need for communication between the microsystem. By implementing weekly huddles between the Inpatient and Outpatient nurses, not only will there be increased care-coordination, but there will also be a decreased delay in discharge from the hospital caused by missed or no communication. Evidence-based practice indicates …

Educational Prevention Program Of Surgical Site Infections (Ssi) At A Metropolitan Pediatric, Daniel Chavez

Master's Theses

Surgical Site Infections are a common hospital acquired disease. The prevention of Surgical Site Infection at a metropolitan pediatric hospital was lacking thorough education on how to prevent Surgical Site Infections. Literature was used to support this educational program with evidence based practices. To further reduce Surgical Site Infections education played a key role. Most importantly the distribution of education is what this educational program aimed toward supporting. In order to optimize patient outcomes through the use of our educational program literacy requirements must be me. Using this information our team constructed educational pamphlets that would help empower patients so …

Educational Prevention Program Of Surgical Site Infections At A Metropolitan Pediatric Hospital, Myra Hasan

Master's Theses

Surgical site infections (SSI) are a common cause of healthcare-associated infections (HAI). They remain a significant problem, as they are associated with increased morbidity and mortality and cause an increase in demand for several healthcare resources. In order to address this problem, hospitals have implemented several protocols and polices that are aimed to reduce these infections. However, the rates of SSIs continue to rise. Healthcare team members have found that while it is their responsibility to enforce preventative measures to the patient in the preoperative and surgical room, patient compliance to preventive measures at home also plays a role.

At …

Educational Prevention Program Of Surgical Site Infections (Ssi) At A Metropolitan Pediatric, Daniel Chavez

Master's Theses

Surgical Site Infections are a common hospital acquired disease. The prevention of Surgical Site Infection at a metropolitan pediatric hospital was lacking thorough education on how to prevent Surgical Site Infections. Literature was used to support this educational program with evidence based practices. To further reduce Surgical Site Infections education played a key role. Most importantly the distribution of education is what this educational program aimed toward supporting. In order to optimize patient outcomes through the use of our educational program literacy requirements must be me. Using this information our team constructed educational pamphlets that would help empower patients so …

Evaluating The Efforts Of An Early Head Start Program To Foster Social And Emotional Child And Family Development, Molly Harmon

Master's Theses

Social emotional development has been found to be a key component in a child’s developmental trajectory, as it supports many developmental domains. Low-income children often enter school having experienced low social emotional support due to the many external barriers that often challenge their families’ ability to foster positive social emotional development. The present literature has made it clear that there is an association between a child’s social emotional trajectory, family functioning, and parent-child interactions. Further, home-based intervention and prevention in early childhood is effective in promoting social emotional development. This investigation aims to assess the efforts of a particular Early …

Inverse Dynamic Analysis Of Acl Reconstructed Knee Joint Biomechanics During Gait And Cycling Using Opensim, Megan V. Pottinger

Master's Theses

ACL (anterior cruciate ligament) injuries of the knee joint alter biomechanics and may cause abnormal loading conditions that place patients at a higher risk of developing osteoarthritis (OA). There are multiple types of ACL reconstruction (ACLR), but all types aim to restore anterior tibial translation and internal tibial rotation following surgery. Analyzing knee joint contact loads provide insight into the loading conditions following ACLR that may contribute to the long-term development of OA. Ten ACLR subjects, who underwent the same reconstruction, performed gait and cycling experiments while kinematic and kinetic data were collected. Inverse dynamic analyses were performed on processed …

Detecting A Probiotic Product Within The Gut Of Broiler Chickens, Anneka Pisula

Master's Theses

As of January 2017, the U.S. poultry industry banned the use of antibiotics and now relies on alternatives such as probiotics to help protect animal health. Although probiotic use is not a new concept in the poultry industry, identifying the best combination of bacterial strains to generate an effective probiotic formula requires further investigation. This study aimed to detect a probiotic product of four bacterial strains (Pedioccoccus acidilactici, Pediococcus pentosaceus, Lactobacillus plantarum, and Bacillus subtilis) in a feeding trial with broiler chickens. Birds given the probiotic were predicted to show an improved growth performance with …

Quantifying The Environmental Performance Of A Stream Habitat Improvement Project, Cody Morse

Master's Theses

River restoration projects are being installed worldwide to rehabilitate degraded river habitat. Many of these projects focus on stream habitat improvement (SHI), and an estimated 60%of the 37,000 projects listed in the National River Restoration Science Synthesis Program focus on SHI for salmon and trout species. These projects frequently lack a sufficient monitoring program or account for the environmental costs associated with SHI. The present study used life cycle assessment (LCA) techniques and topographic effectiveness monitoring to quantify environmental costs on the basis of geomorphic change. This methodology was a novel approach to assessing the cost-benefit relationship of SHI. To …

Assessment Of Granulovirus, Spinosad, And Mating Disruption For Controlling Cydia Pomonella L. [Lepidoptera: Tortricidae] In Organic Coastal California Apple Orchards, Raven Lukehart

Master's Theses

Codling moth, Cydia pomonella[Lepidoptera: Tortricidae], is a major entomological pest of apples, pears, and walnuts cross the world (Pajac et al. 2016). Female codling moths lay eggs on the apple exocarp and larvae burrow within the fruit causing economic losses to fruit growers.Organic apple orchards in San Luis Obispo, CA currently have three codling moth, Cydia pomonella,control options commercially available including granulovirus (CpVG), spinosad, and mating disruption. In field tests on apple (Malus), we compare percent fruit injury between treatments of granulovirus (2.43 oz/ha Cyd-X® organically approved, Certis USA, Columbia MD), spinosad (4.05 oz/ha Entrust® Naturalyte® …

Evaluation Of Endothelial Cell Responses To Elevated Glucose, Gabriella Sugerman

Master's Theses

Developing a tissue-engineered Blood Vessel Mimic (BVM) to represent diabetic macrovascular disease could expedite design of new vascular devices specifically tailored to diabetic patients. In contribution toward this model, this thesis assessed Human Umbilical Vein Endothelial Cell (HUVEC) responses to high glucose conditions. Interleukin 6 (IL-6) and Cluster of Differentiation 36 (CD36) were selected to signify oxidative stress activity, a hallmark of diabetic macrovascular disease. Next, activity of potential reference genes B2M, HPRT1, and ACTB was assessed. All genes were found to exceed acceptable variability, so the E-ΔC T method of data analysis was selected. Next, cellular responses to high …

Enzymatic Activation Of Cannabinoid Pro-Drugs, Anna Theresa Margiotta

Master's Theses

Cannabinoids have been used throughout history as medical treatments spanning from menstrual cramps in ancient China to enhancing appetite in patients with AIDS or cancer in the modern day. Currently there is research indicating that cannabinoids also have anti-proliferative and pro-apoptotic effects on several strains of cancer cells (Carchman, Harris, & Munson, 1976; Glodde, Jakobs, Bald, Tüting, & Gaffal, 2015; McKallip et al., 2002; Preet, Ganju, & Groopman, 2008; Sánchez, Galve-Roperh, Canova, Brachet, & Guzmán, 1998). The traditional methods for administration of cannabinoids are inhalation or oral; however, for some cannabinoids these may result in undesirable psychoactive side effects. Cell-in-a-Box® …

Gold-Silver Core-Shell Nanoparticle Growth; Studies Towards The Development Of Biosensing Applications, Austin James Ethridge

Master's Theses

Gold and silver nanoparticles have been used since antiquity because of their unique optical properties (Amendola, Pilot, Frasconi, Mrago, & Lati, 2017) . These properties are related to a phenomenon called localized surface plasmon resonance (LSPR), which is the collective oscillation of electrons located within the conduction band of a metal upon excitation by light at a specific frequency (Amendola et al., 2017). The extinction cross section, which defines the amount of incident light scattered or absorbed by a solution, that is related to the LSPR of gold and silver nanoparticles is up to five times greater than those of …

Development Of Semantic Reference For Location Symbols By Bottlenose Dolphins (Tursiops Truncatus) Using A Two-Way Communication Keyboard, Alyssa Taylor

Master's Theses

The ability for humans to communicate with another species has been an aspiration and well documented. One example is through training animals to make associations between a designated cue and conditioned response (Pryor, 1986). Two-way communication, however, in which both species can express wants/needs has been predominantly pursued with apes and dolphins. Studies conducted by Louis Herman demonstrated the capabilities of dolphins to comprehend complex semantic and syntactic commands in an artificial language system (Herman, Richards, & Wolz, 1984). Researchers working with primates have used American Sign Language, a computer keyboard system with discrete lexigrams, and a portable lexigram keyboard …

Mississippi’S First Statewide Teachers’ Strike, Emily Doyne Smith

Master's Theses

This thesis argues that the Education Reform Act of 1982 (ERA) inadvertently led to Mississippi’s first statewide teachers’ strike in 1985 because of the Southeastern pay average clause recommending that the teachers’ pay should reach the average of the southeastern states, if possible. The teachers’ associations in Mississippi used this clause to lobby and promote teachers’ pay to that average. However, after two years of stagnated pay raises, the teachers’ associations led a state statewide teachers’ strike. The strike successfully raised the teachers’ salaries and moved state legislators to consider the teachers’ pay issue carefully afterwards. However, the pay raise …

Crossing Corridors: Wildlife Use Of Jumpouts And Undercrossings Along A Highway With Wildlife Exclusion Fencing, Alex J. Jensen

Master's Theses

Roads pose two central problems for wildlife: wildlife-vehicle collisions (WVCs) and habitat fragmentation. Wildlife exclusion fencing can reduce WVCs but can exacerbate fragmentation. In Chapter 1, I summarize the relevant studies addressing these two problems, with a focus on large mammals in North America. Chapters 2 and 3 summarize field assessments of technologies to reduce WVCs and maintain connectivity, specifically jumpout ramps and underpasses, along Highway 101 near San Luis Obispo, CA. In a fenced highway, some animals inevitably breach the fence and become trapped, which increases the risk of a wildlife-vehicle collision. Earthen escape ramps, or “jumpouts”, can allow …

Uptake Of Common Pharmaceutical Compounds In Hydroponically Grown Lactuca Sativa, Dorottya Ida Kelemen

Master's Theses

No abstract provided.

Sh3bp2 Gain-Of-Function Mutation Exacerbates Apical Periodontitis In Cherubism Mice, Homan Javaheri

Master's Theses

Cherubism (CBM) is characterized by multiple fibro-osseous lesions in jawbones and caused by mutations in the SH3-domain binding protein 2 (SH3BP2). CBM patients also suffer from dental abnormalities. Biochemical analyses showed that mutations in CBM lead to SH3BP2 gain-of-function because mutant SH3BP2 is protected from tankyrase-mediated proteasomal degradation. A knock-in (KI) mouse model expressing a CBM substitution mutation (P416R) in Sh3bp2 has been generated. Homozygous mice (Sh3bp2^KI/KI) show increased systemic inflammation and osteopenia phenotype with high serum TNF-α level, increased numbers of macrophages and enhanced osteoclastogenesis. Heterozygous mice (Sh3bp2^+/KI) exhibit intermediate phenotype …

Extraction Of Biologically Relevant Oligopyrrolic Compounds From Nature, Randy Hamchand

Master's Theses

No abstract provided.