Digital Commons Network^™

Physical Activity, Self-Determination, And Self-Conscious Emotions In Adolescents And Young Adults With And Without Autism Symptomatology, Dakota Morales

Master's Theses

Previous literature suggests that autistic individuals engage in physical activity less frequently compared to typically developing peers (Bandini et al., 2013; Jones et al., 2017). This is noteworthy because exercise interventions for autistic individuals have found that engaging in physical activity can improve motor, social, and behavioral skills (Anderson-Hanley et al., 2011; Duffy et al., 2017; Nicholson et al., 2011; Oriel et al., 2011). Thus, the present study seeks to understand what factors may promote physical activity engagement, such as self-determination motivation regulations and body-related self-conscious emotions, in adolescents and young adults with and without autism symptomatology. Participants included 51 …

How To Build A Cortex: Coordinated Assembly Of Cortical Septins And Actomyosin In The Leader Bleb, Asia Marie Paguntalan

Master's Theses

In confined spaces, migrating cells can undergo mesenchymal-to-amoeboid transitions by altering their cortical dynamics and adhesion with the environment. Septins frequently associate with cortical actin and non-muscle myosin (NMII), but the functional nature of these interactions remains unclear. Upon non-adhesive confinement and NMII enrichment, fibroblasts can switch to a fast, leader bleb-based mode of motility, characterized by the absence of adhesions and stress fibers and formation of a single, elongated leader bleb. During this transition, cortical actin remodeling and polarized NMII contractility drive leader bleb stabilization by generating long-range cortical flows, in coordination with changes in septin localization and assembly …

Identification Of New Substrates From Pseudomonas Aeruginosa Exos, Adam V. Thota

Master's Theses

Pseudomonas aeruginosa is a gram-negative environmental bacterium that uses its intrinsic and acquired antibiotic resistance to infect patients with compromised epithelium, such as cystic fibrosis and burn wounds, and corneal keratitis. In order to cause disease, most strains of P. aeruginosa use the type three secretion system (T3SS) to disrupt cellular signaling and integrity. However, P. aeruginosa may also secrete exotoxins after invading host cells, which prolongs host cell death and maintains an intracellular niche. Of the T3 secreted effector toxins, ExoS, specifically the ADP-ribosyltransferase activity of ExoS, was shown to delay the death of invaded corneal cells, but it …

Changing Vaccine Hesitant Attitudes Of Parents Using Moral Persuasion, Max Vitro

Master's Theses

In the fight against Covid-19, overt, science-based messaging is not enough to persuade everyone to get vaccinated no matter how encouraging the data. Recent studies on attitudes toward vaccines and other health-promoting measures have provided clues as to why so many are still opposed, suggesting many who were resistant had reasons that were rooted along moral grounds. This process of moralization occurs when a belief becomes a moral matter of ‘right and wrong’ rather than a means to an end. Because moral beliefs are more entrenched, they’ve proven much more difficult to change. There is one approach that could increase …

Characterization Of The Full-Length Bag3 Protein And Stress Induced Formation Of Bag3-Z, Ahmed Gamal Abdalla Zied

Master's Theses

Bcl2-associated athanogene-3 (BAG3) is a pro-autophagy co-chaperone that we havepreviously shown localizes to the cardiac sarcomere and is critical for proteostasis and maintenance of normal sarcomeric function. Indeed, BAG3 loss in heart failure (HF) results in accumulation of ubiquitinated sarcomeric proteins, and depressed maximum force generating capacity (Fmax). However, how BAG3 is regulated in the cell is not well understood, with uncertainty about its structure and proteoforms. During our analysis of human heart tissue, BAG3 appears as a “doublet”, with one band at 74 kDa (BAG3-Z) and a second at a higher 85 kDa (BAG3-FL). Previous studies hypothesized the full-length …

Incorporating Sex Chromosomes In Transcriptome Prediction Models And Improving Cross-Population Prediction Performance, Daniel S. Araujo

Master's Theses

Transcriptome prediction models built with data from European-descent individuals are less accurate when applied to different populations because of differences in linkage disequilibrium patterns and allele frequencies. We hypothesized multivariate adaptive shrinkage may improve cross-population transcriptome prediction, as it leverages effect size estimates across different conditions - in this case, different populations. To test this hypothesis, we made transcriptome prediction models for use in transcriptome-wide association studies (TWAS) using different methods (Elastic Net, Matrix eQTL and Multivariate Adaptive Shrinkage in R (MASHR)) and tested their out-of-sample transcriptome prediction accuracy in population-matched and cross-population scenarios. Additionally, to evaluate model applicability in …

Investigating The Viral Nature Of Neuronal Capsid Genes, Michael Manuel Long

Master's Theses

Memory formation is an essential part of everyday life. Neuronal communication is thought to be a key driver behind memory formation. There are two heavily studied methods of neuronal communication: chemical (neurotransmitter-mediated) and electrical (physically attached). When issues arise environmentally or genetically, people can experience one of many devastating memory disorders i.e. Alzheimer’s disease and other Dementias. Due to their prevalence, the treatments for disorders that hinder memory formation are a high priority for pharmaceutical companies. Currently, many of the treatments available focus on neurotransmitters or neuronal activity, and scientists are far from a cure. However, there may be an …

The Relationship Between Religiosity And Tobacco Use In A Mexican Spanish Speaking Sample In The United States, Lauren Hales

Master's Theses

To address disparities in minority mental health access and treatment, this study examined the relationship between tobacco use and religiosity, focusing on a Mexican Spanish speaking sample. Based on past research, it was hypothesized that religiosity would act as a protective factor against tobacco use characteristics. Participants were recruited through Amazon’s M*Turk survey platform. The sample included 144 adults aged 18+, currently residing in the US, who speak Mexican Spanish, have had an interaction with a medical provider in the last six months, and have used tobacco daily at some point in the last six months. Along with demographic information, …

Examining The Effect Of Positive Greetings At The Door On Student Academic Engagement And Disruptive Behavior, Abigail Lawson

Master's Theses

Positive Greetings at the Door (PGD) is a proactive classroom management strategy designed to assist students’ transitioning from a non-academic environment (e.g., physical education, lunch, hallway) to an academic environment (e.g., classroom instruction). PGD can prepare students to engage in academic behavior (e.g., sitting in seat, working on-tasks) and avoid engaging in nonacademic/disruptive behavior, thereby delaying the start of classroom instruction. Such disruptive behavior can lead to teacher frustration, which may contribute to a negative classroom environment. The current study used a concurrent multiple baseline design to assess the effects of PGD (Cook et al., 2018) on academically engaged behavior …

Central Americans At A Crossroads: Asylum Seekers’ Testimonios Of Mental Health After Detention And Family Separation, Corie E. Schwabenland Garcia

Master's Theses

Though Central American asylum seekers are presently hypervisible in the U.S. consciousness, this population continues to be inadequately understood or cared for. Discussion of this population often presents them as a helpless and damaged population, in need of saving, fixing, or shelter -- beyond their trauma, they cease to exist. This qualitative study utilizes first-person testimonio methodology to understand the psychological experiences of Central American migrants seeking asylum in the United States, the stressors they face, and the mental health support that can and should be provided to them. Their stories speak to a space of sociopolitical precarity in the …

Impacts Of The Poultry Industry In Mississippi, Sara Watts

Master's Theses

This thesis examines the impacts of the poultry industry in seven counties in the Piney Woods region of South Mississippi: Wayne, Jones, Forrest, Lamar, Jefferson Davis, Marion, and Pike. Current research indicates that the poultry industry has a significant impact on the cultures and economies of rural towns throughout the United States. There is no current research that examines the effects of the poultry industry on residents of the Piney Woods. This thesis addresses that gap in the research and contributes to current understanding of how the industry molds and impacts the lives of those intimately associated with it.

I …

Finding Balance: A Content Analysis Of How Newspaper Authors Framed Simone Biles Before, During, And After The 2020 Olympic Games, Hadley Howell

Master's Theses

Simone Biles was considered the GOAT, Greatest of All Time, going into the 2020 Olympic Games. However, after the COVID-19 pandemic, the Larry Nassar trial, and the weight of the world on her shoulders, Biles would withdraw from the women’s gymnastics team final competition for mental health reasons. Thus, the following study examines how Biles was framed in the ten most circulated newspapers in the United States before, during, and after the 2020 Olympic Games. Results show that an author’s race and gender, topic of the article, type of article, and if an article contained an image or not ultimately …

A Meta-Analysis Of Antecedent Exercise On Children’S Classroom Behaviors, Chelsea Johnson

Master's Theses

The purpose of the current study was to systematically review the literature investigating the effects of antecedent aerobic exercise on students with emotional and behavioral disorders. Eighteen studies met inclusion criteria, which included single case design studies and group studies, participant age, and an exercise intervention. Tau U was used as the procedure to calculate an effect size for A-B contrasts for single case design studies and effect size ranged from small to moderate for multiple variables such as disruptive behavior and academically engaged behavior. Hedges g was used to calculate an omnibus effect size for all single case design …

Message Convergence In Information Seeking And Decision Making Among Adult Children Regarding Their Parent's Diagnosis, Collyn Leggett

Master's Theses

Adult children have a unique role in caregiving and decision-making for a parent diagnosed with a life-threatening illness or condition. In this qualitative study, 15 individuals participated in one-on-one interviews to share their experience seeking information for their parent’s life-threatening diagnosis. This study utilized deductive and inductive coding approaches through axial coding, and two coders analyzed the data through a lens of message convergence framework and uncertainty management. The results show participants engage in information seeking from personal connections to the medical field to retrieve additional information from a more familiar, trusted source. The participants managed uncertainty retrospectively by reassessing …

How A Book Changed A Nation [2022], Teodora Buzea

Master's Theses

“We don’t believe in vampires.”

I didn’t bother to turn away from the TV to look at my parents. On screen, a crew of young men were interviewing an old woman. She spoke only Romanian, and a too-perfect female voice spoke for her in English. I could see the confident fear in her expression as she exclaimed that vampires were indeed real and that she was always scared of them. She wasn’t alone. All of Transylvania were aware of the existence of vampires. Truly, these young men— ghost hunters and cryptologists—were right to come here to this haunted nation. The …

Post Pandemic Cyberbiosecurity Threats From Terrorist Groups, Haley D. Dodge

Master's Theses

The research in this thesis explored the research question: Are United States (US) health systems accessible to cyber-bio terrorist attacks post-pandemic, within the context of the emerging discipline of cyberbiosecurity? Key findings of the analysis demonstrated how US health systems are more accessible to cyber-bio terrorist attacks specifically from cyber hacking groups based on the increasing sophistication of their cyber capabilities and the lack of cyber protection for biological systems. The concept of cyberbiosecurity was first introduced in 2018 by researchers exploring the converging threat landscape of the cyber and biology domains. As biology is growing more dependent upon vulnerable …

Identifying And Minimizing Underspecification In Breast Cancer Subtyping, Jonathan Cheuk-Kiu Tang

Master's Theses

In the realm of biomedical technology, both accuracy and consistency are crucial to the development and deployment of these tools. While accuracy is easy to measure, consistency metrics are not so simple to measure, especially in the scope of biomedicine where prediction consistency can be difficult to achieve. Typically, biomedical datasets contain a significantly larger amount of features compared to the amount of samples, which goes against ordinary data mining practices. As a result, predictive models may fail to find valid pathways for prediction during training on such datasets. This concept is known as underspecification.

Underspecification has been more accepted …

A Design Of A Digital Lockout Tagout System With Machine Learning, Brandon H. Chen

Master's Theses

Lockout Tagout (LOTO) is a safety procedure instated by the Occupational Safety and Health Administration (OSHA) when doing maintenance on dangerous machinery and hazardous power sources. In this procedure, authorized workers shut off the machinery and use physical locks and tags to prevent operation during maintenance. LOTO has been the industry standard for 32 years since it was instantiated, being used in many different industries such as industrial work, mining, and agriculture. However, LOTO is not without its issues. The LOTO procedure requires employees to be trained and is prone to human error. As well, there is a clash between …

Design Of A System To Investigate The Relationship Between Feedback And Delivery Medium For A Novel Motor Task, Ashley Humpal

Master's Theses

Stroke is a chronic, lifelong illness, and full recovery requires continuous physical and cognitive rehabilitation. Such long-term rehabilitation is cost-prohibitive; however an approach to providing long-term therapy that has recently gained traction is the use of socially assistive agent (SAA) systems. These systems make use of non-contact communication devices and can be used to guide people through a variety of rehabilitative tasks. They have the potential supplement current rehabilitation practices by providing motivation during intense exercises, and can extend the reach of the therapist into remote and home settings.

Though SAA systems have been used in a variety of rehabilitative …

Biodegradation Of Methyl Tert-Butyl Ether And Tert-Butyl Alcohol Using Bioaugmentation With Biowish® Aqua, Elizabeth Villanueva

Master's Theses

Aqua, a commercial product manufactured by BiOWiSH® Technologies, was utilized in this research to study its effectiveness to biodegrade methyl tert-butyl ether (MTBE) and tert-butyl alcohol (TBA). Microcosms containing varying concentrations of MTBE and TBA as well as a growth media and mineral salt solution were examined. Analytical instrumentation used in this study included the use of a gas chromatograph-mass spectrometer (GC/MS) to determine concentrations of MTBE and TBA and a spectrophotometer to extrapolate approximate active biomass concentrations in each experiment. Four different environmental conditions were tested for both MTBE and TBA. The environmental conditions tested for each contaminant included: …

Finding One's Artistic Voice Through Use Of Movement Exploration, Improvisation, And Reflective Writing, Maureen Glennon Clayton

Master's Theses

The purpose of this study was to explore how dance students will use movement exploration, improvisational experiences and reflective writing in the creation of personal movement choices and development of the artistic voice. The researcher developed three essential questions to guide this research: Q1 How does improvisation and movement exploration aid students in finding their own artistic voice?

Q2 What did the participants learn about the processes of improvisation and movement exploration through their reflective journal writing?

Q3 Do the participants feel a sense of accomplishment at the end of the study?

The research instruments included pre- and post-surveys and …

Loading Rate Of Two Maximalist Shoes Compared To A Traditional Running Shoe, Elizabeth Ray

Master's Theses

The transition of running footwear to maximalist constructions has been largely spearheaded by runners’ desires for reduced risk of injury. Loading rates have been used as a measure of a shoe’s ability to attenuate vertical ground reaction forces. The purpose of this study was to determine the effect of maximalist running shoes of two differing constructions upon loading rate compared to a traditional shoe condition. A secondary purpose of this study was to investigate any interaction between footwear condition and speed on loading rate. Eight runners (4 women, 4 men; mean age = 29 yr ± 6.5 ; mean body …

Mechanisms Behind The Luteoprotective Effects Of Fish Meal Supplementation In Bovine: Cytokine Sensitivity And Luteal Blood Flow, Anika Shelrud

Master's Theses

Early pregnancy loss continues to be problematic in the cattle industry. A large proportion of the pregnancy loss occurs during the maternal recognition of pregnancy (MRP) phase of gestation. During the MRP, a developing conceptus must secrete sufficient interferon tau to inhibit release of the uterine- derived and luteolytic mediator, prostaglandin F2 alpha (PGF2��). If successful, the progesterone- secreting corpus luteum (CL) will be maintained, which is necessary for establishment and maintenance of pregnancy. Pregnancy loss at the point of MRP may be due to a slow developing conceptus that does not effectively block PGF2��. Therefore, reducing the influence of …

Immunological Effects Of Berberine And Physical Activity In A Murine Breast Cancer Model, Janae Mudge

Master's Theses

Berberine (BBR) is a plant-derived alkaloid popularly used in a complementary context to treat splenomegaly and chronic disease states such as rheumatoid arthritis, diabetes, and cancer. Recent research has examined BBR as a regulator of lipid and glucose metabolism in association with the AMPK pathway; but little is known concerning its immunological impacts. It is also known that exercise is a potent AMPK activator exhibiting immunological benefits, but nothing is known about the combination of these complementary approaches for treating breast cancer. The purpose of this study is to determine if oral consumption of BBR when paired with physical activity …

Finding The Right Combination: An Exploratory Study Of Business Acumen, Community Engagement, And Success Criteria In Colorado Dance Studios, Ann Hunt

Master's Theses

The primary purpose of this study was to discover similarities and differences between Colorado dance studio owner’s definitions of success and data pertaining to community engagement and business strategies. This may help to inform current and future dance studio entrepreneurs of the variety of interpersonal skills needed to maintain a dance studio, how community engagement may be an instrumental part of studio culture, and how business strategies and goals realized an owner’s vision. The essential questions that focused this research study were: Q1 Why is it important for dance studio owners to define success for themselves? Q2 What can be …

Social Emotional Learning And Its Development Through Dance: Comparing The Opinions Of Dance Educators And Non-Dance Educators, Teresa Pachniak

Master's Theses

The purpose of this thesis was to identify connections between what is learned in a dance classroom within public schools and the five components of a Social Emotional Learning Curriculum: self-awareness, self-management, social awareness, relationship skills, and responsible decision-making. The research was designed to answer the following questions: Q1 Are the five components of SEL demonstrated regularly by dance students in compared to non-dance students? Q2 Can SEL be taught using a dance curriculum of movement exploration and dance scholarship? The researcher hoped to accomplish this goal by comparing the opinions of dance teachers and those of non-dance teachers, regarding …

Conservation Genomics: Utilizing Genetic And Transcriptomic Sequencing For Effective Conservation Management Of Astragalus Osterhoutii, Christine Mowad

Master's Theses

Astragalus osterhoutii M.E. Jones (Fabaceae) is a federally listed, rare, endemic species restricted to seleniferous soils in Grand County, CO (Anderson, 1989). This research utilized both RADseq and RNAseq to generate neutral and adaptive genomic datasets. Neutral data analysis aimed to determine i) the genetic diversity of A. osterhoutii and each of its populations level, ii) how genetic structure is partitioned across the species range, and iii) the closest relative to A. osterhoutii. Analysis of adaptive, RNAseq data aimed to identify i) differentially expressed genes, ii) if patterns of expression are similar to neutral data, and iii) differences in Se …

Dance Education In Pennsylvania Charter Schools: Advocating For Parity Among The Core Arts Disciplines, Donna Lynch

Master's Theses

The goal of this research was to collect data on existing dance programs and activities in Pennsylvania charter schools, and to advocate for the presence of dance in school arts offerings for academic credit, creating parity among the four core arts disciplines of visual arts, music, theater, and dance. The researcher developed three essential questions to guide this research:

Q1 What dance education programs currently exist in Pennsylvania charter schools, and what certifications are held by dance educators in these schools?

Q2 What obstacles, other than the teacher certification process, are preventing schools from hiring dance specialists and implementing dance …

Emerging Trends In The Dance Competition Industry: A Qualitative And Quantitative Analysis Of Key Stakeholder Experiences, Alyssa Hinz

Master's Theses

The purpose of this study was to assist dance competition participants in understanding the advantages and disadvantages of participating in dance competitions. The researcher evaluated the experiences and perceptions of the dance students, parents, and teachers that partake in dance competitions with the goal of uncovering the positive and negative effects dance competitions have on them. The research instruments used in this study included a multiple-choice survey, which was analyzed quantitatively, and a short answer survey, which was analyzed qualitatively. Limitations to this study included the survey questions, the number of participants, and the survey demographics. The survey was created …

Who’S Teaching Whom? A Dance Concert Exploring Teacher-Led, Student-Led, And Collaborative Choreographic Methods, Robin Suing

Master's Theses

The purpose of this study was to create a positive learning environment where students with a range of dance backgrounds can flourish. The goal was to discover the feeling responses of college students to teacher-led, student-led, and collaborative choreography to determine the importance of a balance between teacher-led and student-centered instruction. Information from this project will be used to inform curriculum planning in future dance courses. The following essential questions were used as a guide when assessing the qualitative and quantitative answers to the surveys and interview questions given to the participating students: Q1 What similarities and differences are found …