Digital Commons Network^™

The Effect Of Intrafamilial Racism On Biracial Identity Conflict, Lauren Tan

Master's Theses

This study aimed to describe the relation between experiences of intrafamilial racism (i.e., racism perpetrated by family members against other family members), caregiver support, and identity conflict in biracial individuals. Identity conflict is defined as perceived incompatibility with two or more aspects of one’s identity (Sarno et. al., 2015) and is an experience likely to be common among biracial individuals. Regression analyses were conducted to determine the relation between intrafamilial racism, caregiver support, and identity conflict. Moderation analyses were performed to determine the impact of intrafamilial racism on identity conflict at different levels of caregiver support. We hypothesized that intrafamilial …

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 …

Teachers’ Perceptions Of Ells By Racial Identity: A Pilot Study, Ha Tran

Master's Theses

ABSTRACTAs racial and political tensions grow within the United States, it is not uncommon for negative teacher perceptions of English Language Learners (ELLs) to be documented in educational research. This observed phenomenon is especially worrisome for three reasons: (1) teachers’ perceptions of their students are known to affect their pedagogy, (2) teacher perception and pedagogy influences student outcomes, and (3) the ELL population continues to be the quickest growing subset within the American public-school student body. While extensive, previous research has not attempted to compare teacher perceptions of ELLs across varying racial identity groups of ELLs. Thus, this pilot study …

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 …

Ecclesiological Sovereignty: Toward An Understanding Of The Sovereignty Of The Pope In The Context Of Luther's Responses, Erik Lee Grayvold

Master's Theses

This thesis seeks to address the contention between the perceived sovereign power of the Papacy and the Protestant Reformers. It will first provide a historical survey of how the Pope came to understand himself through the history of the Church. It will then analyze responses from the Reformers regarding this topic, focusing mainly on confessional documents and responses to these documents from the Roman Catholic Church. It will conclude with a survey of Luther’s specific responses to the situation and how his response to Papal authority and sovereignty impacted this theological development. This survey will also acknowledge situations in which …

Comparison Of Taxonomy Assignment And Strain Detection In Urobiome Communities Using 16s Rrna Sequencing And Shotgun Metagenomic Sequencing, Delaney Sauer

Master's Theses

Advancements in sequencing technologies have enabled scientists to gain insight into the microbes that inhabit the human body, including the urinary tract. Cataloging the bacteria that inhabit the urinary tract has primarily relied on amplification and sequencing of specific variable regions of the 16S rRNA gene enabling genus-level taxonomic identification. Recently, shotgun metagenomic sequencing has been employed such that bacterial taxonomy as well as the functionality that they encode can be inferred. In this study, we compare taxonomies assigned by 16S sequencing and shotgun metagenomic sequencing of the urinary microbiota (urobiome) of females with and without a clinical diagnosis of …

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 …

Characterizing The Dynamic Localization Of Cmi In Early Drosophila Development, Asra Habibullah

Master's Theses

The COMPASS-like family of lysine methyltransferases, MLR/MLX complexes, are epigenetic regulators that are essential for normal development through the methylation of the fourth lysine residue on histone 3 (H3K4), a universal epigenetic mark associated with active transcription. This family of complexes is highly conserved from yeast to mammals and the genes encoding the human MLR complexes have been associated with various developmental diseases and cancers (Dingwall and Fagan, 2019). In D. melanogaster, the enzymatic methyltransferase core of this complex is composed of two proteins: Cara Mitad (Cmi, also known as Lpt) and Trithorax-related (Trr). Although these proteins have been shown …

Parental Autonomy Support And Children’S Stem Engagement During An At-Home Tinkering Activity, Bianca Martins Aldrich

Master's Theses

Parents play an important role guiding children’s learning of science, technology, engineering, and mathematics (STEM) in informal educational contexts. In this project, we considered the ways in which parents use autonomy supportive or controlling language to encourage or discourage children's independence in problem solving, as well as their feedback to children’s ideas and behaviors. We looked at the association between autonomy support and children’s behavioral, STEM, story, and emotional engagement during an at-home tinkering and storytelling activity. Parents and their 4- to 10- year old children were observed at home via Zoom. We coded parents’ and children’s behaviors using a …

The Jewish Dancing Body: Body Image In Jewish Folk Dance, Alexa Berkowitz

Master's Theses

Throughout my life as a dancer, I often wondered if body image issues were purely found in Western concert dance (such as ballet and modern dance) and if folk dance instilled a sense of ownership over one’s body. It was apparent to me that being asked to stare at yourself in the mirror for hours on end in a ballet class, or any other dance style, forced you to see every tiny defect in your body. For me personally, this caused a lot of body dysmorphia and body image issues that I carry to this day. While some folk dance …

Paul's Attitude Towards Empire, Matthew Kwabena Appiah

Master's Theses

The concept of imperialism has come to stay in the study of Paul and his letters. However, does contextual analysis of his selected texts support such claims of him being anti-imperial? Various arguments arise to challenge Paul to have used hidden codes and imperial ideology to counter the imperial propaganda of the Roman empire of his day. However, contextual analysis of Paul and his letters suggest otherwise. His pastoral care duties, coupled with a desire to win his natives, namely, the Jews, to accept Jesus Christ as the messiah prophesied in the Old Testament is key in his letters. Proponents …

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 …

The Influence Of Spatialheterogeneity On Ocean Quahog (Arctica Islandica) Population Dynamics Along The Mid-Atlantic Bight, Jillian Sower

Master's Theses

The ocean quahog (Arctica islandica) support an economically important fishery in the US, though little is known about their life history traits. To determine how these traits vary geographically, the age frequencies and growth rates from two New Jersey sites (NJ1 & NJ2) as well as Georges Bank (GB) and Long Island (LI) were analyzed. Though sexual dimorphism in bivalves is rare, recent research has shown that A. islandica display distinct differences in sizes between males and females, with females reaching larger sizes than those of males. To determine when this difference in size occurs, the growth rates …

Motives For (In)Effective Giving: Comparing Rural And Urban Groups In South Africa., Luvuyo Bulelani Magwaza

Master's Theses

Different cultures have their own set of norms and values that not only shape people’s motives but also influences their decision making. What may be viewed as logical and ethical in one culture, may be seen as illogical or unethical in another. One area that is consistently affected by cross-cultural differences in motives is charitable giving. Recently, there has been an increase in interest around effective altruism— a social movement and philosophy that argues, people should give to charities that do the most good. Prior research that has found that people do not give based on efficiency; instead, people give …

Between The Sky And Earth, Swetha Amit

Master's Theses

Between The Sky And Earth is a collection of short stories that takes place in India, and in America, capturing the lives of Indian immigrants, and a cat, from different walks of life, some made up of students who came to pursue the American dream. The time span ranges between the early to late 2000s, capturing some significant events like farmer suicide and undocumented immigrants. These stories explore grief, trauma, identity, displacement, and relationships, focusing primarily on the consequences of losing loved ones, and unexpected mishaps that lead to a life and death situation. A couple of the stories grapple …

Queen Academy, Hantian Zhnag

Master's Theses

As an upmarket novel exploring immigration and racial dynamics, Queen Academy lies at the intersection of Kathryn Ma’s The Chinese Groove, Timothy Wang’s Slant, and Toni Morrison’s The Bluest Eye in style and subject. The protagonist Kang comes to the US from China to study statistics, but finds himself becoming a “potato queen”—an Asian gay man interested in dating white men only—and locked in self-loathing. It will take a heartbreak and treading the line of illegality to see himself again. Overall, by engaging with themes of immigration, belonging, and racialized desire, the novel takes the stance that the …

Acetylacetone Oxidation At Room Temperature: A Multiplexed Photoionization Mass Spectrometric Investigation, Study Of The Russell Intermediates In Gas Phase Reactions, And The Investigation Of Oxidation Reaction Products Of Ethanol At Room Temperature, Sara Gallarati

Master's Theses

This thesis presents the combustion study of acetyl acetone using synchrotron radiation coupled with multiplexed photoionization mass spectrometry at 298 K. The experiments were performed at the Chemical Dynamics Beamline 9.0.2 at the Advanced Light Source of the Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory. The reaction of acetyl acetone with chlorine (Cl) radicals was analyzed based on their photoionization spectra and reaction kinetic profiles.

Additionally, a study of the Russell intermediate has been performed. Previous to experimentation at the Advanced Light Source, computational analysis has been investigated to evaluate compounds that could possibly lead to the formation of a stable species. The …

Militant Maids: Domestic Workers’ Participation In Bus Boycotts, Voter Registration, And Head Start Programs In The Deep South, Brittany Ann Carey

Master's Theses

This thesis examines the participation of domestic workers in the Civil Rights Movement, specifically in Gulf South bus boycotts in Baton Rouge, Montgomery, and Tallahassee; voter registration efforts in Mississippi, Louisiana, Alabama, and Florida; and Head Start work in those same Deep South states. Domestic workers engaged in activism by joining unions, women's movements, and the Communist Party to improve their treatment in Northern and Southern cities. Modern historians have expanded their research to explore the participation of domestic workers in the Civil Rights Movement, especially in the Montgomery Bus Boycott. In some cases, researchers also have explored the complicated …

Investigating The Contribution Of Marine Viruses To Optical Backscatter In The <0.2 Μm Fraction Of Seawater, Kacey Mae Lange

Master's Theses

Marine viruses are the smallest and most abundant biological entities in the ocean. Marine viruses play a significant role in carbon and nutrient cycles through the liberation of dissolved organic matter (DOM) through the lysis of their numerically dominant hosts (i.e. bacteria and phytoplankton). Despite their importance, little is known about how viruses contribute to seawaters inherent optical properties (IOP) of seawater, specifically backscatter. All particles produce backscatter, with their contribution dependent on particle size, concentration, and composition. Living particles contribute 10-20% of the total backscatter with the remaining 80% of unclassified backscatter, “missing backscatter”, contributed by submicron particles ( …

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 …

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 …

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 …

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 …

Plant Productivity And Diversity In Coastal Wetlands In Mississippi – Impact Of Hydrological Extremes, Kodi Feldpausch

Master's Theses

Wetlands are highly productive ecosystems that provide important ecosystem services and are threatened by extreme hydrological events. I evaluated how diversion of freshwater like Bonnet Carré Spillway openings in Louisiana, US, affected vegetation productivity and diversity in salt marshes on the neighboring Mississippi Gulf Coast, US. My study area is two estuarine systems that differ in their proximity to the Bonnet Carré Spillway, elevation, and salinity including Hancock County Marshes on the west, and Grand Bay National Estuarine Research Reserve (NERR) on the east in Mississippi. I collected above- and belowground biomass samples in 2020 and 2021, developed linear mixed-effects …

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 …

Near-Infrared Dye-Glycogen Conjugates For Photodynamic And Photothermal Therapy, Farbod Shirinichi

Master's Theses

Near-Infrared (NIR) dyes are small organic molecules emerging as promising imaging agents and therapeutics for anticancer application. However, their small size inevitably resulted in several drawbacks, including low in vivo stability, inherent toxicity, and lack of targeting ability, which compromise their potential for clinical use. This project aims to address those issues by developing a novel “macromolecular” NIR dye. By covalently engineering the glycogen surface with indocyanine green (an FDA-approved NIR dye), we will create a series of glycogen-NIR dye conjugates with a size of 100-200 nm. In addition, this NIR dye is not stable in water for a long …

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 …

Project Management And Systems Engineering Framework For Educational Cubesat Missions, Bailey Garrett

Master's Theses

The rising complexity of CubeSat missions and the unique challenges faced by educational CubeSat programs lead to high rates of mission failure. Implementing project management and systems engineering practices can alleviate these challenges and improve mission success rates for educational CubeSat developers. However, existing project management and systems engineering resources are too cumbersome and often assume the student has a base-level understanding of project management and systems engineering fundamentals. A new universal project management and systems engineering framework was created and tailored specifically to the needs of an educational CubeSat mission. The framework was designed to accommodate first-time CubeSat developers, …