Digital Commons Network^™

Inhibition Of Apoptosis Exacerbates Fatigue-Damage Tendon Injuries In An In Vivo Rat Model, R. Bell, M. A. Robles-Harris, M. Anderson, D. Laudier, M. B. Schaffler, E. L. Flatow, N. Andarawis-Puri

Publications and Research

Tendinopathy is a common and progressive musculoskeletal disease. Increased apoptosis is an end-stage tendinopathy manifestation, but its contribution to the pathology of the disease is unknown. A previously established in vivo model of fatigue-damage accumulation shows that increased apoptosis is correlated with the severity of induced tendon damage, even in early onset of the disease, supporting its implication in the pathogenesis of the disease. Consequently, this study aimed to determine: (1) whether apoptosis could be inhibited after fatigue damage and (2) whether its inhibition could lead to remodeling of the extracellular matrix (ECM) and pericellular matrix (PCM), to ultimately improve …

Associations Of Lifestyle And Vascular Risk Factors With Alzheimer's Brain Biomarker Changes During Middle Age: A 3 Year Longitudinal Study In The Broader New York City Area, Michelle J. Walters, Joanna Sterling, Crystal Quinn, Christine Ganzer, Ricardo S. Osorio, Randolph D. Andrews, Dawn C. Matthews, Shankar Vallabhajosula, Mony J. De Leon, Richard S. Isaacson, Lisa Mosconi

Publications and Research

Objective To investigate the associations between lifestyle and vascular risk factors and changes in Alzheimer’s disease (AD) biomarkers (beta-amyloid load via ¹¹C-PiB PET, glucose metabolism via ¹⁸F-FDG PET and neurodegeneration via structural MRI) and global cognition in middle-aged asymptomatic participants at risk for AD.

Design Prospective, longitudinal.

Setting The study was conducted at New York University Langone/Weill Cornell Medical Centres in New York City.

Participants Seventy cognitively normal participants from multiple community sources, aged 30–60 years with lifestyle measures (diet, intellectual activity and physical activity), vascular risk measures and two imaging biomarkers visits over at least 2 years, …

Thermoresponsive, Redox-Polymerized Cellulosic Hydrogels Undergo In Situ Gelation And Restore Intervertebral Disc Biomechanics Post Discectomy, Devika Varma, H. A. Lin, R. G. Long, G. T. Gold, A. C. Hecht, J. C. Iadridis, Steven B. Nicoll

Publications and Research

Back and neck pain are commonly associated with intervertebral disc (IVD) degeneration. Structural augmentation of diseased nucleus pulposus (NP) tissue with biomaterials could restore degeneration-related IVD height loss and degraded biomechanical behaviors; however, effective NP replacement biomaterials are not commercially available. This study developed a novel, crosslinked, dual-polymer network (DPN) hydrogel comprised of methacrylated carboxymethylcellulose (CMC) and methylcellulose (MC), and used in vitro, in situ and in vivo testing to assess its efficacy as an injectable, in situ gelling, biocompatible material that matches native NP properties and restores IVD biomechanical behaviors. Thermogelling MC was required to enable consistent and timely …

Continuity Of Transcriptomes Among Colorectal Cancer Subtypes Based On Meta-Analysis, Siyuan Ma, Shuji Ogino, Princy Parsana, Reiko Nishihara, Zhirong Qian, Jeanne Shen, Kosuke Mima, Yohei Masugi, Yin Cao, Jonathan A. Nowak, Kaori Shima, Yujin Hoshida, Edward L. Giovannucci, Manish K. Gala, Andrew T. Chan, Charles S. Fuchs, Giovanni Parmigiani, Curtis Huttenhower, Levi Waldron

Publications and Research

Background: Previous approaches to defining subtypes of colorectal carcinoma (CRC) and other cancers based on transcriptomes have assumed the existence of discrete subtypes. We analyze gene expression patterns of colorectal tumors from a large number of patients to test this assumption and propose an approach to identify potentially a continuum of subtypes that are present across independent studies and cohorts.

Results: We examine the assumption of discrete CRC subtypes by integrating 18 published gene expression datasets and >3700 patients, and contrary to previous reports, find no evidence to support the existence of discrete transcriptional subtypes. Using a meta-analysis approach to …

Academic Libraries For Commuter Students: Research-Based Strategies, Mariana Regalado, Maura A. Smale

Publications and Research

This volume brings together research from multiple perspectives on the experiences of commuter college students in academic libraries. The majority of American college students are commuters and are more likely than residential students to have responsibilities apart from their roles on campus; the commute itself may impact the student experience. Each chapter is a case study of research on serving commuter students at a particular institution, encompassing a detailed description of the research methods used, analysis of what was learned during the research, and specific interventions or changes made in library services, resources, or facilities as a result. Taking into …

La Dialéctica, David Harvey

Publications and Research

Raymond Williams eligió el recurso de pensar ‘mundos posibles’ ficticios para abordar la complejidad de temas relativos al lugar, el espacio y el ambiente. ¿Sin embargo, será que este era un recurso necesario, o más bien una estrategia aleatoria suya para profundizar en el estudio de la teoría de la cultura? Empezaré en este capítulo por demostrar que la estrategia empleada por Williams no es necesaria en absoluto. Espero poder demostrar que la investigación materialista histórica, inducida por un entendimiento dialéctico, puede integrar los temas de lugar, espacio y ambiente (naturaleza) en la teoría social y en la teoría literaria. …

Burnout Syndrome And Depression, Renzo Bianchi, Irvin Sam Schonfeld, Eric Laurent

Publications and Research

In this chapter, we proposed an overview of burnout, from the introduction of the construct in the mid-1970s to the growing realization that the syndrome was better conceived of as a depressive condition. Recent studies have shown that the distinction between burnout and depression is problematic, both theoretically and empirically. The history of burnout research suggests that transdisciplinary communication and methodological standards should be strengthened to avoid the proliferation of constructs that, in fact, refer to the same phenomena. Construct proliferation, a transgression of the scientific canon of parsimony, is considered a major problem today because it undermines theory building …

“I’Ll Come Back And Break Your Spell”: Narrative Freedom And Genre In The Haunting Of Hill House, Hilarie Ashton

Publications and Research

In The Haunting of Hill House, Shirley Jackson interplays repression and fear inside a “normal” world, reshaping the modern Gothic novel. In this article, I trace key moments in the text where the perceptions of her complicated protagonist, Eleanor Vance, appear without the mediation of the narrator, via verb tenses, punctuation/formatting choices, and quotation. Many of these moments, I argue, occur in narrative spaces that are more quotidian than Gothic (some not even chilling at all). With the periodic narrative freedom, which I call bare thoughts, this recalibrates the division between imaginary and reality while opening up possibilities for …

Market Integration Predicts Human Gut Microbiome Attributes Across A Gradient Of Economic Development, Keaton Stagaman, Tara J. Cepon-Robins, Melissa A. Liebert, Theresa E. Gildner, Samuel S. Urlacher, Felicia C. Madimenos, Karen Guillemin, J. Josh Snodgrass, Lawrence C. Sugiyama, Brendan J. M. Bohannan

Publications and Research

Economic development is marked by dramatic increases in the incidence of microbiome-associated diseases, such as autoimmune diseases and metabolic syndromes, but the lifestyle changes that drive alterations in the human microbiome are not known. We measured market integration as a proxy for economically related lifestyle attributes, such as ownership of specific market goods that index degree of market integration and components of traditional and nontraditional (more modern) house structure and infrastructure, and profiled the fecal microbiomes of 213 participants from a contiguous, indigenous Ecuadorian population. Despite relatively modest differences in lifestyle across the population, greater economic development correlated with significantly …

From Departure To Destination. Reminiscences Of The Weissman School Of Arts And Sciences., Aldemaro Romero Jr., Gary Hentzi

Publications and Research

This volume is both a remembrance of the past and a prologue of the bright future to come for the George and Mildred Weissman School of Arts and Sciences (WSAS). As these chapter attest, the Weissman School has grown and evolved significantly, and particularly in the period sine George and Mildred Weissman provided their visionary endowment gift in 1999. Now the School is on the precipice of a new era.

Contents:

"Foreword," Mitchel B. Wallerstein

"Introduction," Katherine Pence

"First Annual Weissman Lecture, 1998," George Weissman

"A Two-Way Street," Carol Berkin

"Baruch and the Liberal Arts," Myrna Chase

"Fertile Ground," Roslyn …

Phylogenetic Relationships Of Living And Fossil African Papionins: Combined Evidence From Morphology And Molecules, Kelsey D. Pugh, Christopher C. Gilbert

Publications and Research

No abstract provided.

Comparing Daily Drivers Of Problem Drinking Among Older And Younger Adults: An Electronic Daily Diary Study Using Smartphones, Alexis Kuerbis, Hayley Treloar Padovano, Sijing Shao, Jessica Houser, Frederick Muench, Jon Morgenstern

Publications and Research

Background—By 2030, numbers and proportions of older adults with substance-use problems are expected to increase. While risk factors for problem drinking in late life have been identified, it remains unknown whether these factors drive daily drinking among older problem drinkers. This study examined the daily drivers of drinking among problem drinkers, moderated by age, utilizing ecological momentary assessment (EMA). Method—Participants (N=139), ages 20–73, received daily EMA online surveys completed via a smartphone prior to initiation of treatment. Multilevel modeling tested the moderating impact of age on within- and between-person relationships between drinking and focal predictors (mood, loneliness, boredom, stress, poor …

A Description Of Nesting Behaviors, Including Factors Impacting Nest Site Selection, In Black‐And‐White Ruffed Lemurs (Varecia Variegata), Andrea L. Baden

Publications and Research

Nest site selection is at once fundamental to reproduction and a poorly understood component of many organisms’ reproductive investment. This study investigates the nesting behaviors of black-and-white ruffed lemurs, Varecia variegata, a litter-bearing primate from the southeastern rainforests of Madagascar. Using a combination of behavioral, geospatial, and demographic data, I test the hypotheses that environmental and social cues influence nest site selection and that these decisions ultimately impact maternal reproductive success. Gestating females built multiple large nests throughout their territories. Of these, females used only a fraction of the originally constructed nests, as well as several parking locations as infants …

Microtubule Imaging Reveals Cytoskeletal Deficit Predisposing The Retinal Ganglion Cell Axons To Atrophy In Dba/2j, Denis Sharoukhov, Festa Bucinca-Cupallari, Hyungsik Lim

Publications and Research

PURPOSE: Glaucoma is characterized by progressive loss of the retinal ganglion cells (RGCs) and their axons. Here we test an outstanding notion that microtubules (MTs) within RGC axons degrade before the loss of morphology (‘‘MT hypothesis’’).

METHODS: The integrity of axonal MTs was interrogated by intrinsic second-harmonic generation (SHG) microscopy. Using DBA/2J mice as a model of glaucoma and DBA/2J-Gpnmbþ as a nonglaucomatous control, the relationship between MT disruption and morphology was quantitatively examined as a function of age and sex in the fresh retinal wholemounts.

RESULTS: The mean SHG density (i.e., the mean SHG intensity per thickness) was significantly …

Pitx1 Regulates Cement Gland Development In Xenopus Laevis Through Activation Of Transcriptional Targets And Inhibition Of Bmp Signaling, Ye Jin, Daniel C. Weinstein

Publications and Research

The cement gland in Xenopus laevis has long been used as a model to study the interplay of cell signaling and transcription factors during embryogenesis. It has been shown that an intermediate level of Bone Morphogenetic Protein (BMP) signaling is essential for cement gland formation. In addition, several transcription factors have been linked to cement gland development. One of these, the homeodomain-containing protein Pitx1, can generate ectopic cement gland formation; however, the mechanisms underlying this process remain obscure. We report here, for the first time, a requirement for Pitx proteins in cement gland formation, in vivo: knockdown of both pitx1 …

Rhetoric, Salience And The Reader In The Saddle: A Response To James Phelan, David Richter

Publications and Research

No abstract provided.

Supercycle In Great Earthquake Recurrence Along The Japan Trench Over The Last 4000 Years, Kazuko Usami, Ken Ikehara, Toshiya Kanamatsu, Cecilia M. Mchugh

Publications and Research

On the landward slope of the Japan Trench, the mid-slope terrace (MST) is located at a depth of 4000–6000 m. Two piston cores from the MST were analyzed to assess the applicability of the MST for turbidite paleoseismology and to find out reliable recurrence record of the great earthquakes along the Japan Trench. The cores have preserved records of ~ 12 seismo-turbidites (event deposits) during the last 4000 years. In the upper parts of the two cores, only the following earthquakes (magnitude M ~ 8 and larger) were clearly recorded: the 2011 Tohoku, the 1896 Sanriku, the 1454 Kyotoku, and …

Improving Transgender Policy For A More Equitable Workplace, Nicole M. Elias, Rana Lynn Johnson, Danny Ovando, Julia Ramirez

Publications and Research

Sex and gender categories have become more fluid in recent years. With evolving understandings of sexual orientation and gender identity, public administrators are confronted with questions of how to craft policy and make decisions based on new conceptions of sex and gender for transgender employees. Policy and practice is especially challenging in the workplace where sex and gender encompass both personal and professional dimensions. Within the public sector, the federal government is recognized as a leader on these issues, and this work examines federal transgender policy to answer the following questions: 1) how are federal agencies addressing transgender issues in …

Effects Of Geography On Mental Health Disparities On Sexual Minorities In New York City, Jacob Felson, Amy Adamczyk

Publications and Research

Gay and lesbian individuals have higher rates of psychological distress than do heterosexual individuals. The minority stress hypothesis attributes this disparity to adversity related stress experienced by sexual minorities. In support of this idea, research in the U.S. has generally found that mental health disparities between sexual minorities and others are narrower in places where tolerance is relatively high. However, few studies have examined disparities between sexual minorities and others in neighborhoods where sexual minorities are most highly concentrated. Likewise, little research attention has been given to disparities for people who move to more tolerant places from less tolerant states …

Disability Crossover: Is There A Hispanic Immigrant Health Advantage That Reverses From Working To Old Age?, Mara Getz Sheftel, Frank W. Heiland

Publications and Research

BACKGROUND Hispanic immigrants have been found to be more likely to have a disability than US-born populations. Studies have primarily focused on populations aged 60 and older; little is known about immigrant disability at younger ages.

OBJECTIVE Taking a broader perspective, we investigate whether Hispanic immigrants have lower disability rates in midlife; if so, at what ages this health advantage reverses; and the correlates of this pattern.

METHODS Using American Community Survey 2010–2014 data, we estimate age-specific disability prevalence rates by gender, nativity, education, and migration age from age 40 to 80. We also present estimates by six types of …

Deep Convolutional Neural Networks Enable Discrimination Of Heterogeneous Digital Pathology Images, Pegah Khosravi, Ehsan Kazemi, Marcin Imielinski, Olivier Elemento, Iman Hajirasouliha

Publications and Research

Pathological evaluation of tumor tissue is pivotal for diagnosis in cancer patients and automated image analysis approaches have great potential to increase precision of diagnosis and help reduce human error.

In this study, we utilize several computational methods based on convolutional neural networks (CNN) and build a stand-alone pipeline to effectively classify different histopathology images across different types of cancer.

In particular, we demonstrate the utility of our pipeline to discriminate between two subtypes of lung cancer, four biomarkers of bladder cancer, and five biomarkers of breast cancer. In addition, we apply our pipeline to discriminate among four immunohistochemistry …

Single Olfactory Receptors Set Odor Detection Thresholds, Adam Dewan, Annika Cichy, Jingji Zhang, Kayla Miguel, Paul Feinstein, Dmitry Rinberg, Thomas Bozza

Publications and Research

In many species, survival depends on olfaction, yet the mechanisms that underlie olfactory sensitivity are not well understood. Here we examine how a conserved subset of olfactory receptors, the trace amine-associated receptors (TAARs), determine odor detection thresholds of mice to amines. We find that deleting all TAARs, or even single TAARs, results in significant odor detection deficits. This finding is not limited to TAARs, as the deletion of a canonical odorant receptor reduced behavioral sensitivity to its preferred ligand. Remarkably, behavioral threshold is set solely by the most sensitive receptor, with no contribution from other highly sensitive receptors. In addition, …

Evolution Of The Modern Baboon (Papio Hamadryas): A Reassessment Of The African Plio-Pleistocene Record, Christopher C. Gilbert, Stephen R. Frost, Kelsey D. Pugh, Monya Anderson, Eric Delson

Publications and Research

Baboons ( Papio hamadryas) are among the most successful extant primates, with a minimum of six distinctive forms throughout Sub-Saharan Africa. However, their presence in the fossil record is unclear. Three early fossil taxa are generally recognized, all from South Africa: Papio izodi , Papio robinsoni and Papio angusticeps. Because of their derived appearance, P. angusticeps and P. robinsoni have sometimes been considered subspecies of P. hamadryas and have been used as biochronological markers for the Plio- Pleistocene hominin sites where they are found.

We reexamined fossil Papio forms from across Africa with an emphasis on their distinguishing features and …

Review Of Emerging Approaches In Non- Or Minimally Invasive Glucose Monitoring And Their Application To Physiological Human Body Fluids, Sunghoon Jang, Chen Xu

Publications and Research

The frequent blood glucose monitoring by the diabetics and physicians is a very essential step in the management of the diabetes because this devastating disease can lead the patients to blindness, kidney disease, nervous & circulatory system disease, limb amputations, stroke and cardiovascular disease (CVD). There have been numerous attempts to develop viable painless non- or minimally invasive blood glucose monitoring techniques over the last five decades in order to replace all existing methods of home blood glucose monitoring require drawing a blood sample by piercing the skin. This review describes the principles of two main emerging general technologies such …

Loaning Books By The Semester: A Case Study At A Community College Library, Jennifer Noe

Publications and Research

During the spring and fall semesters of 2016 and the spring semester of 2017, Kingsborough Community College, part of the City University of New York, launched an initiative to loan over 5,000 books for the entire semester to students in its Learning Communities and other special programs. This paper is a case study that describes the challenges of implementing the Textbook Learning Initiative by the Access Services department of the college's Robert J. Kibbee Library and its ongoing work as all of these specially purchased titles are now in the general collection for all students on a first come, first …

Proceedings Of The Cuny Games Conference 4.0: The Interactive Course, Robert O. Duncan, Joe Bisz, Julie Cassidy, Kathleen Offenholley, Maura A. Smale, Carolyn Stallard, Deborah Sturm, Anders A. Wallace, Cuny Games Network

Publications and Research

Proceedings of the CUNY Games Conference, held from January 22-23, 2018, at the CUNY Graduate Center and Borough of Manhattan Community College.

Critical Play with History (Panel) - Composition & Storytelling - Health & Cognitive Sciences - Gaming Anthropology: Teaching Culture and Power Through Games and Design (Panel) - Twine & Writing Games - Easy Ideas II - STEM Games - Global Games for Change Catalog (Panel) - Comics & Active Learning - Fact Checking & Research - Computer Science & Game Design - SimGlobal: Building a Serious Roleplay Course for the Social Sciences (Panel) - Role Playing Games, Narrative, …

Is There “Hope For Every Addicted American”? The New U.S. War On Drugs, B Stone

Publications and Research

The U.S. has been waging a War on Drugs for the last forty years. But in the mid-2010s, a series of reforms have rejected this militant approach. How did these policies manage to break through a gridlocked Congress? What is the nature of these reforms, and what are their political implications? Using critical discourse analysis, I demonstrate that a new policy framework of “addiction recovery” defines the political crises of the opioid epidemic, the failure of the War on Drugs, and mass incarceration in terms of disease, attributing Drug War injustices to prejudice against “addiction,” rather than a constellation of …

A Systematic Review Of Non-Pharmacological Interventions To Improve Nighttime Sleep Among Residents Of Long-Term Care Settings, Elizabeth Capezuti, Rana Sagha Zadeh, Kevin Pain, Aleksa Basara, Nancy Ziyan Jiang, Ana C. Krieger

Publications and Research

Background: Disturbances in sleep and circadian rhythms are common among residents of long-term care facilities. In this systematic review, we aim to identify and evaluate the literature documenting the outcomes associated with non-pharmacological interventions to improve nighttime sleep among long-term care residents.

Methods: The Preferred Reporting Items for Systematic Reviews guided searches of five databases (MEDLINE, Embase, CINAHL, Scopus, and Cochrane Library) for articles reporting results of experimental or quasi-experimental studies conducted in long-term care settings (nursing homes, assisted-living facilities, or group homes) in which nighttime sleep was subjectively or objectively measured as a primary outcome. We categorized each intervention …

Exploration Of Treatment Matching To Problem Drinker Characteristics With Motivational Interviewing And Non-Directive Client-Centered Psychotherapy For Problem Drinkers, Alexis Kuerbis, Jessica Houser, Svetlana Levak, Sijing Shao, Jon Morgenstern

Publications and Research

Motivational Interviewing (MI) is a known effective intervention for alcohol use disorder (AUD). MI's mechanisms of action remain inconsistently substantiated, and research in this area has been reliant on identifying relationships through strength of association rather than experimental manipulation of active ingredients. In two previous studies, a pilot and a larger replication study, we disaggregated MI into its hypothesized active ingredients by creating three conditions: MI, Spirit Only MI (SOMI, in which evocation of change talk was proscribed), and a non-therapy condition (NTC). Results from both studies yielded equivalent findings across all three conditions. In the current analyses, data from …

Two-Dimensional Maximal Repetitions, Amihood Amir, Gad M. Landau, Shoshana Marcus, Dina Sokol

Publications and Research

Maximal repetitions or runs in strings have a wide array of applications and thus have been extensively studied. In this paper, we extend this notion to 2-dimensions, precisely defining a maximal 2D repetition. We provide initial bounds on the number of maximal 2D repetitions that can occur in a matrix. The main contribution of this paper is the presentation of the first algorithm for locating all maximal 2D repetitions in a matrix. The algorithm is efficient and straightforward, with runtime O(n^2 log n log log n+ rho log n), where n^2 is the size of the input, and rho is …