Digital Commons Network^™

Addressing A Labor Market Need For Health Managers And Policy Professionals: Development Of A Non-Clinical Health Science Degree Program For Health Policy And Management, Noemi Rodriguez

Publications and Research

Given the United States of America's health care’s rapidly shifting dynamics and demands to recalibrate its traditional operational and financial models particularly under the emergence of unprecedented strains to the healthcare system such as COVID-19, the Department of Health Sciences at the New York City College of Technology (NYCCT), City University of New York developed a four-year undergraduate degree program in healthcare policy and management. It utilizes a didactic and experiential curriculum to prepare students with very little or no healthcare experience to go into a robust and technology oriented labor market in healthcare planning, operations, and policy. The new …

Reproductive Traits And Change In Body Shape Of Neonates In The Oak Forest Skink, Plestiodon Lynxe, Manuel Feria-Ortiz, Uri Omar García-Vázquez, Carlos Joaquín Pavón-Vázquez, Adrián Nieto-Montes De Oca

Publications and Research

Reproductive traits are critically important for understanding how organisms adapt to their respective environments. In this study, we provide information on relative litter mass (RLM) and other litter and neonate related characters of nine female Plestiodon lynxe captured in the field. We also recorded seven body dimensions in 16 neonates and 15 two-month juveniles, and on the basis of these dimensions we compared the body shape of these two age classes to detect changes in the proportions of body parts. The average litter size (4.55) is larger than that found in other viviparous species of Plestiodon, but smaller than …

Microalbuminuria And Hypertension Among Immigrants With Type 2 Diabetes: A Community-Based Cross-Sectional Study, Shiryn D. Sukhram, Gustavo G. Zarini, Lemia H. Shaban, Joan A. Vaccaro, Fatma G. Huffman

Publications and Research

Purpose: This study examined the association of microalbuminuria (MAU), as determined by albumin-to-creatinine ratio (ACR), with hypertension (HTN) among Turkish immigrants with type 2 diabetes (T2D) living in deprived neighborhoods of The Hague, Netherlands. Methods: A total of 110 participants, physician-diagnosed with T2D, aged ≥ 30 years were recruited from multiple sources from The Hague, Netherlands in a cross-sectional design. Systolic blood pressure (SBP) and diastolic blood pressure (DBP) were measured using automated office blood pressure equipment. Urine albumin was measured by immunoturbidimetric assay. Urine creatinine was determined using the Jaffe method. MAU was defined as ACR ≥ 3.5 mg/mmol …

Rescue Of Deficits By Brwd1 Copy Number Restoration In The Ts65dn Mouse Model Of Down Syndrome, Sasha L. Fulton, Wendy Wenderski, Ashley E. Lepack, Andrew L. Eagle, Tomas Fanutza, Ryan M. Bastle, Aarthi Ramakrishnan, Emma C. Hays, Arianna Neal, Jaroslav Bendl, Lorna A. Farrelly, Amni Al-Kachak, Yang Lyu, Bulent Cetin, Jennifer C. Chan, Tina N. Tran, Rachael L. Neve, Randall J. Roper, Kristen J. Brennand, Panos Roussos, John C. Schimenti, Allyson K. Friedman, Li Shen, Robert D. Blitzer, Alfred J. Robison, Gerald R. Crabtree, Ian Maze

Publications and Research

With an incidence of ~1 in 800 births, Down syndrome (DS) is the most com- mon chromosomal condition linked to intellectual disability worldwide. While the genetic basis of DS has been identified as a triplication of chromosome 21 (HSA21), the genes encoded from HSA 21 that directly contribute to cognitive de fi cits remain incompletely understood. Here, we found that the HSA21- encoded chromatin effector, BRWD1, was upregulated in neurons derived from iPS cells from an individual with Down syndrome and brain of trisomic mice. We showed that selective copy number restoration of Brwd1 in trisomic animals rescued de fi …

Inhibiting Glutamine Utilization Creates A Synthetic Lethality For Suppression Of Atp Citrate Lyase In Kras-Driven Cancer Cells, Ahmet Hatipoglu, Deepak Menon, Talia Levy, Maria A. Frias, David A. Foster

Publications and Research

Metabolic reprogramming is now considered a hallmark of cancer cells. KRas-driven cancer cells use glutaminolysis to generate the tricarboxylic acid cycle intermediate α -ketoglutarate via a transamination reaction between glutamate and oxaloacetate. We reported previously that exogenously supplied unsaturated fatty acids could be used to synthesize phosphatidic acid–a lipid second messenger that activates both mammalian target of rapamycin (mTOR) complex 1 (mTORC1) and mTOR complex 2 (mTORC2). A key target of mTORC2 is Akt–a kinase that promotes survival and regulates cell metabolism. We report here that mono- unsaturated oleic acid stimulates the phosphoryla tion of ATP citrate lyase (ACLY) at …

A Virtue-Ethical Approach To Cultured Meat, Carlo Alvaro

Publications and Research

The proposed benefits of cultured meat fail to track our moral intuitions because they are focused on the practical aspect of cultured meat production and consumption. A virtue-oriented approach can show cultured meat in a different light.

Forest Cover And Geographic Distance Influence Fine-Scale Genetic Structure Of Leaf-Toed Geckos In The Tropical Dry Forests Of Western Mexico, Connor M. French, Casey-Tyler Berezin, Isaac Overcast, Fausto R. Méndez De La Cruz, Saptarsi Basu, Roberto Lhemish Martínez Bernal, Robert W. Murphy, Michael J. Hickerson, Christopher Blair

Publications and Research

The biodiversity within tropical dry forests (TDFs) is astounding and yet poorly catalogued due to inadequate sampling and the presence of cryptic species. In the Mexican TDF, endemic species are common, and the landscape has been continually altered by geological and anthropogenic changes. To understand how landscape and environmental variables have shaped the population structure of endemic species, we studied the recently described species of leaf-toed gecko, Phyllodactylus benedettii, in coastal western Mexico. Using double-digest restriction site-associated DNA sequencing data, we first explore population structure and estimate the number of ancestral populations. The results indicate a high degree of …

Brain And Spinal Cord Paired Stimulation Coupled With Locomotor Training Facilitates Motor Output In Human Spinal Cord Injury, Timothy S. Pulverenti, Morad Zaaya, Ewelina Grabowski, Monika Grabowski, Maria Knikou

Publications and Research

Combined interventions for neuromodulation leading to neurorecovery have gained great attention by researchers to resemble clinical rehabilitation approaches. In this randomized clinical trial, we established changes in the net output of motoneurons innervating multiple leg muscles during stepping when transcranial magnetic stimulation (TMS) of the primary motor cortex was paired with transcutaneous spinal (transspinal) stimulation over the thoracolumbar region during locomotor training. TMS was delivered before (TMS-transspinal) or after (transspinal-TMS) transspinal stimulation during the stance phase of the less impaired leg. Ten individuals with chronic incomplete or complete SCI received at least 20 sessions of training. Each session consisted of …

Genomic Data Mining Reveals Abundant Uncharacterized Transporters In Coccidioides Immitis And Coccidioides Posadasii, Hong Cai, Hao Zhang, Daniel H. Guo, Yufeng Wang, Jianying Gu

Publications and Research

Coccidioides immitis and Coccidioides posadasii are causative agents of coccidioidomycosis, commonly known as Valley Fever. The increasing Valley Fever cases in the past decades, the expansion of endemic regions, and the rising azole drug-resistant strains have underscored an urgent need for a better understanding of Coccidioides biology and new antifungal strategies. Transporters play essential roles in pathogen survival, growth, infection, and adaptation, and are considered as potential drug targets. However, the composition and roles of transport machinery in Coccidioides remain largely unknown. In this study, genomic data mining revealed an abundant, uncharacterized repertoire of transporters in Coccidioides genomes. The catalog …

Mutant C. Elegans P53 Together With Gain-Of-Function Glp-1/Notch Decreases Uvc-Damage-Induced Germline Cell Death But Increases Parp Inhibitor-Induced Germline Cell Death, Jorge Canar, Prima Manandhar-Sasaki, Jill Bargonetti

Publications and Research

The TP53 gene is mutated in over 50% of human cancers, and the C. elegans p53-1 (cep-1) gene encodes the ortholog CEP-1. CEP-1 is activated by ultraviolet type C (UVC)-induced DNA damage and activates genes that induce germline apoptosis. UVC treatment of gain-of-function glp-1(ar202gf)/Notch tumorous animals reduces germline stem cell numbers (and overall tumor size), while UVC treatment of double-mutant cep-1/p53(gk138);glp-1/Notch(ar202gf) increases DNA damage adducts and stem cell tumor volume. We compared UVC-induced mitotic stem cell death and animal lifespans for the two different C. elegans tumorous strains. C. elegans stem cell compartment death has never been observed, and we …

Artificial Intelligence And The Situational Rationality Of Diagnosis: Human Problem-Solving And The Artifacts Of Health And Medicine, Michael W. Raphael

Publications and Research

What is the problem-solving capacity of artificial intelligence (AI) for health and medicine? This paper draws out the cognitive sociological context of diagnostic problem-solving for medical sociology regarding the limits of automation for decision-based medical tasks. Specifically, it presents a practical way of evaluating the artificiality of symptoms and signs in medical encounters, with an emphasis on the visualization of the problem-solving process in doctor-patient relationships. In doing so, the paper details the logical differences underlying diagnostic task performance between man and machine problem-solving: its principle of rationality, the priorities of its means of adaptation to abstraction, and the effects …

Disney Animated Movies, Their Princesses, And Everyone Else, Alia R. Tyner

Publications and Research

In April 2021, The Walt Disney Company (Disney) announced the Ultimate Princess Celebration, ‘a year-long event spotlighting the courage and kindness these Disney heroines inspire in fans all around the world’ (Deitchman, 2021). Princesses have remained an important element of Disney’s identity and the movies they create. Broadening research beyond these characters and examining a larger sample demonstrated distinctions in the characteristics present in Official Disney Princess (ODP) movies, Actual Princess (AP) movies, and the 45 in the full catalog (All-Movies) that are or share characteristics with Disney Princess Movies. This article compares the race, class, and gender of the …

The Communicative Function Of Gender In Italian, Joseph C. M. Davis

Publications and Research

An analysis of gender in modern literary Italian based on attested examples from various genres. The evidence-based hypothesis, thoroughly noncanonical, proposes a system of morphologically signaled meanings, and these are not the traditional categories "feminine" and "masculine." Even the familiar and misleading term "gender" is replaced. The analysis concerns primarily what is typically called "grammatical gender, although it stands to inform too the use of Italian in communication having to do with human cultural gender. The analysis concerns primarily what might be called "variable gender" (essentially adjectives) although it stands to inform too the problem of "invariable gender" (essentially, nouns).

New Approaches To Peer Leader Training, Nadia Kennedy

Publications and Research

This paper describes a Peer Leader training course that has been modified to include innovative components focusing on developing content and pedagogical knowledge, practicing rehearsals, generating action research projects, doing poster presentations, and writing a reflective letter to new Peer Leaders. Through these innovations, four types of reflection–on relevant research and theory, on students’ experiences, on peer practice, and on one’s own practice–have been incorporated into the course. The new course components promise to offer more opportunities for trainees to practice peer leading in a structured and safe environment in which immediate and supportive feedback is available, and group practice …

Conflict Dynamics In Scale-Free Networks With Degree Correlations And Hierarchical Structure, Eduardo Jacobo-Villegas, Bibiana Obregón-Quintana, Lev Guzmán-Vargas, Larry S. Liebovitch

Publications and Research

We present a study of the dynamic interactions between actors located on complex networks with scale-free and hierarchical scale-free topologies with assortative mixing, that is, correlations between the degree distributions of the actors. The actor’s state evolves according to a model that considers its previous state, the inertia to change, and the influence of its neighborhood. We show that the time evolution of the system depends on the percentage of cooperative or competitive
interactions. For scale-free networks, we find that the dispersion between actors is higher when all interactions are either cooperative or competitive, while a balanced presence of interactions …

The Importance Of Low Iq To Early Diagnosis Of Autism, Kristina Denisova, Zhichun Lin

Publications and Research

Abstract
Some individuals can flexibly adapt to life’s changing demands while others, in particular those with Autism Spectrum Disorder (ASD), find it challenging. The origin of early individual differences in cognitive abilities, the putative tools with which to navigate novel information in life, including in infants later diagnosed with ASD remains unexplored. Moreover, the role of intelligence quotient (IQ) vis-à-vis core features of autism remains debated. We systematically investigate the contribution of early IQ in future autism outcomes in an extremely large, population-based study of 8000 newborns, infants, and toddlers from the US between 2 and 68 months with over …

Sustainability Matters: Advocating For The Establishment And Continuation Of Peer-Led Team Learning, A.E. Dreyfuss

Publications and Research

The successful dissemination of the Peer-Led Team Learning (PLTL) model at multiple institutions of higher education, in the United States and other countries, is reflected in the number of publications (see www.pltlis.org). However, many PLTL campus programs are no longer active or exist. This may be due, more recently, to the COVID pandemic and its disruptions. Historically, programs no longer exist because grant funding that supported the initiative ended; other reasons include the promotion, retirement, or even death of the practitioners whose work championing their PLTL program ended. What can sustain a campus PLTL program so that its benefits …

Evaluating Indoor Air Phthalates And Volatile Organic Compounds In Nail Salons In The Greater New York City Area: A Pilot Study, Inkyu Han, Jin Young Seo, Dana Boyd Barr, Parinya Panuwet, Volha Yakimavets, Priya Esilda D'Souza, Heyreoun An-Han, Masoud Afshar, Ying-Yu Chao

Publications and Research

The Greater New York City area ranks highest in the United States in the number of nail salon technicians, primarily Asian immigrant women. Nail salon technicians are exposed to toxic phthalates and volatile organic compounds daily in nail salons. The purpose of this pilot study was to measure a mixture of phthalates and volatile organic compounds in nail salons in the Greater New York City area, and to characterize work-related determinants of indoor air quality in these nail salons. Working with four Asian nail salon organizations in the Greater New York City area, we measured indoor air phthalates and volatile …

Small Molecule Modulation Of Microbiota: A Systems Pharmacology Perspective, Qiao Liu, Bohyun Lee, Lei Xie

Publications and Research

Background

Microbes are associated with many human diseases and influence drug efficacy. Small-molecule drugs may revolutionize biomedicine by fine-tuning the microbiota on the basis of individual patient microbiome signatures. However, emerging endeavors in small-molecule microbiome drug discovery continue to follow a conventional “one-drug-one-target-one-disease” process. A systematic pharmacology approach that would suppress multiple interacting pathogenic species in the microbiome, could offer an attractive alternative solution.

Results

We construct a disease-centric signed microbe–microbe interaction network using curated microbe metabolite information and their effects on host. We develop a Signed Random Walk with Restart algorithm for the accurate prediction of effect of microbes …

Antidepressant Effect Of Ketamine On Inflammation-Mediated Cytokine Dysregulation In Adults With Treatment-Resistant Depression: Rapid Systematic Review, Shiryn D. Sukhram, Grozdena Yilmaz, Jianying Gu

Publications and Research

Background. Major depressive disorder (MDD) and treatment-resistant depression (TRD) represent a global source of societal and health burden. To advise proper management of inflammation-related depression among TRD patients, it is important to identify therapeutic clinical treatments. A key factor is related to proinflammatory cytokines such as interleukin- (IL-) 1β, IL-6, and tumor necrosis factor- (TNF-) α which have been implicated in the pathogenesis of depressive symptoms in MDD patients. Ketamine may provide an anti-inflammatory therapeutic strategy by targeting proinflammatory pathways associated with depressive disorders, which may be exacerbated in the ageing population with TRD.

Objective. Despite a burgeoning body of …

Supporting Women’S Research In Predominantly Undergraduate Institutions: Experiences With A National Science Foundation Advance Institutional Transformation Award, Vita C. Rabinowitz, Virginia Valian

Publications and Research

This paper describes the Gender Equity Project (GEP) at Hunter College of the City University of New York (CUNY), funded by the U. S. NSF ADVANCE Institutional Transformation Award (ITA) program. ADVANCE supports system-level strategies to promote gender equity in the social and natural sciences, but has supported very few teaching-intensive institutions. Hunter College is a teaching-intensive institution in which research productivity among faculty is highly valued and counts toward tenure and promotion. We created the GEP to address the particular challenges that faculty, especially White women and faculty of color, face in maintaining research programs and advancing in their …

Novel Technologies To Characterize And Engineer The Microbiome In Inflammatory Bowel Disease, Alba Boix-Amorós, Hilarly Monaco, Elisa Sambataro, Jose C. Clemente

Publications and Research

We present an overview of recent experimental and computational advances in technology used to characterize the microbiome, with a focus on how these developments improve our understanding of inflammatory bowel disease (IBD). Specifically, we present studies that make use of flow cytometry and metabolomics assays to provide a functional characterization of microbial communities. We also describe computational methods for strain-level resolution, temporal series, myco - biome and virome data, co-occurrence networks, and compositional data analysis. In addition, we review novel techniques to therapeutically manipulate the microbiome in IBD. We discuss the benefits and drawbacks of these technologies to increase awareness …

Phylogenetic Diversity Of Animal Oral And Gastrointestinal Viromes Useful In Surveillance Of Zoonoses, Anthony Michael Esposito, Michelle Marie Esposito, Albert Ptashnik

Publications and Research

Great emphasis has been placed on bacterial microbiomes in human and animal systems. In recent years, advances in metagenomics have allowed for the detection and characterization of more and more native viral particles also residing in these organisms. The digestive tracts of animals and humans—from the oral cavity, to the gut, to fecal excretions—have become one such area of interest. Next-generation sequencing and bioinformatic analyses have uncovered vast phylogenetic virome diversity in companion animals, such as dogs and cats, as well as farm animals and wildlife such as bats. Zoonotic and arthropod-borne illnesses remain major causes of worldwide outbreaks, as …

Critical Social Foundations Of Education: Advancing Human Rights And Transformative Justice Education In Teacher Preparation, Magnus O. Bassey

Publications and Research

No abstract provided.

Advancing Student Futures In Stem, Urmi Ghosh-Dastidar, Sandie Han, Nadia Kennedy, Diana Samaroo Phd, Armando Solis

Publications and Research

This work reports a programmatic effort devoted to increasing diversity, equity, and inclusion in STEM education at a Hispanic-serving undergraduate higher-education institution. Between Fall 2015 and Spring 2020, the STEM program offered comprehensive academic and financial support to ninety-four students from five STEM majors: Bachelor of Science degrees in Biomedical Informatics, Applied Chemistry, and Applied Mathematics; and Associate of Science degrees in Chemical Technology and Computer Science. The goals of the program were to: (1) support, retain and graduate academically talented low-income and underrepresented minority students in the five targeted STEM majors; (2) establish a model for a comprehensive support …

Rna-As-Graphs Motif Atlas—Dual Graph Library Of Rna Modules And Viral Frameshifting-Element Applications, Qiyao Zhu, Louis Petingi, Tamar Schlick

Publications and Research

RNA motif classification is important for understanding structure/function connections and building phylogenetic relationships. Using our coarse-grained RNA-As-Graphs (RAG) representations, we identify recurrent dual graph motifs in experimentally solved RNA structures based on an improved search algorithm that finds and ranks independent RNA substructures. Our expanded list of 183 existing dual graph motifs reveals five common motifs found in transfer RNA, riboswitch, and ribosomal 5S RNA components. Moreover, we identify three motifs for available viral frameshifting RNA elements, suggesting a correlation between viral structural complexity and frameshifting efficiency. We further partition the RNA substructures into 1844 distinct submotifs, with pseudoknots and …

Deep Learning Prediction Of Chemical-Induced Dose-Dependent And Context-Specific Multiplex Phenotype Responses And Its Application To Personalized Alzheimer’S Disease Drug Repurposing, You Wu, Qiao Liu, Yue Qiu, Lei Xie

Publications and Research

Predictive modeling of drug-induced gene expressions is a powerful tool for phenotype-based compound screening and drug repurposing. State-of-the-art machine learning methods use a small number of fixed cell lines as a surrogate for predicting actual expressions in a new cell type or tissue, although it is well known that drug responses depend on a cellular context. Thus, the existing approach has limitations when applied to personalized medicine, especially for many understudied diseases whose molecular profiles are dramatically different from those characterized in the training data. Besides the gene expression, dose-depen- dent cell viability is another important phenotype readout and is …

A Decade Review Of Disease Surveillance Research Trends In The International Journal Of Health Geographics (2009 To 2018), Rose Jimenez, Paradorn Wongchanapai

Publications and Research

The field of health geographics is rapidly growing in its methods and epistemologies. This is a review of the open-source journal International Journal of Health Geographics, and the trends in disease surveillance over ten years (2009-2018). Drawing from research review methodologies, we wrote a Python script to quantify research trends within the field of geographic disease surveillance, finding many articles focusing on population health, techniques of GIS, qualitative techniques, and geospatial technology for health monitoring. This was foundational in conducting an in-depth qualitative lexical analysis of article content and epistemologies. Overall, we concluded that over the time period, the …

Community Engagement Education In Academic Health Centers, Colleges, And Universities, Chyke A. Doubeni, David Nelson, Elizabeth Gross Cohn, Electra Paskett, Seleshi Ayalew Asfaw, Mehek Sumar, Syed M. Ahmed, Rhonda Mcclinton-Brown, Mark L. Wieland, Anita Kinney, Sergio Aguilar-Gaxiola, Lisa G. Rosas, Cecilia M. Patino

Publications and Research

Community engagement (CE) is critical for advancing health equity and a key approach for promoting inclusive clinical and translational science. However, it requires a workforce trained to effectively design, implement, and evaluate health promotion and improvement strategies through meaningful collaboration with community members. This paper presents an approach for designing CE curricula for research, education, clinical care, and public health learners. A general pedagogical framework is presented to support curriculum development with the inclusion of community members as facilitators or faculty. The overall goal of the curriculum is envisioned as enabling learners to effectively demonstrate the principles of CE in …

Review Of Emerging Approaches Utilizing Alternative Physiological Human Body Fluids In Non- Or Minimally Invasive Glucose Monitoring, Sunghoon Jang, Yu Wang, Andre Jang

Publications and Research

Diabetes can cause various acute as well as long-term complications in patients, with blood sugar levels of over 600 mg/dL, such as blindness, kidney disease, nervous & circulatory system disease, limb amputations, stroke, and cardiovascular disease (CVD). Frequent and regular blood glucose monitoring by diabetics and physicians is an essential step in the management of diabetes. Over the last five decades, there have been numerous attempts to develop viable painless non- or minimally invasive blood glucose monitoring techniques to replace all existing invasive methods, such as home blood glucose monitoring, which usually require drawing a blood sample by piercing the …