Digital Commons Network^™

The Relationship Of Disease Severity, Health Beliefs, And Medication Adherence Among Hiv Patients, Xin Gao

Graduate Theses, Dissertations, and Problem Reports (ETD)

Purpose. To investigate the relationship of disease severity, health beliefs, and medication adherence among HIV/AIDS patients.;Results. Seventy-two HIV patients were enrolled. There were no significant differences in patients' perceived severity of HIV/AIDS and perceptions of benefits and barriers of the treatment across three disease stages. However, patients who had greater experience with the disease (stage C) perceived a higher risk to develop complications if they were not adherent compared to asymptomatic patients (stage A). Results also revealed that patients in stage B and C were more adherent to their medications compared to patients in stage A when regimen complexity was …

Heavy-Duty Emissions Inventory And Prediction, Ravishankar Ramamurthy

Graduate Theses, Dissertations, and Problem Reports (ETD)

Heavy duty vehicle emissions represent a significant portion of the mobile source emissions inventory. Accurate estimation of their contribution is essential as on-highway and non-road heavy duty diesel emissions account for at least one third of the oxides of nitrogen (NOx) in the inventory. West Virginia University (WVU) has developed an extensive database of continuous transient gaseous emissions levels from a wide variety of heavy duty vehicles in field operation, from which a subset of vehicles (A to J) have been chosen for further analysis. Several different transient cycles were utilized for testing including the Central Business District schedule. The …

Comparative Analysis Of The Promoters Of The Cyi-Cyiia-Cyiib Actin Gene Cluster In The Sea Urchin Strongylocentrotus Purpuratus, Ruth Lynn Dukes

Graduate Theses, Dissertations, and Problem Reports (ETD)

Three of the eight actin genes in the sea urchin Strongylocentrotus purpuratus were used for a comparative analysis. The cytoplasmic actin genes CyI, CyIIb and CyIIa are linked in the genome and encode very similar proteins. However, their spatial and temporal expression patterns are differentially regulated. The region of CyIIa upstream of the ATG and putative transcription start site was subcloned and sequenced. Sites of protein-DNA interaction were identified using DNaseI footprinting. Comparisons of this data with that previously obtained for CyI and CyIIb showed that while CyI and CyIIb share an identical CArG (or serum response element) and extensive …

Effects Of Fermenten During The Dry And Early Lactation Periods Of Dairy Cows, Wellington Sifuna Mang'oli

Graduate Theses, Dissertations, and Problem Reports (ETD)

Fermenten is a commercially available by-product of lysine production recommended by the manufacturer (Biovance Technologies Inc., Omaha, NE) as a protein source for growing heifers and lactating cows. It has not been used in the diets of dry cows within 4 weeks of parturition. Three groups of 10 cows each, balanced for breed (Ayrshire and Holstein) and parity, were assigned to diets containing 0, 0.73 and 1.45 kg Fermenten dry matter/day. The diets were fed from 4 weeks prior to expected calving through 6 weeks of lactation. Dry matter intake of all diets decreased prior to calving, with the treatments …

Locating And Mapping Cemeteries In Loudon County, Virginia, Scott Marshall Sizer

Graduate Theses, Dissertations, and Problem Reports (ETD)

Protecting smaller family-type cemeteries is a difficult task in a rapidly growing area. This paper investigates that ways in which Loudoun County, Virginia addressed cemetery protection concerns. Cemetery locational data was captured from a variety of sources and integrated into the countys geographic information system (GIS). The locational information was gathered through digitization and with a Global Positioning System (GPS). Once the cemetery locational information was in the GIS, it was then integrated into an existing land development process.

Using Impedance Cardiography To Examine Changes In Hemodynamic Parameters During Heart Rate Biofeedback, Jeffrey Louis Goodie

Graduate Theses, Dissertations, and Problem Reports (ETD)

Reducing cardiovascular responses to stressors may help to reduce one's risk of developing cardiovascular disease. The present study examined the underlying hemodynamic changes that accompany heart rate (HR) response reduction to a stressor following HR feedback training. Twenty-five healthy college males were assigned to either a HR feedback training group (FB+) or a control group (FB--) and were presented with a videogame and mental arithmetic challenge, as HR, blood pressure, and impedance cardiography-derived measures were recorded. During the training sessions, the FB+ group received HR feedback and the FB-- group was not provided with HR feedback while playing the videogame. …

Investigation Of Hot Gas Desulfurization Utilizing A Transport Reactor, David A. Berry

Graduate Theses, Dissertations, and Problem Reports (ETD)

This thesis investigated the use of transport reactor technology to conduct hot gas desulfurization (HGD). The need or market drivers for this technology were assessed to identify the demand and opportunity. A literature review was conducted to assess the status of HGD and the issues involved with its development.;Design requirements were identified for integrated gasification combined cycle (IGCC) power plants that would utilize transport HGD reactors to baseline the design for the technology. A target of 1/10 of the New Source Performance (NSPS) for the emission of sulfur dioxide was chosen as the sulfur removal requirement for the system. Process …

Reconstructing Atticus Finch, Steven Lubet

Michigan Law Review

Atticus Finch. No real-life lawyer has done more for the self-image or public perception of the legal profession than the hero of Harper Lee's novel, To Kill a Mockingbird. For nearly four decades, the name of Atticus Finch has been invoked to defend and inspire lawyers, to rebut lawyer jokes, and to justify (and fine-tune) the adversary system. Lawyers are greedy. What about Atticus Finch? Lawyers only serve the rich. Not Atticus Finch. Professionalism is a lost ideal. Remember Atticus Finch. In the unreconstructed Maycomb, Alabama of the 1930s, Atticus was willing to risk his social standing, professional reputation, and …

The Assault That Failed: The Progressive Critique Of Laissez Faire, Richard A. Epstein

Michigan Law Review

Robert Lee Hale has long been an intellectual thorn in the side of the defenders of laissez faire, among whom I am quite happy to count myself. As Barbara Fried notes in her meticulous study of Hale's work, his name is hardly a household word. But both directly and indirectly, his influence continues to be great. His best known work is perhaps Coercion and Distribution in a Supposedly Non-Coercive State, published in 1923 as a review of Thomas Nixon Carver's Principles of National Economy, itself a defense of the classical principles of laissez faire, remembered today only for the drubbing …

A New Economic Theory Of Regulation: Rent Extraction Rather Than Rent Creation, Douglas Ginsburg

Michigan Law Review

Once upon a time, people believed that the government regulated various indus tries in "the public interest." The idea was that certain conditions, such as "natural monopoly" or the ability to externalize significant costs, caus ed markets to fail and governments to step in to correct that failure. Econmnic regulation predicated upon market failure can be dated conveniently to the Interstate Commerce Act of 1887, in which the Congress established the Inters tate Commerce Commission to regulate railroads in the interests of shippers, principally farmers and small businesses. The legal notion of "affectation with the public interest" dates back much …

Rights And Wrongs, John C.P. Goldberg

Michigan Law Review

If one were to ask an American lawyer or legal scholar for a definition of liberalism, her explanation would likely include mention of constitutional provisions such as the First and Fourth Amendments. This is because liberalism is today understood primarily as a theory of what government officials may not do to citizens. Its most immediate expression in law is thus taken to be those parts of the Bill of Rights that set limits on state action. This tendency to conceive of liberalism exclusively as a theory of rights against government is a twentieth century phenomenon. To be sure, liberalism has …

The Rise Of America's Two National Pastimes: Baseball And The Law, Cleta Deatherage Mitchell

Michigan Law Review

Mark McGwire's seventieth home run ball sold at auction in January of this year for $3,005,000. In late 1998, Baltimore Orioles owner Peter Angelos sued a former Orioles manager and his daughter in the circuit court of Cook County, Illinois. Angelos alleged that the original lineup card from the 1995 game when Cal Ripken, Jr., broke Lou Gehrig's consecutive game record belongs to the Orioles, not to the former manager and certainly not to his daughter. There may be no crying in baseball, but there is money. And wherever earthly treasure gathers two or more, a legal system arises. From …

Mean Value Modeling And Control Of A Diesel Engine Using Neural Networks, Yasser Yacoub

Graduate Theses, Dissertations, and Problem Reports (ETD)

Increasingly stringent emissions legislation and demands for improved fuel economy have mandated the need for advanced control algorithms and complicated the diesel engine calibration procedure. To this end, a neural network-based mean value model of a modern turbocharged direct injection diesel engine has been developed and validated. For a pre-specified engine speed schedule and control vector trajectory, the engine model was shown to produce accurate predictions of the turbocharger manifold charging dynamics and combustion efficiency through engine brake torque predictions. The mean value model was coupled with several sub-models to predict exhaust gaseous and particulate emissions and satisfactory predictions were …

Generalizability Of Cardiovascular Reactivity To Stress Among Doctoral Students Between Laboratory And Natural Settings, James P. Davig

Graduate Theses, Dissertations, and Problem Reports (ETD)

This study extends previous work investigating the generalizability of cardiovascular reactivity to stress obtained in response to laboratory-based tasks to cardiovascular reactivity measured in response to a natural occurring event. Cardiovascular reactivity (HR, SBP, DBP) to stress was measured with ambulatory monitoring equipment in 6 male and 16 female healthy Caucasian graduate students in two settings: during five standardized laboratory stressors, and during the proposal or defense of a thesis or dissertation. Results indicate that for all cardiovascular parameters, the magnitude of change was greatest in response to the natural event, and that among the laboratory tasks, the greatest degree …

Using Stages Of Change To Examine Fear, Threat, Efficacy, And Safety Climate Perceptions In Health Care Workers Who Routinely Handle Needles And Sharps, Brian Thomas Day

Graduate Theses, Dissertations, and Problem Reports (ETD)

Standard precautions are mandated for the purpose of decreasing the risk of bloodborne pathogen transmission of diseases, namely human immunodeficiency virus (HIV) and hepatitis B infections. One of the stipulations of standard precautions is that used needles should not be recapped and should be disposed of in an appropriate sharps container. The rate of needle stick injuries among health care workers remains at a high level despite the 1992 passage of the Occupational Safety and Health Administration (OSHA) regulations regarding standard precautions. The role fear plays in decisions regarding individual health related behaviors such as intravenous drug use has been …

Androgen-Induced Norepinephrine Release In Male Accessory Sex Organ Smooth Muscle Growth And Differentiation, Julie M. Kim

Graduate Theses, Dissertations, and Problem Reports (ETD)

The goal of this research was to determine the role of norepinephrine (NE) in androgen-dependent pubertal proliferation and adult terminal differentiation in normal male accessory sex organ smooth muscle. The guinea pig seminal vesicle served as a model as its unique anatomy allowed clean harvest of smooth muscle without epithelium.;Androgen significantly increased in vivo DNA synthesis, total DNA, and NE release and down-regulated protein kinase C (PKC) in prepubertal seminal vesicle smooth muscle (SVSM) relative to prepubertal orchiectomized controls. High performance liquid chromotography quantified NE release as an increased concentration of (1) endogenous NE-metabolite, 3,4-dihydroxyphenolglycol per NE, and (2) NE …

Domains Of Organizational Effectiveness Of Gerontology Centers In Higher Education, Allison Hale Nichols

Graduate Theses, Dissertations, and Problem Reports (ETD)

This is an exploratory study that focuses on organizational effectiveness of gerontology centers and institutes at American universities. The study was modeled after studies of organizational effectiveness in higher education by Kim Cameron of Brigham Young University. The study identifies six domains of effectiveness that are important to gerontology centers and the structural and functional models and characteristics of gerontology centers that may predict the domain in which it is effective. The target population of the study was dominant coalition members of 87 gerontology centers, namely, administrators and faculty members who have the most influence on policy, direction, and performance. …

Alterations In Intrinsic Heart Rate In Endotoxemia, Peter Drew Wearden

Graduate Theses, Dissertations, and Problem Reports (ETD)

After much early debate, it is now well recognized that the origin of the heart beat is myogenic, or intrinsic, to the heart. It has been felt that the intrinsic heart rate (IHR) is constant and that the observed heart rate is controlled by tonal alterations in the activity of the autonomic nervous system in response to various stimuli. Some investigators have recognized, however, that the intrinsic heart rate (IHR) can be altered in certain conditions. Sepsis, or the host response to bacterial infection, is recognized as a stress to the host that results in decreased myocardial contractility and tachycardia. …

The Effects Of Varying Concentration And Duration Of Cfc-113 Exposure On End-Exhaled Breath Cfc-113 Concentration, Demetra Grace Dalamagas

Graduate Theses, Dissertations, and Problem Reports (ETD)

Subjects were exposed to different concentrations of CFC-113 for variable duration while conducting 30-minute exercise regiments. End-exhaled breath samples were collected 25, 30 and 35 minutes after the exercise regiment and quantified using gas chromatography. Three comparative studies were conducted.;A short duration administration delivered at the beginning or at the end of the regiment was compared to a long duration administration delivered at the beginning or at the end of the exercise regiment. The second study compared breath samples when 500 ppm of CFC-113 was administered at the beginning or end six minutes of the regiment. The third compared continuous …

The Murray Ledger And Times, May 1, 1999, The Murray Ledger And Times

The Murray Ledger & Times

No abstract provided.

The Evaluation Of Research For Promotion And Tenure: An Organizational Perspective, Elsa G. Nadler

Graduate Theses, Dissertations, and Problem Reports (ETD)

The literature on promotion and tenure in institutions of higher education includes a substantial amount of research on various aspects of faculty productivity. Yet other research concentrates on the organizational structure of higher education. In his 1986 book, Burton Clark called for research that would examine how what he called the enterprise (the local university as opposed to the statewide system) and departments within it interact in important arenas.;This dissertation takes up Clark's challenge to examine the interaction of enterprise and department in promotion and tenure in three areas: goals, structure and operations. Content analysis of faculty handbooks from 25 …

The Role Of The Special Education Administrator As Perceived By Principals, Superintendents, And Special Education Administrators In West Virginia, Katherine Leary Porter

Graduate Theses, Dissertations, and Problem Reports (ETD)

This study examined the expectations held by key administrative personnel within West Virginia public schools regarding the role of the special education administrator. Existing differences in perception of the administrative functions of the special education administrator in West Virginia among and within groups of superintendents, principals, and special education administrators were investigated. Forty administrative tasks organized into seven administrative activities were examined in order to identify potential areas of conflict between the school system administrators. The responses analyzed pertained to both the perceived performance and the perceived importance of each administrative task.;The West Virginia school personnel that participated in this …

Fabricating Authenticity: Law Students As Country Music Stars, David S. Caudill

Cardozo Law Review

No abstract provided.

Economic Development And Health Status Among The Poor In Squatter Settlements Of Karachi., Fauziah Rabbani, Anwer T. Merchant

Community Health Sciences

OBJECTIVE:

Socioeconomic status is an important determinant of health outcome measures. This study examines and presents some of the important health outcomes amongst the higher and lower socioeconomic groups within the urban poor.

SETTING:

Data analysis is based on a Health and Demographic Survey conducted in urban squatter settlements of Karachi in 1996.

METHODS:

A structured questionnaire was administered to all households in the catchment area. The indicator used to assess economic status is ownership of assets.

RESULTS:

Comparison between the two economic levels shows that the lower socio-economic group was more likely to experience child mortality, (CI; 1.02-1.29, p …

Operatic Hermeneutics: Harmony, Euphantasy, And Law In Rossini's Semiramis, Peter Goodrich

Cardozo Law Review

No abstract provided.

Is There A Focal Meaning Of Being In Aristotle?, Jiyuan Yu

The Society for Ancient Greek Philosophy Newsletter

At the beginning of Metaphysics Γ Aristotle claims that there is a science which is concerned with being qua being. 'Being’ is said in many senses. Different beings are not said to be purely homonymous, but rather to be “related to one thing (πρόσ ἕν)”(1003a33- 4). G.E.L Owen translates this ττρός ἕν formula as "focal meaning", and in his paraphrase, it means that all the “senses [of ‘being’] have one focus, one common element”, or “a central sense”, so that “all its senses can be explained in terms of substance and of the sense of ‘being’ that is appropriate to …

Bs News

Building Services Engineering

No abstract provided.

Ultrasonic Enhancement Of Antibiotic Action On Escherichia Coli Biofilms: An In Vivo Model, Andrea M. Rediske, Beverly L. Roeder, Maren K. Brown, Jared L. Nelson, Rachel L. Robison, David O. Draper, G. Bruce Schaalje, Richard A. Robison, William G. Pitt

Faculty Publications

Biofilm infections are a common complication of prosthetic devices in humans. Previous in vitro research has determined that low-frequency ultrasound combined with aminoglycoside antibiotics is an effective method of killing biofilms. We report the development of an in vivo model to determine if ultrasound enhances antibiotic action. Two 24-h-old Escherichia coli (ATCC 10798) biofilms grown on polyethylene disks were implanted subcutaneously on the backs of New Zealand White female rabbits, one on each side of the spine. Low-frequency (28.48-kHz) and low-power-density (100- and 300-mW/cm2) continuous ultrasound treatment was applied for 24 h with and without systemic administration of gentamicin. The …

Uptake And Transformation Of Trichloroethylene By Hybrid Poplar: Laboratory Studies, Julie K. Chard

All Graduate Theses and Dissertations, Spring 1920 to Summer 2023

Trichloroethylene (TCE) was widely used as an industrial solvent and degreasing agent for most of the twentieth century. It is now a widespread groundwater contaminant. Phytoremediation may be a cost-effective cleanup method for TCE-contaminated soils and groundwater. Studies of environmental TCE fate are complicated by its volatility. The literature reports both significant and insignificant plant uptake of TCE. Conflicting findings may be due to differences in exposure level, conditions, and duration of the studies, or to experimental artifacts from laboratory systems.

This research quantified plant uptake and volatilization of TCE using a unique laboratory system. Hybrid poplar trees were exposed …

A Community Wide Study Of The Hospice Referral Process, Jarilyn K. Gess

Theses and Dissertations

The purpose of this research study was to understand the decision making process when seeking hospice care. The objectives were to identify the decision maker for the patient when seeking hospice care, why they were seeking hospice care, who initiated the referral, if the decision maker was aware they can self refer to hospice care, and the benefits of hospice care for the patient and family.

The study is a qualitative and quantitative descriptive study utilizing a telephone survey design as described by Dillman (1978). One hundred patients who had been referred to Hospice of the Red River Valley (HRRV) …