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The Molecular Mechanisms Underlying 6-Hydroxydopamine And Ethanol-Induced Neurotoxicity, Gang Chen

Graduate Theses, Dissertations, and Problem Reports (ETD)

Ethanol and 6-hydroxydopamine (6-OHDA), a Parkinson's disease (PD) mimetic, are two toxins to the cerebellum. This study investigated the molecular mechanisms underlying their neurotoxicities. The work in chapter 2 of this thesis focused on 6-OHDA-induced neurodegeneration. Previous studies indicate that impaired function of the endoplasmic reticulum (ER), commonly referred to as ER stress, is an important factor in the neuropathology of a wide variety of neurological disorders. This study demonstrated that 6-OHDA evoked ER-stress and led to apoptosis in SH-SY5Y neuronal cell line and cultured rat cerebellar granule neurons (CGNs). Furthermore, GSK3beta played a crucial role in mediating 6-OHDA's neurotoxicity. …

Investigating Treatment Windows For Effective And Environmentally Sound Herbicide Applications For Controlling Tree-Of-Heaven, William E. Eck

Graduate Theses, Dissertations, and Problem Reports (ETD)

This paper discusses three research studies, each investigating a different treatment window for controlling tree-of-heaven using effective and environmentally sound herbicide applications. In the first study, efficacy of the herbicides triclopyr and imazapyr was tested using injection and basal bark treatment methods. In the second study, efficacy of triclopyr with different levels of imazapyr was tested using the basal bark treatment method. In the third study, weekly timing of chemical controls was investigated. Our study yielded a recommendation to treat tree-of-heaven with a low volume basal spray of Garlon 4 in a non-aromatic penetrating oil when growth is maximized in …

Analysis Of Aging Effects And Effectiveness Of Dewatering Treatment Methods On Acid Mine Drainage Sludge, Phanindra Kumar V. Kunderu

Graduate Theses, Dissertations, and Problem Reports (ETD)

Acid Mine Drainage (AMD) is produced when sulfide minerals in overburden are subjected to oxygen and water, and generally contains low pH, high acidity and high dissolved metal concentrations. Typically, active treatment of AMD involves the addition of a neutralizing reagent to raise the pH and precipitate the metals as their respective insoluble metal hydroxides. As a by-product of the active treatment of AMD, a large amount of sludge is generated. A site, established in Monongalia County, WV for the active treatment of AMD using ammonia and hydrogen peroxide, generated sludge consisting mainly of water with a total solids concentration …

The Effects Of The Route Of Viral Infection On The Balance Of T Helper Immune Responses., Alicia R. Mathers

Graduate Theses, Dissertations, and Problem Reports (ETD)

The majority of pathogens enter the host through mucosal surfaces. Therefore, it stands to reason that production of protective mucosal immunity is a desirable outcome following vaccination for those infections. However, only a few mucosal vaccines have been developed to date, in part because of a general lack of understanding of mucosal immunity. The research presented in this dissertation is focused on the comparison of mucosal and systemic immunizations as a means of contributing to the understanding of how mucosal immune responses are induced. There is evidence that mucosal immunization can skew the balance of T helper (Th) 1 and …

Agenda Setting And Denial In The States. Nonprofit Hospital Tax Exemptions: A North Carolina Case Study., Linda Struyk Millsaps

Graduate Theses, Dissertations, and Problem Reports (ETD)

This research has two objectives. First, it examines the nature of state-level agenda setting, comparing it to the prevailing federal level theories of agenda setting and agenda denial. Specifically it examines state tax exemptions for nonprofit hospitals in North Carolina to determine if this policy arena follows acknowledged theories of agenda setting and denial, or if there is something unique about tax policy that creates a different agenda setting dynamic. Areas of focus included the status of nonprofit hospital property tax exemptions on the policy agenda and how the issue came to that position. Interviews with legislators, lobbyists, hospital and …

Seawater Proteomics: The Recovery, Separation, And Characterization Of Dissolved Proteins In Seawater., Matthew Jacob Powell

Graduate Theses, Dissertations, and Problem Reports (ETD)

Dissolved proteins are important components of high molecular weight marine dissolved organic matter (DOM). Little is known about the sources, transformations, and pathways of marine DOM, and <30% has been characterized at the molecular-level. Advances in proteomics technology have improved our ability to sequence proteins, making dissolved proteins a suitable target for molecular-level characterization. Dissolved proteins are important biomarkers in the oceans, and molecular-level analysis can provide valuable insight into their chemical characteristics, structural modifications, and potential sources. Molecular-level characterization of dissolved proteins in seawater requires a reproducible recovery method with efficient recovery yields and minimal sample losses. The use of surface blocking agents (SBA) to saturate sites of non-specific interactions reduced adsorptive sample losses during recovery of dissolved proteins from artificial seawater by tangential flow ultrafiltration. The SBA pre-treatment resulted in more reproducible recovery yields (∼55–60%) and enhanced initial recovery by 46%. Dissolved proteins recovered from deep and surface seawater samples were separated by gel electrophoresis, revealing the presence of a small number of discrete bands and significant amounts of unresolved background. A proteinase K assay determined that the bands and unresolved background were proteinaceous in nature. Enzymatic digests of the dissolved proteins were analyzed by reversed phase chromatography coupled on-line to a linear trapping quadrupole Fourier transform mass spectrometer (LTQ-FTMS). The peptide MS/MS spectra were searched against non-redundant databases by correlation algorithms, but no positive identifications were made. The peptide tandem mass spectra were directly interpreted by de novo sequencing to generate peptide tags that were used in database searches to develop protein homologue information. The similarity search results revealed two trends for specific classes of proteins observed (membrane/envelope proteins and enzymes) and identified conserved sequences for several multi-species protein homologues. These results demonstrate that there are several different classes of refractory proteins represented in the DOM pool and provide evidence for the presence of dissolved proteins other than bacterial outer membrane proteins. Additionally, an intact protein was extracted from a gel band and analyzed by direct infusion ESI FTMS. The resultant high resolution protein spectrum was deconvoluted to determine the accurate molecular weight of the protein.

The Establishment, Management And Evaluation Of The Conservation Reserve System In The Rangelands Of Western Australia, Anthony Brandis

Theses

The rangelands of Western Australia cover about 85% of the State and include the sub-tropical savanna of the Kimberley, the semi arid and arid spinifex, the southern mulga shrublands and the extensive chenopod plains of the Nullarbor. About 40% of the rangelands are managed for the production of meat and wool under a pastoral lease system. A large range of ecosystems occurs within these pastoral leases where, after a relatively short period of time, many changes to native flora and fauna populations have occurred. Biological diversity in the rangelands is declining most noticeably with the extinction, or reduction in the …

Effects Of Historical And Contemporary Factors On Genetic Diversity In The Mountain Whitefish (Prosopium Williamsoni), Andrew Robert Whiteley

Graduate Student Theses, Dissertations, & Professional Papers

No abstract provided.

An Analysis Of Dropout's Talk About Participation At School From Democratic Perspectives, Rosemary J. Hertel

Graduate Student Theses, Dissertations, & Professional Papers

No abstract provided.

Mechanisms Of Functional Tricuspid Valve Regurgitation In Ischemic Cardiomyopathy, Thomas M. Joudinaud

Graduate Student Theses, Dissertations, & Professional Papers

No abstract provided.

Time-Resolved Analysis Of Ribosomal Rna Dynamics, Scott Patrick Hennelly

Graduate Student Theses, Dissertations, & Professional Papers

No abstract provided.

The Role Of Cognitive Factors In The Development Of Posttraumatic Stress Disorder., Lisa B. Greene

Graduate Theses, Dissertations, and Problem Reports (ETD)

The present study examined the relation between the development of PTSD and coping, posttraumatic cognitions, resilience, spirituality, and religiosity. A total of 91 participants (out of 304 screened) were divided into three groups—Control, Trauma Exposed, and PTSD. Participants completed the Posttraumatic Stress Diagnostic Scale (PDS), Ways of Coping Questionnaire (WOCQ), Posttraumatic Cognitions Inventory (PTCI), ConnorDavidson Resilience Scale (CD-RISC), Spiritual Involvement and Beliefs Scale (SIBS), and Religiosity Measures Questionnaire (RMQ). Results indicated that the Trauma Exposed group scored the lowest on the Self-Controlling, Accepting Responsibility, and Escape-Avoidance subscales of the WOCQ while the PTSD group scored the highest. Additionally, the Trauma …

Spatial Characterization Of Pollution Sources: An Analysis Of In-Stream Water Quality Data From The Potomac Headwaters Of West Virginia., A. Andrew Macqueen Iv

Graduate Theses, Dissertations, and Problem Reports (ETD)

The relationship between land cover characteristics and water pollutant concentrations in surface water was evaluated for 10 sub-basins in the Potomac Headwaters Region of West Virginia. Using water quality data collected between 1998 and 2004 by the West Virginia Department of Agriculture (WVDA), mean and median in-stream concentrations of fecal coliform, total phosphorus, and nitrate nitrogen were determined for specific periods of time during the sampling period. Land use categories were evaluated on a basin-wide and a floodplain-specific scale. The percentages of forest, agriculture, cropland and urban land were determined. In addition, erodibility, organic matter content and permeability were aggregated …

Aterf4 And Aterf7 Are Involved In The Abscisic Acid Signaling Response In Arabidopsis., Zhen Yang

Graduate Theses, Dissertations, and Problem Reports (ETD)

ERFs (ethylene-responsive element binding factors) belong to a large family of transcription factors that are found exclusively in plants. A small subfamily of ERF proteins can act as transcriptional repressors. The Arabidopsis genome contains eight ERF repressors, namely AtERF3, AtERF4, AtERF7, AtERF8, AtERF9, AtERF10, AtERF11, and AtERF12. The different ERF repressors show differential expression, suggesting that they may have different function. The expression of AtERF4 can be induced by ethylene, jasmonic acid, or abscisic acid. AtERF7 can be induced by abscisic acid only. Using a transient expression system, we demonstrated that AtERF4 and AtERF7 can function as transcriptional repressors. By …

The Spiritual Values Of Wilderness, John Copeland Nagle

Journal Articles

The Wilderness Act of 1964 is the principal legal mechanism for preserving wilderness in the United States. The law now protects over 100 million acres of federal land, half of which is in Alaska. Yet the contested meaning of the term wilderness continues to affect the management of those wilderness areas, and the designation of additional lands as wilderness areas. Much current thinking about wilderness emphasizes the ecological and recreational interests that Congress cited when it enacted the law. These justifications for wilderness preservation are important, but they are incomplete. They are best supplemented by a better understanding of the …

Shopping For Law In A Coasean Market, G. Marcus Cole

Journal Articles

In the twentieth century, two Nobel-Prize winning economists wrote two seemingly unrelated characterizations of the processes constraining human behavior. One, Ronald Coase, wrote a short article entitled The Nature of the Firm,1 in which he reduced all managerial decision-making to a fundamental choice between making the factors of production, or buying them. This article and the idea of the "make or buy" decision for which it has come to be known, have proven to be among the most seminal in the history of financial economics and organizational behavior.

The second economist, Friedrich Hayek, wrote what he thought to be a …

Physiological And Psychological Responses To Stress In Elite Swimmers, Josie M. Jedick

Modern Psychological Studies

The purpose of this study was to analyze the effects of different amounts of outside stress on a group of 13 male and 12 female swimmers from Arizona State University who were involved in the same amount of exercise stress. It was hypothesized that high levels of outside stress in addition to the imposed training stress should correlate with more negative mood and with more health problems. It was also expected that the combination of these effects would contribute to a decline in performance. Several questionnaires were utilized to evaluate the defined variables of life event stress (Life Events Survey …

Emerging From Engineering Education – Building A Remotely Operated Submarine, Hong Zhang, Bernard Pietrucha, John Chen

Mechanical Engineering

In spring 2004, the Department of Mechanical Engineering of Rowan University offered a new course called “Emerging Topic – Designing and Building a Remotely Operated Vehicle (ROV)”. It is a project-based course where students are required to design, build and operate a submersible with provided materials. This course integrated many engineering aspects into one project and also exposed mechanical engineering students to Mechatronics. The course was welcomed by students and the response from them was quite positive.

A Study Of The Effects Of The 2004 Tsunami On Coral Reefs And Fisheries Of The Indian Ocean, Joseph Lane Campbell

Honors Theses

This thesis serves as a broad-scale review of the effects of the tsunami on the coral reefs and the fisheries of the affected Indian Ocean region. The main goals were to 1) use my research from a recolonization project completed May 2004 as a basis for predictiverecovery models for the coral reefs, 2) review and summarize the newly available literature of the tsunami effects on coral reefs in the Indian Ocean and 3) predict the future of the Indian Ocean fisheries based on the review of the tsunami effects on human and fishery communities, using selected species as models. It …

Corticosterone Response In A Learned Helplessness Model Of Depression, Courtney M. Cartwright

Honors Theses

This purpose of this study was to quantify both behavioral and biological markers of stress (i.e. distress vocalizations, plasma corticosterone) in the chick stress-separation paradigm. In this study, chicks were isolated from companions for either 5,10,15,20,40, or 60 minutes and distress vocalizations were recorded. In addition, one group was tested in the presence of social companions for 60 minutes. Blood was collected from half of the subjects immediately following the testing period and was also collected in a no-test group to establish plasma corticosterone basal levels. Isolation produced a significant elevation in distress vocalizations and corticosterone. The pattern of distress …

Engineering Genetic Networks To Measure Real Time Repression By Λ Cro In Vivo, Zachary Louis Leblanc

Honors Theses

The field of systems biology seeks to engineer systems in order to explore specific dynamic properties as they act in vivo. Cellular activities have been proven to be regulated by a range of DNA binding proteins that bind to specific sequences that activate or repress transcription. Certain phage and bacterial repressor proteins were among the first of these DNA binding proteins to be characterized structurally and functionally. The demand for study of key steps in regulation of protein expression, folding, and repression has created multiple studies into systems of varying complexity. The data in this report explores the lambda system, …

Differences In Convention: Serious Vs. Comic In Turn-Of-The-Century British Literature (1885-1915), Christopher Michael Mossing

Honors Theses

This thesis attempts to prove that the serious fiction of the late Victorian, the Edwardian, and early modernist eras of British literature differs fundamentally from the comic fiction of the same region and period in the way that it deals with chance. In serious works, authors do not allow acts of chance to dictate the responses of their characters, while the authors of comic works seem to be under no such restriction. To prove that this difference in convention exists, the thesis examines works from a handful of representative authors. For the serious, the thesis examines Thomas Hardy’s Tess of …

The Influence Of Parenting Styles On The Development Of Moral Judgment In College Level Adolescents, Scott M. Hawkins

Doctoral Dissertations and Projects

This research project addresses the relationship between parenting styles and the development of moral judgment in college students enrolled in a four year private University in Central Virginia. The purpose of this study is to identify the extent to which parenting styles are one of the "building blocks" for the development of moral judgment in adolescents. The instruments used are the Parental Authority Questionnaire (Buri, 1988) and the Defining Issues Test - II (Rest, 1999). The researcher hypothesized that the levels of moral judgment found in college students who perceive that they were parented by parents utilizing an Authoritative parenting …

Advanced Glycation Endproducts Analysis Of Glucosamine With Reducing Sugars, Dna Nucleosides And Serum Proteins, Udayan Dutta

Open Access Dissertations

Advanced glycation endproducts (AGE) are a complex and heterogeneous group of compounds formed by the nonenzymatic reactions of reducing sugars with amino acids and proteins. The reaction is called the Maillard reaction and is central to all protein glycation studies. Accumulation of AGE in human tissue has been associated with the pathology of various diseases like diabetes, Alzheimer's disease, renal failure and ageing and has generated great interest in methods for characterizing the glycated products. Glucosamine GlcN is an unregulated high profile dietary supplement used for the treatment of osteoarthritis with few side effects. There is very little understanding on …

Validation Of A Tool To Measure Drug Knowledge: Evaluating Bioterrorism Preparedness Activities, Gregory A. Low

Open Access Dissertations

Background. Pharmaceutical supplies sufficient to protect millions of people are positioned to respond to a bioterrorist attack in the United States of America, but the educational resources, programs, material, and health professional staffing, to utilize those supplies optimally may be underdeveloped. Professionals and municipalities require objective tools to measure their ability to communicate necessary drug information to adhere to emergency prophylactic regimens. Objective. This research project created a survey tool and laid the foundation to establish the tool's validity to measure patient drug knowledge in bioterrorism preparedness activities that involve the dispensing of prophylactic medications. Methods. Test construction was based …

The "War On Terror" And The "War Of Terror": Nomadic Multitudes, Aggressive Incumbents, And The "New" International Law: Prefactory Remarks On Two "Wars", Upendra Baxi

Osgoode Hall Law Journal

This article contrasts and compares the war on terror and the war of terror in the wake of, and before, 11 September 2001. The philosophical underpinnings involved in defining "terrorism" are analyzed in the context of the United States' war on terrorism and related wars of terrorism, such as the 1998 World Islamic Council's fatwa. Both wars fall within the wording of recent United Nations' Resolutions that address the adverse impact of terrorism on Human Rights. The understanding of the meaning of "terrorism" by those promoting the war on terrorism provides a powerful political tool, notwithstanding effects on Human Rights …

Retinohypothalamic Connections In The Rhesus Monkey., John C. Chijuka

All ETDs from UAB

No abstract provided.

Vaccines And Disease Mechanisms Relevant To Pneumococcal Disease In Two Groups Of High -Risk Children., Mamie Thomas Coats

All ETDs from UAB

No abstract provided.

Blockage Of O-Glcnac Metabolism By Overexpressing A Dominant-Negative Splice Variant Of Ncoat Results In Cell Apoptosis., Yong Hu

All ETDs from UAB

No abstract provided.

Hox Proteins As Bmp Downstream Transcription Factors., Xuelin Li

All ETDs from UAB

No abstract provided.