Digital Commons Network^™

Equivariant Deformations Of Horospherical Surfaces, Michael Deutsch

All Theses and Dissertations (ETDs)

The classical Goursat transform for minimal surfaces is interpreted as conformal transformation of the Gauss map, allowing us to "bend" these surfaces for certain geometric purposes. A simple analogue of this deformation is defined for CMC1 surfaces which makes the Goursat transform equivariant with respect to the Lawson correspondence, thereby increasing the number of explicitly computable examples of minimal/CMC1 cousin pairs. We then indicate how the Goursat transformation law and integrability conditions for the "spin curve" of a horospherical surface are analogous to the Lorentz transformation law and equations of motion for the wavefunction of a massless fermion.

Ionic Mechanisms Of Action Potential Rate Dependence, Conduction And Block In Normal Epicardium And In Remodeled Epicardium Post-Infarction, Keith Decker

All Theses and Dissertations (ETDs)

In this work, detailed computational models are used to study the electrophysiology of normal epicardium and the arrhythmogenic effects of epicardial cell remodeling post-infarction. The canine epicardial myocyte model described here reproduces a wide range of experimentally observed rate dependent phenomena in cell and tissue. Model behavior depends on updated formulations for the 4-AP sensitive transient outward current: Ito1), the slow component of the delayed rectifier potassium current: IKs), the L-type Ca2+ channel: ICa,L) and the sodium-potassium pump: INaK) fit to data from canine ventricular myocytes. The model shows that Ito1 plays a limited role in potentiating peak ICa,L and …

Local And Systemic Consequences Of Reducing Notch Signaling In Skin Keratinocytes, Shadmehr Demehri

All Theses and Dissertations (ETDs)

Notch is a transmembrane receptor that mediates short-range signaling between neighboring cells. Notch signaling has been implicated in various cellular and developmental processes essential in the life of metazoans. Specifically, Notch signaling plays a critical role in mammalian skin. Removal of Notch alleles in skin keratinocytes has been associated with an array of phenotypes with varying severity based on the identity and number of remaining Notch receptors. Phenotypes include carcinogenesis: in the case of Notch1 loss), transformation of hair follicles to epidermal cysts and neonatal lethality, the latter seen in the absence of all Notch signaling. Although these phenotypes were …

Impossible Whiteness: Race, Gender, And American Identity In Early Twentieth-Century American Literature, Tarah Demant

All Theses and Dissertations (ETDs)

In Impossible Whiteness, I reveal whiteness--though oftentimes still an implicit critical assumption of normalcy--as a complex, shifting category in the literature of early twentieth-century America, and show how gender, particularly, disrupts American whiteness. I deconstruct the various ways in which whiteness is defined legally, culturally, and in the marketplace, and demonstrate how Edith Wharton, Anzia Yezierska, and F. Scott Fitzgerald trace these standards of whiteness and the inevitable failure of such racial: and implicitly gendered) refinement. Though critical literature has been slow to consider the role of race for these authors, I reveal them as actively participating in contemporary dialogues …

Sizing Up The Competition: Quantifying The Influence Of The Mental Lexicon On Auditory, Visual, And Audiovisual Spoken Word Recognition, Julia Feld

All Theses and Dissertations (ETDs)

A central question in research on spoken word recognition is whether spoken words are recognized relationally, in the context of other words in the mental lexicon: McClelland & Elman, 1986; Norris, 1994; Luce & Pisoni, 1998). The current research evaluated metrics for measuring the influence of the mental lexicon on spoken word recognition in auditory-only: A-only), visual-only: V-only) and audiovisual: AV) conditions, and assessed the extent to which lexical properties influence recognition similarly across modality of input. Lexical competition: the extent to which perceptually similar words influence recognition of a stimulus word) was quantified using metrics that are well-established in …

The Staggered Chiral Perturbation Theory In The Two-Flavor Case And Su(2) Chiral Analysis Of The Milc Data, Xining Du

All Theses and Dissertations (ETDs)

As a part of the Standard Model: SM), Quantum Chromodynamics: QCD) is a widely accepted theory to describe the physics of quarks and gluons. Formulating QCD on finite discrete lattices in Euclidean space-time not only enables one to study the theory non-perturbatively, but also provides a framework analogous to statistical systems, in which numerical methods can be applied. In this work, we concentrate on one specific fermion formalism, staggered fermions. To interpret the data obtained from numerical simulations with staggered fermions, a particular version of chiral perturbation theory: χPT), rooted staggered χPT: rSχPT), is needed to incorporate the discretization effects, …

Mitotic Cell Cycle Progression And Differentiation Of Germline Stem Cells In Caenorhabditis Elegans, Paul Fox

All Theses and Dissertations (ETDs)

In the C. elegans germline, stem cells make a decision to retain the germline proliferative cell fate or differentiate by entering meiosis. Importantly, this decision must be coordinated with progression through the mitotic cell cycle. Previous work has shown that the conserved GLP-1/Notch signaling pathway promotes the proliferative fate while two downstream and redundant pathways are repressed by GLP-1 and promote entry into meiosis: the GLD-1 and GLD-2 pathways. To better understand how the switch to enter meiosis is coordinated with progression through the mitotic cell cycle, I investigated mitotic cell cycle progression among germline proliferative cells. Proliferative cells cycle …

Mechanisms Of Copper-Dependent Notochord Formation In Zebrafish, John Gansner

All Theses and Dissertations (ETDs)

The interplay of genes and nutrition during early development profoundly impacts fetal outcome. Copper is an essential nutrient required for the redox activity of many enzymes, and recent work in our laboratory has elucidated the phenotype of copper deficiency in zebrafish, which includes a strikingly distorted notochord. The studies described here establish the specific genetic etiology of this distortion and reveal a number of gene-gene and gene-nutrient interactions critical to notochord morphogenesis. We first demonstrate that the notochord distortion observed in copper-deficient zebrafish results from lysyl oxidase cuproenzyme inhibition. Four lysyl oxidase family members are expressed throughout the developing zebrafish …

Leveraged Buyouts, Long Term Relationship And Financial Contracting, Lei Gao

All Theses and Dissertations (ETDs)

In the first chapter of my dissertation, I study private equity sponsored leveraged buyouts. In this study, I identify and estimate two components of the created value: benefits of debt and influence of private equity. In the second chapter of my dissertation, I study repeated games with private monitoring in continuous time. I apply stochastic filtering theory to characterize the evolution of players' beliefs, which is difficult to do in discrete time. In the third chapter of my dissertation, I study the connection between financial contracting and staged financing in venture capital.

A Laboratory-Based Study Of Mood And Eating Behavior In Overweight Children, Andrea Goldschmidt

All Theses and Dissertations (ETDs)

Loss of control over eating refers to the sense that one cannot control what or how much one is eating. Loss of control eating is prevalent among overweight children and is associated with psychosocial impairment. Self-report data suggest that pediatric loss of control eating may be related to the experience of aversive emotions, with investigators theorizing that loss of control eating is a maladaptive means of alleviating negative mood. However, these data need to be substantiated using more objective methodology. The current study utilized a feeding laboratory paradigm to further explore the relation between mood and eating in 46 overweight …

Determing The Properties Of Dense Matter: Superconductivity, Bulk Viscosity, And Light Reflection In Compact Stars, Gerald Good

All Theses and Dissertations (ETDs)

In this dissertation, we investigate the properties of matter, denser than nuclei, that exists inside compact stars. First, we examine a mixed superfluid/superconductor system, which likely occurs in neutron star cores. We derive an effective theory of Cooper pair quasiparticles from a microscopic theory of nucleons, and calculate the coupling strengths between quasiparticles. We then calculate the structure of magnetic flux tubes, taking into consideration interactions between neutron and proton Cooper pairs. We find that interactions between the condensates can lead to interesting phenomena and new phases at the border between type-I and type-II behavior. Next, we examine the response …

Evaluating The Patient-Centeredness Of Medicare Part D, Melissa Hensley

All Theses and Dissertations (ETDs)

The implementation of the Medicare prescription drug benefit: "Part D") has brought about many changes in the provision of prescription medications to adults with serious mental illness. Existing research on the impact of Part D on this population, for the most part, examines the benefit from the perspective of the physicians who treat these individuals. This research seeks to use a framework of patient-centered care to examine the impact of the Part D benefit on adults with mental illness, from the viewpoints of beneficiaries themselves and the case managers: "community support workers") who serve them. In addition, data from the …

Roles Of Inhibitory Interneurons In Cerebellar Cortical Processing For Oculomotor Control, Shane Heiney

All Theses and Dissertations (ETDs)

The cerebellar cortex is usually offered up as the prime example of a well-worked out circuit; indeed, its basic neuronal composition and organization has been known for over one hundred years. Yet mysteries still abound about the computations that are performed within its layers, and how these computations contribute to sensation and behavior. This project was an effort to look inside the cerebellar cortical circuit during behavior to see if I could shed some light on the computations being performed. The dissertation is divided into three main sections. In the first, I present the results of preliminary work performed by …

The Role Of Pax6 In Lens Placode Formation, Jie Huang

All Theses and Dissertations (ETDs)

THE ROLE OF PAX6 IN LENS PLACODE FORMATION by Jie Huang Washington University in St. Louis, 2010 Professor David Beeebe, Chairperson Although placodes are ubiquitous precursors of tissue invagination, the mechanism of placode formation and its importance for invagination are unclear. We tested the "restricted expansion hypothesis" of lens placode formation by conditionally deleting the transcription factor, Pax6, or the matrix component, Fn1. Deletion of Pax6 from the lens-forming ectoderm prevented placode formation without altering cell proliferation or volume. Pax6CKO ectoderm expanded, rather than being constrained to a constant area, as normally occurs during lens placode formation, and expressed lower …

Analysis Of Dna-Binding Proteins In Yeast Saccharomyces Cerevisiae, Su-Wen Ho

All Theses and Dissertations (ETDs)

Gene expression is an elaborate and finely tuned process involving the regulated interactions of multiple proteins with promoter and enhancer elements. A variety of approaches are currently used to study these interactions in vivo, in vitro as well as in silico. With the genome sequences of many organisms now readily available, a plethora of DNA functional elements have been predicted, but the process of identifying the proteins that bind to them in vivo remains a bottleneck. I developed two high-throughput assays to address this issue. The first is a modification of the yeast "one-hybrid" assay. The second is probing protein …

Multicultural Men?: The Early, Exclusionary Mulitcultural Vision Of Edward F. Haskell's Lance, Brian Flota

Selected Works

No abstract provided.

An Interview With Edsger W. Dijkstra, Philip Frana

Selected Works

No abstract provided.

Think Locally, Act Globally: Taking Us Copyright Reform To A World Stage, Traci Zimmerman

Selected Works

No abstract provided.

The Times, They Are Remixin’: Indaba Music, Creative Commons, And The Digital Collaboration Frontier, Traci Zimmerman

Selected Works

No abstract provided.

Women At Work And Home: New Technologies And Labor Among Minority Women In Seelampur, Sreela Sarkar

Communication

This study follows Seelampur women who participate in the ICTD project at the Gender Resource Center from the doorsteps of the ICT center into their everyday lives. This paper explores the impact of new technologies on minority women and work in the resettlement colony of Seelampur and other institutional sites of labor through an extended period of fieldwork observations and interviews. One of the main aims of the Seelampur ICT and development project is to empower minority women to participate with equity in the modern labor force. How does work and participation in the labor force change for Seelampur women …

An Argument For The Moral Obligation Of Physicians To Practice Healthy Behaviors, Kathryn A. Skimming

Honors Theses

Obligations of physicians to practice healthy behaviors are analyzed through three ethical frameworks. Physicians can be considered public benefactors and are able to influence patients to adopt healthier habits and increase total utility. Society creates a moral obligation for physicians to follow the norms regarding a physician's appearance. Kant's categorical imperative also shows physicians have a moral obligation to practice healthy behaviors. Finally, a healthy lifestyle can be considered a mean between extreme behaviors. The medical community should try to promote an environment in which physicians are better able to practice healthy behaviors, because a situation can influence our behaviors.

Wittgenstein On Aspect-Seeing, The Nature Of Discursive Consciousness, And The Experience Of Agency, Richard Thomas Eldridge

Philosophy Faculty Works

No abstract provided.

Early Christian Contempt For The Flesh And The Woman Who Loved Too Much In The Gospel Of Luke, Mark I. Wallace

Religion Faculty Works

No abstract provided.

An Anxiety Of Authenticity? Fusion Musics And Tunisian Identity, Rachel R. Colwell

Honors Papers

The analytical trope of "hybridity" has a troubled past in the social sciences. The careless adoption of scientific terminology without adaptation to cultural contexts can result in dangerous consequences for ethnomusicology. This paper challenges, and ultimately accepts, the efficacy of "hybridity" as a model for musical contact. Mindful of essentialization, post-colonial situations, and the perils of over-generalization, ethnomusicology holds sophisticated tools for examining local understandings of hybridity and the role that fusions play in shaping identities. Approaching musics from internal perspectives returns agency to musicians and listeners, liberating the local experience from the cloaking paradigm of "hybridity" as a strict …

Power To Choose?: An Analysis Of The Implications Of Gardasil For Immigrant Women, Olimpia Lee Pizzardi

Honors Papers

When the HPV vaccine, Gardasil, first entered the U.S. market in 2006, its groundbreaking promise to prevent cervical cancer and its status as a costly, gender-specific drug captured the nation's attention. Two years later, the United States Citizenship and Immigration Services (USCIS) began to require the HPV vaccine from immigrant women and girls as part of the naturalization process. In stark contrast to the journalistic stir that Gardasil provoked, the new immigration requirement went unnoticed until the National Coalition for Immigrant Women's Rights (NCIW) called it to attention. I examine the discursive practices and sociohistorical contexts that enabled the problematic …

The Impact Of A Tuition Fee Policy In Scotland; Evidence From A Natural Experiment, Margot Hanley

Honors Papers

In this paper I investigate the relationship between tuition fees and enrollment in higher education; in particular, the effect that the abolishment of upfront tuition fees (which were replaced by a graduate payment scheme) in Scotland for Scottish students had on their enrollment rate into universities in England. Several explanations have been offered as to why tuition response might be relatively large. Tuition is the most visible college price, and it is the one that is most inescapable. College tuitions are conspicuous, and students are unusually conscious of them. Annual increases generally are well publicized and often debated publicly. In …

“Only Connect”: Music’S Role In Forster's A Room With A View, Tammela A. Platt

Honors Papers

This essay addresses fragmentation and connection on multiple levels in relation to E.M. Forster’s 1908 novel, A Room with a View. George Emerson, the novel’s Romantic hero, loves Lucy Honeychurch and wishes to connect with her. But Lucy cannot decide to marry George for love until she realizes she loves him, the latter of which is not possible until she connects two fragments of her self. Music – in particular that of Beethoven, Schumann and Wagner – brings Lucy to the brink of connecting her inexperienced social self with her sophisticated and intuitive musical self.

Forster’s act of combining aesthetic …

Large Cardinals, Oliver Pechenik

Honors Papers

Infinite sets are a fundamental object of modern mathematics. Surprisingly, the existence of infinite sets cannot be proven within mathematics. Their existence, or even the consistency of their possible existence, must be justified extra-mathematically or taken as an article of faith. We describe here several varieties of large infinite set that have a similar status in mathematics to that of infinite sets, i.e. their existence cannot be proven, but they seem both reasonable and useful. These large sets are known as large cardinals. We focus on two types of large cardinal: inaccessible cardinals and measurable cardinals. Assuming the existence of …

Evaluating The Effects Of Colonialism On Deforestation In Madagascar: A Social And Environmental History, Claudia Moon Randrup

Honors Papers

This project examines the historical roots of deforestation during Madagascar's colonial period in order to shed light on contemporary conservation efforts. Through activities ranging from logging concessions and the encouragement of cash crop production, the French colonial government directly caused massive forest loss. Restrictive protectionist conservation legislation failed to adequately protect forest reserves, instead prompting many Malagasy to use the forests as tools of resistance to colonial governance. Furthermore, Madagascar's convergent colonial and environmental history created a problematic association between colonialism and conservation that has persisted post-independence. I will address the formation of this association and its consequences for both …

Assimilation And Discrimination: The Contradictions Of Japanese Colonial Education In Taiwan, 1895-1945, Luna Stevenson

Honors Papers

Japan colonized the island of Taiwan from 1895-1945. During this period, the colonial administration set up the first modernized education system on the island, which emphasized learning the Japanese language at the expense of the students' native Chinese language. The government espoused ideals of equality between the Taiwanese and the Japanese that extended to equal opportunity in schooling and in the work place. However, in reality the Japanese colonial government discriminated against the Taiwanese, and this manifested itself within all levels of the education system. The Japanese harbored racist attitudes against the Taiwanese, and were reluctant to provide opportunities for …