Digital Commons Network^™

Zinc Oxide Nanoparticles As Potential Novel Anticancer Therapies, Janet C. Layne

Boise State University Theses and Dissertations

Nanoparticles (NP) are increasingly being recognized for their utility in the field of medicine, including use as drug carriers and imaging tools. We demonstrated that ZnO NP preferentially kill cancerous cells of the T cell lineage, and extended this research to evaluate other cells types, including normal and malignant B cells, and normal and malignant breast and prostate epithelial cells. Preferential ZnO nanoparticle cytotoxicity occurred for multiple types of cancer cells, but was most pronounced for non-adherent cells of hematopoietic lineage. Normal T and B lymphocytes showed the greatest resistance to NP toxicity, followed by normal breast epithelial cells, and …

Progression Of Breast Cancer Metastatic Disease And Subsequent Osteolytic Bone Degradation Mediated By Oncostatin M, Ken Tawara

Boise State University Theses and Dissertations

Breast cancer is the most diagnosed cancer in women and is the second most common cancer-related death for women worldwide. While the primary tumor itself is not lethal, the metastases that disrupt vital organ functions pose a significant clinical challenge. Seventy percent of women with metastatic breast cancer have metastases to the bone, which is the most significant cause of morbidity for these patients. Oncostatin M (OSM) is a pleiotropic cytokine that plays a role in the immune system, wound repair, and haematopoiesis. OSM was previously considered for anticancer therapy due to its anti-proliferative effects against breast cancer cells in …

Methods For Multilevel Parallelism On Gpu Clusters: Application To A Multigrid Accelerated Navier-Stokes Solver, Dana A. Jacobsen

Boise State University Theses and Dissertations

Computational Fluid Dynamics (CFD) is an important field in high performance computing with numerous applications. Solving problems in thermal and fluid sciences demands enormous computing resources and has been one of the primary applications used on supercomputers and large clusters. Modern graphics processing units (GPUs) with many-core architectures have emerged as general-purpose parallel computing platforms that can accelerate simulation science applications substantially. While significant speedups have been obtained with single and multiple GPUs on a single workstation, large problems require more resources. Conventional clusters of central processing units (CPUs) are now being augmented with GPUs in each compute-node to tackle …

Trophic Ecology Of Burrowing Owls In Natural And Agricultural Habitats And An Analysis Of Predator Communities Using Stable Isotopes Of Carbon And Nitrogen, Kathlyn Jean Mcvey

Boise State University Theses and Dissertations

Stable isotopes of carbon and nitrogen can provide powerful tools for estimating the trophic positions of animals and determining the source or the primary producer of a food web. I used stable isotopes analysis of carbon (δ¹³C) and nitrogen (δ¹⁵N) to investigate the trophic position of burrowing owls (Athene cunicularia) in agricultural and natural habitats and trophic relationships of a community of vertebrate predators in the Morley Nelson Snake River Birds of Prey National Conservation Area (NCA), located in southern Idaho.

Burrowing owl populations have declined across much of North America owing to loss …

Recent Archaeological Investigations At Three Island Crossing: Insights Regarding Late Archaic Diet Breadth And Mobility, Meghan Kim Eastman

Boise State University Theses and Dissertations

In 1986 and 1987, an important Late Archaic period site was excavated at Three Island Crossing (10-EL-294), near Glenns Ferry, Idaho. As ethnographic reports depict extensive reliance upon salmon for winter consumption (Steward, 1938; Murphy and Murphy, 1960) the recovery of 19,000 fish remains was significant. Analysis of this assemblage demonstrated that the minimum number of individual fish recovered was around 300. Equally important were radiocarbon analyses that identified three distinct Late Archaic occupations. Of note was the recovery of a structure and storage suggesting semi-permanent residence. A subsequent excavation was undertaken at Three Island Crossing in 2008 to determine …

The Male Educational Leader In Utah: Gender Dynamics, Power, And Relational Leadership In A Mormon Dominant Culture, Rick Robins

UNLV Theses, Dissertations, Professional Papers, and Capstones

This qualitative study explored the impact of Mormon culture and theology on male and female school leaders that co-exist on high school administrative teams. This problematic relationship is caused by the scarcity of female administrators in Utah as they move up the leadership ladder in education. According to the Utah State Office of Education in 2006, there were 118 public high schools in the state of Utah. Out of those 118 high schools, 18 were lead by female principals. There were 141 middle schools. Of the middle schools in the state, 40 were lead by female principals. Of the 617 …

Second-Order Conditioning In Drosophila, Christopher J. Tabone

UNLV Theses, Dissertations, Professional Papers, and Capstones

Animals possess the ability to associate neutral stimuli in their environment with both rewards and punishment. A conditioned stimulus (CS1) such as a smell or sound, can become associated with an unconditioned stimulus (US), such as a food reward, to elicit what is known as the conditioned response (CR). This type of learning is commonly referred to as classical conditioning or first-order conditioning (FOC). Second-order conditioning (SOC) is an extension of this type of association wherein a novel stimulus is introduced (CS2) and associated with a previously conditioning first-order stimulus (CS1). As a result, the organism may show an attraction …

Environmental Engagement Demand Differences Within And Among Holland Academic Environments, Derek K. Lester

UNLV Theses, Dissertations, Professional Papers, and Capstones

College and university administrators have increased the use of measurements of student engagement to gauge the levels on their campuses. However, little research measures student engagement levels among different academic environments or different academic majors. Some research has been done that used Holland's theory of person/environment fit, and accompanying Hexagonal model, as a means to compare differences among academic environments. However, the validity of the assumptions that the model is based on has not been examined, nor the validity of the grouping of academic majors into environments.

The data set used for this study is the 2005 National Survey of …

Sew Speak! Needlework As The Voice Of Ideology Critique In The Scarlet Letter , "A New England Nun," And The Age Of Innocence, Laura L. Powell

UNLV Theses, Dissertations, Professional Papers, and Capstones

In the Nineteenth Century, needlework, and embroidery in particular, became a signifier of feminine identity. Needlework was such a significant part of women’s lives and so integral to the construction of femininity in nineteenth-century America that both pictoral and narrative art demonstrate numerous representations of women embroidering. The sheer volume of these representations in the Nineteenth Century suggests that the practice of embroidery provides a way of speaking for women—a representation of the voice of subjectivity silenced by patriarchal ideology. Because needlework serves as a signifier of ideal femininity, it provides uniquely fruitful and previously unexplored opportunities for investigating how …

Planning For Building-Integrated Agriculture In Las Vegas, Robert Vralsted

UNLV Theses, Dissertations, Professional Papers, and Capstones

High food prices, concern about food nutrition and safety, and an awareness of commercial farming's environmental impact have generated a renewed interest in sustainable urban agriculture. Advances in controlled environment agriculture (CEA) have made it possible to grow food virtually anywhere in a much more sustainable manner than traditional field-based agriculture. Locating and planning urban farms using retrofitted existing building stock to maximize food production and ease of distribution in Las Vegas requires consideration of multiple barriers related to geography, economics, and the built environment. Consideration of these factors in the planning process informs the design of a successful BIA …

Colonization And Decontamination Of Quagga Mussels In The Western United States: Monitoring Veligers In Lake Mead And Field Testing In The Effects Of Hot-Water Spray As A Means Of Watercraft Decontamination, Sean Robin Comeau

UNLV Theses, Dissertations, Professional Papers, and Capstones

The introduction and establishment of aquatic invasive species (AIS) is one of the top causes of global biodiversity loss and ecological change, and is also financially costly for taxpayers and agencies managing protected areas. This is especially true regarding the nationwide spread of dreissenid mussels to various bodies of freshwater. The discovery of invasive quagga mussels (Dreissena rostriformis bugensis) in Lake Mead on January 6, 2007 has changed the popular recreation area into a potential vector of the destructive AIS. This location could allow for an increased spread of these dressenid species to uninfested bodies of water in the western …

A Statistical Model For Long-Term Forecasting Of Strong Sand Dust Storms, Siqi Tan

UNLV Theses, Dissertations, Professional Papers, and Capstones

Dust elevated into the atmosphere by dust storms has numerous environmental consequences. These include contributing to climate change; modifying local weather conditions; producing chemical and biological changes in the oceans; and affecting soil formation, surface water, groundwater quality, crop growth, and survival (Goudie and Middleton, 1992). Societal impacts include disruptions to air, road and rail traffic; interruption of radio services; the myriad effects of static-electricity generation; property damage; and health effects on humans and animals (Warner, 2004).

In this thesis, we extend the idea of empirical recurrence rate (ERR), developed by Ho (2008), to model the temporal trend of the …

Youth At The Nexus: Ideology In Hiv Prevention In Nairobi, Kenya, Zohra Ahmed

Scholarly Works

In the fight against HIV/AIDS, the Behavior Change Communication (BCC) model stands as international best practice in preventive education. Ideally, a BCC intervention aims to changes behaviors and attitudes by facilitating group negotiation and introspection, with a resultant improvement in health. However, introducing this best practice model to a group of youth in Nairobi resulted in suboptimal outcomes: they were unaccustomed to expressing themselves in the ways prescribed by the class. To explain this failure, I examine how local discourses produced by parents and teachers communicate agency, sexuality and health, and highlight the diverging practices invoked at home, school and …

Examination Of Genotypic Variation In Aluminum Tolerance Of Populus, Ernest Smith

Graduate Theses, Dissertations, and Problem Reports (ETD)

Soil acidity and aluminum (Al) toxicity are major factors limiting crop yield and forest productivity worldwide. Hybrid poplar (Populus spp.) was used as a model woody tree species to assess genotypic variation in Al resistance and physiological stress responses to Al. In the first study eight hybrid crosses of P. trichocarpa, P. deltoides and P. nigra were exposed to Al in solution culture. Resistance to Al varied by genotype and hybrid cross, with P. trichocarpa x P. deltoides crosses being most resistant, P. trichocarpa x P. nigra being intermediate and P. deltoides x P. nigra being most sensitive to Al. …

Mother-Son Connectedness, Substance Use, And Young Men's Criminal Justice System Involvement, Kim L. Moreno Phd

Dissertations

The relationship between a mother and her son and its influence on health and risk behaviors as a boy becomes a man has had little exploration. The purpose of this study was to examine the relationships between mother-son connectedness, substance use, serious delinquency, violent delinquency, and criminal justice system involvement in young men. This study uses data from The National Longitudinal Study of Adolescent Health (ADD Health), a school-based study of students in grades 7–12 in the United States. Multiple regression, ANOVA, and logistic regression were used to analyze independent and dependent variables. Results show a perception of connectedness, which …

Perceptions Of Leadership: An Analysis Of College Students' Understandings Of The Concept Of Leadership, Paige Haber Phd

Dissertations

Colleges and universities increasingly have embraced the goal of developing students' leadership capacity. Diverse curricular and co-curricular leadership programs currently exist and continue to be developed to address leadership development outcomes. There is, however, limited understanding of how college students think about and define leadership. This study sought to fill this gap in the research by examining the ways in which college students understand the concept of leadership. In this mixed methods study the researcher analyzed data from the Multi-Institutional Study of Leadership (MSL) project, a national research study on college student leadership and the college experience. Data for the …

How Working Mothers Negotiate Work-Family Conflict: An Exploration Of Work Satisfaction, Home Life Satisfaction, And Partner Supportiveness, Karen Kramer Horning Phd

Dissertations

The demographics of the American workforce and family structures have shifted dramatically over the past 60 years, but traditional work and domestic roles have evolved only slightly. Women are more impacted than men by fixed interpretations of gender roles due to their assumption of professional positions in the workplace without relief from domestic responsibilities. For many women who are engaged in the professional realm while raising a family, the result is often a work-family conflict. Despite significant research and some governmental policy and organizational policy changes, limited progress has been made in resolving the conflict. Some dimensions of work-family conflict …

Characterization Of Rna Aptamers To Drosophila Splicing Protein B52”, Benjamin Stern

Biological Sciences

The protein B52 is an essential component of the spliceosome in Drosophila M. and is responsible for processing precursor-mRNA. B52 belongs to a family of proteins named SR proteins which are critical in initiation and commitment of RNA splicing. Analogous to human SRp55, B52 has been shown to be responsible for alternative and constitutive splicing during a multitude of cellular and developmental events. RNA aptamers selected during an in vitro selection and amplification process (SELEX) for B52 were found to have a co-variation in the stem of these aptamers. Using biochemical and structural techniques, I will explore the RNA-protein interaction …

The Role Of Rac1 Signaling In Tissue Polarity And Branching Morphogenesis During Salivary Gland Development, Janice Jin

Biological Sciences

Salivary gland development in embryonic mouse occurs through the process of branching morphogenesis and differentiation to ultimately give rise to a fully functional, saliva-secreting adult gland. During branching morphogenesis, epithelial cells establish an apical and basal pole which determines the ultimate direction in which salivary fluid and proteins are secreted. Exactly how salivary tissue polarity is determined on a cellular and glandular level is not fully understood. Rac1, a member of the Rho GTPase family, is an intracellular signal transducer that has been shown in other cell types to regulate cell polarization. Rac1 is also important for the organization of …

Insights Into P53-Dependent Apoptotic Signaling And Cell Fate Vis-A-Vis Functional Cooperation Among Bcl-Xl, Cytoplasmic P53, And Puma, John C. Fisher

Theses and Dissertations (ETD)

Following DNA damage, nuclear p53 induces the expression of PUMA (p53 upregulated modulator of apoptosis), a BH3‑only protein that binds and inhibits the anti‑apoptotic BCL‑2 repertoire, including BCL‑xL. Structural investigations of PUMA and the BCL‑xL×PUMA BH3 domain complex by X‑ray crystallography and nuclear magnetic resonance (NMR) spectroscopy reveal a novel, PUMA‑induced, domain‑swapped dimerization of BCL‑xL that requires a π‑stacking interaction between PUMA W71 and BCL‑xL H113. PUMA is an intrinsically disordered protein, but upon interaction with BCL‑xL, PUMA W71 and the PUMA BH3 domain residues fold into an alpha helix and subtly remodel BCL‑xL to trigger its dimerization. Wild type …

The Treatment Of Breast Cancer Tumor Growth And Metastasis With An Anti-Mmp9 Dnazyme, Miranda A. Hallett

Theses and Dissertations (ETD)

BACKGROUND: Tumor cell proliferation, invasion and metastasis are known to be mediated, at least in part, through degradation of basement membrane by neutral metalloproteinases (MMP) produced by tumor and stromal cells. MMP-9 is known to play a significant role in breast tumor cell invasion and metastasis via degradation of ECM components and activation of cytokines and chemokines. MMP-9 is known to cleave type IV collagen, one of the most abundant collagens of the extracellular matrix. Our lab has found that the fully processed (68 kDa) form of MMP-9 generated in tumor and stromal cells is also capable of cleaving type …

The Design And Synthesis Of Autotaxin Inhibitors And Analogs Of Lysophosphatidic Acid, Renuka Niranjan Gupte

Theses and Dissertations (ETD)

Lysophosphatidic acid (LPA) is a naturally occurring bioactive phospholipid. It has a wide array of biological effects like cell proliferation, survival, migration, apoptosis invasion, wound healing and angiogenesis. Autotaxin (ATX) was identified as an autocrine tumor cell motility factor from A2058 melanoma conditioned medium. ATX has lysophospholipase D enzyme activity and is responsible for the cleavage of lysophophatidylcholine (LPC) leading to the generation of LPA. Antagonists of Autotaxin would have a potential therapeutic application in cancer research. Chapter 1 is an introduction of LPA and autotaxin. It provides the background and significance of the research. Chapter 2 explores the synthesis …

The Long-Term Stability Of Class Ii Cases Treated In A Private Practice Using A Straightwire Appliance: A Dental Cast Analysis, Lina K. Kulkarni

Theses and Dissertations (ETD)

Achieving long-term stability after orthodontic treatment is a major challenge for orthodontists. The previous literature shows that relapse occurs at a considerable magnitude. The purpose of the present study was to determine the amount and type of long-term, posttreatment relapse that occurs in a homogeneous group of patients treated by a single experienced orthodontist in a private practice setting. Dental casts from a sample of 30 Class II division 1 Caucasian females treated without extractions were evaluated at pretreatment (mean age = 13.1 years), posttreatment (mean age = 15.9 years) and recall (mean age = 28.3 years) to determine the …

Rna Interference For Improving The Outcome Of Islet Transplantation And Polymeric Micelle‑Based Nanomedicine For Cancer Therapy, Feng Li

Theses and Dissertations (ETD)

Ex vivo gene transfer has been used to improve the outcome of islet transplantation for treating type I diabetes. RNA interference is an effective approach for reducing gene expressions at the mRNA level. The application of RNA interference to improve the outcome of islet transplantation was reviewed in Chapter 2, where I summarized biological obstacles to islet transplantation, various types of RNAi techniques, combinatorial RNAi in islet transplantation, and different delivery strategies.

Upregulation of inducible nitric oxide synthase (iNOS) and subsequent product of radical nitric oxide (NO) impair islet β cell function. Therefore, we hypothesized that iNOS gene silencing could …

Pharmacokinetic And Pharmacodynamic Studies Of A Novel Spectinamide Series Of Antituberculosis Agents, V. N. R. Pavan Kumar Vaddady

Theses and Dissertations (ETD)

Spectinamides are novel amide derivatives of the antibiotic spectinomycin that have emerged as a new class of agents to treat tuberculosis. These agents showed potent in vitro activity against Mycobacterium tuberculosis (MTB) compared to spectinomycin and in a preliminary in vivo study in interferon gamma (IFN‑γ) knockout mice, spectinamide Lee1329 reduced the lung bacillary load of TB comparable to streptomycin. We hypothesized that the application of an iterative pharmacokinetics and pharmacodynamics (PK/PD) guided approach would facilitate the optimization of these lead compounds suitable for further development.

A series of in vitro experiments including parallel artificial membrane permeability assay (PAMPA), microsomal …

Novel Insights Into Ubiquitin-Like Protein E1-E2 Interactions, Asad Taherbhoy

Theses and Dissertations (ETD)

Posttranslational modification of macromolecules by ubiquitin-like proteins (UBLs) such as ubiquitin, Sumo and NEDD8 regulate a vast array of processes in the cell. Transfer of UBLs to their target generally occurs by a series of molecular handoffs down an E1‑E2‑E3 cascade. We are interested in understanding how E1‑E2 pairs interact and mediate UBL transfer. To this effect, we studied two E1‑E2 pairs: the Sumo pathway (Sumo utilizes a canonical E1 and E2) and the Atg8 pathway (Atg8 is a UBL involved in autophagy that utilizes a non-canonical E1‑E2 pair).

Sumo conjugation is initiated by the heterodimeric Aos1‑Uba2 E1 enzyme (in …

Pten Function In Postnatal Brain Development And Tumorigenesis, Guo Zhu

Theses and Dissertations (ETD)

PTEN (Phosphatase and Tensin homolog deleted on chromosome 10) is a tumor suppressor gene that is commonly mutated in multiple types of human cancers including endometrial, prostate, breast cancers and glioblastoma multiforme (GBM). PTEN functions as a phospholipid phosphatase antagonizing phosphorylation by phosphatidylinositol‑3‑OH kinases (PI3Ks) and thus serves as a major negative regulator of the PI3K pathway. Homozygous Pten knock-out mice die during embryogenesis. Conditional Pten knock-out in the nervous system showed that Pten negatively regulates self-renewal and proliferation of neural stem cells, negatively controls neuronal size, is required for proper neuronal positioning and is involved in the development and …

The Biochemical Pathway Leading To Lpa Generation Upon Blood Coagulation, Alyssa Lynn Jefferson Bolen

Theses and Dissertations (ETD)

Platelet activation initiates an upsurge in 18:2 and 20:4 lysophosphatidic acid (LPA) production. The biochemical pathway responsible for LPA production during blood clotting is not fully understood. We have purified a phospholipase A₁ (PLA₁) from thrombin-activated human platelets using sequential chromatographic steps followed by fluorophosphonate‑biotin affinity labeling and proteomics. We identified acyl‑protein thioesterase 1 (aka. lysophospholipase A1, accession code O75608) as a novel PLA₁. Addition of this recombinant PLA₁ significantly increased the production of sn‑2‑esterified polyunsaturated LPCs and the corresponding LPAs in plasma. We next examined the regioisomeric preference of lysophospholipase …

Analysis Of Out-Of-Pocket Expenditures Of Oral Oncologics For Tennessee Recipients Of Medicare Part D, Eve Carolyn Elias

Theses and Dissertations (ETD)

Background: There are few studies that examine patients' costs of oral oncology drugs from Medicare Part D plan providers. These drugs can impose a financial burden to beneficiaries, and, due to their cost, place beneficiaries in the coverage gap in a short period of time. In addition to examining costs, there is little published concerning the potential impact of drug utilization management techniques on access to these drugs in Medicare Part D plans. This study examined the roles of prior authorization, step-therapy, and placement of drugs in higher formulary tiers on patients' out-of-pocket costs, and access to therapy.

Methods …

Distribution Patterns Of River Otters, Lontra Canadensis, Within Monroe County, New York, Darren Doherty

Theses

River Otters, Lontra canadensis were reintroduced to western NY after being extirpated in the early 1900's. The goal of this project was to understand what environmental variables influence habitat selection of river otters, within Monroe County, New York. Water chemistry and the use of benthic macroinvertebrates were investigated to assess the water quality and human impacts. The research area included three tributaries of the Genesee River: Black, Honeoye, and Oatka Creeks. At identified latrine sites, I collected macroinvertebrates at 9 sites and water chemistry at 30 sites to provide an index of the water quality. Geographical Information Systems (GIS) was …