Digital Commons Network^™

Parenting Blog Coverage Of The Autism-Vaccine Controversy, Aidan Bryant

Media Studies - Theses

This study examines source type, citation accuracy, and anecdotal reliance in parenting blog articles about the autism/vaccine controversy. Existing literature on common errors and shortcomings of traditional health journalism, in conjunction with existing guidelines and suggestions for optimal health journalism practices, were used to synthesize a content analysis code structure. The code structure was used to examine 122 parenting blog posts from 18 different blogs, spanning a time period from June 22, 2005 to January 9, 2012, for details including the following:

• author demographics (gender, profession, parenthood, vaccination patterns)

• type of blog the article appeared in

• author stance of the …

A Lockean Theory Of Intellectual Property Revisited, Adam D. Moore

San Diego Law Review

The primary, and perhaps sole, function of government according to Locke was to secure and protect the lives, liberties, and property of individuals who consented, explicitly or tacitly, to a specific political union. The question that I will address in this Article, and one that I took up over fifteen years ago, is: should we consider intellectual works to be the proper subjects of Lockean property claims? My answer then and now is “yes,” with the acknowledgement that such a view may require substantial revisions to Anglo-American systems of intellectual property. I will argue that intellectual property rights are no …

The Impact Of Genetic Background On Body Temperature Regulation In Beef Cattle During Periods Of Heat And Cold Stress, Jeremy T. Howard

Department of Animal Science: Dissertations, Theses, and Student Research

Cattle are reared in environments that differ and vary greatly in climate, thus the ability to regulate body temperature across multiple environments is essential. However, inherent differences between animals do exist and can influence their response to extreme temperatures. The objectives of the current study were to model the impact of myostatin genotype (MG) on body temperature during heat and cold stress and conduct a genome-wide association study (GWAS) to better understand the genetic basis of body temperature regulation during extreme temperatures.

Crossbred steers and heifers (n= 239) with varying degrees of Piedmontese influence were fed in four groups over …

Spoilage Of Wet Distillers' Grains Plus Solubles When Stored In A Bunker, Jana L. Harding

Department of Animal Science: Dissertations, Theses, and Student Research

Five studies evaluated the impact of spoilage of wet distillers grains plus solubles (WDGS) on nutrient composition, nutrient losses, and cattle performance. Exp. 1 and Exp. 2 utilized barrels to evaluate the ability of various cover treatments to prevent nutrient changes and losses due to spoilage. In Exp. 3, a 140-d barrel study was conducted to mimic bunker storage under ambient temperature but with no precipitation. Barrels were weighed and sampled on 28 day intervals. In Exp. 4, a 130-d finishing study utilized 60 individually-fed steers fed 3 treatments: a dry-rolled corn based diet (control) and 2 diets containing 40% …

Efficacy Of An Expectancy Challenge To Reduce Non-Prescribed Use Of Stimulant Medications Among College Students, Allison Kathryn Labbe

Psychology - Dissertations

Non-prescribed use of stimulant medications among college students, such as Ritalin®, and Adderall®, has become a public health concern. Expectancies, which are beliefs that individuals hold regarding the consequences of engaging in a particular behavior, are known to play a prominent role in the initiation and maintenance of alcohol and drug use. This study had two aims: (1) to determine if an expectancy challenge could reduce participants' academic performance expectancies related to non-prescribed use of stimulant mediations, and (2) to determine if change in expectancies mediates consumption of the drug. Seventy-eight undergraduate students were randomized to either the expectancy challenge …

Obesity Indices And Cognitive Function In Veterans, Kristin Macgregor

Psychology - Dissertations

Obesity is linked to many chronic health conditions and middle-aged obesity is associated with later-life dementia. Obesity rates in veterans are higher than in the civilian population. Research examining body mass index (BMI) and cognitive function has demonstrated that young to middle-aged obese adults consistently demonstrate deficits in memory and executive function. Waist circumference (WC) is another measure of obesity that has been investigated as it relates to cognitive function; however, a clear pattern of deficit has not yet emerged. This study's purpose was to investigate the relationship among BMI, WC, and cognitive function in male veterans aged 18-55. One …

Environmental Triggers Of Winter Annual Weed Emergence And Management To Reduce Soybean Cyst Nematode Reproduction On Winter Annual Weed Hosts, Rodrigo Werle

Department of Agronomy and Horticulture: Dissertations, Theses, and Student Research

Winter annual weeds are becoming more common in many row crop fields in the midwestern USA. The impact of winter annual weeds in cropping systems is often overlooked because these weeds complete their lifecycle near the time of crop sowing. However, delayed soil warming, competition for nutrients during initial establishment of the main crop, difficult planting operations, and yield loss are some of the problems caused by dense mats of winter annual weeds. Moreover, some of these weeds have been reported as alternative hosts for pests such as the soybean cyst nematode (Heterodera glycines, SCN), considered the most …

Building Envelope Wind Pressure Manipulation For Application In Streamlined High-Rise Buildings, Sivaramprasad Sivakumar

Mechanical and Aerospace Engineering - Dissertations

This research investigates methods of manipulating building envelope wind pressure distribution for application in the natural ventilation of high-rise buildings. CFD simulations are employed to predict the wind pressure distribution around the building envelope. First, a 2-D CFD study is conducted to explore various techniques of manipulating the building envelope wind pressure distribution. This study indicates that the use of externally mounted flow-resistance devices is an effective method of manipulating the wind pressure distribution. It is demonstrated that this technique is well suited for application to buildings of streamlined cross-section (e.g. elliptical planform). Next, a 3-D CFD study is conducted …

The Path To An Orally Administered Protein Therapeutic For The Treatment Of Diabetes Mellitus, Susan Clardy James

Chemistry - Dissertations

Protein therapeutics like insulin and glucagon-like peptide-1 analogues are currently used as injectable medications for the treatment of diabetes mellitus. An orally administered protein therapeutic is predicted to increase patient adherence to medication and bring a patient closer to metabolic norms through direct effects on hepatic glucose production. The major problem facing oral delivery of protein therapeutics is gastrointestinal tract hydrolysis/proteolysis and the inability to passage the enterocyte. Herein we report the potential use of vitamin B₁₂ for the oral delivery of protein therapeutics.

We first investigated the ability of insulin to accommodate the attachment of B₁₂ at …

Title Page, North Carolina Law Review

North Carolina Law Review

No abstract provided.

Gps Tracking Out Of Fourth Amendment Dead Ends: United States V. Jones And The Katz Conundrum, Fabio Arcila Jr.

North Carolina Law Review

No abstract provided.

North Carolina's Annexation Wars: Whys, Wherefores, And What Next, Judith Welch Wegner

North Carolina Law Review

No abstract provided.

Mandatory E-Verification In North Carolina: The Adverse Consequences Of The System In The Absence Of Comprehensive Reform, Leann Gerlach

North Carolina Law Review

No abstract provided.

Species Richness And Nest Dispersion Of Some Tropical Meliponine Bees (Apidae: Meliponinae) In Six Habitat Types In The Kakamega Forest, Western Kenya, Kiatoko Nkoba, Suresh Kumar Raina, Elluid Muli, Klaus Mithofer, Jones Mueke

All Peer-Reviewed Publications

A study to determine the species richness and spatial distribution of five meliponine bee species in three different habitats in the Kakamega forest was undertaken for the first time. Two forest (indigenous and mixed indigenous) and two grassland (with Eucalyptus spp. trees and indigenous trees) types, along with homesteads (in the vicinity of mixed indigenous forest and indigenous forest, respectively), were surveyed. Line transect methods were used in the nest survey in each habitat. The highest number of species was recorded in the indigenous forest, while no nest was discovered in the grassland with Eucalyptus spp. trees. The mean number …

Elucidation Of The Biosynthesis Of The Di-C-Glycosylflavone Isoschaftoside, An Allelopathic Component From Desmodium Spp. That Inhibits Striga Spp. Development, Mary L. Hamilton, Serge P. Kuate, Melissa Brazier-Hicks, John C. Caulfield, Ruth Rose, Robert Edwards, Baldwyn Torto, John A. Pickett, Antony M. Hooper

All Peer-Reviewed Publications

Isoschaftoside, an allelopathic di-C-glycosylflavone from Desmodium spp. root exudates, is biosynthesised through sequential glucosylation and arabinosylation of 2-hydroxynaringenin with UDP-glucose and UDP-arabinose. Complete conversion to the flavone requires chemical dehydration implying a dehydratase enzyme has a role in vivo to complete the biosynthesis. The C-glucosyltransferase has been partially characterised and its activity demonstrated in highly purified fractions. © 2012 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.

Disentangling Dispersal, Vicariance And Adaptive Radiation Patterns: A Case Study Using Armyworms In The Pest Genus Spodoptera (Lepidoptera: Noctuidae), Gael J. Kergoat, Dorothy P. Prowell, Bruno P. Le Ru, Andrew Mitchell, Pascaline Dumas, Anne Laure Clamens, Fabien L. Condamine, Jean François Silvain

All Peer-Reviewed Publications

Thanks to the recent development of integrative approaches that combine dated phylogenies with models of biogeographic evolution, it is becoming more feasible to assess the roles of dispersal and vicariance in creating complex patterns of geographical distribution. However, the historical biogeography of taxa with good dispersal abilities, like birds or flying insects, still remains largely unknown because of the lack of complete phylogenies accompanied by robust estimates of divergence times. In this study, we investigate the evolution and historical biogeography of the globally distributed pest genus Spodoptera (Lepidoptera: Noctuidae) using complete taxon sampling and an extensive set of analyses. Through …

How Do The Elderly Fare In Medical Malpractice Litigation, Before And After Tort Reform? Evidence From Texas, Myungho Paik, Bernard S. Black, David A. Hyman, William M. Sage, Charles M. Silver

Faculty Scholarship

The elderly account for a disproportionate share of medical spending, but little is known about how they are treated by the medical malpractice system, or how tort reform affects elderly claimants. We compare paid medical malpractice claims brought by elderly plaintiffs in Texas during 1988–2009 to those brought by adult non-elderly plaintiffs. Controlling for healthcare utilization (based on inpatient days), elderly paid claims rose from about 20% to about 40% of the adult non-elderly rate by the early 2000s. Mean and median payouts per claim also converged, although the elderly were far less likely to receive large payouts. Tort reform …

Distinguishing The “Truly National” From The “Truly Local”: Customary Allocation, Commercial Activity, And Collective Action, Neil S. Siegel

Faculty Scholarship

This Essay makes two claims about different methods of defining the expanse and limits of the Commerce Clause.

My first claim is that approaches that privilege traditional subjects of state regulation are unworkable and undesirable. The approaches are unworkable in light of the frequency with which the states and the federal government regulate the same subject matter in our modern world of largely overlapping federal and state legislative jurisdiction. The approaches are undesirable because the question of customary allocation is unrelated to the principal reason why Congress possesses the power to regulate interstate commerce: solving collective action problems involving multiple …

The Control Of Nitrogenous And Carbonaceous Disinfection Byproduct Precursors With Magnetic Ion Exchange, Xiaojie Gan

All Theses

The objective of this study was to examine the potential of the magnetic ion exchange (MIEX®) process to remove nitrogenous disinfection byproduct (N-DBP) precursors while minimizing carbonaceous DBP (C-DBP) precursors in different water matrices. In the first phase of the study, the MIEX® process was tested in raw dinking waters and waters impacted effluent from wastewater treatment plant. Samples were collected from several drinking water/wastewater treatment plants in South Carolina. The effluent impacted source waters were prepared by mixing treated wastewater effluents with a drinking water. For all samples, formation potential (FP) tests were conducted for regulated trihalomethanes (THMs), haloacetic …

Connecting Architecture, Fitness, Optimizations And Performance Using An Anisotropic Diffusion Filter, Sumedh Naik

All Theses

Over the past decade, computing architectures have continued to exploit multiple levels of parallelism in applications. This increased interest in parallel computing has not only fueled the growth of multi-core processors but has also lead to an emergence of several non-traditional computing architectures like General Purpose Graphical Processing Units (GP-GPUs), Cell Processors, and Field Programmable Gate Arrays (FPGAs). Of these non-traditional computing architectures, GP-GPUs have gained widespread popularity due to their massively parallel computational abilities and relative ease of programmability.
Several software development ecosystems have emerged to harness the power of these parallel architectures. Although several threading libraries like POSIX …

Detecting Copper Residues In Sediments From Aquatic Copper-Based Pesticide Applications, Ben Willis

All Theses

Copper-based algaecides and herbicides are commonly used to mitigate risks of problematic algae and weeds, however there are concerns regarding copper accumulation from treatments. Modeling and laboratory experiments can be used to predict copper accumulation and measurement in sediments, as well as benthic invertebrate responses following treatments. Modeling was used to estimate copper residual concentrations in sediments from algaecide and herbicide treatments. Reported and measured method detection limits (MDLs; minimum concentration of an analyte of interest that can be measured with 99 percent confidence in a specific matrix using an analytical method) were compared to model estimated copper residual concentrations …

The Effects Of Low Dose Ionizing Radiation Exposure On The Metabolic And Mechanical Properties Of Articular Cartilage, Carl Lindburg

All Theses

Radiation therapy is necessary treatment for many cancer patients due to its non-surgical, yet aggressive and efficacious properties. In fact, over 50% of patients with cancer will undergo some form of radiotherapy during the course of their treatment. While the biological response to ionizing radiation has been examined over the years and many adverse effects have been identified, the effects of radiation on mature cartilage and musculoskeletal tissues are not well understood. Bone, once thought to be a tissue relatively resistant to radiation, has recently been shown to have osteoporosis-like bone atrophy after exposure to low doses (2 Gy) of …

Predictors Of Motivation To Participate In Whitewater Kayaking, Jon Evans

All Theses

Whitewater kayaking has grown in popularity over the past two decades (NSRE, 1994; NSRE, 2000). Because of this growth a better understanding of participants motivations could assist vendors, programmers, and decision making bodies for the future of the sport. The intent of this study is to explore the differences between the demographic variables age, sex, and skill level on the motivations to participate in whitewater kayaking. A secondary purpose was to assess the differences between the basic psychological needs (i.e., autonomy, competence, and relatedness) and motivation to participate in the sport of whitewater kayaking.
Whitewater enthusiasts were recruited from across …

Procuring And Tracing Produce From Small- And Medium- Scale Farmers For Use In Institutional Foodservice Operations In Nc, Sc And Ga, Anita Nunnelley

All Theses

In response to concerns about an increasingly globalized food system in the United States, and increasing interest in the connections between small- and medium-scale (SMS) farms and institutional foodservice operations (IFO), the U.S. has recently developed legislation to link farmers to institutional markets (Joshi, Azuma, & Feenstra, 2008; Poulton, Dorward, & Kydd, 2010; USDA, 2010; Wootan, 2012). The purpose of this study is to determine if these connections are viable, sustainable and ultimately if the food is safe for consumption in the IFO. There are significant logistical, contractual and food safety concerns when sourcing food for IFOs from SMS farms. …

The Feasibility Of A Fresh Fruit And Vegetable Processor In Saluda County, South Carolina, Sarah Macdonald

All Theses

ABSTRACT
This research looks at the topic of agriculture and agricultural processing as a means for rural economic development. The purpose of the study is to determine the feasibility and desirability of a fruit and vegetable processor in Saluda County, South Carolina. A fruit and vegetable co-packer was chosen because of positive community response to the idea, large and growing fruit and vegetable production in the county, lack of fruit and vegetable processing in the county and growing demand for fresh cut and frozen produce. The proposed processor would produce sliced, frozen, bagged peaches during peach season and cut, frozen, …

Sediment Based Turbidity And Bacteria Reduction Analysis In Simulated Construction Site Runoff, James W. Berry Iii

All Theses

Large construction projects are highly vulnerable to sediment removal by erosive forces. Turbidity, resulting from this excess sediment, has gained recognition as anindicator of pollution in surface runoff from construction activities. The Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) is currently moving toward regulations that would establish a nationwide maximum turbidity effluent limit discharged from construction sites. Research has shown that current sediment control best management practices (BMPs) are often ineffective at controlling elevated turbidity levels in construction site discharges. Additionally, research confirms that sediment basins may act as reservoirs for bacteria, specifically Escherichia coli (E. coli). During rainfall events, resuspension within sediment …

Matrix Metalloproteinase Levels Identify Heart Failure Patients With Higher Burden Of Atrial Fibrillation, Toshimasa Okabe, Md, Avinash Chandra, Shaw R. Natan, Suzanne Adams, Jocelyn A. Sendecki, Melissa M. Mccarey, Reginald Ho, Md, Behzad B. Pavri, Md, Arnold J. Greenspon, Md, Daniel Frisch, Md

Department of Medicine Faculty Papers

Presented at ACC Mid-Atlantic conference in Washington DC.

INTRODUCTION/HYPOTHESIS

•Adverse cardiac remodeling and fibrosis provide an arrhythmic substrate for atrial fibrillation (AF), but the role of matrix metalloproteinases (MMPs) as a biomarker is not well understood. MMPs are zinc-dependent endopeptidases known to degrade substrates such as elastin, gelatin and collagen.

•In excised human atrial tissue, MMP 2 and 9 levels rise as the AF burden increases from sinus rhythm (“No AF”) to non-permanent AF (“Non-Prm AF”) to permanent AF (“PrmAF”). Higher plasma levels of MMPs are also associated with recurrent AF after cardioversion.

•This study sought to elucidate 1) the …

Profiling H-2a Program Participants In Tobacco Farming: Implications For Extension, Jane H. Starnes, Shiferaw T. Feleke, Harwood D. Schaffer, Kelly J. Tiller

Journal of Extension

The challenge to meet tobacco's labor requirements by domestic sources has prompted tobacco growers to seek a foreign source of labor through the H-2A program. The H-2A program is the only legally sanctioned program allowing farm employers to bring foreign workers into the country to perform seasonal and temporary agricultural work. The article profiles H-2A program participants in major tobacco growing states. The results will help Extension personnel better understand their constituents' labor needs and inform the design of specific Extension programs and workshops in farm labor management, labor laws and regulations as well as labor cost-saving measures.

Comment: Emerging Epa Regulation Of Pharmaceuticals In The Environment, Gabriel Eckstein

Faculty Scholarship

The May 25, 2012, report — entitled EPA Inaction in Identifying Hazardous Waste Pharmaceuticals May Result in Unsafe Disposal — disapproved of EPA’s lack of progress in determining whether certain pharmaceuticals found in surface, ground, and drinking water qualify as hazardous waste, as well as in establishing an evaluation and regulatory process for pharmaceutical wastes. As a result of the report, EPA is now considering mechanisms for assessing and regulating the presence of certain pharmaceutical products in the environment as hazardous wastes under the Resource Conservation and Recovery Act.

Montana State Parks: Visitor Profile And Media Awareness, Christine Oschell, Norma P. Nickerson

Institute for Tourism and Recreation Research Publications

The purpose of this study was to understand resident use of Montana State Parks, the value of state parks to Montana residents, and the effect of media campaigns on state park use.