Digital Commons Network^™

Transcriptome Of The Eastern Oyster Crassostrea Virginica In Response To Bacterial Challenge, Ian Mcdowell

Open Access Master's Theses

The Eastern oyster Crassostrea virginica, an ecologically and economically important estuarine organism, suffers mortalities as high as 90-100% in affected areas due to Roseovarius Oyster Disease (ROD), caused by the bacterial pathogen, Roseovarius crassostreae. Advanced genotypic breeding techniques necessitate information regarding markers and genes associated with disease resistance. As yet, the host-pathogen interaction between C. virginica and R. crassostreae is poorly understood at the molecular level. The identification of potential genes and pathways responsible for an effective host defense response in the Eastern oyster to R. crassostreae is important not only to provide a basis for enhanced breeding techniques, …

Myostatin And Tgf-Β Function In The Regulation Of Myogenesis In Rainbow Trout (Oncorhynchus Mykiss), A Basal Teleost, Ian Morrison Jaffe

Open Access Master's Theses

Myogenesis in vertebrates is a complex and intricately regulated process, various mechanisms of which have been alternately conserved or lost throughout the course of vertebrate evolution. Mammalian myogenesis is highly regulated by myostatin, a member of the Transforming Growth Factor-β (TGF-β) family of cytokines, however, a similar role for myostatin in fish currently remains the subject of inquiry. Myostatin initiates signal transduction by means of the activin type IIb receptor, and shares considerable sequence and structural homology across vertebrate taxa, though its functional homology remains unclear. Two families of transgenic (TG) rainbow trout (RBT), one in which myostatin was inhibited …

A Difference In Perspective: A Comparison Of Ecosystem And Single-Species Focused Fisheries Management, Catherine M. Foley

Open Access Master's Theses

Currently, most fisheries management bodies utilize a narrow, single-species focus in decision-making processes. These methodologies, however, fail to recognize the interrelated nature of ecosystems, and as such are unable to produce realistic and valid estimates of sustainable yield. One proposed method of integrating ecosystem data into the decision-making process of fisheries management involves quantifying ecosystem diversity. This study evaluates historical fisheries management success in terms of changes in biological diversity and evaluates the potential use of length and species diversity measurements to aid managers in understanding fishery-induced community changes. To evaluate these relationships, a comparison of ecological and management outcomes …

Limited Entry In Rhode Island Tracing An Idea From Open Access To License Limitation To Catch Shares, Jonathon M. Peros

Open Access Master's Theses

For centuries fisheries institutions have shaped Rhode Island’s storied fishing tradition, a hallmark of which has been access to marine resources by the residents of the state. In 2001, after a series of moratoriums on commercial fishing licenses, Rhode Island embarked on an extensive public process through the Coastal Institute at the University of Rhode Island to identify fishery management options based on the input of stakeholders. The outcome of that process was the passage of Senate Bill 2771 sub A – otherwise known as Rhode Island Gen. Law 20.2-1 (2002). The legislation ended a moratorium on the issuance of …

A Tunable Electromagnetic Band-Gap Microstrip Filter, Greg A. Lancaster

Master's Theses

In high frequency design, harmonic suppression is a persistent struggle. Non-linear devices such as switches and amplifiers produce unwanted harmonics which may interfere with other frequency bands. Filtering is a widely accepted solution, however there are various shortcomings involved. Suppressing multiple harmonics, if desired, with traditional lumped element and distributed component band-stop filters requires using multiple filters. These topologies are not easily made tunable either. A new filter topology is investigated called Electromagnetic Band-Gap (EBG) structures.

EBG structures have recently gained the interest of microwave designers due to their periodic nature which prohibits the propagation of certain frequency bands. EBG …

Does International Recruiting Make Sense In The Missouri Valley Conference?, Natalie Johnson

Honors Program Theses

The primary purpose of this research study is to examine the prevalence and effects of international recruiting on team performance of women’s swim and dive teams in the Missouri Valley Conference. This research will evaluate the issues that influence coaches’ and athletes’ decisions to recruit or compete internationally, including evaluating the strength of in-state and regional recruitment pools, athlete retention rates by geographic region, and the correlation between the number of Top 8 finishes to the number of Top 8 finishers by region.

Intersectionality: Mapping The Movements Of A Theory, Devon Carbado, Kimberlé W. Crenshaw, Vicki M. Mays, Barbara Tomlinson

Faculty Scholarship

Very few theories have generated the kind of interdisciplinary and global engagement that marks the intellectual history of intersectionality. Yet, there has been very little effort to reflect upon precisely how intersectionality has moved across time, disciplines, issues, and geographic and national boundaries. Our failure to attend to intersectionality’s movement has limited our ability to see the theory in places in which it is already doing work and to imagine other places to which the theory might be taken. Addressing these questions, this special issue reflects upon the genesis of intersectionality, engages some of the debates about its scope and …

Foreign Affairs Federalism: A Revisionist Approach, Daniel Abebe, Aziz Z. Huq

Faculty Scholarship

In April 2010, the Arizona legislature enacted the Support Our Law Enforcement and Safe Neighborhoods Act. Commonly known as SB 1070, the law created a slate of new criminal offenses and arrest powers covering aliens within Arizona's borders. SB 1070 proved divisive. It inspired copycat legislation in several states, provoked sharp criticism from the legal academy, and – most relevant here – catalyzed a lawsuit by the U.S. Department of Justice seeking a preliminary injunction against the state law on the ground that it was preempted by federal law. Initially, the federal government's litigation prospects seemed dim. One term before …

Climate Change Action Without Congress, Michael B. Gerrard

Faculty Scholarship

Congress has not enacted major environmental legislation since 1990, and no end to the paralysis is in sight. Nonetheless, there is a great deal that the Obama Administration can do with its existing statutory powers to fight climate change.

Judicial Review For Enemy Fighters: The Court’S Fateful Turn In Ex Parte Quirin, The Nazi Saboteur Case, Andrew Kent

Faculty Scholarship

The emerging conventional wisdom in the legal academy is that individual rights under the U.S. Constitution should be extended to noncitizens outside the United States. This claim - called globalism in my article - has been advanced with increasing vigor in recent years, most notably in response to legal positions taken by the Bush administration during the war on terror. Against a Global Constitution challenges the textual and historical grounds advanced to support the globalist conventional wisdom and demonstrates that they have remarkably little support. At the same time, the article adduces textual and historical evidence that noncitizens were among …

China At The Tipping Point? The Tum Against Legal Reform, Carl F. Minzner

Faculty Scholarship

No abstract provided.

Child Welfare Cases Involving Parents With Disabilities, Joshua Kay

Articles

Many families include at least one parent with a disability. These parents become involved in the child welfare system more frequently than nondisabled parents, and their child protection cases are more likely to end in termination of parental rights. Parents with cognitive and/or psychiatric disabilities are particularly at risk of child welfare involvement. Cases involving parents with disabilities present special challenges and opportunities in child protection litigation, and strong advocacy is needed to ensure that these parents’ needs are met by the child welfare system and their rights are fully protected. With appropriate services, many parents with disabilities can provide …

Writing Supports For Older Students With Significant Disabilities: Examining Two Students' Journeys Towards Becoming Writers, Emily Helen Freeman

Dissertations and Theses @ UNI

This study describes the changes in linguistic and social communicative competencies that occurred when two older students with significant disabilities where provided with writing opportunities, instruction, and supports over a semester of the academic year. The goals of the study were to identify themes and patterns in the skills associated with linguistic and social communicative competence as evidenced in writing over time. A second aim of this study was to identify instruction methods and assistive technology supports being used in the classroom and describes the themes and patterns that emerged in the students’ writing given the presence of these curriculum …

Snake Oil Salesman Or Purveyors Of Knowledge: Off-Label Promotions And The Commercial Speech Doctrine, Constance E. Bagley, Joshua Mitts

Faculty Scholarship

The Second Circuit’s December 2012 decision in United States v. Caronia striking down the prohibition on off-label marketing of pharmaceutical drugs has profound implications for economic regulation in general, calling into question the constitutionality of restrictions on the offer and sale of securities under the Securities Act of 1933, the solicitation of shareholder proxies and periodic reporting under the Securities Exchange Act of 1934, mandatory labels on food, tobacco, and pesticides, and a wide range of privacy protections. In this Article we suggest that Caronia misconstrues the Supreme Court’s holding in Sorrell v. IMS Health, which was motivated by concerns …

Private Standards Organizations And Public Law, Peter L. Strauss

Faculty Scholarship

Simplified, universal access to law is one of the important transformations worked by the digital age. With the replacement of physical by digital copies, citizens ordinarily need travel only to the nearest computer to find and read the texts that bind them. Lagging behind this development, however, has been computer access to standards developed by private standards development organizations, often under the umbrella of the American National Standards Institute (ANSI), and then converted by agency actions incorporating them by reference into legal obligations. To discover what colors the Occupational Safety and Health Administration (OSHA) requires for use in work-place caution …

Law In Finance, Katharina Pistor

Faculty Scholarship

Law’s relevance to finance is by now well recognized, in no small part due to the literature on "law and finance" (La Porta et al. 1998; La Porta, Lopez-de-Silanes, and Shleifer 2008) celebrated in this journal ten years ago under the heading "the new comparative economics" (Djankov et al. 2003). There will always be some debate as to whether a specific law or regulation distorts or supports markets, but few would argue today that law is irrelevant to financial markets or that they could operate entirely outside it.

This special issue takes the debate about the relation between law and …

Modulation Of Cd8+ T Cell Responses To Aav Vectors With Igg-Derived Mhc Class Ii Epitopes, Daniel J. Hui, Etiena Banser-Tschakarjan, Yifeng Chen, Robert J. Davidson, George Buchlis, Mustafa Yazicioglu, Gary C. Pien, Jonathan D. Finn, Virginia Haurigot, Alex Tai, David W. Scott, Leslie P. Cousens, Shangzhen Zhou, Anne S. De Groot, Federico Mingozzi

Institute for Immunology and Informatics Faculty Publications

Immune responses directed against viral capsid proteins constitute a main safety concern in the use of adeno-associated virus (AAV) as gene transfer vectors in humans. Pharmacological immunosuppression has been proposed as a solution to the problem; however, the approach suffers from several potential limitations. Using MHC class II epitopes initially identified within human IgG, named Tregitopes, we showed that it is possible to modulate CD8⁺ T cell responses to several viral antigens in vitro. We showed that incubation of peripheral blood mononuclear cells with these epitopes triggers proliferation of CD4⁺CD25⁺FoxP3⁺ T cells that …

Making Vaccines "On Demand", Anne S. De Groot, Leo Einck, Leonard Moise, Michael Chambers, John Ballantyne, Robert W. Malone, Matthew Ardito, William Martin

Institute for Immunology and Informatics Faculty Publications

The integrated US Public Health Emergency Medical Countermeasures Enterprise (PHEMCE) has made great strides in strategic preparedness and response capabilities. There have been numerous advances in planning, biothreat countermeasure development, licensure, manufacturing, stockpiling and deployment. Increased biodefense surveillance capability has dramatically improved, while new tools and increased awareness have fostered rapid identification of new potential public health pathogens. Unfortunately, structural delays in vaccine design, development, manufacture, clinical testing and licensure processes remain significant obstacles to an effective national biodefense rapid response capability. This is particularly true for the very real threat of “novel pathogens” such as the avian-origin influenzas H7N9 …

Cyclic Peptides Containing Tryptophan And Arginine As Src Kinase Inhibitors, Amir Nasrolahi Shirazi, Rakesh Kumar Tiwari, Alex Brown, Dindyal Mandal, Gongqin Sun, Keykavous Parang

Biomedical and Pharmaceutical Sciences Faculty Publications

A number of cyclic and linear peptides containing various combinations of amino acids were evaluated for their Src kinase inhibitory potency. Among all the peptides, cyclic decapeptide C[RW]₅ containing alternative arginine (R) and tryptophan (W) residues was found to be the most potent Src kinase inhibitor. C[RW]₅ showed higher inhibitory activity (IC₅₀ = 2.8 μM) than C[KW]₅, L(KW)₅, C[RW]₄, and C[RW]₃ with IC₅₀ values of 46.9, 69.1, 21.5, and 25.0 μM, respectively, as determined in a fluorescence intensity-based assay. Thus, the cyclic nature, the presence of arginine, ring size, …

Degradation Of Mangrove Tissues By Arboreal Termites (Nasutitermes Acajutlae) And Their Role In The Mangrove C Cycle (Puerto Rico): Chemical Characterization And Organic Matter Provenance Using Bulk Δ13C, C/N, Alkaline Cuo Oxidation‐Gc/Ms, And Solid‐State 13C Nmr, Christopher H. Vane, Alexander W. Kim, Vicky Moss-Hayes, Collin E. Snape, Miguel Castro Diaz, Nicole S. Khan, Simon E. Engelhart, Benjamin P. Horton

Geosciences Faculty Publications

Arboreal termites are wood decaying organisms that play an important role in the first stages of C cycling in mangrove systems. The chemical composition of Rhizophora mangle, Avicennia germinans, and Laguncularia racemosa leaf, stem, and pneumatophore tissues as well as associated sediments was compared to that of nests of the termite Nasutitermes acajutlae. Nests gave δ¹³C values of −26.1 to −27.2‰ (±0.1) and C/N of 43.3 (±2.0) to 98.6 (±16.2) which were similar to all stem and pneumatophores but distinct from mangrove leaves or sediments. Organic matter processed by termites yielded lignin phenol …

Regulatory T Cell Epitopes (Tregitopes) In Igg Induce Tolerance In Vivo And Lack Immunogenicity Per Se, Yan Su, Robert Rossi, Anne S. De Groot, David W. Scott

Institute for Immunology and Informatics Faculty Publications

Tregitopes are a set of epitopes, derived from IgG, that bind to MHCII, activate nTregs, and promote tolerance. We have now confirmed that coadministration of Tregitopes with a range of proteins (autoantigens and nominal antigens, such as OVA) in vitro and in vivo leads to suppression of T cell and antibody responses to the test antigens. In this study, we demonstrate that Tregitopes are not immunogenic in vivo even when emulsified with strong adjuvants, such as IFA or CFA. Moreover, in vivo administration of Tregitopes with IFA or CFA does not induce Th1 or Th2 cytokine expression under restimulation conditions …

Health And Financial Fragility: Evidence From Car Crashes And Consumer Bankruptcy, Edward R. Morrison, Arpit Gupta, Lenora M. Olson, Lawrence Cook, Heather Keenan

Faculty Scholarship

This paper assesses the importance of adverse health shocks as triggers of bankruptcy filings. We view car crashes as a proxy for health shocks and draw on a large sample of police crash reports linked to hospital admission records and bankruptcy case files. We report two findings: (i) there is a strong positive correlation between an individual's pre-shock financial condition and his or her likelihood of suffering a health shock, an example of behavioral consistency; and (ii) after accounting for this simultaneity, we are unable to identify a causal effect of health shocks on bankruptcy filing rates. These findings emphasize …

The Billable Hour Is Dead. Long Live…?, Robert Hirshon

Articles

The legal profession, of course, quickly comprehended that pursuant to the hourly approach to billing, two factors were paramount: the total amount of hours it took to complete a matter and the amount of dollars charged per hour. As both transactions and litigation became more complex, law firms found it necessary and easy to justify adding bodies (read: hours) to their clients' legal projects. With the number of legal projects increasing as a result of explosive economic growth in both developed and developing nations, the demand for top legal talent during most of the 1980s, 1990s, and early 2000s was …

Implications Of Traumatic Brain Injury In The Military, Jeremy Rosene

Research Papers

Traumatic Brain Injury (TBI) is a disability that affects many different people in many different ways. The impact the TBI has on a person’s life varies considerably based on the severity of the injury and other psychosocial factors. TBI is one of the disabilities that can and does affect people from all cultures, all age groups, and all socioeconomic groups. It is also known to some as the “invisible disability” because it can present with no obvious visible manifestations and also because the nature of the disability can impact the individual with the TBI’s ability to fully understand their own …

The Effects Of Focus Of Attention On Heart Rate During A Static Balance Task, Alan M. Beck

Research Papers

No abstract provided.

Using Social To Go Local: Analyzing How National And Local Companies Use Facebook To Reach Customers, Brittney L. Edwards

Research Papers

Facebook has developed into an important marketing tool for many different companies. Facebook and other forms of social media allow businesses to generate and encourage two-way interactions with current and potential customers. This study examines the differences between how national and local business pages use Facebook to market and brand themselves and build online fan communities. The author conducted a content analysis of twenty Facebook business pages to ascertain how frequently businesses were posting content, what types of content were being posted, how many comments, likes and shares did the post receive, and were businesses replying to fan comments. The …

Creativity Across Cultures: A Comparison Of Cognitive Creativity To Creative Achievement Between The United States And India, Smit Shah

UNF Graduate Theses and Dissertations

Creativity is a topic that is relevant to everyday life. Research in this area has mainly focused on comparing creativity in work contexts and between Eastern and Western conceptualizations. The current study was designed to measure differences in creativity between students in the United States and India by comparing a measure of cognitive creativity, the Abbreviated Torrance Test for Adults, to a measure of creative achievement, the Creative Achievement Questionnaire. The results from a linear regression showed that the Abbreviated Torrance Test for Adults was predictive of the Creative Achievement Questionnaire in the United States, but not in India. Results …

Bacteriostatic Effects Of Sucralose On Environmental Bacteria, Arthur Phillip Omran Jr.

UNF Graduate Theses and Dissertations

Sucralose is a zero calorie sweetener developed and manufactured by Tate and Lyle Sweetener Company in the 1980’s. They sell the sweetener compounded with maltodextrin and dextrose under the brand name Splenda®. Sucralose was developed as a low cost artificial sweetener that is non-metabolizable in humans and can withstand changes in pH and temperature. It is not degraded by the waste water treatment process. Since the molecule can withstand heat, acidification and microbial degradation it is accumulating in the environment, and has been found in waste water, estuaries, rivers and the Gulf Stream. The highest concentration of environmental sucralose detected …

Volunteers In Museums: Are Small Museums Utilizing Volunteer Management Policies?, Tabetha A. Debo

Research Papers

Volunteers are an asset to any museum. Having written volunteer management policies and procedures for museums can greatly increase the effective use of volunteers within a museum. This paper attempts to answer this question: Do small museums, which are most likely to need volunteers due to lack of paid staff and overall funding, utilize written volunteer management policies and procedures, and are these policies and procedures effective? To answer this question, survey results of four Southern Illinois region museums are analyzed. Two of the museums did have volunteer management policies and procedures, but did not necessarily exhaust all possible topics …

Under Pressure : Self-Compassion As A Predictor Of Task Performance And Persistence, Allison Landgraf

UNF Graduate Theses and Dissertations

Self-compassion is a characteristic composed of self-kindness, common humanity, and mindfulness that promotes adaptive cognitive, behavioral, and emotional processing. A self-compassionate mindset in the face of difficulties can lead to less anxiety and more self-forgiveness, and because of these benefits, some evidence suggests self-compassionate individuals tend to persist longer on a task after an initial failure. This study focuses on the extent to which self-compassion can improve task performance and persistence under pressure. Participants first completed the Self-Compassion Scale (Neff, 2003a) to measure trait levels of self-compassion. Self-compassion was then induced by leading participants to think about a mistake in …