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Nitrogen Incorporation Into Poly(Diiododiacetylene) And Attempts Towards Synthesizing Push-Pull Diynes, Gizem Eren

Stony Brook Theses and Dissertations Collection, 2006-2020 (closed to submissions)

Cocrystallization is a method employed to orient diynes to achieve the appropriate parameters for topochemical polymerization. Using this technique, poly(diiododiacetylene) (PIDA) and 4-(Iodobuta-1,3-diyn-1-yl)benzoic acid are crystalized into their polymeric forms. The weak C-I bonds in PIDA have shown to break easily with Lewis bases like pyrrolidine and iodide. With the use of multiple deiodinating agents, PIDA has also shown to absorb the heteroatoms of present reducing agents in the final amorphous carbon product. Using sodium azide as a deiodinating agent, it has been theorized that nitrogen would incorporate into PIDA and produce a precursor to a carbon-nitride material based off …

Nitrogen Loading To The South Shore, Eastern Bays, Ny: Sources, Impacts, And Management Options, Isabelle Stinnette

Stony Brook Theses and Dissertations Collection, 2006-2020 (closed to submissions)

The excessive delivery of nitrogen from land into coastal waters can lead to a host of environmental problems including algal blooms, hypoxic zones, habitat loss, and acidification. While many of these environmental problems have manifested themselves within Long Island's coastal bays, the quantity and sources of nitrogen are largely unknown in much of this region, making the development of effective management plans to ameliorate these problems exceedingly difficult. This study was designed to quantify nitrogen loads and sources to Moriches, Quantuck and Shinnecock Bays within the eastern extent of Long Island's South Shore Estuary Reserve. Further this study assessed water …

Diversity Of Skates (Batoidea: Rajoidei) And The Spatial Structure Of Nw Atlantic Communities, Christopher Michael Martinez

Stony Brook Theses and Dissertations Collection, 2006-2020 (closed to submissions)

Trait diversity often underlies complexity observed in biological systems. Whether it is behavior, life history, form or function, variation imparts differential performance on the organism, which may influence processes at higher levels of organization. Using two approaches, my dissertation research concerns the appraisal of diversity in fishes and its consequences for their ecology and evolution. The first two chapters focus on variety of spatial behaviors in northwest Atlantic marine communities. Temporal changes in community habitat utilization, as quantified by the interspecific abundance-occupancy (A-O) relationship, were the focus of chapter one. Trends in the A-O relationship indicated large-scale reorganization in some …

Does The Seasonal Acidification Of Spawning Habitat Influence Offspring Co2 Reaction Norms Through Transgenerational Plasticity In The Coastal Fish Species, Menidia Menidia?, Christopher S. Murray

Stony Brook Theses and Dissertations Collection, 2006-2020 (closed to submissions)

Experimental assessments of species vulnerabilities to ocean acidification are rapidly expanding, yet the potential for short- and long-term adaptation to high CO2 by contemporary marine organisms remains poorly understood. We used a novel experimental approach that combined bi-weekly sampling of a wild, spawning fish population (Atlantic silverside, Menidia menidia) with standardized offspring CO2 exposure experiments and parallel pH monitoring of a coastal ecosystem. We assessed whether offspring produced at different times of the spawning season (April-July) would be similarly susceptible to elevated (~1,100 uatm, pHNBS = 7.77) and high CO2 levels (~2,300 uatm, pHNBS = 7.47). Early in the season …

The Vascular Flora Of Steele Creek Park And A Quantitative Study Of Vegetation Patterns In Canopy Gaps, Sullivan County, Tennessee, Phillip C. Klahs

Electronic Theses and Dissertations

An inventory of vascular plants was conducted in Steele Creek Park in Sullivan County, Tennessee from March 2013 to September 2014. The park covers an area of 892 ha and lies within the Ridge and Valley Province. The inventory of vascular plants documented 547 species of 323 genera and 101 families. Two hundred sixteen taxa were newly reported for Sullivan County. Tennessee Special Concern Species included Cardamine rotundifolia, Castanea dentata, Lonicera dioica, Allium tricoccum, Cypripedium acaule, and Panax quinquefolius. A single species, Juglans cinerea L., is considered a Tennessee Threatened Species. Vegetation patterns were studied quantitatively by installing 10 …

Characterization Of A Putative Phospholipase D ´ Like Gene As A Lipid Signaling Modulator And Its Role In Salicylic Acid Mediated Defense Pathway In Nicotiana Tabacum, Phillip T. Dean

Electronic Theses and Dissertations

Plants are in a perpetual evolutionary arms race with a wide range of pathogens. Their sessile nature has led plants to evolve defense mechanisms that can quickly recognize a unique stressor and deploy a resistance tailored for a specific attack. The salicylic acid (SA) mediated defense pathway has been shown to be one of the major defense tactics plants can initiate to defend themselves against microbial pathogens. Following a pathogen attack high levels of methyl salicylate (MeSA) are produced that can be converted to SA by the enzyme salicylic acid binding protein 2 (SABP2). A yeast two-hybrid screening was performed …

Eating In Opposition: Strategies Of Resistance Through Food In The Lives Of Rural Andean And Appalachian Mountain Women, Veronica A. Limeberry

Electronic Theses and Dissertations

This thesis examines ways in which rural mountain women of Andean Peru and southern Appalachia use their lived histories and food knowledge in ways that counter Cartesian epistemologies regarding national and international food systems. Using women’s fiction and cookbooks, this thesis examines how voice and narrative reclaim women’s spaces within food landscapes. Further, this thesis examines women’s non-profits and grassroots organizations to illustrate the ways in which rural mountain women expand upon their lived histories in ways that contribute to tangible solutions to poverty and hunger in rural mountainous communities. The primary objective of this thesis is to recover rural …

Regulation Of C-Reactive Protein Gene Expression And Function, Avinash N. Thirumalai

Electronic Theses and Dissertations

Human C-reactive protein (CRP) is the prototypic acute phase protein whose serum concentration increases rapidly during inflammation. CRP is also associated with atherosclerosis; it is deposited at lesion sites where it may interact with modified lipoproteins. There are 2 major questions regarding CRP: 1. How is the serum concentration of CRP regulated? 2. What are the functions of CRP in atherosclerosis?

Our first aim was to determine the role of the constitutively expressed transcription factor Oct-1 in regulating CRP gene expression. We found that Oct-1 overexpression inhibited (IL-6+IL-1β)- induced CRP gene expression; maximal inhibition required the binding of Oct-1 to …

University Honors Program Newsletters, Honors Program,Georgia Southern University

Honors College: News & Publications (2008-2020)

• Congratulations Fall 2014 Graduates!
• Honors Research Symposium
• Southern Scholars Showcase
• Food For Finals
• Honors First-Year Experience Seminar
• Happy Holidays from the University Honors Program!

Spatial And Temporal Comparisons Of Gopher Rockfish (Sebastes Carnatus) Life History And Condition In South Central California, Natasha Leigh Meyers-Cherry

Master's Theses

Recent studies have shown environmental factors influence life history traits in fishes. Understanding intraspecific variability of life history characteristics and condition is necessary to determine local fisheries management strategies. Gopher rockfish, Sebastes carnatus, comprise 50% of the estimated shallow nearshore recreational rockfish catch in California, yet insufficient local data exist regarding life history traits and condition of this species. Our study locally defines growth parameters (maximum size and age), size (age) at reproductive maturity, and condition (hepatosomatic indices) for gopher rockfish in south central California. The growth parameter values of gopher rockfish from our study are similar to previously …

Growth Media And Lipid Determination Comparison Of High Rate Algae Ponds, Eric Alexander Nicolai

Master's Theses

Growth Media and Lipid Determination Comparison

of High Rate Algae Ponds

Eric Alexander Nicolai

The feasibility of algal biofuel production relies on the use of a non-potable water source. Municipal wastewater is nutrient-rich and a cost effective option as a growth media in algae ponds. However, this resource may be too valuable for algal biomass production, as reclaimed wastewater is needed for surface irrigation and groundwater recharge. This thesis compares the performance of 4.2 m² high rate algal raceway ponds (HRAPs) to 33 m² HRAPs grown on primary settled wastewater during a media recycling study and a growth …

First Report Of Goss's Bacterial Leaf Blight And Wilt Of Corn Caused By Clavibacter Michiganensis Subsp. Nebraskensis In North Dakota, A. Friskop, K. Kinzer, M. Mcconnell, Z. Liu, K. A. Korus, A. Timmerman, T. Jackson

Department of Plant Pathology: Faculty Publications

In August of 2011, the North Dakota State University Plant Diagnostic Lab received a hybrid corn (Zea mays) leaf sample from Burleigh County in southcentral North Dakota (ND). The leaf had long, irregular, water-soaked lesions consistent with Goss's leaf blight of corn. Using a light microscope at 10× magnification, bacterial streaming was observed from the excised edge of leaf tissue. A bacterial suspension was created, streaked onto a semi-selective CNS medium (1), and incubated at 22°C. Dark yellow-orange colonies appeared on the medium after 5 days. Single colonies were subcultured onto additional CNS media. To verify the identity …

Focusing On Drug Versus Disease Mechanisms And On Clinical Subgrouping To Advance Personalised Medicine In Psychiatry, Jose De Leon

Psychiatry Faculty Publications

Personalised medicine has finally been featured in psychiatric journals, but psychiatrists have mainly focused on the promise of using disease mechanisms to personalise treatment. Psychiatric disorders such as schizophrenia and depression are not diseases, in the medical sense, and are probably more like syndromes. Instead of spending much time and effort focusing on the mechanisms of diseases that may instead be syndromes, the author believes that psychiatrists should (1) learn more about personalising prescription via drug mechanisms, a pharmacological approach to personalised medicine; and (2) reconsider prior attempts by traditional clinical psychopharmacologists to use sophisticated clinical approaches that try to …

Lynn Hershman Leeson's Roberta Breitmore And The Art Of Becoming A Woman, Maayan Glaser-Koren

Master's Theses

Throughout the emergence of second-wave feminism in the 1970s, social and political activism inspired female artists to create powerful artworks that critiqued institutional discrimination and supported women's reproductive rights and workplace equality. Feminist artists raised the public's awareness of women's issues by making women the subject of their artwork. In California especially, these creators turned to performance art, often taking their creations to the streets.

This thesis focuses on Lynn Hershman Leeson's performance, Roberta Breitmore (1974-1978), and examines how, through the steps of the performance, the piece's fictitious title character became a living resident of San Francisco. It will explore …

Retrotransposon-Based Profiling Of Mammalian Epigenomes: Dna Methylation Of Iap Ltrs In Embryonic Stem, Somatic And Cancer Cells, Arundhati Bakshi, Joomyeong Kim

Faculty Publications

© 2014 Elsevier Inc. In the current study, we have used HT-TREBS to individually analyze the DNA methylation pattern of 4799 IAP LTR retrotransposons in embryonic stem, somatic and Neuro2A cells. According to the results, half of the loci within this family show constant methylation patterns between the three cell types whereas the remaining half display variable levels of methylation. About half of the variably methylated IAP LTRs tend to be hypomethylated in ES cells, and nearly all in this group are hypomethylated in Neuro2A cells. The observed hypomethylation in both cell types occur in a non-uniform, locus-specific manner and …

The Economics Of Mitigation Of Water Pollution Externalities From Biomass Production For Energy, Naveen Adusumilli, Taesoo Lee, M. Edward Rister, Ronald D. Lacewell

Faculty Publications

© 2014 by the authors; licensee MDPI, Basel, Switzerland. To fulfill the national bioenergy goals of the United States, conversion of marginal lands to intensive biomass crop production and/or application of greater amounts of nutrients to existing cropland could be expected. Such change in agricultural practices could produce unintended environmental consequences such as water quality degradation. Select Best Management Practices (BMPs) are evaluated for water quality mitigation effectiveness as well as for their relative cost-effectiveness, issues that are often ignored in evaluation of biofuels as a sustainable solution for energy demand. The water quality impacts of converting pastureland to intensive …

Nowhere: A Kinetic Typography Motion Graphic About The Pursuit Of Happiness, I-Cheng Lee

Theses

nowhere is a motion graphic project that expresses my personal journey of pursuing happiness. To be happy or not happy, people have the choices of their own lives and thoughts. This project shows that positive thinking could lead to better lives through my example.

A short poetic script on how I realized happiness in my life will be expressed in this project through visuals and composition. Every stylized sentence has a particular connection with the inspiring visuals and transitions. The intent of the piece is to install the viewer with the power of positive thinking by reading the poem with …

The Collegian (2014-12-01), Cleiri Quezada

UTB/TSC Archives - The Collegian [Newspaper]

Vol. 67, No. 14

Bridging Structure And Function In Semi-Arid Ecosystems By Integrating Remote Sensing And Ground Based Measurements, Dan J. Krofcheck

Biology ETDs

The Southwestern US is projected to continue the current significant warming trend, with increased variability in the timing and magnitude of rainfall events. The effects of these changes in climate are already evident in the form of multi-year droughts which have resulted in the widespread mortality of woody vegetation across the region. Therefore, the need to monitor and model forest mortality and carbon dynamics at the landscape and regional scale is an essential component of regional and global climate mitigation strategies, and critical if we are to understand how the imminent state transitions taking place in forests globally will affect …

A Morphological Phylogenetic Analysis And Taxonomic Revision Of The Millipede Family Atopetholidae (Chamberlin) (Diplopoda: Spirobolida) With Descriptions Of New Species And The Conservation Status Of Comanchelus Chihuanus (Chamberlin 1947) (Diplopoda: Spirobolida: Atopetholidae), A Species Of Concern, Michael F. Medrano

Biology ETDs

The taxa of family Atopetholidae Chamberlin 1918 occurring in the southwestern US and Mexico, including Baja California, are revised with new records and species from collections that have never been evaluated. Five new genera, Aculeulus, Bajabolus, Choixulus, Pinnaulus and Tamaulus and twenty new species, Aculeulus monicae, Arinolus anahiae, Arinolus sequoiaensis, Arinolus shelleyi, Atopetholus lowreyi, Atopetholus milleri, Atopetholus westi, Bajabolus bernadinoensis, Bajabolus lapazensis, Choixulus valdezi, Eurelus alisonae, Eurelus isaiasi, Eurelus marisae, Pinnaulus fieldsi, Tamaulus brantleyae, Tamaulus justini, Tamaulus maribelleae, Tamaulus miae, Tamaulus wardae and Watichelus sheari are described using morphological data and 18 synonyms are proposed for a total fauna of …

Community Ecology, Climate Change And Ecohydrology In Desert Grassland And Shrubland, Matthew Daniel Petrie

Biology ETDs

This dissertation explores the climate, ecology and hydrology of Chihuahuan Desert ecosystems in the context of global climate change. In coming decades, the southwestern United States is projected to experience greater temperature-driven aridity, possible small decreases in annual precipitation, and a later onset of summer monsoon rainfall. These changes may have profound consequences for ecological systems in the Chihuahuan Desert, which are intensely water-limited and respond to even small pulses of moisture availability. The first chapter (Chapter 2) compares change in the properties of monsoon season precipitation from 1910-2010 in the northern Chihuahuan Desert region to local variability in monsoon …

Aret: A Novel Regulator Of Alternative Splicing In The Flight Muscle Transcripts In Drosophila Melanogaster, Sandy Thi Oas

Biology ETDs

Drosophila melanogaster has been used as a model organism for understanding muscle development. Drosophila flight and jump muscles are distinct functionally and biochemically. This distinction is due to differentially expressed genes and differentially spliced mRNA transcripts. The exact mechanism of alternative splicing in somatic muscles is not well characterized. Aret was previously shown to be a transcriptional repressor, and has been implicated in splicing regulation based upon literature analysis and preliminary work. This study aims to define the regulatory role of Aret and the impact of alternative splicing on determining muscle diversification and fiber choice. We indicate the importance of …

Physicocehmical Properties And Pre-Exposure Processes Govern Gold Nanoparticle Accumulation In Freshwater Species, Austin Thomas Wray

All Dissertations

Monitoring the distribution and subsequent effects of nanoparticle (NP) contaminants in aquatic ecosystems will be pivotal to developing regulations that minimize their environmental footprint. Regulators are in a unique position to take a proactive role in shaping how we produce and consume nanomaterials as opposed to the reactive role they have had to adopt with other contaminants. Over the last few decades, researchers have made great strides in describing the fate, behavior, and toxicity of NPs in environmental systems. Recent initiatives have made the transition to scenarios with greater environmental relevance, yet important aspects of fate and behavior remain unexplored. …

Numerical Decoding, Johnson-Lindenstrauss Transforms, And Linear Codes, Yue Mao

All Dissertations

Many computational problems are related to the model y = Ax + e, including compressive sensing, coding theory, dimensionality reduction, etc. The related algorithms are extremely useful in practical applications for high performance computing, for example, digital communications, biological imaging and data streaming, etc. This thesis studies two important problems. One problem is related to efficient decoding for Reed-Solomon codes over complex numbers. In this case, A and y are given, and the goal is to find an efficient stable algorithm to compute x. This is related to magnetic resonance imaging (MRI). The other problem is related to fast algorithms …

Ahr-Related Activities In A Creosote-Adapted Population Of Adult Atlantic Killifish, Fundulus Heteroclitus, Two Decades Post-Epa Superfund Status, Josephine Wojdylo

All Dissertations

Atlantic killifish, Fundulus heteroclitus, have adapted to, or at least developed a level of resistance to creosote-based polycyclic aromatic hydrocarbons (PAHs) found at the Atlantic Wood (AW) superfund site in the southern branch of the Elizabeth River, VA USA. Historically, 90+% of the mummichogs at this site have hepatic lesions of varying severity, and 30+% of these fish have tumors of various origin. Many xenobiotics, including select PAHs found at the Atlantic Wood site, are ligands for the aryl hydrocarbon receptor (AhR), which is a promiscuous ligand-dependent transcription factor involved in developmental regulation, environmental sensing, and induction of a suite …

Allosteric Regulation Of Bacterial And Fungal Xylulose 5-Phosphate/ Fructose 6-Phosphate Phosphoketolases (Xfps), Katie Glenn

All Dissertations

Acetate is excreted as a metabolic end product in many microbes. Acetate production has primarily been studied in bacteria and archaea but is known to occur in eukaryotic organisms as well. For example, acetate is one of the most abundant metabolites excreted by the fungal pathogen Cryptococcus neoformans during cryptococcosis suggesting that acetate production may be important during pathogenesis. One possible pathway for acetate production in C. neoformans involves the enzymes xylulose 5-phosphate/ fructose 6-phosphate phosphoketolase (Xfp), which can generate acetyl phosphate from either fructose 6-phosphate (F6P) or xylulose 5-phosphate (X5P), and acetate kinase (Ack), which can then convert acetyl …

Elastically Mismatched Interfaces As Related To Glass-To-Metal Seals, William Horton

All Dissertations

The mechanical performance of Glass-to-Metal seals is largely dependent upon the morphology of the oxide interfaces. The interfaces of the glass-to-metal region are transition zones consisting of a metallically bonded base metal with its reduced oxide and progress to interatomic bonds which are a mixture of ionic and covalent in a glass or ceramic base material. Differences in coefficient of thermal expansion, interatomic bonding and overall physical chemistry cause a number of issues in design, manufacture and lifetime serviceability of a G/M seal. To date the primary dimensions of interface assessment are microscopy and analytical chemistry. The purpose of this …

Majorana Fermions In Chiral Topological Superconductors, Eugen Florin Dumitrescu

All Dissertations

Majorana fermions were first proposed in the context of high energy physics by Ettore Majorana in 1937, just before his mysterious disappearance. Now, over 70 years later, signatures of condensed matter ana-logues of Majorana fermions are finally appearing in low-dimensional superconductor-based heterostructures. In low-dimensional systems, these order parameter, defect-bound Majorana quasiparticles obey non-Abelian quantum statistics and can therefore be used as the building blocks of a topological quantum computer. In this thesis we will analyze the signatures associated with, and the robustness of, Majorana bound states in a variety of one-dimensional superconducting platforms. Our main result is the finding that …

Plant–Soil Feedbacks Of Exotic Plant Species Across Life Forms: A Meta-Analysis, Annelein Meisner, W. H. Gera Hol, Wietse De Boer, Jennifer Adams Krumins, David A. Wardle, Wim H. Van Der Putten

Department of Biology Faculty Scholarship and Creative Works

Invasive exotic plant species effects on soil biota and processes in their new range can promote or counteract invasions via changed plant–soil feedback interactions to themselves or to native plant species. Recent meta-analyses reveale that soil influenced by native and exotic plant species is affecting growth and performance of natives more strongly than exotics. However, the question is how uniform these responses are across contrasting life forms. Here, we test the hypothesis that life form matters for effects on soil and plant–soil feedback. In a meta-analysis we show that exotics enhanced C cycling, numbers of meso-invertebrates and nematodes, while having …

A Novel Method For Simulating Insulin Mediated Glut4 Translocation, Andrew Jezewski, Joshua Larson, Beata Wysocki, Paul H. Davis, Tadeusz Wysocki

Biology Faculty Publications

Glucose transport in humans is a vital process which is tightly regulated by the endocrine system. Specifically, the insulin hormone triggers a cascade of intracellular signals in target cells mediating the uptake of glucose. Insulin signaling triggers cellular relocalization of the glucose transporter protein GLUT4 to the cell surface, which is primarily responsible for regulated glucose import. Pathology associated with the disruption of this pathway can lead to metabolic disorders, such as type II diabetes mellitus, characterized by the failure of cells to appropriately uptake glucose from the blood. We describe a novel simulation tool of the insulin intracellular response, …