Digital Commons Network^™

Sex-Biased Microrna Expression In Mammals And Birds Reveals Underlying Regulatory Mechanisms And A Role In Dosage Compensation, Maria Warnefors, Katharina Mössinger, Jean Halbert, Anja Studer, Tania Studer, John L. Vandeberg, Isa Lindgren, Amir Fallahshahroudi, Per Jensen, Henrik Kaessmann

School of Medicine Publications

Sexual dimorphism depends on sex-biased gene expression, but the contributions of microRNAs (miRNAs) have not been globally assessed. We therefore produced an extensive small RNA sequencing data set to analyze male and female miRNA expression profiles in mouse, opossum, and chicken. Our analyses uncovered numerous cases of somatic sex-biased miRNA expression, with the largest proportion found in the mouse heart and liver. Sex-biased expression is explained by miRNA-specific regulation, including sex-biased chromatin accessibility at promoters, rather than piggybacking of intronic miRNAs on sex-biased protein-coding genes. In mouse, but not opossum and chicken, sex bias is coordinated across tissues such that …

Direct And Indirect Effects Of Parent Stress On Child Obesity Risk And Added Sugar Intake In A Sample Of Southern California Adolescents, Eleanor Tate Shonkoff, Genevieve F. Dunton, Chih-Ping Chou, Adam M. Leventhal, Ricky Bluthenthal, Mary Ann Pentz

Health Sciences Faculty Publications

Objective Research indicates that children are at higher risk for obesity if their parents have been exposed to a larger number of stressors, yet little is known about effects of parents’ subjective, perceived experience of stress on children’s eating behaviours and adiposity and whether weight-related parenting practices (i.e. parent rules and positive family meal practices) mediate this relationship. The present study evaluated the direct and mediated relationship between parent perceived stress and child waist circumference and parent stress and child consumption of added sugars one year later.

Design Longitudinal panel data.

Setting Eleven communities in Southern California, USA.

Subjects Data …

Ud In The News Nov. 18-Dec. 1, University Of Dayton

News Releases

In the last weeks of November, the national magazine of The Marianists, who founded the University of Dayton, highlighted work by Interim Human Rights Center Executive Director Tony Talbott to address human trafficking.

Popular online news outlet Inside Higher Ed also included the University's graduate certificate in sustainability studies in a roundup of new programs launched across the country.

Thresholds Of Sea-Level Rise Rate And Sea-Level Rise Acceleration Rate In A Vulnerable Coastal Wetland, Wei Wu, Patrick D. Biber, Matthew Bethel

Faculty Publications

Feedbacks among inundation, sediment trapping, and vegetation productivity help maintain coastal wetlands facing sea-level rise (SLR). However, when the SLR rate exceeds a threshold, coastal wetlands can collapse. Understanding the threshold helps address key challenges in ecology—nonlinear response of ecosystems to environmental change, promotes communication between ecologists and resource managers, and facilitates decision-making in climate change policies. We studied the threshold of SLR rate and developed a new threshold of SLR acceleration rate on sustainability of coastal wetlands as SLR is likely to accelerate due to enhanced anthropogenic forces. Deriving these two thresholds depends on the temporal scale, the interaction …

A License To Kill: Understanding Natural Killer Cell Licensing To Fight Cancer, Jolie Schafer

Dissertations and Theses (Open Access)

Natural killer (NK) cell education is an essential developmental process for NK cell effector function, that renders some NK cells “licensed” and others “unlicensed” (with heightened or lowered effector function potential, respectively) against tumor and targets lacking self-molecules. However, the underlying mechanisms responsible for the heightened effector responses of licensed cells remain unknown. Using NK cells derived from humans and expanded ex vivo we performed high-throughput protein expression analysis, and identified multiple proteins that are differentially regulated in licensed and unlicensed human NK cells before and after inhibition by killer-cell immunoglobulin-like receptors (KIRs) and activation by the NKp46 natural cytotoxicity …

Evaluating The Therapeutic Efficacy Of Restoring Wild-Type P53 Activity In P53-Mutant Tumors, Connie A. Larsson

Dissertations and Theses (Open Access)

The p53 transcription factor is the most frequently altered in human cancers usually via missense mutations that undermine its transcriptional activity. Clinically, TP53 mutations have been shown to be remarkably predictive of refractoriness to treatment, resulting in poor outcome. Consequently, the development of p53 pathway activating agents is rapidly evolving and gaining more attention in cancer therapeutics research, with several small molecule compounds currently in preclinical and clinical trials. However, it remains largely unknown what types or proportions of p53-mutant tumors will respond to p53 restoration-based therapies.

Using a mouse model of Li Fraumeni syndrome, we genetically restored wild-type …

Identity-By-Descent Mapping Identifies Major Locus For Serum Triglycerides In Amerindians Largely Explained By An Apoc3 Founder Mutation, Wen-Chi Hsueh, Anup K. Nair, Sayuko Kobes, Peng Chen, Harald H. H. Goring, Toni I. Pollin, Alka Malhotra, William C. Knowler, Leslie J. Baier, Robert L. Hanson

School of Medicine Publications

Background—Identity-by-descent (IBD) mapping using empirical estimates of IBD allele sharing may be useful for studies of complex traits in founder populations, where hidden relationships may augment the inherent genetic information that can be used for localization.

Methods and Results—Through IBD mapping, using ~400,000 SNPs, of serum lipid profiles we identified a major linkage signal for triglycerides (TG) in 1,007 Pima Indians (LOD=9.23, p=3.5×10−11 on chromosome 11q). In subsequent fine-mapping and replication association studies in ~7,500 Amerindians, we determined that this signal reflects effects of a loss-of-function Ala43Thr substitution in APOC3 (rs147210663) and 3 established functional SNPs in APOA5. …

Lethal And Sublethal Effects Of Novel Terrestrial Subsidies From An Invasive Shrub (Lonicera Maackii) On Stream Macroinvertebrates, Ryan W. Mcewan, Kevin W. Custer, Eric B. Borth, Sean D. Mahoney

Biology Faculty Publications

The biology of headwater streams is intimately linked to that of the surrounding terrestrial environment through organic matter subsidies. Lonicera maackii, an invasive shrub that is becoming abundant in headwater stream riparian areas, deposits substantial quantities of organic matter into the aquatic system. This organic material has allelopathic effects on terrestrial plants and insects, and a growing body of work suggests strong connections between L. maackii invasion and aquatic biota. Lonicera maackii deposits fruit and flowers in quantities and timings that are unique, and we tested the hypothesis that these subsidies would negatively affect survival and growth of laboratory-cultured …

Toxoplasma Modulates Signature Pathways Of Human Epilepsy, Neurodegeneration & Cancer, Huân M. Ngô, Ying Zhou, Hernan Lorenzi, Kai Wang, Ney Alliey Rodriguez

School of Medicine Publications

One third of humans are infected lifelong with the brain-dwelling, protozoan parasite, Toxoplasma gondii. Approximately fifteen million of these have congenital toxoplasmosis. Although neurobehavioral disease is associated with seropositivity, causality is unproven. To better understand what this parasite does to human brains, we performed a comprehensive systems analysis of the infected brain: We identified susceptibility genes for congenital toxoplasmosis in our cohort of infected humans and found these genes are expressed in human brain. Transcriptomic and quantitative proteomic analyses of infected human, primary, neuronal stem and monocytic cells revealed effects on neurodevelopment and plasticity in neural, immune, and endocrine networks. …

Exome Sequences Of Multiplex, Multigenerational Families Reveal Schizophrenia Risk Loci With Potential Implications For Neurocognitive Performance, Mark Kos, Melanie A. Carless, Juan M. Peralta, Joanne E. Curran, Ellen E. Quillen, Marcio Almeida, August N. Blackburn, Lucy Blondell, David Roalf, Michael F. Pogue-Geile, Harald H. H. Goring, Laura Almasy

School of Medicine Publications

Schizophrenia is a serious mental illness, involving disruptions in thought and behavior, with a worldwide prevalence of about one percent. Although highly heritable, much of the genetic liability of schizophrenia is yet to be explained. We searched for susceptibility loci in multiplex, multigenerational families affected by schizophrenia, targeting protein-altering variation with in silico predicted functional effects. Exome sequencing was performed on 136 samples from eight European-American families, including 23 individuals diagnosed with schizophrenia or schizoaffective disorder. In total, 11,878 non-synonymous variants from 6,396 genes were tested for their association with schizophrenia spectrum disorders. Pathway enrichment analyses were conducted on gene-based …

The Effects Of Perinatal Methamphetamine Use On Maternal And Child Outcomes: Implications For Education Among Bsn Nursing Students, Tina Nguyen

Honors Theses

The implications of methamphetamine use are vast and prevalent in the U.S. This epidemic is also well recognized in Tennessee and in Hamilton County. The number of men and women that continue to use methamphetamine speaks to the importance of this issue. Among these individuals, pregnant women comprise a significant portion of female methamphetamine users across the United States. The potential complications that can arise for not only a mother but also her child due to maternal methamphetamine use pose a much more significant issue. The detrimental effects that a child can experience as a result of maternal methamphetamine use …

A Biotic Survey Of Outcroppings And Pinctada Longisquamosa In Oyster Pond, San Salvador Island, Bahamas, One Year After Hurricane Joaquin, Ashton Selah Mitchell

Honors Theses

Oyster Pond is one of the marine inland ponds located on San Salvador Island, Bahamas. Oyster Pond has connections to the ocean through a series of conduits in the pond, which cause the salinity of the pond to be marine pond, except after a hurricane and during a drought. Oyster Pond has a variety of marine life such as algae, small fish, and invertebrates occurring in mangroves, flocculent, conduits, and biotic outcroppings. The focus of this research was to evaluate the impact of the 2015 Hurricane Joaquin (17 months later) on water chemistry and the marine life of the biotic …

Effectiveness Of Conservation Education At The Chattanooga Zoo, Luke Allen Black

Honors Theses

Conservation is the central focus of many modern zoos and aquariums. These zoos incorporate guest education to facilitate a connection between zoo guests and animal conservation. I conducted a study at the Chattanooga Zoo and the University of Tennessee at Chattanooga which examined two modern zoo education approaches. The two approaches utilized in the study are currently used in keeper chats at the Chattanooga Zoo. The first approach is an emotional appeal (an appeal to the personalities of the chimps at the zoo) and the second approach is a utilization of a take-action initiative (recycling cell phones to reduce mining …

Developmental Steroids And Vitamins: Identified And Quantified In Predatory Lady Beetles, Andrea Hixson

Honors Theses

Autumn brings ladybeetles into homes to seek shelter during the winter, which is a nuisance. Their bites may induce an allergic reaction resulting in painful rashes. Predatory ladybeetles have been used as a biological control agents. Not only do they feed on ecological pests, they also feed on the saps of ripe fruits reducing the value of the damaged crop. Two species of ladybeetles (Coleoptera: Coccinellidae) will be examined to determine the quantities of steroids and vitamins used throughout their life stages. The species examined are native, Hippodamia convergens, of North America, and an invasive, Harmonia axyridis, of Asia. The …

Preparing Education Leaders To Meet Diverse School Needs: A Cross-Case Analysis Of Principal Preparation Programs, Angela W. Cox

All Dissertations

As schools become increasingly culturally diverse, school leaders require the preparation to assist them with the challenges they may face. Educational leaders have a responsibility to guarantee that all students are receiving an equitable and fair education. School leaders have a duty to promote teaching and learning for all students. Principal preparation program should prepare today's school leaders with the knowledge, skills, and dispositions to be culturally aware and hold high expectation for all students and create inclusive school environments. The purpose of this study is to evaluate and determine if principal preparation programs in South Carolina are preparing school …

Giving Technology The Place It Deserves In Creative Problem Solving, Yves De Smet

Creativity and Change Leadership Graduate Student Master's Projects

This project explores the potential for using artificial intelligence (AI) in Creative Problem Solving (CPS) to facilitate a creative process. It invites members from the technology and CPS communities to see the opportunities for AI-augmented creative problem solving, and to join forces to turn those opportunities into reality. To this end the author looks at creativity through a knowledge-centered lens. He proposes a model based on how the human brain makes connections, to enable AI developments that help transform the knowledge residing in a team and/or from external resources into creative solutions. A vision of how AI could be leveraged …

Graft And Mesh Use In Vaginal Surgery, Raheela Mohsin Rizvi, Novera G. Chughtai

Department of Obstetrics & Gynaecology

Pelvic organ prolapse and urinary incontinence are among the most common chronic disorders in women. These are common problems whose pathogenesis remains unclear. As life expectancy increases, significantly greater number of women now present with pelvic organ prolapse and urinary incontinence requiring surgical intervention. Currently, the lifetime risk of undergoing prolapse or continence surgery is one in 11, and up to 30% of patients will require repeat reconstructive surgery and repeat surgery for incontinence in 10%. In an attempt to improve surgical outcomes and to preserve vaginal capacity and coital function, a number of synthetic and biological prostheses have been …

Evaluating Ligand Assisted Activation Of Small Molecules Through Proton Reduction And Alcohol Oxidation., Rahul Jain

Electronic Theses and Dissertations

Hydrogen is a potential alternate to the carbon fuels to meet the future demands for energy in an eco-friendly manner. Hydrogen produced by the electrolysis of water is stored in fuel cells which on demand can be converted into electrical energy upon the reaction with oxygen. In the quest for economically viable electrocatalysts for hydrogen evolution, the work in this dissertation describes evaluation of nickel based catalysts coordinated to redox active ligands, dialkyl/diarylphosphine benzenethiol and bis(thiosemicarbazone) for their ability to generate hydrogen with external acids as a proton source. A nickel complex with the benzenethiol ligand framework follows a traditional …

"It Teaches Them To Have A Conversation In The Real World" : An Analysis Of How Identity Performances Shape Classroom Discussions., Ashley Lauren Shelton Arnold

Electronic Theses and Dissertations

Although discussion has long played a role in classroom learning, recent focus on moving discussion away from the evaluative and toward the dialogic is key to understanding how discussion can be driven by multiple, shared understandings. Adopting a sociocultural perspective, this dissertation explores the ways in which identity performances shape one teacher and his students’ participation in classroom discussions. The theoretical framework guiding this study draws on the relationship between discourse and identities construction, with further attention given to improvisations of identities, figured worlds, and the ways in which power shapes discourse. This dissertation argues that performed identities shape the …

Age-Related Host Factors Regulate Lung Cancer Progression., John Caleb Greenwell

Electronic Theses and Dissertations

Cancer is largely a disease of the elderly. In the United States alone, 87% of all cancers in 2017 will be diagnosed in individuals aged 50 years or older. Among them, lung cancer is the deadliest, accounting for 1 in 4 cancer deaths. The 5-year survival rate is below 20%, a number which has not changed substantially over the past several decades. This underscores a desperate need for new strategies in prevention, early detection and treatment of this deadly disease. While tobacco use is unquestionably the number one risk factor for the development of lung cancer, the majority of diagnoses …

A Novel Approach To Assess Minimally Invasive Surgical Device Failure Utilizing Adverse Event Outcome Severity And Design Complexity., Marie K. Riggs

Electronic Theses and Dissertations

Medical device failure and misuse have the potential to cause serious injury and death. Given the intricate nature of the instruments utilized specifically in minimally invasive surgery (MIS), users and manufacturers of surgical devices share a responsibility in preventing user error and device failure. A novel approach was presented for the evaluation of minimally invasive device failures, which involved assessing the severity of adverse event outcomes associated with the failures modes and investigating aspects of the devices’ design that may contribute to failure. The goals of this research were to 1) characterize the design attributes, failure modes, and adverse events …

Nonspreading Solutions In Integro-Difference Models With Allee And Overcompensation Effects., Garrett Luther Otto

Electronic Theses and Dissertations

Previous work in Integro-Difference models have generally considered Allee effects and over-compensation separately, and have either focused on bounded domain problems or asymptotic spreading results. Some recent results by Sullivan et al. (2017 PNAS 114(19), 5053-5058) combining Allee and over-compensation in an Integro-Difference framework have shown chaotic fluctuating spreading speeds. In this thesis, using a tractable parameterized growth function, we analytically demonstrate that when Allee and over-compensation are present solutions which persist but essentially remain in a compact domain exist. We investigate the stability of these solutions numerically. We also numerically demonstrate the existence of such solutions for more general …

Distribution Based Nearest Neighbor Imputation For Truncated High Dimensional Data With Applications To Pre-Clinical And Clinical Metabolomics Studies, Jasmit Shah, Shesh N. Rai, Andrew P. Defilippis, Bradford G. Hill, Aruni Bhatnagar, Guy N. Brock

Brain and Mind Institute

Background: High throughput metabolomics makes it possible to measure the relative abundances of numerous metabolites in biological samples, which is useful to many areas of biomedical research. However, missing values (MVs) in metabolomics datasets are common and can arise due to both technical and biological reasons. Typically, such MVs are substituted by a minimum value, which may lead to different results in downstream analyses.

Results: Here we present a modified version of the K-nearest neighbor (KNN) approach which accounts for truncation at the minimum value, i.e., KNN truncation (KNN-TN). We compare imputation results based on KNN-TN with results …

Yeast Dynamin And Ypt6 Converge On The Garp For Endosome-To-Golgi Trafficking, Pelin Makaraci

Graduate Theses/Dissertations

Protein recycling is an important cellular process required for cell homeostasis. Results from prior studies demonstrated that Vps1, a dynamin homologue in yeast, is implicated in protein recycling from the endosome to the trans-Golgi Network (TGN). However, the function of Vps1 in relation to Ypt6, a master GTPase in the recycling pathway, remains unknown. The present study reveals that Vps1 physically interacts with Ypt6 if at least one of them is full-length. It was found that overexpression of full-length Vps1, but not GTP hydrolysis-defective Vps1 mutants, is sufficient to rescue abnormal phenotypes in membrane trafficking pathways provoked by loss …

Ostrowski Type Fractional Integral Operators For Generalized (𝒓;𝒔,𝒎,𝝋)−Preinvex Functions, A. Kashuri, R. Liko

Applications and Applied Mathematics: An International Journal (AAM)

In the present paper, the notion of generalized (𝑟;𝑠,𝑚,𝜑)−preinvex function is applied to establish some new generalizations of Ostrowski type inequalities via fractional integral operators. These results not only extend the results appeared in the literature but also provide new estimates on these type.

Heat And Mass Transfer Effects Of Peristaltic Transport Of A Nano Fluid In Peripheral Layer, K. M. Prasad, N. Subadra, M, A. S. Srinivas

Applications and Applied Mathematics: An International Journal (AAM)

This paper deals with a theoretical investigation of heat and mass transfer effects of peristaltic transport of a nanofluid in peripheral layer. By using appropriate methods, the velocity in the core region as well as in the peripheral region, pressure drop, time averaged flux, frictional force, temperature profile, nanoparticle phenomenon, heat transfer coefficient and mass transfer coefficient of the fluid are investigated, using lubrication theory. Effects of different physical parameters like viscosity ratio, mean radius of the central layer, Brownian motion parameter, thermophoresis parameter, local temperature Grashof number as well as local nanoparticle Grashof number on pressure rise characteristics, frictional …

Fractional Order Thermoelastic Deflection In A Thin Circular Plate, J. J. Tripathi, S. D. Warbhe, K. C. Deshmukh, J. Verma

Applications and Applied Mathematics: An International Journal (AAM)

In this work, a quasi-static uncoupled theory of thermoelasticity based on time fractional heat conduction equation is used to model a thin circular plate, whose lower surface is maintained at zero temperature whereas the upper surface is insulated. The edge of the circular plate is fixed and clamped. Integral transform technique is used to derive the analytical solutions in the physi-cal domain. The numerical results for temperature distributions and thermal deflection are com-puted and represented graphically for Copper material.

Behavioral Ecology And Associated Virology Of Mosquito-Host Interactions In Southern California, Oliver Eshun

Loma Linda University Electronic Theses, Dissertations & Projects

Elucidating characteristics of mosquito-host interactions are critical for understanding the ecology and epidemiology of mosquito-borne diseases. In this dissertation, I conducted three studies to explore potential mosquito-host interactions and associated virus infection rates. I first demonstrated that mosquito captures at CO2-baited traps decreased most markedly with height above ground, and also decreased with distance from water at a riparian area but not at an open water source lacking a vegetated border. Birds might therefore prefer elevated nests or roosts to avoid mosquitoes. The second study examined the anti-mosquito behaviors of budgerigars (Melopsittacus undulatus) in a laboratory study. The birds defended …

Comparison Of Antibacterial Activity Of Ozonated Olive Oil And Chlorhexidine Gluconate, Changmin Lee

Loma Linda University Electronic Theses, Dissertations & Projects

Aim: The aim of this in vitro disk diffusion susceptibility test is to compare the antibacterial activity of ozonated olive oil (OzOO) with chlorhexidine gluconate (CHX) against periodontal pathogens, Porphyromonas gingivalis and Aggregatibacter Actinomycetemcomitans. Materials and Methods: The antibacterial activity of two antiseptics, OzOO and CHX, and, two controls, olive oil and normal saline was assessed by disk diffusion susceptibility test. For disk diffusion susceptibility test, two periodontal pathogens, 20 petri dishes for P. gingivalis and 18 petri dishes for A. actinomycetemcomitans, were used. To assess the antibacterial activity, the diameters of the growth inhibition zone were measured with a …

Endothelin-1 And Hypoxic Vascular Remodeling In Ovine Fetal Cerebral Arteries, Jinjutha Silpanisong

Loma Linda University Electronic Theses, Dissertations & Projects

Intrauterine hypoxia resulting from decreased maternal oxygen uptake, insufficient oxygen carrying capacity, or compromised oxygen delivery to the fetus jeopardizes fetal oxygen delivery, detrimentally affecting growth and development of the immature vasculature. Hypoxia transiently increases Hypoxia Inducible Factor-1α (HIF- 1α), which complexes with HIF-1β to form the active HIF-1 dimer that can affect transcription. This temporary rise in HIF-1 can promote gene transcription of ligands such as Vascular Endothelial Growth Factor (VEGF) and Endothelin-1 (ET-1), which rises and falls with HIF levels. The absence of chronic elevation of these ligands prompted the question of how long-term effects of hypoxia is …