Digital Commons Network^™

2H–13C Correlation Solid-State Nmr For Investigating Dynamics And Water Accessibilities Of Proteins And Carbohydrates, Martin D. Gelenter, Tuo Wang, Shu Yu Liao, Hugh O’Neill, Mei Hong

Faculty Publications

© 2017, Springer Science+Business Media B.V. Site-specific determination of molecular motion and water accessibility by indirect detection of 2H NMR spectra has advantages over dipolar-coupling based techniques due to the large quadrupolar couplings and the ensuing high angular resolution. Recently, a Rotor Echo Short Pulse IRrAdiaTION mediated cross polarization (RESPIRATIONCP) technique was developed, which allowed efficient transfer of 2H magnetization to 13C at moderate 2H radiofrequency field strengths available on most commercial MAS probes. In this work, we investigate the 2H–13C magnetization transfer characteristics of one-bond perdeuterated CDn spin systems and two-bond H/D exchanged C–(O)–D and C–(N)–D spin systems in …

Structural And Mutational Analyses Of The Leptospira Interrogans Virulence-Related Heme Oxygenase Provide Insights Into Its Catalytic Mechanism, Anabel Soldano, Sebastián Klinke, Lisandro H. Otero, Mario Rivera, Daniela L. Catalano-Dupuy, Eduardo A. Ceccarelli

Faculty Publications

© 2017 Soldano et al. This is an open access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License, which permits unrestricted use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided the original author and source are credited. Heme oxygenase from Leptospira interrogans is an important virulence factor. During catalysis, redox equivalents are provided to this enzyme by the plastidic-type ferredoxin-NADP+ reductase also found in L. interrogans. This process may have evolved to aid this bacterial pathogen to obtain heme-iron from their host and enable successful colonization. Herein we report the crystal structure of the heme oxygenase-heme complex at …

Estradiol Modulates Neural Response To Conspecific And Heterospecific Song In Female House Sparrows: An In Vivo Positron Emission Tomography Study, Christine R. Lattin, Frank A. Stabile, Richard E. Carson

Faculty Publications

© 2017 Lattin et al. This is an open access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License, which permits unrestricted use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided the original author and source are credited. Although there is growing evidence that estradiol modulates female perception of male sexual signals, relatively little research has focused on female auditory processing. We used in vivo 18F-fluorodeoxyglucose (18F-FDG) positron emission tomography (PET) imaging to examine the neuronal effects of estradiol and conspecific song in female house sparrows (Passer domesticus). We assessed brain glucose metabolism, a measure of neuronal activity, in …

Anaerobic Copper Toxicity And Iron-Sulfur Cluster Biogenesis In Escherichia Coli, Guoqiang Tan, Jing Yang, Tang Li, Jin Zhao, Shujuan Sun, Xiaokang Li, Chuxian Lin, Jianghui Li, Huaibin Zhou, Jianxin Lyu, Huangen Ding

Faculty Publications

© 2017 American Society for Microbiology. While copper is an essential trace element in biology, pollution of groundwater from copper has become a threat to all living organisms. Cellular mechanisms underlying copper toxicity, however, are still not fully understood. Previous studies have shown that iron-sulfur proteins are among the primary targets of copper toxicity in Escherichia coli under aerobic conditions. Here, we report that, under anaerobic conditions, iron-sulfur proteins in E. coli cells are even more susceptible to copper in medium. Whereas addition of 0.2 mM copper(II) chloride to LB (Luria-Bertani) medium has very little or no effect on iron-sulfur …

Varietal Preferences And Within-Orchard And Tree Distribution Of Newly Recorded Gall Midges, Dasineura Amaramanjarae And Procontarinia Mangiferae (Diptera: Cecidomyiidae), From Commercial Mango Cultivars In Pakistan, H. M. Rehman, R. Mahmood, M. Razaq, R. Saeed, M. Jamil, G. V.P. Reddy

Faculty Publications

Gall midges (Diptera: Cecidomyiidae) damage mango by feeding on flowers and fruit tissues, inducing galls on leaves, and providing inoculums of anthracnose. Dasineura amaramanjarae Grover and Procontarinia mangiferae (Felt), two gall midges that damage flowers in all mango-growing areas of the world, have recently been recorded in Pakistan, and studies were conducted in 2011 and 2012 on the within-tree and orchard distribution patterns and cultivar preference of both species in Pakistan at one location (Rahim Yar Khan). Both gall midge species were found on all mango cultivars examined (Chaunsa, Fajri, Dusehri, Surkha, Sindhri, and Anwar Ratul), with the most damage …

Role Of The Aphid Species And Their Feeding Locations In Parasitization Behavior Of Aphelinus Abdominalis, A Parasitoid Of The Lettuce Aphid Nasonovia Ribisnigri, Govinda Shrestha, Henrik Skovgård, Gadi V.P. Reddy, Tove Steenberg, Annie Enkegaard

Faculty Publications

Aphid species feeding on lettuce occupy distinct feeding sites: the lettuce aphid Nasonovia ribisnigri prefers to feed on heart leaves, whereas the potato aphid Macrosiphum euphorbiae feeds only on outer leaves. The aphid parasitoid Aphelinus abdominalis, known to be able to regulate M. euphorbiae on many crops, has recently been indicated as a promising biocontrol candidate also for use against N. ribisnigri, a major pest of lettuce. This study therefore examined A. abdominalis parasitization preference between N. ribisnigri and M. euphorbiae and its ability to parasitize aphids feeding on different parts of lettuce plants. In addition, life history traits of …

Genistein Crosses The Bioartificial Oviduct And Alters Secretion Composition, Constantine A. Simintiras, Roger G. Sturmey

Faculty Publications

The dietary derived isoflavone and oestrogen analogue, genistein, is known to perturb fundamental reproductive events such as implantation and embryo cleavage. However the question of whether genistein is able to traverse the oviduct epithelial monolayer and impact oviduct fluid secretion remains unclear. This study tests these research questions using a bioartificial oviduct to show that genistein permeates the oviduct lumen in vitro with a biphasic (burst and plateau) kinetic profile, faster than spontaneous diffusion, and alters the amino acid composition of in vitro derived oviduct fluid (ivDOF) but not as an oestrogen analogue. In addition to offering insights into the …

Polymeric Nanopillars And Nanotubes, Their Manufacture And Uses, Steven A. Soper, Robin L. Mccarley, Guofang Chen, Hamed Shadpour

College of Science Patents

A method is disclosed for fabricating free-standing polymeric nanopillars or nanotubes with remarkably high aspect ratios. The nanopillars and nanotubes may be used, for example, in integrated microfluidic systems for rapid, automated, high-capacity analysis or separation of complex protein mixtures or their enzyme digest products. One embodiment, preferably fabricated entirely from polymer substrates, comprises a cell lysis unit; a solid-phase extraction unit with free-standing, polymeric nanostructures; a multi-dimensional electrophoretic separation unit with high peak capacity; a solid-phase nanoreactor for the proteolytic digestion of isolated proteins; and a chromatographic unit for the separation of peptide fragments from the digestion of proteins. …

A Reliable And Efficient Wireless Sensor Network System For Water Quality Monitoring, Dung Nguyen, Phu Huu Phung

Computer Science Faculty Publications

Wireless sensor networks (WSNs) are strongly useful to monitor physical and environmental conditions to provide realtime information for improving environment quality. However, deploying a WSN in a physical environment faces several critical challenges such as high energy consumption, and data loss.In this work, we have proposed a reliable and efficient environmental monitoring system in ponds using wireless sensor network and cellular communication technologies. We have designed a hardware and software ecosystem that can limit the data loss yet save the energy consumption of nodes. A lightweight protocol acknowledges data transmission among the nodes. Data are transmitted to the cloud using …

2017-2018 Undergraduate And Graduate Catalog, The University Of Alabama In Huntsville

Course Catalogs

No abstract provided.

Impact Of Awareness Programs On Cholera Dynamics: Two Modeling Approaches, Chayu Yang

Masters Theses and Doctoral Dissertations

We propose two differential equation-based models to investigate the impact of awareness programs on cholera dynamics. The first model represents the disease transmission rates as decreasing functions of the number of awareness programs, whereas the second model divides the susceptible individuals into two distinct classes depending on their awareness/unawareness of the risk of infection. We study the essential dynamical properties of each model, using both analytical and numerical approaches. We find that the two models, though closely related, exhibit significantly different dynamical behaviors. Namely, the first model follows regular threshold dynamics while rich dynamical behaviors such as backward bifurcation may …

Today - August 2017, Loma Linda University Health

TODAY

Inside this issue:

-- Mission trip to Northern Nigeria supports local Adventist hospital, regional outreach
-- A Vision Coming into 2020 Focus
-- Loma Linda University named a ‘2017 Great College to Work For’ by Chronicle of Higher Education
-- Darryl VandenBosch joins LLU Medical Center administrative team
-- Loma Linda University Health fellow wins $50,000 Amgen Young Investigator Award
-- Loma Linda University researchers find links between meal frequency, BMI
-- Cardiac patient honors nurse with 500th Healing Hands award
-- Loma Linda University program enhances K-12 science, technology, engineering and math programs
-- Hyperbaric Medicine Service receives accreditation …

Patient Or Physician Centered Care?: Structural Implications For Clinical Interactions And The Overlooked Patient, Aaron B. Franzen

Faculty Publications

Patient-centered care is widely supported by physicians, but this wide-spread support potentially obscures the social patterning of clinical interactions. We know that patients often want religious/spiritual conversations in the context of medical care but the provision is infrequent. As there is regional variance in religiosity, a gap in the literature exists regarding whether patient populations’ religiosity is connected to physicians’ self-reported religious/spiritual interactions. Using a national sample of U.S. physicians linked to county-level measures, the author test whether both physicians’ background and patient population characteristics are related to religious/spiritual interactions. Specifically, do physicians in more religious locations report more frequent …

Blocking An N-Terminal Acetylation-Dependent Protein Interaction Inhibits An E3 Ligase, Daniel C. Scott, Jared T. Hammill, Jaeki Min, David Y. Rhee, Michele Connelly, Vladislav O. Sviderskiy, Deepak Bhasin, Yizhe Chen, Su-Sien Ong, Sergio C. Chai, Asli N. Goktug, Guochang Huang, Julie K. Monda, Jonathan Low, Ho Shin Kim, Joao A. Paulo, Joe R. Cannon, Anang A. Shelat, Taosheng Chen, Ian R. Kelsall, Arno F. Alpi, Vishwajeeth Pagala, Xusheng Wang, Junmin Peng, Bhuvanesh Singh, J. Wade Harper, Brenda A. Schulman, R. Kiplin Guy

Pharmaceutical Sciences Faculty Publications

N-terminal acetylation is an abundant modification influencing protein functions. Because ∼80% of mammalian cytosolic proteins are N-terminally acetylated, this modification is potentially an untapped target for chemical control of their functions. Structural studies have revealed that, like lysine acetylation, N-terminal acetylation converts a positively charged amine into a hydrophobic handle that mediates protein interactions; hence, this modification may be a druggable target. We report the development of chemical probes targeting the N-terminal acetylation–dependent interaction between an E2 conjugating enzyme (UBE2M or UBC12) and DCN1 (DCUN1D1), a subunit of a multiprotein E3 ligase for the ubiquitin-like protein NEDD8. The inhibitors are …

Exploring The Telecommunications Properties Of The Human Nervous System: Analytical Modeling And Experimental Validation Of Information Flow Through The Somatosensory System, Natalie Hanisch

School of Computing: Dissertations, Theses, and Student Research

The growing field of Body Area Networks (BANs) is providing solutions to the wireless connectivity of wearable and implantable devices with applications in medicine, entertainment, fitness, and military, amongst others. While electromagnetic wave propagation has been the main BANs' enabling technology, the increasingly pervasive nature of these devices encourages novel solutions with added bio-compatibility and sustainability. In this thesis, a novel communication system is proposed for BANs based on the natural propagation of tactile stimuli through the nervous system. This system is composed of a tactile stimulator coupled to an ElectroEncephaloGraphy (EEG) system, and realizes the propagation of somatosensory signals …

Honors College Handbook 2017-2018, University Of Alabama In Huntsville

Student Handbooks

No abstract provided.

Population Density, Distribution, Richness & Health Of Shallow Water Caribbean Porifera From An Unesco Biosphere Reserve, St. John, Usvi, Patrick Michael Vojnyk

Theses, Dissertations and Culminating Projects

Porifera is an important phylum of organisms in benthic ecosystems that filter water, act as biogenic habitat, and provide 3-dimentional structure. Sponge diversity and abundance are often used as bio-indicators for good or improving water quality in a system. Transects were performed during July 2015, January 2016, and July 2016 to determine species richness, density, and assess necrotic pinacoderm tissue decay of species of poriferans in St. John, USVI. 6,800 individuals and 17 different species were recorded during observation periods in Great and Little Lameshur Bays. Results indicate that the non-cryptic species Amphimedon compressa and Aplysina fiulva had the highest …

Watershed Sub-Basin Scale Forest Fire Impacts On Soil Chemistry : A Case Study In Delaware State Forest, Pennsylvania, Usa, Jason Scott Darley

Theses, Dissertations and Culminating Projects

Forest fires can affect soil chemistry and soil properties depending on the fire intensity and type of biomass burned, changing the local environment. For this study, soil and ash samples were examined post-fire from the 16-Mile fire event in the Delaware State Forest, Pennsylvania, to understand the pedosphere chemistry within the watershed subbasin. The main goal of this project was to study the major and trace elements of ash and soil samples of the 16-Mile Fire in the burned area and compare to samples upstream and downstream of the watershed sub-basin. Inductively coupled plasma mass spectroscopy was conducted for major …

The Antiviral Effect Of Epigallocatechin Gallate-Stearate On Enterovirus-69, Hager Mohamed

Theses, Dissertations and Culminating Projects

Enteroviruses are single stranded RNA viruses responsible for diseases from respiratory illness to hand-foot-and-mouth disease. As a rapidly evolving group, enteroviruses often gain genetic variability which leads to emergence of additional types, one of which is Enterovirus 69 (EV-69). EV-69 has been associated with respiratory illness, possibly causing symptoms similar to those caused by EV-68. To challenge the ability of the virus to infect cells, this study examined the result of infection in lung cell lines A549 and MRC-5 in response to Epigallocatechin gallate-stearate (EGCG-S) treatment of the virus before infection. EGCG-S, a modified green tea polyphenol, was assessed for …

Mineral And Bioclimatic Factors Controlling Soil Black Carbon Sequestration Potential Along An Elevational Gradient, Adam Fernandez

Theses, Dissertations and Culminating Projects

Black carbon (BC) is formed by the incomplete combustion of fossil fuels, biofuels, and biomass. It has been suggested due to its ubiquitous nature in soils that BC may act as a significant sink in the global carbon cycle. BC has been widely studied in a variety of soil and sediment types but spodosols (acid forest soils) have been underrepresented in the literature. In the present study, spodosol soil samples were collected along an elevational gradient (~500 to 1,200 m) from three different mountains in the White Mountain National Forest of New Hampshire. Total soil carbon was first measured using …

Molecular Cloning And Characterization Of A Hemolytic Lectin From Venom Of The Stinging Sea Nettle, Chrysaora Quinquecirrha, Anup Khanal

Theses, Dissertations and Culminating Projects

I have identified a novel pore-forming toxin (PFT) in the venom of the Sea Nettle (Chrysaora quinquicherra), a protein I have named Chrysaoralin. This protein is discharged from specialized organelles called cnidocysts (nematocysts) found primarily in the tentacles of this jellyfish. Chrysaoralin was first identified by Nextgen sequencing (RNA-Seq) of libraries made from mRNA isolated from tentacles of mature medusa collected from Barnegat Bay, NJ. The full-length of the Chrysaoralin gene is 1365 bp, encoding a protein of 454 AA (50.695 kD; pI = 6.58). The SignalP 4.1 algorithm (http://www.cbs.dtu.dk/services/SignalP/) predicts a signal peptide of 22 AA. The mature protein …

A Small Molecule Egcg-S, A Modified Green Tea Polyphenol, As A Synergistic Agent To Enhance Antibacterial Activity Of Antibiotics On Bacterial Biofilms, Shrameeta Shinde

Theses, Dissertations and Culminating Projects

The rapidly emerging phenomenon of antibiotic resistance is continually becoming uncontrollable. Over recent years there have been an alarming increase in untreatable multi-drug resistant (MDR) infections that need earnest attention. The mechanisms by which antibiotic resistance is achieved in pathogenic bacteria have been extensively researched and various alternate treatment or intervention strategies have been designed. However, a recently established means of antibiotic resistance observed in bacteria is the formation of a physiological state known as Biofilm. Biofilm are complex adhesive microbial communities known to habitat animate and fomite surfaces. High mortality clinically infectious cases have been associated to the biofilms …

Starch Analysis Of Betula Populifolia And Populus Spp. In An Abandoned Urban Brownfield, Ariel Valverde

Theses, Dissertations and Culminating Projects

In order to cope with a variety of environmental stresses, trees use starch storage as a buffering system to compensate for energy needs. Starch allocation into different tissues throughout the year can determine the health of deciduous trees. Natural environmental stresses including seasonal changes, water and nitrogen availability and defoliation are known to have direct effects on starch storage. Anthropogenic stresses such as heavy metal and other toxic contaminants in soils have not been investigated as factors that alter the normal starch trends in the different tissues of trees. This study assesses how starch storage in different tissues in B. …

In Vitro Antiviral Activity Of Black Tea Polyphenols On Sindbis Virus In Vero Cells, Jose Villagomez

Theses, Dissertations and Culminating Projects

Black tea, derived from the Camellia sinensis plant, is a natural product that is rich in polyphenols. The major polyphenols found in black tea are known as theaflavins. Previous research demonstrated that theaflavins contain antiviral activity against Herpes simplex virus 1 & 2 (HSV-1 & HSV-2), both enveloped DNA viruses. The goal of this research was to investigate the antiviral activity of theaflavins on the Sindbis virus (SINV). SINV is an enveloped RNA virus, and the prototype species of alphaviruses. SINV was treated with various concentrations of a theaflavin rich Black Tea Extract (BTE) before infection of Vero Cells. Antiviral …

Mitochondrial D-Loop Markers And Size Variation Of Sorex Species, Joseph Andrew Osei

Theses, Dissertations and Culminating Projects

Sorex hoyi share similar morphologies with various other shrew species, ranging from nose size to tail length, which makes identification between species difficult. Current species identification relies on specific morphological traits (including dentition), however due to hybridization, these techniques may be inaccurate in certain shrews. Dentition also requires lethal sampling of shrews, which would best be avoided to not impact the populations.

To remedy this problem, a procedure for identifying the species using the mitochondrial D-loop sequences of Sorex hoyi, Sorex cinereus, Sorexfumeus, Cryptotis parva. and Blarina brevicauda was designed. This procedure would look for speciesspecific differences in the shrews' …

Orphan Benefactors And Orphan Innocence In Charles Dickens And Helen Hunt Jackson, Monika Mezyk

Theses, Dissertations and Culminating Projects

This thesis examines the role of the orphan benefactor relationship in Oliver Twist (1838), Great Expectations (1861), and Helen Hunt Jackson's Ramona (1884). This thesis looks at the conflict between the orphan benefactor and the orphan, which is an important link between Ramona and Hard Times. In this respect, my thesis addresses the larger construction of childhood in nineteenth-century Victorian culture. Grounded in common Victorian ideas of the deserving poor, the construction of the "deserving orphan" in these novels shows how orphan "innocence" is the center of major problems that these novels try to solve. One of the main …

Crispr/Cas9 In Leishmania Genome Editing : Towards A Proof Of Concept, Zein Kasbo

Theses, Dissertations and Culminating Projects

Leishmaniasis is a parasitic Neglected Tropical Disease (NTD) that affects mostly poor countries of the third word due to their limited access to clean water and health care. The disease is transmitted through the bite of a sand fly of the genus Phlebotomus in the Old World, and of the genus Lutzomyia in the New World. Historically, NTDs have not been given adequate attention or research funding and finding curative treatments has been slow. However, the fact that the insect vector and the parasite can live and thrive in any ecological system in the world, and under the current circumstances …

Exceptional But Not An Exception : Understanding How African American Women Make Their Way, Ebony E. White

Theses, Dissertations and Culminating Projects

Success in the US has been defined in White American terms (Katz 1985; Mangino, 2014), which may not reflect the values of African American women. The goal of this study was to provide practitioners (e.g., counselors, educators, researchers) with a perspective of African American women from their standpoint. African American women who were raised by female heads of households in under-resourced communities were given the opportunity to name, define, and describe their own successes. Using a phenomenological qualitative interview method of inquiry, a semi-structured interview was used to gain a more in-depth understanding of participants’ lived experiences and how they …

Latino Doctoral Students In Counseling Programs : Navigating Professional Identity Within A Predominantly White American Profession, Anna Flores Locke

Theses, Dissertations and Culminating Projects

Using a basic qualitative research design, this author interviewed eight Latino doctoral students in counseling programs about their professional identity development experiences. The author analyzed the data from a Latino Critical Race theoretical perspective to explore the ways in which power and privilege played a role in the participants’ professional identity development as Latino doctoral students in a predominantly White American profession. The results supported that ethnicity played a central role in the participants’ experiences navigating professional identity within a predominantly White American profession. The three themes that emerged were: (1) being one of the few, (2) navigating professional identity …

Role Of Physical Activity For Weight Loss And Weight Maintenance., Carla E Cox

Articles, Abstracts, and Reports

This article reviews the impact of exercise on weight loss and weight maintenance and the possible reasons that weight loss outcomes resulting from exercise are not consistently realized.