Digital Commons Network^™

Associations Of Four Community Factors With Longitudinal Change In Hemoglobin A1c Levels In Patients With Type 2 Diabetes, Elizabeth Durden

Faculty Journal Articles

OBJECTIVE

To evaluate associations of community factors with glycated hemoglobin (HbA1c).

RESEARCH DESIGN AND METHODS

We identified patients with type 2 diabetes who had an HbA1c ‡7.5% (58 mmol/mol) and subsequent HbA1c testing within 90–270 days. We used mixed-effect models to assess whether treatment intensification (TI) and community domains (community socioeconomic deprivation [CSD], food availability, fitness assets, and utilitarian physical activity favorability [quartiled]) were associated with HbA1c change over 6 and 24 months, controlling for demographics, HbA1c, BMI, and time with evidence of type 2 diabetes. We evaluated whether community domains modified associa- tions of TI with HbA1c change using …

Log Kya Kahenge: Psychological Well-Being And Perceived Stigma In The South Asian American Community, Khushboo Jain

Pomona Senior Theses

Current research has independently studied depression, stigma, and coping mechanisms in relation to culture, yet the effects of perceived stigma on the relationship between depression and control coping are heavily understudied. Typically, studies have broadly focused on comparing eastern and western cultures, but have not analyzed how populations with mixed cultural influences experience depression and stigma and further engage in control coping mechanisms. This study thus explores how perceived stigma moderates the relationship between depressive symptoms and control coping mechanisms for South Asian Americans. The study hypothesizes that the level of perceived stigma will moderate the relationship between depression and …

Promoting Preschoolers’ Emotional Competence Through Prosocial Tv And Mobile App Use, Eric Rasmussen, Gabrielle Strouse, Malinda Colwell, Collen Russo Johnson, Steven Holiday, Kristen Brady, Israel Flores, Georgene Troseth, Holly Wright, Rebecca Densley, Mary Norman

School of Education Faculty Publications

This study explored the relationship between preschoolers’ exposure to Daniel Tiger’s Neighborhood television programming and its accompanying mobile app and preschoolers’ emotion knowledge and use of emotion regulation strategies. An experiment involving 121 parent-child dyads from 3 US metro areas found that children who played with the Daniel Tiger’s Neighborhood app, and those who both played with the app and watched episodes of the program, employed the emotion regulation strategies taught by Daniel Tiger’s Neighborhood media more frequently 1 month later than children in a control condition. Preschoolers (3- and 4-year-olds) also exhibited higher levels of emotion knowledge 1 month …

Personality And Mental Health Support Effects On Occupational Trauma And Posttraumatic Growth In Police Officers, Jennifer Leigh Wills

Graduate Student Theses, Dissertations, & Professional Papers

Purpose: The purpose of this study is to investigate relationships between occupational trauma exposure, work environment stress, personality traits, posttraumatic stress, and posttraumatic growth in police officers.

Scope of the study: A cross sectional mixed method research study design with longitudinal component was utilized. The sample consisted of 109 police officers in approximately 13 police agencies from multiple communities ranging from small rural departments to major city and statewide agencies.

Instruments used: The California Psychological Inventory 434 (CPI-434); the Police Stress Questionnaire-Operational; the Police Stress Questionnaire-Organizational; the Critical Incident History Questionnaire; the Posttraumatic Checklist for the DSM-5; the Centrality of …

Examining Injury Data Reporting Practices Among Wildland Firefighters, Erin M. Boggs

Graduate Student Theses, Dissertations, & Professional Papers

Wildland Firefighter (WLFF) Crews lack an injury surveillance program to collect information on non-traumatic and traumatic injuries. Tactical athletes including: police, military and structural firefighters all have a variety of collection systems in place for injury data collection. The lack of injury data prevents WLFF crews from identifying high-risk environments, implementing injury prevention programs, and improving the overall quality of care on the job. Over the last several decades the recent rise in wildfire occurrences and wildfire suppression costs creates a need for healthy and strong individuals in the field. The cost of firefighter salaries and medical care can be …

The Battle Of The Little Bighorn Gunshot Trauma Analysis: Suicide Prevalence Among The Soldiers Of The 7th Cavalry, Genevieve M. Mielke

Graduate Student Theses, Dissertations, & Professional Papers

No abstract provided.

Colonization Of And Adaptation To Tidal Marshes In The Savannah Sparrow (Passerculus Sandwichensis), Phred M. Benham

Graduate Student Theses, Dissertations, & Professional Papers

Intraspecific patterns of geographic variation reflect a dynamic history of colonization and divergence in response to spatially varying selective pressures. Analysis of this phenotypic variation has long stimulated biological thought, yet many outstanding questions remain regarding the ecological and evolutionary mechanisms driving patterns of geographic variation. In my dissertation, I collected data on demographic history, physiological traits contributing to salinity tolerance, and acclimation responses to different salinities to elucidate the mechanisms shaping colonization and adaptive divergence in tidal marsh populations of Savannah Sparrows (Passerculus sandwichensis). Specifically, I addressed two main questions related to adaptive divergence in this species: (1) how …

Home Is Where The Food Is: Causes And Consequences Of Partial Migration In Elk, Kristin Jennifer Barker

Graduate Student Theses, Dissertations, & Professional Papers

Migratory and non-migratory ungulates often coexist in partially migratory populations, but the mechanisms that drive and maintain different migratory behaviors within the same herd are poorly understood. In western North America, increasing numbers of elk (Cervus canadensis) reside on low-elevation winter range year-round. These residents can cause issues associated with crop damage, potential for disease transmission to livestock, and reduced effectiveness of harvest management strategies. Because migrants transfer nutrients, alter carnivore distributions, and structure vegetative communities across seasonal ranges, reductions in migratory behavior raise ecological as well as management-related concerns. This work investigated the factors affecting migratory behavior …

The Biophysical And Biochemical Impacts Of Forest Disturbances Across Ecosystems, Leila Ann Cooper

Graduate Student Theses, Dissertations, & Professional Papers

Forest disturbances result in numerous impacts on ecosystem services. In the western United States, disturbances such as wildfires and bark beetle outbreaks have resulted in millions of hectares of dead trees. Despite the potential for these events to have significant climatic impacts, it remains a challenge both to effectively locate and characterize disturbance events across landscapes, and to identify the disturbance biophysical and biochemical impacts. The objective of my dissertation research was to improve the ways in which we locate and classify forest disturbances over large areas, as well as to increase our understanding of disturbance biophysical and biochemical impacts …

A Comparison Of Three Agricultural Startups, John Dindia

Graduate Student Theses, Dissertations, & Professional Papers

No abstract provided.

A Cartographic Workflow Manual For Endangered Species Conservation, Martin P. Viereckl

Graduate Student Theses, Dissertations, & Professional Papers

In response to global consumer demand for rare and exotic wildlife products, poaching of endangered species has become pervasive around the world (Eliason 1999). Despite the enactment of CITES, and other international efforts to protect vulnerable species from overexploitation, the global market for illegal wildlife products is estimated as high as $20-billion a year industry (Wyler 2008). Within important wildlife habitat sites, law enforcement struggle to curb rampant poaching that threatens the ultimate survival of many endangered species (Jachmann 2008; Rowcliffe 2004). Law-enforcement agencies responsible for protecting wildlife from poachers often lack geospatial tools that could greatly improve the effectiveness …

Philosophical Ends To Scientific Means: Diagnosis And The Epistemology Of Psychology, Christopher Michael Johnson

Antioch University Dissertations & Theses

Modern scientific psychology continues to advance toward newer and greater discoveries of the inner workings of the human mind, posited in the belief that a universal objectivity exists if only to be found. Despite the professional emphasis on conducting psychological enterprises in this manner, the field has spent much of its formalized existence struggling to answer some of its most basic questions. This paper thoroughly explores the nature of a scientific psychology, while suggesting that psychology may find wisdom in its philosophical origins. It further suggests that psychology continue toward a postmodern epistemology, in which a unitary psychological reality is …

Comparison Of Artificial Saliva Vs Saline Solution On Rate Of Suture Degradation In Oropharyngeal Surgery, Jenna W. Briddell, Luke Riexinger, Jove Graham, Donna M. Ebenstein

Faculty Journal Articles

IMPORTANCE Absorbable sutures are designed to degrade and lose strength over time. Manufacturers warn that exposure to various body fluids can change the estimated degradation rate of these sutures, but few studies have been conducted to quantify the degree of change associated with saliva.

OBJECTIVE To quantify the association of increased loss of strength of sutures over time after exposure to artificial saliva (hereinafter referred to as “saliva”).

DESIGN, SETTING, AND PARTICIPANTS This experimental in vitro study was conducted at Bucknell University (Lewisburg, Pennsylvania) from June 19, 2015, to July 4, 2015. No participants were involved. The loss of strength …

Neutropsychic Personality / A Mathematical Approach To Psychology (Third Enlarged Edition), Florentin Smarandache

Branch Mathematics and Statistics Faculty and Staff Publications

Neutropsyche is the psychological theory that studies the soul or spirit using the neutrosophy and neutrosohic theories. In other words: Neutrosophic Psychological Theory. It is based on triadic neutrosophic psychological concepts of the form (A, neutA, antiA).

Neutropsychic Personality is a neutrosophic dynamic open psychological system of tendencies to feel, think, and act specific to each individual, based on

Neutrosophic Refined Memory: that restructured the division of memory into: consciousness, aconsciousness (which we introduce as a blend of consciousness and unconsciousness), and unconsciousness. Aconscious was further subdivided into preconscious, subconscious, semiconscious = semiunconscious, subunconscious, and preunconscious …

A Sketch Of Consciousness Space Beyond Freudian Mental Model And Implications To Socio-Economics Modeling And Integrative Cancer Therapy, Florentin Smarandache, Victor Christianto

Branch Mathematics and Statistics Faculty and Staff Publications

In this paper, we give an outline of an ongoing study to go beyond Freudian mental archetypal model. First, we discuss the essence of numerous problems that we suffer in our sophisticated and modernized society. Then we discuss possibility to reintroduce spirit into human consciousness. While we are aware that much remain to be done and we admit that this is only a sketch, we hope that this paper will start a fresh approach of research towards more realistic nonlinear consciousness model with wide ranging implications to socio-economic modeling and also integrative cancer therapy. At the last section we also …

Improved Definition Of Nonstandard Neutrosophic Logic And Introduction To Neutrosophic Hyperreals (Third Version), Florentin Smarandache

Branch Mathematics and Statistics Faculty and Staff Publications

On the third version of this response-paper to Imamura’s criticism, we recall that NonStandard Neutrosophic Logic was never used by neutrosophic community in no application, that the quarter of century old neutrosophic operators (1995-1998) criticized by Imamura were never utilized since they were improved shortly after but he omits to tell their development, and that in real world applications we need to convert/approximate the NonStandard Analysis hyperreals, monads and binads to tiny intervals with the desired accuracy – otherwise they would be inapplicable. We point out several errors and false statements by Imamura with respect to the inf/sup of nonstandard …

Comparison Between The Water Activation Effects By Pulsed And Sinusoidal Helium Plasma Jets, Han Xu, Dingxin Liu, Wenjie Xia, Chen Chen, Weitao Wang, Zhijie Liu, Xiaohua Wang, Michael G. Kong

Bioelectrics Publications

Comparisons between pulsed and sinusoidal plasma jets have been extensively reported for the discharge characteristics and gaseous reactive species, but rarely for the aqueous reactive species in water solutions treated by the two types of plasma jets. This motivates us to compare the concentrations of aqueous reactive species induced by a pulsed and a sinusoidal plasma jet, since it is widely reported that these aqueous reactive species play a crucial role in various plasma biomedical applications. Experimental results show that the aqueous H₂O₂, OH/O₂⁻, and O₂⁻/ONOO⁻ induced by the …

An Extensible Mathematical Model Of Glucose Metabolism. Part I: The Basic Glucose-Insulin-Glucagon Model, Basal Conditions And Basic Dynamics, Caleb L. Adams, D. Glenn Lasseigne

Mathematics & Statistics Faculty Publications

A basic model highlighting the counter-regulatory roles of insulin and glucagon is proposed to start a series of models designed to explore continuous rein control and major aspects of glucose metabolism. The three-by-three dynamical system uses black boxes to model unit processes such as the dependencies of insulin secretion rate and the glucagon secretion rate on blood glucose concentration. The dependency of basal conditions on insulin resistance and any defects in insulin or glucagon secretion are shown. Since over-production of hepatic glucose exists early in the history of diabetes, it is important that mathematical models should account for this effect …

A Dynamic Ocean Management Tool To Reduce Bycatch And Support Sustainable Fisheries, Elliot L. Hazen, Kylie L. Scales, Sara M. Maxwell, Dana K. Briscoe, Heather Welch, Steven J. Bograd, Helen Bailey, Scott R. Benson, Tomo Eguchi, Heidi Dewar

Biological Sciences Faculty Publications

Seafood is anessential sourceofprotein formore than3billionpeopleworldwide, yet bycatchof threatened species in capture fisheries remains a major impediment to fisheries sustainability. Management measures designed to reduce bycatch often result in significant economic losses and even fisheries closures. Static spatial management approaches can also be rendered ineffective by environmental variability and climate change, as productive habitats shift and introduce new interactions between human activities and protected species. We introduce a new multispecies and dynamic approach that uses daily satellite data to track ocean features and aligns scales of management, species movement, and fisheries. To accomplish this, we create species distribution models for …

Dialogical Numbers: Counting Humanimal Pain In J.M. Coetzee's Elizabeth Costello, Mike Piero

English Faculty Publications

This essay argues that J.M. Coetzee's Elizabeth Costello stages numerical sequences strategically, dialogically, and parodically in order to call attention to the ideological weight involved in counting. Focusing on how one counts - and accounts for - human and nonhuman animal pain, I contend that the repetition of numbers in the novel works to subvert the neoliberal faith put in numbers, quantification, and data. Without succumbing to some religious-mystical numerology, this reading attempts to expose the fiction involved in the act of counting and the need to pay more attention to numerical discourse in literary fiction. In tracking these numbers …

Gain-Of-Function Experiments With Bacteriophage Lambda Uncover Residues Under Diversifying Selection In Nature, Rohan Maddamsetti, Daniel T. Johnson, Stephanie J. Spielman, Katherine L. Petrie, Debora S. Marks, Justin R. Meyer

Biological Sciences Faculty Publications

Viral gain-of-function mutations frequently evolve during laboratory experiments. Whether the specific mutations that evolve in the lab also evolve in nature and whether they have the same impact on evolution in the real world is unknown. We studied a model virus, bacteriophage λ, that repeatedly evolves to exploit a new host receptor under typical laboratory conditions. Here, we demonstrate that two residues of λ’s J protein are required for the new function. In natural λ variants, these amino acid sites are highly diverse and evolve at high rates. Insertions and deletions at these locations are associated with phylogenetic patterns indicative …

The Mechanisms Shaping The Repertoire Of Cd4(+)Foxp3(+) Regulatory T Cells, Piotr Kraj, Leszek Ignatowicz

Biological Sciences Faculty Publications

Regulatory T (Treg) cells expressing Foxp3 transcription factor control homeostasis of the immune system, antigenic responses to commensal and pathogenic microbiota, and immune responses to self and tumour antigens. The Treg cells differentiate in the thymus, along with conventional CD4⁺ T cells, in processes of positive and negative selection. Another class of Treg cells is generated in peripheral tissues by inducing Foxp3 expression in conventional CD4⁺ T cells in response to antigenic stimulation. Both thymic and peripheral generation of Treg cells depends on recognition of peptide/MHC ligands by the T-cell receptors (TCR) expressed on thymic Treg precursors or …

Better Living Through Chemistry: Addressing Emerging Antibiotic Resistance, Nathan P. Coussens, Ashley L. Molinaro, Kayla J. Culbertson, Tyler Peryea, Gergely Zahoránszky-Köhalmi, Matthew D. Hall, Dayle A. Daines

Biological Sciences Faculty Publications

The increasing emergence of multidrug-resistant bacteria is recognized as a major threat to human health worldwide. While the use of small molecule antibiotics has enabled many modern medical advances, it has also facilitated the development of resistant organisms. This minireview provides an overview of current small molecule drugs approved by the US Food and Drug Administration (FDA) for use in humans, the unintended consequences of antibiotic use, and the mechanisms that underlie the development of drug resistance. Promising new approaches and strategies to counter antibiotic-resistant bacteria with small molecules are highlighted. However, continued public investment in this area is critical …

Characterizing Habitat Suitability For A Central‐Place Forager In A Dynamic Marine Environment, Dana K. Briscoe, Sabrina Fossette, Kylie L. Scales, Elliott L. Hazen, Steven J. Bograd, Sara M. Maxwell, Elizabeth A. Mchuon, Patrick W. Robibson, Carey Kuhn, Daniel P. Costa, Larry B. Crowder, Rebecca L. Lewison

Biological Sciences Faculty Publications

Characterizing habitat suitability for a marine predator requires an understanding of the environmental heterogeneity and variability over the range in which a population moves during a particular life cycle. Female California sea lions (Zalophus californianus) are central‐place foragers and are particularly constrained while provisioning their young. During this time, habitat selection is a function of prey availability and proximity to the rookery, which has important implications for reproductive and population success. We explore how lactating females may select habitat and respond to environmental variability over broad spatial and temporal scales within the California Current System. We combine near‐real‐time …

Eleven Strategies For Getting Into Graduate School In Ecology & Evolutionary Biology, Eric Walters

Biological Sciences Faculty Publications

Getting into graduate school can be tough if you have not done your homework. I outline eleven strategies for increasing your chances of successfully being accepted into an ecology or evolutionary biology lab. Try to get good grades as an undergraduate, do well on the Graduate Record Exam (if applicable), join a lab reading group or undertake an undergraduate thesis, take time to forge relationships so you can have strong reference writers, obtain relevant work experience, author a publication, read peer-reviewed literature, attend national meetings, come up with some good research ideas, develop a relationship with a potential advisor, and …

Overexpression Of Egfr In Oral Premalignant Lesions And Oscc And Its Impact On Survival And Recurrence, Yumna Mirza, Syed Adnan Ali, Mohammad Sohail Awan, Romana Idress, Sana Naeem, Nida Zahid, Urooj Qadeer

Department of Surgery Docs

Introduction: Oral squamous cell carcinoma (OSCC) the sixth leading cancer worldwide ranks as the most common cancer in males, and the third most common in females in Pakistan. It is influenced by risk factors which are widely consumed in our population. The epidermal growth factor receptor (EGFR) is a tyrosine kinase receptor that is imperative for cell signalling, growth and differentiation. It is mutated and overexpressed in a variety of cancers, while in OSCC it has been linked to poor patient survival; premalignant to malignant transformation and recurrence. This study investigates the use of EGFR as a prognostic factor …

Procalcitonin And Interleukin-6 In Pediatric Patients Admitted With Suspected Sepsis At Tertiary Care Hospital, Panipak Temboonnark, Kittipol Klaiklueng, Wissaroot Karoonboonyanan, Panjachat Ratanamongkol

Chulalongkorn Medical Journal

Background : Bacterial sepsis remains one of the leading causes of mortality andmorbidity among children. Early identification of individuals at risk ofdeveloping life-threatening sepsis could enable early treatment and improveoutcomes. Procalcitonin (PCT), the peptide hormone precursor of calcitonin,and Interleukin-6 (IL-6), the pro-inflammatory cytokine, are both substancesthat present in higher concentrations after inflammation. The potential valueof measuring PCT and IL-6 levels are recognized as biological markers inpediatric patients with systemic inflammatory response syndrome (SIRS)in both early diagnosis of sepsis and to differentiate sepsis from the otherSIRS non-septic conditions, has higher accuracy than the routine laboratorytests pragmatically such as total leukocytes count …

Plastid Dna Variation Of The Endemic Species Oxytropis Glandulosa Turcz. (Fabaceae), Alla Kholina, Marina Kozyrenko, Elena Artyukova, Denis Sandanov, Inessa Selyutina, Daba Chimitov

Turkish Journal of Botany

Oxytropis glandulosa Turcz. (Fabaceae) is a rare perennial plant endemic to Buryatia (Russia). We sequenced three intergenic spacers (the psbA−trnH, trnL−trnF, and trnS−trnG) of chloroplast DNA (cpDNA) in specimens of four populations from two geographic regions (Barguzin and Yeravna depressions) within this species range. The levels of haplotype and nucleotide diversity varied in the range of 0.133−0.911 and 0.0002−0.0059, respectively. The highest values of these parameters are characteristic of populations located in the Barguzin depression. Variable sites detected within the intergenic spacers allowed the identification of eleven haplotypes; nine of them were found in the populations from the Barguzin depression …

Predicting The Potential Distribution Area Of Solidago Xniederederi (Asteraceae), Malgorzata Jazwa, Elzbieta Jedrzejczak, Ewelina Klichowska, Artur Pliszko

Turkish Journal of Botany

In this study, we aimed to investigate the potential distribution area of Solidago xniederederi, a natural hybrid between North American S. canadensis and European S. virgaurea, in Central and East Europe using the MAXENT modeling approach. The final MAXENT model was constructed based on 83 occurrence records from Austria, Poland, Lithuania, and Latvia and six abiotic environmental variables. The jackknife test revealed that annual temperature range, mean temperature of wettest quarter, and minimum temperature of coldest month had the highest gain for the training and test data when used alone, whereas precipitation seasonality, precipitation of coldest quarter, and precipitation of …

Properties, Variations, Roles, And Potential Applications Of Epicuticular Wax: A Review, Priyal Sharma, Shankar Lal Kothari, Mahender Rathore, Vinod Gour

Turkish Journal of Botany

The cuticular wax layer covers the aerial surface of plants and acts as a barrier between plants and the environment. The cuticle plays a key role in the protection of plants from pathogens, UV light, and transpiration. Variation in the wax quality and quantity is influenced by factors like the solvent used for extraction, species, ontogeny, and season. Compounds isolated from the cuticle layer have been studied by various methods and were found to play an important role from the ecological and physiological points of view. These compounds include esters, alcohols, ether, alkane, and aldehydes. Nonpolar compounds help reduce water …