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Commonwealth Times 2018-08-22

Commonwealth Times, 1969-

No abstract provided.

Fireflies Thwart Bat Attack With Multisensory Warnings, Brian C. Leavell, Juliette J. Rubin, Christopher J. W. Mcclure

KIP Articles

Many defended animals prevent attacks by displaying warning signals that are highly conspicuous to their predators. We hypothesized that bioluminescing fireflies, widely known for their vibrant courtship signals, also advertise their noxiousness to echolocating bats. To test this postulate, we pit naïve big brown bats (Eptesicus fuscus) against chemically defended fireflies (Photinus pyralis) to examine whether and how these beetles transmit salient warnings to bats. We demonstrate that these nocturnal predators learn to avoid noxious fireflies using either vision or echolocation and that bats learn faster when integrating information from both sensory streams—providing fundamental evidence that multisensory integration increases the …

Of Typicality And Predictive Distributions In Discriminant Function Analysis, Lyle W. Konigsberg, Susan R. Frankenberg

Human Biology Open Access Pre-Prints

While discriminant function analysis is an inherently Bayesian method, researchers attempting to estimate ancestry in human skeletal samples often follow discriminant function analysis with the calculation of frequentist-based typicalities for assigning group membership. Such an approach is problematic in that it fails to account for admixture and for variation in why individuals may be classified as outliers, or non-members of particular groups. This paper presents an argument and methodology for employing a fully Bayesian approach in discriminant function analysis applied to cases of ancestry estimation. The approach requires adding the calculation, or estimation, of predictive distributions as the final step …

Survey And Insights Into Unmanned Aerial Vehicle-Based Detection And Documentation Of Clandestine Graves And Human Remains, Bryce Murray, Derek T. Anderson, Daniel J. Wescott, Robert Moorhead, Melissa F. Anderson

Human Biology Open Access Pre-Prints

Numerous biological and archaeological studies have demonstrated the legitimacy of remote sensing in anthropology. Herein, focus is placed on detecting and documenting terrestrial clandestine graves and surface remains (CGSR) of humans using unmanned aerial vehicles (UAVs), sensors and automatic processing algorithms. CGSR is a complex decision making under uncertainty problem that requires the identification and intelligent reasoning about direct evidence of human remains and their environmental fingerprints. As such, it is as much an engineering and geospatial problem as it is an anthropology problem. This article is a cross- disciplinary effort to survey existing work across disciplines and to provide …

Ud Top Performer In Aashe 2018 Sustainable Campus Index, University Of Dayton

News Releases

The Association for the Advancement of Sustainability in Higher Education 2018 Sustainable Campus Index released Aug. 22 lists the University of Dayton among the world's top performers in the categories of research and purchasing, and highlights the UD's Energy GPA program and Kennedy Union green roof.

School Of Engineering Welcomes New Dean David A. Puleo, Edwin B. Smith

University of Mississippi News

Former Kentucky associate dean brings years of leadership experience, vision to position

Hydrodynamics In A Shallow Seasonally Low-Inflow Estuary Following Eelgrass Collapse, Ryan K. Walter, Edwin J. Rainville, Jennifer K. O'Leary

Physics

Hydrodynamics play a critical role in mediating biological and ecological processes and can have major impacts on the distribution of habitat-forming species. Low-inflow estuaries are widespread in arid regions and during the dry season in Mediterranean climates. There is a growing need to evaluate dynamics and exchange processes in these systems and the resultant ecological linkages. We investigate the role that hydrodynamics play in shaping environmental gradients in a short and seasonally low-inflow estuary located along the central California coast. Since 2007, eelgrass meadows in Morro Bay have declined by more than 90%, representing the collapse of the major …

Chemical Engineering Junior Wades Into Study At Water Security Institute, Ryan Upshaw

University of Mississippi News

Jordan Wescovich part of two-week study of Gulf Coast's water security issues

Improving Diet & Physical Activity Behaviors Through Tailored Mhealth Messages: Application To Childhood Obesity Prevention In A Pediatric Emergency Department, Samantha Oldman

Master's Theses

No abstract provided.

A Longitudinal Examination Of Factors Associated With Network Bridging Among Ymsm: Implications For Hiv Prevention, Dexter R. Voisin

Faculty Scholarship

Social-environmental factors may be associated with social network stability, which has implications for HIV acquisition. However, the link between social-environmental factors, network composition and HIV risk has not been examined previously among a city-population based sample of young Black men who have sex with Men (YBMSM). Respondent driven sampling was used to recruit a cohort of 618 YMBSM. Respondents were evaluated at baseline, 9 and 18 months beginning June 2013. A logistic regression model was used to assess the relationship between bridging (i.e. having non-redundant contacts in one’s network, indicating network instability) and social-environmental factors and HIV risk factors between …

Dry Bean Water Use/Yield Production Function To Estimate Dryland Yields In The U.S. Central High Plain, David C. Nielsen

United States Department of Agriculture-Agricultural Research Service / University of Nebraska-Lincoln: Faculty Publications

Dry edible bean (Phaseolus vulgaris L.) could be used to diversify dryland rotational cropping systems in the U.S. Central High Plains. Dryland production potential of dry bean is undocumented in this region. The objectives of this study were to determine dry bean yield and water use under a range of water availability conditions in order to produce a water use-yield production function and to use that production function in conjunction with long-term precipitation records to estimate average yields and probabilities of attaining given yields. Dry bean was grown over a six-yr period at Akron, CO under a line-source gradient irrigation …

Transcriptional Response Of Honey Bee (Apis Mellifera) To Differential Nutritional Status And Nosema Infection, Farida Azzouz-Olden, Arthur G. Hunt, Gloria Degrandi-Hoffman

Plant and Soil Sciences Faculty Publications

Background: Bees are confronting several environmental challenges, including the intermingled effects of malnutrition and disease. Intuitively, pollen is the healthiest nutritional choice, however, commercial substitutes, such as Bee-Pro and MegaBee, are widely used. Herein we examined how feeding natural and artificial diets shapes transcription in the abdomen of the honey bee, and how transcription shifts in combination with Nosema parasitism.

Results: Gene ontology enrichment revealed that, compared with poor diet (carbohydrates [C]), bees fed pollen (P > C), Bee-Pro (B > C), and MegaBee (M > C) showed a broad upregulation of metabolic processes, especially lipids; however, pollen feeding promoted more functions, and …

Searching For Stability, Michael Hutson

Doctoral Dissertations

Understanding how multiple competing species can inhabit the same natural communities has been one of the most enduring challenges of ecology. Barring specific stabilizing mechanisms, diversity should erode over time as fitness differences lead to rapid competitive exclusion, although species with similar fitness might co-occur for longer periods during a random walk to extinction. Empirical studies addressing coexistence have lagged theoretical work, and this dissertation aims to address this knowledge gap. I focus on predation and some of the ways in which predation may contribute to stability, moving from laboratory microcosms to field enclosures, and from temporary ponds to the …

Propargyl-Linked Antifolates As Inhibitors Of The Folate Biosynthetic Pathway In Mycobacterium Tuberculosis And M. Avium, Behnoush Hajian

Doctoral Dissertations

Mycobacterium tuberculosis, the causative agent of tuberculosis (TB), has co-evolved with humans since the dawn of our species. Despite advances in antibiotic therapy, TB global burden is till enormous. Antimicrobial resistance and HIV epidemic challenge the ongoing efforts to control TB. Novel anti-TB agents are required to address the issues associated with current drug regimens and to improve the outcomes of TB therapy. In this work, we have evaluated the antimycobacterial activity of propargyl-linked antifolates against drug-susceptible and drug-resistant M. tuberculosis. Antifolates exerts their antimicrobial effect by interruption of folate biosynthetic pathway and one-carbon metabolism. We have successfully …

Bio-Inspired Stimuli Responsive Smart Soft Materials, Songshan Zeng

Doctoral Dissertations

Smart soft materials, which are commonly integrated with function-oriented surface engineering and substrate configuration, capable of reversibly changing transparency, fluorescence, coloration, are playing critical part in the emerging optical/electronic applications. Inspired by the vivid displaying tactics in marine life, a series of intriguing bilayer or multi-layer devices based on a rigid thin film tightly bonded to a soft stretchable substrate was achieved in this dissertation. These devices exhibit versatile multi-stimuli responsive characteristics which can dynamically change their optical properties (such as transparency, fluorescent intensity/coloration, reflective color) as exposed to specific stimulus (such as heat, UV, moisture, electrical field and/or mechanical …

August 22, 2018, The Daily Mississippian

Daily Mississippian (all digitized issues)

No abstract provided.

Mechanisms Of Dissolved And Labile Particulate Iron Supply To Shelf Waters And Phytoplankton Blooms Off South Georgia, Southern Ocean, Christian Schlosser, Katrin Schmidt, Alfred Aquilina, William B. Homoky, Maxi Castrillejo, Rachel A. Mills, Matthew D. Patey, Sophie Fielding, Angus Atkinson, Eric P. Achterberg

School of Geography, Earth and Environmental Sciences

Abstract. The island of South Georgia is situated in the iron (Fe)-depleted Antarctic Circumpolar Current of the Southern Ocean. Iron emanating from its shelf system fuels large phytoplankton blooms downstream of the island, but the actual supply mechanisms are unclear. To address this, we present an inventory of Fe, manganese (Mn), and aluminium (Al) in shelf sediments, pore waters, and the water column in the vicinity of South Georgia, alongside data on zooplankton-mediated Fe cycling processes, and provide estimates of the relative dissolved Fe (DFe) fluxes from these sources. Seafloor sediments, modified by authigenic Fe precipitation, were the main particulate …

Improvements On Orca For Fast Computation Of Graphlet Degree Vectors Of Any Graphlet Order, Wilberto Z. Nunez

Theses

It is increasingly common to find real-life structures or behaviors represented as graphs in many areas of the computing sciences. Comparing these graphs is a hard task, especially when we are interested in assigning a non-binary similarity score between two large graphs based on some domain-specific context. In bioinformatics, social network analysis and other areas is frequently necessary to compute graph similarities based on the local topological information of each vertex of the given graphs. This is why graphlet degree vectors have become more and more popular in these areas. They provide a simple yet detailed representation of a vertex's …

Spheroid Size Does Not Impact Metabolism Of The Beta-Blocker Propranolol In 3d Intestinal Fish Model, Laura M. Langan, Stewart F. Owen, Maciej Trznadel, Nicholas J.F. Dodd, Simon K. Jackson, Wendy M. Purcell, Awadhesh N. Jha

School of Biomedical Sciences

No abstract provided.

Sex-Specific Associations Of Infants’ Gut Microbiome With Arsenic Exposure In A Us Population, Anne G. Hoen, Juliette C. Madan, Zhigang Li, Modupe Coker, Sara N. Lundgren, Hilary G. Morrison, Thomas J. Palys, Brian P. Jackson, Mitchell L. Sogin, Kathryn L. Cottingham, Margaret R. Karagas

Dartmouth Scholarship

Arsenic is a ubiquitous environmental toxicant with antimicrobial properties that can be found in food and drinking water. The influence of arsenic exposure on the composition of the human microbiome in US populations remains unknown, particularly during the vulnerable infant period. We investigated the relationship between arsenic exposure and gut microbiome composition in 204 infants prospectively followed as part of the New Hampshire Birth Cohort Study. Infant urine was analyzed for total arsenic concentration using inductively coupled plasma mass spectrometry. Stool microbiome composition was determined using sequencing of the bacterial 16S rRNA gene. Infant urinary arsenic related to gut microbiome …

The Consideration Of Male Victims Of Sexual Violence As A Subset Of The Particular Social Group “Homosexual” In Adjudicating Asylum Claims, Christiana Desrosiers

Pace International Law Review

This Article analyzes the difficulties African male victims of sexual violence experience when seeking asylum in homophobic host countries and the lack of attention they receive from international and national governments and organizations. It concludes by recommending that male victims of sexual violence be able to seek asylum in host countries due to lack of medical care that they receive in their countries on account of imputed homosexual status.

Delivering Solutions, Sandy Doyle-Ahearn

Leadership Hour at Otterbein University

As President of EMH&T, Sandy oversees the activities of more than 350 professionals and technical personnel, which she describes as solution-oriented partners for the firm’s valued clients. She joined EMH&T in 1997, and today she is responsible for leading the firm and focusing on corporate operations, client relationships, employee engagement and business development. Sandy is an active member of the consulting and philanthropic communities, serving in leadership positions in a number of organizations including the YWCA Columbus, Columbus Academy, the Nature Conservancy of Ohio, Childhood League, the Affordable Housing Alliance of Central Ohio, American Council of Engineering Companies (Ohio) and …

2018 August 21 - Medical Student Education Committee Minutes, Medical Student Education Committee, East Tennessee State University

Medical Student Education Committee Minutes

No abstract provided.

Trade-Offs Between Growth, Reproduction And Defense In Response To Resource Availability Manipulations, Robert Marquis, Juliana Tuller, Samara Andrade, Angelo Monteiro, Lucas Faria

Biology Department Faculty Works

The Brazilian Cerrado is one of the most endangered biomes in the world. We evaluated the sustainability of leaf harvest in one of the most important Cerrado tree species, Stryphnodendron adstringens. The bark of this tree is used as a source of medicinal tannin. Harvesting bark, however, often kills the tree. In a manipulative field experiment, we tested the hypothesis that harvesting leaves, which might serve as an alternative source of tannin, would be less detrimental for tree survival, growth, reproduction, and defense than harvesting bark. In a two-way crossed experimental design, we either clipped 100% of a plant’s leaves …

N-Terminal Domain Of Human Uracil Dna Glycosylase (Hung2) Promotes Targeting To Uracil Sites Adjacent To Ssdna-Dsdna Junctions, Brian P Weiser, Gaddiel Rodriguez, Philip A Cole, James T Stivers

Rowan-Virtua School of Osteopathic Medicine Departmental Research

The N-terminal domain (NTD) of nuclear human uracil DNA glycosylase (hUNG2) assists in targeting hUNG2 to replication forks through specific interactions with replication protein A (RPA). Here, we explored hUNG2 activity in the presence and absence of RPA using substrates with ssDNA-dsDNA junctions that mimic structural features of the replication fork and transcriptional R-loops. We find that when RPA is tightly bound to the ssDNA overhang of junction DNA substrates, base excision by hUNG2 is strongly biased toward uracils located 21 bp or less from the ssDNA-dsDNA junction. In the absence of RPA, hUNG2 still showed an 8-fold excision bias …

Considerations For Best Practices In Studies Of Fiber Or Other Dietary Components And The Intestinal Microbiome, David M. Klurfeld, Cindy D. Davis, Robert W. Karp, Emma Allen-Vercoe, Eugene B. Chang, Benoit Chassaing, George C. Fahey Jr, Bruce R. Hamaker, Hannah D. Holscher, Johanna W. Lampe, Andre Marette, Eric Martens, Stephen J. O'Keefe, Devin J. Rose, Maria Saarela, Barbara O. Schneeman, Joanne L. Slavin, Justin L. Sonnenburg, Kelly S. Swanson, Gary D. Wu, Christopher J. Lynch

Food for Health: Publications

Considerations for best practices in studies of fiber or other dietary components and the intestinal microbiome. Am J Physiol Endocrinol Metab 315: E1087–E1097, 2018. First published August 21, 2018; doi:10.1152/ajpendo.00058.2018.—A 2-day workshop organized by the National Institutes of Health and U.S. Department of Agriculture included 16 presentations focused on the role of diet in alterations of the gastrointestinal microbiome, primarily that of the colon. Although thousands of research projects have been funded by U.S. federal agencies to study the intestinal microbiome of humans and a variety of animal models, only a minority addresses dietary effects, and a small subset is …

Faculty Nominees For The 2018 Argus Awards Announced, Uab Heersink School Of Medicine News

Browse All News

No abstract provided.

Common Pitfalls In Analysis Of Tissue Scores, David K. Meyerholz, Nathan L. Tintle, Amanda P. Beck

Faculty Work Comprehensive List

Histopathology remains an important source of descriptive biological data in biomedical research. Recent petitions for enhanced reproducibility in scientific studies have elevated the role of tissue scoring (semiquantitative and quantitative) in research studies. Effective tissue scoring requires appropriate statistical analysis to help validate the group comparisons and give the pathologist confidence in interpreting the data. Each statistical test is typically founded on underlying assumptions regarding the data. If the underlying assumptions of a statistical test do not match the data, then these tests can lead to increased risk of erroneous interpretations of the data. The choice of appropriate statistical test …

Move-Hf: An Internet-Based Pilot Study To Improve Adherence To Exercise In Patients With Heart Failure, Pallav Deka, Bunny Pozehl, Mark A. Williams, Joseph F. Norman, Deepak Khazanchi, Dola Pathak

Information Systems and Quantitative Analysis Faculty Publications

Aim: The use of the internet and newer activity monitors such as the Fitbit Charge HR to improve exercise adherence is limited. The primary aim of the Move on Virtual Engagement (MOVE-HF) was to investigate the effects of group social support by internet-based synchronized face-to-face video and objective physical activity feedback on adherence to recommended exercise guidelines.

Methods: Thirty stable heart failure patients (New York Heart Association class I–III), aged 64.7±11.5 years, were randomly assigned to an experimental or comparison group. Participants were provided a handout on self-care in heart failure, an exercise routine, a Fitbit Charge HR and were …

August 21, 2018, Faculty Senate

Minutes

No abstract provided.