Digital Commons Network^™

Create A Revolution In Undergraduates' Understanding Of Science: Teach Through Close Analysis Of Scientific Literature, Sally G. Hoskins

Publications and Research

The teaching of science to undergraduates aligns poorly with the practice of science, leading many students to conclude that research is boring and researchers themselves are antisocial geniuses. Creativity, a key driver of scientific progress, is underemphasized or ignored altogether in many classrooms, as teaching focuses on the complex integrated concepts and voluminous amounts of information typical of STEM curricula. Faculty, largely untrained in science education per se, teach largely as they were taught, through lectures based in textbooks. This situation could change, and students' understanding of research practice could be fostered relatively easily, if faculty began teaching classes focused …

Microcystin Exposure And Liver Injury Outcomes In Nafld, Muayad Albadrani

Theses and Dissertations

Non-alcoholic fatty liver disease (NAFLD) is an emerging worldwide pandemic which is highly prevalent among obese individuals including children and adults. In a NAFLD condition, exposure to environmental contaminants or toxins can act as a second/ multiple hit, which leads to the progression of simple steatosis to NASH and ultimately may result in liver cirrhosis. With climate change today, elevated levels of microcystins are an emerging problem in fresh water bodies, which are a source of drinking water. Individuals are therefore at risk of exposure to microcystin through consuming contaminated water. In the progression of NAFLD from one clinical stage …

Differential Cholinergic Modulation Of Prelimbic And Thalamic Input To The Basolateral Amygdala, Sarah Catherine Tryon

Theses and Dissertations

The basolateral amygdala (BL) is critical for emotional memory acquisition and expression. It receives afferent projections from both cortical and subcortical regions that send glutamatergic transmission to the BL. This input conveys information necessary for survival, including information about one’s behavioral state and environment. How this information is integrated and processed by the BL, however, remains largely unknown. Interestingly, the BL receives the densest amount of cholinergic innervation from the basal forebrain. This acetylcholine (ACh) can modulate emotional memories, but how it modulates specific afferent inputs to the BL is unexplored. To answer this question, we used brain slice field …

Study Of The Inflammatory And Fibrotic Pathology In The Gut Following Microcystin Exposure Under Conditions Of Non-Alcoholic Fatty Liver Disease., Sutapa Sarkar

Theses and Dissertations

Non-alcoholic fatty liver disease (NAFLD) has become a global pandemic with increased risks of chronic inflammation in obese and elderly population. It has become a major public health concern due to the unavailability of proper therapeutic approaches. NAFLD is a condition of the liver involving wide spectrum of events including accumulation of fat in the liver and inflammation, which can progress to a fibrotic and cirrhotic phenotype, often termed as non-alcoholic steatohepatitis (NASH). In this backdrop, exposure to environmental toxins from harmful algal blooms could prove detrimental to the overweight, obese or elderly population. NAFLD not only affects the liver …

Green Forest Businesses As A Method To Improve Communities In Unesco’S East Usambara Biosphere Reserve In Tanzania, Myoung Su Ko

Theses and Dissertations

A number of developing countries, especially those in Africa which have experienced former colonization, are still struggling with exploitation of their natural resources. Throughout the development of environmental management, the strategy of natural resource management has evolved from mistreating the environment for economic and social development, to separating human activities from the environment for extreme environmental protection, to ensuring the interaction between human life and environment for sustainable development. Although an abundance of natural resources, and particularly forests, exist in the protected areas, the residents in communities surrounding protected areas are usually economically and socially poor.

With this situation, the …

Investigation Of Electrostatic Interactions Towards Controlling Silylation-Based Kinetic Resolutions And Exploring The Effect Of The Polymer Backbone On Silylation-Based Kinetic Resolutions Employing A Polymer-Supported Triphenylsilyl Chloride, Tian Zhang

Theses and Dissertations

This dissertation focuses on studies of silylation-based kinetic resolution methodology developed by the Wiskur group, which is a powerful method for the separation of a single enantiomer from a mixture of racemic secondary alcohols. Chapter 1 introduces the background of our silylation-based kinetic resolution..

Chapter 2 involves mechanistic studies of electrostatic interactions in controlling enantioselectivities of our silylation-based kinetic resolution. Electrostatic interactions between a silylated isothiourea intermediate and an ester π system is determined via linear free energy relationship study. To be specific, how variations in sterics and electronics affect the selectivity of a silylation-based kinetic resolution.

Chapter 3 is …

Using Long Time Series Of Satellite Remote Sensing Data To Assess The Impact Of Climate And Anthropogenic Changes In The Mesopotamian Marshes, Iraq, Reyadh Albarakat

Theses and Dissertations

In the recent past, the Mesopotamia region has been rich in all forms of biological diversity, characterized by a fertile living environment and natural habitats full of rare birds, wild animals, aquatic animals, and diverse plants. Its natural abundance and geographical location have allowed it to be break or transit point for millions of migratory birds from Russia to South Africa. It is a breeding ground for many species of Persian Gulf fish. Despite all this historical, environmental and economic richness, they have been neglected as a result of the combination of a number of human and climatic factors, which …

Neurobiological Core Content In The Research-Supported Transforming Impossible Into Possible (Tip) Program Model, Rana Hong, Philip Young P. Hong

Social Work: School of Social Work Faculty Publications and Other Works

This article explores neurobiological components in the Transforming Impossible into Possible (TIP) program; a research-supported social work group model developed from the theory of psychological self-sufficiency (PSS). The PSS theory emerges from a participatory action research in workforce development, defining PSS as the force within someone that activates a process of transforming perceived barriers into hope driven actions. TIP program is a bottom-up, participant-centered, multi-systematic approach which empowers individuals to begin the PSS process by developing self-awareness, confidence, hope, goal-orientation, leadership, accountability, conscientiousness, and grit. Applying the core concepts of neurobiological content derived from both cognitive neuroscience and interpersonal neurobiology, …

Spartan Daily, October 1, 2019, San Jose State University, School Of Journalism And Mass Communications

Spartan Daily, 2019

Volume 153, Issue 16

The Normal Review, A Literary And Arts Publication, Fall 2019, The Normal Review

The Normal Review

No abstract provided.

Defining Catholic Higher Education In Positive Terms, Michael Rizzi

Journal of Catholic Education

Debates about Catholic higher education in the United States sometimes focus too much on what Catholic colleges and universities should not do, rather than what they should do. This article attempts to reframe those debates away from the negative expressions of Catholic identity (i.e., denying guests a right to speak on campus based on their stance on abortion) and toward more positive expressions, like promoting scholarship on Catholic history, culture, and theology. It reviews some key academic literature that approaches Catholic identity from this positive, proactive perspective, and attempts to categorize that literature into common, identifiable themes.

Demographics Of A Painted Turtle (Chrysemys Picta) Population Responding To Drought In The Nebraska Sandhills, Allyson Beard

Honors Program: Senior Projects (Public)

A large portion of herpetofauna species are declining as a result of anthropogenic influences such as habitat destruction and climate change, and turtles are no exception. Studying demographics of turtle populations in a wide variety of settings could help establish a baseline for future species management because demographics such as survival and movement are essential to understanding the ecology of a species. We conducted a long-term mark-recapture study on painted turtles (Chrysemys picta) in a permanent pond in the Nebraska Sandhills to exam population size, survival, and movement of an aquatic turtle as drought conditions changed in a …

The Cross-Validation Of The Classification Accuracy Of A Dynamic Assessment Of Narrative Language For School-Age Children With And Without Language Disorder, Kallie Dawn Clark

Theses and Dissertations

Purpose: This study examined how well a dynamic assessment of narrative language accurately identified kindergarten through sixth grade students with and without language disorder. Method: The participants included 110 school-age children from Utah and Colorado who were administered a narrative-based dynamic assessment of language that entailed a pretest, a teaching phase, an examiner rating of the child's ability to learn language (modifiability), and a posttest. Results: The dynamic assessment investigated in this study demonstrated good to excellent levels of sensitivity and specificity. The results of this study also determined that, in concurrence with previous dynamic assessment research, posttest and modifiability …

Lawful Neutral: The Justice System And Dungeons And Dragons, Laura Lea Williams

Cardozo Journal of Equal Rights & Social Justice

The note argues that the ban on Dungeons & Dragons (D&D) in prisons is rooted in outdated misconceptions and fails to recognize the game's potential as a rehabilitative tool. It critiques the judicial system's reliance on the Turner test, which has been used to uphold such bans, and advocates for a more nuanced approach that considers the game's benefits in fostering communication, empathy, and problem-solving skills among inmates.

The Characterization Of Heavy Metals In The Diet Of Socotra Cormorants (Phalacrocorax Nigrogularis) In The United Arab Emirates, Nuray Etibar Qizi Alizada

Biology Theses

This study was performed to measure the bioaccumulation of Al, As, Cd, Co, Cr, Cu, Fe, Mn, Mo, Ni, P, Pb, V, Zn, Ca, K, Na, Mg, S, Sr, and Hg in the liver, gastrointestinal tract (GI) and muscles of one hundred and five samples of Indian anchovy (Stolephorus indicus) purchased from local fisherman at the three main study areas, namely Ajman, Sharjah, and Umm Al Quwain in UAE. The main objectives of this study were to evaluate the heavy metal concentration in the muscle, liver and gastrointestinal tract (GI) of Indian anchovy, to compare the level of …

Adaptive Performance Evaluation For Sdn Based On The Statistical And Evolutionary Algorithms, Afrah Salman, Mohammed Najm Abdullah

Iraqi Journal of Computers, Communications, Control and Systems Engineering

Being able to send different types of data (i.e. text, audio, or video) through the network is the most important aspect of networks. Different networks have different Issues and restrictions while sending data. These restrictions are basically the QoS (Quality of Service) metrics and security. The recent Software-Defined Networking (SDN) that aims to separate the control plane from the data plane can be applied where Business requirements are not responsible for the way the network is configured; instead, it is the responsibility of the high-level business policies and objectives. SDN gives preferable techniques for centralized dynamic management and control configurations. …

Automatic Navigation Of Mobile Robot Based On Wheel’S Encoder And Predefined Map, Hala Jamal, Prof. Dr. Salih Al-Qaraawi

Iraqi Journal of Computers, Communications, Control and Systems Engineering

Recently, the automatic movement of mobile robots has played a very important role in the advancement of technology. Automated mobile robot path determination is one of the most important challenges in the science of technology. This paper proposed a path planning method for wheeled mobile robots based on a real time calculation of a predefined distance on a certain map to enable the mobile robot to navigate at indoor areas according to the calculated distances and angles on the paths. The proposed system uses two wheels’ car as a prototype with two optical encoders to determine the number of wheel’s …

Complications Of Ultrasound-Guided Liver Biopsy At A Tertiary Care Hospital In Pakistan: An Audit, Basit Salam, Fatima Mubarak, Yusra Waheed, Noman Khan

Department of Radiology

Introduction: Liver diseases account for two million deaths per year worldwide, half of which are attributed to complications of cirrhosis. Liver conditions have wide-ranging serological findings and imaging appearances and may require biopsy for a definitive diagnosis. Despite ultrasound (US) guidance, liver biopsy is an invasive procedure and the expected benefit must outweigh risks involved.
Objective: The purpose of the audit was to calculate complication rates of US-guided liver biopsy and summarize institutional data pertaining to the procedure.
Materials and Methods: The audit was performed at Aga Khan University Hospital, Karachi, Pakistan. All consecutive patients undergoing liver biopsy from February …

Learning Opportunities 2019/2020, Illinois Mathematics And Science Academy

Course Catalogs

The graduation requirements of the Illinois Mathematics and Science Academy are established by the IMSA Board of Trustees. Each semester students must take a minimum of five academic courses (2.5 credits) for a letter grade (not Pass/Fail) not including Fine Arts, Wellness, SIR, Internship, and Independent Study. Students may enroll in a maximum of nine courses each semester including academic courses, Fine Arts,Wellness, SIR, Internship, and Independent Study. Only courses taken for a letter grade will count towards graduation credit.

The Advocate (Fall 2019), Lewis & Clark Law School

The Advocate

No abstract provided.

Fall 2019

The Weldon Times

A student-run publication from the Schulich School of Law at Dalhousie University.

Editors in Chief: Justin Monahan, Anthony Buckland

Editor: Joel Tichinoff

Graphic Design & Layout: Alexandra Fox

Photography: Luke MacGillivray

Learning The Land: Indians, Settlers, And Slaves In The Southern Borderlands, 1500-1850, William Cane West

Theses and Dissertations

Between 1500 and 1850, Native Americans, Europeans, and enslaved African Americans competed for territory within the landscape of the lower Arkansas Valley. The complex transitional environment between delta bottomlands, interior highlands, and Great Plains fostered the co-existence of competing Native and Euro-American claims to regional sovereignty and settlement well into the nineteenth century. The geopolitical divides often hinged on debates over environmental resources and scientific practices. Indigenous polities from the Mississippians to the Quapaws and Osages adapted to environmental changes to establish and maintain their borders in the face of European colonial presence. In the nineteenth century, Cherokees and white …

Motivational And Physiological Dysregulation Due To Development And Onset Of Obesity Via Melanocortin 4 Receptor +/- Haploinsufficiency, Alex Steiner

Theses and Dissertations

Obesity is one of the leading most health risks around the world, being especially problematic in the United States. A combination of high-fat diets and genetic abnormalities are to blame for the ever-growing number of obese individuals.

Melanocortin 4 receptors are vital for regulating energy expenditure and feeding behaviors; mutations of the receptors have been found to be the leading monogenetic cause of obesity. Using MC4R +/- haploinsufficient rats being fed a range of dietary fat, we investigated the physiological and motivational differences using a locomotor task, an operant task with fixed and progressive ratios, as well as a distraction …

Discovery Of Materials Through Applied Machine Learning, Travis Williams

Theses and Dissertations

Advances in artificial intelligence technology, specifically machine learning, have cre- ated opportunities in the material sciences to accelerate material discovery and gain fundamental understanding of the interaction between certain the constituent ele- ments of a material and the properties expressed by that material. Application of machine learning to experimental materials discovery is slow due to the monetary and temporal cost of experimental data, but parallel techniques such as continuous com- positional gradients or high-throughput characterization setups are capable of gener- ating larger amounts of data than the typical experimental process, and therefore are suitable for combination with machine learning. A …

Investigating The Relationship Of Copd, Lung Cancer, And Polycyclic Aromatic Hydrocarbons From Ambient Air Pollution, Daniel John Kilpatrick

Theses and Dissertations

Polycylic aromatic hydrocarbons (PAHs) are a group of chemically-related compounds with a well-established body of evidence of adverse human health impacts. Additionally, there is a growing area of research on the health outcomes following PAH exposure via air pollution, specifically with chronic obstructive pulmonary disorder (COPD) and lung cancer. The purpose of this dissertation was to investigate the strength of associations among PAHs, COPD, and lung cancer from ambient (outdoor) air pollution. The first objective was to determine if there is a potential environmental link among PAHs, COPD, and lung cancer occurrence among nonsmokers using data from the National Health …

The Relationship Between The Electronic Health Record Patient Portal And Shared Decision Making, Gloria Esoimeme

Theses and Dissertations

Shared decision making (SDM) is a collaborative decision-making style where the patient and the physician are involved in the clinical decision-making process. The goal of this dissertation project was to examine the relationship between the patient portal of an electronic health record (EHR) and SDM.

The SDM process has three main components: information sharing, deliberation and decision making. Patients participate in SDM at varying levels: some patients may prefer to share information and deliberate but leave the final decision making to the provider while others prefer to participate in all the three components of SDM. The patient portal of an …

Heterogeneous Ozonation Of Model Drinking Water Contaminants Using Cbv-720 Zeolite, Benson Maxwell Solomon

Theses and Dissertations

Advanced Oxidation Processes (AOPs) are designed to remove aqueous organic contaminants through their reaction with hydroxyl radicals (HO∙). Ozone is classified as an AOP due to its ability to produce hydroxyl radicals, as well as its ability to oxidize a wide range of organic contaminants. Due to the unselective nature of hydroxyl radicals, many organic and inorganic co-solutes can act as scavengers, reducing the efficiency of an AOP. Here we show a probe system for testing the hypothesis that adsorptive ozonation of contaminants may yield a more selective environment that favors neutral contaminant oxidation over oxidation of co-solutes.

Initial experiments …

The Development Of Multi-Functional System That Combine Patterned Hydrogels, Plasmin-Degradable Nanoparticles And Stem Cells For Applications In Tissue Engineering And Growth Factors Delivery, Safaa I. Kader

Theses and Dissertations

This thesis spots the light on the development of a novel multi-functionalized system for application in tissue engineering and on-demand morphogens delivery. Three types of materials used in this study are synthetic polymer, biopolymer, and nanomaterials. Polyethylene glycol (PEG), a synthetic polymer was chosen in this study because of its high biocompatibility, non-immunogenicity, inert nature, ease of modification, and reduces protein denaturation to provide a wide range of physical and mechanical properties. Here, PEG is used one time as a hydrogel, linear polyethylene glycol-co-lactide (LPELA), and another time as peptide-PEG based nanoparticles (PxSPCP). Gelatin, a natural polymer has been widely …

Sound-Evoked Activations Of Visual Cortex And The Principles Of Multisensory Integration, Spencer Lawrence Mac Adams

Theses and Dissertations

Multisensory integration (MSI) refers to the neural processes that integrate information from multiple different sensory systems and follows three established principles: the spatial, temporal and inverse effectiveness principles. Evidence now suggests that MSI can occur at the earliest stages of sensory processing in primary sensory cortices, including audiovisual integration in primary visual cortex; however, the mechanism responsible for audio-visual MSI enhancements remains elusive. Recently, unimodally presented sounds have been shown to activate visual cortex; however, no research has been conducted to evaluate if these sound-evoked responses reflect the auditory contribution to audiovisual integration in primary visual cortex. Here we conducted …

Ultra-Fast Sensors To Study The Fundamental Neurochemistry Underlying Disease, Alyssa West

Theses and Dissertations

Serotonin is a vital neurotransmitter whose exact roles are ill-defined. Dysfunctions in serotonin signaling are thought to underlie a myriad of neurological problems including depression and autism spectrum disorder (ASD). Prior to investigating serotonin’s role in disease states, one must understand more about the functionality of serotonin in healthy in vivo models. To study serotonin in vivo, fast-scan cyclic voltammetry (FSCV) and fast- scan controlled adsorption voltammetry (FSCAV) are employed to measure evoked and basal serotonin concentration, respectively. These methods, combined with mathematical modeling, provide information regarding regulatory mechanisms of serotonin neurotransmission. FSCV and FSCAV are first applied to …