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Epigenetic Regulation On Plant Stress Memory, Febri Adi Susanto

International Programs

Plants are sessile organisms; they cannot move like animals when the environment is not favorable. Therefore, plants need a mechanism to cope with environmental changes. For example, when a plant experiences stress, like water deficit, it will employ a certain mechanism that allows the plant to survive the next exposure (see Fig. 1), often referred to as “Epigenetic” regulation. By application, epigenetics deals with the changes of the level of the gene expression without change in the DNA sequence, by DNA methylation, histone modifications, and or small RNA regulation. Plant epigenetic regulation is related to the Lamarckian theory of evolution. …

Utah State Magazine, Fall 2019, Utah State University

Utah State Magazine

The quarterly magazine for friends and alumni of Utah State University.

Emergence Of Human Immunoprofiling In Health And Disease, Bhagirath Singh

Microbiology & Immunology Publications

The human immune system is critical for maintaining health and providing protection from infectious diseases and cancer. Major advances in our understanding of the immune system have largely emerged from studies using animal models such as mice. However, this mouse-centric research has also limited our ability to comprehend the human immune system and how it changes with age and disease state. The fact that we have yet to define what constitutes a normal human immune system has hampered our ability to diagnose, treat, and prevent many human diseases. Immunoprofiling that measures the frequency of human immune cells based upon their …

Lindenwood University Student Handbook, 2019-2020, Lindenwood University

Student Handbooks

Information and guidelines for Lindenwood University students.

Lindenwood University -Belleville Student Handbook, 2019-2020, Lindenwood University

Student Handbooks

Information and guidelines for Lindenwood University students.

Earth Democracy: Sustainability, Justice And Peace, Vandana Shiva

Buffalo Environmental Law Journal

No abstract provided.

Environmentalism Isn’T New: Lessons From Indigenous Law, Joseph Kowalski

Buffalo Environmental Law Journal

The much-overlooked laws and lifeways of Indigenous people show that concepts of environmental sustainability have long been a part of the human tradition. By studying the Indigenous jurisprudence of societies that maintained these traditions into the modern era, much can be learned. Rather than making laws in regards to the land, the land itself was the source of the law, for the environmental laws were built around a relationship with the land.

Through most of human history, the western world had a similar relationship. However, the Holy Roman Empire’s interpretation of Biblical scripture, which at that time was law, forever …

Reconceptualizing Entrenched Notions Of Common Law Property Regimes: Maori Self-Determination And Environmental Protection Through Legal Personality For Natural Objects, Bridget Williams

Buffalo Environmental Law Journal

No abstract provided.

Mysci: A New Approach To Teaching Biological Science Laboratories, Korli Alford

Master's Theses

According to the National Science Foundation’s report “Vision and Change in Undergraduate Biology Education: A Call to Action,” project-based learning creates effective graduates and future collaborators. Instructors who are able to adapt their course to meet the unique interests of their students create graduates who are more likely to engage with peers and to retain the information taught throughout the class. The goal of this project was to develop a course based on student-driven, evidence-based learning. Five major and 12 minor, student-selectable labs were implemented in the initial test reported herein. A total of seven undergraduate students and three graduate …

Studies On Pathogenesis Of The Diseases Caused By Macrophomina Phaseolina And Phomopsis Longicolla On Soybean, Marcio Leizer Zaccaron

Graduate Theses and Dissertations

Soybean (Glycine max), a legume, is an economically important crop in many parts of the world, including the USA, Brazil, Argentina, China, and India, currently the top five producing countries. Soybean is primarily used as feed, with incising markets for food and biodiesel. Similar to most crops, soybean yield and quality are affected by a diverse group of plant pathogens. In particular, several species of filamentous fungi have been the cause of severe yield losses in most growing regions world-wide. The soil born fungus Macrophomina phaseolina, causal agent of charcoal rot, has been found to be endemic to several soybean …

Meox2 Haploinsufficiency Accelerates Axonal Degeneration In Dba/2j Glaucoma., Rebecca A Buchanan, Kate E Foley, Keating W. Pepper, Alaina M Reagan, Kelly J Keezer, Amanda A Hewes, Cory A Diemler, Christoph Preuss, Ileana Soto, Simon W M John, Gareth R Howell

Faculty Research 2019

Purpose: Glaucoma is a complex disease with major risk factors including advancing age and increased intraocular pressure (IOP). Dissecting these earliest events will likely identify new avenues for therapeutics. Previously, we performed transcriptional profiling in DBA/2J (D2) mice, a widely used mouse model relevant to glaucoma. Here, we use these data to identify and test regulators of early gene expression changes in DBA/2J glaucoma.

Methods: Upstream regulator analysis (URA) in Ingenuity Pathway Analysis was performed to identify potential master regulators of differentially expressed genes. The function of one putative regulator, mesenchyme homeobox 2 (Meox2), was tested using a combination of …

The Effect Of Conversational Agent Skill On User Behavior During Deception, Ryan M. Schuetzler, G. Mark Grimes, Justin Scott Giboney

Information Systems and Quantitative Analysis Faculty Publications

Conversational agents (CAs) are an integral component of many personal and business interactions. Many recent advancements in CA technology have attempted to make these interactions more natural and human-like. However, it is currently unclear how human-like traits in a CA impact the way users respond to questions from the CA. In some applications where CAs may be used, detecting deception is important. Design elements that make CA interactions more human-like may induce undesired strategic behaviors from human deceivers to mask their deception. To better understand this interaction, this research investigates the effect of conversational skill—that is, the ability of the …

Women’S Right And Education In Saudi Arabia: Raising Critical Consciousness In Arabic Studies Courses In Female High Schools In Saudi Arabia, Eman Almutairi

Education (PhD) Dissertations

This is a qualitative research study that investigated the understanding of the concept of “critical consciousness” by female teachers teaching Arabic in Saudi Arabia’s high schools, the opportunity they have to develop critical consciousness, and how and why they develop it. The researcher engaged in semi-structured interviews with 25 female teachers who have at least nine years teaching experiences. The findings revealed that these teachers: (a) have a collective sense of the importance of critical consciousness skills to better themselves and Saudi Arabian society; (b) they are interested in and motivated to develop their critical thinking skills; (c) they develop …

Group Differences In Motivation And Achievement Outcomes Within A First-Year Seminar, Selani D. Flores

Dissertations

This intervention study explored potential motivation, achievement, and gender differences among students within an existing first-year program (n = 388). This intervention program (FYE 101) was chosen because it has a diverse population and a large number of underserved students, it fosters content that is grounded in motivational research, and it has had a positive impact on increased student GPA and fall-to-fall persistence. Prior research showed that FYE 101 was effective in mitigating academic outcomes for students within the course when compared to students who did not participate, however, we do not know if it would be equally effective for …

Effect Of Beaver On Brook Trout Habitat In North Shore, Lake Superior Streams, Kathryn Renik

Biology Graduate Theses

In Minnesota, North American Beavers Castor canadensis (hereafter Beaver) are considered to have an overall negative affect on native Brook Trout Salvelinus fontinalis. Brook Trout provide a valued and productive sport fishery to the North Shore streams of Lake Superior and since revival of the Beaver population from past trapping and timber harvest, a reexamination of the complex ecological relationship where the two taxa interact is imperative. Suitable Brook Trout habitat is characterized by cold, spring- fed water with silt-free rocky substrate and abundant cover, all of which Beaver may directly, or indirectly, affect. Data collection occurred on 79 (200 …

Flexible Electrochemical Sensors Based On Iridium Oxide For Biomedical Applications, Xuesong Yang

Electrical Engineering Dissertations - Archive

Considering the disadvantages of the costly, laborious, and time-consuming traditional clinical analyses, there is a tendency of developing non-hospital point-of-care which allows patients to monitor their health conditions conveniently at home. To optimize the convenience of the point-of-care instruments, a wearable device with the ability of detecting different biological components in different biological conditions is preferer. The device should also have the qualities of rapid analyses, high accuracy, and high sensitivity. To accomplish these requirements, we proposed a flexible electrochemical sensor based on iridium oxide (IrOx). As a noble metal, iridium oxide has the advantages of bio-compatible, stable, and corrosive …

User Syndication Using Speech Rhythm, Faisal Z H Alnahhas

Computer Science and Engineering Theses - Archive

In recent years we have seen a variety of approaches to increase security on computers and mobile devices including fingerprint, and facial recognition. Such techniques while effective are very expensive. Voice biometrics, specifically speech rhythm, is a method that has been drawing attention and growing in recent years. Unlike other methods, it requires little to no additional hardware installed on a device for it to work accurately. Speech rhythm utilizes the device's built-in microphone, and analyzes speakers based on features of their speech. In this work we leverage the existing hardware and simply add an efficient layer of software to …

Nonlinear Control Of Unmanned Aerial Vehicles With Cable Suspended Payloads, Ameya Godbole

Mechanical and Aerospace Engineering Dissertations - Archive

The research focuses on the mathematical modeling and control of an unmanned aerial vehicle with cable suspended payload. A comprehensive mathematical model is derived for a quadcopter with a cable suspended payload using the Newton-Euler method and the Euler-Lagrange formulation. These methods assume that the cable is massless and always taut and cannot be used to simulate the cases when the cable is flexible. Hence, an alternative approach to model the flexibility of the cable is presented using Lagrangian mechanics by approximating the cable to be a chain of serially connected links. The motion of the payload induces disturbances on …

Numerical Simulation Of Biodiesel Synthesis In A Continuous Flow Microreactor And A Porous Media Reactor, Terdsak Neadkratoke

Mechanical and Aerospace Engineering Dissertations - Archive

Biodiesel has become an increasingly popular fossil fuel substitute in recent years. Constant attempts are being made to develop new technology that increases the efficiency and yield of biodiesel production units. Numerical simulation can play an integral role in evaluating new reactor designs or optimizing existing ones. Various attempts have been made to develop an accurate computational model that represents biodiesel production. Many computational models for transesterification are based on simplified kinetic models that do not include the effect of saponification. Furthermore, many models assume isothermal conditions and uniform spatial concentrations. Therefore, these models would not be appropriate for evaluating …

Comparative Cfd Analysis Of The Effect Of Air And Liquid Cooling On The Form Factor Of Gpu Server, Ankit Bharatkumar Sutaria

Mechanical and Aerospace Engineering Theses - Archive

Artificial intelligence (AI) has becoming an important area which may significantly impact everyone’s daily life. This means a lot of high-performance chips such as high-performance CPU, GPU, FPGA (Field-programmable gate array), ASIC (application specific integrated circuit) devices may need. The thermal design power (TDP) of these chips are high, and now it is very common to see a processor TDP reaches as high as 300Watts[1]. When these high-power density processors are packaged together, the power density of the servers and compute boxes are significantly high. Traditional air-cooling is approaching its cooling capability limitation, especially when a cluster of racks is …

Design, Development, And Validation Of A Novel Optical Imaging Device For Biomedical Applications, Ashley Christine Dacy

Bioengineering Dissertations - Archive

Fluorescence and luminescence imaging are two promising optical techniques for diagnosing a variety of critical pathologies in vivo, including wound healing, inflammation, and vascular diseases. Despite this, there is a lack of imaging devices in research and commercially available that are capable of these imaging modalities in large animal applications. This work describes the progressive development of several optical imaging devices to fill this void, culminating in a final design with robust fluorescence and luminescence functionality designed for large animal and human applications. These devices are used to gather new data about various physical parameters in small and large animal …

Ultrasound Switchable Fluorescence Imaging Based On A Time Gated Iccd Camera, Shuai Yu

Bioengineering Dissertations - Archive

Ultrasound switchable fluorescence (USF) imaging has been proposed as a novel imaging modality which provides microscopic fluorescence imaging in centimeter-deep tissue. USF is possible to reveal many interesting phenomena such as microcirculation, tumor angiogenesis, and cancer metastasis and diagnose early-stage cancer. USF adopts a focused ultrasound (FU) to repetitively switch “on” fluorescent agents in tissue, and the USF photons scatter out and are captured by a detector. A USF image provides acoustic resolution and optical sensitivity. In USF, there are two key components: 1) an excellent USF contrast agent; and 2) a sensitive USF imaging system. The major challenge of …

Lung Cancer Targeted Chemotherapy Via Herceptin Based Chimeric Antigen Receptor (Car) Engineered T Cell Membrane Coated Synthetic Nanoparticles, Serkan Yaman

Bioengineering Dissertations - Archive

Cell membrane-derived nanoparticles recently caught attention due to their desirable features in drug delivery such as mimicking properties of native tissue and cells, avoiding systemic clearance, and alleviating foreign body responses. Besides nanoparticle technology, adoptive immunotherapy has emerged for its promising treatment modalities, including cancer specificity. Our long-term goal for this research is to develop a biomimetic drug carrier based on chimeric antigen receptor (CAR) transduced T cell membranes. In the study, anti-cancer drug afatinib loaded poly(D,L-lactide-co-glycolide) (PLGA) nanoparticles (NPs) co-extruded with anti her-2 based chimeric antigen receptor (CAR) Jurkat T cell membranes. Anti her-2 CAR-T cells were produced by …

Development Of Medical Devices For Diagnosing Cartilage Injury And Metastatic Cancers, Yi Hui Huang

Bioengineering Dissertations - Archive

My research focused on applying biomedical engineering techniques to diagnose different diseases and conditions. The results of these work led to one published paper and two submitted manuscripts which are summarized in Chapters 2, 3 &4. Briefly, in Chapter 2, my work laid emphasis on developing a method for early detection of cartilage injury. An apoptotic cell-detecting probe was fabricated by the conjugation of the apoptotic cell-binding peptide (CQRPPR) and a sulfo-cyanine7 N-hydroxysuccinimide ester (Cy7 dye). Both in vitro and ex vivo examination showed an excellent relationship between the number of apoptotic chondrocytes and probe binding affinity. Finally, using a …

Application Of Tissue Engineering Techniques For Treating Cartilage Injury And Diagnosing Cancer Metastasis, Amirhossein Hakamivala

Bioengineering Dissertations - Archive

This study focuses on the application of tissue engineering techniques for the diagnosis of cancer metastasis, cartilage regeneration, and modeling of lymph node metastasis. Chapter 1 is an overview of tissue engineering strategies, and it describes how each chapter relates to the central theme. Chapter 2 describes the development of 3D lymph node (LN) mimetic for studying prostate cancer metastasis. The overall objective of this chapter was to develop a biosystem with the ability to mimic metastatic LN condition. Studies were first designed to uncover the critical cells types and chemokines responsible for cancer metastasis to the LNs. An LN …

Development Of An In Vitro Tbi Models And Validation Of Nanodelivery For Restoration Of Disrupted Brain Endothelium, Edidiong I. Inyang

Bioengineering Dissertations - Archive

Blast-induced traumatic brain injury (bTBI) is a serious concern among military personnel and their families. Although the mechanisms responsible for disruption to the brain are not well understood, the development of reliable diagnosis along with effective therapeutic treatment is urgently warranted. Recent findings suggest that shockwaves produced by a blast can generate micron-size bubbles that subsequently collapse in the brain tissue. The collapse of microbubbles (referred to as microcavitation) may compromise the integrity of the blood-brain barrier (BBB). Moreover, addiction to the psycho-stimulant drugs (PSDs), e.g. cocaine and alcohol which are known to cause toxicity due to oxidative stress, can …

Stress Responses Of Corals And Their Symbiotic Partners, Contessa A. Ricci

Biology Dissertations - Archive

Disease and temperature are primary threats to coral persistence, and these stresses can work synergistically to accelerate coral declines. In the face of climate change, understanding the effects of these stresses is key to understanding ecosystem services of future reefs. Corals are an amalgam of the coral animal, an intracellular dinoflagellate symbiont (family Symbiodiniaceae), and a consortium of other symbiotic microbes that exist in the coral surface mucus layer. As such, it is important to consider the role of each component. It is also important to view any coral study through the lens of immunity, as the existence of these …

Spatial And Temporal Variation In The Diet Composition Of Zooplankton In Mission Bay, Bryanna Paulson

Theses

Analyses of quantitative data on zooplankton diets are vital for understanding the drivers of zooplankton abundance within an ecosystem. Such analyses also provide insight into trophic pathways within the lower planktonic food web, which support populations of higher trophic level species. This study used carbon and nitrogen stable isotope ratios of size-fractionated plankton in Mission Bay, San Diego, CA to examine the spatial and temporal variation in zooplankton trophic ecology and determine potential environmental drivers of zooplankton community structure. Carbon stable isotopes reflect primary production sources in an organism’s diet, and nitrogen stable isotope ratios can be used to estimate …

Evaluation Of Data Collection Operations For Real-Time Influenza Surveillance During An Emergency, Yuwen Gu

Dissertations

It is unclear how data collection operations for surveillance alter the disease portrayal that influenza reported trends attempt to provide during an emergency. This study developed a model that simulates the collection and testing of influenza specimens after an outbreak is declared in Michigan. It performed simulation based optimization to understand which operational factors affect the biases between the growth rates of original and observed influenza incidence trends, and to quantify the predictive power of the influenza incidence trends at different points of data collection. The results show that emergency driven high risk perception increases the reporting, which leads to …

Altering The Regiospecificity Of C6 Indole Prenyltransferase Enzymes Towards Drug Development, Ahmed R. Aoun

Pharmaceutical Sciences (MS) Theses

Prenyltransferase (PT) biocatalysts are late-stage tailoring enzymes that modify natural products. PTs catalyze the attachment of prenyl moieties to natural product acceptors using pyrophosphate donors. This prenyl modification in small molecules leads to changes in structural and biological activities. Understanding the structural insights as well as the mechanisms by which PTs function allows us to utilize PTs as a unique approach towards drug development. PriB PT is an example of aromatic PTs that has been characterized previously as a L-tryptophan (L-Trp) C6 C-prenyltransferase (C6-C-PT). Analysis of PriB binding pocket, highlighted key residues that might play an important …