Digital Commons Network^™

Ultrasonic Generation Of Pulsatile And Sequential Therapeutic Delivery Profiles From Calcium-Crosslinked Alginate Hydrogels, Tania Emi, Kendra Michaud, Emma Orton, Grace Santilli, Catherine Linh, Meaghan O'Connell, Fatima Issa, Stephen Kennedy

Chemical, Biomolecular, and Materials Engineering Faculty Publications

Control over of biological processes can potentially be therapeutically regulated through localized biomolecular deliveries. While implantable hydrogels can provide localized therapeutic deliveries, they do not traditionally provide the temporally complex therapeutic delivery profiles required to regulate complex biological processes. Ionically crosslinked alginate hydrogels have been shown to release encapsulated payloads in response to a remotely applied ultrasonic stimulus, thus potentially enabling more temporally complex therapeutic delivery profiles. However, thorough characterizations of how different types of therapeutic payloads are retained and ultrasonically released need to be performed. Additionally, the impact of potentially disruptive ultrasonic stimulations on hydrogel structure and temperature need …

Development And Characterization Of Nanomaterials For Pulmonary Drug Delivery Applications, Elisa A. Torrico Guzman

Open Access Dissertations

Chronic pulmonary diseases such as lung cancer and cystic fibrosis represent significant global health concerns because of their resulting high mortality and low life expectancy. Pulmonary drug delivery has demonstrated advantages over other delivery routes due to the ability to use lower concentrations of drug, reduction in systemic toxicity, and offering better targeting to the area of disease. Effective application of dry powder therapeutics requires the optimization of particle deposition in the lungs and avoidance of physiologic defense mechanisms such as mucosal entrapment, mucociliary clearance, and macrophage engulfment. Evaluation of aerosol pulmonary therapeutic parameters demands accurate in vitro models that …

Advancements In Biomimetic Underwater Propulsion: Boundary Interactions And Crossflow Compensation, Matthew Perkins

Open Access Dissertations

Biomimetic propulsion is an active area of research in the field of robotics. This work presents advancements to help improve the performance of vehicles employing oscillating foil propulsion. For vehicles operating near the sea floor, ground effect on rolling and pitching foils was investigated in Manuscript 1. The ‘ground effect’ was found to be present and to cause a repulsion force on the foil as well as an increased thrust force. It was also shown that ground effect can be activated by biasing the foil into the ground effect zone while the vehicle maintains a greater distance from the boundary. …

Nanomaterials For Sensing, Heating And Applications In Composites And Emulsion Biofouling, Akram Abbasi

Open Access Dissertations

Nanoscale materials often exhibit fascinating physical, chemical, and biological properties which are considerably different from those of their macro-and/or microscale counterparts. These unique characteristics have led to considerable growth over the last decade in nanomaterial-enabled applications in areas such as biomedicine, environmental sensing and remediation, and energy production and storage. In this dissertation, techniques are presented to create new nanomaterials relevant to these areas.

Gold nanostructures are an example of a nanomaterial with great interest in biomedical therapy and sensing applications due to their high chemical and physical stability, ease of synthesis and surface functionalization and their unique optical properties. …

Teachers’ Perception Of Stem Integration And Education: A Systematic Literature Review, Kelly C. Margot, Todd Kettler

Open Access Publishing Support Funded Articles

Background: For schools to include quality STEM education, it is important to understand teachers’ beliefs and perceptions related to STEM talent development. Teachers, as important persons within a student’s talent development, hold prior views and experiences that will influence their STEM instruction. This study attempts to understand what is known about teachers’ perceptions of STEM education by examining existing literature.

Results: Study inclusion criteria consisted of empirical articles, which aligned with research questions, published in a scholarly journal between 2000 and 2016 in English. Participants included in primary studies were preK-12 teachers. After quality assessment, 25 articles were included in …

In Support Of Scholarly Teaching, Emily K. Faulconer

Publications

Whether you are a college science teacher who has embraced education as a second discipline or you are teaching science teachers, the SoTL (scholarship of teaching and learning) and DBER (discipline-based educational research) publications are key resources to support your scholarly teaching, providing actionable ideas for your classroom.

Science, Philosophy, And Magic, Anwar Shaikh Phd

Archives of Anwar Shaikh

This collection includes:

• Shaikh, A. (n.d.). [Handwritten folder label identifying contents as "Science, magic + philosophy"; folder tab notation: "Science, magic + philosophy"]. Unpublished manuscript note. New School for Social Research.
• Shaikh, A. (2019, November 23). RE: Readings for the seminar [Email with attachments: Review of Mama's Last Hug.docx; Sleights of Mind.pdf; sent to Clara Mattei at [email protected]; body text comprises five seminar discussion questions on the philosophy and methodology of science, the nature of economics as a science, the relationship between biology and science, and the relationship between stage magic and scientific principles; with handwritten annotations regarding …

Clarifying The Interpretation Of Carbon Use Efficiency In Soil Through Methods Comparison, Kevin M. Geyer, Paul Dijkstra, Robert Sinsabaugh, Serita D. Frey

Faculty Publications

Accurate estimates of microbial carbon use efficiency (CUE) are required to predict how global change will impact microbially-mediated ecosystem functions such as organic matter decomposition. Multiple approaches are currently used to quantify CUE but the extent to which estimates reflect methodological variability is unknown. This limits our ability to apply or cross-compare published CUE values. Here we evaluated the performance of five methods in a single soil under standard conditions. The microbial response to three substrate amendment rates (0.0, 0.05, and 2.0 mg glucose-C g−1 soil) was examined using: 13C and 18O isotope tracing approaches which estimate CUE based on …

Half-Baked: The Science And Politics Of Legal Pot, Joelle Anne Moreno

Penn State Law Review (2003 - Present)

Weed, herb, grass, bud, ganja, Mary Jane, hash oil, sinsemilla, budder, and shatter. Marijuana - whether viewed as a medicine or intoxicant - is fast becoming a part of everyday life, with the CDC reporting 7,000 new users every day and the American market projected to grow to $20 billion by 2020. Based on early campaign rhetoric, by that same year the U.S. could have a pro-marijuana president. Despite its growing acceptance and popularity, marijuana remains illegal under federal law. Like heroin, LSD, and ecstasy, marijuana is a DEA Schedule I drug reflecting a Congressional determination that marijuana is both …

The Clash Of The Acts: Fema'simplementation Of The National Floodinsurance Program And Its Collision With Theendangered Species Act And The Nationalenvironmental Policy Act, Ani Esenyan

Penn State Law Review (2003 - Present)

The Federal Emergency Management Agency (FEMA) administers the National Flood Insurance Program (NFIP), a federal flood insurance program that also aims to prevent flooding in flood-prone areas. However, the structure and implementation of the NFIP has created mixed results. FEMA's implementation of the NFIP has been found to inadvertently incentivize unsustainable floodplain development, which in turn threatens species and their habitats protected by the Endangered Species Act (ESA). Over the years, FEMA has engaged in lawsuits and settlements regarding its implementation of the NFIP. As a result of these lawsuits, the National Marine Fisheries Service (NMFS) conducted scientific studies, known …

Subversive Science, Dov Fox

Penn State Law Review (2003 - Present)

This Article introduces the phenomenon of subversive science, reveals its operation in modern American society, and analyzes its implications for law and policy amidst calls to defund or repress controversial lines of inquiry. Existing debates center on whether cutting-edge science casts doubt on abstract ideals that animate our legal system, from racial equality to criminal responsibility. This focus misses the deeper and more practical danger that lies in how citizens misperceive and misapply these ideals in election and trial decisions. What makes certain science “subversive” is its power to shake the public’s faith in those democratic cornerstones.

Emerging bodies of …

Algorithms & Instruments: The Effective Elimination Of New Jersey’S Cash Bail System And Its Replacement, David Reimel Iii

Penn State Law Review (2003 - Present)

Until 2017, every state conditioned pretrial release on cash bail. Judges across the United States predicted the risk individuals posed of failing to appear and the danger to the community. As a result, indigent individuals waited in jails merely because they could not afford their bail. In 2017, New Jersey spearheaded the movement to change how the bail system operates by passing the Criminal Justice Reform Act (“CJRA”), which created an objective decision-making tool called the Public Safety Assessment.

Today, New Jersey judges are no longer required to speculate about the future decisions of individual defendants. Instead, the Public Safety …

I Now Pronoun-Ce You: A Proposal For Pronoun Protections For Transgender People, Erin E. Clawson

Penn State Law Review (2003 - Present)

Title VII of the Civil Rights Act protects employees from discrimination “because of sex,” which the Supreme Court found includes gender and sex/gender stereotyping. The circuit courts, however, are split on whether discrimination against transgender people is “because of sex.” In the circuits that extend Title VII’s protection to transgender people, the courts differ as to whether a claim must be based on sex stereotyping or based on a person’s status as transgender or transitioning alone. This issue was recently granted certiorari by the Supreme Court.

Not only do the circuit courts conflict but government agencies disagree on this matter …

Fields Of The Mind: An Integral Learning Styles Component Of The E&L Cognitive Styles Construct, Betty Lou Leaver, Andrew R. Corin

Russian Language Journal

The E&L Cognitive Styles Construct was developed in 1997 and copyrighted in 2002 by Ehrman, director of the Research, Evaluation, and Development Division at the Foreign Service Institute (FSI), and Leaver, then an associate at the National Foreign Language Center. It was developed in order to organize the proliferation of validated cognitive styles into a single instrument with ten easy-to-understand subscales specifically for the field of foreign or second language (L2) learning and teaching (Leaver 1997, 2000; Ehrman and Leaver 2002). The first two subscales, which relate to fields of the mind, however, have often created confusion or misunderstanding among …

The Orphan Drug Act At 35: Observations And An Outlook For The Twenty-First Century, Nicholas Bagley, Benjamin Berger, Amitabh Chandra, Craig Garthwaite

Articles

On the thirty-fifth anniversary of the adoption of the Orphan Drug Act (ODA), we describe the enormous changes in the markets for therapies for rare diseases that have emerged over recent decades. The most prominent example is the fact that the profit-maximizing price of new orphan drugs appears to be greater today than it was in 1983. All else equal, this should reduce the threshold for research and development (R&D) investment in an economically viable product. Further, the small size of patient populations for orphan drugs, together with the increasing prevalence of biologics among orphan drugs, have created a set …

Depression Across Cultures, Carlota Garcia

Student Publications and Presentations

No abstract provided.

Reprogramming Of Rat Hepatoma Cells With Fibroblast-Specific Protein Twist1, Kezban Ucar Cifci

Masters Theses

In mammalian development, a complex system comprised of regulatory signals causes tissue distinction with unique structures as well as functions. Gene expression controls these functions through specific combinations of transcription factors and cofactors that influence cell differentiation by both activation and repression of genes.

Whole genome microarray studies of fibroblasts have identified candidate genes that can serve as master regulators of fibroblast identity. A previous study showed that Prrx1 and Snai2 play important roles in activating expression of fibroblast identity, and Snai2 overexpression in hepatoma cells (Fg14) activated expression of fibroblast specific genes. Moreover, Snai2 overexpression resulted in repression of …

Faculty Publications 2018, Lsu Health Sciences Center New Orleans

Historical Faculty Publications

This Faculty bibliography contains 810 publications.

Letter From The New Editor-In-Chief - Linking Global Priorities: Biodiversity And Scientific Equity, Jennifer Guevara

Neotropical Biodiversity

No abstract provided.

Diversity And Foraging Activity Of Bats In Cultivated And Uncultivated Areas In Agroecosystems Of A Mediterranean-Climate Hotspot, Alejandra E. Muñoz, Gonzalo Ossa, Tania Zaviezo, Cristián Bonacic

Neotropical Biodiversity

Bats are one of the least-studied vertebrate groups in Chile. We sampled six fruit farms in the Mediterranean-climate zone and three in a semiarid zone during 2015 and 2016, respectively. We assessed if activity (passes) and foraging (feeding buzzes) of bat species differed between cultivated and uncultivated intra-farm habitats. We found six bat species, all threatened and insectivorous. Tadarida brasiliensis was the most frequently recorded species. We found more activity and foraging in uncultivated than cultivated habitats in total, although the opposite trend was observed during springtime in semiarid region. More than a third of the bat passes were feeding …

Genetic And Morphometric Analyzes Of Paralichthys Species Confirm The Presence Of P. Brasiliensis In The Uruguayan Waters, Daniela Olsson, Alejandro Marquez, Javier .S. Tellechea, Pedro Hollanda Carvalho, Alfredo N. Pereira, Walter Norbis

Neotropical Biodiversity

Paralichthys species have high commercial value and constitute a resource for demersal fisheries in the Southwestern Atlantic Ocean. Although six species have been described based on morphological characters for the Uruguayan and Argentinean waters, only the presence of three species is accepted, being their distribution still uncertain. Genetic tools are useful for species identification as a complement of morphological characters. This paper determines the genetic and morphometric variation between three species of Paralichthys that inhabiting Uruguayan waters. The interorbital width (IN) and the length from the mouth to the dorsal fin base (SD) of P. patagonicus differed significantly from the …

Altitudinal Differences In Alpha, Beta And Functional Diversity Of An Amphibian Community In A Biodiversity Hotspot, Jaime Villacampa, Andrew Whitworth, Laura Allen, Juan E. Malo

Neotropical Biodiversity

Biodiversity research along altitudinal gradients can provide us with new insights into conservation and human impacts. In this context, amphibians are a useful and important group due to their rapid response to environmental changes, severely threatened status and because of the gaps in our knowledge of their ecology, especially in tropical forests. Here, we investigate the differences in amphibian communities along an altitudinal gradient with the aim to understand how different groups respond to altitude and what factors drive such responses. We carried out our research in the Piñi-Piñi range, located in the Manu Biosphere Reserve (south-eastern Peru), a global …

Revisiting The Advertisement Call Features Of Scinax Montivagus (Anura: Hylidae), André Gomes Lopes, Davi Lee Bang, Ariovaldo Antonio Giaretta

Neotropical Biodiversity

In the present study, we revisit the advertisement call of Scinax montivagus based on new recordings from Rio de Contas, state of Bahia, Brazil. The species’ call consists of a single type of multipulsed note of relatively short duration (mean = 192 ms), having two non-harmonically related emphasized frequency bands. The dominant frequency corresponds either to the lower or the higher band, or it may shift between both along call emissions. Herein, we assess and discuss call features that diverge from what is in the literature and also provide further details on the species call. We reinforce that detailed and …

Spectrum 2019, Saint Mary's College Of California

The Undergraduate Spectrum

No abstract provided.

Attraction Among Late-Adolescents, C. Nathalie Yuen, Tom Koziol, Jonathan Santo

Psychology Faculty Publications

Using a within-subjects experimental design, this study assessed the association between age and level of attraction in 514 male and female participants 19 years of age or older when rating photographs of individuals 19-22. The hypotheses were formulated to test the evolutionary perspective of attraction, that males prefer a younger female mate while females prefer an older male mate. Additionally, this theory suggests that initial attraction is influenced largely by reproductive factors. To test these hypotheses, 320 different pictures for each sex were used to measure perceived attractiveness. Multilevel modeling was used to test the proposed hypotheses which were partially …

Imsa 2019 Profile, Office Of College And Academic Counseling

IMSA Profile

The Illinois Mathematics and Science Academy (IMSA) fosters the discoverers. The thinkers. The innovators and experimenters. The problem-solvers of the future who can change the world through their life’s work. IMSA innovates the future of science, technology, engineering and math (STEM) education. It creates a strong and diverse pipeline of talented students at its tuition-free residential academy in Aurora, IL for 10th through 12th grade students. IMSA’s mission is to ignite and nurture creative, scientific, ethical minds that advance the human condition.

Understanding Sexual Prejudice: The Role Of Political Ideology And Strategic Essentialism, Crystal L. Hoyt, Thekla Morgenroth, Jeni L. Burnette

Jepson School of Leadership Studies articles, book chapters and other publications

Despite the increased visibility and acceptance of the LGBTQ community, sexual minorities continue to face prejudice and discrimination in many domains. Past research has shown that this prejudice is more prevalent among those holding conservative political views. In two studies, we merge strategic essentialism and motivated ideology theoretical perspectives to empirically investigate the link between political orientation and sexual prejudice. More specifically, we examine how conservatives strategically use different forms of essentialism to support their views of gay individuals and their reactions to messages aimed at changing essentializing beliefs. In Study 1 (N = 220), we demonstrate that conservatives endorse …

Single Parent Households And The Effect On Student Learning, Asia Watt

Masters Theses

The purpose of this research is to examine if there is a relationship between single-parent households and the effect on student learning. A total of seven parents and three elementary teachers took a survey. Students’ scores in math and reading from report cards and PARCC scores were also used as data sources. Results revealed that the involvement of single parents at school varies depending on the type of involvement, however, data from the report card review showed all the parents review their child’s report card. Approximately 70 % or more assisted their children in math and English homework. In addition, …

Investigating The Prevalence Of An Insecticide Resistance Gene In Culex Mosquito Populations Of Central Illinois, Kylee R. Noel

Masters Theses

The globalization of society has led to the spread of the vectors, mosquitoes, and diseases. Each year millions of people are killed by diseases vectored by mosquitoes. For example, West Nile Virus alone killed over 2,000 people in North America in 2017; 8 of those deaths being in Illinois. Two prominent vectors of West Nile Virus are Culex pipiens and Culex restuans; which are difficult to differentiate based upon morphological features. In this study, mosquitoes collected from two Illinois counties, Coles County and Champaign County, were first identified based upon morphology and this identification was then compared to probe-based …

Teachers' Perception Of Mental Health In The School System, Nicholas Caldwell

Masters Theses

The study examined teachers' perceptions of their school's mental health system. Specifically, teachers were asked about their role in the identification process, how effective their school's system is at identifying and treating mental health problems, and their suggestions for improvement. Mental health problems affect a significant portion of today's youth (Merikangas et al., 2010). Mental health problems can negatively impact an adolescent's academic achievement, social relationships, and behavioral functioning (Woodward & Fergusson, 2001). Six teachers from a southeastern, rural Illinois high school participated in the study. Each teacher participated in a single interview and discussed their perceptions of the school's …