Digital Commons Network^™

The Development Of Endoplasmic Reticulum Stress-Inducingstrategies To Overcome Resistance To Cancer Therapy, Ravyn Marie Duncan

MUSC Theses and Dissertations

Effectively treating therapeutic resistant malignancies remains one of the greatest challenges that cancer researchers and clinicians face today. Intra-tumoral heterogeneity contributes to intrinsic and acquired genetic alterations that render tumor cells nonresponsive to single agent therapies. Adaptations to endoplasmic reticulum (ER) stress are a critical driver of tumorigenesis and a source of therapeutic resistance in tumors, as many malignancies suppress this mechanism for survival. Therefore, combination strategies that induce ER stress offer an approach for combating therapeutic resistant cancer. The studies outlined in this dissertation offer two novel synergistic therapeutic strategies: (1) pairing glutaminase inhibitor CB-839 with proteasome inhibitors (PI) …

Formation Of Escherichia Coli O157: H7 Persister Cells In The Lettuce Phyllosphere And Application Of Differential Equation Models To Predict Their Prevalence On Lettuce Plants In The Field, Daniel S. Munther, Michelle Q. Carter, Claude V. Aldric, Renata Ivanek, Maria T. Brandl

Mathematics and Statistics Faculty Publications

American Society for Microbiology. Escherichia coli O157:H7 (EcO157) infections have been recurrently associated with produce. The physiological state of EcO157 cells surviving the many stresses encountered on plants is poorly understood. EcO157 populations on plants in the field generally follow a biphasic decay in which small subpopulations survive over longer periods of time. We hypothesized that these subpopulations include persister cells, known as cells in a transient dormant state that arise through phenotypic variation in a clonal population. Using three experimental regimes (with growing, stationary at carrying capacity, and decaying populations), we measured the persister cell fractions in culturable EcO157 …

Role Of Hydrodynamic Interactions In Chemotaxis Of Bacterial Populations, Shawn D. Ryan

Mathematics and Statistics Faculty Publications

How bacteria sense local chemical gradients and decide to move has been a fascinating area of recent study. Chemotaxis of bacterial populations has been traditionally modeled using either individual-based models describing the motion of a single bacterium as a velocity jump process, or macroscopic PDE models that describe the evolution of the bacterial density. In these models, the hydrodynamic interaction between the bacteria is usually ignored. However, hydrodynamic interaction has been shown to induce collective bacterial motion and self-organization resulting in larger mesoscale structures. In this paper, the role of hydrodynamic interactions in bacterial chemotaxis is investigated by extending a …

Pulsatile Flow Through Idealized Renal Tubules: Fluid-Structure Interaction And Dynamic Pathologies, Niksa Praljak, Shawn D. Ryan, Andrew Resnick

Mathematics and Statistics Faculty Publications

Kidney tubules are lined with flow-sensing structures, yet information about the flow itself is not easily obtained. We aim to generate a multiscale biomechanical model for analyzing fluid flow and fluid-structure interactions within an elastic kidney tubule when the driving pressure is pulsatile. We developed a two-dimensional macroscopic mathematical model of a single fluid-filled tubule corresponding to a distal nephron segment and determined both flow dynamics and wall strains over a range of driving frequencies and wall compliances using finite-element analysis. The results presented here demonstrate good agreement with available analytical solutions and form a foundation for future inclusion of …

Learning Wakanda: Assessing The Responses Of African-American Children And Their Caregivers Toward Concordant Educational Media, Cameron L. Coleman

LMU Theses and Dissertations

Screen-based educational media, as an extension of the schooling process whose history has mirrored brick and mortar institutions, have traditionally espoused narratives of Eurocentricity, shifting relatively recently to multicultural yet simultaneously raceless narratives. While many viewers have learned from and been inspired by these media, the enthusiastic response to the film Black Panther (2018), as demonstrated by financial earnings and sustained social media energy, revealed an intense yearning in the Black community for media positively centering the strengths and successes of Black lives. Launched from the sociocultural fervor for Black concordance in media, and extending concordance into the educational media …

Robust Multi-Objective Design Of Suspension Systems, Muhammad Ali Khan

Theses, Dissertations and Capstones

This thesis presents a robust multi-objective optimal design of four-degree-of-freedom passive and semi-active suspension systems. The passive suspension system is used in a racing car and the semi-active suspension is implemented on a passenger car. Mathematical models of the commercial and racing vehicle suspension systems are used in the computer simulations. A robust multi-objective design of the suspension systems is carried out by considering the minimization of three objectives: passenger’s head acceleration (HA), suspension deflection (SD), and tire deflection (TD). The first objective is concerned with the passenger’s health and comfort. The suspension stroke is described by SD and the …

Stability Analysis Of Einstein's Universe In Loop Quantum Cosmology, Eamon Mccaughey

Articles

A stability analysis of Einstein’s universe in both classical General Relativity and semiclassical Loop Quantum Cosmology regimes is presented. The stability properties of the General Relativity model are significantly altered due to Loop Quantum Gravity corrections. Comparisons between both dynamical systems are considered on the basis of these modifications. The Loop Quantum Cosmology solutions are restricted to an open universe model (k = -1) and represent a cyclic universe. The integrals of motion for both systems are found and their Hamiltonian structure determined.

Acoustic Microfluidic Separation Techniques And Bioapplications: A Review, Yuan Gao, Mengren Wu, Yang Lin, Jie Xu

Mechanical, Industrial & Systems Engineering Faculty Publications

Microfluidic separation technology has garnered significant attention over the past decade where particles are being separated at a micro/nanoscale in a rapid, low-cost, and simple manner. Amongst a myriad of separation technologies that have emerged thus far, acoustic microfluidic separation techniques are extremely apt to applications involving biological samples attributed to various advantages, including high controllability, biocompatibility, and non-invasive, label-free features. With that being said, downsides such as low throughput and dependence on external equipment still impede successful commercialization from laboratory-based prototypes. Here, we present a comprehensive review of recent advances in acoustic microfluidic separation techniques, along with exemplary applications. …

Needfinding, Devorah Kletenik

Open Educational Resources

This activity guides students through the process needfinding to identify areas of need for their creation of a technology for the "public good." Students will conduct contextual inquiry to identify the needs of their target audience.

Personas, Scenarios And Storyboards, Devorah Kletenik

Open Educational Resources

This activity guides students towards the creation of personas, scenarios and storyboards for a product/website that they are creating.

Public Interest Technology: Coding For The Public Good, Devorah Kletenik

Open Educational Resources

These slides are used to guide a discussion with students introducing them to the notion of public interest technology and coding for the public good. The lesson is intended to spark a discussion with students about different sorts of technology and their societal ramifications.

Accessibility: The Whys And The Hows, Devorah Kletenik

Open Educational Resources

This presentation introduces Computer Science students to the notion of accessibility: developing software for people with disabilities. This lesson provides a discussion of why accessibility is important (including the legal, societal and ethical benefits) as well as an overview of different types of impairments (visual, auditory, motor, neurological/cognitive) and how developers can make their software accessible to users with those disabilities. This lesson includes videos and links to readings and tutorials for students.

Coding For The Public Good: Front-End Website Design And Development, Devorah Kletenik

Open Educational Resources

This activity helps student design and develop a front-end of a website, from wireframes through HTML/CSS/Javascript. It includes design questions for students, including the invocation of Ben Schneiderman's eight golden rules for interface design.

Note: this activity assumes prior knowledge of web development. Since this activity is designed for an HCI course, with a focus on interface design, students are not expected to create a back-end for it. This activity can obviously be modified for a full-stack experience.

Accessibility Evaluation, Devorah Kletenik

Open Educational Resources

This activity guides students through the evaluation of a website that they have created to see if it is accessible for users with disabilities. Students will simulate a number of different disabilities (e.g. visual impairments, color blindness, auditory impairments, motor impairments) to see if their website is accessible; they will also use automated W3 and WAVE tools to evaluate their sites. Students will consider the needs of users with disabilities by creating a persona and scenario of a user with disabilities interacting with their site. Finally, students will write up recommendations to change their site and implement the changes.

Structural And Lexical Methods For Auditing Biomedical Terminologies, Rashmie Abeysinghe

Theses and Dissertations--Computer Science

Biomedical terminologies serve as knowledge sources for a wide variety of biomedical applications including information extraction and retrieval, data integration and management, and decision support. Quality issues of biomedical terminologies, if not addressed, could affect all downstream applications that use them as knowledge sources. Therefore, Terminology Quality Assurance (TQA) has become an integral part of the terminology management lifecycle. However, identification of potential quality issues is challenging due to the ever-growing size and complexity of biomedical terminologies. It is time-consuming and labor-intensive to manually audit them and hence, automated TQA methods are highly desirable. In this dissertation, systematic and scalable …

Estimating Free-Flow Speed With Lidar And Overhead Imagery, Armin Hadzic

Theses and Dissertations--Computer Science

Understanding free-flow speed is fundamental to transportation engineering in order to improve traffic flow, control, and planning. The free-flow speed of a road segment is the average speed of automobiles unaffected by traffic congestion or delay. Collecting speed data across a state is both expensive and time consuming. Some approaches have been presented to estimate speed using geometric road features for certain types of roads in limited environments. However, estimating speed at state scale for varying landscapes, environments, and road qualities has been relegated to manual engineering and expensive sensor networks. This thesis proposes an automated approach for estimating free-flow …

Deep Neural Architectures For End-To-End Relation Extraction, Tung Tran

Theses and Dissertations--Computer Science

The rapid pace of scientific and technological advancements has led to a meteoric growth in knowledge, as evidenced by a sharp increase in the number of scholarly publications in recent years. PubMed, for example, archives more than 30 million biomedical articles across various domains and covers a wide range of topics including medicine, pharmacy, biology, and healthcare. Social media and digital journalism have similarly experienced their own accelerated growth in the age of big data. Hence, there is a compelling need for ways to organize and distill the vast, fragmented body of information (often unstructured in the form of natural …

Temporal Data Extraction And Query System For Epilepsy Signal Analysis, Yan Huang

Theses and Dissertations--Computer Science

The 2016 Epilepsy Innovation Institute (Ei2) community survey reported that unpredictability is the most challenging aspect of seizure management. Effective and precise detection, prediction, and localization of epileptic seizures is a fundamental computational challenge. Utilizing epilepsy data from multiple epilepsy monitoring units can enhance the quantity and diversity of datasets, which can lead to more robust epilepsy data analysis tools. The contributions of this dissertation are two-fold. One is the implementation of a temporal query for epilepsy data; the other is the machine learning approach for seizure detection, seizure prediction, and seizure localization. The three key components of our temporal …

Formation Of P-N Junctions In Nanoparticle Cerium Oxide Electrolytic Cells Displaying Memristive Switching Behaviour, Rafaela Cristina De Carvalho, Tony Betts, John Cassidy

Articles

A macro-scale metal–semiconductor–metal device comprising CeO₂ nanoparticles cast from a suspension of cerium dioxide formed by a novel synthetic method was fabricated. Thin CeO₂ films of 40 nm thickness placed between panels of aluminium and/or copper displayed memristive-like resistive switching behaviour upon the application of potential sweeps ranging between −0.6 V and 0.6 V. A mechanism is proposed based on the notion that an electrolytic cell operates under such conditions with the initial formation of p and n-type regions within the central semiconductive thin film. Evidence is presented for the existence of numerous point defects in these nanosized …

Producing Urban Aerobiological Risk Map For Cupressaceae Family In The Sw Iberian Peninsula From Lidar Technology, Raúl Pecero‐Casimiro, Santiago Fernández‐Rodríguez, Rafael Tormo‐Molina, Inmaculada Silva‐Palacios, Ángela Gonzalo‐Garijo, Alejandro Monroy‐Colín, Juan Francisco Coloma, José María Maya‐Manzano

Articles

Given the rise in the global population and the consequently high levels of pollution, urban green areas, such as those that include plants in the Cupressaceae family, are suitable to reduce the pollution levels, improving the air quality. However, some species with ornamental value are also very allergenic species whose planting should be regulated and their pollen production reduced by suitable pruning. The Aerobiological Index to create Risk maps for
Ornamental Trees (AIROT), in its previous version, already included parameters that other indexes did not consider, such as the width of the streets, the height of buildings and the geographical …

Exploring 4th Year Medical Students’ Learning And Understanding In Mental Health And Psychiatry, Kimberly Smith

Theses

The stigmatisation and disempowerment of mental health consumers led to the consumer recovery movement, which now underpins the reform of Western Australia’s (WA’s) mental health system. As medical professionals are one of the first lines of care for consumers, it is necessary to understand whether future doctors’ training aligns with the direction of the reform. This research explored a group of WA-based fourth-year medical students’ learning in mental health and psychiatry to understand how their knowledge and training prepared them for working with people experiencing mental or emotional distress. Conducted under a qualitative research paradigm using critical theory and underpinned …

Earth News, V43, Winter 2020, University Of Northern Iowa. Department Of Earth And Environmental Sciences.

Earth News

Inside this issue:
--From the Department Head
--Faculty Updates
--Staff Updates
--SGE Chapter News
--Outreach-Global Visit
--Student Recognition
--Sunday at the Quarry
--Student Spotlights
--Student Research
--50th Anniversary
--Alumni Updates
--Homecoming 2019
--Gifts from Alumni & Friends
--Contribution Form

Biology News 2020, University Of Northern Iowa. Department Of Biology.

Biology News

Contents:

Letter from the Department Head --- 2
Welcome to Our New Staff Members --- 3
Undergraduate Research --- 4
What's New in Our Department --- 7
Spotlight on Outstanding Teaching --- 9
Outdoors on Campus --- 10
Year in Review for UNI Biology --- 12
Thank you to Donors --- 13
Donor Form / Make a Gift --- 14

The Wright Message, 2019-2020, University Of Northern Iowa. Department Of Mathematics.

The Wright Message

Inside this issue:
-- New Faculty
--Faculty Spotlight
--Around Wright Hall
--Retirement Announcement
--Alumni Spotlights
--News from the CTLM
--News from TEAM
--Student Spotlights
--Hari Shankar Lecture
--Donor Spotlight
--Teaching Award
--Contributions to an Account – Recognition
--Department Funds
--Contribution Form

07. Introduction To Slx, Illinois Mathematics And Science Academy

EnACT

No abstract provided.

12. Clash Of Enact, Illinois Mathematics And Science Academy

EnACT

No abstract provided.

13. Slx Next Steps, Illinois Mathematics And Science Academy

EnACT

No abstract provided.

03. Enactivism, Illinois Mathematics And Science Academy

EnACT

No abstract provided.

A Model For Currency Exchange Rates, Sundar Tamang

All ETDs from UAB

Catastrophic economic events like the oil price shock in 1973, the 9/11 event in 2001, the stock market crash in October, 1987, the financial crash of late 2008 and the Covid-19 epidemic impact the US economy without warning, with varying effect, from sharp downturns to actual market crashes. Current economic theory and the associated statistical models are not able to predict these events. The development of predictive models for the US economy needs at the very least prediction models for its major components: commodities, stocks, bonds and currencies. I am going to model the currency exchange rates using a stochastic …

Kean University Institutional Profile 2020, Kean University

Evidence Inventory

Externally Sponsored Research programs can be found on page 35.