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Blanket Statements, Issue 160, Fall 2023

Blanket Statements: News Publication of the American Quilt Study Group

Blanket Statements, Issue 160, Fall 2023

Columnas: The Honors Program Newsletter At Bentley University, Hailey Jennato, Samson Shen, Clara Williams

Honors Program

Page 1: HOW AI IS IMPACTING THE BENTLEY CLASSROOM AND EDUCATION OVERALL ~ by Nayeli Franco ’24

Page 2: A BEAUTY OF DIVERSITY ~ by Yun Song ’26

Page 3: RESURRECTING THE DEAD THROUGH COMPUTER TECHNOLOGY: HONORING THEIR MEMORY OR EXPLOITING THEIR LEGACY? ~ by Hailey Jennato ’24

Page 4: THE IMPORTANCE OF DEVELOPING EMOTIONAL INTELLIGENCE ~ by Isa Ramirez Perdomo ’26

Page 5: FROM STRUGGLE TO STRENGTH: THRIVING AS AN INTERNATIONAL STUDENT ~ by Ledion Hoti ’25

Page 6: CHASING BUTTERFLIES ~ by Alyssa Galin ’27

A Not-So-Stable Environment: An Assessment Of Stable Isotopic Niches Of The Non-Native European Flounder And Native Salmonids In The Westfjords, Iceland, Annamarie Cross

Iceland: Climate Change and The Arctic

No abstract provided.

Depolymerizing Self-Immolative Polymeric Lanthanide Chelates For Vascular Imaging., Eric Grolman, Quinton E A Sirianni, Joy Dunmore-Buyze, Charmainne Cruje, Maria Drangova, Elizabeth R Gillies

Chemistry Publications

Medical imaging is widely used clinically and in research to understand disease progression and monitor responses to therapies. Vascular imaging enables the study of vascular disease and therapy, but exogenous contrast agents are generally needed to distinguish the vasculature from surrounding soft tissues. Lanthanide-based agents are commonly employed in MRI, but are also of growing interest for micro-CT, as the position of their k-edges allows them to provide enhanced contrast and also to be employed in dual-energy micro-CT, a technique that can distinguish contrast-enhanced blood vessels from tissues such as bone. Small molecule Gd3+ chelates are available, but are excreted …

Supporting A Community Of Pets, Noah C. Madden

IPS/BAS 495 Undergraduate Capstone Projects

This capstone project highlights a community's efforts to support in-need pets, particularly dogs and cats, as well as their owners. For this project, I organized and executed a multiple-week food drive focused specifically on collecting pet food. The objective of this project was to help diminish the rate of food insecurity found in pets within the Boise community, as well as bring a fresh sense of hope to pet owners who may be facing financial hardship or other personal challenges. Over nearly a month’s time, my pet food drive was able to raise over 750 pounds of food for those …

Iris 2023 Fall

Iris

No abstract provided.

The Water Question: Coverage, Conflict, And Confusion In Negaunee During The Typhoid Fever Epidemic Of 1889, Sam Brink

Upper Country: A Journal of the Lake Superior Region

Epidemic disease and the strain it places upon communities is the source of crucial insight into the structures and intricacies of community life. This assessment of the course of the 1889 Negaunee typhoid fever epidemic uncovers a variety of perspectives on the treatment and mitigation of the disease between August and November of 1889 in a diverse and densely-populated Iron Range town. These perspectives, presented primarily in the contemporary medical literature and the pages of The Weekly Mining Journal newspaper, illustrate a complex state of contention and conflict between Negaunee area residents and state health authorities. Investigation of community responses …

The Future Of U.S. Agricultural Biotechnology And Trade: Summary Of A Roundtable Discussion

Yeutter Institute Publications

The United States is one of the largest and highest-yield agricultural producers and exporters in the world. But the world’s population is growing, and growing conditions themselves are changing. Farms face shifting weather patterns, more frequent and severe storms, floods, and drought, and changing pest and disease pressures. What farmers plant and how they plant it are evolving to keep pace with these changes. Future global food security, sustainability, and U.S. leadership in agriculture will depend on the domestic and international policy and regulatory landscapes for agricultural biotechnology innovation. The Clayton Yeutter Institute of International Trade and Finance at the …

François Libermann, The Savernois Melting Pot Of A Jew Founder Of A Religious Congregation, Mathieu Biala Balu Cssp

Spiritan Horizons

No abstract provided.

Spiritan Mission And Development In A Rapidly Changing World, Michael Begley Cssp

Spiritan Horizons

No abstract provided.

'Poor Unfortunate Souls': Acculturation And Reception Of Womanhood In Fairy Tales, Dalton C. Whitby

Fall Showcase for Research and Creative Inquiry

This essay examines traditional fairy tales, symbolized by Perrault’s “Blue Beard,” and contemporary ones, illustrated by Disney’s animated film Brave (2012), with the implementation of ideas from theorists Marcia Lieberman and Hans Robert Jauss, to demonstrate that dated conceptions of womanhood prevail in these stories and continue to be received and acculturate children today. Although it is reasonable to assume social changes brought on by feminism would echo in twenty-first-century fairy tales, an investigation of Disney's animated fairy tale films, the modern storyteller aimed at acculturating children, reveals that these stories subversively persist in presenting traditional ideas of womanhood, depicting …

A Comparison Of The Biodiversity Of Two Chesapeake Bay Islands, Ebony Arauz Tellez, Lyndsey Brown, Alexzandria Davis, Lucy Ellis, Nicolas Freeman, Rachel M. Griffith, Antonio Harvey, Joseph Jackson, Abigail Marple, Shae Sloan, Melissa C. Rhoten, Mark Fink

Fall Showcase for Research and Creative Inquiry

This poster presents a survey of the biodiversity encountered on Tangier Island, Virginia and Smith Island, Maryland during our fall break excursion (October 4-8, 2023) for CTZN 327, Stewardship of Public Waterways. We recorded species information or took pictures of plants and animals for later identification. The data collected allowed some conclusions to be drawn on the similarities and differences in biodiversity in these two Chesapeake Bay island communities.

Benthic Macroinvertebrate Populations And Water Quality Of Aquatic Systems, Nicholas Duellman

Fall Showcase for Research and Creative Inquiry

Macroinvertebrates are key indicators of aquatic health. We surveyed 3 distinct locations in the Appomattox River basin to gather data regarding conductivity and water temperature correlation on species diversity among three locations. There were significant correlations between species diversity and conductivity.

Gsl Researcher (Fall 2023)

GSL Researcher

GSL Researcher (Fall 2023)

Greetings

People

Range and pasture update

Technical note

Ranch update

Highlighted research

GSL Open House agenda

GSL spotlight

Learning Opportunities 2023/2024, 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 eight courses each semester including academic courses, Fine Arts, Wellness, SIR, Internship, and Independent Study. The College and Academic Counselor approves enrollment for students in all courses and experiences. Only courses taken for a letter grade will count toward graduation credit.

The Doj Olc Transparency Act: Is Transparency Enough To Combat Problematic Norms In The Office Of Legal Counsel?, Sarah Patrick

Northwestern Journal of Law & Social Policy

Over the last two decades, the Office of Legal Counsel has come under scrutiny for controversial opinions that have advised the President on the constitutionality of his actions, from interrogation and detention of military detainees to presidential immunity from congressional investigation and subpoenas to testify. Its opinions tend to conform with the unitary executive theory and defer to the executive’s position—and that’s only the opinions the public knows about. The Office of Legal Counsel is not required to disclose its opinions, and often does not, citing concerns about national security and the need for confidentiality.

A recent legislative effort, the …

Biopsychosocial Markers Of Social Adversity As Risk Factors For Mental Illness, Meghan Alexandra Collins

Yale Graduate School of Arts and Sciences Dissertations

Stress and adversity are strong predictors of poor mental health outcomes among individuals at clinical high-risk for psychosis (CHR). Furthermore, atypical neurodevelopment during adolescence has been proposed as a biological mechanism that contributes to psychosis onset. Approximately 20% of youth who meet CHR criteria will go on to develop a psychotic disorder within two years. Thus, delineating the mechanisms linking adversity and neurodevelopment with conversion to psychosis is important for enhanced risk identification and early intervention. There is a lack of clarity in the existing literature regarding which types of adversity are most predictive of poor clinical outcomes among CHR, …

Tackling Fgfr Fusion-Positive Cancers With A Novel Synergistic Combination Of Fgfr And Hdac Inhibitors, Zechen Wang

Yale Graduate School of Arts and Sciences Dissertations

FGFR genomic alterations have been implicated in a number of cancers as oncogenesis driver genes. However, despite the approval of several FGFR inhibitors as targeted therapies for the treatment of cancer patients with FGFR aberrations in recent years, durable responses for FGFR inhibitors are still uncommon and most patients relapse to metastatic disease. In particular, FGFR2 fusions have been detected in ~15% of intrahepatic cholangiocarcinoma (ICC) patients. ICC is a highly aggressive bile duct carcinoma, with a dismal 5-year overall survival rate for patients at advanced stages. Therefore, there is a desperate and urgent need for the development of new …

Religion And The Politics Of Gender, Radha Sarkar

Yale Graduate School of Arts and Sciences Dissertations

This dissertation seeks to understand how religion shapes political outcomes related to women's participation. Much political science scholarship emphasizes the material or structural aspects of religion in shaping political commitments. In contrast, I highlight the importance of religious norms and beliefs, conveyed chiefly by clerical leaders. I delve into the Colombian case and compare the effects of Catholic and Pentecostal teachings about women's roles and attributes. With survey experimental data, text-as-data techniques, and interview-based fieldwork, I demonstrate that Catholic sermons tend to elicit benevolent sexism, a mindset that seeks to protect women who occupy traditional male roles in the public …

Determining The Role Of Beta-Tubulin 4b In Cilia And Development, Mycah Theair Sewell

Yale Graduate School of Arts and Sciences Dissertations

Microtubules (MTs) are a key component of the cytoskeleton and participate in multiple cellular functions and processes. MTs are made of α- and β-tubulin proteins that are encoded by multiple, individual isotype genes. Over the recent decades there has been mounting evidence that despite the high similarity among tubulin proteins, these various isotypes have unique functions rather than being functionally redundant. First, tubulins have different expression and localization patterns. Second, mutations in different tubulin genes result in a variety of disease phenotypes, some of which are exclusively tied to specific tubulins. Finally, multiple tubulin studies have shown that tubulin composition …

Data-Driven Heart Geometry Modeling For Patient-Specific Biomechanics, Daniel Hyungseok Pak

Yale Graduate School of Arts and Sciences Dissertations

Accurate heart geometry modeling from medical images is important for both cardiovascular research and clinical practice. Prominent use cases include anatomical measurements, physics-based simulations, and 3D-printed phantoms. Various computational approaches have been proposed to automate the geometry modeling tasks. Most existing methods have utilized a ``bottom-up" approach, starting with a simpler geometry representation and progressively increasing its complexity to obtain the final desired output. Such methods have often consisted of mixtures of techniques that tackle each sub-problem separately, which can offer flexibility in the modeling process but can also lead to inefficient workflows and high dependency on human experts. In …

Exitron Splicing Of Odor Receptors In Drosophila, Xueying Shang

Yale Graduate School of Arts and Sciences Dissertations

Odor receptors (Ors) are the major olfactory receptors in Drosophila. They signalthe presence of food, mates, and predators. Proper expression of Ors is critical for the function of olfactory receptor neurons (ORNs). In this study we discovered exitrons in five of the 39 Ors expressed in the adult antennae. Exitrons (exonic introns) are sequences that can be spliced from within a protein-coding exon, thereby altering the resulting protein. Exitrons have not been identified previously in Drosophila to our knowledge. We focused on Or88a, which encodes a pheromone receptor, and found that exitron splicing of Or88a is conserved across five Drosophila …

Belonging, Equality, And The Law, Danieli Evans

Yale Graduate School of Arts and Sciences Dissertations

This dissertation is a series of three articles exploring (and critiquing) the ways in which the law sustains and legitimates social exclusion, despite a purported commitment to equal opportunity and non-discrimination. The first article, Socioeconomic Status Discrimination, begins by describing how discrimination based on socioeconomic status (SES) is prevalent and widely accepted under the law. I argue that lawmakers should prohibit SES-based discrimination for the same reasons they prohibit discrimination based on race, gender, and other protected traits. I argue that discrimination based on SES is illegitimate, and importantly, because SES-based discrimination is inextricably intertwined with racial discrimination, by accepting …

The Satellite And The Territory: Essays On Remote Sensing And The Economics Of Sustainable Development, Matthew Gordon

Yale Graduate School of Arts and Sciences Dissertations

The increasing availability of satellite data is creating unprecedented opportunities to study sustainable development processes at both a global scale and fine temporal and spatial resolution. Economists and environmental researchers are using satellite data products to measure land-use change, economic growth, household vulnerability, air pollution, and more. When these data products are used in research or policy-making uncritically, however, the conclusions that follow can be inappropriate. This dissertation examines the potential opportunities and the shortcomings of three different uses of satellite data to inform sustainable development policy -- targeting policy, causal inference, and measurement. The first chapter studies the question …

Identifying Cellular And Molecular Mechanisms Contributing Towards Neuronal Vulnerability In Spinocerebellar Ataxia Type 1, Kimberly Petra Luttik

Yale Graduate School of Arts and Sciences Dissertations

Neurodegenerative disorders are highly complex, progressive disorders often involving interactions of multiple cell types, disease-causing genes and pathways, and brain regions. For the majority of neurodegenerative disorders, no effective therapeutics are currently available to slow disease onset or progression, and the mechanisms underlying the degeneration of specific cellular populations remain largely unknown. Here, we use spinocerebellar ataxia type 1 (SCA1) as a model to investigate the impact of the disease-causing gene, ATAXIN-1 (ATXN1), in diverse cell types and brain regions. We identify region-specific differences in disease signatures, and investigate the mechanistic contribution of glia, specifically astrocytes, towards SCA1 pathology and …

Seismic And Kinematic Studies Of Subduction Zones Along The Western Margins Of North And South America, Neta Bar

Yale Graduate School of Arts and Sciences Dissertations

Subduction zones are a fundamental part of plate tectonics yet changes in the morphology and behavior of subducting slabs with time and their relations to surface expression and deformation in the upper plate remain uncertain. The west margins of North and South America have been shaped by long periods of subduction, providing a valuable opportunity to explore the long-term evolution of subduction zones. This thesis presents three studies on subduction zones along the western margins of North and South America. The first study focuses on the Central Andes above the subducting Nazca plate in northern Bolivia and southern Peru. The …

Improving Genetic Diagnostics And Developing Gene Therapies In Rare Muscle Diseases, Kaiyue Ma

Yale Graduate School of Arts and Sciences Dissertations

The journey towards finding a cure for rare disease patients is hindered by two significant obstacles: the challenge of obtaining a definitive diagnosis and the difficulty in accessing effective treatment. This dissertation research aims to address both issues in rare muscle diseases. Firstly, a highly adaptable workflow called Saturation Mutagenesis-Reinforced Functional assays (SMuRF) was developed to enhance variant interpretation and aid in clinical decision-making. To validate its utility, SMuRF was applied to a group of rare diseases called dystroglycanopathies, which are caused by mutations in enzymes involved in alpha-dystroglycan glycosylation, including FKRP and LARGE1. Over 99.9% of all possible single …

A Multidisciplinary Approach With Dogs As The Model Organism To Identify Whole-Genome Breed-Specific Genotypes Potentially Relating To Human Complex Traits, Zicheng Li

Yale Graduate School of Arts and Sciences Dissertations

Background: Domestic dogs (Canis lupus familiaris) share more than 300 common diseases and similar spontaneous disease development characteristics with humans, making them an excellent animal model to study human heritable diseases. Besides, dogs as a model organism also have been favored for mapping complex traits that are hard to map in humans benefiting from drastically different phenotypes and limited genetic heterogeneity across breeds as results of intensive artificial selection. In light of previous studies that profiled breed-specific traits or used genome-wide association studies (GWAS) to refine loci associated with characteristic morphological features in dogs, the field has gained tremendous genetic …

Peripheral Immune Signatures Of Fibrotic Lung Diseases, Amy Zhao

Yale Graduate School of Arts and Sciences Dissertations

Fibrotic lung diseases constitute a heterogeneous group of disorders that cause scarring of the lung parenchyma, making breathing difficult for patients, and affect an estimated 300,000 people in the United States alone. These diseases may have either “intrinsic” or “extrinsic” immune etiologies. A subset of these fibrotic lung diseases, like Idiopathic Pulmonary Fibrosis (IPF; intrinsic) and Fibrotic Hypersensitivity Pneumonitis (FHP; extrinsic), can often be difficult to distinguish due to their similar symptoms, pulmonary function tests, and radiographic and histologic findings. However, their immune drivers, prognoses, and treatments are distinct; thus, accurate diagnosis of the fibrotic lung disease subtype is essential …

Investigating Stem Cell Chromatin Organization And Oncogenic Tissue Morphogenic Change Through Intravital Microscopy, Sangwon Yun

Yale Graduate School of Arts and Sciences Dissertations

Tissue architecture is predicated on actively maintained cellular equilibrium. Loss of homeostatic tissue organization is a hallmark of epithelial derived malignancy. In the following studies, we attempt to understand the principles governing cell behavior in a regenerative tissue, the skin epidermis, under homeostatic conditions and during oncogenic expression. Epidermal cells undergo continual proliferation and differentiation, navigating drastic changes in gene expression and chromatin architecture during identity transition from stem to differentiated. However, when and where genome reorganization occurs continues to be an arena of active investigation. We developed a high-throughput, quantitative pipeline that enabled us to longitudinally measure chromatin compaction …