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Transgressive Gene Expression And Expression Plasticity Under Thermal Stress In A Stable Hybrid Zone, Lindsey C. Schwartz, Vanessa L. González, Ellen E. Strong, Manuela Truebano, Thomas J. Hilbish

School of Biological and Marine Sciences

Interspecific hybridization can lead to myriad outcomes, including transgressive phenotypes in which the hybrids are more fit than either parent species. Such hybrids may display important traits in the context of climate change, able to respond to novel environmental conditions not previously experienced by the parent populations. While this has been evaluated in an agricultural context, the role of transgressive hybrids under changing conditions in the wild remains largely unexplored; this is especially true regarding transgressive gene expression. Using the blue mussel species complex (genus Mytilus) as a model system, we investigated the effects of hybridization on temperature induced gene …

The Embryonic Thermal Environment Has Positive But Weak Effects On Thermal Tolerance Later In Life In The Aquatic Invertebrate Gammarus Chevreuxi, Honor Haskett, Luke Gill, John I. Spicer, Manuela Truebano

School of Biological and Marine Sciences

Recent evidence suggests that the adult phenotype is influenced by temperatures experienced in early life. However, our understanding of the extent to which the embryonic environment can modulate thermal tolerance later in life is limited, owing to the paucity of studies with appropriate experimental designs to test for this form of developmental plasticity. We investigated whether the thermal environment experienced during embryonic development affects thermal limits in later life. Embryos of the estuarine amphipod Gammarus chevreuxi were incubated until hatching to 15 °C, 20 °C and 25 °C, then reared under a common temperature. Using thermal ramping assays, we determined …

Guidelines For Protecting And Promoting Decapod Crustacean Welfare In Research, Mark Briffa

School of Biological and Marine Sciences

The decapod order contains ~15,000 species, including crabs, lobsters, crayfish, prawns, and shrimps. The idea that these animals might experience pain was long dismissed because they were thought to respond to noxious stimuli and tissue damage purely by nociceptive reflex—a position questioned by Sherwin (2001). Later experimental studies demonstrated that their responses were complex, long-lasting, and largely consistent with criteria for pain that had been produced initially for vertebrates (Elwood 2019). While the nature and extent of potential sentience in decapods remains an active area of research, these animals were recently recognized as sentient for the purposes of UK law, …

Aquaculture In Zambia: The Current Status, Challenges, Opportunities And Adaptable Lessons Learnt From China, Lin Zhang, Sahya Maulu, Fenglei Hua, Majory K.H. Chama, Pao Xu

School of Biological and Marine Sciences

As a land-locked country in Southern Africa, Zambia is rich in natural resources suitable for fish production. However, aquaculture is still in its infancy with enormous potential as most of Zambia’s fish now comes from capture fisheries. The aim of this study was to review the recent progress, status, challenges, and opportunities in Zambia’s aquaculture industry while drawing some lessons from China’s aquaculture experience, focusing on policy instruments, external support, quality seeds, and the investment environment for possible adaptation. To achieve this, we reviewed the existing literature about aquaculture in Zambia. This paper starts by reviewing the overall fishery sector’s …

A Binary Integer Linear Programming Model For Optimizing Underground Stope Layout, Theophilus Mensah

Masters Theses

"Underground mine planning engineers face significant challenges when determining what geometry provides the most profitable and safe stope for extraction. Several techniques and optimization algorithms have been developed in recent years, but most fail to find optimal solutions because they are heuristic or LP-based without efficient geometric constraints. This thesis work proposes a two-dimensional binary linear programming (BILP) model for determining the optimal combination of blocks in a stope that maximizes the economic value of the layout of stopes for a sublevel deposit. The work draws from Queyranne and Wolsey’s (2017 & 2018) formulations of tight constraints for bounded up/down …

Upa-Mediated Polyamidoamine Dendrimer-Based Targeted Gene Delivery System On Triple-Negative Breast Cancer, Hsin-Yin Chuang

Masters Theses

"Around 15% of breast cancers are triple-negative breast cancer (TNBC), which is characterized by the absence of three common receptors—ER, PR, and HER2, and therefore do not respond to hormonal or anti-HER2 therapies. It is urgent to explore targeted therapeutic strategies for TNBC due to its poor prognosis and rare effective targeted therapy. In this study, we developed a polyamidoamine (PAMAM) dendrimer-based targeted gene delivery system—GDP-uPA, to utilize urokinase-type plasminogen activator (uPA) to target uPA receptor (uPAR), which is highly expressed in both TNBC cells and cancer-associated stromal cells. Our results of 1H NMR spectrum, TEM imaging, and MTT assay …

Hysplit In Simulating The Atmospheric Dispersion Of Hazardous Aerosols: A Case Study In St. Louis, Missouri, Ahmet Tolga Odabasi

Masters Theses

"Atmospheric dispersion and transmission play an important role in the behavior and effects of air pollution. Human health can be adversely affected by air pollution in a variety of ways, both immediately and over time. The Hybrid Single Particle Lagrangian Integrated Trajectory Model (HYSPLIT) modeling program, a computer model and software package, tracks the transport trajectories and distributions of air pollution and various pollutants, including radioactive pollutants, in the atmosphere. It also facilitates research on pollution sources. This study simulated the transport of hazardous aerosols in St. Louis region for the years 2020, 2021, and 2022 using the HYSPLIT modeling …

Investigation Of The Relationships Between Hydraulic, Physical, And Biological Soil Parameters At A Vineyard In Saint James, Missouri, Lyndsey Bennett

Masters Theses

"Soil is a living, dynamic system that performs vital functions such as crop production, organic matter decomposition, and the flow and transport of water. Given the pressures of food and in some locales water security, climate change, and sustainability, farmers, scientists, and other related specialists and stakeholders must have access to understandable soil health indicators as well as the soil hydraulic function parameters to maximize crop growth while maintaining soil health. Although biological and physical soil parameters are different, we aim to evaluate their relationship at the field scale. Hydraulic conductivity in the vadose zone may be especially important, as …

Branching Fractional Brownian Motion, Reece Beattie-Hauser

Masters Theses

"Fractional Brownian Motion (FBM) is a Gaussian process whose increments are correlated over long times. FBM is an example of anomalous diffusion, and recently it has been used to model the distribution of serotonergic fibers in the brain [1, 2]. To better represent these fibers, branching FBM (bFBM), where FBM trajectories may randomly split into two, is introduced. One-dimensional bFBM is studied in both sub diffusive and super diffusive regimes, examining three potential behaviors of the correlations (memory) in a branching event: both trajectories retain the memory of previous steps, only one keeps the memory, and neither keeps the memory. …

Ontogenetically Driven Changes In The Endocranial Anatomy Of Maiasaura Peeblesorum And Its Implications For Sensory Functions, Emma Puetz

Masters Theses

"Hadrosaurids exhibited extreme morphological diversity and behavioral characteristics that can be compared with other, closely related members of Dinosauria – particularly through the study of neuroanatomy. X-ray CT generated endocrania of the Late Cretaceous saurolophine hadrosaur Maiasaura peeblesorum, known as the “good mother” dinosaur, offers a unique opportunity to compare complex ecological behaviors between non-avian dinosaurs and their modern archosaur relatives. The 3D reconstruction software ORS Dragonfly provided linear and volumetric measurements taken from the digital cranial endocast and endosseous labyrinths of three ontogenetically varied M. peeblesorum specimens from the Two Medicine Formation in Montana that were used to …

Metal-Ion Doped Borate Bioactive Glasses- A Novel Direction In Minimizing Nosocomial Infections And Antibiotic Resistance, Sarah Fakher

Masters Theses

"Nosocomial infections represent a formidable challenge and induce a substantial burden on patients and healthcare systems. These infections result from the interaction of numerous pathogenic microorganisms, particularly bacteria, and lead to increased morbidity, mortality, and healthcare costs. Extensive research has been carried out to devise innovative solutions, mainly focusing on antimicrobial natural and synthetic substances. However, the proclivity of bacterial strains to form biofilms complicates treatment and elevates antibiotic resistance, prompting research into pioneering more effective and versatile antibacterial strategies. Borate bioactive glasses (BBGs) are the latest, remarkable classes of biomaterials with a wide array of medical applications, owing to …

Groundwater Movement In Boiling Spring, Onyx Spring, Yelton Spring, Wilkins Spring, Hudgens Spring And Natural Bridge Spring, Katherin Roxana Montes Chamorro

Masters Theses

"Onyx Spring, Boiling Spring, Yelton Spring, Wilkins Spring, Hudgens Spring, and Natural Spring are located on public land in Pulaski and Phelps County, Missouri. They were selected randomly to determine groundwater movement and compare water chemistry from the springs that are connected.

Using a dye tracing method, we were able to determine the direction of groundwater flow and a water multiparameter sonde was used to characterize the water chemistry at each point of the springs. As a result, from the six springs studied only three springs are connected which are Yelton, Onyx and Boiling Spring. Regarding to water chemistry this …

Protein Turnover Rate And Life History As An Explanation Of The Extreme Difference In Cost Of Biosynthesis In Cockroach Nymphs And Painted Lady Butterfly Larva, Kyara Nicole Holloway

Masters Theses

The cost of biosynthesis in painted lady caterpillars is far lower than that of a red runner cockroach. A promising explanation for this phenomenon is the protein turnover rate for the animal during biosynthesis and tissue maintenance. Previous research has shown that, per gram of body weight, the painted lady butterfly can synthesize a biomass using up to 15x less energy and resources than the cockroach, even under similar conditions. The resulting ratios, especially in respect to growth rate, show a wide disparity between species in such a manner that does support a protein synthesis and degradation rates as a …

“Criminalizing” Depositions In Arbitration, Mitch Zamoff

Articles

Civil litigation–style deposition practice is preventing commercial arbitration from reaching its full potential as an economical, efficient alternative to a civil lawsuit. Although there is consensus among alternative dispute resolution experts that meaningful limits must be imposed on arbitration discovery to unlock the efficiency benefits of arbitration, depositions continue to feature prominently in commercial arbitrations for at least three reasons. First, civil litigators are addicted to depositions. They reflexively propose overdone deposition practice in arbitrations that replicates their litigation experience. Second, arbitrators may hesitate to disallow deposition discovery out of fear that their awards will be vacated for failure to …

Shareholders All The Way Down: Eu Corporate Sustainability Reforms And The Structure Of Corporate Governance, Matthew Bodie

Articles

The laws and norms of corporate law are changing across the globe. Gone are the days when scholars could confidently predict that shareholder wealth maximization would be the universal metric of corporate success. Instead, corporate leaders, governments, workers, activists, and even shareholders are looking beyond simplistic models of shareholder primacy to a broader understanding of corporate responsibility. This new approach has taken its firmest hold in the European Union, where three directives over the last decade have reshaped reporting requirements and directors’ duties in significant ways, pushing for greater accountability and attention to the needs of stakeholders.

Changes to company …

Optimized Gadolinium-Do3a Loading In Raft-Polymerized Copolymers For Superior Mr Imaging Of Aging Blood-Brain Barrier, Hunter A. Miller, Aaron Priester, Evan T. Curtis, Krista Hilmas, Ashleigh Abbott, Forrest M. Kievit, Anthony J. Convertine

Materials Science and Engineering Faculty Research & Creative Works

The development of gadolinium-based contrast agents (GBCAs) has been pivotal in advancing magnetic resonance imaging (MRI), offering enhanced soft tissue contrast without ionizing radiation exposure. Despite their widespread clinical use, the need for improved GBCAs has led to innovations in ligand chemistry and polymer science. We report a novel approach using methacrylate-functionalized DO3A ligands to synthesize a series of copolymers through direct reversible addition-fragmentation chain transfer (RAFT) polymerization. This technique enables precise control over the gadolinium content within the polymers, circumventing the need for subsequent conjugation and purification steps, and facilitates the addition of other components such as targeting ligands. …