Digital Commons Network^™

The Cost Of Providing Care By Family And Friends (Informal Care) In The Last Year Of Life: A Population Observational Study, Miriam J. Johnson, David C. Currow, Jade Chynoweth, Helen Weatherly, Gamze Keser, Ann Hutchinson, Annie Jones, Laurie Dunn, Victoria Allgar

Peninsula Medical School

Introduction: Little is known about replacement costs of care provided by informal carers during the last year of life for people dying of cancer and non-cancer diseases. Aim: To estimate informal caregiving costs and explore the relationship with carer and decedent characteristics. Design: National observational study of bereaved carers. Questions included informal end-of-life caregiving into the 2017 Health Survey for England including estimated recalled frequency, duration and intensity of care provision. We estimated replacement costs for a decedent’s last year of life valuing time at the price of a substitutable activity. Spearman rank correlations and multivariable linear regression were used …

Crop Yield Using Novel Parametric L-System Plant Modelling, Christopher Cameron Napier

Theses: Doctorates and Masters

This research considers a system for the recognition of real plant parts through image analysis based upon synthetic plant modelling. It aims to use data pipelines and synthetic datasets to define recognizable features that assist in the efficient analysis of real plants and plant images. This research asks about the efficacy of L-systems in accurately simulating wheat crop characteristics. It specifically focusses on readable, understandable, accurate, and complex L-system algorithms. The research examines wheat crops in terms of phenotypes and examines the accuracy of a dataset in support of real image annotation. The methodology used was experimental in nature and …

Research Access To Social Media Data: Lessons From Clinical Trial Data Sharing, Christopher J. Morten, Gabriel Nicholas, Salomé Vilgoen

Articles

For years, social media companies have sparred with lawmakers over how much independent access to platform data they should provide researchers. Sharing data with researchers allows the public to better understand the risks and harms associated with social media, including areas such as misinformation, child safety, and political polarization. Yet researcher access is controversial. Privacy advocates and companies raise the potential privacy threats of researchers using such data irresponsibly. In addition, social media companies raise concerns over trade secrecy: the data these companies hold and the algorithms powered by that data are secretive sources of competitive advantage. This Article shows …

Rethinking Innovation At Fda, Rachel E. Sachs, Nicholson Price, Patricia J. Zeitler

Articles

In several controversial drug approval decisions in recent years, the Food & Drug Administration (“FDA”) has publicly justified its decision partly on the ground that approving the drugs in question would support innovation in those fields going forward. To some observers, these arguments were surprising, as the Agency’s determination whether a drug is “safe” and “effective” does not seem to depend on whether its approval also supports innovation. But FDA’s use of these innovation arguments in drug approval decisions is just one example of the ways in which the Agency has come to make many innovation-related judgments as part of …

Cognitive Dissonance In The Antebellum South About The Lawfulness Of Slavery, Peter K. Westen

Articles

The institution of slavery, by its nature, was necessarily grounded in law. For whenever a society adjudges one class of persons as free and another as enslaved, law-like norms must exist to identify and distinguish the free from the enslaved. And whenever a society institutionalizes slavery, law-like norms must exist to establish the privileges and disabilities possessed by masters, by the enslaved, and by third persons in relation to masters and slaves. Such master-slave norms may not always be enforced. But, until societies disavow or disremember them, they constitute standards of right and wrong that master-slave societies profess to embrace. …

The Molecular Landscape Of Sepsis Severity In Infants: Enhanced Coagulation, Innate Immunity, And T Cell Repression, Susie Shih Yin Huang, Mohammed Toufiq, Pirooz Eghtesady, Nicholas Van Panhuys, Mathieu Garand

2020-Current year OA Pubs

INTRODUCTION: Sepsis remains a major cause of mortality and morbidity in infants. In recent years, several gene marker strategies for the early identification of sepsis have been proposed but only a few have been independently validated for adult cohorts and applicability to infant sepsis remains unclear. Biomarkers to assess disease severity and risks of shock also represent an important unmet need.

METHODS: To elucidate characteristics driving sepsis in infants, we assembled a multi-transcriptomic dataset from public microarray datasets originating from five independent studies pertaining to bacterial sepsis in infant < 6-months of age (total n=335). We utilized a COmbat co-normalization strategy to enable comparative evaluation across multiple studies while preserving the relationship between cases and controls.

RESULTS: We found good concordance with only two out of seven …

Empowering Providers To Empower Their Patients: One Model To Expand Knowledge, Competency, And Awareness For The Perinatal Substance Use Workforce, Jacqueline Jacobs

Graduate School of Professional Psychology: Doctoral Papers and Masters Projects

Perinatal substance use (PSU) is a serious and growing public health concern. It is associated with a variety of adverse health outcomes for both mother and child and has been shown to negatively impact the parent-child relationship. Despite the growing prevalence of PSU, there are notable deficits in provider knowledge regarding, and comfortability with, PSU. Moreover, providers report feelings of judgment, resentment, fear, and hesitancy related to their work with women with PSU. Subsequently, women with PSU struggle to find appropriate, compassionate, and effective treatment for their substance misuse. Widespread and accessible training is needed to bolster provider knowledge base, …

Queer: Litigating Gender Non-Conformity, Eliot Tracz

American University Journal of Gender, Social Policy & the Law

Section I of this article provides background information on the complexity of gender identity. This section addresses some of the different terminology used by members of the LGBTQ community to describe their gender identity, including the relatively well-known term “nonbinary” and continuing through to the less concrete term “queer.” Section II looks at the history of state action policing queer bodies and identities. It outlines statutes enacted to prevent individuals from hiding their identities and how such laws were used to target queer individuals. Section III discusses the case of Grimm v. Gloucester County School Boardand the two approaches …

The Prevalence And Characteristic Of Latent Tb In Patients On Immunosuppressant Agents And Biological Treatment, Tuqa Deia Khadhim, Basil Fawzi Jassar

Muthanna Medical Journal

LTTB is a common condition occurring in one fourth of those who were exposed to mycobacterial bacilli with Medically induced immunosuppression stands as a significant risk factor for having LTTB. Aim of the study: To assess the prevalence and characteristics of LTTB in patients on immunosuppressive agents and biological treatment. A cross-sectional research of 150 patients on immunosuppressants and biological therapy for diverse diseases at Baghdad teaching hospital outpatient rheumatology, dermatology, and TB clinics between 2023 and 2024 was done. All patients were examined with a detailed clinical history, physical exam, and chest x-ray or CT scan. IGRA testing was …

Why Play? Exploring The Realities Of Play-Based Learning In Kindergarten, Sofia Josephine Steele

Honors Program Theses

By nature, children are curious and love to explore the world around them. Play is one way that children can fulfill that innate curiosity. Through play-based learning, educators can utilize that innate curiosity and wonder in children to create valuable learning experiences that will engage and teach them. This pedagogical approach is used in early childhood education to help children develop their academic, social, and emotional skills through appropriate learning experiences that consider their abilities and interests. However, in recent years, there has been a shift away from play-based learning in kindergarten classrooms. The reasoning behind this shift may be …

Designing A Use-Error Robust Machine Learning Model For Quantitative Analysis Of Diffuse Reflectance Spectra, Allison Scarbrough, Keke Chen, Bing Yu

Biomedical Engineering Faculty Research and Publications

Significance

Machine learning (ML)-enabled diffuse reflectance spectroscopy (DRS) is increasingly used as an alternative to the computation-intensive inverse Monte Carlo (MCI) simulation to predict tissue’s optical properties, including the absorption coefficient,μaand reduced scattering coefficient, μs′.

Aim

We aim to develop a use-error-robust ML algorithm for optical property prediction from DRS spectra.

Approach

We developed a wavelength-independent regressor (WIR) to predict optical properties from DRS data. For validation, we generated 1520 simulated DRS spectra with the forward Monte Carlo model, where μa=0.44 to 2.45cm−1, and μs′=6.53 to 9.58cm−1. We introduced common use-errors, such as wavelength miscalibrations and intensity fluctuations. Finally, we …

Field And Laboratory Evaluation Of The Interactions Between Pesticides And The Gut Microbiome In Honey Bees (Apis Mellifera), Macee R. Mitchell

EWU Masters Thesis Collection

Western honey bees (Apis mellifera) are important pollinators yet are threatened by a combination of factors such as poor nutrition, pathogens, parasites, and pesticide use. Bees encounter numerous pesticides while foraging (e.g. imidacloprid, a neonicotinoid insecticide) or in the hive colony (e.g. Tau-fluvalinate, a miticide commonly used to treat Varroa mite parasites). Similar to most organisms, the gut microbiome is important for bee health, metabolism, and behavior, however it is not well known how environmental factors like pesticides impact their gut bacterial symbionts. I hypothesized that 1) pesticide concentrations in bees are correlated with gut bacterial community structure, and 2) …

Autoregulatory Mechanism Of Enzyme Activity By The Nuclear Localization Signal Of Lysine-Specific Demethylase 1, Dulmi Senanayaka, Danyun Zeng, Sahar Alishiri, William J. Martin, Khadijah I. Moore, Roshni Patel, Zigmund Luka, Alexander Hirschi, Nicholas J. Reiter

Chemistry Faculty Research and Publications

The N-terminal region of the human lysine-specific demethylase 1 (LSD1) has no predicted structural elements, contains a nuclear localization signal (NLS), undergoes multiple posttranslational modifications (PTMs), and acts as a protein-protein interaction hub. This intrinsically disordered region (IDR) extends from core LSD1 structure, resides atop the catalytic active site, and is known to be dispensable for catalysis. Here, we show differential nucleosome binding between the full-length and an N terminus deleted LSD1 and identify that a conserved NLS and PTM containing element of the N terminus contains an alpha helical structure, and that this conserved element impacts demethylation. Enzyme assays …

Efficient Synthesis Of Thiazole-Fused Bisnoralcohol Derivatives As Potential Therapeutic Agents, Subrata Roy, Hansa Raj Kc, Sanjay Adhikary, Alexander N. Erickson, Mohammad Abrar Alam

Chemistry Faculty Research and Publications

Thiazole derivatives are known for a wide range of therapeutic properties. Bisnoralcohol is an inexpensive natural product obtained by the biodegradation of sterols. This article describes an efficient synthesis of a library of thiazole-fused bisnoralcohol derivatives. These novel compounds have been studied for their antineoplastic and antibacterial properties, which led to the discovery of hit compounds with therapeutic potential. The antibacterial compound is noncytotoxic and nonhemolytic against cancer cell lines and sheep red blood cells, respectively. Several of the antineoplastic compounds showed activity against human cancer cell lines with growth inhibition at submicromolar concentration.

Screen Time And Problematic Behavior: Piloting A Family- Based Intervention, Naomi Morissette

PCOM Psychology Dissertations

School-aged children are increasingly growing up in a technology-driven society. The amount of time children spend engaged with screens is problematic, as is the subsequent impact on the development of their executive functioning skills. The current study investigated the feasibility of an online, asynchronous, family-based intervention to limit screen usage for elementary-aged children. It was hypothesized that removing screens from children’s bedrooms and one hour before bedtime was a feasible strategy to limit screen use and would result in positive behavior change, specifically regarding the ability to self-cue the use of executive skills. Additionally, it was hypothesized that an online …

Nsu Florida Undergraduate Student Catalog 2024-2025, Nova Southeastern University

Undergraduate Programs Course Catalogs

No abstract provided.

Portraits Of A Rural Georgia High School Stem Program, Jonathan L. Garner, Gwen Scott Ruttencutter, Forrest R. Parker Iii

Georgia Educational Researcher

This research examined school personnel’s strategies and practices responsible for increasing student science proficiency at a certified rural high school STEM program. In the United States, difficulties have developed in adequately preparing students for careers in STEM sectors, especially in secondary education. This trend has led to increased difficulties for high school graduates competing globally for high-paying jobs. Rural schools have been especially susceptible to inadequately preparing their students academically. I used qualitative research portraiture to generate a mental image of the STEM program at the selected high school. I interviewed three teachers and two administrators in a certified rural …

Ecosystem Functions And Services​ Landscaping For Water Quality – April 30, 2024​ Sunapee, Nh​, Julia Peterson

UNH Cooperative Extension

No abstract provided.

Assessing And Understanding Soil Characteristics​, Amy Papineau

UNH Cooperative Extension

No abstract provided.

Critical Data For Critical Care: A Primer On Leveraging Electronic Health Record Data For Research From Society Of Critical Care Medicine's Panel On Data Sharing And Harmonization, Donna Lee Armaignac

All Publications

A growing body of critical care research draws on real-world data from electronic health records (EHRs). The bedside clinician has myriad data sources to aid in clinical decision-making, but the lack of data sharing and harmonization standards leaves much of this data out of reach for multi-institution critical care research. The Society of Critical Care Medicine (SCCM) Discovery Data Science Campaign convened a panel of critical care and data science experts to explore and document unique advantages and opportunities for leveraging EHR data in critical care research. This article reviews and illustrates six organizing topics (data domains and common data …

Incorporating Variable Rbe In Impt Optimization For Ependymoma, Hadis Moazami Goudarzi, Gino Lim, David Grosshans, Radhe Mohan, Wenhua Cao

Faculty, Staff and Student Publications

PURPOSE: To study the dosimetric impact of incorporating variable relative biological effectiveness (RBE) of protons in optimizing intensity-modulated proton therapy (IMPT) treatment plans and to compare it with conventional constant RBE optimization and linear energy transfer (LET)-based optimization.

METHODS: This study included 10 pediatric ependymoma patients with challenging anatomical features for treatment planning. Four plans were generated for each patient according to different optimization strategies: (1) constant RBE optimization (ConstRBEopt) considering standard-of-care dose requirements; (2) LET optimization (LETopt) using a composite cost function simultaneously optimizing dose-averaged LET (LET

RESULTS: We found that the LETopt plans consistently achieved increased LET in …

Placental Co-Transcriptional Activator Vestigial-Like 1 (Vgll1) Drives Tumorigenesis Via Increasing Transcription Of Proliferation And Invasion Genes, Heather M Sonnemann, Barbara Pazdrak, Barbara Nassif, Yimo Sun, Lama Elzohary, Amjad H Talukder, Arjun S Katailiha, Krishna Bhat, Gregory Lizée

Faculty, Staff and Student Publications

Introduction: Vestigial-like 1 (VGLL1) is a co-transcriptional activator that binds to TEA domain-containing transcription factors (TEADs). Its expression is upregulated in a variety of aggressive cancer types, including pancreatic and basal-like breast cancer, and increased transcription of VGLL1 is strongly correlated with poor prognosis and decreased overall patient survival. In normal tissues, VGLL1 is most highly expressed within placental trophoblast cells, which share the common attributes of rapid cellular proliferation and invasion with tumor cells. The impact of VGLL1 in cancer has not been fully elucidated and no VGLL1-targeted therapy currently exists.

Methods: The aim of this study was to …

Crosstalk Between Breast Cancer-Derived Micrornas And Brain Microenvironmental Cells In Breast Cancer Brain Metastasis, Munazza S Khan, Grace L Wong, Chuling Zhuang, Mariana K Najjar, Hui-Wen Lo

Faculty, Staff and Student Publications

Breast cancer is the most frequent malignancy in women, constituting 15.2% of all new cancers diagnosed in the United States. Distant breast cancer metastasis accounts for the majority of breast cancer-related deaths; brain metastasis is the third most common site for metastatic breast cancer but is associated with worst prognosis of approximately eight months of survival. Current treatment options for breast cancer brain metastasis (BCBM) are limited and ineffective. To help identify new and effective therapies for BCBM, it is important to investigate the mechanisms by which breast cancer cells metastasize to the brain and thrive in the brain microenvironment. …

Does Varicocele Repair Improve Conventional Semen Parameters? A Meta-Analytic Study Of Before-After Data, Rossella Cannarella, Rupin Shah, Taha Abo-Almagd Abdel-Meguid Hamoda, Florence Boitrelle, Ramadan Saleh, Murat Gul, Amarnath Rambhatla, Parviz Kavoussi, Tuncay Toprak, Ahmed M Harraz, Edmund Ko, Gökhan Çeker, Damayanthi Durairajanayagam, Noora Alkahidi, Shinnosuke Kuroda, Andrea Crafa, Ralf Henkel, Gianmaria Salvio, Berk Hazir, Mahsa Darbandi, Marion Bendayan, Sara Darbandi, Marco Falcone, Nicolas Garrido, Raghavender Kosgi, Raneen Sawaid Kaiyal, Keshab Karna, Nguyen Ho Vinh Phuoc, Ponco Birowo, Giovanni M Colpi, Jean De La Rosette, Germar-Michael Pinggera, Quang Nguyen, Armand Zini, Wael Zohdy, Rajender Singh, Pallavi Saini, Sidney Glina, Haocheng Lin, Taymour Mostafa, Cesar Rojas-Cruz, Mohamed Arafa, Aldo E Calogero, Fotios Dimitriadis, Priyank Kothari, Vilvapathy Senguttuvan Karthikeyan, Keisuke Okada, Koji Chiba, Ates Kadıoglu, Baris Altay, Tahsin Turunc, Birute Zilaitiene, Fatih Gokalp, Aram Adamyan, Darren Katz, Eric Chung, Tiago Cesar Mierzwa, Daniel Suslik Zylbersztejn, Gustavo Marquesine Paul, Nikolaos Sofikitis, Ioannis Sokolakis, Vineet Malhotra, Sakti Ronggowardhana Brodjonegoro, Ricky Adriansjah, Akira Tsujimura, Toshiyasu Amano, Giancarlo Balercia, Imad Ziouziou, Isaac Ardianson Deswanto, Marlon Martinez, Hyun Jun Park, Mustafa Emre Bakırcıoglu, Erman Ceyhan, Kaan Aydos, Jonathan Ramsay, Suks Minhas, Manaf Al Hashimi, Ramy Abou Ghayda, Nicholas Tadros, Puneet Sindhwani, Christopher C K Ho, Rinaldo Indra Rachman, Marcelo Rodriguez Pena, Ahmad Motawi, Arun Karthik Ponnusamy, Satish Dipankar, Azwar Amir, Saleh Binsaleh, Ege Can Serefoglu, Ravi Banthia, Kareim Khalafalla, Ari Basukarno, Nguyen Hoai Bac, Karun Singla, Rafael F Ambar, Konstantinos Makarounis, Shivam Priyadarshi, Gede Wirya Kusuma Duarsa, Widi Atmoko, Sunil Jindal, Eko Arianto, Hamed Akhavizadegan, Haitham El Bardisi, Ohad Shoshany, Gian Maria Busetto, Mohamad Moussa, Mounir Jamali, Mohamed S Al-Marhoon, Mikhail Ruzaev, Hasan M A Farsi, Shingai Mutambirwa, Dong Sup Lee, Deniz Kulaksiz, Yu-Sheng Cheng, Abderrazak Bouzouita, Selcuk Sarikaya, Hussein Kandil, Georgios Tsampoukas, Ala'a Farkouh, Kasonde Bowa, Missy Savira, Nasser Mogharabian, Tan V Le, Maruto Harjanggi, Dang Tuan Anh, Tran Quang Tien Long, Mohammad Ayodhia Soebadi, Lukman Hakim, Marko Tanic, Umut Cagin Ari, Firuza R Parikh, Gokhan Calik, Vinod Kv, Gyem Dorji, Andri Rezano, Osvaldo Rajmil, Dung Mai Ba Tien, Yiming Yuan, Juan Francisco Lizarraga-Salas, Balantine Eze, Kay Seong Ngoo, Joe Lee, Umut Arslan, Ashok Agarwal, Global Andrology Forum

Faculty, Staff and Student Publications

Purpose: The purpose of this meta-analysis is to study the impact of varicocele repair in the largest cohort of infertile males with clinical varicocele by including all available studies, with no language restrictions, comparing intra-person conventional semen parameters before and after the repair of varicoceles.

Materials and methods: The meta-analysis was performed according to PRISMA-P and MOOSE guidelines. A systematic search was performed in Scopus, PubMed, Cochrane, and Embase databases. Eligible studies were selected according to the PICOS model (Population: infertile male patients with clinical varicocele; Intervention: varicocele repair; Comparison: intra-person before-after varicocele repair; Outcome: conventional semen parameters; Study type: …

Technical Aspects And Clinical Limitations Of Sperm Dna Fragmentation Testing In Male Infertility: A Global Survey, Current Guidelines, And Expert Recommendations, Ashok Agarwal, Ala'a Farkouh, Ramadan Saleh, Taha Abo-Almagd Abdel-Meguid Hamoda, Gianmaria Salvio, Florence Boitrelle, Ahmed M Harraz, Ramy Abou Ghayda, Parviz Kavoussi, Murat Gül, Tuncay Toprak, Giorgio Ivan Russo, Damayanthi Durairajanayagam, Amarnath Rambhatla, Ponco Birowo, Rossella Cannarella, Nguyen Ho Vinh Phuoc, Armand Zini, Mohamed Arafa, Christine Wyns, Kelton Tremellen, Selçuk Sarıkaya, Sheena Lewis, Donald P Evenson, Edmund Ko, Aldo E Calogero, Fahmi Bahar, Marlon Martínez, Rafael F Ambar, Giovanni M Colpi, Mustafa Emre Bakircioglu, Ralf Henkel, Hussein Kandil, Ege Can Serefoglu, Abdullah Alfakhri, Akira Tsujimura, Alireza Kheradmand, Angelo Marino, Aram Adamyan, Birute Zilaitiene, Cevahir Ozer, Edoardo Pescatori, Paraskevi Vogiatzi, Gian Maria Busetto, Giancarlo Balercia, Haitham Elbardisi, Hamed Akhavizadegan, Hesamoddin Sajadi, Hisanori Taniguchi, Hyun Jun Park, Israel Maldonado Rosas, Mohamed Al-Marhoon, Mohammad Ali Sadighi Gilani, Naif Alhathal, Nguyen Quang, Germar-Michael Pinggera, Priyank Kothari, Sava Micic, Sheryl Homa, Tran Quang Tien Long, Wael Zohdy, Widi Atmoko, Wael Ibrahim, Marjan Sabbaghian, Saad Mohammed Abumelha, Eric Chung, Muhammet Rasit Ugur, Mehmet Serkan Ozkent, Osama Selim, Mahsa Darbandi, Shinichiro Fukuhara, Mounir Jamali, Jean De La Rosette, Shinnosuke Kuroda, Ryan P Smith, Aykut Baser, Arif Kalkanli, Nicholas N Tadros, Kaan Aydos, Tiago Cesar Mierzwa, Kareim Khalafalla, Vineet Malhotra, Mohamad Moussa, Federica Finocchi, Rinaldo Indra Rachman, Carlo Giulioni, Tomer Avidor-Reiss, Oguzhan Kahraman, Gökhan Çeker, Cătălina Zenoaga-Barbăroșie, Trenton L Barrett, Mehmet Yilmaz, Ates Kadioglu, Sunil Jindal, Huda Omran, Kadir Bocu, Vilvapathy Senguttuvan Karthikeyan, Giorgio Franco, Jesús Fernando Solorzano, Ranjit B Vishwakarma, Eko Arianto, Nicolas Garrido, Divyanu Jain, Nazim Gherabi, Ioannis Sokolakis, Ayad Palani, Gokhan Calik, Deniz Kulaksiz, Vaida Simanaviciene, Mara Simopoulou, Nur Dokuzeylül Güngör, Gideon Blecher, Marco Falcone, Davor Jezek, Mirko Preto, Edouard Amar, Tan V Le, Sun Tae Ahn, Andri Rezano, Keerti Singh, Lucia Rocco, Missy Savira, Osvaldo Rajmil, Sara Darbandi, Emrullah Sogutdelen, Luca Boeri, Guadalupe Hernández, Lukman Hakim, Yoshiharu Morimoto, Andrian Japari, Nikolaos Sofikitis, Baris Altay, Asli Metin Mahmutoglu, Manaf Al Hashimi, Imad Ziouziou, Christina Anagnostopoulou, Haocheng Lin, Rupin Shah

Faculty, Staff and Student Publications

Purpose: Sperm DNA fragmentation (SDF) is a functional sperm abnormality that can impact reproductive potential, for which four assays have been described in the recently published sixth edition of the WHO laboratory manual for the examination and processing of human semen. The purpose of this study was to examine the global practices related to the use of SDF assays and investigate the barriers and limitations that clinicians face in incorporating these tests into their practice.

Materials and methods: Clinicians managing male infertility were invited to complete an online survey on practices related to SDF diagnostic and treatment approaches. Their responses …

Pet Image Denoising Based On Denoising Diffusion Probabilistic Model, Kuang Gong, Keith Johnson, Georges El Fakhri, Quanzheng Li, Tinsu Pan

Faculty, Staff and Student Publications

Purpose: Due to various physical degradation factors and limited counts received, PET image quality needs further improvements. The denoising diffusion probabilistic model (DDPM) was a distribution learning-based model, which tried to transform a normal distribution into a specific data distribution based on iterative refinements. In this work, we proposed and evaluated different DDPM-based methods for PET image denoising.

Methods: Under the DDPM framework, one way to perform PET image denoising was to provide the PET image and/or the prior image as the input. Another way was to supply the prior image as the network input with the PET image included …

Transcriptomics Analysis Reveals Potential Mechanisms Underlying Mitochondrial Dysfunction And T Cell Exhaustion In Astronauts’ Blood Cells In Space, Maria Moreno-Villanueva, Luis E Jimenez-Chavez, Stephanie Krieger, Liang-Hao Ding, Ye Zhang, Adriana Babiak-Vazquez, Mark Berres, Sandra Splinter, Kristen E Pauken, Brian C Schaefer, Brian E Crucian, Honglu Wu

Faculty, Staff and Student Publications

Introduction: The impact of spaceflight on the immune system and mitochondria has been investigated for decades. However, the molecular mechanisms underlying spaceflight-induced immune dysregulations are still unclear.

Methods: In this study, blood from eleven crewmembers was collected before and during International Space Station (ISS) missions. Transcriptomic analysis was performed in isolated peripheral blood mononuclear cells (PBMCs) using RNA-sequencing. Differentially expresses genes (DEG) in space were determined by comparing of the inflight to the preflight samples. Pathways and statistical analyses of these DEG were performed using the Ingenuity Pathway Analysis (IPA) tool.

Results: In comparison to pre-flight, a total of 2030 …

Integrating Christian Beliefs And Scientific Psychology: Honoring John Carter, Rodger K. Bufford

Faculty Publications - Doctor of Psychology (PsyD) Program

John Carter had a profound role in shaping the thinking of generations of students and scholars in our understanding of the relationship of Christian beliefs and modern psychol- ogy. That Carter and Narramore’s (1979) volume remains in print and in use after more than four decades is a testimony to that influence. Here, I briefly explore the ways of knowing in general and elaborate on scientific knowing as a unique and powerful approach to appre- hending what our senses and instruments reveal. Scientific knowing is premised on several essential assumptions, employs a time-tested array of strategies to systematically gath- er …

The Role Played By Non-Formal Education In The Lives Of Iraqi-British Citizens: A Study Of Three Iraqi-British Cultural Institutions And How Non-Formal Education Empowers Individuals And Communities, Nadeem Al-Abdalla

School of Law, Humanities and Social Sciences Theses

This thesis highlights the role played by non-formal education in the lives of Iraqi community members who participate in the activities offered by London’s Iraqi-British cultural centres. The key aims of this thesis were; to research, document and analyse London’s Iraqi community and their experiences of non-formal learning within Iraqi cultural centres; and to establish the extent to which they found their participation in this non-formal learning empowering, both at an individual and community level. Many studies have been conducted into the lives of newly arrived communities. Generally, these studies tend to focus on their early years in the UK …

Exposure To Metal Accumulation In Chicken Giblets And Human Health Risk In Lokoja, Nigeria, Jude Ehwevwerhere Emurotu, Lami Habib, Ephraim Musa Dallatu, Adamu Shuaibu Onakpa, Aloysius Akaangee Pam

Applied Environmental Research

When consumed, the toxic heavy metals in chicken giblets pose a grave risk to humans. An inductively coupled plasma optical emission spectrometer (ICP-OES) was used to measure the concentrations of metals (Al, Cd, Co, Cr, Ni, Mn, and Pb) in the liver, gizzard, and kidney of chickens from the Lokoja poultry market. Except for lead, which slightly exceeded the FAO/WHO limit of 0.1 mg kg-1, the metal concentrations found were all within the threshold limit. The estimated daily intake (EDI), hazard quotient (HQ), hazard index (HI), and cancer risk (CR) were used to assess the risks that humans would face …