Digital Commons Network^™

Potential Of Anogenital Distance As A Genetic Selection Trait In Canadian Holstein, G.R. Dodd, F.S. Schenkel, F. Miglior, T.C. Bruinjé, M. Gobikrushanth, J.E. Carrelli, M. Oba, D.J. Ambrose, C.F. Baes

Dairy Science and Food Science Faculty Publications: 2022 to Present

Maintaining optimal fertility in dairy cattle herds is a global challenge that is typically addressed through the genetic selection of fertility indicator traits. However, many of the traits currently implemented in breeding programs are heavily influenced by environmental factors, resulting in a slow rate of genetic improvement. Anogenital distance (AGD) has recently emerged as a promising fertility indicator trait due to its association with favorable reproductive outcomes and its higher heritability estimates compared with currently evaluated traits. This study aimed to enhance the understanding of AGD's genetic potential by estimating its genetic parameters in Canadian Holsteins, assessing the reliability …

Ashwagandha And Sexual Health In Women With Hypoactive Sexual Desire Disorder: Exploring Extent Of Adaptogenic Properties, Rhea Chatterjee

AUCTUS: The Journal of Undergraduate Research and Creative Scholarship

Hypoactive Sexual Desire Disorder (HSDD) affects 40% of women and potentially decreases their quality of life. Currently, the primary treatment for HSDD is Flibanserin, which is a serotonergic agonist and an antidepressant. However, the limited efficacy of Flibanserin encourages the exploration of the utilization of traditional drugs such as Withania somnifera, otherwise known as Ashwagandha, as an alternative treatment for HSDD. Minimal studies examine ayurvedic medications or the symptoms of illnesses that traditional Western medicines are unable to treat. This comprehensive literature review investigated the efficacy of Ashwagandha in improving sexual function in women with HSDD. The paper evaluated …

Dim Theory Applied To Law: The Disintegration Of American Law, Tristen Fleig

CGU Theses & Dissertations

Plato, Aristotle, and Montesquieu each argued the importance of law to political regime and Constitution. The ancients emphasized the law as the rational component of the regime and Montesquieu applied some of the first political science to show how political regimes rely upon law. Still, the exact connection between law and politics, and law and philosophy more broadly has remained largely obscured. In my account, legal system ought to be understood as the institutional framework that supports and protect a particular kind of life accepted by the intellectuals and the people of a nation. Using DIM theory from The DIM …

Personal Wisdom And Coping: Insights From The Covid-19 Pandemic, Noah Ringler

CGU Theses & Dissertations

Much of personal wisdom research has focused on the relationship between personal wisdom and difficult life events (DLEs). Research indicates that those high in personal wisdom cope more effectively with DLEs. However, these studies primarily focused on older adults and assessed coping through well-being measures. Seeking to address these limitations, Ringler (2021) found that mindfulness partially mediates the relationship between personal wisdom and coping with DLEs (measured through meaning-making) in a more age-diverse sample. Despite this progress, several gaps in knowledge remain. For example, there is still a lack of understanding about how wisdom relates to the use of specific …

Associations Between Initial Alcohol Sensitivity And Problematic Nicotine Or Cannabis Use In Emerging Adults Who Co-Use Substances, Erwin Murray, Spit For Science Working Group, Karen Chartier

IRBEH/Spit for Science Publications and Presentations

Background: Co-use of alcohol and nicotine or cannabis is prevalent among emerging adults. Alcohol sensitivity is associated with problematic alcohol use. Here, we examined whether alcohol sensitivity is associated with problematic nicotine or cannabis use in those who use these substances in addition to alcohol.

Methods: Data were from first-year college students who reported alcohol and nicotine (N=599) or alcohol and cannabis (N=787) use in Spit for Science’s Fall 2014 survey, an ongoing longitudinal cohort study of students at a large, urban public university. The Self-Rating of Effects of Alcohol scale (SRE) measured initial alcohol sensitivity, and the Fagerstrom Test …

Cultivating Quality Of Life: Assessing Diet, Physical Activity, And Mental Health Among Arab-American Breast Cancer Survivors - Uncovering Barriers And Facilitators For Holistic Well-Being, Nouf Ali Alhomaidhi

CGU Theses & Dissertations

This dissertation examines the quality of life among Arab-American breast cancer survivors, with a particular emphasis on dietary practices, physical activity, and mental health. Despite increasing survivorship rates in this population, there remains a significant gap in the literature addressing their unique post-treatment experiences and needs. Employing a convergent parallel mixed-methods design, this study integrates quantitative survey data and qualitative narrative interviews to assess adherence to health behavior guidelines and to identify culturally specific barriers and facilitators to well-being. Quantitative findings indicated suboptimal adherence to recommended dietary and physical activity guidelines and highlighted prevalent psychological distress among participants. Thematic analysis …

The Women’S Legal Rights Index: A New Approach To Measuring Women’S Autonomy, Mona Shadia

CGU Theses & Dissertations

Existing indicators of women’s empowerment focus on women’s educational attainment. Yet theories of women’s empowerment in politics, in particular their role in democratization, extend beyond the consequences of education to require agency and autonomy in their lives. In the first chapter of this dissertation, I argue that in an effort to measure women’s citizenship and standing in their respective societies, access to legal rights should be measured and considered. My theoretical framework builds on literature that demonstrates that while education is critical to women’s prosperity in many facets of life, other measures related to their legal rights can provide a …

An Evolving Standard Of Decency: Examining The American Juvenile Justice System And The Constitutionality Of Youth Incarceration, Mark S. Smith

CGU Theses & Dissertations

The United States incarcerates more children and adolescents than any other developed nation in the world. Studies have shown that juvenile detention is generally ineffective at rehabilitating delinquent youth, which places the practice at odds with the stated intent of modern juvenile justice. Similar to the adult criminal justice system, there is a significant and widespread disparity in the incarceration rate between that of minority youth and their white counterparts in the juvenile system. Finally, a substantial and growing body of medical and behavioral research concludes that trauma associated with juvenile detention can cause long-term or even lifetime negative neurological …

What Did Independent Study Do For Me? Perspectives Of Latine Graduates Of A California Independent Study High School Program, Monique R. Escobedo

CGU Theses & Dissertations

The independent study model in K-12 education has rarely been studied as an opportunity to meet the needs of diverse learners who require access to education outside of the traditional school day and brick and mortar settings (Anderson & Amesse, 2022). This multimethod study (Cram & Mertens, 2016) explores the experiences of 15 Latine graduates of an independent study high school that serves four counties in southern California. The study takes a critical approach both theoretically and methodologically to understand how the independent study model as carried out at the school site met the intersectional needs (e.g. cultural, linguistic, geographic, …

Dispossession, Adoption, And (Dis)Inheritance: The Sympathetic Sublime In George Eliot’S Fiction, Beth Ann Jones

CGU Theses & Dissertations

The aim of this dissertation is to explore the promise and the peril of George Eliot’s sympathetic sublime in her fictional writing. To arrive at this designation for Eliot’s literary project, the dissertation synthesizes three distinct yet interconnected strands within Eliot scholarship: her emphasis on building absorbing sympathetic relationships between individuals, communities, and readers; her use of inheritance plots to develop the personalities and destinies of her protagonists; and her dependence upon the sublime aesthetic inherent in the poetry of William Wordsworth and the philosophy of Immanuel Kant, Edmund Burke, and Ludwig Feuerbach. Eliot’s drive to create sympathetic connections which …

Unseen Journeying: Latinx Mothers’ Experiences And Navigation Of Pre-Referral Home-School Collaboration, Yoné Rodríguez

CGU Theses & Dissertations

Research has documented various home-school collaboration obstacles faced by Latinx mothers whose children receive special education services. However, minimal attention has focused on Latinx mothers of students in the pre-referral stage—the time when students facing significant academic difficulties may be struggling in the classroom but have not yet been referred to special education evaluation. Responding to this gap in the literature, this qualitative study investigated how Latinx mothers experienced and navigated pre-referral home-school collaboration, which was conceptualized as the dynamic process occurring between family members and school personnel working towards common goals related to student growth. In alignment with Chicana …

A Study Of The Parental Decision To Homeschool, Leonard Cheung

CGU Theses & Dissertations

This phenomenological qualitative study provides context and understanding of why parents choose to homeschool their children using Rational Choice Theory as the framework. As of 2024, while there is quantitative data that breaks the reasons why parents homeschool down into several categories, scholars often criticize these data for being poorly done because these studies lack context. There have also been many qualitative studies that investigate certain reasons why parents homeschool, but almost all of them do not use a decision-making framework nor were they studying the decision-making process on why parents choose homeschooling. The literature has shown that parents homeschool …

Innovating Government The Open Way: Modeling The Open Data Ecosystem, Jeanne Holm

CGU Theses & Dissertations

Governments around the world are releasing open data with the aim of stimulating innovation, driving economic development, and advancing social good. Despite significant investment in data infrastructure and technology, many open data initiatives struggle to effectively engage stakeholders or deliver on their intended outcomes. Thus, this dissertation targets the research question: How can a human-centered open government data ecosystem be modeled to ensure that stakeholders are engaged and find data? It also explores which stakeholders should be engaged and what methods are most effective in engaging them. To address the research questions, this dissertation adopts a design science methodology and …

The Role Of Multiracial Identity Integration In Developing Leader Adaptability, Ashley M. Watterson

CGU Theses & Dissertations

Today’s global economy and diverse workforce require leaders to navigate complex environments, demanding that they be highly adaptable. However, few studies have examined the cognitive resources needed to support this adaptability. This study examined the relationship between multiracial identity integration (MII) and leader adaptability, exploring the cognitive mechanisms of paradox mindset and attributional complexity. Using a sample of 182 multiracial leaders in the United States, results of a path analysis revealed that MII did not significantly predict leader adaptability, paradox mindset, or attributional complexity when controlling for other factors. Unexpectedly, attributional complexity had a significant but negative relationship with leader …

What We Talk About When We Talk About Race: Racial Discourses, Nationalism And Identity In Nineteenth Century Ireland, Timothy Werlinger

CGU Theses & Dissertations

The 19th century witnessed the rise of race and racism as a dominant framework of worldwide identity politics. These politics shaped the various social hierarchies and nationalist contexts across Europe and the world. Racial constructs adopted cultural, economic, and political components and did not rely exclusively on biological determinism. This had the effect of reinforcing or hardening boundaries between groups. This dissertation examines how racial identity was negotiated within an Irish context. It does this by considering social, scientific and nationalist discourses that engaged race as a device of inclusion and exclusion. By examining how racialized language permeated the Irish …

Ever Ancient, Ever New: Holding It Together, James L. Heft S.M.

Marianist Award Lectures

James Heft (Marianist) is a priest in the Society of Mary and leader for more than 30 years in Catholic higher education. Heft spent many years at the University of Dayton, serving as chair of the Religious Studies Department for six years, Provost of the University for eight years and Chancellor for 10 years. He left UD in 2006 to found the Institute for Advanced Catholic Studies at the University of Southern California in Los Angeles, where he served as the Alton Brooks Professor of Religion and the Founder and President Emeritus of the Institute until returning to UD in …

Quantifying Multidimensional Effects Of Physicochemical Parameters On Pfas Adsorption Using A Hybrid Response Surface Methodology-Machine Learning Approach, Harsh V. Patel, Jazmin Green, John Park, Stephanie Luster-Teasley Pass, Renzun Zhao

Engineering Management & Systems Engineering Faculty Publications

Per- and polyfluoroalkyl substances (PFAS) contamination has posed a significant environmental and public health challenge due to their ubiquitous nature. Adsorption has emerged as a promising remediation technique, yet optimizing adsorption efficiency remains complex due to the diverse physicochemical properties of PFAS and the wide range of adsorbent materials. Traditional modeling approaches, such as response surface methodology (RSM), struggled to capture nonlinear interactions, while standalone machine learning (ML) models required extensive datasets. This study addressed these limitations by developing hybrid RSM-ML models to improve the prediction and optimization of PFAS adsorption. A comprehensive dataset was constructed using experimental adsorption data, …

Fixing Double Patenting, Mark A. Lemley, Lisa Ouellette

American University Law Review

The U.S. patent doctrine of "double patenting" allows an inventor to obtain many patents on obvious variants of the same invention as long as they file a "terminal disclaimer" agreeing that all of these patents will expire simultaneously. Two recent limitations on double patenting practice have led

to vigorous protest from the patent bar. First, the Federal Circuit held in In re Cellect that patents tied by double patenting must expire on the same day, even if one of the patents has received a patent term adjustment giving it a more-than-twenty-year term. Second, the USPTO proposed a rule (since withdrawn) …

Exploring Factors Associated With Adverse Childhood Experiences And The Development Of Posttraumatic Stress Symptoms Among Children And Adolescents, Ayesha Qureshi, Sarah Delahanty Phd, Sima Sharghi Phd, Lisa Shauver Ms, Ayla Mapes Phd

Williams Honors College, Honors Research Projects

Adverse Childhood Experiences (ACEs) have a significant influence on long term mental and physical health risks, including the development of Posttraumatic Stress Symptoms (PTSS). The current study examined the association between demographic and geo-coded environmental factors and ACE exposure and PTSS development among pediatric patients seen in a behavioral health department at a children’s hospital. Geo-coded factors included Child Opportunity Index (COI scores) and Rural Urban Area Commuting Codes (RUCA). ACE-related factors (type of ACE, ACE overall score) were also included when examining PTSS. Machine learning results indicated that models incorporating environmental data and ACE-related factors performed better than models …

Removal Of Fluoridation Caused 700% Increase In Serious Dental Infections

Bulletin of the Ninth District Dental Association

Yorktown Totwn Supervisor Lachterman is waiting for a decision by the EPA per court order to act concerning possibility of IQ loss at current fluoridation levels before making a final decision on town fluoridation. The court decision was based on a report by the National Toxicology Program of foreign studies of high dose exposure that the public health community deemed as having “high bias,” i.e., questionable studies and results. The EPA has decided to appeal the decision. Evidence-based studies deemed as having low bias have consistently shown no harm to IQ at fluoridation levels of 1.5mg/L, twice the amount of …

Distracted But Still Listening: How Cognitive And Perceptual Load Affect Multisensory Integration, Eddie Lee

Honors Theses

There is an ongoing debate about whether multisensory integration (MSI) occurs automatically and before attention is allocated or if multisensory integration occurs after attention is allocated and is subject to top-down attentional control. A recent study investigated this by manipulating the availability of attentional resources in a dual-task paradigm, finding that when the demands of the secondary task increased, susceptibility to the Sound-Induced-Flash-Illusion, a non-speech audiovisual illusion, also increased (Michail & Keil, 2018). This was taken as evidence for the role of post-attentive, top-down control during MSI. In the present study, we extend this logic to explore the role of …

Do Patients Who Receive Dexmedetomidine As An Adjunct To Spinal Anesthesia For Cesarean Delivery Achieve Longer Block Duration Compared To Those Who Receive Spinal Anesthesia With Local Anesthetic Alone?, Liana S. Garrison

Theses, Dissertations and Capstones

Problem Statement: Cesarean delivery is associated with significant postoperative pain, typically managed with spinal anesthesia using a local anesthetic. While opioids are often added as adjuncts, the addition of dexmedetomidine, an alpha-2 agonist, has emerged as a potential alternative that may enhance the efficacy of the spinal block in terms of pain management, potentially improving block duration and quality compared to local anesthetic alone.

Methodology: A literature review was conducted on the use of dexmedetomidine as an adjunct to spinal anesthesia for patients undergoing cesarean sections. Databases used for the search included PubMed, CINAHL Complete, and MEDLINE. The keywords used …

Why Not Both? How Social Surrogacy Can Further Women’S Rights, Anita Saliu

UIC Law Review

No abstract provided.

“Hope Is The Only Thing We Have”: Same-Sex Marriage In Hindu Traditions And The Modern Indian Legal System, Ruth Vanita

Global Humanities and Religions Faculty Publications

No abstract provided.

Chimerism Testing In Myeloid Malignancies: Practical Guidance And Clinical Correlates, Christian Puzo

Yale Medicine Thesis Digital Library

Relapse is the primary cause of mortality for patients with myeloid malignancies post-allogeneic stem cell transplant (aSCT). As early intervention for those deemed high risk for relapse may improve outcomes, identification of residual malignant cell burden is of critical importance. Chimerism testing, the use of DNA sequencing technology to determine the relative percentage of donor to recipient hematopoietic cells post-aSCT, offers a practical metric to monitor for residual leukemic cell burden. The precise value of donor chimerism is influenced by many procedural and contextual factors, and multiple strategies, including the analysis of specific hematopoietic cell subsets, termed lineage-specific chimerism (LSC), …

Common Data Set 2024-2025, Clemson University

Common Data Sets

No abstract provided.

Understanding And Assessing Conduct Disorder: A Literature Review, Garrett Holman

Williams Honors College, Honors Research Projects

In this literature review, the current understanding and assessment of conduct disorder will be examined with the intention of finding areas in need of future research. The importance of how conduct disorder develops with individuals, the comorbidities associated with the disorder, and the ways in which conduct disorder is assessed will be the focal point for this review. In particular, this review explores how the development of conduct disorder is connected with the long-term outcomes and the ways in which the interaction of co-occurring disorders can impact the course of this condition. Existing research on conduct disorder has gaps that …

Ideas For Papers Or Term Papers On John Kennedy Toole's A Confederacy Of Dunces, The Occasional Series, Final Version, H. Vernon Leighton

Library Faculty Works

This document lists thirty-three ideas that the reader might use for the basis of a literary study of the novel A Confederacy of Dunces, or its author, John Kennedy Toole. Some ideas, such as the first few, are minor and might warrant a five-page undergraduate paper. Others, such as the final one, might warrant a peer-review article or a graduate thesis. These ideas were originally posted between 2010 and 2025 on the John Kennedy Toole Research blog by H. Vernon Leighton.

Characterization Of The Slc7a5/Slc3a2 Amino Acid Transporter In Human Pleural Mesothelial Cells, Ann Francis

Biotechnology Theses

The SLC7A5/SLC3A2 amino acid transporter moves essential amino acids, such as leucine, phenylalanine, and tryptophan, across the cellular plasma membrane. SLC7A5 overexpression was identified in diverse cancers, suggesting a role in tumorigenesis and cancer cell proliferation. However, the role of SLC7A5/SLC3A2 in other aggressive cellular phenotypes, including mesothelial mesenchymal transition (MesoMT), remains unexplored. RNA sequencing analyses identified SLC7A5 as one of three highly upregulated SLCs in mesothelial cell derived myofibroblasts. This sodium independent transporter exhibits a high affinity for branched chain amino acids such as leucine; however, what role, if any, this channel plays in MesoMT is unclear. SLC7A5 knockdown …

The Use Of Therapeutic Communication To De-Escalate Aggression And Violence In Clients Living In A Homeless Shelter, Tionna S. Felder

Doctor of Nursing Practice Projects

Individuals working at homeless shelters have the daunting task of managing violent/aggressive behaviors with the population they serve. This project focused on educating homeless shelter staff on the use of therapeutic communication to decrease the escalation of aggression and violence when caring for their guests. The DNP Project Leader taught 23 homeless shelter staff members, and the project included three 2-hour educational sessions. The first class focused on understanding what regions in the brain are responsible for aggressive, violent, and emotional behaviors; the second class focused on what the literature says about aggressive behavior in homelessness; and the last class …