Digital Commons Network^™

Characterizing The Targeting Of Toc159 Receptors To The Chloroplast Outer Envelope Membrane And Their Role In The Assembly Of Distinct Toc Complexes, Michael Fish

Theses and Dissertations (Comprehensive)

Global agriculture and food security face challenges from climate change, population growth, and other human-driven pressures. Enhancing our understanding of plant biology, particularly chloroplast function, is critical for improving crop yield and stress resilience. As the sites of photosynthesis and key regulators of plant responses to environmental cues, chloroplasts depend on the precise import of thousands of nuclear-encoded proteins to maintain their biogenesis and function. While much is known about the core translocon components in the chloroplast outer envelope membrane that form the TOC complex, the mechanisms underlying their targeting, assembly, and regulation remain incompletely understood.

Plastids, including chloroplasts, evolved …

Battling Oppression And Crafting New Identities: Case Study Of The Woman, Life, Freedom Movement In Canada, Kiana Habibagahi

Theses and Dissertations (Comprehensive)

Iran’s Woman, Life, Freedom movement began in 2022, and Canada’s Iranian diaspora– the second-largest globally–continues to mobilise advocacy initiatives in its support. However, no studies have examined the movement’s implications on identity individually or collectively. These gaps fail to recognise the experiences of Iranian peoples in Canada who care deeply for the movement and have been historically marginalised. As such, using a qualitative and arts-based method, my project facilitates the retelling of experiences of young adult advocates (n = 4) in the Woman, Life, Freedom movement. Specifically, I inquired about the perceived development of their collective identities as advocates, along …

The Perceived Frequency And Effects Of Multilingual Communication In Youth And Adolescent Soccer, Simao M. Araujo

Theses and Dissertations (Comprehensive)

In professional soccer, the topic of multilingual communication has been widely researched; however, there appears to be a gap in the literature concerning how multilingual use is perceived by athletes and coaches at the youth and adolescent level of the sport. In the present study, male soccer athletes ages 10 to 18 years old and their coaches completed a questionnaire in which they rated both perceived frequency of use and perceived effects of using multilingual communication in youth and adolescent soccer. Specifically, these questionnaires elicited quantitative information regarding categories such as tactical advantages, words of encouragement, general expressions, and group …

Unveiling Trauma And Seeking Justice: Exploring Mass Atrocities Against Tamils Through The Lens Of Religion, Culture, And Global Justice, Arrabe Vigneswaran

Theses and Dissertations (Comprehensive)

This paper examines the mass atrocities committed against the Tamil population in Sri Lanka, analyzing them through the interconnected lenses of religion, culture, and global justice. It explores how Sinhalese-Buddhist nationalism, codified through legal and constitutional mechanisms such as the Sinhala Only Act and state-sponsored cultural erasure, facilitated the systemic marginalization, displacement, and dehumanization of Tamils. The study investigates the legal, political, and cultural underpinnings of these acts ranging from war crimes and ethnic cleansing to potential genocide while assessing the reluctance of both domestic and international actors to enforce meaningful accountability. Drawing on hybrid court models, transitional justice theories, …

Technology-Enhanced Professional Development For Early Literacy: A Comparative Study Of Online Teacher Learning Models In Kenya, Constanza Uribe-Banda

Theses and Dissertations (Comprehensive)

Growing recognition of early literacy as essential for lifelong learning, along with evidence that teachers’ mastery of foundational literacy instruction influences student outcomes (Darling-Hammond et al., 2017; UNESCO, 2020), has led to increased investment in teacher professional development. Despite these efforts, many educators face significant challenges in accessing high-quality training, particularly in resource-constrained settings where geographical barriers and limited institutional support persist. This is especially true in rural Kenyan communities, where teachers often work in under-resourced schools with unreliable electricity and internet connectivity yet bear responsibility for laying critical literacy foundations. The present study examines the potential to deliver effective …

Development Of A Stress Response Framework For Understanding Sogie Refugee Health, Arooran Saravanan Ananthavel Murugan

Theses and Dissertations (Comprehensive)

As an increasing number of individuals flee persecution on the basis of sexual orientation and gender identity expression (SOGIE), Canada has become a prominent destination for SOGIE refugees. The chronic stressors encountered by this marginalized population remain insufficiently studied, particularly in relation to physical health outcomes. This qualitative study investigates the cumulative health impacts of chronic stress among SOGIE refugees through the application of a cell-to-society framework, underpinned by Minority Stress Theory (MST). The study seeks to develop a SOGIE-specific stress response framework that theorizes the processes by which social and environmental stressors become biologically embedded, thereby contributing to elevated …

Negotiated Cultural Identity And Belonging Of Self-Identified Indo-Guyanese Immigrant Women, Neta (Goomatee) Deonarain-Gear

Theses and Dissertations (Comprehensive)

This dissertation examines how young, self-identified Indo-Guyanese women who immigrated to Southwestern Ontario in the 1970s negotiate cultural identity and belonging. Utilizing a bio-ethnographic bricolage narrative methodology, the study explores the impact of postcolonial diaspora and social displacement on these women’s experiences within the "third space" or borderlands. Grounded in relativist ontology and constructivist epistemology, storytelling serves as the primary data collection method through a critical theory lens. Interviews with 12 participants were analyzed thematically and reflexively, revealing how participants construct meaning and navigate cultural identities. The analysis, conducted through feminist, decolonial, and trauma-informed perspectives, offers insights into "psychological homelessness" …

Re-Imagining Care For Aging Disabled Adults, Caitlin L. Tizzard

Theses and Dissertations (Comprehensive)

In Ontario, the landscape of aging is shaped by ageist and ableist ideologies that view older disabled adults through the lens of decline and dependency. Much of the current discourse on aging focuses on reforming long-term care (LTC), reinforcing institutional and carceral responses both within policy and academic imagination. This qualitative study takes a different approach by asking participants how care for aging disabled adults can be reimagined beyond institutionalization. Grounded in intersectional feminist, disability justice and abolitionist praxis, and using a critical transformative paradigm, this research employed Appreciative Inquiry across three focus groups with four participants engaged in aging-related …

A Pilot Study Examining Children’S Evaluations And Reasoning About Concealment And Instrumental Forms Of Antisocial Lying, Noah Battaglia

Theses and Dissertations (Comprehensive)

Children as young as 4 years of age judge self-benefitting lies (i.e., antisocial lying) as wrong. Although this has traditionally been interpreted as evidence that young children view honesty as a moral obligation, contemporary moral development theory and research suggests that right/wrong judgments fail to capture important aspects of children’s social cognition. Research from a perspective known as social domain theory (Smetana et al., 2014; Turiel, 1983) has shown that children’s understanding of morality (i.e., norms concerning others’ rights and wellbeing) is distinct from their understanding of other types of socially unacceptable behaviour. While children judge many social events as …

Tackling Paradoxes And Double Binds For A Healthier Workplace: Insights From The Early Covid-19 Responses In Quebec And Ontario, Daniel Côté, Amelia León, Ai-Thuy Huynh, Jessica Dubé, Ellen Maceachen, Pamela Hopwood, Marie Laberge, Samantha Meyer, Meghan K. Crouch, Joyceline Amoako

Études primaires

The urgency of managing the COVID-19 health crisis in workplaces led to tensions, work overload, and confusion about preventive measures. This study presents a secondary analysis of qualitative data on paradoxes and double binds (PDBs) experienced by precarious essential workers in Canada who interacted with the public and their supervisors. Based on 13 interviews from a larger qualitative dataset, we examine how workers navigated public health recommendations and organisational demands during the pandemic. Findings reveal multiple organisational and managerial PDBs—both COVID-19-related and pre-existing—that contributed to psychological distress and compromised well-being. We argue that PDBs represent a significant occupational health hazard …

Indopacom Force Structure: A Trajectory Into The 2030s, Robert Burke

Graduate Theses/Dissertations

Over the past ten years Taiwan has become a major point of friction between the United States and People’s Republic of China with both militaries preparing for a potential conflict over the island. China vastly expanded its military forces and capabilities over the past thirty years and is intent on obtaining the ability to both seize Taiwan by force and prevent the United States from generating enough combat power to intervene and defend the island. The Pentagon began to restructure its conventional forces in the Western Pacific at the end of the 2010s, implementing new operational concepts designed to fight …

Alpha-Synuclein Interaction With Gedunin, Tony Matundura Nyabayo

Graduate Theses/Dissertations

Parkinson’s disease (PD) and other Proteinopathies develop when α-synuclein misfolds and aggregates into toxic amyloids. While existing treatments for PD are primarily focused on managing its symptoms, a viable solution for slowing down the progress of Parkinson’s disease involves targeting the toxic α-synuclein amyloids. Gedunin, a natural inhibitor of heat shock protein 90, has been extensively used to treat malaria. Also, recent research investigations have shed light on its potential beyond malaria therapy, indicating that Gedunin may offer a possible solution for treating a variety of neurodegenerative diseases. Using plate-based assays, we examined how Gedunin influences α-synuclein fibrillation and its …

Investigating The Presence Of Individuality And Behavioral Syndromes In Northern Cottonmouths (Agkistrodon Piscivorus), Joshua Lowy

Graduate Theses/Dissertations

Within the last 15 ̶20 years, research on behavioral syndromes has seen a surge in prominence and popularity in behavioral ecology, revealing that many animals exhibit individually consistent behavioral tendencies. Behavioral syndromes occur when behavioral traits are correlated with one another within the same context or across different contexts. Despite new appreciation for the ecological, evolutionary, and conservation implications of behavioral syndrome data, the taxonomic breadth of studies is uneven. Snakes are underrepresented within squamate reptiles and, among venomous species, only two rattlesnakes (Crotalus) have been investigated for evidence of behavioral syndromes. My study investigates individuality and the presence of …

Optical Properties Of Rare Earth Doped Molybdenum Trioxide Thin Films, Jessica Fink

Graduate Theses/Dissertations

This study aims to investigate the optical properties of Dy-doped MoO₃ thin films. MoO₃ is a transition metal oxide that is wide band gap semiconductor. As a transition-metal oxide, it has been widely studied for its tunable properties. However, there is little literature on the subject of Dysprosium doped MoO₃, and none found as of now on thin film Dy-MoO₃ . This indicates that this topic is at best under reported, and thin film Dy-MoO₃ possesses a certain novelty. Unlike most transition metal oxides, undoped MoO₃ has a negligible crystal field splitting. This is due to the electron vacancy of …

A Mystery Of Microecology: Revealing The Ecological Relationship Between Allorhizobium Vitis And Missouri Native Grape Species, Hunter White

Graduate Theses/Dissertations

Crown gall disease can be very detrimental to grape and wine producers around the world by reducing vine vigor and yield. It is caused by the bacteria Allorhizobium vitis (A. Vitis) carrying a tumor inducing (Ti) plasmid. The A. vitis bacteria have been found in soil and cane tissues in vineyards around the world, and infect all cultivated grapes. However, there have been no reports of crown gall on native wild grapevines, and very little is known about the ecology of A. vitis in native ecosystems. I have sampled cambium tissues from three native wild grape species of …

Predicting Real Estate Prices Using Deep Learning Regression Models On Socio Spatial Data, Gentle Engworo

Graduate Theses/Dissertations

ABSTRACT

Cities keep their own kind of ledger. Every block, bus stop, corner store, and year that slips by leaves a small entry about what homes are worth. That ledger is what we call socio-spatial data: simple facts about what a home is (its age), where it sits (latitude/longitude), how easy it is to get around (distance to the nearest MRT station), what’s nearby (number of convenience stores), and when it sold (transaction date). This thesis asks a practical question in that everyday language: given these common clues, can we predict home prices more accurately and explain why? Using 414 …

The Long-Term Psychological Effects Of Violent Crime On Victims: A Review Of Evidence And Supportive Interventions, Jayden E. Oleksyn-Lamb

Graduate Theses/Dissertations

This study utilizes anonymous survey data collected from 26 mental health professionals in various regions of Canada to understand which psychological disturbances are the most prevalent among victims of violent crime as well as which psychological interventions are most beneficial for treating violent crime victims. The data revealed that Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder (PTSD), Major Depressive Disorder (MDD), Generalized Anxiety Disorder (GAD), anger, guilt, self-blame, and shame are each highly prevalent. Findings also revealed that certain therapeutic methods including Eye Movement Desensitization Reprocessing (EMDR), Supportive Counselling (SC), Progressive Relaxation (PR), Cognitive Reprocessing Therapy (CPT) and Cognitive Restructuring (CR) are associated with …

Fostering Effective Practice: Using Metacognition Logs In The Private Voice Studio, Colleen C. Pingel

Graduate Theses/Dissertations

ABSTRACT

The purpose of this case study was to examine the short-term impact of metacognition instruction on the practice of a single voice student in a private studio. Across four lessons, the student received explicit instruction in metacognitive strategies and applied them through guided practice logs supporting planning, monitoring, adjusting, and reflecting. Each lesson began with a review and discussion of the practice logs. The teacher-researcher recorded these discussions to capture the student’s thinking and maintained a journal to document observations, instructional decisions, and reflections. Data analysis involved primarily qualitative methods focused on reflections, discussions, and practice logs. Quantitative measures, …

Topology-Guided Adaptive Social Navigation For A Robot In Environments With Dynamic Obstacles, S.M. Faiaz Mursalin

Graduate Theses/Dissertations

Robotic navigation in dynamic environments presents significant challenges, particularly in managing interactions with moving obstacles while ensuring efficient path planning. Incorporating social navigation principles is crucial as robots share the same workspaces with humans frequently in daily life. This becomes essential for safe, efficient, and socially acceptable movements. In this thesis, I introduce a novel integration of social navigation strategies with topological path planning that leverages Discrete Morse Theory, a homotopical framework to enhance adaptability. My method dynamically assesses path feasibility and optimizes trajectory selection through three key strategies: waiting, deflection, and diverse path selection. Based on how close the …

Constitutional Theory And The Problem Of Disagreement, J. Joel Alicea

Scholarly Articles

For decades, constitutional theory has been haunted by the problem of disagreement: the reality that we are deeply divided on fundamental questions of justice and the good society. Theorists have generally responded to the problem of disagreement in one of two ways. One approach minimizes the extent to which constitutional theories rely on controversial moral premises and instead grounds constitutional theories in widely endorsed social practices. The other generally discards any social practices that reflect disagreement with the controversial moral views that the theorist holds.

Neither approach is sound. Constitutional theory requires both controversial moral claims and attention to social …

The Great Writ Of Popular Sovereignty, William M.M. Kamin

Scholarly Articles

American habeas corpus, long conventionally known as the Great Writ of Liberty, is more properly understood as the Great Writ of Popular Sovereignty—a tool for We the People to insist that when our agents in government exercise our delegated penal powers, they remain faithful to our sovereign will. Once we grasp this conceptual shift, the implications for the law of habeas are profound.

In the past fifteen years, novel archival research has shown the Great Writ of Liberty’s founding myth to be ahistorical—that ideas about sovereignty, rather than individual liberty, drove the common-law writ’s development in the centuries of English …

Originalism And Truth-Telling: A Reply To Stephen Sachs, J. Joel Alicea

Scholarly Articles

Sachs focuses on my claim that a theory of constitutional adjudication needs to make a moral argument that justifies telling judges why they ought to decide constitutional disputes in a particular way rather than in some other way. Why be an originalist, for example, rather than a common-law constitutionalist? In answering that question, a theory of constitutional adjudication cannot depend exclusively on a positivist, descriptive account of what the law is—even if Sachs correctly identifies originalism as the law— because knowing that originalism is the “law” (in a positivist sense of “law”) does not tell us why anyone ought to …

“Declaring Law”: A Pragmatic Analysis Of Law As Communication And Implications For The Hart-Fuller Debate, A.G. Harmon

Scholarly Articles

The year 2024 is the sixtieth anniversary of a seminal work in American jurisprudence, itself the consequence of the one of the most important debates in legal philosophy, the Hart-Fuller Debate conducted in 1958’s Harvard Law Review.

Legal philosopher Lon Fuller famously and controversially posited eight “legal principles” as constitutive of a “morality of law” (The Morality of Law, Yale University Press). Legal positivists stridently objected to Fuller’s theory, notably philosopher H.L.A. Hart. They rejected the idea that such things indicated a “moral” dimension to the law. The debate continued for many years, lately with many legal scholars reclaiming the …

Culpable Kids, Cara H. Drinan

Scholarly Articles

When a child commits a crime, how do states determine if that child is culpable? There are procedural rules that determine the forum for a minor’s trial and doctrines that limit children’s exposure to the most severe sentencing. But when it comes to culpability, states employ the same substantive law whether the defendant is 50 or 15. As this Article explains, that approach is profoundly flawed. In the early 21st century, in a series of cases known as the Miller trilogy, the United States Supreme Court established that youth are fundamentally different from adults and state sentencing practices must recognize …

The President’S Authority To Impose Tariffs, Chad Squitieri

Scholarly Articles

The International Emergency Economic Powers Act (“IEEPA”) empowers the President to “regulate . . . importation.” In Learning Resources v. Trump, the United States District Court for the District of Columbia ruled that such language did not empower the President to impose tariffs. The District Court reasoned that there was a distinction between the power to “regulate” and the power to “tax,” and that tariffs required a power to tax. This Essay explains why the District Court was wrong.

The Constitution’s original meaning and Supreme Court precedent indicate that tariffs can be an exercise of Congress’s power to regulate …

Associational Rights Versus Nonprofit Transparency: Information Reporting In The Internet Age, Roger Colinvaux

Scholarly Articles

For decades, the nation’s charitable and nonprofit organizations have been required to file an information return, known as the Form 990, with the Internal Revenue Service. Congress mandates that the return be made publicly available. Such information reporting, both to the IRS and to the public, is the cornerstone of the federal government’s approach to assuring that nonprofit organizations are legally compliant. The Supreme Court’s decision in Americans for Prosperity Foundation v. Bonta (APF), however, casts a shadow on the constitutionality of nonprofit reporting requirements. In APF, the Court held unconstitutional California’s effort to require charities to …

Beyond Judicial Dialogue: Reference To Domestic Law By The Inter–American Court Of Human Rights, Soledad Bertelsen

Scholarly Articles

The recent freeze of U.S. funding to the Inter–American Commission on Human Rights serves as a reminder of how fragile the Inter–American System of Human Rights truly is. The effectiveness of the Inter–American institutions largely depends on their legitimacy in the eyes of the member states. This article argues how the legitimacy of the Inter–American Court can be enhanced by the language used in its judgments. The paper focuses on how references to domestic law in the case–law of the Inter–American Court can persuade states to comply with its decisions. Citations transcend the much–discussed judicial dialogue since they also reference …

Bruen Was Right, J. Joel Alicea

Scholarly Articles

New York State Rifle & Pistol Association v. Bruen is one of the most methodologically significant—and widely maligned—constitutional law decisions of the last several decades. By rejecting the tiers of scrutiny that have loomed large in rights jurisprudence since the 1960s and substituting a text-and-history test for Second Amendment cases, Bruen signals a potential transformation of American constitutional law far beyond the Second Amendment context. Given Bruen’s methodological significance and the text-and-history approach it represents, one might have expected that the debate over Bruen would break down along familiar lines, with originalists defending Bruen and non-originalists critiquing it. Yet, the …

Foundations Of The Right Of Charitable Uses, Adam J. Macleod, Mark David Hall

Scholarly Articles

In recent years, municipalities around the United States have enacted ordinances that prohibit or restrict food-sharing in public places. These ordinances make it difficult for charitable souls to share food with those most in need. In one case, a town in Arizona arrested a woman under an ordinance that prohibits sharing food in public for charitable purposes.
The closest analogs to these laws are the English anti-almsgiving acts of the fourteenth and sixteenth centuries. One must look that far back in history because infringements of the right of charitable uses of property are exceedingly rare. Indeed, throughout the history of …

Public Right And Humane Punishment, Adam J. Macleod

Scholarly Articles

Retribution is the strategic lynchpin for securing justice and the presumption of innocence. It is the justification that takes the criminal defendant to be a human being rather than a mere instrument of social engineering and political control. By contrast, modern, results-oriented theories of punishment—deterrence, incapacitation, and rehabilitation—have made our institutions of criminal justice less humane in important ways. Gerard Bradley’s contemporary, detailed account of the old idea of retribution can be cashed out in legal doctrines that secure the presumption of innocence and limit the corrosive effects of strict-liability offenses. This new articulation of an old juristic concept provides …