Digital Commons Network^™

Can Statins Mitigate Adverse Effects Of Hormone Replacement Therapy In Women?, Adhm Farid

Undergraduate Student Symposium

Heart disease is the leading cause of death for women in the United States. One possible overlooked risk factor for heart disease in women is hormone replacement therapy(HRT). HRT is most often used to treat certain kinds of breast cancer that depend on sex hormones to grow or to supplement estrogen to women over 60 or who have had a hysterectomy. HRT has been found to increase levels of C-reactive protein(CRP), which is the bio-inflammatory marker that best predicts cardiovascular risk. Statin therapy has been found to decrease levels of C-reactive protein. Currently, CRP is not taken into consideration when …

Comparative Study Of Homocoupling Reactions To Create 2,2'-Bipyridine Adducts, Ethan Depry, Hoa Le

Undergraduate Student Symposium

The project focuses on investigating the synthesis of 2,2’-bipyridine adducts for potential use as ligands in novel organometallic ruthenium complexes. The bipyridine building blocks, based on their excellent bidentate ligands with complexing abilities, will be incorporated into ruthenium complexes in a collaborative project, increasing the photosensitivity of these complexes, and opening the doors for many applications, ranging from synthetic photovoltaics to anti-cancer activity.

The aim of this study was to optimize the preparation of the 2,2’-bipyridine adducts. Prior studies conducted in our lab have compared several homo and cross coupling reactions. It was determined that homocoupling offers a more efficient …

Effect Of Gamma Irradiation On Vitamin D Stability In Salmon, Varun Natarajan

Undergraduate Student Symposium

Salmon and other finfish are one of the major dietary sources of vitamin D. However, the presence of pathogenic bacteria, such as vibrio sp and listeria sp, can lead to foodborne illnesses. In 2015, 18% of foodborne illnesses were attributed to finfish. Gamma irradiation can serve as an effective tool to minimize bioburden and thereby decrease the risk of foodborne illnesses. While gamma irradiation has been used on other types of food, including chicken and crustaceans, its effects on fresh finfish has not been studied. This project examines the effect of low dose gamma irradiation on the stability of vitamin …

Emotional Resilience Of The Covid-19 Pandemic On A College Campus, Jenna Binaco

Undergraduate Student Symposium

The perceptions of people during the Covid-19 pandemic cannot always be true. This is due to a life of uncertainty and for many people, fear. Since the pandemic has been around for about two years, this is an excellent opportunity to see how this pandemic has impacted people’s mental health. A way that this information can be recorded is with The Emotional Resilience scale of the Covid-19 Pandemic on a College Campus. Emotional resilience was measured in 1704 American university students, staff, and faculty in October to November 2021 of the Covid-19 pandemic. This was a transitional period for people …

Evaluation Of Mdm2 Regulation On Aurkb Expression In Lung Cancer, Karen Kameo, Alexandra Carbone

Undergraduate Student Symposium

Objective. This study was conducted to analyze the molecular mechanism of the MDM2 regulation on AURKB in lung cancer cells. Background. Lung cancer is the leading cause of cancer death within the United States, with the 5-year survival rate at about 22%, indicating the need to develop different drugs and treatment strategies. This study focuses on understanding the mechanisms linking MDM2 and AURKB to develop new treatment strategies against lung cancer. Methods. The H446 cells were treated with RG7388 (2 μM), an MDM2 inhibitor, and Barasertib (50 nM), an AURKB inhibitor, including a combination of the two drugs for 24 …

Gadra's Allegory, Bianca Vucetich

Undergraduate Student Symposium

“Gadra’s Allegory” is a silent (with no dialogue, but music is utilized) short film that follows a modern day ‘prisoner’ who exemplifies how their society is chained to the screens that surrounds them. The film shows their journey from a repetitive, thoughtless, and disillusioned way of life, to a majestic awakening to the nature of reality. This film is based on and inspired by Plato’s “Allegory of the Cave,”; though the main character of the film is based off the chained prisoner of the allegory, this alternate version shows another path to their own enlightenment and expresses their own internal …

Heavy Metal Contaminants In The Sciaenids From Lake Sabine, Katerina Sawickij

Undergraduate Student Symposium

Lake Sabine is a shallow, estuarine lake situated on the border between Texas and Louisiana with outflow to the Gulf of Mexico. The Louisiana side is a protected natural area while the Texas side is susceptible to pollution from several commercial industries as well as maintenance dredging. This study determined the concentrations of metal(loids) within commercially and economically important fish tissues and compared them intra- and inter-specifically using known diets and a range of sizes. Specimens were collected from Lake Sabine from April through October 2018 from four sciaenid fishes: Atlantic Croaker Micropogonias undulatus, Red Drum Sciaenops ocellatus, …

How The Molecular Vibrations Of Water May Prevent Skin Cancer, Ramson Munoz Morales, Jenna Handal

Undergraduate Student Symposium

Studies have shown that when DNA absorbs ultraviolet light it can become structurally damaged leading to a mutation and possibly skin cancer. However, exposing skin to sunlight rarely leads to a mutation. This indicates that after the ultraviolet light is absorbed by the DNA the energy from the light can either cause a structural change to the DNA (a mutation) or be dissipated in a way that does not damage the DNA. Absorption of ultraviolet light causes molecular vibrations in DNA and these vibrations are what likely leads to structural changes in the DNA. One way the structural changes could …

Induction Of Necroptosis In Mcf-7 Breast Cancer Cells Through Caspase-Independent Mechanisms Following Saha Treatment, Grace Waldron

Undergraduate Student Symposium

Currently, many anti-cancer drugs are known to induce programmed cell death (apoptosis) through activation of intrinsic or extrinsic pathways. However, many types of cancer cells have acquired resistance to apoptosis-mediated cell death. Therefore, simultaneous induction of other forms of cell death in addition to apoptosis of cancer cells is becoming an attractive strategy. For this purpose, we initially explored the role of XIAP in caspase-dependent and caspase-independent mechanisms of cell death. Our western blot data revealed that RIPK3 and MLKL levels were significantly elevated in MCF-7 cells following SAHA treatment. During induction of SAHA-induced cell death, the XIAP levels were …

Inter-Limb Kinetic Asymmetries Differ Between Concentric And Eccentric Phases Of The Vertical Jump, Vanessa Alexandre

Undergraduate Student Symposium

Inter-limb asymmetries during the vertical jump (VJ) have been used to identify injury risk and performance deficits with >10% being a threshold. Force, or kinetic asymmetries have typically been studied for the concentric (propulsive) phase of the VJ while eccentric (loading) phase analyses are limited. The purpose of this study was to determine if there were differences in inter-limb asymmetry (%) in impulse (force * time) and peak force between VJ eccentric and concentric phases. Results may inform coaches and sport healthcare providers. Participants were 60 highly skilled males (age, 22.7±1.1yrs.; height, 186.4±6.8cm; mass, 103±21.2kg) undergoing training for the National …

Investigating The Bouba-Kiki Phenomenon In Impression Formation, Pritika Shah

Undergraduate Student Symposium

Humans associate sounds and symbols in non-arbitrary ways. One example of this phenomenon is the Bouba/Kiki effect: the nonword “Bouba” is associated with rounder shapes, whereas “Kiki” is associated with sharper shapes. Although many studies have been done on the Bouba-Kiki effect, it has not been studied in the context of personality judgments and impression formation. Study 1 used a between-subjects design to test the Bouba/Kiki effect in this domain. A person named “Bouba” was rated as more moral than a person named “Kiki”, whereas “Kiki” was rated as more sociable, however no significant difference was found for competence ratings. …

Minimal K-Blockers Of 123-Avoiding Permutation Matrices, Megan Bennett

Undergraduate Student Symposium

We investigate n × n (0, 1)-matrices A that avoid σk, where σk is the permutation {1, 2,…, k}, and we focus on 123-avoiding permutations. A k-blocker of 123-avoiding permutation matrices is a set of positions in an n × n matrix that intersect each 123-avoiding permutation matrix at least k times. The Hankel cyclic decomposition implies that each k-blockers must have cardinality at least kn. The dimensions of the k-blockers of all permutation matrices are determined by Fulkerson’s generalization of the Frobenius-König theorem: any r × s submatrix is a k-blocker of all permutation matrices if r …

Phage Hunters: The Discovery Of Two Novel Bacteriophages That Infect Gordonia Rubripertincta, Sarah Ballarin, Neel G. Balusa, Melissa Bell, Samia Caballero, Joshua Chan, Maria P. Farez, Ashley Guillen-Tapia, Nashrah Pierre-Louis, Victoria Polishuk, Bhavya Soni

Undergraduate Student Symposium

Antibiotic resistance is a global healthcare concern because it poses a threat to effectively treating bacterial infections and the need for alternative therapeutics are urgently required. Phage therapy, which uses viruses to treat bacterial infections, is a promising alternative to conventional antibiotics. Phages have also been widely used in the food industry to prevent microbial growth on certain foods and are currently being explored as a method for bioremediation of oil spills and wastewater treatment. Although phages are ubiquitous in nature, many have yet to be discovered. Through the SEA-PHAGES (Science Education Alliance-Phage Hunters Advancing Genomics and Evolutionary Science) program …

Synthesis Of Chelating Polymers Via Raft For Metal Extraction, Agustin Olivares, Blake Naar

Undergraduate Student Symposium

Heavy metal contamination in drinking water is known to cause damage to multiple organs and is one of the major causes of cancer. The presence of heavy metals in water has the ability to cause lifethreatening conditions. The purpose of our study is to synthesize metal binding polymers and to determine their efficiency at extracting heavy metals from contaminated water. Poly pentafluorophenyl acrylate (PPFPA) was synthesized via the employment of reversible addition-fragmentation chain transfer (RAFT) polymerization using pentafluorophenyl acrylate (PFPA) as the monomer to create linear and hyperbranched polymers. RAFT polymerization allows control over molecular weight and the molecular architecture …

The Effect Of Fluorinated Substitution Of Meso Phenyl Porphyrins On Porphyrin Basicity, Harsh Chheda, Rushi Patel

Undergraduate Student Symposium

The purpose of this study was to determine the effects of fluorinated substitution of meso phenyl porphyrins on porphyrin basicity. The protonation of meso-Tetra(2,3,4-trifluoromethylphenyl) porphyrin (TF) and meso-Tetra(pentafluorophenyl) porphyrin (PF) will be studied through UV vis spectroscopy. Protonation is achieved by titration of each porphyrin in toluene with trifluoroacetic acid (TFA). The presence of a wavelength shift from the free base Soret to the protonated Soret will indicate the formation of a dication. The data from the UV spectra will be used to calculate the pK_a values associated with each porphyrin. Based on the results, the average pK_{a …}

The Teacher, Amari Russell

Undergraduate Student Symposium

“The Teacher” is a short film about a professor who gets harassed by one of his former students. The film is directed by Amari Russell. Another crew member/actor includes Adam Deross.

Using Social Media To Educate And Increase Awareness About The Harmful Effects Of Tobacco And Its Relationship With Covid-19, Rylee Azia Gardner, Tina Takla

Undergraduate Student Symposium

Tobacco use is the leading cause of deaths, diseases, and health care costs in our society. The Area Health Education Center (AHEC) Program at Nova Southeastern University launched a pilot social media campaign in June 2021 to encourage widespread distribution of information on the harmful effects of tobacco use across multiple social media platforms (Facebook, Instagram, Twitter, and LinkedIn). This initiative is student driven and faculty supported. Its goals are to increase social consciousness about the harmful effects of tobacco use through the widespread sharing of messaging and to motivate tobacco users to seek readily available cessation services provided through …

A Preliminary Survey Of Dog-In-Prison Programs Across The Us, Isabella Defilippis, Janan Abushaban, Mariya Baig, Ariel Cherry, Naziha Mustafa, Trini Somasundaram, Ashesh Soni

Undergraduate Student Symposium

The molecular effects of canine-human bonding have not been well-studied, but both species are deeply driven to seek out prosocial interactions. We therefore expect to see quantitative changes in both physiological biomarkers (e.g. cell-level phenotypes linked to psychiatric disease) and animal behavior on both sides of the ancient (>15,000 year old) symbiosis between dogs and humans when dogs and people form interspecies dyads. A compelling context for studying this involves "dog-in-prison" programs, in which incarcerated humans help to train canines for future lives as companionship or service animals. Notably, both the incarcerated humans and orphaned/stray dogs within such programs …

Deficits In Gait Biomechanics In Runners On A University Team: Implications For Preventative Sport Healthcare, W. Zachary Dean

Undergraduate Student Symposium

Sport healthcare providers in team-based settings conduct functional testing to identify injury risk. Results are used in team-based injury prevention programs. This process is different than care for a patient once they become injured. Gait analyses are a functional test for runners. Therefore, we aimed to describe the bilateral running biomechanics in a university cross country team with emphasis on variables linked to running-related injury (RRI). Twenty-seven male (n=10) and female (n=17) distance runners (age, 18-23yrs; height, 1.82±0.57m; mass, 58.4±6.8 kg) from a single university team participated in this descriptive study. Gait was assessed during a treadmill run at a …

Determinants Of Hospital Charges For Hospital Admissions And Readmissions In 2017 In The United States For Bronchitis And Asthma With Complications And Comorbidities (Drg = 202), Japjot Singh

Undergraduate Student Symposium

Understanding hospital charges in the U.S. healthcare system is vital for value-based care, recovery, and socio-economic wellbeing of the public. Hospital charges vary across hospitals regionally as well as nationally. As per the clinical history of hospital in-patient care, there are several determinants of hospital charges that are specific to the patient, disease, hospital, or the chargemaster. Empirical research on hospital in-patient care has bolstered the extant knowledge on the factors that determine the healthcare cost and utilization, but research is limited on how hospital readmissions impact hospital charges. The Agency for Healthcare Research and Quality (AHRQ) has developed a …

Effect Of Periodontitis On Inducing Late Onset Alzheimer's Disease (Load) Pathology In Mice, Neha Gupta, Courtney Mai, Miguel Cuello

Undergraduate Student Symposium

Alzheimer’s disease is the most common form of dementia; affecting approximately 50 million people worldwide. Recent evidence indicates poor dental hygiene may accelerate Alzheimer’s degeneration. Experimenters used a mouse model of periodontitis induced by P. gingivalis and investigated the implications of poor dental health on Alzheimer’s Disease and neuroinflammation, as well as memory skills, in relation to aging, gender, and condition. All the mice in the model were the same age, and a total of 8 mice with Alzheimer’s Disease and 8 mice who had Alzheimer’s Disease with inflammation with an equivalent number of males and females were utilized. Experimenters …

Elucidating The Function Of 3l1w, A Functionally Unknown Enzyme From Enterococcus Faecalis V583, Michael Egozi, Ethan Depry

Undergraduate Student Symposium

As of February 2022, there were 4057 protein structures with unknown functions in the Protein Data Bank. In all biological organisms there are a variety of enzymes that speed up key biochemical pathways. Despite having a known sequence and structure, many enzymes remain uncharacterized. One relevant enzyme identified is 3L1W, whose function has yet to be elucidated. The P.O.I. was isolated and imaged via Xray crystallography from the vancomycin resistant strain E. faecalis V583.

The purpose of this research was to provide an accurate characterization of 3L1W and its substrates, thus directing our approach of combining in silico and …

Firearm-Related Injuries Rates From 2014 To 2017 Among Floridian Children, Joel Marlapudi

Undergraduate Student Symposium

Purpose: To assess the prevalence of firearm-related injuries among pediatric patients in Florida by age, race, and ethnicity.

Method: The dataset from the Florida’s Agency for Health Care Administration from 2014-2017 was utilized for this analysis as well as the Florida Community Health Assessment and Resource Tool Set. The study included ambulatory ED-visits of Floridian patients (aged ≤ 19 years) who had firearm-related Principal Diagnosis coded using the International Classification of Diseases. Patients who reported race as White or Black and Ethnicity as Hispanic or non-Hispanics were included. Patients’ county was categorized into 11 regions defined by Florida Local Health …

Great Plains Midcontinental Loess Deposits Following Prehistoric Megadroughts And Climate-Change Related Ecosystem Collapse In The Badlands, Melanie Vasquez, Drew Tozer, Catherine Acosta

Undergraduate Student Symposium

Understanding effects of prehistoric extreme climate events on the environment is necessary to help predict effects of modern global climate change. Research shows prehistoric megadroughts caused the collapse of North American grassland ecosystems, allowing wind to erode soils and fined-grained sediment. Timing, severity, and regional extent of these megadroughts remain controversial, but research indicates at least three megadrought periods on the North American midcontinent over the last 20,000 years. Evidence for prehistoric megadroughts is preserved in dune fields and loess deposits throughout the North American Great Plains, including our field area in the Badlands of South Dakota. Loess, composed of …

Ha Ha Ha... Good One!... Not You Hmongs. Laughter, White Privilege, And "Othering" In Medical Cultures, Sarah Soliman

Undergraduate Student Symposium

The response to alternative medical approaches of underprivileged and underrepresented groups detailed by Anne Fadiman differ from the hegemonic alternative approaches exemplified by Norman Cousins. In The Spirit Catches You and You Fall Down, Fadiman describes the inadequate efforts made by healthcare professionals to communicate with the Lee family who did not understand English and had significantly different medicinal practices from Western biomedical practices. Rather than being met with respect and attentiveness, these medical professionals viewed this family as “difficult” and “stupid.” In comparison to the various mistreated groups of minorities, the Hmong are a minority within the minority …

How Non-Profit Organizations Can Create A Hybrid Social Media Strategy Using Paid And Organic Posts, Samantha Carl Selorio

Undergraduate Student Symposium

The emergence of social media has changed the methods and approaches for communication between health agencies and their community. As such, non-profit organizations must learn to use social media to better promote their mission. Organizations can engage and capture the attention of their online target audience via paid posts. Broward Regional Health Planning Council (BRHPC), a non-profit organization, provides an analysis of how integrating social media tools has increased its social media presence. BRHPC already had an online presence on the social media sites Facebook, Twitter, Instagram, and LinkedIn. To increase the number of people in BRHPC’s intended audience who …

Human Mtdna Copy Number Quantification, Leonardo Lacayo, Luzcarime Saco-Vertiz

Undergraduate Student Symposium

Our social worlds and physical health are profoundly intertwined, but we have limited tools for studying these important connections. Within the recent psychiatric literature, changes in mitochondrial DNA copy number (mtDNAcn) have been linked to a variety of socially influenced mental illnesses such as major depression. In principle, this biomarker may therefore also be responsive to more subtle changes in our social environments, including life events that attenuate stress.

This poster outlines plans for a novel molecular study of how interspecies social bonding impacts human cells. Specifically, we propose to use quantitative PCR to measure the abundances of (single copy) …

I Can Hear You, I Just Can't Remember You: Deconstructing The Sensory And Cognitive Components Of Hearing Loss, Pranay Narang, Hana Amireh

Undergraduate Student Symposium

Hearing loss is commonly thought of as solely a sensory, not cognitive, problem. According to the effortfulness effect, however, those with presbycusis are burdened with an increased attentional cost for auditory processing, taxing the central executive such that working memory is impaired. The excess strain placed on the central executive to decode sensory noise ultimately impairs one’s capacity to attend to and consolidate memories, compromising retention. We hypothesize that the presence of white noise during encoding will mimic the effect of hearing loss sustained in older adults and will impair the retrieval of auditory information in those with normal hearing. …

Implications Of Covid-19 For Education And Research In Healthcare And Stem: Analysis Of Global Case Studies, Yumna Indorewala

Undergraduate Student Symposium

The novel coronavirus, SARS-CoV-2 has posed a major threat to global education and research in STEM and healthcare. Social distancing guidelines were initially recommended to refrain from face-to-face operations for preventing the transmission of the virus. As schools and higher academic institutions implemented multifarious methods to effectively transition to remote/online or hybrid educational formats, the Coronavirus Infectious Disease 2019 (COVID-19) pandemic introduced further hurdles and necessitated designing, adopting, as well as evaluating the efficacy of new instructional approaches, especially for disciplines that require active, experiential learning such as healthcare and STEM. These effects are accentuated in less developed/developing nations or …

Investigating Polymer Metal Chelation Via Atomic Absorption Spectroscopy, Meha Pandya, Agustin Olivares

Undergraduate Student Symposium

Heavy metal contaminants in water are known to disrupt ecological systems and cause detrimental biophysical and physiological effects in living systems. Prominent metallic environmental contaminants include lead, cadmium, and zinc. Removing heavy metal contaminants is essential to enhance water quality and reduce heavy metal toxicity. Chelating polymers that contain functional groups such as carboxyls and amines, offer an inexpensive and efficient way to remove metals from solution. The purpose of our study is to develop a protocol to quantify metal binding efficiency of various polymers via Atomic Absorption Spectroscopy (AAS). Alginate and Chitosan, two bio derived polymers with known chelating …