Digital Commons Network^™

Site-Specific Incidence Rate Of Blastocystis Hominis And Its Association With Childhood Malnutrition: Findings From A Multi-Country Birth Cohort Study, Barbie Zaman Wahid, Ahshanul Haque, Amran Gazi, Shah Mohammad Fahim, Abu Syed Golam Faruque, Mustafa Mahfuz, Tahmeed Ahmed

Department of Nutrition and Health Sciences: Faculty Publications

In this study, we investigated the potential association between the burden of asymptomatic Blastocystis spp. (Blastocystis hominis) infection and nutritional status among children under 2 years of age using the data collected from 1,715 children from eight distinct geographic locations, including Bangladesh, Brazil, India, Peru, Tanzania, Pakistan, Nepal, and South Africa. Childhood stunting, wasting, and underweight were the outcome variables, and B. hominis infection was the exposure variable of this present study. The presence of B. hominis in nondiarrheal stools was evaluated by TaqMan Array Cards. Site-specific incidence rates were estimated using Poisson regression, and multiple generalized estimating …

Acces To Justice Laboratories: Reregulating Legal Services With A Sandbox, Mckay Mitchell

Chicago-Kent Law Review

No abstract provided.

Impact Of Pistachio Shell Biochar In Finishing Beef Cattle Diets, Levi J. Mcphillips, Mitchell M. Norman, J. L. Sperber, Andrea K. Watson, Galen E. Erickson

Nebraska Beef Cattle Reports

A 190-day finishing experiment was conducted to evaluate effects of feeding biochar on methane and carbon dioxide production, animal performance and carcass traits in beef steers. A high concentrate feedlot diet was used, and two dietary treatments were compared, 0 or 1% biochar as % of diet dry matter. Cattle were monitored using a calorimetry emissions barn to quantify production of methane and carbon dioxide. There were no differences in emissions, performance, or carcass characteristics for cattle fed the control diet or with biochar supplemented into the diet.

Anteromedial Thalamus Gates The Selection & Stabilization Of Long-Term Memories, Andrew Toader

Student Theses and Dissertations

The hippocampus is necessary for the initial encoding and recent storage of memories. Under the standard model of systems consolidation, it is thought that the memory trace eventually reorganizes from the hippocampus to a distributed cortical network, with the anterior cingulate cortex playing a central role in remote memory retrieval. However, little is known about the mechanisms responsible for coordinating this process. Additionally, the intermediate memory representations in the brain and the circuits that might gate and select memories for permanent storage remain unknown. To facilitate the longitudinal tracking of memory circuits in the brain, we first developed a novel …

Interrogation And Manipulation Of The Igg Fc Glycan, Aaron Keshav Gupta

Student Theses and Dissertations

Antibody signaling is a cardinal feature of successful adaptive immune responses. The magnitude and direction of this signaling is determined by the structure of a given antibody's fragment crystallizable (Fc) domain, which interfaces with cells of the immune system. Often considered a constant region, the immunoglobulin G (IgG) Fc protein backbone and conserved N-linked glycan combine to introduce structural diversity in IgG molecules that in turn, triggers divergent humoral responses. These N-glycans are variably constructed, ultimately leading to families of highly related, but non-equivalent glycoproteins known as glycoforms. Despite burgeoning interest in understanding the complexities of IgG Fc glycoforms and …

On The Origins Of Genetic Novelty In Drosophila, Eric Bo Zheng

Student Theses and Dissertations

Evolution is at its heart the study of variation: which variants survive and even thrive across generations, and why? Behind this lies the fundamental question of the origins of novelty, for there cannot be variation without a source of new variants. Understanding how novelty emerges, then, is a crucial problem of basic relevance in evolutionary biology. In this thesis, I examine two aspects regarding the origins of novelty: first, how new proteins originate and subsequently evolve; second, how chromatin accessibility maintains evolutionary lability while remaining conserved across broad sequence divergence. The study of the origins of new genes has flourished …

Neural Control Of Sickness Behavior, Anoj Ilanges

Student Theses and Dissertations

Infections are an omnipresent threat to all species. Thus, effective adaptive responses to resist and tolerate infections are essential for survival. Beyond the immune response, animals also induce a set of pleiotropic responses including anorexia, adipsia, lethargy, and changes in temperature, collectively termed sickness, during infections. While these responses have been shown to be adaptive for animal survival during infection and have been attributed to the central nervous system, the underlying control mechanisms for this response have not been elucidated. The goal of this work was to quantitatively characterize the many phenotypes associated with infection-induced sickness and to identify neural …

Inter-Organellar Nucleic Acid Communication By A Mitochondrial Trna Regulates Nuclear Transcription, Christopher Rouya

Student Theses and Dissertations

Balancing metabolic demands with transcriptional output requires efficient communication between mitochondria and the nucleus. However, the mitochondrial factors that mediate signals to the nucleus remain poorly defined. In eukaryotes, the mitochondrial genome encodes transfer RNAs (mito-tRNAs) that function in mitochondrial-specific translation. Here, we report the detection of multiple mito-tRNAs within the nucleus of human cells. Focused studies of one such nuclear-transported mito-tRNA-asparagine (mito-tRNA-Asn) revealed that its cognate charging enzyme (NARS2) is also present in the nucleus. Nuclear localization of mito-tRNA-Asn and NARS2 was dependent on the VDAC1 mitochondrial channel and importin-α nuclear transport factor, respectively. Mito-tRNA-Asn promoted the interaction of …

Transgenic Tools In Ants And The Representation Of Alarm Pheromones In The Ant Antennial Lobe, Taylor Eco Hart

Student Theses and Dissertations

For decades, ants have served as major study species for ethologists, theorists, geneticists, and chemical ecologists, who have been drawn to understand how their unique features contribute to the evolution and maintenance of insect societies. These features, especially their extreme morphological plasticity, collective behavior, and complex chemical communication, together with their small sizes and relatively simple brains, make ants intriguing model systems for many topics in neurobiology. While many ant species possess brains no larger than the wellcharacterized vinegar fly, the primary olfactory processing centers (antennal lobes) contain an order of magnitude more functional units compared to the vinegar fly, …

Enrichment And Transcriptome Analysis Of Cd4+ T Cell Clones Harboring Intact Hiv-1 Proviruses, Georg Hartmut Johannes Weymar

Student Theses and Dissertations

More than 40 years after its onset, the Human Immunodeficiency Virus Type 1 (HIV-1) epidemic remains a major global health burden. HIV-1 is a retrovirus that infects and destroys predominantly CD4+ T cells. Since CD4+ T cells are crucial for the innate and adaptive immune system, their progressive loss in the course of HIV-1 infection leads to the Acquired Immune Deficiency Syndrome (AIDS). Antiretroviral therapy can suppress the virus in people living with HIV and prevent progression to AIDS, but does not provide a cure. Therefore, lifelong antiretroviral therapy is necessary. The barrier to HIV-1 cure is the HIV-1 reservoir, …

Using Chemical Probes To Examine Cellular Activities, Megan Elizabeth Kelley

Student Theses and Dissertations

Chemical probes are valuable tools for investigating rapid cellular processes, such as anaphase in cell division, by allowing for the modulation of protein activity over the course of minutes. In addition, resistance to chemical probes by mutation can provide insight into inhibitor binding interactions and may provide morphological pharmacodynamic markers that allow for the identification of drug resistance or sensitivity. Here, I present a two-part thesis in which I (i) explore the role of spastin during late anaphase and nuclear envelope reformation using our recently developed spastin inhibitor and (ii) use inhibitor resistance to identify morphological markers of drug resistance …

Life On The Edge: Insights Into The Neural And Behavioral Algorithms Of Plume Tracking, Andrew Siliciano

Student Theses and Dissertations

Animals use turbulent odor plumes as chemical beacons to navigate long distances. What are the neural and behavioral algorithms that underlie such a navigational feat? While plume navigation has been conventionally described as a simple sensory reflex, animals may instead rely on their memories of past plume encounters and current assessment of the wind direction to pursue a dynamic odor source. Differentiating between these strategies has been challenging due to the fact that plumes are invisible and spatially complex, precluding an understanding of the exact sensory experience of an animal. We have been leveraging the concise architecture of the Drosophila …

Dissecting Host-Viral Interactons Through Focused Or Unbiased High-Throughput Genetic Approaches, Daniel Poston

Student Theses and Dissertations

In the world around us, viruses surround and vastly outnumber us. Indeed, there are roughly 1 sextillion—or one thousand million million million—times as many viral particles as humans on earth (1). While most of these viruses do not cause disease in humans, those that do present a grave and increasing threat to human health. Fundamental studies in host-viral interactions are thus critical to further our understanding of the parameters of viral infection and elucidate potential new treatments. Since, as obligate intracellular parasites, viruses rely on host resources at every step of the viral lifecycle, in-depth knowledge of how viruses hijack …

Cortical Control Of Naturalistic Facial Expression Production In Primates, Geena Rose Ianni

Student Theses and Dissertations

Facial expressions constitute a fundamental class of social communication signals in primates. Nonverbal expressions shared between individuals can instantly and effortlessly communicate endogenous affective state, the valence of external stimuli, as well as more complex concepts such as intentions, social rank, and receptivity to future social interactions. All of this information is transmitted through the fine, dynamic arrangement of dozens of small facial expression muscles. Commiserate with their importance, the muscles of facial expression are under direct cortical control from descending projections to the facial nucleus. These direct corticomotoneuron projections are unique to primates and originate in multiple distinct cortical …

Deep Molecular Characterization Of Human Cortical Cell-Types, Christina Pressl

Student Theses and Dissertations

Human cortical cytoarchitecture is as beautiful as it is complex. Harboring dozens of morphologically, functionally, and molecularly distinct cell-types, the neocortex is organized into cytoarchitectonically and functionally diverse regions. In concert, the diverse cell-types that are found within the diverse cortical regions build the center of all higher cognitive functions, including but not limited to sensory processing, instruction and execution of motor movements, abstract thinking, perception, as well as speech processing and production. Over the past decades, detailed knowledge on the molecular characteristics of cortical cell-types has been obtained from genetically engineered animal models. These deep insights into the molecular …

Life On A Ball: Multi-Week Tethered Behavior In Drosophila, Jazz Weisman

Student Theses and Dissertations

By studying head-fixed or rigidly tethered animals, neuroscientists have been able to make high-resolution neurophysiological and behavioral measurements during naturalistic tasks. Tethered paradigms have a particularly rich history in the study of insect behavior and in this thesis I describe technology that extends by one-hundred fold—from hours to weeks—the timescale over which individual Drosophila can be routinely studied while tethered in place. Specifically, I designed and constructed a new experimental rig that allows a rigidly tethered fly to live for at least two weeks within a virtual reality environment. The fly stands (and is free to walk) on an airsupported …

Development Of Improved Genetic Methods For Enterococcus Faecium, Victor Chen

Student Theses and Dissertations

Enterococcus faecium is a ubiquitous Gram-positive bacterium that has been recovered from the environment, food, and microbiota of mammals. Enterococcus faecium is widely recognized as an emerging public health threat with the rise of drug resistance and nosocomial infections. Antibiotic usage has afforded antibiotic-resistant and pathogenic isolates from livestock and humans. Nevertheless, commensal Enterococcus strains possess beneficial health functions in mammals to upregulate host immunity and prevent microbial infections. However, the dissection of E. faecium functions and mechanisms has been restricted by inefficient genetic methods. Current genetic engineering methods in E. faecium still require passive homologous recombination from plasmid DNA. …

The Internal Orchestration Of A Courtship Ritual In Drosophila, Tom Anton Hindmarsh Sten

Student Theses and Dissertations

The diversity of behaviors exhibited by animals is astounding. Even within a species, members constantly select between a myriad of ways to interact with their environment, ranging from foraging to fighting. Yet, why an individual behaves as it does in each moment of time typically remains nebulous to us as observers. In this thesis, I explore the possibility that these seemingly idiosyncratic behavioral decisions can be understood by accessing the hidden internal motivations that spur an animal to do one thing in lieu of another. By leveraging the compact brain architecture and rich social behaviors of the fruit fly Drosophila …

On The High-Dimensional Geometry Of Neuronal Population Dynamics, Jason M. Manley

Student Theses and Dissertations

The brain's remarkable computational properties arise from the collective activity of up to billions of densely interconnected neurons. Neurotechnologies to simultaneously measure the activity of many neurons have been steadily developed over the past decades, with mesoscopic optical imaging now reaching tens of thousands or more neurons in a single experiment. These data have only opened up additional fundamental questions on how the neuronal population code enables robust yet flexible computation from the highly variable activities of single neurons. Here, we utilized large-scale optical imaging to investigate how neuronal population dynamics are structured across diverse brain regions during spontaneous and …

New Insights Into The Roles Of Fan1 Nuclease In Genome Maintenance And Disease, Christian S. Saffran

Student Theses and Dissertations

Exogenous and endogenous insults to genomic integrity are an existential threat to every species, and therefore robust DNA damage repair mechanisms have evolved to protect against genotoxic threats. FANCD2 and FANCI associated nuclease 1 (FAN1) has roles in protection against two major threats to genomic stability: DNA interstrand crosslinks (ICLs), and the expansion of trinucleotide repeats. ICLs are highly deleterious lesions that disrupt replication, are destructive to dividing cells, and are extremely toxic to the hematopoietic system. The replication-dependent Fanconi anemia (FA) pathway defends against ICL toxicity in rapidly dividing cells. However, while it is critical for protecting the bone …

Sex Differences And The Evolution Of Gene Expression, Samuel Khodursky

Student Theses and Dissertations

Phenotypic sex differences are essential byproducts and drivers of evolution in sexually reproducing species. Knowing how sex differences arise and how they influence evolution is central to our understanding of evolution. Although many facets of sex differences have been explored, many remain unknown. Here I focus on sex differences and the evolution of gene expression in three parts. First, I examine the evolutionary properties of genes with sex differences in mean expression levels in the Drosophila brain – a surprisingly understudied organ in this context. Second, I identify and characterize genes with sex differences in gene expression variability in human …

Converting An Allocentric Goal Direction Into An Egocentric Steering Signal In Drosophila, Peter Mussells Pires

Student Theses and Dissertations

Neuronal signals relevant for spatial navigation have been described in many species, however, a circuit-level understanding of how such signals interact to guide behaviour is lacking. In this thesis, I characterize a neuronal circuit in the Drosophila central complex that compares internally generated estimates of the fly's heading and goal angles––both encoded in world-centred, or allocentric, coordinates––to generate a body-centred, or egocentric, steering signal. Past work has argued that the activity of EPG cells, or "compass neurons", represents the fly's moment-to-moment angular orientation, or heading angle, during navigation. An animal's heading angle, however, is not always aligned with its goal …

Growing In Christian Spiritual Identity Through Enhanced Biblical Interpretation At Camino Church, Charlotte, Nc, Steve Sellers

Doctor of Ministry Projects

This project evaluated the impact of biblical study and interpretation on spiritual identity, focusing on the Latino population. The project’s goal was to assess a disciplined, historically oriented study of Scripture as a pre-condition for Scriptural perspicuity to come to fuller expression.

Findings for this project indicate the process of learning biblical interpretation leads to greater spiritual identity in Latino and non-Latino populations. While any particular aspect of the learning process could not be determined as the primary source for the effect the instructor, the learning methodologies, and biblical interpretation model had meaningful impacts on the project participants.

How The Commonwealth Of The Northern Mariana Islands Stalled Covid-19 For 22 Months And Managed Its First Significant Community Transmission, Dwayne Davis, Stephanie Kern-Allely, Lily Muldoon, John M. Tudela, Jesse Tudela, Renea Raho, Heather S. Pangelinan, Halina Palacios, John Tabaguel, Alan Hinson, Guillermo Lifoifoi, Warren Villagomez, Joseph R. Fauver, Haley L. Cash, Esther Muña, Sean T. Casey, Ali S. Khan

Journal Articles: Epidemiology

OBJECTIVE: The Commonwealth of the Northern Mariana Islands (CNMI) is a remote Pacific island territory with a population of 47 329 that successfully prevented the significant introduction of coronavirus disease (COVID-19) until late 2021. This study documents how the response to the introduction of COVID-19 in CNMI in 2021 was conducted with limited resources without overwhelming local clinical capacity or compromising health service delivery for the population.

METHODS: Data from COVID-19 case investigations, contact tracing, the Commonwealth's immunization registry and whole genome sequencing were collated and analysed as part of this study.

RESULTS: Between 26 March 2020 and 31 December …

Krakisto, Worldwide Bakery, Sara Barbas Vázquez

Grado en Diseño Multimedia y Gráfico

Durante los últimos años, se ha notado un crecimiento en el número de pas- telerías en Madrid. Sin embargo, su oferta es limitada ya que, a excepción de los contados productos estacionales que se añaden a los menús, sus productos son fijos y, a largo plazo pueden resultar repetitivos.

Por ello se ha planteado la creación de Krakisto, una pastelería que, mediante sus sistema de rotación trimestral, ofrece una gran gama de postres y dulces. Esta propuesta de continua novedad sumada al auge de la gastronomía internacional, resulta en una tienda que trae las recetas tradicionales originales de cada país …

0,007%, Irene Marcos Herranz

Grado en Diseño Multimedia y Gráfico

0,007% es un proyecto de concienciación contra el desperdicio de agua que además ofrece una solución en forma de aplicación (GUBB), para ayudar a los usuarios a contribuir al objetivo del ahorro de agua.

Inglés

0,007% is a project that aims to raise awarness about the water crisis and offers a solution based on an app that helps the user to save water and rewards them for it.

Ciudades Humanas. 280 Veintiocho Cero., Sara Zaloña Sanz

Grado en Diseño Multimedia y Gráfico

Ciudades Humanas es un proyecto de concienciación sobre la deshumanización de la ciudad. Quiere comunicar la importancia del espacio público, la cultura y la vida de barrio mediante un espacio digital sumado a publicaciones físicas periódicas. Con un tono reivindicativo pero esperanzador, llama a la movilización ciudadana y da voz a los problemas existentes. El proyecto empieza analizando la ciudad de Madrid, pero es escalable a otras ciudades de España como Barcelona, Bilbao o Sevilla, pudiendo incluso extender la iniciativa internacionalmente. Desea alentar a jóvenes y adultos a reflexionar sobre su manera de ver la ciudad, animándolos a la generación …

Prison Amour., Aitana Blasco Fernández

Grado en Diseño Multimedia y Gráfico

Se trata de la creación de la identidad visual de un estudio de dirección creativa y la realización de un video promocional. un fashion film para una marca llamada reparto studio. Un encargo que tiene como objetivo promocionar las piezas de ropa que han ido creando durante años. quieren darles visibilidad a estas piezas de una manera más creativa y original.

Reparto Studio es una marca que se fundó por Margil Peña y Ana Viglio en el 2019 y tiene como característica principal la creación de personajes ficticios, de ahí el nombre reparto, reparto de personajes en un guion de …

Finding And Using Federal Information Relevant To People With Disabilities, Isabella Folmar, Blake Robinson

Faculty Publications

No abstract provided.

"No, Not There": The Literary Precarity And Profundity Of Queer Spatiality, Samuel James Aftel

Theses and Dissertations--English

Love, broadly defined, needs space to grow. For love to materialize and sustain itself (in both literature and society), it must find hospitable geosocial, institutional, and psychic terrain. This is especially true for queer intimacies beyond heteronormative relationality, for the prospect of love’s radical––or reactionary––possibilities is contingent upon the more general sociality in which it develops. Yet love is often a worldmaking and, sometimes, historic mechanism unto itself. Love and its concomitant sexualities must therefore be understood within and without normative structures of hegemony; the workings of (neo)colonialism and capitalism––as well as patriarchy, white supremacy, and heterosexism––dictate to love, and …