Digital Commons Network^™

The Rise And Fall Of ‘Purity Culture’ In The Land Of Israel: A Historic Perspective, Zeev Safrai

'Atiqot

This article aims at determining the turning point in the adherence to the Jewish laws of purity in the Land of Israel, considering the situation before ‘the outburst of purity,’ its decline and final cessation. Four different stages were distinguished regarding the practice of purification: (1) prior to the appearance of the ritual bath (miqweh), before the Hasmonean Kingdom; (2) the period of ‘purity culture,’ when purity was widespread, becoming a central religious phenomenon; (3) individual purity; (4) the final decline of purity. Once the ‘purification water’ became unavailable, halakhic immersion was observed only by women, while symbolic purification continued …

Archaeology, Purity And Society: Some Methodological Reflections, Eyal Regev

'Atiqot

This article examines the assumptions and methodology underlying the correlation between stepped pools and stone vessels and purity laws and practices. It focuses on the way these are interpreted in light of Second Temple period and early rabbinic texts. The article further introduces more complex understandings of the emergence of ritual baths in the Hasmonean period as an expression of Jewish ethnic identity, and the flourishing of ritual baths and stone vessels in the first century CE, as an indication of social individualism.

Jews, Landlords And Peasants In The Ghaznavid Bamiyan Hinterland: A Private Archive From The Eleventh Century (Bamiyan Papers/Afghan Genizah), Ofir Haim

'Atiqot

This paper discusses the ‘Bamiyan Papers,’ also known as the ‘Afghan Genizah,’ which probably originated in the Bamiyan region in present-day central Afghanistan. Particular attention is given here to their earliest phase, comprising the private archive of Yehuda ben Daniel, a Jewish landowner residing in early Ghaznavid Bamiyan in the first half of the eleventh century, who plays a central role in this study. The archive documents shed significant light on the interaction between an urban private landowner and the rural population, with specific emphasis on his tenants. By closely examining two texts from the archive, this paper illuminates the …

Trash Or Cache? The Textile Evidence From The NahׅAl ‘Omer Middens As An Indicator Of Early Islamic-Period Trade Networks Along Israel’S Silk Road, Orit Shamir, Berit Hildebrandt, Roy Galili, Nofar Shamir, Guy Bar-Oz

'Atiqot

Middens provide an important source of data for exploring the history of ancient settlements. Excavations at the middens of Naḥal ‘Omer, an Early Islamic way-station in the ‘Arava desert, yielded a treasure-trove of textiles, such as silk and cotton, including ikats probably imported from India or South Arabia. The Early Islamic period witnessed a flourishing of artistic and cultural achievements, with textiles playing a central role in expressing creativity. The Silk Road, Mediterranean trade routes and connections with India and Central Asia facilitated the movement of textiles and inspired cross-cultural influences. This period probably witnessed a “textile revolution” that was …

Student Comprehension Of Biochemistry In A Flipped Classroom Format, Ed Harris, Evan A. Schroder, Teryn J. Berks

Department of Biochemistry: Faculty Publications

Concept-heavy courses such as Biochemistry in life and physical science curricula are challenging for many college-aged students. It is easy for students to disengage in a lecture and not learn the subject matter while in class. To improve student learning and participation, we employed a flipped format for the first half of the course and compared learning outcomes and attitudes with the traditional lecture in the second half of the course. The experimental course was an upper-level biochemistry course taken primarily by juniors (49%), seniors (40%), and some graduate students (10%) at the college level. Our results indicate that lower-performing …

Effect Of Roadway Lighting On Safety In Utah, Samuel Lewis Runyan

Theses and Dissertations

A significant portion of severe crashes and severe crashes involving vulnerable road users, 29 percent and 39 percent respectively, occur at night in Utah, despite roughly only 25 percent of traffic occurring at night. Nighttime crash causes are less understood than daytime crashes as there are fewer nighttime crashes, but it is generally assumed that increasing street lighting can help mitigate these crashes. To test this assumption, the Utah Department of Transportation was interested in developing Crash Modification Factors (CMFs) specific to the state of Utah which correlate the quantity and quality of light to crash outcomes, to observe how …

Schoeller, Margaret, Samantha Bender

Querying the Past: LGBTQ Maine Oral History Project Collection

Margaret “Margie” Schoeller is a 65-year-old newly-wed lesbian, retired OB/GYN, LGBTQ+ activist, and aspiring interfaith chaplain. Born and raised in Minneapolis, Minnesota, Schoeller reflects fondly on her upbringing in a progressive Presbyterian community, as well as her exposure to the arts and access to excellent education. In 1977, she moved to Maine to attend Bowdoin College, where she came out in 1981 during an era of significant cultural and social transformation for the gay and lesbian community.

Schoeller’s medical career stands as a testament to her unwavering commitment to dignity, inclusivity, and compassionate care. After earning her medical degree from …

Joseph Aruanno V. Bureau Of Fiscal Service United States Department

2024 Decisions

Agency

Metabolic Scaling, Energy Allocation Tradeoffs, And The Evolution Of Humans’ Unique Metabolism, Andrew K. Yegian, Steven B. Heymsfield, Eric R. Castillo, Manfred J. Müller, Leanne M. Redman, Daniel E. Lieberman

Clinical Research Faculty Publications

All organisms use limited energy to grow, survive, and reproduce, necessitating energy allocation tradeoffs, but there is debate over how selection impacted metabolic budgets and tradeoffs in primates, including humans. Here, we develop a method to compare metabolic rates as quotients of observed relative to expected values for mammals corrected for size, body composition, environmental temperature, and phylogenetic relatedness. Contrary to previous analyses, these quotients reveal that nonhuman primates have total metabolic rates expected for similar-sized mammals in similar environments. In addition, data from several small-scale societies show that humans evolved exceptionally high resting, activity, and total metabolic rates apparently …

Clinical Effects Of Dexamethasone Among Patients With Sickle Cell Disease Hospitalized With Covid-19: Outcomes From A Single Academic Health System, William M. Garneau, Matthew J. Lankiewicz, Catherine R. Lesko, Ashley P. Lauriello, Kelly A. Gebo, Sophie M. Lanzkron

Department of Medicine Faculty Papers

BACKGROUND: Dexamethasone is a steroid used in the treatment of hospitalized patients with severe COVID-19. However, the effect of dexamethasone in patients with SCD remains unclear given that steroids may precipitate vaso-occlusive crisis (VOC) in patients with SCD.

METHODS AND FINDINGS: We performed a retrospective analysis of patients with SCD who were hospitalized at Johns Hopkins Health System between June 1, 2020 and June 26, 2022. We reviewed individual charts to assess severity of illness and eligibility for dexamethasone treatment. The exposure of interest was treatment with dexamethasone. Outcomes of interest included incident VTE, length of hospital stay, ICU admission, …

Bismuth And Tellurium Co-Doping: A Route To Improve Thermoelectric Efficiency In Inse Polycrystals, Manasa R. Shankar, A. N. Prabhu, Tulika Srivastava

Open Access archive

Indium selenide (InSe), a layered chalcogenide material, has gained substantial scientific interest as a thermoelectric material due to its intrinsic low thermal conductivity. However, its intrinsic carrier concentration is notably minimal (∼10¹⁴ cm⁻³) due to a significant bandgap of 1.3 eV limiting its thermoelectric efficiency. Therefore, to optimize InSe-based materials for thermoelectric applications, it is essential to increase the carrier concentration through precise doping methodologies. In this study, co-doping at both the anion and cation sites of InSe was achieved by introducing Bi to the In site and Te to the Se site. The impact of this …

Acute Care Hospitalizations: Intentional Rounding And The Relationship To Patient Satisfaction, Ernestine Lucrecia Quick

Walden Dissertations and Doctoral Studies

Patients evaluate their experiences to determine if they will allow hospitals to provide their needed health services. Patient experience scores are used by hospitals to assess patients’ feelings about their interactions with the health care team and providers, the hospital facilities, and their likelihood to recommend the hospital to others. The purpose of this quantitative study was to determine whether a significant difference existed in patient satisfaction between those receiving care in a North Carolina inpatient health system before and after implementing intentional rounding (IR). The three research questions addressed the independent variable by comparing Press Ganey survey data for …

Identifying Redundant Audio Content Over Cloud Environment Using Deduplication Techniques, Venkatesh K

Theses and Dissertations

Cloud computing has become an integral part of modern internet-based services, with users relying heavily on cloud environments as primary storage solutions. However, the exponential growth in data volume presents a challenge (i.e) the proliferation of duplicated content within cloud repositories. Deduplication techniques provide a promising approach to mitigate this issue. This research focuses on detecting redundant audio content within a cloud environment, specifically targeting the sharing of extensive audio files, such as those in Waveform Audio File Format (WAV). The study proposes the Refined Super Subset Identification Algorithm (RSSIA) to efficiently identify redundant content and segments within existing audio …

Cardiac Amyloidosis Versus Other Restrictive Cardiomyopathies: A Retrospective Analysis Of Cardiovascular Outcomes And Arrhythmic Burden, Andrew Sagalov, Waqas Ullah, Yevgeniy Brailovsky, Michael Buhnerkempe, Steve Scaife, Abhishek Kulkarni, Mohamed Labedi, Shruti Hegde

Abington Jefferson Health Papers

BACKGROUND: The arrhythmic burden and cardiovascular risks of cardiac amyloidosis compared with other types of restrictive cardiomyopathies (RCM), such as hemochromatosis and cardiac sarcoid, have not been well characterized in the literature. An increase in emphasis on screening has resulted in more diagnoses of cardiac amyloidosis and a larger data pool to analyze the cardiovascular outcomes of this cardiomyopathy.

METHODS AND RESULTS: We queried the National Inpatient Sample (NIS) database to identify all adult patients diagnosed with cardiac amyloidosis or other RCM between the years 2016 and 2019. Discharge-weighted analysis using survey regressions accounts for discharge weights and characteristics found …

Reparations And Higher Education: How Public Universities May Offer Reparation Scholarships To Black Students In The Post-Affirmative Action Era After Students For Fair Admissions V. Harvard, William Y. Chin

Tennessee Journal of Race, Gender, & Social Justice

No abstract provided.

Friends With Social Benefits: Queerplatonic Relationships And The Future Of Marriage

Tennessee Journal of Race, Gender, & Social Justice

No abstract provided.

Placing The Four Rounds Of Israeli-Palestinian Negotiations In The Twenty-First Century In A Historical And Philosophical Context, Michael J. Reimer Dr

Department of Political Science and Law Faculty Scholarship and Creative Works

This paper will take a three-pronged approach to the analysis of prior treaty negotiations and their comparison to the Israeli Palestinian conflict. The first prong, which will be addressed in the next section, will be a historical analysis of other treaty negotiations which resulted in end of conflict treaties. These examinations will include The Congress of Vienna, 1814-1815; the Portsmouth Treaty, 1905 which involved a Treaty between a European and a non-European state2 negotiated by the President of the United States and American Diplomats; the Paris Peace Conferences of 19193 ; and Multiparty Mediation in Cyprus, 1963-1965. In each of …

Religious Attitudes And Fear Toward Traditional Biomedical And Psychological Services Among People Of The Christian Faith, Brennan Cackett

Walden Dissertations and Doctoral Studies

Adults who identify as Christian often seek help within their religious communities for mental health issues. Research suggested that religious counseling services may discourage members from reporting mental health issues to traditional biomedical and psychological providers. The purpose of this quantitative study was to examine the extent to which people who identify as Christian in Southern California seek help outside of the Church and whether their help seeking is influenced by their religious attitudes and perceived fear of traditional psychological services. Southern California was chosen as it is where the Christian Counseling movement was started and has a large population …

Understanding Mechanisms For Coastal Marsh Sustainability In A Changing Climate, Ashley R. Booth

LSU Doctoral Dissertations

In the Chenier Plain of Louisiana and Texas, coastal marshes are subject to high rates of relative sea level rise (RSLR), restricted sedimentation, and declining elevation attributed to subsidence and decades of intensive management. These marshes were created via mineral sedimentation but now largely accrete via organic matter accumulation. This organic matter accumulation (OMA) – or the balance between plant productivity and decomposition – is essential for maintaining elevation and thus long-term sustainability. However, management for elevation is complicated by a poor understanding of how abiotic factors like flooding and salinity impact processes driving OMA and elevation. To better understand …

322 W. 47th St. Hdfc V. Loo

All Decisions

The court denied defendant tenant's motion for summary judgment, rejecting his claim of collateral estoppel regarding the validity of his proprietary lease. The court found that the issue was not conclusively determined in a prior derivative action involving the HDFC board members, and thus tenant's lease validity could still be contested. Additionally, Guarino's request for attorney's fees under RPL § 234 was denied as he was not the prevailing party.

Gut Microbiota Profiling In Injection Drug Users With And Without Hiv-1 Infection In Puerto Rico, Nirosh Aluthge, Seidu Adams, Carmen A. Davila, Nova R. Gocchi Carrasco, Kathy S. Chiou, Roberto Abadie, Sydney J. Bennett, Kirk Dombrowski, Angel M. Major, Aníbal Valentín-Acevedo, John T. West, Charles Wood, Samodha C. Fernando

School of Medicine Faculty Publications

INTRODUCTION: The full extent of interactions between human immunodeficiency virus (HIV) infection, injection drug use, and the human microbiome is unclear. In this study, we examined the microbiomes of HIV-positive and HIV-negative individuals, both drug-injecting and non-injecting, to identify bacterial community changes in response to HIV and drug use. We utilized a well-established cohort of people who inject drugs in Puerto Rico, a region with historically high levels of injection drug use and an HIV incidence rate disproportionately associated with drug use. METHODS: Using amplicon-based 16S rDNA sequencing, we identified amplicon sequence variants (ASVs) that demonstrated significant variations in the …

An Integrative Approach Clarifies Species Delimitation And Biogeographic History Of Debregeasia (Urticaceae), Amos Kipkoech, Ke Li, Richard I. Milne, Oyetola Olesegun Oyebanji, Moses C. Wambulwa, Xiao-Gang Fu, Dennis A. Wakhungu, Zheng-Yuan Wu, Jie Liu

Biological Sciences Faculty Publications and Presentations

Integrative data from plastid and nuclear loci are increasingly utilized to resolve species boundaries and phylogenetic relationships within major angiosperm clades. Debregeasia (Urticaceae), an economically important genus, presents challenges in species delimitation due to its overlapping morphological traits and unstable taxonomic assignments. Here, we analyzed 14 morphological traits and generated 12 data matrices from the plastomes and nrDNA using genome skimming from the nine recognized morphospecies to clarify species boundaries and assess barcode performance in Debregeasia. We also used a universal set of 353 nuclear genes to explore reticulate evolution and biogeographic history of Debregeasia. Plastomes of Debregeasia …

The Effect Of Call Center Agent Burnout On Employee Engagement, Shyriah M. Marshall

Walden Dissertations and Doctoral Studies

Call center organizations have become important contact centers for various fields to conduct customer service. Within the automotive industry, call centers are used for emergency roadside assistance. The customer service representatives who are responsible for handling roadside assistance may be managing various issues, including burnout, which may carry over into their performance and ability to properly service customers. The relationships between burnout and employee engagement for inbound emergency roadside assistance agents were not well understood. The purpose of this study was to examine the relationship between customer service representatives’ level of burnout and employee engagement. A quantitative, cross-sectional research design …

Perceptions Of Experiences Of Formerly Incarcerated Individuals On Community Reentry Programs To Reduce Recidivism, Kelly Sieger

Walden Dissertations and Doctoral Studies

This study was conducted to identify the perceptions of experiences of formerly incarcerated individuals who have been actively involved in community-based reentry programming (CBRP). Utilizing a qualitative interview approach with previously incarcerated persons, the study’s focus was to identify the differences in literature, lived experiences, and the connection between CBRP and recidivism through the perceptions of formerly incarcerated persons who have completed CBRP. A key goal was to identify difficulties in the reentry process through the perception of lived experience and offer suggestions for improvements through the lens of actuarial justice. Using a qualitative, phenomenological approach, data was collected through …

Brief Of Banking And Administrative Law Scholars As Amici Curiae In Support Of Appellants/Cross-Appellees, Jeffrey Lubbers

Amicus Briefs & Court Filings

Amici have a strong interest in how this Court’s decision will affect the fields of banking and administrative law and the enforcement of banking regulation. Amici seek to assist this Court in resolving questions of law that arise in the core of their professional expertise and scholarship, namely the scope of the Seventh Amendment as applied to the Federal Deposit Insurance Corporation’s authority to regulate and adjudicate unsafe or unsound practices in the operation of banks.

High Diagnostic Accuracy Of Arterial Phase Ct In Differentiating Pheochromocytoma In Good/Poor Washout Adrenal Masses, Aditya Phadte, Brijesh Krishnappa, Saba Samad Memon, Virendra Patil, Anurag Lila, Padma Vikram Badhe, Vijaya Sarathi, Gwendolyn Fernandes, Sameer Rege, Gagan Prakash, Santosh Menon, Manjiri Karlekar, Rohit Barnabas, Nalini Shah, Hemangini Thakkar, Tushar Bandgar

Faculty, Staff and Student Publications

Introduction: Differentiating pheochromocytomas from other adrenal masses based on computed tomography (CT) characteristics remains challenging, particularly in lipid-poor lesions with variable washout patterns. This study evaluated CT features for distinguishing pheochromocytomas in good and poor washout subcohorts.

Methods: We prospectively analyzed 72 patients with unilateral lipid-poor adrenal masses. CT protocol included basal, bolus-tracked arterial, early venous (45 seconds postarterial), and delayed (15 minutes postarterial) phases. Masses were categorized into good and poor washout groups. Histopathology provided the final diagnosis. CT characteristics and calculated indices were compared between pheochromocytomas and other masses in each washout category.

Results: The cohort included pheochromocytomas …

Septal Wall Synthesis Is Sufficient To Change Ameba-Like Cells Into Uniform Oval-Shaped Cells In Escherichia Coli L-Forms, Masafumi Hayashi, Chigusa Takaoka, Koichi Higashi, Ken Kurokawa, William Margolin, Taku Oshima, Daisuke Shiomi

Faculty, Staff and Student Publications

A cell wall is required to control cell shape and size to maintain growth and division. However, some bacterial species maintain their morphology and size without a cell wall, calling into question the importance of the cell wall to maintain shape and size. It has been very difficult to examine the dispensability of cell wall synthesis in rod-shaped bacteria such as Escherichia coli for maintenance of their shape and size because they lyse without cell walls under normal culture conditions. Here, we show that wall-less E. coli L-form cells, which have a heterogeneous cell morphology, can be converted to a …

Neuro-Symbolic Ai Techniques To Advance Model Verification, Scalability And Equity With Applications To Math Learning, Anup Shakya

Electronic Theses and Dissertations Archive

Neuro-symbolic models leverage the combined strengths of both symbolic AI and Deep Neural networks (DNNs), namely the interpretability of symbolic AI and the representation power of DNNs. These models are gaining significant attention, particularly in high-stakes domains where domain knowledge and interpretability play a key role. In this dissertation, we propose to develop neuro-symbolic AI based techniques to improve the scalability, verifiability, and equitability of these models. Specifically, we will focus on a high-stakes domain where the aforementioned properties are crucial, namely, AI-enabled education. In particular, Intelligent Tutoring Systems (ITSs) can make high-quality education available for a large and diverse …

Network Differentiation And Identification Of Singletons In Gaussian Networks Under The Bayesian Framework, James Olusegun Adefisoye

Electronic Theses and Dissertations Archive

This dissertation explores Bayesian approaches for network analysis in the context of epigenetic modifications, specifically focusing on Deoxyribonucleic acid methylation (DNA-m) at cytosine-phosphate-guanine (CpG) sites. DNA-m is a key epigenetic modification associated with diseases and infections. Recent research suggests that analyzing joint activities across multiple CpG sites could provide more powerful insights, which can be achieved using network-based approaches, such as Gaussian networks. The first project introduces a Bayesian variable selection method for detecting singletons and reconstructing networks that incorporate singleton status. Singletons, or isolated nodes, can lead to false connections and biased interpretations. The proposed method effectively detects singletons, …

Louise Farrenc's Études De Dexterité, Op. 41, Nos. 1-6: An Artistic, Pedagogical, And Analytical Exploration, Julia Aguayo Carreras

Electronic Theses and Dissertations Archive

Louise Farrenc’s life and work embody the challenges female musicians encountered in the nineteenth century, and the progress they made beyond societal norms and gender-based restrictions. Thanks to her talent, perseverance, teaching position at the Paris Conservatory, and the support of her husband (who encouraged her and edited most of her music), she helped to shape the established societal mindset and impacted history, smoothing the road for future generations of female musicians. By examining Farrenc’s compositions we can gain insight into the contribution of a female musician who successfully established herself as an admired composer as well as a respected …