Digital Commons Network^™

Defining A Multi-Omic, Ai-Enabled Stool Screening Paradigm For Colorectal Cancer: A Consensus Framework For Clinical Translation, Arturo Loaiza-Bonilla, Yan Leyfman, Viviana Cortiana, Rhys Crawford, Shivani Modi

Einstein Health Papers

Colorectal cancer (CRC) develops through both conventional adenoma-carcinoma and serrated neoplasia pathways, yet noninvasive screening still under-detects the advanced precursor lesions that enable true cancer prevention. Stool-based screening reduces CRC mortality, but its preventive impact remains constrained by limited detection of advanced precancerous lesions (APLs), including advanced adenomas and sessile serrated lesions. Next-generation multitarget stool DNA assays (mt-sDNA; e.g., Cologuard Plus) have established high sensitivity for CRC and specificity approaching 94%, leaving improved APL detection as the principal opportunity for innovation. This review presents a consensus framework for a multi-omic stool screening paradigm that integrates host epigenetic markers (DNA methylation) …

Generative Ai/Machine Learning In The Screen Production Classroom And The Implications For Tertiary Educators., James Thompson, Kereen Ely-Harper, Tom Young, Rachel Wilson, Nico Meissner

Staff Scholarship - Australia & Dubai

This report explores how screen production educators in the ASPERA community are responding to the rapid integration of generative Artificial Intelligence (genAI) in teaching and learning. Framed by Sean Cubitt’s (2020) notion of Common Intelligence, we investigate two guiding questions: How are students engaging with genAI tools in their productions, and what are the implications for educators? Methodologically, we engaged in qualitative professional dialogue with screen practice educators through three mechanisms during the 2024 ASPERA Conference: lightning provocations, an anonymous Mentimeter survey, and a facilitated roundtable discussion. These activities provided a collaborative forum for educators to share practice-based insights, reflect …

Communication Challenges Experienced By Telephone Triage Registered Nurses Providing Assessment Of Health Symptoms, Stacy Huddleston

Walden Dissertations and Doctoral Studies

Telephone triage nurses routinely assess symptoms and make clinical decisions without visual contact, which introduces complex communication challenges. Language differences, emotional distress, cultural misunderstandings, and the absence of visual cues may influence how symptoms are described, interpreted, and acted upon during telephone encounters. The purpose of this qualitative interpretive description study, guided by Peplau’s theory of interpersonal relations, was to explore how RNs experience and manage communication barriers in telephone triage practice. Six RNs with recent experience in telephone triage participated in semistructured interviews, and the data were analyzed using interpretive description and thematic analysis. Findings indicated that participants relied …

Ulk4 And Cdkn2a Polymorphisms Influence The Risk Of Developing Monoclonal Gammopathy Of Undetermined Significance, José Manuuel Sánchez-Maldonado, Angelica Macauda, Antonio José Cabrera-Serrano, Hauke Thomsen, Murat Güler, Rob Ter Horst, Bethany Van Guelpen, Pavel Vodicka, Stefano Landi, Subhayan Chattopadhyay, Pelin Ünal, Lucía Ruiz-Durán, Delphine Casabonne, Hartmut Goldschmidt, Istemi Serin, María Carretero-Fernández, Elena Cabezudo, Fernando Reyes-Zurita, Alyssa I. Clay-Gilmour, Et. Al.

Faculty Publications

Monoclonal gammopathy of undetermined significance (MGUS) is a necessary precursor condition to multiple myeloma (MM). Given the role of autophagy in modulating MM risk, we investigated whether genetic variation in autophagy-related genes influences susceptibility to MGUS. We analyzed the association of 34,042 common autophagy-related single nucleotide polymorphisms (SNPs) with MGUS across six independent cohorts, five from Europe and one from North America, comprising 2317 MGUS cases and 282,358 controls. We also assessed their impact on immune parameters, including absolute counts of 91 blood-derived immune cell subsets and 103 circulating immunological proteins. Meta-analysis revealed a genome-wide significant association between the ULK4 …

Impact Of Medicaid Enrollment Timing On Tumor Stage At Diagnosis And Survival In Breast, Colorectal, And Lung Cancer, Gabriel A. Benavidez, Stella Coker Watson Self Ph.D., Ms, Anthony Alberg Ph.D., M.P.H., Janice Probst, Jan Marie Eberth

Faculty Publications

Background: Medicaid-insured patients experience higher rates of late-stage cancer diagnosis and worse survival than non-Medicaid patients. The impact of Medicaid enrollment timing on cancer outcomes is less clear. This study examines the association between Medicaid enrollment and timing with tumor stage and cancer-specific survival for breast, colorectal, and lung cancers. Methods: We analyzed SEER-Medicaid linked data for 276,755 breast, 104,784 colorectal, and 101,058 lung cancer patients < 65 years of age. Patients were categorized as non-Medicaid enrollees, pre-diagnosis enrollees (≥12 months before), or post-diagnosis enrollees (≤12 months after). Multivariable logistic regression estimated odds ratios of late-stage diagnosis, and cause-specific Cox proportional hazards models were used to assess cancer-specific survival, adjusting for demographic and socioeconomic factors. Results: Compared to non-Medicaid enrollees, post-diagnosis enrollees had the highest odds of late-stage diagnosis (breast cancer: OR: 3.41; colorectal cancer: OR: 3.78; lung cancer: OR: 1.87). Pre-diagnosis enrollees also had increased odds, but the …

Interlibrary Loan: From Basics To Current Issues, Jennifer K. Lloyd

Library Faculty Publications

While interlibrary loan has been a core service for health science libraries for decades, changes in policies, software, and workflow are accelerating. This webinar will explain some basics of ILL and its platforms while also focusing on current issues and changes that are confronting libraries.

Brain-Engrafted Monocyte-Derived Macrophages From Blood And Skull-Bone Marrow Exhibit Distinct Properties, Siling Du, Feiya Ou, Antoine Drieu, Eric Z Xu, Yumeng Cheng, Steffen E Storck, Tornike Mamuladze, Jay Cao, Nora Abduljawad, Bishan Bhattarai, Justin Rustenhoven, Niall Mortimer, Simone Brioschi, Khai Nguyen, Patrick Fernandes Rodrigues, Igor Smirnov, Daniel Gibson, J Michael White, Wandy Beatty, David Denardo, Qingyun Li, Michael Meers, Claudia Z Han, Na Sun, Florent Ginhoux, Marina Cella, Marco Colonna, Jonathan Kipnis

The Brown Foundation: Institute of Molecular Medicine

Microglia arise from yolk sac progenitors and are thought to persist throughout life with minimal input from adult hematopoiesis. However, whether brain-engrafted monocyte-derived macrophages (MDMs) exist at homeostasis and during turnover and how they function relative to yolk-sac-derived microglia (YSMs) remain unsettled. Here, we combine lineage tracing, pharmacological microglia depletion, and multi-omics profiling to define the ontogeny, identity, and function of brain parenchymal macrophages. Despite sharing the parenchymal milieu, MDMs display transcriptional and epigenetic landscapes distinct from YSMs. Fate-mapping reveals that brain-engrafted MDMs transiently express CD206, echoing a developmental stage of microglial precursors. MDM engraftment and polarization are modulated by …

Schistosome Esophageal Gland Factor Meg-82 Drives Host Cell Lysis And Interacts With Host Immune Proteins, Pallavi Yadav, Sabona B Simbassa, Ryan Sloan, Phillip A Newmark, Jayhun Lee

Faculty, Staff and Student Publications

Schistosomes are blood flukes that ingest large amounts of host blood during their intra-mammalian stage. The ingested blood contains leukocytes that can be harmful, yet the parasites survive inside the host for decades, reflecting superb immune evasion mechanisms that remain poorly understood. Our previous work discovered that FoxA, a forkhead transcription factor, drives the production of the esophageal gland, an anterior digestive organ essential for degrading ingested leukocytes and for in vivo survival. However, a comprehensive molecular makeup of the esophageal gland remains unclear. Importantly, the esophageal gland factors responsible for degrading ingested leukocytes, their mechanisms of action, and how …

Uncovering Hidden Features Of Copyback Viral Genomes, Sarah Pye

Arts & Sciences Graduate Student Theses and Dissertations

Copyback viral genomes (cbVGs) are truncated non-protein coding viral genomes produced when an RNA virus polymerase detaches from the replication template and resumes elongation downstream, copying back a sequence complementary to the nascent strand. cbVGs can stimulate antiviral immunity and compete for viral proteins to suppress virus replication, but technical limitations of PCR-based approaches have painted an incomplete picture of the diverse cbVG populations generated during infection. Here, we sought to improve our understanding of cbVG molecular structure by harnessing long-read RNA sequencing tools. To do this, we developed a robust and reliable pipeline to sequence and analyze native full-length …

2026-03-11 Seattle U Women’S Rowing Sets Sights On Wcc Debut, Maya Deguzman

The Spectator Online

No abstract provided.

Empirical Evaluation Of A Cnn-Resnet-Rf Hybrid Model For Occupancy Rate Prediction In Passive Ultra-Low-Energy Buildings, Yiwen Liu, Yibing Xue, Chunlu Liu, Runyu Wang

Student Papers, Posters & Projects

Accurate occupancy information is critical for optimizing energy efficiency in buildings. Hybrid machine learning models have demonstrated great potential in previous studies; however, their application in passive ultra-low-energy buildings remains underexplored. This study conducts an empirical evaluation of real-time occupancy rate prediction using a CNN-ResNet-RF hybrid model based on multi-source environmental and behavioral data from a passive ultra-low-energy educational building. The model integrates Convolutional Neural Networks (CNN) for local feature extraction, Residual Networks (ResNet) to enhance deep feature representation, and Random Forests (RF) for ensemble-based generalization. Indoor CO₂ concentration exhibits the strongest linear correlation with occupancy rate (r = …

Inverse Associations Of Serum Total Omega-6 Polyunsaturated Fatty Acids And Linoleic Acid With Biomarkers Of Inflammation: A Cross-Sectional Analysis, Kevin C Maki, Xiwei Chen, Meredith L Wilcox, Carol F Kirkpatrick, Liana L Guarneiri, Orsolya M Palacios, Erika T Beidelman, Anna Lm Macagno, David B Allison

Children’s Nutrition Research Center Staff Publications

Background: Observational evidence supports associations between higher consumption of omega-6 (n-6) polyunsaturated fatty acids (PUFAs) with reduced risks for cardiometabolic diseases. However, some have hypothesized that higher n-6 PUFA intake may be proinflammatory.

Objectives: The purpose of this cross-sectional analysis using baseline data from the Aegis cohort was to examine associations of serum total n-6 PUFA and linoleic acid concentrations with biomarkers of inflammation.

Methods: Serum concentrations of high-sensitivity C-reactive protein (hs-CRP), glycoprotein acetyls, serum amyloid A (SAA), soluble intercellular adhesion molecule-1 (sICAM-1), and soluble vascular cell adhesion molecule-1 (sVCAM-1) were assessed as biomarkers of inflammation. Univariate Pearson correlation coefficients …

Quality Of Life In Patients With P16+ Oropharyngeal Cancer Receiving Accelerated Radiation Therapy With Either Cisplatin Or Cetuximab In The Nrg/Rtog 1016 Randomized Controlled Trial, Jolie Ringash, Pedro A Torres-Saavedra, Maura L Gillison, Jimmy J Caudell, David J Adelstein, Paul M Harari, Erich M Sturgis, Ethan Basch, Shlomo A Koyfman, Greg A Krempl, Dukagjin M Blakaj, James Edward Bates, Thomas J Galloway, Christopher U Jones, Beth M Beadle, Jonathan Harris, Quynh-Thu Le, Sue S Yom, Benjamin Movsas

Faculty, Staff and Students Publications

Purpose: NRG/RTOG 1016 was a phase III randomized noninferiority de-escalation trial comparing cetuximab versus cisplatin, concurrent with accelerated radiation 70 Gy/6 weeks, in p16+ oropharyngeal cancer. Quality of life (QOL) was a secondary endpoint.

Methods and materials: Eligible/consenting patients among the first 400 entered completed the EORTC QLQ-C30/H&N35 at baseline, end of treatment, 3, 6, and 12 months posttreatment, to provide 90% power to detect an effect size of 0.5 in the between-arm change in QOL scores from baseline to 6 months. We report completion, responsiveness, and patterns over time across domains between arms, considering a difference of >10 points …

Construction Of Chinese Identities And Community: A Linguistic Ethnographic Study Of A Chinese Culture-Sharing Club At A Us University, Yuxuan Mu

USF Tampa Graduate Theses and Dissertations

Chinese identity has been viewed as a debated and contested notion in sociolinguistics (Wong et al., 2021). Existing sociolinguistic research, which has centered on Chinese identity-related questions, such as “Who can be or cannot be Chinese?”, has been closely involved with the current political tensions between mainland China, Taiwan, and Hong Kong, as well as their associated linguistic tensions between simplified Chinese writing and traditional Chinese writing, and Cantonese and Mandarin. Building on these studies, this dissertation goes beyond the scope of Sinophone contexts traditionally examined in prior research (e.g., mainland China, Singapore, Taiwan, Hong Kong) to examine how US …

Cilostazol Conduction Effects: A Possible Adjunctive Therapy Option?, Justin Haloot, Yochai Birnbaum

Faculty, Staff and Students Publications

No abstract provided.

Interview No. 1840, Norma Flores

Combined Interviews

This interview with El Pasoan Norma Flores reflects on her childhood growing up in Segundo Barrio and the strong family and community ties that shaped her life. Born in 1949 at Newark Methodist Maternity Hospital in South El Paso, she described growing up primarily with her grandmother on Grama St while her parents and siblings lived nearby on Frutas St. Norma shared vivid memories of her neighborhood life, including children playing outside together, helping with household chores and walking to school at Guardian Angel Catholic School. She recalled both joyful and difficult moments, such as spending summers outdoors with family …

They Find A Way: The Transnational Practices And Experiences Of Diaspora Conflict Journalists, Grace E. Smith

USF Tampa Graduate Theses and Dissertations

As global tensions continue to rise, media landscapes are changing. Diaspora communities play an integral role in this shift, as they search for verifiable news with a global perspective to keep them informed on crises in their home countries. In order to keep their communities informed, diaspora journalists step up to localize coverage, creating transnational networks to bridge home and host countries. They often work through intense situations, sacrificing normalcy for information. Building on the framework from Ogunyemi’s (2018) diasporic media observations, Fraser’s (1992) counterpublics theory, and D.K. Thussu’s (2006) contra-flow in global media theory, this study explores how diaspora …

Lost & Found: The Postmodernism Of Japan's "Lost Decades" In Kamen Rider Decade, Andrew K. Barrow

USF Tampa Graduate Theses and Dissertations

As a franchise, Kamen Rider is underrepresented in anglophonic scholarship despite its potential to relate postmodern texts, nostalgia, and history. In making these relations, Decade in particular challenges postmodern critiques that were prevalent in its time and during the time of the material it references, from 2000 to 2008. Scholars critical of postmodernism such as Fredric Jameson and Hiroki Azuma situate themselves as such because of postmodernism’s perceived detachment from history and lack of depth, creating a cultural logic of artworks that pales in comparison to older logics and eras. By teaching himself and another Kamen Rider morals and lessons …

Examining Whether Survivors Of Domestic Violence Perceive Ifps As More Helpful Than Other Available Support Resources, Aleidys Lopez Romero

USF Tampa Graduate Theses and Dissertations

Injunctions for protection (also known as restraining orders or civil protection orders) are often used by survivors as a line of defense against continued instances of physical violence or stalking by abusers (Houseman et al., 2024). This study aims to fill these gaps by examining whether survivors of domestic violence perceive IFPs as more helpful than other available support resources. Understanding this process may offer important insights into IFP accessibility, survivor perspectives, and/or alternative resources that may be equally, if not more, helpful to survivors than IFPs. Grounded in Gondolf & Fisher’s (1988) Survivor Hypothesis and Kimberlé Crenshaw’s (1989) Structural …

Bias Evaluation Of Healthcare Data With The Use Of Vbqa - A Vaers Inspired Bias Question Answer Dataset, Nolan Dulude, Renu Karthikeyan, Bivin Sadler, Faizan Javed

SMU Data Science Review

Abstract. Large Language Models (LLMs) are being used increasingly within the healthcare industry to summarize complex clinical information, but their outputs can often reflect biases inherited from their training data. In healthcare, these biases are not just technical flaws, but they can lead to distorted and false information about vaccine safety, compromise patient trust, and lead to potential harmful outcomes. This study investigates bias found in LLM-generated outputs to question-answer pairs inspired by adverse vaccine reactions using COVID-19 data from the Vaccine Adverse Event Reporting System (VAERS) from 2020–2024. We examined whether training the LLMs on a known Bias Benchmark …

Nlp Bias And African American English, Kenya Roy, Faizan Javed

SMU Data Science Review

African American English (AAE), also referred to as African American Vernacular English (AAVE), is widely used on social media, but most sentiment analysis tools are trained only on Standard American English (SAE). This mismatch can cause models to misclassify dialectal expressions—especially by labeling neutral or positive AAE as negative or toxic. These errors matter, since Natural Language Processing (NLP) systems are now central to content moderation and brand monitoring. This research will evaluate the VADER, RoBERTa, GPT-OSS, and Gemma’s handling of AAE in comparison to SAE using the TwitterAAE corpus, a public dataset of tweets with estimated AAVE usage. The …

Virtual Ai Lifestyle Assistant, Solomon T. Mathew, Babu T. Mathew

SMU Data Science Review

Patients struggle with adhering to prescribed medication and leading a healthy lifestyle outside of clinical visits. A mechanism needs to be developed and deployed to constantly remind them about the need to take medication and to lead a healthy lifestyle in a non-intrusive way while watching for changes in vitals that can be collected using wearable devices. With these considerations, a Virtual Healthcare Assistant is proposed, built with a multi-agent system that is easily integrated with wearable devices such as Apple Watches, Fitbits, and Oura Rings. a LangGraph-based multi-agent workflow to mimic real-world continuous monitoring. The resulting system enables agent-to-agent …

Knowledge And Attitude Of Physicians In Relation To Delivering Bad News To Patients In Al-Diwaniya Province, Iraq., Hassan Jalood, Hassan Raji Jallab

Al-Qadisiyah Medical Journal

Abstract Background         Delivering bad news which is usually refers to convey any information that seriously and negatively affects the patients and or their families’ views to the present or future life, regards as one of the most difficult tasks that face physicians during their professional life regardless to their qualification. Aims of the study:  To evaluate physicians’ awareness of delivering bad news to their patients and their behavior in relation to breaking bad news in Al-diwaniya province. Method: Across sectional study conducted among physicians from different hospitals and primary health centers in Al-diwaniya City, from both sex, male and female. …

The Study Of The Effect Of Serum Zinc Level In The Mothers And Neonates On Neonatal Jaundice In Al-Diwanyia, Nasma Naji Al-Hajjiah

Al-Qadisiyah Medical Journal

Background : Zinc has a role in normal growth and development during pregnancy, childhood, and is needed for the proper sense of taste and smell. Studies on animals, adolescents and low birth weight neonates showed that oral zinc salt intake decreased serum bilirubin level, probably through inhibition of the bilirubin enterohepatic circulation. Objective : To study the effect of serum zinc level of the newborn and their mothers on neonatal jaundice. Patient and methods A case control study included a total 130, 65 with jaundice and 65 healthy neonates with their mothers. The study was carried out from May to …

Evaluation Of Urethral Advancement And Glanuloplasty In Hypospadias Repair, Bahr Sabah Abboud Allawi

Al-Qadisiyah Medical Journal

Background:There has been great progress in reconstructive surgery of the male urethra in the last decades. Several complex techniques were developed to correct urethral defects with great variations in the success rate. However, there is no an ideal substitute for the male urethra as good as the urethra to our knowledge at this time .Human male urethra has a large capacity to extend under traction. This extensibility is the principle of urethral advancement technique used to correct urethral defect in hypospadias by using the urethra itself.The objective of this study was to evaluate the urethral advancement and glanuloplasty (UGPI) procedure …

Prevalence And Factors Associated With Rotavirus Infection Among Infants Admitted For Diarrhea In The Region Of Mid Iraq, Wisam S. Abood, S. A. Al-Juboury, M. A. Al-Rodhan

Al-Qadisiyah Medical Journal

Rotavirus is the most common cause of severe childhood diarrhea worldwide and of diarrheal mortality in developing countries. In Iraq, few studies and analysis were executed for evaluation of the extent of rotavirus caused diarrhea among infants and its magnitude as a cause of the most common clinical attending symptoms to the daily care clinics and hospital admission.. The aim of this study was to estimate the prevalence of rotavirus caused gastroenteritis and identify the clinical factors associated with rotavirus caused diarrhea among infants admitted to the hospital or treated as outpatients in three governorates in the region of Mid-Iraq …

Reciprocal Intermolecular Antigenic Competition Between E. Coli And P. Aeruginosa, Ibrahim Mohamed-Saeed Abdulwahid, Raad Abdulabass Hamza Alharmoosh

Al-Qadisiyah Medical Journal

It has been observed that in a dimicrobic mucosal urinary tract infection . The specific antibody titre of E. coli was higher than that of P. aeruginosa. The interpretation was based on antigenic competition . Hence a case of UTI with combined gram negative infection were chosen and diagnosed as E. coli and P. aeruginosa (Identified by classical tests and API 20E system) . Balanced and unbalanced heat killed E. coli and P. aeruginosa antigens in different combination proportions were made and used for specific immune priming of rabbits. Monotypic heat killed antigens were made and used for priming rabbits …

Stereological Study Of The Mid Piece Of Ductus Epididymis In Human And Other Animal Species, Khalida K. Jbara

Al-Qadisiyah Medical Journal

A stereological study of a (middle piece) of ductus epididymis between normal adult human, bulls, rams, goats and buffalos was conducted using routine histological techniques. The following stereological parameters were determined; Stereocilia height, epithelial height, muscular wall thickness, lumen and tube diameters. The human epididymal stereocilia height is shorter than in goat only and higher than bulls and goats in both the epithelial height and muscular wall thickness. Human ductile diameter is smaller than in other animals. In conclusion, all human epididymal mid piece parameters in the present study differ significantly than in the other animals. Because human epididymis differs …

Gram-Positive Bacteremia In Febrile Children Under Two Years Of Age In Babylon Province, Naher H.S, J. M. Al-Mrzoq, Hasson S.O

Al-Qadisiyah Medical Journal

This study aimed to investigate gram-positive bacteremia in febrile children according to some risk factors and to detect the type causative bacteria. One hundred sixty blood samples were collected from children under 2 years who were suffering from fever and admitted to emergency department of Babylon Maternity and Children Hospital in Hilla. The results indicated that 31(19.4%) blood samples revealed positive cultures consisting of 21(68%) gram-positive bacterial isolates and 10(32%) gram-negative isolates*. Gram-positive isolates represented by; Staphylococcus aureus which accounted for 10(33%), Coagulase negative Staphylococci (CoNS) which accounted for 5 isolates(16%), Streptococcus pygenes 4 isolates(13%), Listeria monocytogenes and Micrococcus sp. …

Noise Induced Hearing Loss In Textil Factory And Dental Labrotory, Runak Tahr Ali, Nabil Abdulrazzaq Fatah, Fatehiya Fathullah Hasan

Al-Qadisiyah Medical Journal

In order to provide a standard reference of noise induced hearing loss for Kurdistan population in Erbil city from textile factory & dental laboratory, a hearing loss survey was conducted on 125 sample of different ages and both sex .The hearing threshold of air conduction and bone conduction was measured over a frequency range from 250 Hz to 8 KHz under standard condition. Audiometric test was performed for the selected sample in a sound proof room, type (IAC). A pure tone manually operated Vienna tone type (Operating instruction MA 53), equipped with TDH 39 earphone mounted in Maico diagnostic GmbH. …