Digital Commons Network^™

Montana Voices Amplified: My Perspective: Living And Grieving In Faith, Briella Wilson, University Of Montana Rural Institute

Independent Living and Community Participation

Briella Wilson lost her brother, Weston, when she was in the 3rd grade and has worked hard to overcome her grief. Her contribution to Montana Voices Amplified shares the importance of faith in negotiating grief.

Genetic Determinants Involved In Acquisition Of Iron In The Opportunistic Pathogen Mycobacterium Abscessus, Manal F. Farhat

Dissertations, Theses, and Capstone Projects

The opportunistic pathogen Mycobacterium abscessus subsp. abscessus (Mab) has become an emerging public health threat due to the increasing number of Mab-associated chronic pulmonary disease cases. Infection cure rates are only 50% due to the complex resistance of Mab to most antimicrobial drugs and chemotherapy.

Deeper knowledge of Mab biology is needed to illuminate potential candidates for development of improved therapeutics against Mab infections. The ESX-3 type VII protein secretion system of Mab plays an important role in host inflammatory and pathological responses during infection.

In this study, we demonstrate a functional link between the ESX-3 secretion …

Leveraging Bio-Inspired Molecules For Cancer Theranostics, Douglas S. Macpherson

Dissertations, Theses, and Capstone Projects

A variety of molecules can be radiolabeled and delivered to a cancer site for the purposes of diagnostics and therapy. Among the most promising of tumor targeting molecules are peptides and antibodies. These bio-inspired molecules can be designed and synthesized to target and respond to cancer cells based on the properties of those cells. Matrix metalloproteinase (MMP) enzymes are over-expressed by some metastatic cancers, in which they are responsible for the degradation and remodeling of the extracellular matrix. In recent years, MMPs have emerged as promising targets for enzyme-responsive diagnostic probes because oligopeptides can be designed to be selectively hydrolyzed …

Unsung Heroines In Black And White: Sixties Girl Groups As Sonic Rock Rebellion, Hilarie Ashton

Dissertations, Theses, and Capstone Projects

Before the Beatles arrived in America, exploding open the intersection between pop music and the emerging genre of rock and in so doing, drawing heavily on the work of Black music and musicians, girl groups were powerfully enacting a kind of cultural rebellion in both of those genres. In contrast to the historical impulse to privilege a breathlessly incomplete white male lineage, "Unsung Heroines" examines in closer, more connected spotlights the subversive creative work of the Black and working-class teenage girls in the Ronettes, the Chiffons, and the Shangri-Las. Across four chapters, "Unsung Heroines" shows how these singers subversively tucked …

Synthesis And Biomedical Applications Of Hollow Iron Oxide Nanoparticles, Aloka S. Paragoda Arachchilage

Dissertations, Theses, and Capstone Projects

Nano-scale materials have gained much attention during the past few decades due to the stark differences in their properties compared to bulk material. Thus, they are being studied for a myriad of applications ranging from harnessing solar energy to diagnostics. This thesis focuses on the synthesis of hollow iron oxide nanoparticles using Galvanic replacement reactions and their application in drug delivery. Moreover, the use of a peptide precursor for the enhancement of exosomes is also discussed.

Chapter 1 discusses a simple and economical Galvanic approach used for the synthesis of hollow one-dimensional iron oxide nanotubes. In the initial reaction, the …

How The U.S. Mainstream Media Perpetuates Cis White Masculine Hegemony, Yelena Dzhanova

Dissertations, Theses, and Capstone Projects

The news is important because it helps individuals understand their place in the world and make the best decisions for themselves. Throughout its strong history and presence in the United States, the journalism industry has prided itself on delivering fact-based news using an objective framework, meaning that there is an expectation that journalists communicate the news impartially and without bias. Through an examination of gendered language and visual representations published in and by recent mainstream U.S. digital and print media outlets, this paper explains how the media plays a major role in the perpetuation of cis white masculinity. This paper …

The Numbers Don’T Lie: A Quantitative Examination Of Trauma Outcomes Among Black Homeless Women, Lisa Marie Persad

Dissertations, Theses, and Capstone Projects

Based on the extensive levels of trauma exposure and the need to provide effective mental health treatment for homeless women and their families, this dissertation was conducted to better understand trauma-related psychological distress and associated mental health outcomes among Black homeless women. More specifically, this study’s researcher examined a national sample of homeless women using three theoretical frameworks (Social Determinants of Health, Critical Race Theory, and Intersectionality), conducting a secondary analysis of the Mental Health Client Level-2018 dataset from the Substance Abuse and Mental Health Services Administration (SAMHSA), and employing hierarchical logistic regression modeling to examine the relative impact of …

Unlocking Potential: The School-To-Prison Pipeline For Students With Disabilities, Navena F. Chaitoo

Dissertations, Theses, and Capstone Projects

This research uses quasi-experimental, matched sampling to examine the school-to-prison pipeline for students with disabilities using data from the National Longitudinal Study of Adolescent to Adult Health. This study presents novel insights into an at-risk group that has faced disproportionate rates of school discipline and incarceration. The study finds school suspension to be associated with future involvement in the criminal legal system and lower educational attainment. Disability was not found to mediate the relationship between suspension and future involvement in the criminal legal system or the relationship between suspension and academic outcomes. However, disability was found to be a statistically …

Late Talkers: Maternal Input And Attention Allocation In Mother–Child Dyad Play, Toby B. Mehl

Dissertations, Theses, and Capstone Projects

Late talkers (LT) are two-year-old children with expressive language delays, who do not yet have a lexicon of fifty words, and do not combine words. Maternal child-directed language to these children, termed ‘maternal input’ may influence their language learning. The first aim of this study was to examine the relationship between a child’s language, as measured by expressive vocabulary, and the child-directed speech by the mother of the child. Maternal input to late-talking children was compared to the maternal input presented to two typical language matched groups: an age-matched group of children (AM) and a vocabulary-matched group of children (VM) …

Developing A Scale To Measure Internalization Of Oppression Among Latinx Living In New York City, Jeannette A. Sucre

Dissertations, Theses, and Capstone Projects

This study created a valid scale of internalization of oppression experienced by Latinx students in New York City. This scale might be used by school counselors, college advisors, and clinicians who work to help Latinx clients. Internalization of oppression refers to the attitudes, beliefs and feelings that may develop among people who belong to populations placed in subordinate positions or devalued by the dominant populations in the societies in which they live. During the past hundred years, sociologists, anthropologists, psychologists, historians, and other social thinkers have theorized about the problems that people experience when the groups and categories they belong …

Civil Society Organizations Serving Children In Vietnam: Opportunities And Constraints Working With Government Agencies, Trang P. Kelly

Dissertations, Theses, and Capstone Projects

When Vietnamese civil society organization (CSO) administrators manage their relationships with government authorities to ensure children receive social services, they operate under Vietnam’s complex political, socioeconomic, and cultural constraints in environments where the Vietnamese government employs soft power to control CSOs and their donors. This study adds to the literature on the nature of CSO in Vietnam. It details the current imbalance of power between state-sponsored organizations (SSOs) and non-SSOs and provides an updated view of how Vietnamese non-SSOs mix social, economic, and political roles as employers and advocates.

Combining a qualitative exploratory and interpretative case study, I address a …

Exploring The Barriers And Facilitators Of Puerto Rican Women Senior Leadership In New York City Nonprofit Social Service Organizations, Emily Lopez

Dissertations, Theses, and Capstone Projects

Puerto Rican women in senior leadership positions within nonprofit organizations contribute to the direction and governance of many New York City agencies. The findings in this research bring attention to their experiences and grit in the sector. According to Smith and Nkomo (2022) grit gives women of color in leadership the ability to bounce back after being discouraged and sidelined in their careers or to survive in hypermasculine cultures. Grit is defined as women who lead with passion, perseverance and know who they are (Smith & Nkomo, 2022). This study explores barriers and facilitators encountered by Puerto Rican women who …

Sit Less, Move More: A National Study Of Physical-Activity Behavior And Cancer, Stella O. Nwogugu

Dissertations, Theses, and Capstone Projects

Background: Physical activity is associated with lower risks of cancer, the second leading cause of death among Americans. Yet, sedentary behavior is the prevailing lifestyle for about 80% of American adults. Additionally, cancer survivors remain significantly inactive, even though physical activity has been shown to decrease risk of cancer and cancer recurrence, improve tolerance of cancer therapy, and reduce mortality. This research explores the relative impact of personal agency, social support, and key demographic variables on physical-activity behavior for a national sample of adults as well as how these relationships differ for cancer survivors and their counterparts.

Methods: Using the …

Naming Venus: An Exploration Of Goddesses, Heroines, And Famous Women, Kavya Beheraj

Dissertations, Theses, and Capstone Projects

Humans have been observing and romanticizing Venus for more than 5,000 years. However, mapping its surface has nearly always been impossible, since the planet is shrouded in thick clouds. A breakthrough came just fifty years ago with the invention of radar imaging, leading to the discovery (and naming) of hundreds of new features in a relatively short length of time.

The rapid naming of Venus is a case study on the impact of planetary nomenclature — the process of naming features on other worlds. While the act of naming streamlines communication and humanizes alien landscapes, it is subject to bias, …

Identification Of A Rare Sars-Cov-2 Xl Hybrid Variant In Wastewater And The Subsequent Discovery Of Two Infected Individuals In Nevada, Van Vo, Anthony Harrington, Salman Afzal, Katerina Papp, Ching-Lan Chang, Hayley Baker, Perseveranda Aguilar, Erin Buttery, Michael A. Picker, Cassius Lockett, Daniel Gerrity, Horng-Yuan Kan, Edwin C. Oh

Nevada Institute of Personalized Medicine Faculty Research

The identification of novel SARS-CoV-2 variants can predict new patterns of COVID-19 community transmission and lead to the deployment of public health resources. However, increased access to at-home antigen tests and reduced free PCR tests have recently led to data gaps for the surveillance of evolving SARS-CoV-2 variants. To overcome such limitations, we asked whether wastewater surveillance could be leveraged to detect rare variants circulating in a community before local detection in human cases. Here, we performed whole genome sequencing (WGS) of SARS-CoV-2 from a wastewater treatment plant serving Las Vegas, Nevada in April 2022. Using metrics that exceeded 100× …

Pronunciation Ambiguities In Japanese Kanji, Wen Zhang

Dissertations, Theses, and Capstone Projects

Japanese writing is a complex system, and a large part of the complexity resides in the use of kanji. A single kanji character in modern Japanese may have multiple pronunciations, either as native vocabulary or as words borrowed from Chinese. This causes a problem for text-to-speech synthesis (TTS) because the system has to predict which pronunciation of each kanji character is appropriate in the context. The problem is called homograph disambiguation. In Japanese TTS technology, the trick in any case is to know which is the right reading, which makes reading Japanese text a challenge. To solve the problem, …

Cost-Effective And Performance-Preserving Secured Application Management In Cloud Environments, Minh Nguyen

Dissertations, Theses, and Capstone Projects

Data-intensive science applications in areas such as high-energy and particle physics, bioinformatics, genomics, and healthcare are increasingly using distributed resources for computation and storage. For distributed systems, such applications can be represented in terms of: i) the involved data (e.g., sensitive healthcare data requiring HIPAA-compliance) and ii) the different lifecycle stages of processing, transfer, and storage that the data goes through (i.e., the application workflow which is typically represented as a directed acyclic graph). In most cases, such applications have specific performance (i.e., in terms of compute/networking/storage resources) and security requirements for both the data and workflow stages. Hence, more …

Incarceration-Related Stigma And Caring Self-Efficacy Among Long-Term Care Nurses, Sandra D. Langston

Dissertations, Theses, and Capstone Projects

Background: A silver tsunami is occurring in U.S. prisons because of an unprecedented increase in the older population. Prisons are structurally ill-suited to care for this population and financially burdened with providing the necessary medical and nursing care. States have enacted legislation to afford justice-involved persons parole to manage chronic conditions in community-based long-term care (LTC) facilities. Changes in Medicaid regulations provide a seamless transition from prison to community long-term care for this population. However, it is not known if the stigma of justice involvement impacts the perception of long-term nurses concerning this population.

Aims/Purpose: This study examined the effects …

A Novel Measure Of Narrative Self-Functioning And Its Role In The Transformative Potential Of Psychedelic Experience Across Clinical And Non-Clinical Participants, Nicole M. Amada

Dissertations, Theses, and Capstone Projects

The eudaimonic field of well-being is founded on the idea that self-knowledge and the realization of one’s potential is at the heart of what it means to strive for well-being. While the “self” is at the core of this perspective, theories derived from this field have yet to incorporate neurocognitive conceptualizations of the self, and account for the collection of self-referential cognitions that influence striving for well-being. Such a theory and measure could fill this theoretical gap and be applied in person centered interventions to capture change in these processes over time. One such intervention utilizes psychedelic experience as a …

2023-February-01-Etsu Professor Interested In Philosophy Of Science.Pdf, Iversity Marketing And Communication, East Tennessee State University

ETSU News

JOHNSON CITY – Dr. David Harker’s research, like the philosophy and purpose of science, was always important in academic circles. But in recent years, it has reached a deep level of relevancy – both in the United States and throughout the world. 

“Vaccine skepticism and vaccine hesitancy are big problems, and they are also really complicated,” said Harker, a professor and chair of Philosophy and Humanities at East Tennessee State University.

Harker has considered some of the reasons why such indecision exists.

“There is nothing very intuitive about the idea of injecting something into your arm helping protect you …

2023-February-01-Etsu Research Corp Announces New Industry Advisors.Pdf, Iversity Marketing And Communication, East Tennessee State University

ETSU News

JOHNSON CITY – The East Tennessee State University Research Corporation announced the addition of four industry advisors to its team as well as the creation of Rugged Buc Labs Content Studio (RBL). 

The new advisors include Scott Andrew, Ty Warren, Anthony Haney-Jardine and Jason Thompson. They will offer their support for ETSU Research Corporation initiatives as well as mentor ETSU students in the RBL.  

Scott Andrew

Launching A 3d Printing Program For Students: Recommendations And Best Practices For Libraries, Wilhelmina Randtke, Nathaniel Lee Bareford

University Libraries: Faculty Publications

The Georgia Southern University Libraries launched a 3D printing program for students in July 2022. Prior to launch, library employees at two of Georgia Southern University’s campuses investigated options for implementing safe, affordable, and sustainable 3D printing in existing academic libraries without retrofitting costly ventilation systems into existing facilities. This article describes the reasons why the Georgia Southern University Libraries thought that a 3D printing program could fulfill a service need for students across university colleges and departments and outlines some of the challenges, best practices, and unique innovations that the library’s employees experienced throughout the program launch process. The …

Compassion Satisfaction: Redressed Professional Stress And Representation Burnout, Kay Coates

University Libraries: Faculty Presentations

No abstract provided.

“Get On The Truth Train”: Faculty Perceptions Of Misinformation And Disinformation In The Classroom And In The Disciplines, Sarah Slaughter

LOEX Quarterly

No abstract provided.

Gaps In The Screening Process For Women Diagnosed With Cervical Cancer In Four Diverse Us Health Care Settings, Chun R. Chao, Jessica Chubak, Elisabeth F. Beaber, Aruna Kamineni, Connie Mao, Michael J. Silverberg, Jasmin A. Tiro, Celette Skinner, Michael Garcia, Douglas A. Corley, Rachel L. Winer, Tina Raine-Bennett, Sarah Feldman, Cosette M. Wheeler

Pathology Research and Scholarship

BACKGROUND: Potential care gaps in the cervical cancer screening process among women diagnosed with cervical cancer in an era with increased human papillomavirus (HPV) testing have not been extensively evaluated.

METHODS: Women diagnosed with cervical cancer between ages 21 and 65 at four study sites between 2010 and 2014 were included. Screening histories were ascertained from 0.5 to 4 years prior to cervical cancer diagnosis. We identified potential care gaps in the screening history for each woman and classified them into one of three mutually exclusive types: lack of a screening test, screening test failure, and diagnostic/treatment care gap. Distributions …

02-07-23 Hsc Committee Meeting Agenda, Hsc Committee

HSC Committee (A subcommittee of the UNM Board of Regents)

No abstract provided.

Refining The Moose Serum Progesterone Threshold To Diagnose Pregnancy, Madeline Struck, William J. Severud, Yvette M. Chenaux-Ibrahim, Edmund J. Isaac, Janine L. Brown, Seth A. Moore, Tiffany M. Wolf

Natural Resource Management Faculty Publications

Pregnancy determination is necessary for sound wildlife management and understanding population dynamics. Pregnancy rates are sensitive to environmental and physiological factors and may indicate the overall trajectory of a population. Pregnancy can be assessed through direct methods (rectal palpation, sonography) or indicated using hormonal assays (serum progesterone or pregnancy-specific protein B, fecal progestogen metabolites). A commonly used threshold of 2 ng/ml of progesterone in serum has been used by moose biologists to indicate pregnancy but has not been rigorously investigated. To refine this threshold, we examined the relationship between progesterone concentrations in serum samples and pregnancy in 87 moose ( …

Social Bot Detection Using Machine Learning Algorithms: A Survey And Research Challenges, Kayhan Zrar Ghafoor

Polytechnic Journal

In the past decade social media platforms growing rapidly and they are part of our routine life. Each platform has its own specification which uses for specific purposes. After this widely spread, those SMPs were targeted by the cybercriminals to cast their malicious activities. There are many different malicious activities in SMPs such as spamming, phishing, fake account. In these papers, Bots activities in SMPs one of those threats which include fake accounts, fake friends/followers, spreading misinformation by purpose, and many more. At the beginning of our work, we explain all terminology related to this topic to have a clear …

State V. Gutierrez Abolishing The Spousal Communications Privilege: An Opinion Raising Profound Questions About The Future Of Evidentiary Privileges In The United States, Edward J. Imwinkelried

New Mexico Law Review

Part I of this article is a detailed description of the original Gutierrez decision, the dissents as well as the majority opinion. Part II then critically evaluates the majority’s analysis of the application of the instrumental theory to the spousal communications privilege. Part II argues that the majority correctly concluded that the instrumental case for the spousal privilege is weak. The majority rigorously applied the instrumental criteria to the privilege and came to the honest, realistic conclusion that, in most cases, spouses would consult and confide even if there were no spousal privilege. However, Part II points out that the …

Crowdsourcing Justice, Matthew Dylag

Canadian Journal of Law and Technology

Social media has become ubiquitous in the daily lives of Canadians. Beyond connecting with friends and family, people also turn to social media to find information and seek advice on any number of topics, be it home cooking, workout routines, or automobile purchases. Indeed, social media is a flexible vehicle that can be leveraged for communication on almost any topic. It is not surprising, therefore, that individuals are also turning to social media to help resolve their legal problems. Even a cursory examination of social media will reveal that it is not uncommon for individuals who are experiencing legal difficulties …