Digital Commons Network^™

Barriers To Veterans Affairs (Va) Healthcare Utilization: Exploring The Underutilization Of Va Healthcare Services Among Rural, West Texas Veterans, Adam G. Rodgers

Electronic Theses and Dissertations

Rural veterans forgo Department of Veterans Affairs (VA) healthcare at disproportionate rates, and this study found that the primary barrier is not enrollment but utilization. Seven of the eight participants were already enrolled yet remained functionally outside the system. The purpose of this qualitative single-case study was to explore why rural West Texas veterans forgo and underutilize Veterans Health Administration (VHA) healthcare. Two research questions examined the perceptions contributing to that decision and the barriers preventing access. Andersen’s behavioral model of health services use provided the framework. Semistructured virtual interviews with eight rural West Texas veterans were analyzed using Braun …

Early Prediction Of The Breast Cancer Response To Neoadjuvant Chemotherapy Based On Intratumoral Interstitial Fluid Pressure Using 3-D Subharmonic-Aided Pressure Estimation, Sung In Choi, Basak Dogan, Corinne E. Wessner, Jessica H. Porembka, Priscilla Machado, B. Bersu Ozcan, Nisha Unni, Maysa Abu-Khalaf, Kenneth Hoyt, Flemming Forsberg, Kibo Nam

Department of Radiology Faculty Papers

Elevated intratumoral interstitial fluid pressure (IFP) may negatively impact the efficacy of neoadjuvant chemotherapy (NAC). This study aimed to predict the breast cancer response to NAC based on intratumoral IFP using 3D contrast-enhanced ultrasound (CEUS) with subharmonic-aided pressure estimation (SHAPE). This prospective study enrolled breast cancer patients undergoing NAC from two clinical sites. 3D CEUS was performed at 0%, 10%, and 30% of NAC completion using a GE Logiq E9 with Definity. The pressure gradients between the tumor and adjacent normal tissue were estimated by SHAPE, utilizing the inverse linear relationship between the ultrasound contrast agent’s subharmonic signal amplitude and …

Rompiendo Fronteras: Addressing Language Barriers In Hispanic Palliative Cancer Care, Carla Mcnulty, Catherine Finlayson

International Nursing Research Congress (INRC)

Background: Cancer is the leading cause of death among Hispanic people, accounting for 20% of deaths (American Cancer Society, 2023). In 2024, the American Cancer Society predicted that 195,300 Hispanics would be diagnosed with cancer in the United States, and 50,400 (25%) would die from their disease, leaving approximately 144,900 (75%) living with cancer. As the Hispanic population rises in the United States, one can predict that cancer diagnoses will also increase. This is likely to result in a higher number of cancer-related deaths, as well as more individuals living with cancer. Consequently, there will be an increased demand for …

Resource Assessment Report No. 12: North Coast Demersal Scalefish Resource: Pilbara Red Emperor 2026 Assessment, Fabian I. Trinnie, Rubie Evans-Powell, Brett Crisafulli, S. A. Hesp, Ainslie Denham, Dion Boddington, Craig L. Skepper

Resource Assessment Reports

Executive Summary

The North Coast Demersal Scalefish Resource (NCDSR) comprises ecological suites of tropical demersal fish species that occur predominantly in inshore (20–250 m deep) and offshore (> 250 m deep) waters of the North Coast Bioregion (NCB). More than 60 demersal species are landed by fisheries operating in the Kimberley and Pilbara regions of the NCB each year, including higher-valued species, such as red emperor (Lutjanus sebae), goldband snapper (Pristipomoides multidens), rankin cod (Epinephelus rankini), and ruby snapper (Etelis boweni), and lower-valued species, such as bluespotted emperor (Lethrinus punctulatus).

The Pilbara Demersal Scalefish Resource (PDSR) is harvested by the …

Investigating The Role Of Gαf In Sperm Storage In The Spermathecae Of Female Drosophila Melanogaster, Aileen Liu

Holster Scholar Projects

Reproductive secretory cells are essential for fertility and have been implicated in diseases such as high-grade serous cancer, yet the molecular mechanisms governing their function remain poorly understood. Using genetic tools available in Drosophila melanogaster, we investigated whether Gαf contributes to reproductive secretory-cell function by examining its role in sperm storage. Gαf is highly expressed in these cells, suggesting a potential role in secretory cell function. Tissue-specific RNAi, trans-heterozygous mutants, and tissue-specific rescue were utilized to examine the role of Gαf in sperm storage. Gαf knockdown consistently reduced sperm storage, supporting a role for Gαf in maintaining normal sperm …

The Β2Αb Loop Determines Nad(P) Cofactor Specificity And Kinetics In Trypanosomal D-3-Hydroxybutyrate Dehydrogenases, Hideharu Hashimoto, Ian H. Mawn, William Escobar-Arrillaga, Linh Nguyen, Laura A. Madigan, Gina Antuono, Tatiana Rossy, Jorna Sojati, Anna Mienko, Erik W. Debler, Jennifer B. Palenchar

Department of Biochemistry and Molecular Biology Faculty Papers

Bacterial d-3-hydroxybutyrate dehydrogenases (HBDHs) catalyze the conversion between d-3-hydroxybutyrate and acetoacetate with NAD as the cofactor but not with NAD 2'-phosphate (NADP). However, HBDHs of the early-branched eukaryotic genus Trypanosoma utilize both NAD and NADP (T. brucei) or exclusively NADP (T. cruzi). Here we reveal that NADP specificity of T. cruzi HBDH arises from stabilization of the flexible β2αB loop by the 2'-phosphate interaction. Stabilization of this loop by a nearby C64Y mutation enables T. cruzi HBDH to use NAD in addition to NADP; thus, the Cys/Tyr residue is critical for determining cofactor specificity in trypanosomal HBDHs, suggesting that most …

Parents Don’T Dictate The Menu: Lack Of Strong Host-Specific Parental Effects May Help Maintain Dietary Generalism, Emma J. Sellers, Mayra C. Vidal, Dhaval K. Vyas, Mykaela Tanino-Springsteen, Gina M. Wimp, Mattheau S. Comerford, Mariana Abarca, Shannon M. Murphy

Biological Sciences: Faculty Publications

The environment or experiences of a parent generation can impact the fitness of the next generation, a phenomenon known as parental effects. While a high-quality diet can directly benefit an individual and a low-quality diet can reduce fitness, a parental effect occurs only when there is a transgenerational response to these stimuli that manifests in the individual’s offspring. In dietary generalists, a parental effect could play an important role for offspring performance if the species experiences considerable variation in quality across host plants; posi- tive parental effects may result from host matching between parents and offspring on high-quality host plants, …

Peritoneal Dialysis Catheter Complications In Neonates With Kidney Failure., Shannon Reinert, Maanasa Yarlagadda, Alexander Bondoc, Donna Claes, Stefanie Riddle, Meredith P. Schuh

Manuscripts, Articles, Book Chapters and Other Papers

BACKGROUND: Neonates with kidney failure require placement of a peritoneal dialysis catheter (PD-C) shortly after birth. PD-C malfunction and peritonitis, both common in this population, are associated with PD failure. The aim of this study was to describe our center's PD-C-related practices and outcomes in neonates with kidney failure.

METHODS: We performed a retrospective chart review of neonates who required kidney replacement therapy (KRT) within the first 30 days of life from 01/2018-12/2023. We evaluated for PD-C duration, PD-C replacement or revision, and peritonitis.

RESULTS: Twenty-four neonates had PD-C placed for chronic dialysis at a median of 9.7 days and …

Bile Acid Metabolites And Carotid Intima Media Thickness In The Chronic Kidney Disease In Children (Ckid) Study., Arthur M. Lee, Mark M. Mitsnefes, Jennifer Roem, Bradley A. Warady, Susan L. Furth, Michelle R. Denburg, Ckid Study Investigators

Manuscripts, Articles, Book Chapters and Other Papers

No abstract provided.

Reframing Foster Care Permanency Through Multi-Party Arbitration, Jacqueline Kitzes

Cardozo Journal of Conflict Resolution

The foster care system is intended to provide children with temporary, safe living arrangements while working toward permanency through reunification, adoption, or guardianship. Yet adversarial court proceedings, judicial backlogs, limited stakeholder participation, and insufficient judicial expertise in child development can delay permanency decisions and prolong children’s exposure to placement instability. This Note examines the shortcomings of the current judicial framework for resolving foster care cases and argues that multi-party arbitration offers a more efficient and child-centered alternative. Drawing on the historical development of the child welfare system and research concerning placement instability, permanency hearings, and stakeholder participation, the Note considers …

Failed Gay Rights Amendment To Mankato's Human Rights Ordinance In Mankato, Minnesota In 1987, Kellian Clink

Library Services Publications

In 1987, small but passionate people urged the city to pass an amendment to Mankato’s existing human rights ordinance to protect LGBTQ+ communities.   Advocates argued that gays were entitled to the same rights as straight people and were looking for protection in housing and employment, particularly. They demonstrated that people had lost jobs, housing, and access to dance venues. Some opponents equated gays with promiscuity, child molestation, solicitation, sin, and AIDS; some were convinced it was not needed; some pinned their arguments on the existence of laws already on the books.  This narrative is based on articles from the local …

Ai-Driven Biomarker Discovery & Progression Modeling For Precision Diagnosis Of Glaucoma, Cheng Huang

Computer Science and Engineering Theses and Dissertations

This dissertation presents a comprehensive study on the integration of artificial intelligence (AI) for glaucoma diagnosis and retinal image analysis. Leveraging multimodal imaging data including fundus photography, Optical Coherence Tomography Optical Coherence Tomography (OCT) and Optical Coherence Tomography Angiography (OCTA), the research develops a suite of deep learning frameworks designed to detect early glaucomatous changes with high precision, robustness, and interpretability. A series of novel architectures are introduced, spanning vessel segmentation networks, biomarker discovery pipelines, and multimodal fusion models, all designed to enhance diagnostic accuracy and generalizability across diverse populations. To facilitate reproducible and scalable ophthalmic AI research, this work …

Is More The Merrier? A Study Of External Social Support, Anxiety Symptomologies, And Job Satisfaction, Olga Chapa, Rawia Ahmed, María Del Carmen Triana, Liza M. Lybolt

All Works

The purpose of this study is to analyze the relationship between the amount of social support employees receive from external social networks and employees' anxiety and job satisfaction. Data was collected to quantify employees' external social network engagements within a 30-day time period and analyze how the source of support will play a role in employees' self-reported symptoms of anxiety during the same 30-day period and job satisfaction. We sampled employees in the United States from various industries. Findings show that the amount of social support played a role in experienced anxiety and job satisfaction. Specifically, there was a curvilinear …

Legal Scapegoating Of Transgender People, Democratic Vulnerability, And The Problem Of Judicial Blinders, Suzanne B. Goldberg

Faculty Scholarship

Over the past decade, lawmakers have proposed an extraordinary number of restrictions on transgender people across nearly every area of public and private life — bathrooms, health care, athletics, education, identity documents, military service, prisons, and more. This Article argues that these measures are best understood as legal scapegoating, meaning the use of law to galvanize public discomfort and hostility toward a targeted group. While demagogic rhetoric can also galvanize those reactions, the concrete restrictions of a legal scapegoating effort raise two further risks, one for democratic governance and the other for judicial review. First, legal scapegoating normalizes government’s use …

2026 Fall - Veterans Upward Bound Newsletter, Veterans Upward Bound, East Tennessee State University

Veterans Upward Bound Newsletters

No abstract provided.

A Response To How Ai Destroys Institutions, Andrew M. Perlman

SMU Law Review Forum

No abstract provided.

An Exploration Of Plasticity In Apocynum Cannabinum, Mia Moore 28, Rose Keith

Annual Student Research Poster Session

Hemp Dogbane (Apocynum Cannabinum) is a perennial plant native to the United States known for being extremely plastic, meaning its morphological traits adapt to its environment. This study explores how dogbane adapts to microgeographic variance and how its morphological traits are influenced by its genetics vs. the environment. We conducted various experiments over the summer. The first was a large census at the beginning of the summer where we measured several morphological traits of dogbane from the quarry bottom of the DePauw Nature Park (DNP) and various other locations in or adjacent to the DNP. We repeated this census at …

Intermediate College Writing: Building And Practicing Mindful Writing Skills, Dawn Atkinson, Stacey Corbitt

Writing

No abstract provided.

Fostering Public Appreciation For Science Through Online Communication, Carrie Craig-Barnes

Paul English Applied Artificial Intelligence (AI) Institute Publications

This presentation explores strategies for fostering public appreciation for science through online communication, highlighting initiatives developed by the NSF Center for Computer Assisted Synthesis (C-CAS). Carrie Craig-Barnes discusses the use of social media platforms, including Instagram, YouTube, and TikTok, to communicate scientific research, engage broader audiences, and make complex scientific concepts more accessible.

The presentation examines approaches to science communication through short-form videos, educational content, collaborations with science communicators, and audience engagement strategies. It also introduces an interactive video game project that combines chemistry education, machine learning, and crowdsourced scientific research, allowing participants to contribute to the classification of scientific …

The Case For Cases: From Compelling Stories To Responsible Reasoning And Adaptive Learning, Hashem Elassad, James Hutson

Faculty Scholarship

Examples, stories, and cases connect abstract propositions with situations, yet their pedagogical usefulness does not establish their evidentiary adequacy. This conceptual article examines how case-based learning can support understanding, responsible judgment, and adaptive knowledge use without allowing memorable narratives to substitute for warranted inference. Building on an originating essay about the value of examples, the analysis integrates selected scholarship on case-based reasoning, worked examples, analogical comparison, narrative persuasion, epistemic cognition, and Cognitive Flexibility Theory. The methodology consists of purposive literature selection, conceptual differentiation, comparison of explanatory mechanisms, examination of boundary conditions, and development of an integrative instructional framework; it is …

First Evaluation Of Contrast-Enhanced Micro-Xct As A Tool For Organismal And Reproductive Trait Observations In Corals Based On Scans Of Thesea Nivea Deichmann, 1936, Erin E. Easton

School of Earth, Environmental, & Marine Sciences Faculty Publications

Micro-X-ray computed tomography (micro-XCT) with contrast enhancement is considered a non-destructive tool that is increasingly being applied to explore the internal and external structures of vertebrates and invertebrates. Although micro-XCT has been applied to corals to study skeletal features, contrast enhancement has not been applied to evaluate the utility for visualization of soft tissue structures in corals. This study is the first to evaluate the utility of contrast enhancement to visualize internal and external features, including soft tissue features, of octocorals. Contrast staining of a Thesea nivea specimen with 2.5% Lugol's iodine permitted visualization of soft tissues with sufficient density …

Asa Gray’S Darwinian Theism And The Problem Of Coherence, Michael A. Flannery

Libraries Professional Work

Recently it has been argued by Rope Kojonen that Asa Gray’s public promotion of Darwinian evolution can be defended as a “conjunctive” explanation that accommodates both Darwin’s natural selection and its stochastic processes as well as a teleology fully commensurate with a divine order—theistic evolution thus, if not vindicated, is at least supportable on logical grounds. However, on close examination this idea is questioned by focusing on certain important historical issues that the conjunctive explanation fails to resolve, and in some cases, even address. In the end, Gray’s spirited public promotion of Darwin’s “grand idea” is not an issue of …

A Folk Taxonomy Of Magic, Gustav Kuhn, Cyril Thomas, Griffiths Thomas

School of Psychology

Magic tricks provide a uniquely powerful window onto the boundaries of what people consider possible, and the ways in which those boundaries can be challenged. Although there exists an effectively infinite variety of magic tricks, relatively little is known about how different magical effects relate to one another at a psychological level. Previous attempts to classify magic have largely relied on the judgments of a small number of expert magicians, rather than capturing people’s intuitive understanding of magical phenomena. Here, we introduce a new multi-dimensional taxonomy of magic that treats the observable effect (e.g., an object vanishing) and the attributed …

Scientific Innovation, Institutionalization, And Moral Dilemmas: From Chemical Warfare In World War I To Ai In Modern Conflict, Kylie Kiefer

Holster Scholar Projects

This research examines the different American perspectives surrounding the morality and future of chemical warfare during and after World War I. Using primary sources collected at the National Archives at College Park, it argues that the Chemical Warfare Service survived not because Americans agreed that poison gas was morally acceptable, but because wartime mobilization created scientific expertise, military facilities, and relationships that made dismantling the service after the war difficult. While opponents emphasized moral and humanitarian concerns, advocates defended chemical warfare through arguments about preparedness, military necessity, and claims that gas was more humane than conventional weapons. The paper also …

Advanced-Level Writing In The University Classroom And Beyond: Mindful Practices For Technical, Business, And Scientific Communication, Dawn Atkinson, Stacey Corbitt

Writing

No abstract provided.

Spatio-Temporal Analysis Of The Roadside Transportation-Related Air Quality (Startraq 2024): Time-Series Analysis, Jaymin Kwon, Yushin Ahn, Steve Chung

Mineta Transportation Institute

Transportation-related air pollution remains a significant environmental and public health challenge in California’s San Joaquin Valley. This report presents a spatio-temporal analysis of roadside transportation-related air quality in Fresno County, California, from 1985 to 2023 with projections from 2024 through 2032. Using historical emissions inventories, projected vehicle miles traveled (VMT), infrastructure data, and land cover analysis, the study examines how transportation activity and urban expansion have influenced air quality across the region over time. Findings reveal that while PM10, PM2.5, NOx, SOₓ, CO, and CO₂ emissions from on-road mobile sources have declined significantly due to regulatory programs and cleaner technologies, …

Dipl 6276 Global Health Governance, Yanzhong Huang Ph.D.

Diplomacy Syllabi

Public health challenges — pandemic influenza, HIV and AIDS, COVID-19, obesity, neglected diseases, tobacco use, climate change, and underperforming health systems — increasingly shape and are shaped by the political, economic, and social dimensions of globalization. At the same time, international rules that fall outside the traditional health sphere, such as those governing intellectual property, trade, and greenhouse gas emissions, can have profound consequences for human health. Strong national health systems remain essential, but the reach of health threats and the capacity to respond often extend beyond any single state and beyond the health sector itself. Translating development goals into …

Blue Carbon Ecosystems As Climate Solutions: Sequestration Across Coastal And Marine Environments, Allison K. White, Richard J. Kline, Md. Saydur Rahman

School of Earth, Environmental, & Marine Sciences Faculty Publications

Blue carbon ecosystems (BCEs) such as mangroves, salt marshes, and seagrasses, sequester significant amounts of CO2 from the atmosphere. These ecosystems capture and store carbon in biomass and sediments over long periods. Other marine ecosystems, including the open ocean, kelp forests, bivalve reefs, and coral reefs, have been excluded from the BCEs, but they have the potential to serve as crucial blue carbon sinks or to support adjacent BCEs. Climate change, however, poses severe threats to these ecosystems. Rising sea levels, increasing temperatures, and ocean acidification can lead to habitat loss, reduced biodiversity, and impaired carbon sequestration capacity. Consequently, anthropogenic …

October 1, 2026 (The Breeze Family Weekend Special Edition)

The Breeze, 2020-

No abstract provided.

Student Perceptions Of Artificial Intelligence-Generated Child Sexual Abuse Material: A Qualitative Content Analysis, Paige Horton, Amanda Isabel Osuna

Dignity: A Journal of Analysis of Exploitation and Violence

The rapid growth of artificial intelligence (AI), especially generative AI and deepfake technology, has introduced new challenges in the production and dissemination of child sexual abuse material (CSAM). While existing research has examined the technological and legal implications of AI-generated child sexual abuse material, less is known about how the public, especially young adults who are most likely to use AI technologies, perceive these developments. The present study addresses this gap by examining undergraduate student perceptions of AI-generated child sexual abuse material at a medium-sized private university in the Southeastern United States. Using data from a Qualtrics survey, this study …