Digital Commons Network^™

Interview No. 1756, Eva Valdez

Combined Interviews

Eva was offered to join the strike during her time working at Farah Manufacturing Company, she first felt kind of scared because she didn’t want to be part of a strike. Eva didn’t understand what the union strike was about but she would later find out.

Eva’s first days at the Farah Manufacturing Company were filled with patches and jeans. She mentioned that she had to put patches in clothing items all day for long periods of time. For her work she would get pay less than $1.60 an hour. Some of her women coworkers had been working there for …

Interview No. 1761, Rios

Combined Interviews

Everyone at Farah hated their job, that’s how Rios described it when she first started working there. She didn’t understand the problems happening at Farah at Paisano that made every worker hate going to work every day. A couple of days pass, she received her first check and realized that she got payed very little, when the manager told her that she would be getting payed more. She realized that she started her work there as a lie and that the contract that she sign was also a total lie that the managers didn’t respect.

At first, she thought that …

Interview No. 1765, Garcia

Combined Interviews

Garcia has lived and worked in El Paso, Texas. She mentioned that poverty in Mexico is worse than the poverty in the United States. Garcia left Mexico 5 years ago to get a better life in the USA. She left her children with her mother and got on the train to get to El Paso, Texas. She first arrived to Ciudad Juarez, Mexico and stayed with a family during a couple of weeks, while she gathered her papers to get a passport. After she got her passport she went to El Paso and started working and sending money back to …

Interview No. 1768, Arieta

Combined Interviews

When Arieta initially started working there, she said that everyone at Farah detested their jobs. She didn't get the issues at Farah in Paisano that made every employee dread reporting to work each day. After a few days had passed, she received her first check and found she had been paid very little before the manager informed her that her pay would be increasing. She came to the realization that the contract she signed when she first started working there was also a complete fabrication that the bosses didn't regard.

She initially believed that Farah employed anyone who was willing …

Interview No. 1770, Del Hierro

Combined Interviews

Nearly all of Farah's employees were exhausted and tired of work. That was when Del Hierro started working there. She didn’t understand the problem in Farah of Paisano that was causing all workers to be reluctant to go to work every day. A few days went by and she received her first check and when the manager told her she would be paid more, she realized she had barely been paid, and realized that the contract she signed was also a complete lie and not respected by her manager.

At first, she thought the hiring process would be so easy …

Interview No. 1775, Jaramillo De Palacio

Combined Interviews

She mentions that the companies were demanding the same quality of work and they were not realizing the amount of work they were giving to the workers, and it was an excessive amount of it. She says that the strikes separated people because it was a movement that had different opinions, but in the end they were fighting for the same thing. The union was created to support employees but the workers realized that that wasn’t true at all. When the strike first started she couldn’t ever imagine that the strike was going to be as big as it was, …

Interview No. 1776, Paraa

Combined Interviews

She says that everything is back in busisnes at Farah and that the new president of Farah is not fighting with the union any more. She says that many people are getting left off and many people just like her she was let off and came back 3 times in a row and she says that she is thinking that is better for her to start studying. She says that Willy Farah, the owner, was very hated and loved at the same tiem and she says that many people will give them gifts such as bringing him mariachi and workers …

Interview No. 1778, Herrera

Combined Interviews

She said her husband worked for Farah, but they treated him very poorly, and were told to keep working with the bad consditionds. All they could do was keep working, but eventually tired of the abuse. She says that his His job at Farah included cutting metals that left a lot of metal debrie, which were labor intensive and heavy jobs. She claims that before the union there was no one to turn to for help and his husband was part of the union. They believed a union would improve their situation, but it didn't work. When you were hired, …

Interview No. 1783, Avalos

Combined Interviews

Avalos grandmother is from Mexico. Her father was always on duty and her mother passed away when Avalos was four years old. After her mother passing, her grandmother adopted them and she became their mother. Avalos considers her grandmother her real mother, because she did everything for them. Avalos thanks her grandmother for everything she did for them even when she was an older woman struggling with her health. During her childhood before living with her grandmother she was at an orphanage for a couple of months. Once Avalos and her siblings went to stay with her grandmother their lives …

A Fair Incentive Scheme For Community Health Workers, Avinandan Bose, Tracey Li, Arunesh Sinha, Tien Mai

Research Collection School Of Computing and Information Systems

Community health workers (CHWs) play a crucial role in the last mile delivery of essential health services to under-served populations in low-income countries. Many non-governmental organizations (NGOs) provide training and support to enable CHWs to deliver health services to their communities, with no charge to the recipients of the services. This includes monetary compensation for the work that CHWs perform, which is broken down into a series of well-defined tasks. In this work, we partner with a NGO D-Tree International to design a fair monetary compensation scheme for tasks performed by CHWs in the semi-autonomous region of Zanzibar in Tanzania, …

Lightweight And Non-Invasive User Authentication On Earables, Changshuo Hu, Xiao Ma, Dong Ma, Ting Dang

Research Collection School Of Computing and Information Systems

The widespread adoption of wireless earbuds has advanced the developments in earable-based sensing in various domains like entertainment, human-computer interaction, and health monitoring. Recently, researchers have shown an increased interest in user authentication using earables. Despite the successes witnessed in acoustic probing and speech based authentication systems, this paper proposed a lightweight and non-invasive ambient sound based user authentication scheme. It employs the difference between the in-ear and out-ear sounds to estimate the individual-specific occluded ear canal transfer function (OECTF). Specifically, the {out-ear, in-ear} scaling factors at different frequency bands are captured via linear regression and treated as the OECTF …

Mitigating Popularity Bias For Users And Items With Fairness-Centric Adaptive Recommendation, Zhongzhou Liu, Yuan Fang, Min Wu

Research Collection School Of Computing and Information Systems

Recommendation systems are popular in many domains. Researchers usually focus on the effectiveness of recommendation (e.g., precision) but neglect the popularity bias that may affect the fairness of the recommendation, which is also an important consideration that could influence the benefits of users and item providers. A few studies have been proposed to deal with the popularity bias, but they often face two limitations. Firstly, most studies only consider fairness for one side - either users or items, without achieving fairness jointly for both. Secondly, existing methods are not sufficiently tailored to each individual user or item to cope with …

Learning To Count Isomorphisms With Graph Neural Networks, Xingtong Yu, Zemin Liu, Yuan Fang, Xinming Zhang

Research Collection School Of Computing and Information Systems

Subgraph isomorphism counting is an important problem on graphs, as many graph-based tasks exploit recurring subgraph patterns. Classical methods usually boil down to a backtracking framework that needs to navigate a huge search space with prohibitive computational costs. Some recent studies resort to graph neural networks (GNNs) to learn a low-dimensional representation for both the query and input graphs, in order to predict the number of subgraph isomorphisms on the input graph. However, typical GNNs employ a node-centric message passing scheme that receives and aggregates messages on nodes, which is inadequate in complex structure matching for isomorphism counting. Moreover, on …

On Generalized Degree Fairness In Graph Neural Networks, Zemin Liu, Trung Kien Nguyen, Yuan Fang

Research Collection School Of Computing and Information Systems

Conventional graph neural networks (GNNs) are often confronted with fairness issues that may stem from their input, including node attributes and neighbors surrounding a node. While several recent approaches have been proposed to eliminate the bias rooted in sensitive attributes, they ignore the other key input of GNNs, namely the neighbors of a node, which can introduce bias since GNNs hinge on neighborhood structures to generate node representations. In particular, the varying neighborhood structures across nodes, manifesting themselves in drastically different node degrees, give rise to the diverse behaviors of nodes and biased outcomes. In this paper, we first define …

Flexible Job-Shop Scheduling Via Graph Neural Network And Deep Reinforcement Learning, Wen Song, Xinyang Chen, Qiqiang Li, Zhiguang Cao

Research Collection School Of Computing and Information Systems

Recently, deep reinforcement learning (DRL) has been applied to learn priority dispatching rules (PDRs) for solving complex scheduling problems. However, the existing works face challenges in dealing with flexibility, which allows an operation to be scheduled on one out of multiple machines and is often required in practice. Such one-to-many relationship brings additional complexity in both decision making and state representation. This article considers the well-known flexible job-shop scheduling problem and addresses these issues by proposing a novel DRL method to learn high-quality PDRs end to end. The operation selection and the machine assignment are combined as a composite decision. …

Contrastive Learning Approach To Word-In-Context Task For Low-Resource Languages, Pei-Chi Lo, Yang-Yin Lee, Hsien-Hao Chen, Agus Trisnajaya Kwee, Ee-Peng Lim

Research Collection School Of Computing and Information Systems

Word in context (WiC) task aims to determine whether a target word’s occurrences in two sentences share the same sense. In this paper, we propose a Contrastive Learning WiC (CLWiC) framework to improve the learning of sentence/word representations and classification of target word senses in the sentence pair when performing WiC on lowresource languages. In representation learning, CLWiC trains a pre-trained language model’s ability to cope with lowresource languages using both unsupervised and supervised contrastive learning. The WiC classifier learning further finetunes the language model with WiC classification loss under two classifier architecture options, SGBERT and WiSBERT, which use single-encoder …

Encapsulation Of Orange Peel Oil In Biopolymeric Nanocomposites To Control Its Release Under Different Conditions, Sanaz Ghasemi, Elham Assadpour, Mohammad Saeed Kharazmi, Shima Jafarzadeh, Masoumeh Zargar, Seid Mahdi Jafari

Research outputs 2022 to 2026

Orange peel oil (OPO) is one of the most common flavorings used in the food industry, but it is volatile under environmental conditions (the presence of light, oxygen, humidity, and high temperatures). Encapsulation by biopolymer nanocomposites is a suitable and novel strategy to improve the bioavailability and stability of OPO and its controlled release. In this study, we investigated the release profile of OPO from freeze-dried optimized nanocomposite powders as a function of pH (3, 7, 11) and temperature (30, 60, and 90 °C), and within a simulated salivary system. Finally, its release kinetics modelling was performed using experimental models. …

Psychological Profiles Of South African Smallholder Farmers, Navjot Bhullar, Nkhanedzeni B. Nengovhela, Livhuwani Mudau, Renato A. Villano, Isaac Koomson, Heather M. Burrow

Research outputs 2022 to 2026

The present study examined smallholder farmer profiles based on key psychological variables associated with farm business performance in the South African context. A sample of 471 beef farmers (mean age = 54.15 years; SD = 14.46; men = 76 %) and 426 poultry farmers (mean age = 47.28 years; SD = 13.53; women = 54.5 %) provided data on a range of measures assessing attitudes, subjective norms, perceived behavioral control, personality characteristics, present and future time orientation, expected benefits of, and efficacy to perform the farm business tasks, and farm-related concerns. Latent profile analysis identified three distinct profile segments of …

Calling An Ambulance For Non-Emergency Medical Situations: Results Of A Cross-Sectional Online Survey From An Australian Nationally Representative Sample, Brennen Mills, Michella Hill, Alecka Miles, Erin Smith, Eben Afrifa-Yamoah, David Reid, Shane Rogers, Moira Sim

Research outputs 2022 to 2026

Objective

To investigate the Australian general public's perception of appropriate medical scenarios that warrants a call to an emergency ambulance.

Methods

An online survey asked participants to identify the likely medical treatment pathway they would take for 17 hypothetical medical scenarios. The number and type of non-emergency scenarios (n = 8) participants incorrectly suggested were appropriate to place a call for an emergency ambulance were calculated. Participants included Australian residents (aged >18 years) who had never worked as an Australian registered medical doctor, nurse or paramedic.

Results

From a sample of 5264 participants, 40% suggested calling an emergency ambulance …

Risk Factors Associated With 30-Day Unplanned Hospital Readmission For Patients With Mental Illness, Huaqiong Zhou, Irene Ngune, Matthew A. Albrecht, Phillip R. Della

Research outputs 2022 to 2026

Unplanned hospital readmission rate is up to 43 % in mental health settings, which is higher than in general health settings. Unplanned readmissions delay the recovery of patients with mental illness and add financial burden on families and healthcare services. There have been efforts to reduce readmissions with a particular interest in identifying patients at higher readmission risk after index admission; however, the results have been inconsistent. This systematic review synthesized risk factors associated with 30-day unplanned hospital readmissions for patients with mental illness. Eleven electronic databases were searched from 2010 to 30 September 2021 using key terms of 'mental …

Clinical Epigenomic Explanation Of The Epidemiology Of Cannabinoid Genotoxicity Manifesting As Transgenerational Teratogenesis, Cancerogenesis And Aging Acceleration, Albert Stuart Reece, Gary Kenneth Hulse

Research outputs 2022 to 2026

As global interest in the therapeutic potential of cannabis and its’ derivatives for the management of selected diseases increases, it is increasingly imperative that the toxic profile of cannabinoids be thoroughly understood in order to correctly assess the balance between the therapeutic risks and benefits. Modern studies across a number of jurisdictions, including Canada, Australia, the US and Europe have confirmed that some of the most worrying and severe historical reports of both congenital anomalies and cancer induction following cannabis exposure actually underestimate the multisystem thousand megabase-scale transgenerational genetic damage. These findings from teratogenic and carcinogenic literature are supported by …

Corticospinal And Intracortical Responses From Both Motor Cortices Following Unilateral Concentric Versus Eccentric Contractions, Onno Van Der Groen, Christopher Latella, Kazunori Nosaka, Dylan Edwards, Wei Peng Teo, Janet L. Taylor

Research outputs 2022 to 2026

Cross-education is the phenomenon where training of one limb can cause neuromuscular adaptations in the opposite untrained limb. This effect has been reported to be greater after eccentric (ECC) than concentric (CON) strength training; however, the underpinning neurophysiological mechanisms remain unclear. Thus, we compared responses to transcranial magnetic stimulation (TMS) in both motor cortices following single sessions of unilateral ECC and CON exercise of the elbow flexors. Fourteen healthy adults performed three sets of 10 ECC and CON right elbow flexor contractions at 75 % of respective maximum on separate days. Elbow flexor maximal voluntary isometric contraction (MVIC) torques were …

Search For Gamma-Ray And Neutrino Coincidences Using Hawc And Antares Data, H. A. Ayala Solares, S. Coutu, D. Cowen, D. B. Fox, T. Grégoire, F. Mcbride, M. Mostafá, K. Murase, S. Wissel, A. Albert, S. Alves, M. André, M. Ardid, S. Ardid, J. J. Aubert, J. Aublin, B. Baret, S. Basa, B. Belhorma, M. Bendahman, F. Benfenati, V. Bertin, S. Biagi, M. Bissinger, J. Boumaaza, M. Bouta, M. C. Bouwhuis, H. Branzas, R. Bruijn, J. Brunner, J. Busto, B. Caiffi, D. Calvo, A. Capone, L. Caramete, J. Carr, V. Carretero, S. Celli, M. Chabab, T. N. Chau, R. Cherkaoui El Moursli, T. Chiarusi, M. Circella, J. A. B. Coelho, A. Coleiro, R. Coniglione, P. Coyle, A. Creusot, A. F. Diaz, G. De Wasseige, B. De Martino, C. Distefano, I. Di Palma, A. Domi, C. Donzaud, D. Dornic, D. Drouhin, T. Eberl, T. Van Eeden, D. Van Eijk, N. El Khayati, A. Enzenhofer, P. Fermani, G. Ferrara, F. Filippini, L. Fusco, J. Garcia, P. Gay, H. Glotin, R. Gozzini, R. Gracia Ruiz, K. Graf, C. Guidi, S. Hallmann, H. Van Haren, A. J. Heijboer, Y. Hello, J. J. Hernandez-Rey, J. Hobl, J. Hofestadt, F. Huang, G. Illuminati, C. W. James, B. Jisse-Jung, M. De Jong, P. De Jong, M. Kadler, O. Kalekin, U. Katz, A. Kouchner, I. Kreykenbohm, V. Kulikovskiy, R. Lahmann, M. Lamoureux, R. Le Breton, D. Lefevre, E. Leonora, G. Levi, S. Le Stum, D. Lopez-Coto, S. Loucatos, L. Maderer, J. Manczak, M. Marcelin, A. Margiotta, A. Marinelli, J. A. Martinez-Mora, K. Melis, P. Migliozzi, A. Moussa, R. Muller, L. Nauta, S. Navas, E. Nezri, B. O Fearraigh, A. Paun, G. E. Pavalas, C. Pellegrino, M. Perrin-Terrin, V. Pestel, P. Piattelli, C. Pieterse, C. Piore, V. Popa, T. Pradier, N. Randazzo, D. Real, S. Reck, G. Riccobene, A. Romanov, A. Sanchez-Losa, D. F. E. Samtleben, M. Sanguineti, P. Sapienza, J. Schnabel, J. Schumann, F. Schussler, J. Seneca, M. Spurio, Th. Stolarczyk, M. Taiuti, Y. Tayalati, S. J. Tingay, B. Vallage, V. Van Elewyck, F. Versari, S. Viola, D. Vivolo, J. Wilms, S. Zavatarelli, A. Zegarelli, J. D. Zornoza, J. Zuniga, A. Albert, C. Alvarez, J. C. Arteaga-Velazquez, R. Babu, E. Belmont-Moreno, K. S. Caballero-Mora, T. Capistran, A. Carraminana, S. Casanova, U. Cotti, O. Chaparro-Amaro, J. Cotzomi, S. Coutino De Leon, E. De La Fuenta, C. De Leon, R. Diaz Hernandez, M. A. Duvernois, M. Durocher, J. C. Diaz-Velez, K. Engel, C. Espinoza, K. L. Fan, M. Fernandez Alonso, N. Fraija, J. A. Garcia-Gonzalez, F. Garfias, M. M. Gonzalez, J. A. Goodman, J. P. Harding, S. Hernandez, D. Huang, F. Hueyotl-Zahuantitla, P. Huntemeyer, A. Iriarte, V. Joshi, S. Kaufmann, A. Lara, H. Leon Vargas, J. T. Linnemann, A. L. Longinotti, G. Luis-Raya, K. Malone, O. Martinez, I. Martinez-Castellanos, J. Martinez-Castro, J. A. Matthews, P. Miranda-Romagnoli, J. A. Morales-Soto, E. Moreno, A. Nayerhoda, L. Nellen, M. U. Nisa, R. Noriega-Papaqui, N. Omodei, A. Peisker, Y. Perez Araujo, E. G. Perez-Perez, C. D. Rho, D. Rosa-Gonzalez, E. Ruiz-Velasco, H. Salazar, F. Salesa Greus, A. Sandoval, M. Schneider, A. J. Smith, Y. Son, R. W. Springer, O. Tibolla, K. Tollefson, I. Torres, R. Torres-Escobedo, R. Turner, F. Urena-Mena, E. Varela, Xiaojie Wang, K. Whitaker, E. Willox, A. Zepeda, H. Zhou

Physics Faculty Research & Creative Works

In the quest for high-energy neutrino sources, the Astrophysical Mult messenger Observatory Network has implemented a new search by combining data from the High-Altitude Water Cherenkov (HAWC) Observatory and the Astronomy with a Neutrino Telescope and Abyss environmental RESearch (ANTARES) neutrino telescope. Using the same analysis strategy as in a previous detector combination of HAWC and IceCube data, we perform a search for coincidences in HAWC and ANTARES events that are below the threshold for sending public alerts in each individual detector. Data were collected between 2015 July and 2020 February with a live time of 4.39 yr. Over this …

Glass-Based Biodegradable Pressure Sensor Toward Biomechanical Monitoring With A Controllable Lifetime, Devdatt Chattopadhyay, Jonghyun Park, Chang-Soo Kim

Mechanical and Aerospace Engineering Faculty Research & Creative Works

A New Class of Potentially Implantable Solid-State Sensors is Demonstrated Utilizing Biodegradable Glass as the Main Structural Material. the Device Behavior is Manipulated Via Chemical Decomposition, and Then Physically Disintegrated in a Controlled Manner. It is based on the Capacitive Sensing Mechanism, Comprising an Elastic Insulator between Two Borate-Rich Glass Substrates. This Mesoscale Pressure Sensor is Characterized by a Range of Pressure of Up to 14 MPa in a Phosphate Buffer Solution Environment. the Sensor Exhibits Good Sensitivity and Reversibility Responding to Compressive Pressures and Remains Fully Functional Before a Desired, Sudden Failure Caused by Dissolution. the Operational Lifetime Can …

Selection Of Solidification Pathway In Rapid Solidification Processes, Nima Najafizadeh, Men G. Chu, Yijia Gu

Mechanical and Aerospace Engineering Faculty Research & Creative Works

Rapid Solidification Processing of Alloys Enables the Formation of Exotic Nonequilibrium Microstructures. However, the Interrelationship between the Processing Parameters and the Resulting Microstructure is Yet to Be Fully Understood. in Melt Spinning (MS) and Additive Manufacturing (AM) of Rapidly Solidified Alloys, Opposite Microstructure Development Sequences Were Observed. a Fine-To-Coarse Microstructural Transition is Typically Observed in Melt-Spun Ribbons, Whereas Melt Pools in AM Exhibit a Coarse-To-Fine Transition. in This Paper, the Microstructural Evolutions during These Two Processes Are Investigated using Phase-Field Modeling. the Variation of All Key Variables of the Solid-Liquid Interface (Temperature, Composition, and Velocity) throughout the Entire Rapid Solidification …

Biostimulation Of Petroleum-Contaminated Soil Using Organic And Inorganic Amendments, Ogochukwu A. Udume, Gideon O. Abu, Herbert O. Stanley, Ijeoma F. Vincent-Akpu, Yusuf Momoh, Michael O. Eze

Chemistry Faculty Research & Creative Works

The most common approaches for the in-situ bioremediation of contaminated sites worldwide are bioaugmentation and bio stimulation. Bio stimulation has often proved more effective for chronically contaminated sites. This study examined the effectiveness of optimized water hyacinth compost in comparison with other organic and inorganic amendments for the remediation of crude oil-polluted soils. Water hyacinth was found to be rich in nutrients necessary to stimulate microbial growth and activity. an organic geochemical analysis revealed that all amendments in this study increased total petroleum hydrocarbon (TPH) biodegradation by ≥75% within 56 days, with the greatest biodegradation (93%) occurring in sterilized soil …

Correlated Dynamics Of Collective Droplet Excitations In A One-Dimensional Harmonic Trap, I. A. Englezos, Simeon I. Mistakidis, P. Schmelcher

Physics Faculty Research & Creative Works

We Address The Existence And Dynamics Of One-Dimensional Harmonically Confined Quantum Droplets Appearing In Two-Component Mixtures By Deploying A Nonperturbative Approach. We Find That, In Symmetric Homonuclear Settings, Beyond-Lee-Huang-Yang Correlations Result In Flat-Top Droplet Configurations For Either Decreasing Intercomponent Attraction Or Larger Atom Number. Asymmetric Mixtures Feature Spatial Mixing Among The Involved Components With The More Strongly Interacting Or Heavier One Exhibiting Flat-Top Structures. Applying Quenches On The Harmonic Trap We Trigger The Lowest-Lying Collective Droplet Excitations. The Interaction-Dependent Breathing Frequency, Being Slightly Reduced In The Presence Of Correlations, Shows A Decreasing Trend For Stronger Attractions. Semianalytical Predictions Are Also …

Curcumin Release From Biomaterials For Enhanced Tissue Regeneration Following Injury Or Disease, Adelle E. Hamilton, Ryan J. Gilbert

Chemical and Biochemical Engineering Faculty Research & Creative Works

Curcumin, a bioactive phenol derived from turmeric, is an antioxidant, anti-inflammatory, and antibacterial molecule. Although curcumin exhibits beneficial effects in its innate form, it is highly hydrophobic, which leads to poor water solubility and, consequently, low bioavailability. The lack of bioavailability limits curcumin's effectiveness as a treatment and restricts its use in clinical applications. Furthermore, to achieve beneficial, clinically relevant results, high doses of curcumin are required for systemic administration. Many researchers have utilized biomaterial carriers, including electrospun fibers, nanoparticles, hydrogels, and composite scaffolds, to overcome curcumin's principle therapeutic limitation of low bioavailability. By using biomaterials to deliver curcumin directly …

Mathematical Modeling Of Microscale Biology: Ion Pairing, Spatially Varying Permittivity, And Born Energy In Glycosaminoglycan Brushes, William J. Ceely, Marina Chugunova, Ali Nadim, James D. Sterling

Business and Information Technology Faculty Research & Creative Works

Biological macromolecules including nucleic acids, proteins, and glycosaminoglycans are typically anionic and can span domains of up to hundreds of nanometers and even micron length scales. The structures exist in crowded environments that are dominated by multivalent electrostatic interactions that can be modeled using mean-field continuum approaches that represent underlying molecular nanoscale biophysics. We develop such models for glycosaminoglycan brushes using steady state modified Poisson-Boltzmann models that incorporate important ion-specific (Hofmeister) effects. The results quantify how electroneutrality is attained through ion electrophoresis, spatially varying permittivity hydration forces, and ion-specific pairing. Brush-salt interfacial profiles of the electrostatic potential as well as …

Salt Doping Of Hyaluronic Acid Glycopolymer Biocondensates, James D. Sterling, Lu Fu, Kenisha Pudun, Shenda Baker, Megan Lord, Henry E. Riggs

Business and Information Technology Faculty Research & Creative Works

Biocondensates are largely studied with regard to intracellular components, while recognition of the formation of extracellular biocondensates are emerging, such as for cell surface heparan sulfate binding with basic fibroblast growth factor. This study analyzed the formation of biocondensates in vitro between the ubiquitous extracellular component, hyaluronan an anionic glycosaminoglycan, and cationic derivitized polyglucosamines known to bind to mucosal interfaces. The effect of molecular weight and net charge ratio was studied using a combination of microscopy, turbidity, laser diffraction particle sizing and zeta potential measurements. These analyses revealed that molecular weight affected the ability to form biocondensates while the surface …