Life Sciences Commons^™

Use Of An Alternative Natural Weed Suppressant: Effects Of Parboiled Rice Hull Mulch On The Growth Of Container Weeds, Amy R. Fields-Taylor, Vanessa Slinger-Friedman

The Kennesaw Journal of Undergraduate Research

The Chattahoochee Nature Center (CNC) is one of the leading educational centers in Georgia about the ecology of the Chattahoochee River. Due to lack of man power, keeping down the weeds in the CNC plant nursery is one of those tasks that often gets left undone. The nursery becomes overgrown with invasive weed species. Understandably, they must sometimes resort to the use of herbicides, such as Roundup®, to keep the hundreds of native and endangered species of plants housed at CNC from being choked out by invasive weeds. This study tests the ability to suppress weed growth by use of …

The Blurred Line Between Photic And Aphotic Environments: A Large Mexican Cave With Almost No Dark Zone, Luis M. Mejía-Ortíz, Tanja Pipan, David C. Culver, Peter Sprouse

International Journal of Speleology

Sistema Muévelo Rico is a 1.2 km long cave in Quintana Roo, less than 2 km from the Caribbean Sea. We measured illuminance to a level of 0.1 lux, organic matter (weight loss on ignition), temperature, and relative humidity. The last two were measured at hourly intervals for nearly one year. Approximately one-third of the cave has illuminance values greater than 0.01 lux, and most of the rest of the cave has light as well. Temperature and relative humidity were relatively constant, but they showed a daily cycle at all stations, albeit with different strengths. Organic matter averaged 8%, intermediate …

Assessing Preservation Priorities Of Caves And Karst Areas Using The Frequency Of Endemic Cave-Dwelling Species, Eugen Nitzu, Marius Vlaicu, Andrei Giurginca, Ioana N. Meleg, Ionut Popa, Augustin Nae, Ştefan Baba

International Journal of Speleology

Endemic and rare species as bioindicators of habitat vulnerability were used to develop protection and management plans for biotope prioritization (mainly islands habitats, lava tubes or groundwaters). Due to their narrow distribution, the endemic species (species confined to a restricted geographic area) are more susceptible to ecological disequilibrium and habitat loss than the widespread ones. Consequently, endemics become endangered in the context of ecological disturbance caused by anthropogenic pressure, making them suitable candidates to assess environmental preservation needs. Taking into consideration that most of the stygobitic and troglobitic species are endemic and confined to specific karst areas, based on their …

Note From The Editorial Board

Dartmouth Undergraduate Journal of Science

No abstract provided.

Movement I From Lamentationes, Timothy W. Mcdunn

CrissCross

This piece is a setting of the first poem in the book of ʼêḵāh from the Hebrew Bible (the book of Lamentations in the Christian Old Testament). Setting the text in its original language has had two primary advantages: (1) it preserved euphony and other poetic subtleties and (2) it left the poetry's original cultural context intact.

I use harmonic rhetoric to imitate several features of the text. One of them is the so-called "tragic reversal," a device illustrated by the lines cited above, where a reversal of fortune is expressed through the contrast between the first colon and the …

Minerva 2017, The Honors College

Minerva

This issue of Minerva includes a feature on Honors College research collaboratives; an article on Honors students studying abroad in Singapore and Chile; an article reflecting upon the 15-year anniversary of the Honors College and the importance of mentorship; and articles on Honors students Isaiah Mansour and Aliya Uteova.

Heat And Mass Transfer Effects Of Peristaltic Transport Of A Nano Fluid In Peripheral Layer, K. M. Prasad, N. Subadra, M, A. S. Srinivas

Applications and Applied Mathematics: An International Journal (AAM)

This paper deals with a theoretical investigation of heat and mass transfer effects of peristaltic transport of a nanofluid in peripheral layer. By using appropriate methods, the velocity in the core region as well as in the peripheral region, pressure drop, time averaged flux, frictional force, temperature profile, nanoparticle phenomenon, heat transfer coefficient and mass transfer coefficient of the fluid are investigated, using lubrication theory. Effects of different physical parameters like viscosity ratio, mean radius of the central layer, Brownian motion parameter, thermophoresis parameter, local temperature Grashof number as well as local nanoparticle Grashof number on pressure rise characteristics, frictional …

Stochastic Analysis Of A Mammalian Circadian Clock Model: Small Protein Number Effects, David W. Morgens, Blerta Shtylla

Spora: A Journal of Biomathematics

The circadian clock, responsible for coordinating organism function with daily and seasonal changes in the day-night cycle, is controlled by a complex protein network that constitutes a robust biochemical oscillator. Deterministic ordinary differential equation models have been used extensively to model the behavior of these central clocks. However, due to the small number of proteins involved in the circadian oscillations, mathematical models that track stochastic variations in the numbers of clock proteins may reveal more complex and biologically relevant behaviors. In this paper, we compare the response of a robust yet detailed deterministic model for the mammalian circadian clock with …

Using Data To Improve Services For Infants With Hearing Loss: Linking Newborn Hearing Screening Records With Early Intervention Records, Maria Gonzalez, Lori Iarossi, Yan Wu, Ying Huang, Kirsten Siegenthaler

Journal of Early Hearing Detection and Intervention

The purpose of this study was to match records of infants with permanent hearing loss from the New York Early Hearing Detection and Intervention Information System (NYEHDI-IS) to records of infants with permanent hearing loss receiving early intervention services from the New York State Early Intervention Program (NYSEIP) to identify areas in the state where hearing screening, diagnostic evaluations and referrals to the NYSEIP were not being made or documented in a timely manner. Data from 2014-2016 NYEHDI-IS and NYEIS information systems were matched using The Link King. There were 274 infants documented in NYEIS Information System as receiving early …

Examining The Electrical Excitation, Calcium Signaling, And Mechanical Contraction Cycle In A Heart Cell, Kristen Deetz, Nygel Foster, Darius Leftwich, Chad Meyer, Shalin Patel, Carlos Barajas, Matthias K. Gobbert, Zana Coulibaly

Spora: A Journal of Biomathematics

As the leading cause of death in the United States, heart disease has become a principal concern in modern society. Cardiac arrhythmias can be caused by a dysregulation of calcium dynamics in cardiomyocytes. Calcium dysregulation, however, is not yet fully understood and is not easily predicted; this provides motivation for the subsequent research. Excitation-contraction coupling (ECC) is the process through which cardiomyocytes undergo contraction from an action potential. Calcium induced calcium release (CICR) is the mechanism through which electrical excitation is coupled with mechanical contraction through calcium signaling. The study of the interplay between electrical excitation, calcium signaling, and mechanical …

Age-Structured And Vaccination Models Of Devil Facial Tumor Disease, Christopher D. Bruno, Timothy Comar, Megan O. Powell, Adjo Tameklo

Spora: A Journal of Biomathematics

Tasmanian devil populations have been devastated by devil facial tumor disease (DFTD) since its first appearance in 1996. The average lifespan of a devil has decreased from six years to three years. We present an age-structured model to represent how the disease has affected the age and breeding structures of the population. We show that with the recent increase in the breeding of juvenile devils, the overall devil population will increase but not nearly to pre-DFTD levels. The basic reproductive number may be increased with the influx of young breeding devils. In addition, our model shows that the release of …

Vegetation And Arthropod Responses To Brush Reduction By Grubbing And Stacking, Carter Crouch, J. Alfonso Ortega-Santos, David B. Wester, Fidel Hernández, Leonard A. Brennan, Greta L. Schuster

National Quail Symposium Proceedings

Grubbing is a mechanical brush-reduction technique that allows targeting of mesquite (Prosopis glandulosa) and huisache (Vachellia farnesiana) and can be used to open lanes for hunting northern bobwhites (Colinus virginianus). Follow-up treatments of stacking allow the piling up of downed brush. We initiated this study on the Santa Gertrudis Division of the King Ranch, Inc., Texas, to determine effects of grubbing and stacking on vegetation and arthropod communities important to bobwhite. We hypothesized that grubbing and stacking would be able to selectively remove mesquite and huisache while leaving mixed brush species largely intact. We …

Modeling Aggregation Of Proliferating Microglia In Response To Amyloid-Beta In Dementia, Adrienne C. Kinney, Ellen R. Swanson

Spora: A Journal of Biomathematics

Amyloid-beta plaques are prominent biological markers in dementia brains. In response to plaque formation, the brain's immune cells, microglia, become reactive. Microglia are measurable cells that surround amyloid-beta plaques, indicating their location. A system of partial differential equations describes the concentration of microglia in dementia brains by incorporating chemotactic signaling. However, this system fails to incorporate increasing numbers of reactive microglia cells in response to amyloid-beta aggregation. A system of ordinary differential equations describing the number of significant cells and proteins in the brain suggests the amount of reactive microglia increases significantly during the progression of dementia. We couple these …

The Effects Of Tension, Curvature, And Lipid Diffusion On The Enrichment Of Ras Proteins In Model Membranes, Nina Daneshvar

Journal of the South Carolina Academy of Science

An intriguing aspect of the cell membrane that provokes study is lipid-anchor enrichment of lipidated proteins on the cell membrane. Specifically, recent in vitro studies involving the enrichment of Ras proteins were done to see how enrichment was affected by changes in membrane curvature. These studies demonstrated the Ras protein’s inclination to the expanded, or outer, leaflet of highly curved membranes. Other research done in vivo, however, provoked further inquiry into Ras protein behavior, since when highly curved protrusions were created in living cells, Ras proteins showed affinity for the inner leaflet. This inspired research to determine the exact mechanism …

Table Of Contents

Journal of the South Carolina Academy of Science

No abstract provided.

The Effects Of Sports Related Head Impact On Balance And Neurocognitive Functions, Shaquanda D. Ross-Simmons, Michelle L. Vieyra, Abhishek Jain, Keri Weed

Journal of the South Carolina Academy of Science

The goal of this study was to investigate the effects of sports-related head injury on balance, attention, and memory. Reliable differences have been found using measures that directly tap into brain functioning, such as the auditory oddball task combined with EEG recording. We hypothesized that athletes reporting a diagnosed concussion or participation in high-risk sports would have compromised balance and neurocognitive functioning compared to athletes in low risk sports. Forty-five undergraduate participants were identified as either concussed, non-concussed in high-risk sports, or non-concussed in low-risk sports using a survey of athletic history, head trauma and demographics. The Biopac MP36 system, …

Investigating The Toxicity And Accumulation Of 2,4-Dichlorophenoxyacetic Acid (2,4-D) And Glyphosate In Eisenia Fetida, Caitlin Lazurick, Nicole Lidzbarski, Rachel Owings, Jeff Brotherton, Edna Steele

Journal of the South Carolina Academy of Science

Glyphosate, the main ingredient in Roundup^®, is the most widely used herbicide in the world. It is also used in combination with another effective herbicide, 2,4-D, in the formulation called Enlist Duo^®. The EPA approved the use of Enlist Duo^® on certain crops including those genetically modified to be resistant to both herbicides. The predicted significant increase in the use of these herbicides raised concerns from the general public because both compounds have been classified as possibly or probably carcinogenic. Since herbicides are applied directly to vegetation, the safety of organisms that come in contact …

Big Data: Computational Biology Opens A New Window On The World's Challenges For Colby Scientists, Kate Carlisle

Colby Magazine

"What makes us 'us' and not a plant? Not a bacteria, or a virus," asks Andrea Tilden, the J. Warren Merrill Associate Professor of Biology and a genomics expert. "Any one genome has six thousand novels worth of information. Computational biology is the tool we use to read them."

When Art Is Rooted In Place: Strawtown Studio's Environmental Education And Water Advocacy, Laurie Seeman, Joanna Dickey

Artizein: Arts and Teaching Journal

When art is rooted in place, it gives voice to the place. To create art from the earth and to advocate for the natural places we know and love is our work as Strawtown artists and educators. We develop place-based arts programs that connect people with their natural surroundings and show them new ways of seeing and being.

The Effects Of Climate On Radial Growth Of Disjunct Northern White Cedar (Thuja Occidentalis L.) In Virginia, Joshua A. Kincaid

Virginia Journal of Science

Understanding the geographic range and growth of species is essential for effective land management in a landscape affected by anthropogenic activity and climate change. Climate change is expected to alter the distribution and growth of many tree species in eastern North America, including northern white cedar (Thuja occidentalis L.). This research examined the effects of climate on radial growth of T. occidentalis in disjunct populations south of its continuous range margin in eastern North America. A T. occidentalis tree-ring chronology was developed and examined for growth-climate interactions. Mean sensitivity of the T. occidentalis chronology was within the range of …

Tracking 19th Century Late Blight From Archival Documents Using Text Analytics And Geoparsing, Laura Tateosian, Rachael Guenter, Yi-Peng Yang, Jean Ristaino

Free and Open Source Software for Geospatial (FOSS4G) Conference Proceedings

In 1845, Ireland's potato crop was struck by a devastating potato disease that killed Ireland’s crop caused devastation for seven years and led to mass starvation and emigration from the country. The cause of the potato destruction was a fungus-like plant pathogen. There are several theories about the origin of the disease and the source of the 19th century outbreaks. We use historical documents contemporary to that time to investigate spatial information that might inform these mysteries. We present methodologies for automatically extracting information from these voluminous data sources. We identify and map geographic locations that are proximate in the …

Processing Conservation Indicators With Open Source Tools: Lessons Learned From The Digital Observatory For Protected Areas, Lucy Bastin, Andrea Mandrici, Luca Battistella, Grégoire Dubois

Free and Open Source Software for Geospatial (FOSS4G) Conference Proceedings

The European Commission has a commitment to open data and the support of open source software and standards. We present lessons learnt while populating and supporting the web and map services that underly the Joint Research Centre's Digital Observatory for Protected Areas. Challenges include: large datasets with highly complex geometries; topological inconsistencies, compounded by reprojection for equal-area calculations; multiple different representations of the same geographical entities, for example coastlines; licensing requirement to continuously update indicators to respond to monthly changes in the authoritative data. In order to compute and publish an array of indicators, we used a range of open …

Rehabilitation Of An Injured Golden Eagle (Aquila Chrysaetos): A Case Study, Fida Muhammad Khan, Fakhar-I- Abbas, Abu Ul Hassan Faiz

Journal of Bioresource Management

Habitat destruction and anthropogenic activities cause wild birds to migrate towards urban areas in search of food and sometimes nesting in high-roof buildings, where they are caught by local people using different techniques and are further used for hunting or recreational purposes. An injured Golden Eagle (Aquila chrysaetos) was found entangled in bushes near the vicinity of Balkasar Research Complex, Chakwal, Pakistan. After complete physical examination, a wound on the right wing and closed leg fracture was diagnosed. The successful treatment was done by anti-parasitic and anti-bacterial drugs with careful monitoring. Splint was adjusted after aligning the fractured …

Desert Pool {If Every Desert Was Once A Sea}, Karen Miranda Abel

The Goose

Desert Pool {If every desert was once a sea} is a site-specific art project by Canadian artist Karen Miranda Abel completed in 2016 while artist-in-residence at Joya: arte + ecología, an arts-led research centre situated in an alpine desert within a national park in southern Spain. The elemental installation represents an envisioning of the ancient sea that occupied the Sierra de María-Los Vélez Natural Park millions of years before the current desert ecology, a time when its highest mountain peaks may have been islands.

Effects Of A Prescribed Burn On The Adult Butterfly Assemblage Of A Coastal Grassland, J. Nicole Desha, Joseph Colbert, Kimberly M. Andrews, Scott Coleman, C. Tate Holbrook

Georgia Journal of Science

Coastal grasslands are globally threatened by development and natural succession. In the southeastern United States, these increasingly rare ecosystems are being managed using prescribed fire, but ecological responses to fire management are largely unknown, particularly among nontargeted species. We tested for short-term effects of controlled burning on the abundance and species richness of adult butterflies, which utilize coastal grasslands for nectaring resources and as migratory stopover sites. In February 2015, four plots of coastal grassland on Little St. Simons Island, GA were burned and paired with unburned (control) plots of equal size. Throughout the following summer-fall flight season, we conducted …

Protecting The Environment: Awareness And Responsibility, Susan E. Mason, James J. Winkelman

Journal of Vincentian Social Action

Protecting the environment is not only the right thing to do, it is the smart thing to do, in terms of both short-term and long term business goals. Green businesses can realize immediate financial benefits from environmental sustainability and energy conservation, and there are branding benefits associated with developing and maintaining a reputation for integrity and social responsibility. All participants first answered demographic questions and then responded to a ten-item questionnaire, which was a modified version of Simpson’s (1998) environmental awareness questionnaire. In conclusion, the study revealed gender, age, and political affiliation difference in environmental awareness.

Voices: Conference On Teaching Stem With Music, September 27-28, 2017, Gregory J. Crowther

Journal of Humanistic Mathematics

This first-of-its-kind, online-only conference will explore the use of music to teach STEM (science, technology, engineering, and mathematics) at the college level (including AP courses). Presentations will be live-streamed from the conference website, https://www.causeweb.org/voices. Online registrations (for only $10 apiece!) will be accepted at the conference website until the conclusion of the conference on September 28, 2017.

One = Zero, Eric John Gofen

Journal of Humanistic Mathematics

In this paper, I use Mathematics in addition to the three most pure sciences --- Physics, Chemistry, and Rap --- to prove that 1=0. The argument uses The Ideal Gas Law, Ohm's Law, the Definitions of Power and Velocity in addition to indefinite integrals, simple mathematical operations, and the 99 Problems Law. The intuition-crushing result can be applied to all branches of mathematics and sciences and will likely go down as one of the greatest discoveries of all time.

Parts Of The Whole: Why I Teach This Subject This Way, Dorothy Wallace

Numeracy

The importance of mathematics to biology is illustrated by search data from Google Scholar. I argue that a pedagogical approach based on student research projects is likely to improve retention and foster critical thinking about mathematical modeling, as well as reinforce quantitative reasoning and the appreciation of calculus as a tool. The usual features of a course (e.g., the instructor, assessment, text, etc.) are shown to have very different purposes in a research-based course.

The Impact Weather Has On Nyc Citi Bike Share Company Activity, Mark Martinez

Journal of Environmental and Resource Economics at Colby

This paper seeks to figure out the effect weather has on individuals’ behavior. A more focused approach to determining this effect is seeing how different weather conditions ranging from the temperature, the precipitation, the amount of inches of snowfall and the wind speed effect the ridership of Citi Bikes throughout all four seasons. The approach of this research paper is using data from the National Climatic Data Center that focuses in on the weather found in Manhattan, New York and correlates each of the weather conditions to the total number of trips per day that is provided by the Citi …