Systems Biology Commons^™

Developmental Exposure To Corn Grown On Lake Erie Dredged Material: A Preliminary Analysis, Kaylyn A. S. Flanigan, Madelyn I. Czuba, Victoria R. Riesgo, Megan A. Rúa, Louise M. Stevenson, Jari Willing

Biological Sciences Faculty Publications

While corn is considered to be a healthy food option, common agricultural practices, such as the application of soil amendments, might be introducing contaminants of concern (COC) into corn plants. The use of dredged material, which contain contaminants such as heavy metals, polychlorinated biphenyls (PCBs) and polycyclic aromatic hydrocarbons (PAHs), as a soil amendment is increasing. Contaminants from these amendments can accumulate in corn kernels harvested from plants grown on these sediments and potentially biomagnify in organisms that consume them. The extent to which secondary exposure to such contaminants in corn affect the mammalian central nervous system has been virtually …

The Bellarmine Bee Bed: Organizing A Native Plant Garden Using Feedback From The Local Community, Kate Moran

Undergraduate Theses

Animal pollinators are the cornerstone of healthy ecosystems. Their survival is essential for the persistence of entire food chains: from the flowers they cross-pollinate directly, to the animals who depend on those plants for nutrition. The establishment of pollinator gardens—particularly ones that consist of native plants—is an effective way to enhance their biodiversity, abundance, and well-being.

The main goal of this thesis is to construct a pollinator garden that maximizes the benefits for animal pollinators using feedback from local gardeners. A survey was used to gather information about the popularity and preferences of 40 flowering plants, and after analyzing the …

The Impact Of Study Strategies On Knowledge Growth And Summative Exam Performance In The First Year Of Medical School, Markia Black, William L. Romine, Molly Simonis, Jeffrey L. Peters, Volker Bahn, Amber Todd

Biological Sciences Faculty Publications

Although the distinction between deep and surface processing strategies, their potential to differentially impact learning, and data supporting the superiority of deep processing strategies on summative exam scores are well supported by the literature, more work is needed to understand: (1) how medical students combine study strategies into learning practices, and (2) the effectiveness of these learning practices in facilitating knowledge gains as measured by standardized test scores.

Linking Science And Literacy Through Multimodal Text Sets: Student Perspectives, Heba Abdelnaby, William L. Romine, Delinda Van Garderen, Tracey Milarsky, Ankita Agarwal, Qingli Lei, Cassandra Smith, Amy Lannin, William Folk, Rachel Juergensen

Biological Sciences Faculty Publications

We present findings of a mixed methods study examining the perceptions of students’ (with and without disabilities) understanding and engagement with multimodal STEM text sets. Exit slip and survey data were used to identify areas for improvement in the development of the multimodal STEM text sets for middle school students. Data were collected from 434 middle school students, 86 of whom had a disability, from six teachers’ classrooms in Spring 2021. Significant differences in perceptions of understanding of argumentation were reported between students with and without disabilities. However, ratings of the lessons and the quality of learning, as well as …

Measuring Claim-Evidence-Reasoning Using Scenario-Based Assessments Grounded In Real-World Issues, William L. Romine, Amy Lannin, Ankita Agarwal, Maha Kareem, Emily Burwell

Biological Sciences Faculty Publications

Improving students’ use of argumentation is front and center in the increasing emphasis on scientific practice in K-12 Science and STEM programs. We explore the construct validity of scenario-based assessments of claim-evidence-reasoning (CER) and the structure of the CER construct with respect to a learning progression framework. We also seek to understand how middle school students progress. Establishing the purpose of an argument is a competency that a majority of middle school students meet, whereas quantitative reasoning is the most difficult, and the Rasch model indicates that the competencies form a unidimensional hierarchy of skills. We also find no evidence …

Dredged Sediments Contain Potentially Beneficial Microorganisms For Agriculture And Little Harmful Cyanobacteria, Megan A. Rúa, Ashley N. Julian, Louise Stevenson

Biological Sciences Faculty Publications

Abstract Introduction Soils worldwide are degrading, raising concerns about our ability to feed the growing global population. Soil amendments that can alleviate degradation are gaining attention. The application of sediments dredged from waterways to agricultural fields has increasing promise as a means for improving degraded soils. However, herbaceous plant species may have difficulty establishing on dredged material because of low nutrient availability, inhibitory levels of toxins, unsuitable moisture conditions and lack of microorganisms capable of ameliorating these characteristics. To counteract these issues, we sought to understand if the use of a cover crop would increase the abundance, diversity and function …

Getting To The Root Of Tree Soil Microbiome Sampling, Sarah Addison, Megan A. Rua, Simeon Smaill, Kaitlyn Daley, Brajesh Singh, Steve Wakelin

Biological Sciences Faculty Publications

Microbiomes play critical roles in host functioning and therefore there is increasing interest in the microbiome assembly of plants. However, sampling strategies for long-lived perennial trees need to be standardised to produce robust data that accurately represents the microbiome over time. This issue is currently unresolved because there is little evidence indicating which portion of perennial tree species (e.g., root region or surrounding soil) is the best to sample to produce the most accurate measure of microbiome communities. Our aim was to sample different compartments of a plant’s belowground microbiome to identify the optimal sampling strategy to account for the …

Long-Term Exposure To An Invasive Fungal Pathogen Decreases Eptesicus Fuscus Body Mass With Increasing Latitude, Molly C. Simonis, Lynn K. Hartzler, Gregory G. Turner, Michael R. Scafini, Joseph S. Johnson, Megan A. Rúa

Biological Sciences Faculty Publications

Abstract Invasive pathogens threaten wildlife health and biodiversity. Physiological responses of species highly susceptible to pathogen infections following invasion are well described. However, the responses of less susceptible species (relative to highly susceptible species) are not well known. Latitudinal gradients, which can influence body condition via Bergmann's rule and/or reflect the time it takes for an introduced pathogen to spread geographically, add an additional layer for how mammalian species respond to pathogen exposure. Our goal was to understand how hosts less susceptible to pathogen infections respond to long‐term pathogen exposure across a broad latitudinal gradient. We examined changes in body …

Fine Characterization Of Leafing Phenology In The Brazilian Atlantic Forest By Optical And Microwave Remote Sensing, James B. Bell

Dissertations and Theses

Tropical forests provide important ecosystem functions in the global biosphere, but they remain among the most poorly understood elements of land surface models, especially with regard to their seasonal dynamics. For instance, in seasonally dry forests, the pattern of the annual green-up in their canopies closely follows annual patterns of rainfall. The same, however, does not occur in wet forest canopies which are dominated by evergreen trees. In the latter, water is not scarce enough to limit leaf photosynthetic function. Canopy leafing phenology in these forests is therefore poorly characterized by optical remote sensing methods which are not sensitive to …

Land Systems, Soils And Vegetation Of The Southern Goldfields And Great Western Woodlands Of Western Australia - Volume 1, Peter-Jon A. Waddell, Paul Galloway

Technical Bulletins

This technical bulletin defines and maps the land resources of the southern Goldfields region of Western Australia (WA). The southern Goldfields region, as featured in this bulletin, covers 151,753 km². The western and eastern borders are variable because they align with various cadastral boundaries. The western survey border, which in part follows the WA State Barrier Fence, demarcates cleared agricultural land from the intact, western extent of the Great Western Woodlands. The eastern border abuts the westernmost Nullarbor pastoral lease boundaries, except for the north-easternmost and south-easternmost edges which continue into Crown land. Major towns are Coolgardie, Kalgoorlie …

Land Systems, Soils And Vegetation Of The Southern Goldfields And Great Western Woodlands Of Western Australia - Volume 2, Peter-Jon A. Waddell, Paul Galloway

Technical Bulletins

This technical bulletin defines and maps the land resources of the southern Goldfields region of Western Australia (WA). The southern Goldfields region, as featured in this bulletin, covers 151,753 km². The western and eastern borders are variable because they align with various cadastral boundaries. The western survey border, which in part follows the WA State Barrier Fence, demarcates cleared agricultural land from the intact, western extent of the Great Western Woodlands. The eastern border abuts the westernmost Nullarbor pastoral lease boundaries, except for the north-easternmost and south-easternmost edges which continue into Crown land. Major towns are Coolgardie, Kalgoorlie …

Caribbean Reef-Building Coral-Symbiodiniaceae Network: Identifying Symbioses Critical For System Stability In A Changing Climate, Shaman Patel

All HCAS Student Capstones, Theses, and Dissertations

Increasing global ocean temperatures and frequency of marine heatwaves pose dire consequences for coral reefs. High temperatures often lead to disruptions in coral symbiosis resulting in coral bleaching, increasing the mortality of corals. However, corals can potentially avoid bleaching peril by associating with thermally tolerant symbionts. Here we provide a tool for understanding symbiosis network stability of Caribbean reef-building corals. We created a network of Caribbean hermatypic corals and their associated Symbiodiniaceae phylotypes. A bleaching model was applied to this network to test for resilience and robustness (R50) to thermal stress. It was also layered with trait data for coral …

Drone-Based Water Sampling And Characterization Of Three Freshwater Harmful Algal Blooms In The United States, Regina Hanlon, Stephen J. Jacquemin, Johnna A. Birbeck, Judy A. Westrick, Charbel Harb, Hope Gruszewski, Andrew P. Ault, Durelle Scott, Hosein Foroutan, Shane D. Ross, Javier González-Rocha, Craig Powers, Lowell Pratt, Harry Looney, Greg Baker, David G. Schmale

Biological Sciences Faculty Publications

Freshwater harmful algal blooms (HABs), caused mostly by toxic cyanobacteria, produce a range of cyanotoxins that threaten the health of humans and domestic animals. Climate conditions and anthropogenic influences such as agricultural run-off can alter the onset and intensity of HABs. Little is known about the distribution and spread of freshwater HABs. Current sampling protocols in some lakes involve teams of researchers that collect samples by hand from a boat and/or from the shoreline. Water samples can be collected from the surface, from discrete-depth collections, and/or from depth-integrated intervals. These collections are often restricted to certain months of the year, …

Tau-Dependent Neurodegeneration And Alleviation By Etas®50, Clifford Tyree Castleberry

Theses (2016-Present)

Brain growth factors are a broad group of molecules that enable the brain to adapt to stress. In a study on Alzheimer’s mice (APP), we tested the role of an asparagus supplement, ETAS®50, to mitigate the stress caused by the Alzheimer’s condition in this mouse model. Gene expression data revealed regulation of genes related to neuronal growth and function, such as tau, which were severely stressed in the APP mice to be alleviated.

The Mayfly Newsletter, Donna Giberson

The Mayfly Newsletter

The Mayfly Newsletter is the official newsletter of the Permanent Committee of the International Conferences on Ephemeroptera.

Parasitism Of Corn Earworm, Helicoverpa Zea (Boddie) (Lepidoptera: Noctuidae), By Tachinid Flies In Cultivated Hemp, Armando Falcon-Brindis, John O. Stireman Iii, Zenaida J. Viloria, Raul T. Villanueva

Biological Sciences Faculty Publications

In a survey on hemp grown in western Kentucky we found an average of 27.8 CEW larvae per plant. We recorded 45% parasitism of CEW in these fields by two species of tachinid flies, Winthemia rufopicta and Lespesia aletiae. Most parasitized larvae were third to sixth instars at the time of collection. We found up to 22 tachinid eggs per host larva, 89% of which typically bore between 1 and 5 eggs on the thorax. 45.9% of CEW bearing eggs died. The number of tachinid eggs per host was unrelated to host body mass, but both the number of tachinid …

Periodic Spatial Disturbances Alter The Expression Of Quorum Sensing Virulence Factors In Pseudomonas Aeruginosa, Laura García-Diéguez

All HCAS Student Capstones, Theses, and Dissertations

Pseudomonas aeruginosa is an opportunistic pathogen associated with severe acute and chronic illnesses. Current antibiotic-based approaches fail to effectively treat P. aeruginosa infections due to the effectiveness and robustness of the quorum sensing signaling system (QS). Pathogenic bacteria, such as P. aeruginosa, employ this population density-dependent communication mechanism to confer antimicrobial resistance, propagate infection, and coordinate the expression of virulence factors, through the production and detection of autoinducing signaling molecules (AI). As such, there is a growing interest in developing novel non-antibiotic-based techniques to attenuate the pathogenicity of P. aeruginosa by disrupting the functionality of its QS system. Previous …

Variation In Student Perceptions Of Higher Education Course Quality And Difficulty As A Result Of Widespread Implementation Of Online Education During The Covid-19 Pandemic, Joseph Cavanaugh, Stephen J. Jacquemin, Christine Junker

Biological Sciences Faculty Publications

The onset of the COVID-19 global pandemic affected higher education in a myriad of ways. One of the most notable effects however was the rapid and sudden transition of nearly all courses at most institutions to an online environment. And while there are a growing number of courses offered online already, this transition to nearly 100% remote education presented numerous challenges for instructors and students of face-to-face and hybrid style courses. Since student perceptions are closely tied to recruitment and retention, it is important to know if there are differences in student perceptions present in the way different courses are …

The Future Of The Big Sagebrush Ecosystem: Plant Community Response To Grazing, Wildfire, And Invasive Annual Grass In A Changing Climate, Margaret Eleanor England

Theses, Dissertations and Capstones

Climate change is increasingly affecting the plant communities across the world. In the Western United States, these changes are affecting plant communities and their risk of invasive species, as well as the frequency and severity of wildfire. Big sagebrush (Artemisia tridentata Nutt.) ecosystems of the Western United States are facing threats of increasingly frequent wildfire and invasion of the annual grass cheatgrass (Bromus tectorum L.), which may be exacerbated by global climate change. Past studies have found cheatgrass to exhibit a positive feedback loop with wildfire, and climate change is expected to facilitate expansion of the cheatgrass …

Wetland Restoration Efforts Result In Increasing Phylogenetic Diversity, Nicholas T. Foster

Graduate Research Theses & Dissertations

Over the course of ecological restoration efforts, it has been observed that, despite restoration activities, species richness sometimes declines in a given habitat. While this response can be interpreted to mean that restoration activities are ineffective, other measures known as Phylogenetic Diversity Metrics can show that the community is actually becoming more diverse. Utilizing plant inventories collected as transect data from 1992-2021 of five wetland sites under various types of restoration in northern Illinois, a regional wetland community phylogeny was assembled. The community phylogeny was then analyzed for phylogenetic diversity measures through this 30-year period across the five sites. Additionally, …

Measuring Science Teachers' Emotional Experiences With Evolution Using Real World Scenarios, William Lee Romine, Rutuja Mahajan, Amber Todd

Biological Sciences Faculty Publications

Low acceptance of evolution remains an obstacle to quality biology instruction. We develop and utilize a novel assessment which measures emotional experience in light of real-world evolution education scenarios. We presented 296 science teachers 4 pro-evolution and 8 anti-evolution scenarios and asked them to rate their levels of joy, anger, sadness, fear, disgust, shame, and guilt elicited by that scenario on an ordinal 5-point scale. We used exploratory factor analysis to extract the most important dimensions in the teachers’ responses, Rasch analysis to explore the validity of the extracted subscales, and stepwise regression to find the most important factors driving …

A Dystrophin Exon‐52 Deleted Miniature Pig Model Of Duchenne Muscular Dystrophy And Evaluation Of Exon Skipping, Yusuke Echigoya, Nhu Trieu, William Duddy, Hong M. Moulton, Haifang Yin, Terence A. Partridge, Eric P. Hoffman, Joe N. Kornegay, Frank A. Rohret, Christopher S. Rogers, Toshifumi Yokota

Genomics and Precision Medicine Faculty Publications

No abstract provided.

The Mayfly Newsletter, Donna Giberson

The Mayfly Newsletter

The Mayfly Newsletter is the official newsletter of the Permanent Committee of the International Conferences on Ephemeroptera.

Quantifying Planarian Behavior As An Introduction To Object Tracking And Signal Processing, Nicole C. Stowell, T. Goel, Vir Shetty , '22, Jocelyne Noveral, Eva-Maria S. Collins

Biology Faculty Works

Answers to mechanistic questions about biological phenomena require fluency in a variety of molecular biology techniques and physical concepts. Here, we present an interdisciplinary approach to introducing undergraduate students to an important problem in the areas of animal behavior and neuroscience—the neuronal control of animal behavior. In this lab module, students explore planarian behavior by quantitative image and data analysis with freely available software and low-cost resources. Planarians are ∼1–2-cm-long aquatic free-living flatworms famous for their regeneration abilities. They are inexpensive and easy to maintain, handle, and perturb, and their fairly large size allows for image acquisition with a webcam, …

Three Lc-Ms Plant Metabolomics Studies Of Hop (Humulus) Species: Wild H. Neomexicanus, Drought Stress, And Agricultural Terroir, Taylan Morcol

Dissertations, Theses, and Capstone Projects

The hop plant (Humulus L., Cannabaceae) is a dioecious, perennial, twining vine with a long history of human use. Nowadays, hop plants are generally grown for their inflorescences (“cones”), which are used in brewing for their phytochemical metabolites. Many of these metabolites are involved in plant stress response and communication. Genetics and environment are two major factors that affect plant metabolism. In three separate metabolomics studies, this project examined the effects of both genetic and environmental factors on hop phytochemistry.

In the first study, 23 hop genotypes were grown in two different locations in the Pacific Northwest region of …

Understanding Potassium Toxicity Stress Responses Of The Extremophyte Schrenkiella Parvula Using Systems Biology Approaches, Pramod Pantha

LSU Doctoral Dissertations

Schrenkiella parvula is an extremophyte model closely related to Arabidopsis thaliana and Brassica crops. Its natural habitat includes shores of saline lakes in the Irano-Turanian region. It has adapted to grow in soils rich in multiple salts including Na⁺ and K⁺. I have investigated the genetic basis for high K⁺ tolerance in plants using S. parvula as a stress tolerant model compared to the premier plant model, Arabidopsis thaliana which is highly sensitive to salt stresses using physiological, ionomic, transcriptomic, and metabolomic approaches. Under high K⁺ stress, root system architecture changes significantly compared to control …

The Mayfly Newsletter, Donna Giberson

The Mayfly Newsletter

The Mayfly Newsletter is the official newsletter of the Permanent Committee of the International Conferences on Ephemeroptera.

Of Biodiversity, Boundaries, And Distribution: The Myxomycetes Of The Philippines And Beyond, Sittie Aisha Bustamante Macabago

Graduate Theses and Dissertations

This dissertation contains a compilation of independently performed studies primarily focusing on the myxomycetes (plasmodial slime molds) from the Philippines and integrating local and worldwide data to demonstrate regional and global trends. The major themes include the following: (I) a review of the diverse group of spore-producing amoeboid protists, including the myxomycetes; (II-IV) diversity assessments in three different groups of islands in the Philippine archipelago; (V) mapping the myxomycetes found in the Philippines for databasing and analyzing the geocoded data; (VI) a study on regional boundaries, including the Philippines, using myxomycete species composition; and, (VII) creating a global species distribution …

The Neurological Asymmetry Of Self-Face Recognition, Aleksandra Janowska, Brianna Balugas, Matthew Pardillo, Victoria Mistretta, Katherine Chavarria, Janet Brenya, Taylor Shelansky, Vanessa Martinez, Kitty Pagano, Nathira Ahmad, Samantha Zorns, Abigail Straus, Sarah Sierra, Julian Keenan

Department of Biology Faculty Scholarship and Creative Works

While the desire to uncover the neural correlates of consciousness has taken numerous directions, self-face recognition has been a constant in attempts to isolate aspects of self-awareness. The neuroimaging revolution of the 1990s brought about systematic attempts to isolate the underlying neural basis of self-face recognition. These studies, including some of the first fMRI (functional magnetic resonance imaging) examinations, revealed a right-hemisphere bias for self-face recognition in a diverse set of regions including the insula, the dorsal frontal lobe, the temporal parietal junction, and the medial temporal cortex. In this systematic review, we provide confirmation of these data (which are …

Public Discussion Of Anthrax On Twitter: Using Machine Learning To Identify Relevant Topics And Events, Michele Miller, William Lee Romine, Terry L. Oroszi

Biological Sciences Faculty Publications

Background: Social media allows researchers to study opinions and reactions to events in real time. One area needing more study is anthrax-related events. A computational framework that utilizes machine learning techniques was created to collect tweets discussing anthrax, further categorize them as relevant by the month of data collection, and detect discussions on anthrax-related events. Objective: The objective of this study was to detect discussions on anthrax-related events and to determine the relevance of thetweets and topics of discussion over 12 months of data collection. Methods: This is an infoveillance study, using tweets in English containing the keyword “Anthrax” and …