Physical Sciences and Mathematics Commons^™

Host-Pathogen Interactions In A Changing World: Microbes, Mucosal Defenses, And Multiple Hosts, Brandon C. Labumbard

Graduate Doctoral Dissertations

As fungal diseases continue to emerge, research increasingly focuses on host-microbiome interactions and links to disease. Certain skin-associated microbes may benefit hosts by protecting them from invading pathogens. Seasonal changes in the host environment can also result in shifts in the microbial community and pathogen virulence – potentially influencing disease dynamics. I investigated how cutaneous microbial communities differ across hosts, seasons, and Batrachochytrium dendrobatidis (Bd) infection status by sequencing the microbial communities of 1,100 leopard frogs at five locations across the US. Percent anti-Bd function varied seasonally and with Bd infection status. Bacterial communities also varied across locations and time. …

How Environmental Change Will Impact Mosquito-Borne Diseases, Arsal Khan

Master's Projects and Capstones

Mosquitos, the most lethal species throughout human history, are the most prevalent source of vector-borne diseases and therefore a major global health burden. Mosquito-borne disease incidence is expected to shift with environmental change. These changes can be predicted using species distribution models. With the wide variety of methods used for models, consensus for improving accuracy and comparability is needed. A comparative analysis of three recent modeling approaches revealed that integrating modeling techniques compensates for trade-offs associated with a singular approach. An area that represents a critical gap in our ability to predict mosquito behavior in response to changing climate factors, …

Quantitative Microbial Risk Assessment For Parts, Ground, And Msc Poultry Product Including Intervention Analysis And Exploration Of Enterobacteriaceae As An Indicator Organism In Poultry Processing, Leigh Ann Parette

Graduate Theses and Dissertations

Samples collected at five different large bird poultry processing facilities over a period of 7 months from prescald to post debone locations were enumerated for Enterobacteriaceae, Salmonella spp., and Campylobacter spp. and the results were used to create Quantitative Microbial Risk Analyses (QMRA) models for parts, ground, and mechanically separated chicken (MSC) products. Sensitivity analyses indicated the points in the process at which reductions would be most advantageous to the endpoint and simulation models were run to test reductions required to meet the current USDA performance standards.

These data were analyzed to determine the reductions from one node (location) to …

Can Prescribed Fire Reduce Tick Parasitism Of Birds?, Leslie A. Sterling, Kim Medley, Katie Westby, Solný Adalsteinsson

Undergraduate Research Symposium Posters

Tick-borne diseases spread through enzootic transmission cycles that often involve ticks parasitizing bird hosts. Some avian species are competent reservoirs, amplifying the pathogens that cause tick-borne illnesses in humans. Prescribed burns in forests have the potential to reduce tick-borne disease risk if they limit interactions between ticks and infectious wildlife hosts. Although prescribed burns are increasingly being used for a variety of habitat management purposes, little is known about how they affect tick-host interactions. We hypothesize that if prescribed fires reduce tick abundance, then birds in burned forest plots will host fewer ticks than birds in unburned forest plots. Experimental …

Ms Environmental Biology Capstone Project, Annamaria Marcel

Regis University Student Publications (comprehensive collection)

Due to the worldwide decline of biodiversity, protected nature reserves are necessary for species facing extinction. Many frog species have been experiencing rapid population decline and extinction due to the threat of the fungus Batrachochytrium dendrobatidis (Bd), which inflicts the highly transmittable and deadly disease chytridiomycosis. Chytridiomycosis causes increased skin tissue growth which disrupts respiration and the maintenance of water balance, which can ultimately lead to death. Certain ecological and geographical characteristics have been studied in order to assess their influence on Bd’s prevalence. Specifically, it is hypothesized that high elevations, lotic habitats, and low species richness have a positive …

Spatial Modelling And Wildlife Health Surveillance: A Case Study Of White Nose Syndrome In Ontario, Lauren Yee

Theses and Dissertations (Comprehensive)

Wildlife data is often limited by survey effort, small sample sizes, and spatial biases associated with collection and missing data. These factors can create unique challenges from a surveillance perspective when trying to extract spatial patterns of habitat suitability and disease distributions for conservation and management purposes. This thesis examined data quality from a wildlife health database in the context of spatial analysis of wildlife disease. Spatial analysis of the data to predict habitat suitability of bats and white nose syndrome afflicted bats was examined by using the MaxEnt modelling method. Methods to reduce spatial bias were examined and specific …

Of Rats And Men, Thomas S. Walsh

Capstones

This capstone is a data-driven investigation into New York City's rat problem. By using publicly available government data to map rat activity in NYC, I identified several socio-economic variables that correlate with rat populations at the community district, borough, and city-scale. I used these findings (mainly that rat problems are linked to lower incomes) as the basis of an investigation, which includes interviews with residents, experts, and city officials. Prof. Bobby Corrigan, urban rodentologist and formerly with the NYC Department of Health criticizes the city's efforts for the first time on the record.

https://thomasseiyawalsh.wixsite.com/ratstone

Bacterial Communities Associated With Healthy And Diseased Acropora Cervicornis (Staghorn Coral) Using High-Throughput Sequencing, Charles Walton

HCNSO Student Theses and Dissertations

Coral diseases were first noted in the 1960s and 1970s and have had major impacts globally on coral reef community structures. In the Caribbean, a major outbreak of white band disease has been considered responsible for the drastic decline of Caribbean Acroporids since the 1970s. In addition to white band disease, another more recently described condition known as rapid tissue loss (RTL) has had major impacts on Acropora cervicornis populations, specifically offshore Broward County Southeast Florida. While these diseases have contributed to the population decline, determining their etiologies has been elusive.

Coral diseases have been characterized by shifts in their …

Addressing Antibiotic Resistance From Farm-Raised Fish Imported To The United States, Nicholas Ali

Bard Center for Environmental Policy

Misuse of medically important antibiotics in animal production threatens the effectiveness of drugs that are vital in combating disease and infections. Recently, the FDA implemented regulations to limit the use of and access to veterinary drugs. However, these regulations only affect domestic production operations. Because over 90% of seafood consumed in the U.S. is imported from countries with different regulatory standards and because the U.S. has an import inspection rate of less than 1%, antibiotic resistance stemming from imported aquaculture is still a risk that is not sufficiently accounted for. This research investigates how the U.S. has reacted to the …

Space-Time Modelling Of Emerging Infectious Diseases: Assessing Leptospirosis Risk In Sri Lanka, Cameron C F Plouffe

Theses and Dissertations (Comprehensive)

In this research, models were developed to analyze leptospirosis incidence in Sri Lanka and its relation to rainfall. Before any leptospirosis risk models were developed, rainfall data were evaluated from an agro-ecological monitoring network for producing maps of total monthly rainfall in Sri Lanka. Four spatial interpolation techniques were compared: inverse distance weighting, thin-plate splines, ordinary kriging, and Bayesian kriging. Error metrics were used to validate interpolations against independent data. Satellite data were used to assess the spatial pattern of rainfall. Results indicated that Bayesian kriging and splines performed best in low and high rainfall, respectively. Rainfall maps generated from …

Identification And The Significance Of Selective Proteins In Bile And Plasma Of Normal And Health-Compromised Chickens, Balamurugan Packialakshmi

Graduate Theses and Dissertations

During the last 50 years, animal breeding programs in commercial poultry have made significant progress in the bodyweight gain of broilers but led to several metabolic and skeletal disorders. Lameness associated with proximal femur known as femoral head separation (FHS) or femoral head necrosis (FHN) is one of the major metabolic disorders in poultry industry. In order to select for healthy chickens, markers that can distinguish between healthy and affected birds are required. Biomarkers from blood represent an ideal and rich source of markers which can be obtained using minimally invasive methods. The biomarkers were explored in an experimental model …

The Effects That Liquid And Solid Cattle Manure Have On The Water Quality Of Drainage Ditches In Putnam County, Ohio, Janelle Horstman

Honors Projects

Lake Erie has experienced harmful algal blooms with increased frequency since the mid-1990s due to excess nutrients from Rivers, such as the Maumee River, and largely agricultural watersheds. Nonpoint source pollution from agriculture contributes to eutrophication, algal blooms, and the degradation of water quality. This creates stress on aquatic fauna, reduced aesthetic quality, odor, and limits of the water for usage of drinking, recreation, and industry. This research paper asks what the contributions of having access to manure application records, soil records, and information about antibiotics have on what is known about manure management and antibiotic resistance, which has been …

The Effect Of Salinity On Experimental Hematodinium Sp Infections In The Blue Crab, Callinectes Sapidus, Anna Huntley Coffey

Dissertations, Theses, and Masters Projects

No abstract provided.

Idiopathic Lesions And Visual Deficits In The American Lobster (Homarus Americanus) From Longs Island Sound, Ny, Christopher Robert Magel

Dissertations, Theses, and Masters Projects

In 1999 a mass mortality of the American lobster (Homarus americanus) occurred in western Long Island Sound (WLIS). Although the etiology remains unknown, warm bottom water temperature, hypoxia, heavy metal poisoning, and pesticides have been suggested as casual factors. Subsequently, lobsters from WLIS have continued to display symptoms of morbidity that include lethargy and cloudy grey eyes, caused by idiopathic lesions. The effects of these lesions on lobster vision are unknown. We therefore used electoretinography (ERG) to document changes in visual function in lobsters obtained from WLIS, while simultaneously using histology to quantify the extent of damage. Of the lobsters …

Trophic Ecology And Growth Dynamics Of Striped Bass (Morone Saxatilis) In Chesapeake Bay, With Reference To Mycobacteriosis, Kathleen Anne Mcnamee

Dissertations, Theses, and Masters Projects

No abstract provided.

Eye Pathologies Found In Several Decapod Crustaceans, Andrea M. Maniscalco

Dissertations, Theses, and Masters Projects

No abstract provided.

A Study Of The Eastern Oyster, Crassostrea Virginica: (1) Dermo Tolerance, Survival, Growth, Condition And Hsp70 Expression In Different Geographic Stocks; (2) Heat Tolerance And Effects Of Sublethal Heat Shock On Survival And Hsp70 Expression Of Infected And Uninfected Oysters, Vincent G. Encomio

Dissertations, Theses, and Masters Projects

The diseases Dermo and MSX have devastated Chesapeake Bay populations of the eastern oyster, Crassostrea virginica. The protozoan Perkinsus marinus, which causes Dermo, is particularly problematic since it persists over a wide range of salinities and temperatures. An objective of this dissertation was to determine whether specific wild oyster stocks had developed natural resistance to Dermo and if several parameters (survival, growth, condition and energy reserves) were associated with resistance. Another objective was to characterize heat shock protein (hsp70) expression in the eastern oyster. Heat shock proteins such as hsp70 protect organisms from thermal stress and other stressors, and this …

Pathobiology Of Mycobacteria In Striped Bass (Morone Saxatilis), David T. Gauthier

Dissertations, Theses, and Masters Projects

Striped bass (Morone saxatilis) in Chesapeake Bay, USA, are experiencing an epizootic of mycobacteriosis. This disease, caused by bacteria in the genus Mycobacterium, causes granulomatous lesions of the skin and viscera. Diseased fish are often emaciated, and fish with skin lesions may be significantly disfigured. The overall goal of this work was to examine aspects of the pathobiology of mycobacteria in striped bass via laboratory exposure studies and cellular assays. Striped bass were injected intraperitoneally with a sublethal dose of Mycobacterium marinum, M. shottsii, or M. gordonae and sampled for histology and bacteriology at regular intervals to 45 weeks post-injection …

Natural Dermo Resistance And Related Defense Mechanisms In Eastern Oysters, Crassostrea Virginica, With Implications For Restoration, Shawn Michael Stickler

Dissertations, Theses, and Masters Projects

American oyster (Crassostrea virginica) stocks on the East Coast in general, and in Chesapeake Bay in particular, have been in decline over the past half-century in large part due to Dermo disease, caused by the protist parasite Perkinsus marinus. Efforts to restore oysters for their ecological and economic value have centered on the development and use of hatchery-based seed selectively bred for disease resistance. Selective breeding could benefit from the incorporation of oysters from wild stocks that have developed "natural Dermo resistance", but few such stocks have been identified and verified. This dissertation describes reciprocal common-garden experiments carried out at …

Investigations Into The Etiology Of Ulcerative Lesions In Atlantic Menhaden, Brevoortia Tyrannus, Raemarie Ann Johnson

Dissertations, Theses, and Masters Projects

No abstract provided.

Mycobacteriosis In Striped Bass, Morone Saxatilis, From Virginia Waters Of Chesapeake Bay, Jennifer L. Cardinal

Dissertations, Theses, and Masters Projects

No abstract provided.

Protease Inhibitors Of The Eastern Oyster, Crassostrea Virginica, And Their Relationship To The Protozoan Pathogen, Perkinsus Marinus, Jacques L. Oliver

Dissertations, Theses, and Masters Projects

No abstract provided.

Osmotic Tolerance And Volume Regulation In Cultured Cells Of The Oyster Pathogen Perkinsus Marinus, Caroline L. O'Farrell

Dissertations, Theses, and Masters Projects

No abstract provided.

In Vitro And In Vivo Effects Of Chemotherapeutants On The Oyster Parasite, Perkinsus Marinus, Gustavo W. Calvo

Dissertations, Theses, and Masters Projects

To investigate the potential of chemotherapeutants to control the oyster pathogen Perkinsus marinus, anticoccidial and antifungal compounds were tested in vitro on infected hemolymph and cultured P. marinus cells and in vivo on infected oysters. In addition, acute toxicity to oysters was determined for six anticoccidials. In vitro experiments with infected hemolymph consisted of 24 h exposure of 0.2 mL hemolymph aliquots to concentrations ranging from 100 mg/L to 0.01 mg/L of amphotericin-B, amprolium, arprinocid, cycloheximide, lasalocid, malachite green, monensin, sulfadimethoxine, and a potentiated sulfadimethoxine, followed by incubation in fluid thioglycollate medium (FTM) to determine prezoosporangia abundance. Lasalocid, malachite green, …

The Effect Of Low Salinity On Established Infections Of Perkinsus Marinus (Apicomplexa: Perkinsasida) In The Eastern Oyster, Crassostrea Virginica, Lisa M. Ragone

Dissertations, Theses, and Masters Projects

No abstract provided.

Characterization Of Minchinia Sp Spores (Ascetospora: Haplosporidiidae) Infecting Teredo Navalis L And Placopecten Magellanicus Von Martens (Mollusca: Teredinidae) In The Western North Atlantic, Elizabeth Robinson Mcgovern

Dissertations, Theses, and Masters Projects

No abstract provided.

Parasite Community Structure In Summer Flounder: Paralichthys Dentatus (Linnaeus), Of The Chesapeake Bay, Maura E. Jansen

Dissertations, Theses, and Masters Projects

No abstract provided.

Seasonal Immune Response In Juvenile Summer Flounder Paralichthys Dentatus To The Hemoflagellate Trypanoplasma Bullocki In The Lower Chesapeake Bay, Linda Jane Frizzell

Dissertations, Theses, and Masters Projects

No abstract provided.

Ecological And Epidemiological Studies Of Nematopsis Ostrearum, A Sporozoan Parasite Of The Oyster Crassostrea Virginica, In Lower Chesapeake Bay And Its Tributaries, Sung Yen Feng

Dissertations, Theses, and Masters Projects

No abstract provided.