Physical Sciences and Mathematics Commons^™

Amin-Modified Graphene Oxide As A Promising Adsorbent For Selective Extraction Of Dexamethasone Adulterant From Herbal Supplements, Mahboob Nemati, Ali Zayer, Samin Hamidi

Turkish Journal of Chemistry

In most cases, herbal supplements found in illegal centers and herbal medicine stores have harmful content that causes irreparable damage to people. As a representative of the green chemistry method, a rapid and efficient dispersive micro solid-phase extraction (D-mSPE) method was applied to extract dexamethasone adulterant from handmade supplements sold as power natural enhancing materials. The quantification of the analyte was performed by high performance liquid chromatography with an ultraviolet detector. Effective parameters on the extraction recovery, including the type and amount of adsorbent, the kind of elution solvent, and the time of extraction and elution, were systematically investigated. The …

Photocatalytic Degradation Of Paracetamol By Semiconductor Oxides Under Uv And Sunlight Illumination, Derman Akşi̇t, Güli̇n Selda Pozan Soylu

Turkish Journal of Chemistry

In this study, photocatalytic degradation of paracetamol (acetaminophen), an analgesic and antipyretic drug, was investigated in using semiconductors under UV-B and sunlight irradiation. Semiconductor materials, Bi₂O₃, ZnO, TiO₂, and ZrO₂, were prepared using simple sol-gel, coprecipitation, and microwave synthesis methods. These photocatalyts were characterized by various spectroscopic and other techniques. As a result of the reactions, 25 ppm paracetamol with Bi₂O₃ and ZnO photocatalyst, total degradation was achieved with UV-B irradiation in 90 min. The results of photocatalytic activities showed that the highest degradation rate was obtained with the …

Thermal Versus Photochemical Tautomerization Of Cytosine And Guanine: A Blyp Computational Study Along The Irc Curves, Tsvetina Cherneva, Vassil Delchev

Turkish Journal of Chemistry

We performed a theoretical study, at the BLYP/aug-cc-pVDZ theoretical level, of the mechanisms of H-transfer between biologically relevant tautomers of cytosine and guanine. The analysis of the ground- and excited state energy barriers of the conversions showed that in some cases they are lower as compared to the ground state reactions. The inclusion of one water molecule as a catalyst in the oxo-amino form of cytosine and guanine drastically changes the mechanism of the reactions in the ground as well as in the excited state. For example, the ground state reaction path of cytosine reduces the energy barrier from 165 …

Predicting Customer Loyalty In The Mobile Banking Setting: An Integrated Approach, Nhuong Bui, Zach Moore, Hayden Wimmer, Long Pham

Computing: Faculty Publications

This study uses a novel theoretical approach that combines two multidimensional service quality models that focus on customer satisfaction, perceived value, and customer loyalty as outcomes of service quality in the context of mobile banking. Additionally, the study assesses the potential moderating effects of switching costs between mobile banking service quality and customer loyalty. The study found a strong direct effect between service quality, perceived value, customer satisfaction, and loyalty. The moderating effect of switching costs was found to be inconsequential to customer loyalty. The study demonstrates that financial institutions should focus on building and maintaining functional, secure mobile banking …

Mapping The Dna Damaging Effects Of Polypyridyl Copper Complexes With Dna Electrochemical Biosensors, Anna Banasiak, Nicolò Zuin Fantoni, Andrew Kellett, John Colleran

Articles

Several classes of copper complexes are known to induce oxidative DNA damage that mediates cell death. These compounds are potentially useful anticancer agents and detailed investigation can reveal the mode of DNA interaction, binding strength, and type of oxidative lesion formed. We recently reported the development of a DNA electrochemical biosensor employed to quantify the DNA cleavage activity of the well-studied [Cu(phen)₂]²⁺ chemical nuclease. However, to validate the broader compatibility of this sensor for use with more diverse—and biologically compatible—copper complexes, and to probe its use from a drug discovery perspective, analysis involving new compound libraries is …

Charge Transfer Mediated Triplet Excited State Formation In Donor-Acceptor-Donor Bodipy: Application For Recording Of Holographic Structures In Photopolymerizable Glass, Tatsiana Mikulchyk, Safakath Karuthedath, Catherine S.P. De Castro, Andrey A. Buglak, Aimee Sheehan, Aaron Wieder, FréDéRic Laquai, Izabela Naydenova, Mikhail Filatov

Articles

Donor–acceptor–donor BODIPY triads bearing anthracene or pyrene as electron donating subunits were prepared through a stepwise synthesis. Photoinduced electron transfer and formation of long-lived triplet excited states via spin–orbit charge transfer intersystem crossing (SOCT-ISC) was studied by steady-state and ultrafast pump-probe spectroscopy and further supported by DFT computations. New BODIPYs were found to form triplet states and sensitize singlet oxygen in both polar and non-polar solvents which is unusual for photosensitizers operating via SOCT-ISC. BODIPY-anthracene triad (ABA) was used as a photosensitizer component in a photopolymerizable glass that was prepared by a four-step sol–gel process. ABA in combination with N …

Fluctuating Temperature Modifies Heat-Mortality Association Around The Globe, Yao Wu, Bo Wen, Shanshan Li, Antonio Gasparrini, Shilu Tong, Ala Overcenco, Aleš Urban, Alexandra Schneider, Alireza Entezari, Ana Maria Vicedo-Cabrera, Antonella Zanobetti, Antonis Analitis, Ariana Zeka, Aurelio Tobias, Barrack Alahmad, Ben Armstrong, Bertil Forsberg, Carmen Íñiguez, Caroline Ameling, César De La Cruz Valencia, Chrisofer Åström, Danny Houthuijs, Do Van Dung, Dominic Royé, Ene Indermitte, Eric Lavigne, Fatemeh Mayvaneh, Fiorella Acquaotta, Francesca De’Donato, Francesco Sera, Gabriel Carrasco-Escobar, Haidong Kan, Hans Orru, Ho Kim, Iulian-Horia Holobaca, Jan Kyselý, Joana Madureira, Joel Schwartz, Klea Katsouyanni, Magali Hurtado-Diaz, Martina S. Ragettli, Masahiro Hashizume, Mathilde Pascal, Micheline De Sousa Zanotti Stagliorio Coélho, Noah Scovronick, Paola Michelozzi, Patrick J. Goodman, Paulo Hilario Nascimento Saldiva, Rosana Abrutzky, Samuel Osorio, Tran Ngoc Dang, Valentina Colistro, Veronika Huber, Whanhee Lee, Xerxes Seposo, Yasushi Honda, Michelle L. Bell, Yuming Guo

Articles

Studies have investigated the effects of heat and temperature variability (TV) on mortality. However, few assessed whether TV modifies the heat-mortality association. Data on daily temperature and mortality in the warm season were collected from 717 locations across 36 countries. TV was calculated as the standard deviation of the average of the same and previous days’ minimum and maximum temperatures. We used location-specific quasi-Poisson regression models with an interaction term between the cross-basis term for mean temperature and quartiles of TV to obtain heat-mortality associations under each quartile of TV, and then pooled estimates at the country, regional, and global …

Towards Plasmon Mapping Of Sers-Active Ag Dewetted Nanostructures Using Spels, Mohamed Beshr, E. Dexter, Paul E. Tierney, Aidan Meade, Shane Murphy, George Amarandei

Articles

Thermal dewetting of silver thin flm can lead to SERS-active Ag nanoparticles. Here, we report our progress towards using scanning probe energy loss spectroscopy (SPELS) to map the plasmonic behaviour of SERS-active Ag nanoparticles (NP) by investigating NPs produced through the dewetting study of Ag thin flms on SiO2/Si and Ti/SiO2/Si substrates. The nanoparticles size and spatial distribution were controlled by the deposition and thermal annealing parameters. The results of preliminary SPELS measurements of these structures, alongside SERS data show that there is a correlation between the Raman enhancement and the nanoparticle size and interparticle spacing.

International Consensus On Lung Function Testing During Covid-19 Pandemic And Beyond, Aisling Mcgowan, Pierantonio Laveneziana, Sam Bayat, Nicole Beydon, P.W. Boros, Felip Burgos, Matjaž Fležar, Monika Franczuk, Maria-Alejandra Galarza, Adrian H. Kendrick, Enrico Lombardi, Jellien Makonga-Braaksma, Meredith C. Mccormack, Laurent Plantier, Sanja Stanojevic, Irene Steenbruggen, Bruce Thompson, Allan L. Coates, Jack Wanger, Donald W. Cockcroft, Bruce Culver, Karl Sylvester, Frans De Jongh

Articles

Coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) has negatively affected the delivery of respiratory diagnostic services across the world due to the potential risk of disease transmission during lung function testing. Community prevalence, reoccurrence of COVID-19 surges and the emergence of different variants of SARS-CoV-2 have impeded attempts to restore services. Finding consensus on how to deliver safe lung function services for both patients attending and for staff performing the tests are of paramount importance. This international statement presents the consensus opinion of 23 experts in the field of lung function and respiratory physiology balanced with evidence from the reviewed literature. It describes …

Modelling And Design Of Holographic Optical Elements For Beam-Coupling Applications For A Range Of Incident Beam Angles, Dipanjan Chakraborty, Rosen Georgiev, Sinéad Aspell, Vincent Toal, Izabela Naydenova, Dervil Cody, Suzanne Martin

Articles

Theoretical modelling has been used to calculate the holographic recording beam angles required in air (at any recording wavelength) to produce a Volume Holographic Optical Element (VHOE) for any defined input and output beam angles. The approach is used to facilitate the design and fabrication of diffractive coupling elements through a holographic process that avoids the use of coupling prisms during recording and will help in the design of recording arrangements that better suit the mass production of low-cost elements, especially those designed for non-normal incidence. In this study, the recording angles needed for a range of recording wavelengths were …

Biomolecular Corona Stability In Association With Plasma Cholesterol Level, Duong N. Trinh, Meda Radlinskaite, Jack Cheeseman, Gunther Kuhnle, Helen M.I. Osborn, Paula Meleady, Daniel I.R. Spencer, Marco P. Monopoli

Articles

Biomolecular corona is spontaneously formed on the surface of nanoparticles (NPs) when they are in contact with biological fluids. It plays an important role in the colloidal stability of NPs, which is of importance for most of their medical applications and toxicity assessment. While typical studies use either blood plasma or serum from a pooled biobank, it is unclear whether differences in the media, such as cholesterol level or protein concentration, might affect the NP colloidal stability and corona composition. In this study, the silica corona was prepared at particularly low plasma concentrations (3%, v/v–1.98 mg/mL) to identify the critical …

Measuring Semantic Similarity Of Documents By Using Named Entity Recognition Methods, David Efraín Muñoz Morales

Masters

The work presented in this thesis was born from the desire to map documents with similar semantic concepts between them. We decided to address this problem as a named entity recognition task, where we have identified key concepts in the texts we use, and we have categorized them. So, we can apply named entity recognition techniques and automatically recognize these key concepts inside other documents. However, we propose the use of a classification method based on the recognition of named entities or key phrases, where the method can detect similarities between key concepts of the texts to be analyzed, and …

Self-Consistent Markovian Embedding Of Generalized Langevin Equations With Configuration-Dependent Mass And A Nonlinear Friction Kernel, Cihan Ayaz, Lucas Tepper, Roland R. Netz

Turkish Journal of Physics

We consider a generalized Langevin equation (GLE) in which the deterministic force, the mass and the friction kernel are configuration-dependent, i.e. general nonlinear functions of the reaction coordinate. We introduce a projection operator that allows for a self-consistent Markovian embedding of such GLEs. Self-consistency means that trajectories generated by the Markovian embedding are described by a GLE with the same configuration-dependent deterministic force, mass and friction kernel. Using the projection operator, we derive a closed-form relation between the parameters of the Markovian embedding Langevin equations and the parameters of the GLE. This is accomplished by applying the projection operator formalism …

Quantum Kinetic Equation For Fermionic Fluids And Chiral Kinetic Theory, Ömer Faruk Dayi

Turkish Journal of Physics

We first review how one can establish the quantum kinetic equation for fluids of spin-1/2 particles. Then we present the construction of the semiclassical relativistic chiral kinetic equation of the fluid in the presence of the external electromagnetic fields. We derive the resulting nonrelativistic chiral kinetic theory. We calculated the particle number current density and showed that chiral effects are correctly generated. Moreover, it satisfies the anomalous continuity equation.

3d Self-Assemble Formation Of Molybdenum Disulfide (Mos2)-Doped Polyacrylamide (Paam) Composite Hydrogels, Sümeyye Durmaz, Ekrem Yildiz, Bengü Özuğur Uysal, Mehmet Önder Pekcan

Turkish Journal of Physics

Polyacrylamide (PAAm), a renowned member of the hydrogel class, has many uses throughout a wide range of industrial processes, including water absorbed diapers, contact lenses, wastewater treatment, biomedical applications such as drug delivery vehicles and tissue engineering because of its physical stability, durability, flexibility easier shaping, and so on. PAAm also provides new functionalities after the incorporation of inorganic structures such as molybdenum disulfide (MoS₂). During the copolymerization process, the transmittance of all samples reduced significantly after a particular time, referred to as the gel point. Microgels form a tree above the gel point as projected by Flory-Stockmayer …

Potential Of Entomocomposting Toward Soil Pathogen Suppression, Dennis Beesigamukama, María Gómez-Brandón, Chrysantus Mbi Tanga

All Peer-Reviewed Publications

Waste accumulation and microbial pollution are key environmental challenges in most developing countries. Land filling, the commonest waste disposal method, is not sustainable due to land scarcity and point source pollution. Thus, a large fraction of organic wastes is not properly disposed, yet the conventional methods of waste recycling are less effective. The degradation of waste using insect life stages (entomocomposting) has emerged as a novel tool that is fast, affordable, and sustainable in recycling organic wastes with maximum pathogen suppression. This bioconversion process also generates an organic fertilizer with potential to enhance soil remediation and provide additional benefits on …

Mass Production Of Entomopathogens In Less Industrialized Countries, David Grzywacz, Sean Moore, Belinda Luke, Sevgan Subramanian, David Moore, R. J. Rabindra

All Peer-Reviewed Publications

Production of entomopathogenic agents as biopesticides, mainly fungal and some viral agents, has been established in many countries of Asia, South America and Africa using low technology approach, often by small to medium scale producers. While these reduced technology systems can generate effective products, these systems require the application of appropriate production methodology and rigorous monitoring if the appropriate quality and safety standards are to be reached. The role of governments in creating and maintaining a policy and regulatory environment that promotes local entomopathogen (EP) production, marketing and use remains important for success. The wider adoption of EP products in …

Integrated Pest Management Of Tuta Absoluta: Practical Implementations Across Different World Regions, Nicolas Desneux, Peng Han, Ramzi Mansour, Judit Arnó, Thierry Brévault, Mateus R. Campos, Anais Chailleux, Raul N.C. Guedes, Javad Karimi, Kouassi Arthur J. Konan, Anne Violette Lavoir, María G. Luna, Meritxell Perez-Hedo, Alberto Urbaneja, François J. Verheggen, Lucia Zappalà, Khaled Abbes, Abid Ali, Yunus Bayram, Fernando Cantor, Andrew G.S. Cuthbertson, Raf De Vis, Fedai Erler, Dnyaneshwar M. Firake, Khalid Haddi, M. Jamal Hajjar, Khasan Ismoilov, Coline C. Jaworski

All Peer-Reviewed Publications

The South American tomato pinworm, Tuta absoluta (Meyrick) (Lepidoptera: Gelechiidae), has invaded most Afro-Eurasian countries and is threatening worldwide tomato production. Various strategies have been developed and implemented to manage this pest. Here, we present a timely review on the up-to-date development and practical implementation of integrated pest management (IPM) programs for tomato crops across different world regions infested by T. absoluta. While insecticide resistance is a growing concern, biological control via releasing or conserving arthropod natural enemies and sex pheromone-based biotechnical control are the most successful management practices. Agronomic control-related research is an emerging area where the soil fertilization …

The Depauw Story - A Retrospective On The Beginnings Of Our Institutional Sustainability Initiative (2008 - 2021), Jeannette K. Pope

Interdisciplinary Faculty Scholarship

On September 15, 2008, DePauw University joined the community of the nearly 700 other institutions of Higher Education that had “pledged to neutralize the greenhouse gas emissions of their institutions and make environmental awareness a key component of campus life” by signing the American College and Universities Presidents’ Climate Commitment (ACUPCC, hereafter referred to as the PCC). This action established the Office of Sustainability at DePauw, which formally dedicated human resources to the emerging discipline of campus sustainability for the first time, but it did not begin the conversations about environmental best practices on our campus. To fully understand how …

Controls On Carbon Gas Fluxes From A Temperate Forest Soil, Natalie A. White, Ruth K. Varner, Clarice R. Perryman

Honors Theses and Capstones

Forest soils consume atmospheric methane (CH₄), serving as a major global CH₄ sink that uptake an estimated 22 ± 12 Tg of CH₄ per year. Temperature and soil moisture have been identified as key controls of the microbial consumption of CH₄ in forest soils. Climate-driven warming and changing moisture regimes may impact forest soils’ role in the carbon cycle, and recent works suggests that forests could become weaker CH₄ sinks. Long-term monitoring sites can capture these changes, leading to better predictions of CH₄ exchange between the atmosphere and soils under climate change. This study …

Impact Of Drought Stress On Oak Stomatal Size And Density At Thompson Farm, Nh, Emily Chen

Honors Theses and Capstones

Global climate change is likely to affect northeastern U.S. forests by increasing the frequency and severity of drought events. Historically, droughts rarely occurred in this region, so native tree species are not well-adapted to extreme moisture stress. In the future, the changing climate will likely cause unprecedented levels of low water availability which may have implications on future forest composition. It is hypothesized that trees can respond to these environmental changes by altering their functional traits, also referred to as phenotypic plasticity; for example, by producing leaves with fewer and smaller stomata.

To determine the capacity to which oak trees …

Environmental And Societal Impacts In New England Following A Potential Yellowstone Eruption, Serena L. Butler

Honors Theses and Capstones

Yellowstone National Park is famously known for its history of “super-volcano” eruptions. From the evidence of volcanic deposits, scientists know that the ash cloud that erupted from Yellowstone covered most of the western U.S. states, but until recently, models have not shown the ash could also have reached eastern states. The scope of this investigation is to determine what would happen to New England if Yellowstone were to erupt today in terms of health, agriculture, transportation, relocation, economy, and climate. In order to do so, three significant eruptions during human history are considered as case studies in order to compare …

Comparing Twins Ion Temperature Maps With Mms, Ampere, And Themis Observations During July 26, 2017 Reconnection Event, Isabella M. Householder

Honors Theses and Capstones

The solar wind releases a constant stream of ionized particles into space which causes complex behaviors to occur within Earth’s magnetosphere. These disruptions can initiate magnetic reconnection and cause flow reversal of ions in the magnetotail. Two flow reversal events were locally detected by the Magnetospheric Multiscale Mission (MMS) on July 26, 2017 at 0700 UT and 0730 UT. The Two Wide-Angle Imaging Neutral-Atom Spectrometers (TWINS) provide a global measurement of heated signatures of the magnetic field and detected an increase in ion temperature during these reconnection events without the presence of a geomagnetic storm. Active Magnetosphere and Planetary Electrodynamics …

Location And Calibration Of Lightning Pulses From Lofar Radiation Measurements, Nicholas R. Demers

Honors Theses and Capstones

Lightning has the power to shock and awe as an incredible force of nature, yet so many phenomena surrounding lightning are still not well-understood. In fact, the very physics regarding what actually sparks a lightning strike remain poorly defined. In an effort to understand how lightning initiation is achieved, data collected from the Low Frequency Array in the Netherlands were calibrated and interferometry performed to map the flash in 4D space. The calibration process itself is explored, from choosing lightning sources to calibrate, to the various stages of calibration leading to a fully calibrated flash ready for interferometric analysis. Using …

Mindfulness And Pain Regulation: The Role Of Acceptance And Commitment Therapy For Individuals With Chronic Pain, Ariana C. White

Honors Theses and Capstones

Chronic pain is a significant and widely prevalent health condition which requires comprehensive care to address the many facets contributing to symptomatology. In 2016, 20% of American adults (about 50 million) reported experiencing chronic pain, of which 7.4% indicated that chronic pain frequently limited their life and participation in activities within the past 3 months (CDC, 2018). As a result, many individuals with chronic pain turn to opioid-based medication for pain relief, but long-term use of opioids actually increases pain sensation (Tobin, 2019). Moreover, opioid medication is unable to target underlying mental health components which emerge as part of chronic …

Attempts To Measure Nanosecond Resolved Electronic Dynamics Of Charge Density Wave Phase Transition In 1t-Tas2, Ben Campbell

Honors Theses and Capstones

Scanning tunneling microscopes allow for atomic spatial resolution but the resulting images are necessarily time-averaged and fast dynamics are lost. Pump-probe spectroscopy is a common optical technique used to measure ultrafast electronic dynamics but the integration of optical pump-probe spectroscopy into an STM requires specialized knowledge and equipment. Alternatively, an all-electronic pump-probe spectroscopy technique has recently been developed for use with an STM that replaces the laser pulses of optical pump-probe with voltage pulses. In this paper, I implemented an all-electronic pump-probe scheme into an existing scanning tunneling microscope using an arbitrary waveform generator and a lock-in amplifier. I developed …

Realtime Event Detection In Sports Sensor Data With Machine Learning, Mallory Cashman

Honors Theses and Capstones

Machine learning models can be trained to classify time series based sports motion data, without reliance on assumptions about the capabilities of the users or sensors. This can be applied to predict the count of occurrences of an event in a time period. The experiment for this research uses lacrosse data, collected in partnership with SPAITR - a UNH undergraduate startup developing motion tracking devices for lacrosse. Decision Tree and Support Vector Machine (SVM) models are trained and perform with high success rates. These models improve upon previous work in human motion event detection and can be used a reference …

Gas-Phase Acid-Base Properties And Conformations Of Oligopeptides Through Mass Spectrometry And Computational Studies, Yuntao Zhang

University of the Pacific Theses and Dissertations

This dissertation presents a comprehensive study of the peptides of interest to deeper understand the gas-phase acid-base properties in relation to their conformations and chirality. In the first part of the study, two pairs of alanine (A)-based isomeric peptides consisting of a basic probe, lysine (Lys) or 2,3-diaminopropionic acid (Dap), were investigated to understand the nature of the enhanced basicity when the basic probe was moved from the N-terminus to the C-terminus. In the second part of the study, alanine-based peptides containing a cysteine (C) as the acidic probe were investigated to understand the chirality effects on the gas-phase acidity …

Utilization Of Virtual Reality For General Education Purposes, Amit Lal

University of the Pacific Theses and Dissertations

The use of Virtual Reality (VR) in a variety of professional, military, governmental, and educational fields has continued to expand over the past several decades, and the recent Covid-19 pandemic has brought attention to this field. This study surveys 154 college students over 23 questions that include various demographics that can be used to look for discriminators, multiple-choice VR-related questions, as well as a few free-form questions about use of VR in learning environments. The students’ experience with, interest in, and thoughts on how to best use VR vary considerably. The Covid-19 pandemic is found to have limited impact thus …

Elucidating The Molecular Basis Of Spontaneous Activation In An Engineered Mechanosensitive Channel, Kalyan Immadisetty, Adithya Polasa, Reid Shelton, Mahmoud Moradi

Chemistry & Biochemistry Faculty Publications and Presentations

Mechanosensitive channel of large conductance (MscL) detects and responds to changes in the pressure profile of cellular membranes and transduces the mechanical energy into electrical and/or chemical signals. MscL can be activated using ultrasonic or chemical activation methods to improve the absorption of medicines and bioactive compounds into cells. However, re-engineering chemical signals such as pH change can trigger channel activation in MscL. This study elucidates the activation mechanism of an engineered MscL at an atomic level through a combination of equilibrium and non-equilibrium (NE) molecular dynamics (MD) simulations. Comparing the wild-type (WT) and engineered MscL activation processes suggests that …