Author:  Aliya Babul

Nuclear magnetic resonance (NMR) can provide incredible insight into chemical changes that occur in biological tissues under closed conditions. Utilizing NMR can lead to a better understanding of the breakdown of chemicals in a biological substance which in turn can help determine expiry dates and optimal storing conditions for a variety of substances ranging from fruits and vegetables to medical materials. In this experiment, NMR was applied to examine the effect of storage time on chemical and physical properties of orange juice pulp.

Author:  Havell Markus, May Boggess, Mary Beth Nabity, George Lees

Glomerular filtration rate (GFR) is the amount of fluid the kidney filters through the glomeruli per unit time. It is used to evaluate renal function, since a low value indicates poor kidney function. Serial plasma concentrations of an exogenous marker over time can be used to estimate GFR. In this paper, we will demonstrate how the delta method can be applied to approximate the standard error of estimated GFR, thus allowing the provision of an interval estimate for GFR, using two pharmakinetic models: the single compartment and the non-compartmental. These results were applied to canine observations of plasma iohexol concentrations.

Authors:  Nicole Lindsay-Mosher, Cathy Su

Cancer causes one in seven deaths worldwide, making it one of the most important issues in the world of biotechnology today. Current cancer therapies, including chemotherapy and radiotherapy, have severe side effects and often prove ineffective at completely eradicating malignant cells. Therefore, a more selective method of targeting tumour cells must be designed. Gene therapy holds great potential to selectively target cancer cells, allowing the treatment to effectively destroy the cancer while leaving healthy tissues intact. In order to develop a gene therapy treatment, two main obstacles must be overcome: a therapeutic agent must be developed to facilitate genetic changes, and a delivery method must be optimized to insert the therapeutic agent into target cells.

Author:  Sophia Carter

Research supports personality differences between tattooed and non-tattooed individuals. However, few studies have investigated whether any of these differences are associated with positive indicators for tattooed individuals. In this study, personality differences between tattooed and non-tattooed individuals in three of the Big Five personality areas considered critical to successful employees in the workforce were examined. Previous research has established that higher levels of conscientiousness and extraversion coupled with lower levels of neuroticism are indicators of high-quality employees. The present study attempts to augment this line of research by adding the dimension of tattoos; investigating whether individuals with tattoos report more positive personality indicators in these dimensions than individuals without tattoos. Thus it was hypothesized that tattooed individuals would report higher levels of conscientiousness and extraversion and lower levels of neuroticism than non-tattooed individuals.

Author:  Julie A. Steinke

Deforestation impacts tropical forests and alters habitats worldwide, which can negatively affect sensitive species. Reforestation efforts are currently increasing. However, little is known about herpetofaunal (reptile and amphibian) reconstruction post-reforestation, other than that it is a slow process. This study focuses on determining impacts of reforestation efforts in coastal Ecuador. Transects at similar elevations were established in a forested and reforested area in and near the Jama-Coaque Ecological Reserve. Visual Encounter Surveys (VES) were carried out, and species richness, abundance, composition, and density were determined. A Chi-square test was used to determine association between reptiles and amphibians within the two sites, and a t-test was used to determine if there was a significant difference in species density between the two sites. Five species of reptiles and eight species of amphibians were detected.

Author: Christian Peterson

Quantum and atomic physics can often be an abstract and difficult subject for students to learn. Derived here is a simple model for helium and two-electron systems that may make some concepts, such as screening, easier for students to understand. We extend Bohr’s derivation, assuming a natural electron configuration, to explain some of the spectral lines of helium (He).

Authors: Michael K. Slade and Russell T. Warne

Because of their widespread use, trauma-focused cognitive-behavioral therapy (TF-CBT) and play therapy (PT) were selected as treatments to be included in a meta-analytic study examining their effectiveness in aiding victims of child abuse. Studies analyzing the effectiveness of TF-CBT or PT were found using Academic Search Premier, PsycARTICLES, Psychological and Behavioral Sciences Collection, PsychINFO, Google Scholar, and Digital Dissertation.

Autoimmune polyendocrinopathy-candidiasis-ectodermal dystrophy (APECED) is a rare, recessive disease caused by mutations in the autoimmune regulator (AIRE) gene. A loss of function at the AIRE locus is widely known to induce autoimmune activation against host tissues due to lack of central tolerance during thymic T cell development. Failure to delete autoreactive T cell clones allows their release into the periphery, where they may proliferate and initiate an autoimmune response.By investigating the multiple ways AIRE function can be compromised, recent research has uncovered the steadfast mechanisms explaining how AIRE is expressed in mTECs, how AIRE transactivates tissue-specific antigens (TSAs), and how those TSAs are presented to T cells by both medullary thymic epithelial cells (mTECs) and bone marrow-derived antigen-presenting cells.

Author:  Mackenna Hill, Elizabeth Duval

Attention bias modification (ABM) has been shown to decrease self-reported symptom severity for those with social anxiety disorder (SAD). ABM may also decrease attention bias towards threat present in SAD. Currently, the most prominent form of ABM is a modified dot-probe paradigm that uses two affective/emotional faces to measure or train attention bias. Results are mixed in previous studies regarding the ability of ABM to alter attention bias. 

Author:  Anthony J. Eckdahl and Todd J. Eckdahl

Gene expression in bacteria begins with transcription, the process by which the base sequence of DNA is copied into RNA. Promoters contain the DNA structural and chemical information for the initiation of transcription by RNA polymerase. Many bacterial promoters have conserved DNA sequences for this purpose called the -35 region and the -10 region. We used a new system for promoter research called pClone Red to carry out mutational analysis of the -35 region of a high strength promoter.

Authors:  Joseph A. Hammerstrom, Pierre-Richard J. Cornely

Earthquakes are extremely dangerous physical phenomena. The ability to properly forecast them would go a long way in reducing the damage they cause. One earthquake forecasting method being researched uses the ionospheric Total Electron Content (TEC). Our investigation used TEC data from 2011 during certain days near and on the date of the earthquake off the coast of Tōhoku, Japan. We took advantage of the large amounts of GPS records obtained by the GPS Earth Observation Network (GEONET) of Japan which contained the TEC data needed. This data was used to visualize the TEC over the course of the day of the Tōhoku earthquake.

Author:  Marvin X. C. Seow

Nanostructured metal alloys made up of Pt and another metal are more efficient in catalysing reactions than pure Pt nanoparticles. However, few studies have investigated low heat, solvent-free chemical deposition techniques of nanostructured metal alloys. This paper investigates the deposition of Pt–Au nanostructured metal alloy on fluorine-doped tin oxide glass via the low heat, solvent-free polyol reduction and the effect of Pt:Au mass loading ratio on the catalytic performance.

Authors:  Felix B. A. Tellander, Johan E. M. Ulander, Irina I. Yakimenko, Karl-Fredrik Berggren

The structure of scattered wave fields and currents is of interest in a variety of fields within physics such as quantum mechanics and optics. Traditionally two-dimensional structures have been investigated; here we focus on three-dimensional structures. We make a generic study of three dimensional quantum box cavities, and our main objective is to visualize the probability current.

Author:  Donald H. Kuettel III

Active orthotic devices for joint articulation have a vast number of applications that could benefit many people. Examples include joint articulation for people suffering from disabilities, increased load carrying capacity and walking distance for humans, and gait training. The main goal of this research is to help people with disabilities regain natural walking ability by replicating normal walking gait through the use of an active ankle-foot orthosis (AAFO). This research investigates the optimization of a pulley system for the primary actuator of an AAFO utilizing a high-efficiency pneumatic “Walking Engine.”

Author:  Michael Lai

The Epithelial Mesenchymal Transition (EMT) has been implicated as a driving force behind the metastasis of epithelial derived cancers; it stimulates the acquisition of a migratory, drug resistant mesenchymal phenotype. Current proposals for targeting EMT-facilitated metastasis are ineffective, as a majority focus on the inhibition of EMT-initiating signals. Instead, this study used a novel approach aimed at directly inhibiting the mesenchymal phenotype by targeting mesenchymal survival pathways post mapping at specifically up-regulated points in the mesenchymal state. 

Author:  Erinola Araoye, Karina Ckless

The Nod-Like Receptor Protein-3/Interleukin-1β (NLRP3/IL-1β) inflammatory pathway activation is associated with autoimmune diseases including gout, Muckle-Wells syndrome, familial Mediterranean fever and multiple sclerosis. Type 2 diabetes and insulin resistance have been associated with chronic inflammation; however, the mechanism by which the NLRP3 inflammatory pathway participates in this condition remains unclear. 

Authors:  Greg D. Owens, Patrice D. Smith, Nafisa M. Jadavji

The primary pathway for removing homocysteine, a potentially neurotoxic molecule, from circulation is via 5-methyltetrahydrofolate. This molecule is converted from folate via an enzyme known as methylenetetrahydrofolate reductase (MTHFR). Polymorphisms in the MTHFR gene have been linked to various pathologies (e.g. neurological disease) and animal models have been developed to study the in vivo effects of the deficiency. These models have revealed increased levels of apoptosis in the cerebellum and hippocampus and potential modulation of neurogenesis, which may contribute to the pathologies viewed. 

Authors:  Cecily Wing Hei Cheng, Matthew Wai Heng Chung, & Joseph Chi Fung Ng

The nucleation of amyloid-β (Aβ) oligomers, and the fibril formation that follows represents an important pathologic mechanism for Alzheimer's disease (AD). This has motivated the search for therapeutics that specifically target Aβ, which holds promise to be a cure for AD. However, conventional biophysical approaches like X-ray crystallography and nuclear magnetic resonance (NMR) spectroscopy fall short of capturing this highly dynamic process. The aggregation of amyloid fibrils has been unravelled by a mix of novel approaches.