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Exploration of CIC-DUX4 Sarcoma Surfaceome
CIC-DUX4 sarcoma (CDS) is a rare and aggressive subtype of undifferentiated round-cell sarcomas, primarily impacting adolescents and young adults, with a median survival of less than 2 years. Its molecular and cellular aspects remain poorly understood, particularly concerning the CDS surfaceome, cell surface membrane proteins. Understanding the cancer’s surfaceome is important for understanding how tumors interact with their surroundings and laying the basis of developing targeted treatments.
In this study, we conducted a comprehensive analysis of the CDS surfaceome using RNA-Sequencing data obtained from CDS cell lines. Through the integration of various analytical approaches, we identi- fied a distinctive subset of 20 surface proteins that encapsulate critical biological attributes, serving as potential therapeutic targets for CIC-DUX4 sarcoma.
Beyond gene expression profiling, we utilized advanced Network Science tools such as ego networks and personalized PageRank centrality. Leveraging existing biomedical literature databases, we identified therapeutic interventions targeting the candidate genes identified in our analysis. Our findings highlighted the potential of computational tools in discovering novel biomarkers and therapeutic avenues for CDS, thereby advancing precision medicine for rare cancers
Beyond the Institution: Radical Archiving Practices in Community- Based Archival Work
Throughout my time at Macalester, I have become increasingly aware of a tension that exists between those housing the archive and what the archive seeks to document. Many of the archives that document the lives of those who have been victims of structural violence and those forcibly pushed to the outskirts of society, are housed within large institutions. Oftentimes these large institutions rest upon the very colonial and white supremacist harm they work to document. In this paper, I acknowledge this tension and ask what it looks like to move beyond housing identity-based history at an institution and in the hands of the perpetrators, and instead what it looks like to place these histories back into the communities they emerge from. Drawing upon the Lesbian Herstory Archive, Queer Newark Oral History Project, and Shingwauk Residential Schools Centre Community Archive as case studies for community archival work, this paper will examine radical archiving as a theoretical framework geared towards equity and justice in archival spaces. Using case study review as a methodology, I will draw conclusions as to what community-based archiving looks like as a practice. Together these case studies will illustrate what community archiving looks like in practice and how radical archiving, as a framework, provides the tools necessary to engage in community-based archiving
Moroccan Women: Diverse Agencies/Les femmes marocaines: l’agentivité diverse
My name is Rose and my general academic interests are in French and Francophone studies, Arabic, and International or regional studies. In this honors project, I am interested in examining the subjectivities of Moroccan women and their agency in society. This agency can be formal or informal but in general it varies from person to person and is impacted by areas like ethnicity, religion, and social class. While much research and scholarship has been done in the area of gender in Moroccan society, the things I am interested in exploring more myself is the differences in experiences among Moroccan women as their experiences and perspectives often differ considerably around various types of labor and expression including family, education, organizing, and profession or creative and political expression. For example, today most Moroccan women I have met identify as very independent and career driven. Although Morocco is a patriarchal society in some ways, this assertion is not the complete story and it ignores the fact that Moroccan women are often empowered in ways different from the way women in France. My focus is on how Moroccan women find agency in their home communities to aspire to ambition and dream outside the box. Still there are also structural limitations in the country such as discrimination and the impact of neoliberal policies which make some of these ambitions challenging to achieve. Morocco is a country that has historically been matrilineal before the Arab conquest. It is also home to many diverse women’s activist groups. My goal is to see how women navigate between the complex working spaces today in the face of growing globalization and continued Western influence. These factors directly impact how women navigate differing perspectives surrounding women’s labor and expression.
In the past decade, many Moroccan women have disagreed with each other on certain labor issues. For example, the recent changes in the family code has garnered controversy. These changes were heavily supported by organizations like USAID and World Bank, although these organizations are mostly funded from Western countries. For some conservative women in organizations like the Justice and Development Party (PJD) and Adal wa al Ihsanne, traditional Islam should be at the heart of their government’s Islamic policies. These spiritual guides often seeked to support and uplift women through the teachings of Islam, but many rural communities especially often interpreted religion through their cultural lens as well. Still, the experience of a woman living in Sale, a working class suburb outside Rabat is not the same as a woman in Hay Riad, an upper class neighborhood near Rabat which sits on the ancient tribal land of a semi nomadic Arab community called guichey oudaya. Their relationship to gender will be greatly differing depending on their personal circumstances including social class, background or ethnicity, familial status, etc. In general, my project will explore the voices and experiences of Moroccan women in Morocco.
Je m’appelle Rose et mes intérêts académiques généraux sont en études françaises et francophones, en études arabes et internationales ou régionales. Dans ce projet d’honneurs, je m’intéresse aux subjectivités des femmes marocaines et leur agentivité en société. Cela peut être formel et informel, mais en général ça varie d’une personne à l’autre et est affecté par des facteurs comme l’ethnicité, la religion et la classe sociale. Alors que de nombreuses recherches ont été menées dans le domaine du genre dans la société marocaine, je suis intéressée à explorer plus moi-même les différences d’expériences parmi les femmes marocaines. Leurs expériences et perspectives peuvent souvent différer considérablement autour de divers types de travail et d’expression, y compris de la famille, l’éducation, l’organisation, et le travail professionnel et l’expression créative ou politique. Par exemple, aujourd’hui, la plupart des femmes marocaines que j’ai rencontrées s’identifient comme très indépendantes et motivées par leur carrière. Bien que le Maroc ait une société patriarcale à certains égards, ce n’est pas l’histoire complète et ignore le fait que les femmes marocaines sont souvent habilitées d’une manière différente de la façon dont les femmes en France vers leur capacité de résister à l\u27oppression. Je me concentrerai sur la façon dont les femmes marocaines trouvent l’agentivité dans leurs communautés d’origine pour aspirer grand et rêver hors des sentiers battus, mais aussi sur les limites des structures dans le pays comme la discrimination et l’impact des politiques néolibérales. Le Maroc est un pays qui a historiquement été matrilinéaire avant la conquête arabe et il abrite également de nombreux groupes de femmes activistes. Mon objectif est de voir comment les femmes naviguent entre les espaces de travail complexes d’aujourd’hui face à la mondialisation croissante et à l’influence occidentale continue où les femmes naviguent dans différentes perspectives entourant leur expression créative et civique.
Au cours de la dernière décennie, de nombreuses femmes marocaines ont été en désaccord avec les uns et les autres et ne se sont pas entendues sur certaines questions liées au travail. Par exemple, les récents changements apportés au code de la famille ont suscité des controverses. Ces changements ont été fortement soutenus par des organisations comme USAID et la Banque mondiale, parce que ces organisations sont principalement financées par les pays occidentaux. Pour certaines femmes conservatrices dans des organisations comme le Parti de la justice et du développement (PJD) et Adal wa al Ihsanne deux orginisations islamistes (le PJD est reconnu par le gouvernement mais Adal al Ihsanne n’est pas reconnu), l’islam traditionnel devrait être au cœur de la politique islamique de leur gouvernement. Au contraire, les murshidats sont les femmes nommées par le gouvernement pour enseigner la religion d\u27 une façon officielle. Ces guides spirituels ont souvent cherché à soutenir et à élever les femmes grâce aux enseignements de l’islam, mais de nombreuses communautés rurales ont également souvent interprété la religion à travers leur optique culturelle et religieuse. Évidement, l’expérience d’une femme vivant à Sale, une banlieue ouvrière à l’extérieur de Rabat n’est pas la même qu’une femme à Hay Riad, un quartier de la classe supérieure près de Rabat qui se trouve sur l’ancienne terre tribale d’une communauté arabe semi nomade appelée guichey oudaya. Leur relation au genre sera très différente selon leur situation personnelle, y compris la classe sociale, l’origine ou l’ethnicité, le statut familial, etc. En général, mon projet explore les voix et les expériences des femmes marocaines au Maroc
Enhancing Early Detection: Improving Autism Spectrum Disorder Diagnostic Processes
Early identification and intervention of Autism Spectrum Disorder (ASD) has been well-established as extremely important for developmental outcomes, as the most efficacious treatments for the disorder occur prior to five years of age (McCarty & Frye, 2020). In this paper, divided into two chapters, I examine potential changes to the ASD diagnostic process to aid the goal of early intervention.
In Chapter 1, I discuss how modifications to current gold-standard diagnostic tools could help with this goal. Efforts to improve early detection and intervention for Autism Spectrum Disorder (ASD) have led to the development of screening and diagnostic tools such as M-CHAT-R, ADOS, and ADEC. However, despite the progress in this field, the average diagnostic age remains significantly older than optimal (McCarty & Frye, 2020). This literature review delves into the limitations of existing tools and proposes modifications aimed at enhancing early detection, such as revising scoring systems, incorporating assessments for motor issues, and improving cohesion between screening and diagnosis.
In Chapter 2, I expand upon how utilizing the motor domain in the ASD diagnostic process could aid early detection. While research has consistently demonstrated a link between ASD and delays in the motor domain, the mainstream screening practices often neglect motor considerations. Specific trends in infant motor development, such as balance (Odeh et al., 2020), gait, and postural control (Fulceri et al., 2019), have been identified as predictive of ASD diagnosis. Moreover, motor difficulties have been found to impact outcomes in domains core to ASD itself (Libertus & Violi, 2016; Iverson et al., 2018). Yet, less than 1% of individuals with ASD receive clinical recognition for motor impairments, and even fewer receive targeted therapeutic interventions (Bhat, 2020; Licari et al., 2019). Incorporating motor assessment into current screening practices and modifying diagnostic labeling to include motor concerns could improve early recognition of ASD
Predatory Inclusion in Higher Education: Labor and Financial Exploitation at a Predominantly White Institution in the Era of Neoliberal Multiculturalism
In the summer of 2020, racial justice movements that emerged in response to the murder of George Floyd at the hands of Minneapolis police officer Derek Chauvin passionately decried the systems and institutions at fault and complicit in still perpetuating racial discrimination towards Black people, as well as Indigenous and other People of Color (BIPOC). As a response to these racial justice demands, college institutions pushed for diversity in their student body and across college affairs in order to appear like they were effectively responding to student demands. However, this fight against racial inequality and inequity began long before during the post-Civil War era when, as W.E.B. DuBois has written, America’s enduring problem of the color line continued to structure race relations in the nation. Formally, the work to desegregate higher education began in the 1960s after the Civil Rights Act was passed. Over time, higher education consequently became an increasingly popular commodity as it was framed as a necessity to access better and higher-paying jobs, where going to college became framed as an inclusive opportunity for increasing racial social mobility. As BIPOC students gain opportunities to enroll in higher education, it is important that we examine the relationship between institutions’ DEI efforts and the experiences that people with “diverse” racialized bodies have within them. To further explore this relationship, I conducted in-person interviews with 14 students who self-identified as BIPOC and were currently enrolled at Macalester College, a self-proclaimed racially progressive liberal arts college located in the Twin Cities less than ten miles away from where Floyd had been murdered. Ultimately engaging with Keeanga-Yamahtta Taylor’s concept of predatory inclusion but applying it to the context of higher education instead of the housing market, my results reveal that there are two general forms of exploitation that BIPOC students reported experiencing: labor and financial. As a result, I conclude that the DEI efforts promoted and promised by the college do not reflect the true experiences of BIPOC students who are being tokenized and exploited by the institution instead of being offered material redistribution or a fair path to upward mobility
Ecosystem response to increasing hurricane disturbance: Comparing nutrient cycling dynamics associated with early- and late-successional tree species in a wet tropical forest
Puerto Rico has seen changes in the frequency and severity of disturbances in recent years as hurricanes become more frequent and more intense under climate change. In ecosystems experiencing increasing disturbances, we expect that species composition will shift as early successional trees become more common. These changes to species composition and community ecology are likely to affect terrestrial nutrient cycling both directly and indirectly, and it is still not well understood how shifting community composition may alter ecosystem functioning. To address this gap, I measured carbon (C) and nitrogen (N) variables in soils, microbial biomass, roots, leaves, and soil greenhouse gas fluxes within 1 m of individuals from three tree species (5 replicates per species) across a topographic gradient in El Yunque National Forest in Puerto Rico. The three species of interest are likely to be differently affected by changing hurricane regimes: an early successional tree species (Cecropia schreberiana), a secondary successional species (Prestoea montana), and a late successional species (Guarea guidonia). I hypothesized that the soil area surrounding early successional and late successional tree species would exhibit differences in carbon and nitrogen cycling and the resulting soil greenhouse gas emissions. I found that there were significant species-related differences in leaf composition, soil nutrients, and soil gas fluxes. G. guidonia had the highest %C and %N in senesced leaves compared to the other two species, having on average 6.39% and 8.38% higher %C compared to C. schreberiana and P. montana respectively. Senesced G. guidonia leaves had on average more than 50% higher %N compared to P. montana, and nearly double the %N of C. schreberiana at 90.55% more on average. All three species had statistically distinct C:N ratios, with G. guidonia having the lowest at 28.859 ± 2.435 (compared to 39.988 ± 2.274 for P. montana and 51.522 ± 3.751 for C. schreberiana), and thus likely decomposing the fastest. C. schreberiana and G. guidonia had statistically distinct amounts of extractable C and N associated with the soil at the base of each tree (p \u3c 0.01). While the soil CO2 flux associated with each tree did not differ significantly between species, the CH4 flux was significantly higher in the soil near P. montana compared to the other two species, averaging around -0.052 ± 0.155 compared to -0.608 ± 0.123 and -0.685 ± 0.041 for C. schreberiana and G. guidonia respectively, suggesting that P. montana is associated with lower soil CH4 uptake. In combination, my results suggest that, as the successional state of the forest shifts to be dominated by early successional species for longer stretches of time due to increasing incidence of large-scale hurricane disturbance, the nutrient cycling of this forest may also be altered drastically
Concrete Legacy: The Effects of the Interstate Highway System on Black Communities in the U.S.
This article examines the role that racism, racial capitalism, neoliberalism, and classism played in the construction of the Interstate Highway System as a part of 20th-century urban renewal. It will first understand the context of American urban renewal and then look at the policy specific to the Interstate Highway System. After that, I will discuss the resistance many communities portrayed and how bureaucracy stood firm against grassroots organizing. Then, this paper will explore the process of highway removal and new construction, as well as reparations for the communities most affected by the Interstate Highway System. Finally, I will give warnings of possible ramifications that could emerge from highway removal. This article is rooted in the community of Rondo/Old Rondo in Saint Paul, Minnesota, where this paper got its start. The Rondo community was targeted by city planners to be destroyed as the highway rolled in, as were many other Black communities in the United States. Hundreds of homes were damaged, but now, the community, in partnership with the city government, is making plans for repair. I recognize the importance of the Rondo community and the City of Saint Paul to the future of highway-related reparations and this paper specifically. The answer to the question of the most effective way to restore and repair affected communities lies within those very people
On the Backs of Slaves: A Comparative Study on the Glamorization of Colonialism at the University of Amsterdam, Harvard University and Georgetown University
This capstone project explores the intricate relationship between colonialism, the slave trade, and higher education, focusing on the University of Amsterdam, Harvard University and Georgetown University. It argues that these institutions are deeply intertwined with slavery and colonialism, shaping their foundations and contributing to present-day structural inequalities in higher education. This essay highlights the perpetuation of elitism and exclusion by critiquing the University of Amsterdam for celebrating the Dutch East India Company (VOC) without acknowledging its connection to the slave trade. It also discusses Harvard University\u27s historical ties to slavery and the slave trade, including the institutions use of slave labor and their scientific research that reinforced racial hierarchies. Georgetown University’s connection to the Jesuit religion and their involvement in the sale and use of slaves is explored while also emphasizing the institution\u27s recent efforts for acknowledgment and reparations. This capstone concludes by calling for a more inclusive and critical approach to higher education, recognizing the need for ongoing examination and acknowledgment to address the lasting impact of colonialism on academic institutions and advocating for increased accessibility and racial equity in higher education
Abolish r(ICE): (Dis)ability, Immigration, and Asian American Resistance
In 2021, Minneapolis-based Khmer artist, Kat Eng designed the “Abolish r(ICE)” t-shirt as part of a fundraiser for Southeast Asians and their families experiencing deportation. Inspired by the iconic Three Ladies Brand jasmine rice bag, Eng re-imagined the three ladies as freedom fighters in response to heightened immigration policing and detention of Southeast Asian communities. In this paper, I unpack and contextualize the Abolish r(ICE) t-shirt campaign within immigration debates, the contemporary abolitionist movement, and Asian American resistance. The Abolish r(ICE) shirts also function as a form of political education and an invitation specifically to Asian American youth to learn more about Southeast Asian issues and the larger movements towards abolition. Through a reading of the Abolish r(ICE) campaign I show how Kat Eng along with their collaborator Stephanie Shih draw upon food imagery and branding as part of their larger work to link Asian American cultural formations and urgent political issues. In doing so, the artists unapologetically center Southeast Asian American aesthetics, imagery, and voices as part of amplifying the Asian American community organizing against deportation. The design and imagery of the logo centers Southeast Asian and Asian American experiences and histories within the larger contemporary movement towards abolition and continued debates around immigration and detention policies within the United States.
Applying a disability justice framework, I unpack how we might understand (dis)ability not just as an object of study but as an analytic. Drawing upon feminist-of-color disability studies, I argue for a disability justice approach to unpack immigration, deportation, and imperialism as discourses of state violence. What does disability justice reveal to us about “the refugee”, immigration and the carceral system? How are young contemporary Asian American artists using iconic household goods and foods as a critique of the U.S. Empire? Why does the model minority myth overlook Southeast Asian refugees? How do we understand state violence against Southeast Asians through immigration and detention as an issue of disability justice? In this paper, I explore these questions and make connections around Asian American abolitionists organizing across both national and local scales connecting the Twin Cities. Overall, I argue that by using a feminist-of-color disability studies analysis of the Abolish r(ICE) campaign we can further deepen our understanding of power and resistance that moves us beyond a liberal project of inclusion and representational politics
Power, Control, and Policy: A Comparison of State Policy Responses to Domestic Violence
What policies are most effective at addressing and lowering cases of domestic violence? In the United States, there have been, and continue to be, a variety of responses and solutions brought forward by governments, communities, and individuals on how to prevent violence within families and what the consequences are when it occurs. Following federal policy guidelines, state and local governments have adopted different approaches to address domestic violence that focus on specific programs and systems that contribute to the reduction of domestic violence. This project is an in depth analysis of different policy approaches to identify the strategies that have empirically proven successful in lowering levels of domestic violence, as reported by CDC. I analyze two groups of states to determine if policies related to criminal justice or services for survivors have proven to be more successful at addressing domestic violence among women in the United States