shifting center

Senior Project submitted to The Division of Arts of Bard College

The Isolationism Of Senator Charles W. Tobey

Thesis (M.A.) University of Alaska Fairbanks, 197

Investing in the Housing Crisis: An exploration of the North Carolina public pension system's relationship with Landmark Partners and the Single Family Rental industry

North Carolina has a corporate landlord problem. Large investors now own over 40,000 single family homes in North Carolina1, squeezing out would-be homebuyers and burdening renters with rising rental costs and prolonged maintenance issues. Some of these corporate rental companies are owned or backed by private equity firms that receive funding from public pension systems, including the North Carolina Retirement System (NCRS). The North Carolina Retirement System has committed more than $3.2 billion to one such private equity firm, Landmark Partners, since 2014.$2.6 billion of these commitments to Landmark have been made since Dale Folwell became State Treasurer and took over responsibility for the pension fund in 2017. No other pension fund has invested more than $500 million in Landmark during the 2017 - 2022 time period.This matters because Landmark is a major investor in Progress Residential,4 the largest single family rental company in the U.S. with over 7,700 homes in North Carolina

Progress for Who?: Progress Residential Preys on Renters as it Buys Up Homes in Tennessee and the U.S. South

Recent headlines have called attention to the expansion of corporate investors in the single-family rental home industry. Corporate landlords' growing acquisition of homes is particularly high in cities throughout the U.S. South, where a dire lack of renter protections has abetted rapid gentrification. In this context, the National Rental Home Council (NRHC), a real estate industry group headed by the largest single-family rental (SFR) landlords to advance their interests, is holding its national conference in Nashville, Tennessee this April 16-19, 2023. Renters have repeatedly demanded that the NRHC, and the corporate landlords that lead it, adopt tenant protections in the homes they own and manage, due to their exploitative business practices.Tennessee has suffered first-hand the harms that can come from the proliferation of corporate-owned rental homes, and Nashville is a key target for the largest predatory landlords. Renters in corporate-owned properties have reported unfair rent hikes, shoddy maintenance, excessive fees, and more. Renters are organizing against evictions, as well as for limits on arbitrary rent increases, and the right to bargain collectively about living conditions

Multimodal Magnetic Resonance and Near-Infrared-Fluorescent Imaging of Intraperitoneal Ovarian Cancer Using a Dual-Mode-Dual-Gadolinium Liposomal Contrast Agent.

The degree of tumor removal at surgery is a major factor in predicting outcome for ovarian cancer. A single multimodality agent that can be used with magnetic resonance (MR) for staging and pre-surgical planning, and with optical imaging to aid surgical removal of tumors, would present a new paradigm for ovarian cancer. We assessed whether a dual-mode, dual-Gadolinium (DM-Dual-Gd-ICG) contrast agent can be used to visualize ovarian tumors in the peritoneal cavity by multimodal MR and near infra-red imaging (NIR). Intraperitoneal ovarian tumors (Hey-A8 or OVCAR3) in mice enhanced on MR two days after intravenous DM-Dual Gd-ICG injection compared to controls (SNR, CNR, p < 0.05, n = 6). As seen on open abdomen and excised tumors views and confirmed by optical radiant efficiency measurement, Hey-A8 or OVCAR3 tumors from animals injected with DM-Dual Gd-ICG had increased fluorescence (p < 0.05, n = 6). This suggests clinical potential to localize ovarian tumors by MR for staging and surgical planning, and, by NIR at surgery for resection

An Investigation of the Activities Conducted by the Local Affiliated Units of the Washington Education Association

The purposes of this study were (1) to determine what activities are carried on by the local city and /or county affiliated units of the Washington Education Association and (2) to compare the programs on the local unit level to the basic objective of the Washington Education Association, i.e., to promote the cause of teaching in the State of Washington (27:1)

The representational dynamics of task and object processing in humans

Despite the importance of an observer’s goals in determining how a visual object is categorized, surprisingly little is known about how humans process the task context in which objects occur and how it may interact with the processing of objects. Using magnetoencephalography (MEG), functional magnetic resonance imaging (fMRI) and multivariate techniques, we studied the spatial and temporal dynamics of task and object processing. Our results reveal a sequence of separate but overlapping task-related processes spread across frontoparietal and occipitotemporal cortex. Task exhibited late effects on object processing by selectively enhancing task-relevant object features, with limited impact on the overall pattern of object representations. Combining MEG and fMRI data, we reveal a parallel rise in task-related signals throughout the cerebral cortex, with an increasing dominance of task over object representations from early to higher visual areas. Collectively, our results reveal the complex dynamics underlying task and object representations throughout human cortex

Emerging Techniques in Breast MRI

As indicated throughout this chapter, there is a constant effort to move to more sensitive, specific, and quantitative methods for characterizing breast tissue via magnetic resonance imaging (MRI). In the present chapter, we focus on six emerging techniques that seek to quantitatively interrogate the physiological and biochemical properties of the breast. At the physiological scale, we present an overview of ultrafast dynamic contrast-enhanced MRI and magnetic resonance elastography which provide remarkable insights into the vascular and mechanical properties of tissue, respectively. Moving to the biochemical scale, magnetization transfer, chemical exchange saturation transfer, and spectroscopy (both “conventional” and hyperpolarized) methods all provide unique, noninvasive, insights into tumor metabolism. Given the breadth and depth of information that can be obtained in a single MRI session, methods of data synthesis and interpretation must also be developed. Thus, we conclude the chapter with an introduction to two very different, though complementary, methods of data analysis: (1) radiomics and habitat imaging, and (2) mechanism-based mathematical modeling