A Fictional Exploration of Breast Cancer

The thesis that follows is made up of two parts. First, there is a reflection paper, which includes a small literature review related to the topic chosen as well as a discussion of the creative process, a plan for the future of my creative work, and some issues and questions that arose during writing. Following the reflection paper is a 40 page excerpt of a young adult novel I plan to finish in the future entitled “Anastasia’s Warrior.” This excerpt follows a female main character that is 16 years of age as her mother is diagnosed with breast cancer and they navigate her treatment

Race, Culture & Abuse of Persons with Disabilities

This chapter will explore how race and culture influence the lives of persons with disabilities who are experiencing abuse. The discussion will be framed by an intersectional lens and will be informed by cultural humility and critical race theory. Practitioners need to remain open to the idea that they cannot and will not know all there is to know about any given culture, and they should be open to hearing about their clients’ understanding and experiences of culture. Rather than knowing certain pieces of “knowledge” about a cultural group, it is more important to understand what pieces of culture the clients embrace or reject. This chapter will conclude with a composite client case example of a female, middle-aged, Korean immigrant with Multiple Sclerosis, who is very active in her Christian church, and who is being abused by her husband. Discussion of this case will highlight the intersectional context of the client’s experience and how they may influence her decision to seek help (and from whom) as well as her experience of receiving help. The case discussion also highlights the practitioner’s values and behaviors that are consistent with cultural humility and critical race theory

The influences of parenting styles on children\u27s classroom motivation

This study was part of a larger, longitudinal project investigating the relationships between family stress processes and children\u27s development. The purpose of the current study was to examine the relationship between authoritarian, permissive, and authoritative parenting styles and children\u27s classroom motivation as measured by child interviews and teacher perceptions. The population of this study included 281 first and third grade students and their parents in a mid-sized Southern city. Parenting styles data for this study were collected via mailed questionnaires consisting of the Primary Caregivers Practices Report (Robinson et al., 1995) and questions used to obtain demographic information. Motivation data were collected via child interviews using the Self-Report Scale of Intrinsic versus Extrinsic Motivation in the Classroom (Harter, 1981) and the Teacher-Report Scale of Intrinsic versus Extrinsic Motivation in the Classroom (Harter, 1981), which was given to teachers to complete. Correlation analyses were performed to determine which demographic characteristics should be used as control variables. Regression analyses were performed to examine the relationship between parenting styles and children\u27s classroom motivation. In general, the results of the current study did not support the researcher\u27s expectations that the authoritative parenting style would be positively related to children\u27s intrinsic motivation, and authoritarian and permissive parenting styles would be negatively related to children\u27s intrinsic motivation. The results were inconclusive. As expected by the researcher, mothers\u27 authoritative parenting was found to be positively related to first graders\u27 mastery motivation, fathers\u27 authoritarian parenting was found to be negatively related to first graders\u27 mastery motivation, and mothers\u27 permissive parenting was negatively related to teachers\u27 perceptions of children\u27s classroom motivation. Contrary to the researcher\u27s expectations, fathers\u27 authoritarian parenting was found to be positively related to third graders\u27 mastery motivation and teachers\u27 perceptions of children\u27s classroom motivation

The Cellular Mirna, Mir-190, is Upregulated in Type I Ebv Latency by Ebers and Modulates Cellular Mrnas involved in Cell Survival and Viral Reactivation

Epstein-Barr Virus (EBV) is a highly prevalent human pathogen infecting over 90% of the population. Much of the success of the virus is attributed to its ability to maintain latency through different programs in host cells. MicroRNAs (miRNA) are small, non-coding RNAs capable of post-transcriptionally regulating mRNA expression. A microarray comparison of EBV type I latency and type III latency infected cells yielded evidence of differential cellular microRNA expression. I hypothesized that one of these differentially upregulated type I latency miRNAs, miR-190, is important in maintenance of latency I, and miR-190 upregulation is due to viral gene expression. Lentiviral overexpression systems were used to overexpress miR-190 and a microarray of gene expression revealed candidate miR-190 targets, including: TP53INP1 and NR4A3. The modulation of these targets by miR-190 was confirmed through evaluating mRNA and protein level changes in the presence or absence of miR-190. In the case of TP53INP1, a 3’UTR target site was identified through mutagenesis. The effect of miR-190 expression was evaluated for markers of cell cycle and cell death by flow cytometry, western blot and RT-PCR. Measures of viral reactivation were lowered in the presence of miR-190 after induction by anti-IgG stimulation. I also observed upregulation of miR-190/Talin2 promoter activity or miR-190 expression in the presence of EBERs, Epstein-Barr encoded RNAs. Interestingly, a panel of type I latency cell lines had higher EBER1 expression compared to their type III latency counterparts. Work by others has indicated that EBERs activate the double-stranded RNA (dsRNA) sensor, retinoic acid-inducible gene 1 (RIG-I). Transiently expressed, constitutively activated RIG-I induced miR-190 expression and promoter activity. Knockdown of RIG-I in the type I latency cells yielded lowered miR-190 expression levels. To investigate how miR-190 is upregulated I generated miR-190/Talin2 promoter reporters that lacked YinYang1 (YY1) and Nuclear factor-κB (NF-kB) binding motifs. In the presence of EBERs, promoters with these deleted binding motifs had lowered activation compared to the full miR-190/TLN2 promoter. This work describes a mechanism by which EBERs upregulate a cellular miRNA, miR-190, which aids in type I latency preservation by preventing apoptosis, promoting cell cycle and maintaining virus in its latent state

U.S. Office of Global Humanitarian Demining Works Toward Demining 2010 Goals

Since 1994, the United States has committed approximately $400 million to worldwide humanitarian demining efforts. With its sights set on 2010, the U.S. Office of Global Humanitarian Demining is working to establish partnerships in the private sector

The Mineseeker Airship: \u27Supporting the U.N.\u27

The Lightship Group and the Defense Research and Evaluation Agency team up to help survey mine fields from above. Airship completed its flagship mission in 2000

K9 Demining Corp to Aid Clearance Efforts in Lebanon

The Marshall Legacy Institute, with major contributions from the Humpty Dumpty Institute, is contributing six mine detection dogs to the Lebanese Army\u27s mine clearance team

Hate Crime Laws and Sexual Orientation

This article provides definitions for hate crimes, a summary of national data on hate crime incidents, and descriptions of federal and state hate crime laws. The author presents various arguments in support of and against hate crime laws, and the inclusion of sexual orientation in such laws. The author contends that it is illogical and a violation of the Fourteenth Amendment to exclude sexual orientationf rom hate crime laws. The perpetratorso f hate crime incidents, regardess of the target group, have similar motives and perpetrate similar types of assaults; the victims experience similar physical and psychological harm. Excluding a class of persons who are targets of hate crimes denies them equal protection under the law because the Equal Protection Clause of the Fourteenth Amendment establishes a fundamental right to equal benefit of laws protecting personal security

The Quest for Sustainability in International Library Development: The Experience of the Riecken Foundation

The Riecken Foundation provides support to communities in developing countries to create sustainable partnership library programs focusing on collection development, technology applications, and assembling professional staff and volunteers. This article studies the experience of the Foundation through research gathered in interviews with Bill Cartwright, President and CEO of the Foundation, along with onsite observations at six participating libraries, and offers analysis of documentation related to these sustainability initiatives. The study also examines the transition of the Foundation from a private foundation to a public charity and the effect this has had in its programming

In Situ Thermal Inspection of Automated Fiber Placement Operations for Tow and Ply Defect Detection

The advent of Automated Fiber Placement (AFP) systems have aided the rapid manufacturing of composite aerospace structures. One of the challenges that AFP systems pose is the uniformity of the deposited prepreg tape layers, which complicates detection of laps, gaps, overlaps and twists. The current detection method used in industry involves halting fabrication and performing a time consuming, visual inspection of each tape layer. Typical AFP systems use a quartz lamp to heat the base layer to make the surface tacky as it deposits another tape layer. The innovation proposed in this paper is to use the preheated base layer as a through-transmission heat source for inspecting the newly added tape layer in situ using a thermographic camera mounted on to the AFP hardware. Such a system would not only increase manufacturing throughput by reducing inspection times, but it would also aid in process development for new structural designs or material systems by providing data on as-built parts. To this end, a small thermal camera was mounted onto an AFP robotic research platform at NASA, and thermal data was collected during typical and experimental layup operations. The data was post processed to reveal defects such as tow overlap/gap, wrinkling, and peel-up. Defects that would have been impossible to detect visually were also discovered in the data, such as poor/loss of adhesion between plies and the effects of vacuum debulking. This paper will cover the results of our experiments, and the plans for future versions of this inspection system