Urban Portraiture: Capturing the Personality of Place

This capstone aims to develop a prototypical process using digital photography to document the essence of place. A final visual narrative element is created with the intent of being utilized by architectural designers to draw inspiration and understanding from the setting in which they are designing. The process involved four distinct phases that culminated in a single narrative montage. These four phases included the actual photographing of the city, evaluating and taxonomy of the photographs into categories that best embodied the spirit of the place, the altering of individual photographs into their essential parts and pieces, and the process of montaging these individual pieces into a larger, single narrative. The project is a personal experimentation that utilizes a set of skills and values that can be recreated and repeated but also altered to culminate in a visual product that is unique to the designer and place

Looking Within The Rainbow: An Action Research Project on The Rainbow Educators

The purpose of my research was to explore the importance of learning about oneself in order to teach others effectively. My overarching question was, how can I cultivate identity development and better equip Rainbow Educators (RE) as facilitators? A secondary question was: how can I create space for identity development and storytelling when people are in different developmental stages and have different experiences to help deepen the learning? Using Coghlan’s Spirals of Action Research as a guiding framework, I conducted one pre-cycle, a needs assessment, as well as three cycles of data collection. As a result of this study, I influenced the RE team’s growth and development through the themes of practice, praxis, trust, and community

Studying the Effects of Theraflu on the Growth of Selenastrum Capricornutum

Algae contribute to self-purification of streams and rivers and are necessary as food for fish and as components of aquatic food webs (1). However, too much or too little algae may create or be indicative of a problem. If nutrients are present in large amounts, algae growth may become excessive, resulting in algal “blooms.” These algal blooms can change the chemistry of the water, making it toxic to other aquatic occupants, including fish, birds, animals, and other plants (1). On the other hand, if nutrients in the water are limiting or are exhausted, algae growth is inhibited, which results in lower oxygen production via photosynthesis (1). In other words, the composition and abundance of algae directly affect water quality. In addition, algae composition and abundance is a direct result of the availability of nutrients. In order to compare algal growth potentials from a number of widely different water sources there are advantages in using a single representative species of alga. It is ideal for the alga being used to be readily available and for its growth to be measured easily yet accurately (1). For this study, the freshwater green alga Selenastrum capricornutum was used as a model for the aquatic environment. S. capricornutum was first isolated in 1959 by O.M. Skulkberg in the River Nitelva in Akershus, Norway (4). The taxonomy of S. capricornutum is as follows: Domain: Eukaryota Kingdom: Plantae Phylum: Chlorophyta Class: Chlorophyceae Order: Sphaeropleales Family: Selenastraceae Genus: Selenastrum Species: capricornutum S. capricornutum is a crescent-shaped freshwater green alga which has a single chloroplast found within the algal cell and occasionally forms non-mucilaginous colonies of four to sixteen cells. These colonies are rarely intertwined and, instead, form a matrix by attaching their dorsal sides to other cells. S. capricornutum is important in bioassays of water quality and environmental assessment (2). It is a sensitive species and is one of the three chosen organisms by the Environmental Protection Agency as a toxicity test species in the National Pollutant Discharge Elimination System (NPDES). Algae have long been used in water quality assessment as in situ bio-monitors, but have not been commonly used in toxicity tests (6). Therefore, a small toxicity database exists which is not consistent with the ecological importance of algae in aquatic ecosystems (6). In response to this, Terry W. Snell, Joy L. Mitchell, and Susan E. Burbank performed a study that focused on rapid toxicity assessment in four different species of algae (6). This study tested seven different toxicants: pentachlorophenol, naphthol, chlorpyrifos, cadmium, mercury, copper, and phenol. The four algae species tested were Selenatrum capricornutum, Tetraselmis suecica, Cyclotella sp., and Synechococcus leopoliensis. In the study, S. capricornutum was the most sensitive alga used for five of the seven toxicants (6). My study involves studying the effect of Pharmaceuticals and Primary Care Products (PPCPs) on water quality in the environment. PPCPs can be drugs, soaps, lotions, and other such compounds. These PPCPs affect the environment when they enter water systems via, flushing the toilet and human and animal excretions. The question that this study tries to address is how these seemingly harmless drugs affect our environment and water quality. The PPCP being studied is the over-the-counter drug Theraflu, containing diphenhydramine HCl, acetaminophen, and phenylephrine HCl. These three drugs are the active ingredients in several nighttime cold and allergy medicines, e.g. Sudafed, Delsym, Theraflu (5). Diphenhydramine HCl is an active ingredient in most sleep aids and antihistamines, particularly Benadryl and ZzzQuil (7). Theraflu was chosen to study based on its widespread popularity and its availability in liquid form. S. capricornutum functions in this study as a test species for the aquatic environment. The hypothesis is that if the growth of S. capricornutum is inhibited, then it is possible that a component of Theraflu—diphenhydramine HCl, acetaminophen, or phenylephrine—affects the environment negatively

Trafficking in persons monitoring report: January 2009–June 2011

Since 2008, the Australian Government has increased the tempo on investigating and understanding these crimes, and the Australian Institute of Criminology’s research and monitoring program is part of this effort.  The Government has introduced new legislation to crack down on trafficking slavery and servile marriages. Human trafficking is a serious but underreported problem as victims are unwilling to come forward. Since 2004 only 14 people have been convicted of people trafficking-related offences (nine of the 14 defendants were convicted of slavery offences, three of sexual servitude, one of people trafficking and one of labour exploitation). Between January 2009 and June 2011 there were 73 police investigations in Australia and 145 trafficked people entering the government’s victim support program—slightly more than in the previous period. Victims continue to be overwhelmingly from south-east Asia, one-third from Thailand alone. Authored by Jacqueline Joudo Larsen, Lauren Renshaw, Samantha Gray-Barry, Hannah Andrevski, and Toby Corsbie

Profiling ambivalence in the context of nonsuicidal self-injury

Background: We aimed to identify profiles of ambivalence among individuals with a history of non-suicidal self-injury (NSSI) and tested whether profiles differed across various theoretically informed constructs: NSSI-related characteristics, cognitive (outcome expectancies, self-efficacy to resist NSSI), emotional (psychological distress, difficulties in emotion regulation), personality, and incentives to engage/not engage in NSSI. Methods: Individuals with a lifetime history of NSSI (n = 224) reported the extent to which they wanted to and did not want to engage in NSSI and completed well-validated measures of the constructs of interest. Results: Latent profile analysis indicated four ambivalence profiles (avoid: n = 39; moderately ambivalent: n = 85; highly ambivalent: n = 30; approach: n = 70). The profiles differed across a number of NSSI-related characteristics, cognitive, emotional, and incentive-related variables. Differences between the ambivalence profiles and the avoid/approach profiles varied across constructs. For example, the ambivalence and approach profiles were similar for NSSI-related outcome expectancies, but the ambivalence and avoidance profiles were similar for self-efficacy to resist NSSI. Conclusion: Findings highlight variation between the desire to engage or not engage in NSSI that are consistent with the notion of ambivalence. Understanding these differences may allow for a more person-centered approach in treatment for NSSI

An integrated model for the nucleo-cytoplasmic transport of cytoplasmic poly(A)-binding proteins

Cytoplasmic poly(A)-binding proteins (PABPs) regulate mRNA stability and translation. Although predominantly localized in the cytoplasm, PABP proteins also cycle through the nucleus. Recent work has established that their steady-state localization can be altered by cellular stresses such as ultraviolet (UV) radiation, and infection by several viruses, resulting in nuclear accumulation of PABPs. Here, we present further evidence that their interaction with and release from mRNA and translation complexes are important in determining their sub-cellular distribution and propose an integrated model for regulated nucleo-cytoplasmic transport of PABPs

Increased Hematopoietic Extracellular RNAs and Vesicles in the Lung during Allergic Airway Responses.

Extracellular RNAs (exRNAs) can be released by numerous cell types in vitro, are often protected within vesicles, and can modify recipient cell function. To determine how the composition and cellular sources of exRNAs and the extracellular vesicles (EVs) that carry them change in vivo during tissue inflammation, we analyzed bronchoalveolar lavage fluid (BALF) from mice before and after lung allergen challenge. In the lung, extracellular microRNAs (ex-miRNAs) had a composition that was highly correlated with airway-lining epithelium. Using cell type-specific membrane tagging and single vesicle flow, we also found that 80% of detected vesicles were of epithelial origin. After the induction of allergic airway inflammation, miRNAs selectively expressed by immune cells, including miR-223 and miR-142a, increased and hematopoietic-cell-derived EVs also increased >2-fold. These data demonstrate that infiltrating immune cells release ex-miRNAs and EVs in inflamed tissues to alter the local extracellular environment

Nuclear relocalisation of cytoplasmic poly(A)-binding proteins PABP1 and PABP4 in response to UV irradiation reveals mRNA-dependent export of metazoan PABPs

Poly(A)-binding protein 1 (PABP1) has a fundamental role in the regulation of mRNA translation and stability, both of which are crucial for a wide variety of cellular processes. Although generally a diffuse cytoplasmic protein, it can be found in discrete foci such as stress and neuronal granules. Mammals encode several additional cytoplasmic PABPs that remain poorly characterised, and with the exception of PABP4, appear to be restricted in their expression to a small number of cell types. We have found that PABP4, similarly to PABP1, is a diffusely cytoplasmic protein that can be localised to stress granules. However, UV exposure unexpectedly relocalised both proteins to the nucleus. Nuclear relocalisation of PABPs was accompanied by a reduction in protein synthesis but was not linked to apoptosis. In examining the mechanism of PABP relocalisation, we found that it was related to a change in the distribution of poly(A) RNA within cells. Further investigation revealed that this change in RNA distribution was not affected by PABP knockdown but that perturbations that block mRNA export recapitulate PABP relocalisation. Our results support a model in which nuclear export of PABPs is dependent on ongoing mRNA export, and that a block in this process following UV exposure leads to accumulation of cytoplasmic PABPs in the nucleus. These data also provide mechanistic insight into reports that transcriptional inhibitors and expression of certain viral proteins cause relocation of PABP to the nucleus. © 2011. Published by The Company of Biologists Ltd