The Unseen Cost of Lowering Labor Market Flexibility on Higher Education Market: Evidence from Cross-sectional Data from OECD

This paper attempts to determine the unseen consequences of lowering labor market flexibility and its impact on individuals’ demand for higher education by using standard OLS multiple regression analysis and cross-sectional data. I examine the independent variables that are theorized to increase the percentage of college diplomas attained in the market. Independent variables are chosen based on what has been studied in the prior literature. This study finds that labor market flexibility has a positive correlation with the percentage of adult population who have a higher education diploma. The results of this study suggest that individuals’ demand for higher education is a multifaceted issue that is not close to being fully explained. Keywords: labor market flexibility, higher educatio

Bernard: An Illustrated Children’s Book

My Capstone Project is an illustrated children’s book titled, Bernard, that I authored and illustrated. It is a 32-page full color illustrated book following the adventures of a bear named Bernard, as he explores what it is like to spend a day in a human town. The idea behind the story was imagined during a serendipitous moment and expanded into a full narrative. During the creation of the Bernard, I learned the importance of elements such as the rhythm and structure of the children’s book. Wielding a pencil and paper, I explored how little or how much was necessary to convey a concept. I learned the importance of finding purpose to drive a narrative, and explored the relationship between text and image. My intention behind this project was to gain a more thorough understanding of the anatomy of the children’s book. By going through the process of creating a children’s book - from start to finish - I encountered new obstacles and made essential discoveries that I ultimately found valuable to my growth as a children’s book illustrator

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Department of Biological SciencesTargeted delivery is an important area of biomedical research, which can reduce side effects in clinical field. Various carriers, such as organic, inorganic particles, liposome, polymer, etc., have been utilized in targeted delivery. However, these vehicles have several difficulties such as the complexity of synthesis, heterogeneous size and shape and lower biocompatibility. Protein nanoparticles could be an attractive candidate as delivery vehicles. Protein nanoparticles have well-defined structure with high symmetry, uniform size and shape. These particles have also biodegradability, greater stability during in vivo circulation and being easy to prepare the particles. And protein nanoparticles can attach drugs, fluorescent dye, enzymes, radioactive isotopes, antigens, or antibodies at desired site depending on their purpose. In this study, we used Aquifex aeolicus Lumazine synthase (AaLS) as a targeted delivery vehicle. Antibody binding domain (ABD), which was known to selectively bind to Fc part of the antibody, was genetically encoded to AaLS (ABD-AaLS). We have designed a modular delivery platform that can deliver drugs to a variety of cancer cells by binding various antibodies to ABD. This platform can deliver drug to variety of target cancer cells in in vitro. Recently we have developed a targeted delivery platform using P22 virus-like particle (P22 VLP) that is relatively large-sized protein cage nanoparticles. We covalently attached affibody to exterior surface of P22 VLP using bacterial superglue system. These platforms successfully delivered anticancer drug, doxorubicin, to tumor site and showed tumor specific killing effect. In addition, we developed the cloaking drug delivery system using mesoporous silica nanoparticles (MSNs). We constructed GST fused affibody molecules and bound these fusion proteins on MSNs as capping materials. This pre-coated nanoparticles blocked nonspecific binding of serum proteins, avoiding immune response, while maintaining targeting ability in vivo. Our studies demonstrated that protein nanoparticles are promising platforms for diagnostic and/or therapeutic agent delivery in biomedical field.clos

T-equivariant disc potentials for toric Calabi-Yau manifolds

We formulate and compute the equivariant disc potentials of immersed SYZ fibers in toric Calabi-Yau manifolds, which are closely related to the open Gromov-Witten invariants of Aganagic-Vafa branes. The main tool is an equivariant version of the gluing method in \cite{CHL-glue,HKL}.First author draf

Factors Explaining Obesity in the Midwest: Evidence from Data

This paper attempts to determine the factors explaining obesity in the Midwest by using standard OLS multiple regression analysis and cross-sectional data. We examine independent variables related to built environment and determine effects on obesity. This study finds that some factors influencing calories consumed, such as percent of restaurants that are fast food, are consistent with the prior literature. However, other factors, such as the number of fast food restaurants per 1000 people, yield surprising results. The results of this study suggest that obesity is a multifaceted issue that is not close to being fully explained

Density of Elliptic Curves over Number Fields with Prescribed Torsion Subgroups

Let $K$ be a number field. For positive integers $m$ and $n$ such that $m\mid n$, we let $\mathscr{S}_{m,n}$ be the set of elliptic curves $E/K$ defined over $K$ such that $E(K)_{\operatorname{tors}}\supseteq \mathscr{T}\cong \mathbb{Z}/m\mathbb{Z}\times \mathbb{Z}/n\mathbb{Z}$. We prove that if the genus of the modular curve $X_{1}(m,n)$ is $0$, then `almost all' $E\in \mathscr{S}_{m,n}$ satisfy that $E(K)_{\operatorname{tors}}= \mathscr{T}$, i.e., no larger than $\mathscr{T}$. In particular, if $m=n=1$, this result generalizes Duke's theorem over $\mathbb{Q}$ to arbitrary number fields $K$ for the trivial torsion subgroup.Comment: Corollary 1.8 is added and more explanation about the raised questions are added in the introducito

Cultivation of Natural Killer Cell for Immunotherapy

University of Minnesota M.S. thesis. April 2018. Major: Microbial Engineering. Advisor: Wei-Shou Hu. 1 computer file (PDF); vii, 91 pages.Natural Killer (NK) cells are a type of blood immune cells that are capable of lyse the infected or transformed cells without prior sensitization. Due to a small fraction of NK cells within human bodies, and the fact that the cells are not able to expand to lyse the target cells, cells were isolated from human blood, and were expanded. NK cells expanded without feeder cells showed only a small number of fold expansion. However, when the NK cells were co-cultivated with artificial Antigen Presenting Cells (aAPCs), NK cells showed a much greater number of fold expansion. Especially, NK cells co-cultured with K562 cells with membrane bound IL-21 (K562.mbIL21) showed about 10,000-fold expansion for 14 days cultivation. Continuous cultivation of NK cells with the K562.mbIL21 showed more than 100 billion-fold expansion for 30 days before it shows senescence. By employing a multivariate analysis technique, phenotypic changes during the activation and expansion of NK cells were captured. In addition, various kinetic parameters during the cultivation were identified to provide preliminary data for future research. It was found that NK cells could expand with dead aAPCs and their debris, showing a possibility of expanding NK cells without feeder cells since the K562 cells are cancerous, thus, they need to be completely removed for clinical use in promoting NK cells in the field of adoptive immunotherapy

Lagrangian Floer potential of orbifold spheres

For each sphere with three orbifold points, we construct an algorithm to compute the open Gromov–Witten potential, which serves as the quantum-corrected Landau–Ginzburg mirror and is an infinite series in general. This gives the first class of general-type geometries whose full potentials can be computed. As a consequence we obtain an enumerative meaning of mirror maps for elliptic curve quotients. Furthermore, we prove that the open Gromov–Witten potential is convergent, even in the general-type cases, and has an isolated singularity at the origin, which is an important ingredient of proving homological mirror symmetry.National Research Foundation of Korea; 2010-0019516; 2012R1A1A2003117; 2013R1A1A1058646 - National Research Foundation of Kore

Assessing the Impact of Retirement Resources on U.S. Older Female Workers’ Retirement Timing: A Theory of Planned Behavior Model

Retirement is an important life event for all workers. Most older workers look forward to retirement and having a retirement plan is important for a successful transition. Those who plan also demonstrate a more positive attitude and greater confidence in their retirement. Much previous work on retirement and related policies or programs has focused on male workers. Consequently, social awareness of the problems encountered by older women during retirement remains low. Women have limited retirement resources (Vrdoljak & Rappaport, 2018) and are more likely to live in poverty than older men. Many older women who lack financial security depend on Social Security benefits. Moreover, the gender gap increases with age and is closely associated with quality of life and health (James, Matz-Costa, & Smyer, 2016). Unequal work experience and access to fewer retirement resources can postpone older women’s retirement, leading to a higher retirement age for women. Therefore, I examine the relationship between older women’s retirement resources and the timing of their retirement. I also examine the relationship between older women’s marital status and retirement timing. In this study, I investigated these questions with a sample of women aged between 50 and 62 years old who worked either full - or part-time, using data from the RAND Corporation and the University of Michigan Health and Retirement Study (2017). Guided by the theory of planned behavior, multiple regression analysis was used to examine older adults’ expected retirement timing. Factors that might influence this timing included attitudes toward retirement, subjective norms about retirement, and perceived behavioral control (retirement security). My analyses also examined gender differences in predicting retirement timing. Subsequent analyses were conducted with women only, primarily to examine a potential linear relationship between retirement timing and marital status, one of the “background factors” in the theory of planned behavior. Additionally, logistic regression analyzed the effects of respondents’ expectations of retirement (i.e., comparing respondents with an expected timing of their retirement with those who did not). The study findings indicated that theory of planned behavior factors are useful for predicting retirement timing. The model works similarly for men and women, but there is a difference according to marital status. Unmarried women are likely to anticipate a later retirement than married women and are less likely to set an expected timing for retirement