Crowdfunding Your DIY Project: Introducing Students to Kickstarter

The purpose of this learning module is to help instructors consider how crowdfunding can serve as a meaningful way to build culturally rich, entrepreneurial projects. Such projects — which include film, music, publications, video and board games, art, performance, and technology — invite amateurs to not only articulate their vision of the world, but to ask others to participate in it, telling their story publicly in such a way that their network feels compelled to support them. While the obvious value of crowdfunding is that it financially supports the work of creators, it also uses the exigence of capital to lead communities into forms of mutual aid where their identities or needs are represented through a creative process and a final product.https://rdw.rowan.edu/oer/1030/thumbnail.jp

Study of the thermodynamics of chromium(III) and chromium(VI) binding to iron(II/III)oxide or magnetite or ferrite and magnanese(II) iron (III) oxide or jacobsite or manganese ferrite nanoparticles

Removal of chromium(III) or (VI) from aqueous solution was achieved using Fe3O4, and MnFe2O4 nanomaterials. The nanomaterials were synthesized using a precipitation method and characterized using XRD. The size of the nanomaterials was determined to be 22.4±0.9 nm (Fe3O4) and 15.5±0.5 nm (MnFe2O4). The optimal binding pH for chromium(III) and chromium(VI) were pH 6 and pH 3. Isotherm studies were performed, under light and dark conditions, to determine the capacity of the nanomaterials. The capacities for the light studies with MnFe2O4 and Fe3O4 were determined to be 7.189 and 10.63 mg/g, respectively, for chromium(III). The capacities for the light studies with MnFe2O4 and Fe3O4 were 3.21 and 3.46 mg/g, respectively, for chromium(VI). Under dark reaction conditions the binding of chromium(III) to the MnFe2O4 and Fe3O4 nanomaterials were 5.74 and 15.9 mg/g, respectively. The binding capacity for the binding of chromium(VI) to MnFe2O4 and Fe3O4 under dark reaction conditions were 3.87 and 8.54 mg/g, respectively. The thermodynamics for the reactions showed negative ΔG values, and positive ΔH values. The ΔS values were positive for the binding of chromium(III) and for chromium(VI) binding under dark reaction conditions. The ΔS values for chromium(VI) binding under the light reaction conditions were determined to be negative

Overlapping Roles of CXCL13, Interleukin 7 Receptor α, and CCR7 Ligands in Lymph Node Development

Lymphoid tissue development is associated with local accumulation of CD4+ CD3− IL-7Rαhi hematopoietic cells that deliver lymphotoxin (LT)α1β2 signals to resident stromal cells. Previous studies have established an important role for CXCL13 (BLC) in the development of Peyer's patches (PP) and some peripheral lymph nodes (LNs), but the chemokine requirements for several LN types, including mesenteric LNs, remain undefined. Using CXCL13−/− mice that additionally carry the paucity of LN T cell mutation (plt/plt), we discovered that CCR7 ligands function in peripheral LN development. We also tested for a genetic interaction during LN development between CXCL13 and a cytokine receptor required in PP development, IL-7Rα. Mice deficient for both CXCL13 and IL-7Rα displayed a striking absence of LNs, including mesenteric LNs. These data extend the role of CXCL13 to the development of all LNs and establish a previously unappreciated role for IL-7Rα in this process. Both circulating and LN CD4+ CD3− IL-7Rαhi cells are shown to express LTα1β2 in an IL-7Rα–dependent manner. Furthermore, CXCL13 was found to be sufficient to mediate CD4+ CD3− IL-7Rαhi cell recruitment in vivo to an ectopic site. These findings indicate that CXCL13 and CCR7 ligands promote accumulation of CD4+ CD3− IL-7Rαhi cells, delivering IL-7Rα–dependent LTα1β2 signals critical for LN development

Noise over signal: Phonography culture as participatory

While participatory culture has been of special interest to scholars for nearly three decades, much of the focus has centered on digitally networked contexts. The digital age has indeed transformed our approaches to listening to music and how we operate as fans of music; these approaches can weave together the new and the old, and are enacted among a variety of spaces, objects, and relationships. We explore how the re-emergence of one such object in the digital age — the LP — has produced social arrangements that perhaps excavate older listening practices but do so in ways that have been affected by the mediascape more generally. We offer the concept of phonography culture: a term that emphasizes the social practices of those who not only curate and collect vinyl records but communicate through them in participatory activities including listening parties, vinyl nights at local bars, Facebook groups, and sites of e-commerce. We share the case study of Record Nite, a semi-regular gathering of phonography culture participants, who take turns playing one side of an LP on a given theme, revealing in their fandom and reveling in and encouraging that of others. Over the course of an evening, ten to twenty friends connect over their own “noise” — their experiences, histories, and knowledge of artists, albums, and genres—while simultaneously listening to LPs together. These phonographic, cultural interactions are revelatory because they draw our attention away from individualized and digital listening, which isolate signal, and make space for social and aural noise. That noise is infused with fandom and participation, as well as elements of memory, meaning making, and nostalgia

BLC Expression in Pancreatic Islets Causes B Cell Recruitment and Lymphotoxin-Dependent Lymphoid Neogenesis

AbstractCXCR5, the receptor for B lymphocyte chemoattractant (BLC), is required for normal development of Peyer's patches, inguinal lymph nodes, and splenic follicles. To test the in vivo activity of BLC in isolation of other lymphoid organizers, transgenic mice were generated expressing BLC in the pancreatic islets. In addition to attracting B cells, BLC expression led to development of lymph node–like structures that contained B and T cell zones, high endothelial venules, stromal cells, and the chemokine SLC. Development of these features was strongly dependent on B lymphocytes and on lymphotoxin α1β2 and could be reversed by blocking lymphotoxin α1β2. These findings establish that BLC is sufficient to activate a pathway of events leading to formation of organized lymphoid tissue