Evaluating the Mechanism of Oxalate Synthesis of Fibroporia Radiculosa Isolates Adapting to Copper-Tolerance

Four Fibroporia radiculosa isolates undergoing decay of untreated and 1.2% ammoniacal copper citrate treated wood were evaluated for differential expression of citrate synthase (CS), isocitrate lyase (ICL), glyoxylate dehydrogenase (GLOXDH), succinate/fumarate antiporter (ANTI), and a copper resistance-associated ATPase pump (ATPase). Samples were analyzed at 2, 4, 6, and 8 weeks for oxalate and protein production, enzyme activities, and gene expression. ATPase pump expression was increased in the presence of copper when initial oxalate concentrations were low, suggesting it functions in helping the fungus adapt to the copper-rich environment by pumping toxic copper ions out of the cell. A connection in expression levels between CS, ANTI, ICL, and GLOXDH for the four isolates was found suggesting the production of oxalate originates in the mictochondrial TCA cycle (CS), shunts to the glyoxysomal glyoxylate cycle (ANTI), moves through a portion of the glyoxylate cycle (ICL), and ultimately is made in the cytoplasm (GLOXDH)

Evaluating the Mechanism of Oxalate Synthesis of Fibroporia Radiculosa Isolates Adapting to Copper-Tolerance

Four Fibroporia radiculosa isolates undergoing decay of untreated and 1.2% ammoniacal copper citrate treated wood were evaluated for differential expression of citrate synthase (CS), isocitrate lyase (ICL), glyoxylate dehydrogenase (GLOXDH), succinate/fumarate antiporter (ANTI), and a copper resistance-associated ATPase pump (ATPase). Samples were analyzed at 2, 4, 6, and 8 weeks for oxalate and protein production, enzyme activities, and gene expression. ATPase pump expression was increased in the presence of copper when initial oxalate concentrations were low, suggesting it functions in helping the fungus adapt to the copper-rich environment by pumping toxic copper ions out of the cell. A connection in expression levels between CS, ANTI, ICL, and GLOXDH for the four isolates was found suggesting the production of oxalate originates in the mictochondrial TCA cycle (CS), shunts to the glyoxysomal glyoxylate cycle (ANTI), moves through a portion of the glyoxylate cycle (ICL), and ultimately is made in the cytoplasm (GLOXDH)

Designing Service-Oriented Chatbot Systems Using a Construction Grammar-Driven Natural Language Generation System

Service oriented chatbot systems are used to inform users in a conversational manner about a particular service or product on a website. Our research shows that current systems are time consuming to build and not very accurate or satisfying to users. We find that natural language understanding and natural language generation methods are central to creating an e�fficient and useful system. In this thesis we investigate current and past methods in this research area and place particular emphasis on Construction Grammar and its computational implementation. Our research shows that users have strong emotive reactions to how these systems behave, so we also investigate the human computer interaction component. We present three systems (KIA, John and KIA2), and carry out extensive user tests on all of them, as well as comparative tests. KIA is built using existing methods, John is built with the user in mind and KIA2 is built using the construction grammar method. We found that the construction grammar approach performs well in service oriented chatbots systems, and that users preferred it over other systems

Slavery in White and Black: Class and Race in the Southern Slaveholders\u27 New World Order

Slavery in the Abstract Elite southerners argued in the antebellum era that hierarchy was natural to society and that enslavement was better for propertyless laborers than free agency as experienced by wage workers in the North and in Europe. Urban workers especially lived as impoverish...

Sex, Sickness, and Slavery: Illness in the Antebellum South

Exploring Antebellum Medicine Sex, Sickness, and Slavery is more about physicians than patients. It is an intellectual history of how doctors thought about illness, race, and gender. Doctors in the era were struggling to identify themselves as men of science, modernity, and stand...

Nesting and postfledging ecology of Neotropical migrant songbirds in Missouri forest fragments

Dissertation supervisor: Dr. John Faaborg.Includes vita.The postfledging period, after fledging and before migration, is a critical stage for Neotropical migrant songbirds. The postfledging period encompasses an interval of high mortality that can greatly affect population growth models. Several species of mature forest nesting birds have been documented using very different habitat late in the summer, suggesting shifting habitat requirements during the postfledging period. I monitored nests and used radio-telemetry to observe postfledging juveniles of two species, the Ovenbird (Seiurus aurocapilla) and Acadian Flycatcher (Empidonax virescens), which overlap in nesting territories but differ in natural history. Monitoring was done in Missouri mature-forest fragments from 2012 to 2015. I document juvenile ecology and investigate how risks and habitat selection vary from the nesting period to the postfledging period and observe if trends are preserved across guilds. In chapter 1, I describe postfledging juvenile behavior, parental care, and space use. I used generalized linear mixed models within an information theoretic framework to evaluate the relationship of postfledging movement rates to intrinsic, temporal, and local-habitat variables. Fledgling Acadian Flycatchers (n = 45) utilized more vertical space and had 59% smaller natal home-ranges than fledgling Ovenbirds (n = 62). I found strong positive effects of age on movement distances for both study species and found a negative effect of foliage density on Ovenbird movements. My work provides a new source of support for the theory that habitat quality for postfledging Ovenbirds and other ground foraging forest songbirds increases with forest understory or groundcover foliage density. The few postfledging survival rates published to date are as variable as nest survival across regions and fragmentation gradients. However, factors that negatively impact nest survival may benefit postfledging individuals or not be as important postfledging. In chapter 2, I used an information-theoretic approach to determine support for effects of intrinsic, temporal, edge and local vegetation factors on survival in each stage and examined the potential effect of the resulting survival estimates on population growth. I did not find support for survival tradeoffs in habitat between stages. Nest period survival was comparable between species (~0.30) while postfledging period survival was 43% lower for Ovenbirds (~0.50) than for Acadian Flycatchers (~0.89). Projected population growth was sensitive to estimates of postfledging survival in our populations. In chapter 3, I compared resource selection for nest-sites and by postfledging juveniles using Bayesian discrete choice resource selection models evaluated with an information theoretic approach. Resource selection models indicated that Acadian Flycatcher habitat selection requirements relaxed from nesting to postfledging, with only canopy cover positively contributing to selection postfledging. Resource selection for Ovenbirds shifted from a preference for open understory mature forest nest sites, to increased selection for high understory foliage density and sapling density. Habitat management based upon nesting requirements would likely be sufficient for postfledging Acadian Flycatchers, but insufficient for postfledging Ovenbirds.Includes bibliographical references

Observing snow and wind: using the environment to engage students in science and engineering

posterThis study focused on the effectiveness of new curriculum that was integrated with hands on environmental instrumentation and student learning. The goals of this study were to increase student proficiency with environmental instrumentation, as well as enhance student confidence to use technologies to observe the environment and solve real-world problems. A description of activities used and feedback received are included