The Influence of #MeToo on Sexual Assault Survivors' Decision Making and Health Behaviors: A Qualitative Inquiry

Thesis advisor: Holly B. FontenotSexual assault is a national public health problem, yet there is a dearth of information about how and why survivors disclose and obtain post sexual assault healthcare in the era of social media campaigns. This study examined the influence of #MeToo on sexual assault survivors’ decision-making post assault, including formal disclosures to health providers and formal health seeking behaviors. The research question is “what are the patterns of sexual assault survivors’ disclosure and health seeking behaviors in the era of #MeToo?” A qualitative, exploratory descriptive study was undertaken to understand the influence of #MeToo on a survivor’s decision to disclose sexual assault and obtain health care. With the use of online focus groups, 56 participants’ stories were shared, and four salient themes emerged. These results were the first to provide insight into how an online social media movement (#MeToo) influenced offline health behaviors. The knowledge gained from this study advanced nursing science focused on the care of sexual assault survivors. Additionally, findings informed intervention strategies such as developing targeted public health campaigns that capitalize on online social movements to impact offline behaviors.Thesis (PhD) — Boston College, 2022.Submitted to: Boston College. Connell School of Nursing.Discipline: Nursing

Dietary prophage inducers and antimicrobials: toward landscaping the human gut microbiome.

The approximately 1011 viruses and microbial cells per gram of fecal matter (dry weight) in the large intestine are important to human health. The responses of three common gut bacteria species, and one opportunistic pathogen, to 117 commonly consumed foods, chemical additives, and plant extracts were tested. Many compounds, including Stevia rebaudiana and bee propolis extracts, exhibited species-specific growth inhibition by prophage induction. Overall, these results show that various foods may change the abundances of gut bacteria by modulating temperate phage and suggests a novel path for landscaping the human gut microbiome

PHACTS, a computational approach to classifying the lifestyle of phages

Motivation: Bacteriophages have two distinct lifestyles: virulent and temperate. The virulent lifestyle has many implications for phage therapy, genomics and microbiology. Determining which lifestyle a newly sequenced phage falls into is currently determined using standard culturing techniques. Such laboratory work is not only costly and time consuming, but also cannot be used on phage genomes constructed from environmental sequencing. Therefore, a computational method that utilizes the sequence data of phage genomes is needed

The Vehicle, Fall 2010

Table of ContentsPoetryFill Your Mouth with BerriesAaron Whitepage 1 RelationsJamie Van Allenpage 2 ExodusMegan Marie Olsonpage 4 Single FileRashelle McNairpage 7 The Aesthetic Value of the Moon, by CandlelightKathy Deckerpage 15 FactalsGabrielle Keigherpage 16 Day 5David Jacksonpage 17 Esta LloviendoHeather Gerrishpage 19 FacebrokeDarrin Gordonpage 23 5:08 pmNikki Riechertpage 24 Train TunnelsAshton Tembypage 34 VariationsKathy Deckerpage 35 WantRashelle McNairpage 36 FriendshipScott Maypage 37 Golden LandJacob Swansonpage 38 Last Night I DreamtAshton Tembypage 39 Smallest GestureScott Maypage 44 Somebody\u27s Hut in MexicoGinamarie Lobiancopage 45 Some Things You Just Can\u27t Tap Dance AroundClint Walkerpage 53 Prose Lamparus de DiosAaron Whitepage 8 Learning CurveScott Maypage 18 RocktonKatelyn Pfaffpage 20 Fatal DistractionSolomohn Ennispage 25 Noodle NonsenseGabrielle Keigherpage 41 AntarcticaMichael Payeapage 46 Special Features James K Johnson Award Winners: God is GraciousJohn Klyczekpage 57 To My Ever Growing ChestJennifer Hindespage 74 God\u27s ScapegoatJennifer Hindespage 76 Rape (Verb, Noun)Jennifer Hindespage 78 Featured Artist: Ashton Tembypage 81 Editor\u27s Pick: The Shooter by Patrick Hallpage 87 Chapbook 2010 Author:Kim Hunter-Perkinspage 114 About the Contributorspage 118 About the Editorspage 122https://thekeep.eiu.edu/vehicle/1092/thumbnail.jp

The Vehicle, Fall 2010

Table of ContentsPoetryFill Your Mouth with BerriesAaron Whitepage 1 RelationsJamie Van Allenpage 2 ExodusMegan Marie Olsonpage 4 Single FileRashelle McNairpage 7 The Aesthetic Value of the Moon, by CandlelightKathy Deckerpage 15 FactalsGabrielle Keigherpage 16 Day 5David Jacksonpage 17 Esta LloviendoHeather Gerrishpage 19 FacebrokeDarrin Gordonpage 23 5:08 pmNikki Riechertpage 24 Train TunnelsAshton Tembypage 34 VariationsKathy Deckerpage 35 WantRashelle McNairpage 36 FriendshipScott Maypage 37 Golden LandJacob Swansonpage 38 Last Night I DreamtAshton Tembypage 39 Smallest GestureScott Maypage 44 Somebody\u27s Hut in MexicoGinamarie Lobiancopage 45 Some Things You Just Can\u27t Tap Dance AroundClint Walkerpage 53 Prose Lamparus de DiosAaron Whitepage 8 Learning CurveScott Maypage 18 RocktonKatelyn Pfaffpage 20 Fatal DistractionSolomohn Ennispage 25 Noodle NonsenseGabrielle Keigherpage 41 AntarcticaMichael Payeapage 46 Special Features James K Johnson Award Winners: God is GraciousJohn Klyczekpage 57 To My Ever Growing ChestJennifer Hindespage 74 God\u27s ScapegoatJennifer Hindespage 76 Rape (Verb, Noun)Jennifer Hindespage 78 Featured Artist: Ashton Tembypage 81 Editor\u27s Pick: The Shooter by Patrick Hallpage 87 Chapbook 2010 Author:Kim Hunter-Perkinspage 114 About the Contributorspage 118 About the Editorspage 122https://thekeep.eiu.edu/vehicle/1092/thumbnail.jp

Global phylogeography and ancient evolution of the widespread human gut virus crAssphage

Microbiomes are vast communities of microorganisms and viruses that populate all natural ecosystems. Viruses have been considered to be the most variable component of microbiomes, as supported by virome surveys and examples of high genomic mosaicism. However, recent evidence suggests that the human gut virome is remarkably stable compared with that of other environments. Here, we investigate the origin, evolution and epidemiology of crAssphage, a widespread human gut virus. Through a global collaboration, we obtained DNA sequences of crAssphage from more than one-third of the world's countries and showed that the phylogeography of crAssphage is locally clustered within countries, cities and individuals. We also found fully colinear crAssphage-like genomes in both Old-World and New-World primates, suggesting that the association of crAssphage with primates may be millions of years old. Finally, by exploiting a large cohort of more than 1,000 individuals, we tested whether crAssphage is associated with bacterial taxonomic groups of the gut microbiome, diverse human health parameters and a wide range of dietary factors. We identified strong correlations with different clades of bacteria that are related to Bacteroidetes and weak associations with several diet categories, but no significant association with health or disease. We conclude that crAssphage is a benign cosmopolitan virus that may have coevolved with the human lineage and is an integral part of the normal human gut virome

Global phylogeography and ancient evolution of the widespread human gut virus crAssphage

Microbiomes are vast communities of microorganisms and viruses that populate all natural ecosystems. Viruses have been considered to be the most variable component of microbiomes, as supported by virome surveys and examples of high genomic mosaicism. However, recent evidence suggests that the human gut virome is remarkably stable compared with that of other environments. Here, we investigate the origin, evolution and epidemiology of crAssphage, a widespread human gut virus. Through a global collaboration, we obtained DNA sequences of crAssphage from more than one-third of the world’s countries and showed that the phylogeography of crAssphage is locally clustered within countries, cities and individuals. We also found fully colinear crAssphage-like genomes in both Old-World and New-World primates, suggesting that the association of crAssphage with primates may be millions of years old. Finally, by exploiting a large cohort of more than 1,000 individuals, we tested whether crAssphage is associated with bacterial taxonomic groups of the gut microbiome, diverse human health parameters and a wide range of dietary factors. We identified strong correlations with different clades of bacteria that are related to Bacteroidetes and weak associations with several diet categories, but no significant association with health or disease. We conclude that crAssphage is a benign cosmopolitan virus that may have coevolved with the human lineage and is an integral part of the normal human gut virome

Fixing What’s Wrong: The Problem of Coding Anomalies in Genomic Data

Genomic sequencing is at the forefront of biological research, in part due to the ever-increasing accessibility of sequencing technology. What used to take an entire lab devoted solely to nucleotide sequencing, can now be accomplished by a single person on a tiny USB device plugged into an old laptop. Around 80% of this data is microbial in nature: originating from Bacteria, Archaea, or viruses. Generally, the goal of this sequencing is to identify and analyze the genes that occur within the DNA (or RNA). This is because it is the genes that carry out the functions and are the building blocks of every cell. Frameshifts, where coding sequences switch between frames on the collinear strand, are ubiquitous in this genomic data, as both artificially induced sequencing error and naturally occurring cellular processes. These frameshifts break the genes into different frames, which confound downstream gene prediction analysis, since all current genome-based analyses of microbes uses methods that are remiss when it comes to identifying these frameshifts. In order to improve current genomic research, we developed software that is able to identify both artificial and natural frameshifts within an input genome using a convolutional neural network to classify fixed-size windows taken from a genome in a scrolling manner. Windows that come from a coding gene are classified as such while windows taken from intergenic regions or out-of-frame with a coding gene are not classified as coding. The individual window predictions are then analyzed by a change-point algorithm to detect when a coding gene begins or ends

GenomePeek Data

<p>These are the sequencing files generated for use in the GenomePeek analysis.</p