Measuring Effectiveness of Public Safety Dispatch Training

A capstone submitted in partial fulfillment of the requirements for the degree of Doctor of Education in the Ernst and Sara Lane Volgenau College of Education at Morehead State University by James Michael Keyser on October 24, 2022

Why Lawyers Do What They Do (When Behaving Ethically)

Since the early 1990s, when David Wilkins published his influential paper “Who Should Govern Lawyers” in the Harvard Law Review, legal ethics scholars and professors have paid attention to the range of processes and devices that govern lawyer behavior. This Article will report on the results of a study currently underway that seeks to provide empirical evidence to answer the question posed in this Article’s title: Do lawyers train staff in confidentiality preservation because they fear bar discipline? Because they fear malpractice liability? Because they must comply with malpractice liability carrier demands? Because they honor client confidences for their own value and wish to protect them? Because the market forces them to do so? Because it is the right thing to do? The same, or similar, sets of questions may be asked about establishing conflict check procedures, devising their marketing to stay within norms, charging reasonable fees, and other professional ethics-related actions by lawyers. To gather data on these issues, the authors conducted a survey of the bars of Florida and Virginia and present on the findings

Lipid-bilayer-spanning DNA nanopores with a bifunctional porphyrin anchor

Holding tight: An artificial nanopore assembled from DNA oligonucleotides carries porphyrin tags (red), which anchor the nanostructure into the lipid bilayer. The porphyrin moieties also act as fluorescent dyes to aid the microscopic visualization of the DNA nanopore

Multiplexed DNA Identification Using Site Specific dCas9 Barcodes and Nanopore Sensing.

Decorating double-stranded DNA with dCas9 barcodes to identify characteristic short sequences provides an alternative to fully sequencing DNA samples for rapid and highly specific analysis of a DNA sample. Solid state nanopore sensors are especially promising for this type of single-molecule sensing because of the ability to analyze patterns in the ionic current signatures of DNA molecules. Here, we systematically demonstrate the use of highly specific dCas9 probes to create unique barcodes on the DNA that can be read out using nanopore sensors. Single dCas9 probes are targeted to various positions on DNA strands up to 48 kbp long and are effectively measured in high salt conditions typical of nanopore sensing. Multiple probes bound to the same DNA strand at characteristic target sequences create distinct barcodes of double and triple peaks. Finally, double and triple barcodes are used to simultaneously identify two different DNA targets in a background mixture of bacterial DNA. Our method forms the basis of a fast and versatile assay for multiplexed DNA sensing applications in complex samples

Process and apparatus for analyzing specimens for the presence of microorganisms therein

Microorganisms in a specimen are detected, identified, and enumerated by introducing the specimen into a sampling cartridge and diluting the specimen with a known volume of water within the cartridge. The cartridge has a manifold and several cassettes attached to the manifold. Each cassette contains a serpentine flow channel having a series of filters therein and a detection cell located downstream from each filter. The flow channel in each cassette also contains a culture medium which is freeze dried and is highly selective in the sense that it promotes the growth of one type of microorganism, but not others. The mixture of the specimen and water flows from the manifold into the flow channel of each cassette where it rehydrates the culture medium therein and further flows through the filters. Each filter removes a known proportion of the microorganisms from the mixture of specimen, water and medium, thereby effecting a serial dilution. After the cassettes are heated to incubate the microoganisms, the detection cells are observed for growth of the microorganisms therein which is manifested in a change in the light transmitting characteristics of the mixtures within the cells

Local partitioning of the overturning circulation in the tropics and the connection to the Hadley and Walker circulations

Conceptually, it is useful to partition the three-dimensional tropical circulation into meridional and zonal components, namely, the Hadley and Walker circulations. The averaging involved in their definitions can introduce ambiguities. These problems can be circumvented by first partitioning the total vertical mass flux into components associated with overturning in the meridional and zonal directions, respectively, called here the local Hadley and local Walker circulations. Defining the local Hadley and local Walker circulations this way ensures the pair of two-dimensional overturning circulations can be added to give the original three-dimensional circulation, even when the averages are taken over limited domains. The method is applied to the vertical motion from the ERA-Interim reanalysis for the period 1979 to 2009. One important result is that the local Hadley circulation responds much more strongly to ENSO than the local Walker circulation, even though the local Walker circulation in the central Pacific weakens during El Niño years and strengthens and widens during La Niña years

Insecticidal effects of deltamethrin in laboratory and field populations of Culicoides species: how effective are host-contact reduction methods in India?

BACKGROUND: Bluetongue virus (BTV) is transmitted by Culicoides biting midges and causes bluetongue (BT), a clinical disease observed primarily in sheep. BT has a detrimental effect on subsistence farmers in India, where hyperendemic outbreaks impact on smallholdings in the southern states of the country. In this study, we establish a reliable method for testing the toxic effects of deltamethrin on Culicoides and then compare deltamethrin with traditional control methods used by farmers in India. RESULTS: Effects of deltamethrin were initially tested using a colonised strain of Culicoides nubeculosus Meigen and a modified World Health Organisation exposure assay. This method was then applied to field populations of Culicoides spp. in India. The field population of C. oxystoma in India had a greater LC50 (0.012 ± 0.009%) for deltamethrin than laboratory-reared C.nubeculosus (0.0013 ± 0.0002%). Exposure of C. nubeculosus to deltamethrin at higher ambient temperatures resulted in greater rates of knockdown but a lower mortality rate at 24 h post-exposure. Behavioural assays with C. nubeculosus in WHO tubes provided evidence for contact irritancy and spatial repellence caused by deltamethrin. The field experiments in India, however, provided no evidence for repellent or toxic effects of deltamethrin. Traditional methods such as the application of neem oil and burning of neem leaves also provided no protection. CONCLUSIONS: Our study demonstrates that field-collected Culicoides in India are less susceptible to deltamethrin exposure than laboratory-bred C. nubeculosus and traditional methods of insect control do not provide protection to sheep. These low levels of susceptibility to deltamethrin have not been recorded before in field populations of Culicoides and suggest resistance to synthetic pyrethrioids. Alternative insect control methods, in addition to vaccination, may be needed to protect Indian livestock from BTV transmission

Spatial variation in breeding habitat selection by Cerulean Warblers (Setophaga cerulea) throughout the appalachian mountains

Studies of habitat selection are often of limited utility because they focus on small geographic areas, fail to examine behavior at multiple scales, or lack an assessment of the fitness consequences of habitat decisions. These limitations can hamper the identification of successful site-specific management strategies, which are urgently needed for severely declining species like Cerulean Warblers (Setophaga cerulea). We assessed how breeding habitat decisions made by Cerulean Warblers at multiple scales, and the subsequent effects of these decisions on nest survival, varied across the Appalachian Mountains. Selection for structural habitat features varied substantially among areas, particularly at the territory scale. Males within the least-forested landscapes selected microhabitat features that reflected more closed-canopy forest conditions, whereas males in highly forested landscapes favored features associated with canopy disturbance. Selection of nest-patch and nest-site attributes by females was more consistent across areas, with females selecting for increased tree size and understory cover and decreased basal area and midstory cover. Floristic preferences were similar across study areas: White Oak (Quercus alba), Cucumber-tree (Magnolia acuminata), and Sugar Maple (Acer saccharum) were preferred as nest trees, whereas red oak species (subgenus Erythrobalanus) and Red Maple (A. rubrum) were avoided. The habitat features that were related to nest survival also varied among study areas, and preferred features were negatively associated with nest survival at one area. Thus, our results indicate that large-scale spatial heterogeneity may influence local habitat-selection behavior and that it may be necessary to articulate site-specific management strategies for Cerulean Warblers

Soil Resources Area Affects Herbivore Health

Soil productivity effects nutritive quality of food plants, growth of humans and animals, and reproductive health of domestic animals. Game-range surveys sometimes poorly explained variations in wildlife populations, but classification of survey data by major soil types improved effectiveness. Our study evaluates possible health effects of lower condition and reproductive rates for wild populations of Odocoileus virginianus Zimmerman (white-tailed deer) in some physiographic regions of Mississippi. We analyzed condition and reproductive data for 2400 female deer from the Mississippi Department of Wildlife, Fisheries, and Parks herd health evaluations from 1991–1998. We evaluated age, body mass (Mass), kidney mass, kidney fat mass, number of corpora lutea (CL) and fetuses, as well as fetal ages. Region affected kidney fat index (KFI), which is a body condition index, and numbers of fetuses of adults (P ≤ 0.001). Region affected numbers of CL of adults (P ≤ 0.002). Mass and conception date (CD) were affected (P ≤ 0.001) by region which interacted significantly with age for Mass (P ≤ 0.001) and CD (P < 0.04). Soil region appears to be a major factor influencing physical characteristics of female deer

All-optical detection of neuronal membrane depolarization in live cells using colloidal quantum dots

Luminescent semiconductor quantum dots (QDs) have recently been suggested as novel probes for imaging and sensing cell membrane voltages. However, a key bottleneck for their development is a lack of techniques to assess QD responses to voltages generated in the aqueous electrolytic environments typical of biological systems. Even more generally, there have been relatively few efforts to assess the response of QDs to voltage changes in live cells. Here, we develop a platform for monitoring the photoluminescence (PL) response of QDs under AC and DC voltage changes within aqueous ionic environments. We evaluate both traditional CdSe/CdS and more biologically compatible InP/ZnS QDs at a range of ion concentrations to establish their PL/voltage characteristics on chip. Wide-field, few-particle PL measurements with neuronal cells show the QDs can be used to track local voltage changes with greater sensitivity (ΔPL up to twice as large) than state-of-the-art calcium imaging dyes, making them particularly appealing for tracking sub-threshold events. Additional physiological observation studies showed that whilst CdSe/CdS dots have greater PL responses on membrane depolarization, their lower cytotoxicity makes InP/ZnS far more suitable for voltage sensing in living systems. Our results provide a methodology for the rational development of QD voltage sensors and highlight their potential for imaging changes in cell membrane voltage.EPSRC Doctoral Training Award (EP/L016087/1