When English as a Second Language students meet text-responsible writing

This thesis follows two international freshman students in an English composition class at California State University, San Bernardino. The results indicate that the students generally experienced feeling challenged and overwhelmed about the unfamiliar topic, but detailed assignment guidelines played a key role for students to progress in understanding the assignment

Asian American Undergraduates Sense of Belonging at a Predominantly White Institution

In the fall of 2019, institutionalized data reported that Asian American undergraduate students had a lower sense of belonging at the University of San Diego (USD) in comparison to white peers. This action research paper explores the needs and experiences of the Asian American undergraduate student population at USD— a predominantly white, private, religious-based institution. This research is centered around the question, “How can Student Affairs professionals better understand and support Asian American undergraduate students and their sense of belonging at a predominantly White institution?” Through ten semi-structured interviews and one community focus group, participating students associated their sense of belonging on campus with community, authenticity, and feelings of safety— socially, emotionally, and physically. Additionally, their stories included personal experiences of culture shock, code-switching, the crucial role that faculty and multicultural-based student organizations play in fostering Asian American students’ sense of belonging, and addressing the politics of belonging

Ethic of responsibility and the future of nature

The question of science is the one that concerns the very foundations of our reality and, in addition to that, it is a question that deals not only with our natural reality, with what was once called the "natural nature", but also with social and technological reality produced by science itself, which for a long time now is our second nature. Science has become not only the instrument by which we try to understand the reality of nature, through the process of creating reality, forming and transforming nature, it has become the reality in which we live itself, and without which, as it seems, we could hardly go on living. However, even though science as an instrument for understanding reality has become the reality which we have produced ourselves, we are still, paradoxically enough, far from answering the essential question: What is science? Since the question of science is at the same time the one of the production of reality, it is obvious that the question "what is science?" does not amount to a self-evident question asked by a scientist regarding his scientific field. It is not only a question concerning the nature of scientific knowledge, or of scientific methods of scientific results achieved. What is at stake here is the insight concerning social and political usage of science, that the reality, which is produced by the sciences, reveals to us even in the forms of its deification, manipulation, ideologization and virtualization. Is persevering in its science-Enlightenment paradigm of human emancipation or does it, on the wave of critical self-reflection spanning all the way through the 20th century, more and more question, as Paul Feyerabend (Against Method) does, the extent of constraints imposed on free thought which it produces itself? Of course, the other side of the questioning itself belongs here too: scientific progress can be evaluated regardless of its consequences, of the dangerous threats it poses to our future: nuclear annihilation, ecological pollution or climate changes which endanger the survival of the living world ?

Determinants of NPL growth in Macedonıa

Non-performing loans are one of the most vulnerable categories in the balance sheet of banks. Their increase can affect banks’ liquidity and solvency. That is why defining the main indicators that influence the development of non-performing loans is crucial for both bank performance and the financial system as a whole. This paper investigates macroeconomic and bank determinants of NPLs in Macedonia for the period 2006-2015, including descriptive and econometric analyses. The first analysis presents the correlation between NPLs and two macroeconomic indicators: GDP and Inflation. The second econometric analysis shows the correlation between NPLs and two bank indicators: Capital to Assets and Return on Equity. In these estimations, we also include the inflation as an independent variable. The analyses show that in a period of economic growth and higher inflation, non-performing loans are low and stable. The increase of the capital to asset and return on equity ratios reduces the level of NPLs as well. We conclude that as long as the economy is stable and banks are profitable and have adequate capital, nonperforming loans are on a level suitable for the banks

Relaciones entre el Estilo de aprendizaje perceptual, el Ideal de uno mismo en L2 y el Comportamiento motivado en L2 en estudiantes universitarios de idiomas

The study investigated the effects of 283 college students’ perceptual learning styles, imagination, and the ideal L2 self on their motivated L2 behavior. The college students were found to prefer a visual learning style the most, followed by auditory and kinesthetic styles. Statistical analyses indicated that visual and auditory styles were meaningfully correlated with motivated behavior, while the kinesthetic style was not; this was consistent with the findings of younger students. Sequential regression analysis found that the ideal L2 self had the most explanatory power, followed by imagination, auditory style, and visual style. No statistically significant difference was found between male and female students in the perceptual learning style variables.El estudio investigó los efectos que tienen los estilos de aprendizaje perceptuales, la imaginación y el ideal de uno mismo en L2 sobre el comportamiento motivado en L2 de 283 estudiantes universitarios. Los estudiantes prefieren mayoritariamente un estilo de aprendizaje visual, seguido por estilos auditivos y quinestésicos. Los análisis estadísticos indican que los estilos visuales y auditivos estaban significativamente relacionados con el comportamiento motivado, mientras que el estilo quinestésico no; esto fue similar a los resultados de estudiantes más jóvenes. El análisis de regresión secuencial reveló que el ideal de uno mismo en L2 tuvo el poder más explicativo, seguido por la imaginación, el estilo auditivo y el estilo visual. La diferencia de género no fue encontrada dentro de las variables

Future Self: Service design for nurturing the dignity and autonomy of formerly incarcerated students

This project explored dignity as a design principle for a service supporting formerly incarcerated students by helping them achieve their higher education goals and career ambitions. We highlight autonomy as the foundation of dignity and explore how autonomy and dignity are intertwined in the context of education. We conducted interviews with formerly incarcerated students and their educators to develop the “Future Self” service strategy. This service inspires the students to stay motivated by assisting them to design their future identities and connect with mentors who can serve as role models, and through income share agreement (ISA) financial plans to provide upfront funding, and ways of giving back to the community by empowering them to become mentors themselves

Self-Feedback DETR for Temporal Action Detection

Temporal Action Detection (TAD) is challenging but fundamental for real-world video applications. Recently, DETR-based models have been devised for TAD but have not performed well yet. In this paper, we point out the problem in the self-attention of DETR for TAD; the attention modules focus on a few key elements, called temporal collapse problem. It degrades the capability of the encoder and decoder since their self-attention modules play no role. To solve the problem, we propose a novel framework, Self-DETR, which utilizes cross-attention maps of the decoder to reactivate self-attention modules. We recover the relationship between encoder features by simple matrix multiplication of the cross-attention map and its transpose. Likewise, we also get the information within decoder queries. By guiding collapsed self-attention maps with the guidance map calculated, we settle down the temporal collapse of self-attention modules in the encoder and decoder. Our extensive experiments demonstrate that Self-DETR resolves the temporal collapse problem by keeping high diversity of attention over all layers.Comment: Accepted to ICCV 202

Insights into the spatiotemporal regulation of the cellular cytoskeleton through applications of FRET

Das zelluläre Cytoskelett besteht aus Mikrofilamenten, intermediären Filamenten, Mikrotubuli und einer Reihe von weiteren Proteinen, die seine von dem Zelltyp und von der Zellumgebung abhängige Dynamik kontrollieren. Proteine, die der Rho GTPase Familie angehören, spielen hierbei eine wichtige Rolle. Die RhoA GTPase, zum Beispiel, koordiniert gleichzeitig die Entstehung von Faserbündeln und fokalen Adhäsionen (FA). Die Faserbündel zeichnen sich durch ihre kontrahierenden, auf Aktomyosin basierenden Kräfte aus, die sich auf FA konzentrieren und damit zur Generation der zytoplasmischen Tension beitragen, die wiederum bestimmend für die Zellmorphologie, Adhäsion und Zellmigration ist. Basierend auf den Prinzipien des Förster Resonanz Energie Transfers (FRET) wurde ein optischer Biosensor konstruiert, um den Umfang aktiver, GTP-gebundener RhoA GTPase zu veranschaulichen, deren biochemiche Aktivität zur Entstehung physikalischer Kräfte im zellulären Cytoskelett führt. Der Biosensor wurde durch den Einsatz von alpha-Helices von sukzessiv wachsender Länge optimiert, die der linearen Extension für gute Orientierung (LEGO) dient. Somit wurde eine Methode für das rationale Design eines FRET Biosensors von hoher dynamischer Sensitivitätsreichweite entwickelt. Der beste RhoA GTPase Biosensor, LEGO10, zeigte einen Anstieg der FRET Effizienz, wenn RhoA in der GDP-gebundenen, inaktiven Form vorlag, während eine Verringerung der FRET Effizienz eintrat, wenn die GTP-gebundene Form von RhoA überwog. In FA enthaltene Integrin Moleküle sind integrale Membranproteine, die einen indirekten Kontakt zwischen dem Cytoskelett und der extrazellulären Matrix (EZM) herstellen, so dass ein kontinuierlicher Informationsaustausch zwischen der intra- und extrazellulären Umgebung stattfindet. Dieser Informationsaustausch ist bedeutsam für die Genexpression, das Zellwachstum, die Proliferation und die Zellmotilität. Um diesen Prozess erklären zu können, muss man die raumzeitliche Aktivitätsverteilung von Proteinen und die an dem bidirektionalen Cytoskelett-EZM Informationsaustausch beteiligten Signalkaskaden verstehen. Während der Zelladhäsion oder Zellmotilität müssen Aufbau, Erhalt und Abbau der Adhäsionskontakte mit der EZM koordiniert werden. Diese Kontakte sind für die Erzeugung und Durchleitung von Zugkräften besonders wichtig und unterstehen der Kontrolle der Rho GTPase Proteinfamilie. Um diese Kräfte näher zu erforschen, wurde eine auf Fibronektin basierende EZM konstruiert, die mit den FRET kompatiblen Cy3 und Cy5 Fluorophoren markiert war, so dass eine FRETing Matrix zustande kam. Gleichzeitig konnten GFP-markierte Cytoskelettkomponenten wie Aktin beobachtet werden, da genügend spektrale Separation zu den Cy3 und Cy5 Fluorophoren bestand. Die FRETing Matrix wurde eingesetzt, um raumzeitliche Aspekte der mechanischen Kraftausübung von Zellen während Adhäsion, Ausbreitung und Migration zu veranschaulichen. Umstrukturierungen innerhalb der FRETing Matrix, verursacht durch Kraftausübung der Zellen, bewirkten Änderungen in deren FRET Effizienz, die Rho GTPase abhängig waren und unterhalb von FA und Faserbündeln stattfanden. In den Anfangsstadien der Zellausbreitung - und zwar bevor die Zelle Adhäsionen zu der EZM etablierte - bildeten sich aufgrund von Aktinpolymerisation Ausstülpungen in der Zellmembran. Zelladhäsionen kamen erst in späteren Stadien der Ausbreitung zustande, durch die dann auch diejenigen Kräfte ausgeübt wurden, die zur Herstellung der innerzellulären Tension und Zellpolarität notwendig sind. Die FRETing Matrix wurde somit als ein Biosensor für die kontinuierliche und schnelle Veranschaulichung von Kräften etabliert, die während der dynamischen Interaktion von Zellen mit der EZM ausgeübt werden

A NOVEL PIPELINE FOR LIBRARY DESIGN AND DECONVOLUTION OF GENUS-WIDE VIRAL EPITOPE REACTIVITY PROFILING

PhIP-Seq(Phage ImmunPrecipitation Sequencing) is a powerful tool to analyze antibodies against the VirScan library composed of human viral peptides. However, the current VirScan library constructed with Pepsyn only includes peptide tiles from representative sequences with individual sequence coordinate systems. Thus, the library loses diversity and the comparability of the related virus. Our new pipeline builds a high-resolution library by including all reported virus sequences and enables the comparison of equivalent peptides across relevant viruses by applying a genus-wide consensus multiple sequence alignment (MSA) coordinate system. In this study, we created an Enterovirus Library using our new pipeline by capturing seven species with 275 strains. The library contains 191,846 peptides representing more than 4,000 enterovirus and rhinovirus sequences. Using our high-resolution EnteroScan library, we will reveal the epitopes most highly associated with type 1 diabetes. We anticipate replacing the current VirScan library with this new pipeline to retain diversity and ensure the deconvolution of genus-wide viral epitope reactivity of highly related viruses

Cr-Ga-N materials for negative electrodes in Li rechargeable batteries : structure, synthesis and electrochemical performance

Thesis (S.M.)--Massachusetts Institute of Technology, Dept. of Materials Science and Engineering, 2007.Includes bibliographical references (p. 95-97).Electrochemical performances of two ternary compounds (Cr2GaN and Cr3GaN) in the Cr-Ga-N system as possible future anode materials for lithium rechargeable batteries were studied. Motivation for this study was dealt in chapter 2 following chapter 1 that covered introduction to batteries, lithium ion batteries and anode materials for lithium ion batteries. Synthesis method with less time was attempted and factors affecting synthesis of these compounds were investigated. (Chapter 3) Through electrochemical characterization and insitu XRD, practical values of electrochemical capacities were examined in comparison with theoretical capacity values (Chapter 4) and also possible reaction mechanisms of these compounds vs. Li were proposed (Chapter 5).by Miso Kim.S.M