536 research outputs found
Assessing Remedial Course Transitional Intervention Effectiveness for First Generation College Students
First generation college students experience a more challenging transition to collegiate success than their peers. As institutions feel the pressure to fulfill their enrollment goals, the doors of opportunity are being widened which includes an increase in first generation college students This study focuses on how the remedial course intervention affects student confidence levels in key college success indicators after their first semester of college level coursework. A survey is used to determine variations between first generation students who were exposed to this form of intervention, and those who were not. The findings point to a need for expanded conversation on intervention methodology to better frame a holistic model of success for today’s incoming student
Virucidal activity of 70% Ethanol vs Enveloped and Non-Enveloped Viruses
Viruses contain genetic material packaged in a protein coat called the capsid. For some viruses, the capsid is surrounded by an envelope composed of a lipid bilayer derived from the host cell membrane (Figure 2). Virus structure determines the stability characteristics of the virus particle, such as resistance to chemical or physical inactivation (Lucas, 2010). To maintain a safe environment at the Institute for Antiviral Research, it is important to understand which viruses are resistant to which chemicals. Thus, the objective of this experiment was to test survival of the viruses listed in table 1, when exposed to various chemicals. Neutral red dye is routinely used in antiviral assays and 70% ethanol is common disinfectant used. MEM & H2O were used as negative controls. Mt. Dew was also tested because we thought it would be fun
An agent-based modeling template for a cohort of veterans with diabetic retinopathy
BACKGROUNDAgent-based models are valuable for examining systems where large numbers of discrete individuals interact with each other, or with some environment. Diabetic Veterans seeking eye care at a Veterans Administration hospital represent one such cohort.OBJECTIVEThe objective of this study was to develop an agent-based template to be used as a model for a patient with diabetic retinopathy (DR). This template may be replicated arbitrarily many times in order to generate a large cohort which is representative of a real-world population, upon which in-silico experimentation may be conducted.METHODSAgent-based template development was performed in java-based computer simulation suite AnyLogic Professional 6.6. The model was informed by medical data abstracted from 535 patient records representing a retrospective cohort of current patients of the VA St. Louis Healthcare System Eye clinic. Logistic regression was performed to determine the predictors associated with advancing stages of DR. Predicted probabilities obtained from logistic regression were used to generate the stage of DR in the simulated cohort.RESULTSThe simulated cohort of DR patients exhibited no significant deviation from the test population of real-world patients in proportion of stage of DR, duration of diabetes mellitus (DM), or the other abstracted predictors. Simulated patients after 10 years were significantly more likely to exhibit proliferative DR (PCONCLUSIONSAgent-based modeling is an emerging platform, capable of simulating large cohorts of individuals based on manageable data abstraction efforts. The modeling method described may be useful in simulating many different conditions where course of disease is described in categorical stages
Does detection range matter for inferring social networks in a benthic shark using acoustic telemetry?
Accurately estimating contacts between animals can be critical in ecological studies such as examining social structure, predator–prey interactions or transmission of information and disease. While biotelemetry has been used successfully for such studies in terrestrial systems, it is still under development in the aquatic environment. Acoustic telemetry represents an attractive tool to investigate spatio-temporal behaviour of marine fish and has recently been suggested for monitoring underwater animal interactions. To evaluate the effectiveness of acoustic telemetry in recording interindividual contacts, we compared co-occurrence matrices deduced from three types of acoustic receivers varying in detection range in a benthic shark species. Our results demonstrate that (i) associations produced by acoustic receivers with a large detection range (i.e. Vemco VR2W) were significantly different from those produced by receivers with smaller ranges (i.e. Sonotronics miniSUR receivers and proximity loggers) and (ii) the position of individuals within their network, or centrality, also differed. These findings suggest that acoustic receivers with a large detection range may not be the best option to represent true social networks in the case of a benthic marine animal. While acoustic receivers are increasingly used by marine ecologists, we recommend users first evaluate the influence of detection range to depict accurate individual interactions before using these receivers for social or predator–prey studies. We also advocate for combining multiple receiver types depending on the ecological question being asked and the development of multi-sensor tags or testing of new automated proximity loggers, such as the Encounternet system, to improve the precision and accuracy of social and predator–prey interaction studies
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Lactate levels in emergency department patients across all causes of physiologic instability
Lattice congruences of the weak order
We study the congruence lattice of the poset of regions of a hyperplane
arrangement, with particular emphasis on the weak order on a finite Coxeter
group. Our starting point is a theorem from a previous paper which gives a
geometric description of the poset of join-irreducibles of the congruence
lattice of the poset of regions in terms of certain polyhedral decompositions
of the hyperplanes. For a finite Coxeter system (W,S) and a subset K of S, let
\eta_K:w \mapsto w_K be the projection onto the parabolic subgroup W_K. We show
that the fibers of \eta_K constitute the smallest lattice congruence with
1\equiv s for every s\in(S-K). We give an algorithm for determining the
congruence lattice of the weak order for any finite Coxeter group and for a
finite Coxeter group of type A or B we define a directed graph on subsets or
signed subsets such that the transitive closure of the directed graph is the
poset of join-irreducibles of the congruence lattice of the weak order.Comment: 26 pages, 4 figure
Game-Based Design for Inclusive and Accessible Digital Exhibits
Imagining the future of libraries and especially of digital exhibits cannot be completed without exploring the role games can play in the future of collection curation. Besides their popularity, games facilitate and inform our understanding through interactive engagement, and have been shown to serve as alternative modes for designing learning experiences and environments. We adopt such a perspective as we look into the ways gaming can inform the design of digital exhibits and help make digital collections more accessible and inclusive to a wider audience
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