Oral History Transcript - Angela Oaks

https://scholarworks.utrgv.edu/spanishlandgrantsoralhistories/1036/thumbnail.jp

Psychological and Behavioral Campus Climate Assessment at a Small Midwestern University: Studying Mixed-methodological Practices

Plan ACampus climate was assessed using a concurrent mixed-methodological approach. The study partially replicated Vaccaro’s (2010) suggestion that positive quantitative campus climate assessment results sit negative qualitative results. The study also used a framework of campus climate assessment including behavioral and psychological climate, adapted from Hurtado, Milem, Clayton-Pedersen and Allen (1999). This research used an online survey. Both behavioral climate and psychological climate domains were measured both by qualitative and quantitative measures. There were four main hypotheses that were tested in SPSS by running Pearson’s r correlations: H1: The psychological climate regarding gender will reveal a negative correlation between qualitative and quantitative results. H2: The psychological climate regarding race will reveal a negative correlation between qualitative and quantitative results. H3: The behavioral climate regarding gender will reveal a negative correlation between qualitative and quantitative results. H4: The behavioral climate regarding race will reveal a negative correlation between qualitative and quantitative results. The first hypothesis was untestable due to a survey error. The remainder three hypotheses were rejected, as the Pearson’s r correlations all tested strongly at the p < .01 significance level. This study disconfirms Vaccaro’s (2010) assertions that behind positive quantitative campus climate assessment results yield negative qualitative results

Alloimmune induction of endothelial cell-derived interferon-gamma-inducible chemokines

BACKGROUND: The interaction between host lymphocytes and endothelial cells on the transplanted organ is believed to play an important role in acute and chronic graft rejection. Trafficking and recruitment of lymphocytes to the site of inflammation is known to be controlled by several cytokines and chemokines. It is unclear whether endothelial cells themselves can be a source of inflammatory chemoattractant molecules on alloimmune induction. METHODS: Using a semiquantitative polymerase chain reaction method, the authors analyzed the expression of chemokine mRNA coding for interferon (IFN)-gamma-induced protein 10 (IP-10) and monokine induced by IFN-gamma (Mig) in a pool of human aortic endothelial cells. Both of these chemokines are known to be induced by IFN-gamma. Endothelial cell-derived chemokine mRNA was assayed at rest, after IFN-gamma activation, and after co-culture with allogeneic peripheral blood mononuclear cells (PBMC) from normal blood donors with and without a monoclonal antibody to IFN-gamma. Finally, protein release into the media was assayed using an enzyme-linked immunosorbent assay to IP-10. RESULTS: Mig and IP-10 were expressed in human endothelial cells both after IFN-gamma treatment and after PBMC co-culture. Furthermore, the expression of both of these endothelial cell-derived chemokines was dependent on IFN-gamma because PBMC-induced expression was blocked with anti-IFN-gamma. IP-10 levels in the endothelial cell supernatant increased from a baseline of 13.4+/-10.8 pg/mL to 299.5+/-13.4 pg/mL (P CONCLUSIONS: Vascular endothelial cells are capable of producing inflammatory chemokines when activated and potentially serve to amplify the allogeneic response

Lipid-Based Nutrient Supplementation Increases High-Density Lipoprotein (HDL) Cholesterol Efflux Capacity and Is Associated with Changes in the HDL Glycoproteome in Children.

Prenatal plus postnatal small-quantity lipid-based nutrient supplements (SQ-LNS) improved child growth at 18 months in the International Lipid-Based Nutrient Supplements DYAD trial in Ghana. In this secondary outcome analysis, we determined whether SQ-LNS versus prenatal iron and folic acid (IFA) supplementation improves the cholesterol efflux capacity (CEC) of high-density lipoprotein (HDL) particles and alters their lipidomic, proteomic, or glycoproteomic composition in a subset of 80 children at 18 months of age. HDL CEC was higher among children in the SQ-LNS versus IFA group (20.9 ± 4.1 vs 19.4 ± 3.3%; one-tailed p = 0.038). There were no differences in HDL lipidomic or proteomic composition between groups. Twelve glycopeptides out of the 163 analyzed were significantly altered by SQ-LNS, but none of the group differences remained significant after correction for multiple testing. Exploratory analysis showed that 6 out of the 33 HDL-associated proteins monitored differed in glycopeptide enrichment between intervention groups, and 6 out of the 163 glycopeptides were correlated with CEC. We conclude that prenatal plus postnatal SQ-LNS may modify HDL protein glycoprofiles and improve the CEC of HDL particles in children, which may have implications for subsequent child health outcomes. This trial was registered at clinicaltrials.gov as NCT00970866

Multiple myeloma vaccination sequential immune response pilot study

BACKGROUND: Multiple myeloma (MM) is a cancer of the immune system. Infection is a major cause of morbidity and mortality in MM. Vaccinations (vax) are recommended in MM, but clinical efficacy endpoints have not been demonstrated and surrogate markers of efficacy have limited data. This pilot study evaluated sequential immunologic markers after standard vax for pneumococcal pneumonia (PV) and influenza (FV). METHODS: MM patients and non-MM control (Ctrl) participants signed informed consent to this IRB approved study. The MM patients were not selected for treatment or disease status. Vax was standard PV (PCV13 or PPV23) and/or FV (IIV4) with research laboratory testing at baseline and at 2, 4, 12, 24 weeks after vax. If PV, then PCV13 preferred followed by PPV23 suggested at \u3e= 26 weeks. IgG antibodies (Ab) to influenza and pneumococcal antigens were detected by ELISA. Measurement of Ab to influenza was performed as previously described (Oaks et al. 2013OncoImmunology) and used Flulaval Quadrivalent 2015/2016 form (GlaxoSmithKline) as the coating antigen. Anti-pneumococcal IgG levels were determined with The Binding Site VaccZymeAnti-PCP IgG EIA Kit (#MK012-U) according to the manufacturer\u27s instructions. RESULTS: Ten MM (5 M, 5 F) and 9 Ctrl (4 M, 5 F) were enrolled. MM median age was 69.8y (range: 59-78) and Ctrl was 63.5y (range: 56-73). Over the total time course 5/10 MM and 4/9 Ctrl had no missing samples. Vax included: 5 (2 MM, 3 Ctrl) FV only; 10 (6 MM, 4 Ctrl) PV (8 PCV13, 2 PPV23) only; and 4 (2 MM, 2 Ctrl) both FV and PV (3 PCV13, 1 PPV23). Tetanus Ab response was unchanged, which served as a negative control. FV results included 2/4 MM showed at least a doubling of anti-flu titer, although the other 2 showed no measurable response. All 5/5 Ctrl had at least a 2-fold increase in anti-flu titers at some point. PV humoral response varied considerably for both MM and Ctrl. All 4 Ctrl responded with at least a 2-fold increase in Ab titer, only 2 Ctrl had a sustained increase in titer at the closing visit. Six of 10 MM had at least a 2-fold Ab increase at some point during the course of the study. Only 2 MM patients showed a sustained increase of anti-PV Ab. Response rate differences were not statistically significant and there was no relationship between responsiveness to FV or PV and initial serum IgG concentration at entry into the study (data not shown). DISCUSSION: Study limitations include small sample size, sample dropouts, and heterogeneous population. We are unaware of prior MM vax immunology response time courses. This may be because of the difficulties including PV studies with PCV13-\u3ePPV23 recommendations and the potential long follow up. FV response may be more amenable to short term follow up. In 2013 Hahn and colleagues showed proof of principle with Boost vax improves influenza humoral immune response in MM (ow.ly/sEBEO), but without a time course or clinical outcomes data. The 2015Branagan et al. (http://ow.ly/W4tLS) pilot study showed a 2 dose FV strategy had lower flu infections compared to historical controls. Karlsson et al. (http://ow.ly/YUumy) showed that Ab response does not correlate with functional assays. We found no relationship with total IgG level. This is consistent with Beers et al. findings that IgG isotypes may be of more importance than the total IgG level. (http://ow.ly/Z5g2A) CONCLUSION: We found that FV and PV Ab response was low and not sustained in most MM patients. Infection in MM remains an important concern. Future vax studies should address the following: 1) Homogeneous population - eg therapy trial or autologous stem cell transplant with a standardized re-vax and sequential testing, 2) validate relevant immunologic surrogates - eg Ab response twice baseline, 4) fresh assay vs frozen (batched), 5) correlation of metric with functional outcomes such as hospitalization, cost, and death, 6) and epidemiologic data may complement translational approaches

Carbon and nitrogen fluxes in the marine coccolithophore Emiliania huxleyi grown under different nitrate concentrations

Information on interaction of C and N at the cellular level is lacking for ecologically relevant phytoplankton species. We examined the effects of NO3- availability on C and N fluxes in the widely distributed marine coccolithophore Emiliania huxleyi. Cells were cultured at replete (∼ 280 μM) and ambient (∼ 10 μM) NO3-, the latter representing a typical surface water nitrate concentration of the North Atlantic Ocean during spring. While growth rates and C to N ratios were not altered by the NO3- availability, organic C and N as well as inorganic C quotas were reduced under ambient NO3-. Growth at ambient NO3- caused a higher proportion of fixed C to be allocated to lipids relative to carbohydrates and especially to proteins. Ambient NO3--grown cells showed lower Vmax of nitrate reductase (NR) and nitrite reductase (NiR) (ambient/replete: VmaxNR = 0.64/1.09 fmol min-1 cell-1; VmaxNiR = 0.3/0.56 fmol min-1 cell-1), whereas they had higher Vmax of glutamine synthetase (GS) and glutamate synthase (GOGAT) (ambient/replete: VmaxGS = 0.57/0.38 fmol min-1 cell-1; VmaxGOG = 3.91/2.87 fmol min-1 cell-1). In these cells, photosynthetic O2 evolution and HCO3- uptake rates were lower as compared to replete NO3--grown cells (ambient/replete: VmaxO2 = 6.5/12.9 fmol min-1 cell-1; VmaxHCO3- = 2.8/8.1 fmol min-1 cell-1). The CO2 uptake and the maximum light use efficiency of photosynthesis (α) were unaffected by the concentration of NO3-. The affinities of NR for NO3-, of NiR for NO2-, of GS for Glu, and of the inorganic carbon uptake system for HCO3- were higher under ambient NO3- (ambient/replete: KmNR = 0.074/0.099 mM; KmNiR = 1.69/3.14 mM; KmGS = 1.62/3.81 mM; KmHCO3- = 195/524 μM). Our data suggest that a concerted regulation of the intracellular CO2 and NO3- concentrations is required to maintain balanced C and N metabolic fluxes resulting in a constant C to N ratio