Elliptic curves and their applications in cryptography

The entire thesis text is included in the research.pdf file; the official abstract appears in the short.pdf file; a non-technical public abstract appears in the public.pdf file.Title from PDF of title page (University of Missouri--Columbia, viewed on December 30, 2009).Thesis advisor: Dr. William Banks.Includes bibliographical references.M.S. University of Missouri--Columbia 2009.Dissertations, Academic -- University of Missouri--Columbia -- Applied mathematics.In 1985, Koblitz and Miller proposed elliptic curves to be used for public key cryptosystems. This present thesis examines the role of elliptic curves on cryptography and basic problems involving implementation and security of some elliptic curve cryptosystems. Some of the aspects we are concerned with include: Methods to determine the number of points on an elliptic curve over a finite field; Implementation of cryptosystems based on the discrete logarithm problem for elliptic curves defined over a finite field; Examine an elliptic curve analogue of the RSA cryptosystem. We provide answers to these and discuss a number of applications for number theory, such as factorization and primality testing

Saliva Stimulants and the Oral Health of Geriatric Patients

Root-surface caries (RSC) has been recognized as a specific and important dental disease. Significant advances have been made in the pathology and microbiology of RSC, and the need to standardize the guidelines for recording RSC data has been recognized. Researchers have emphasized the increasing impact RSC will have on the geriatric population, especially since the methods to treat and prevent this disease are limited. The purpose of this study was to investigate the possibility of limiting RSC in a Veterans Administration (VA) patient population, using polyol-containing saliva stimulants that were voluntarily consumed by residents of a VA Medical Center (VAMC) over a period of from six to 30 months. Another aim was to study the effect of this program on the gingival health of periodontal patients.Peer Reviewedhttp://deepblue.lib.umich.edu/bitstream/2027.42/68278/2/10.1177_08959374950090020901.pd

Archival ethics: The truth of the matter

This essay explores the question of whether records professionals are as aware of the ethical dimensions of their work as they should be. It consider first the historical and professional context of archival ethics, then examines a recent case about business archives involving the author that suggests the need for renewed attention to professional ethics, and concludes with a discussion about how archivists might reconsider the ethical dimensions of their work

A conceptual framework for evaluating cooking systems

PUBLISHED 7 March 2022Tami C Bond, Christian L, Orange, Paul R Medwell, George Sizoomu, Samer Abdelnour, Verena Brinkmann, Philip Lloyd and Crispin Pemberton-Pigot

A flawed construct? Understanding and unpicking the concept of resilience in the context of economic hardship

Increasingly, the construct of resilience has been used by social scientists and (social) policy makers in relation to individual resilience to economic hardship. There are a number of issues within the literature on the subject that are unresolved including: whether it is an attribute or a process; the extent to which resilience is a positive phenomenon; the extent to which individuals living in economic hardship have agency; and, whether it is finite. The article unpacks these issues, drawing on qualitative data from a longitudinal study in Northern Ireland. It found resilience to be a negative experience for study participants, although they did exhibit a number of attributes that may be described as being positive. They were often unable to exercise 'positive', transformative agency, because the choices available were limited and pernicious in nature. The paper concludes that as an analytical tool for exploring the experiences of people living in economic hardship the construct of resilience is not helpful

Polyol-combinant saliva stimulants and oral health in Veterans Affairs patients—An exploratory study

Peer Reviewedhttp://deepblue.lib.umich.edu/bitstream/2027.42/72530/1/j.1754-4505.1996.tb00843.x.pd

Transcriptional profiling of the ovine abomasal lymph node reveals a role for timing of the immune response in gastrointestinal nematode resistance

Gastrointestinal nematodes are a serious cause of morbidity and mortality in grazing ruminants. The major ovine defence mechanism is acquired immunity, with protective immunity developing over time in response to infection. Nematode resistance varies both within and between breeds and is moderately heritable. A detailed understanding of the genes and mechanisms involved in protective immunity, and the factors that regulate this response, is required to aid both future breeding strategies and the development of effective and sustainable nematode control methods. The aim of this study was to compare the abomasal lymph node transcriptome of resistant and susceptible lambs in order to determine biological processes differentially expressed between resistant and susceptible individuals. Scottish Blackface lambs, with divergent phenotypes for resistance, were challenged with 30,000 Teladorsagia circumcincta larvae (L3), and abomasal lymph nodes recovered at 7 and 14 days post-infection (dpi). High-throughput sequencing of cDNA from the abomasal lymph node was used to quantitatively sample the transcriptome with an average of 32 million reads per sample. A total of 194 and 144 genes were differentially expressed between resistant and susceptible lambs at 7 and 14 dpi respectively. Differentially expressed networks and biological processes were identified using Ingenuity Pathway Analysis. Genes involved in the inflammatory response, attraction of T lymphocytes and binding of leukocytes were more highly expressed in resistant animals at 7 dpi and in susceptible animals at 14 dpi indicating that resistant animals respond to infection earlier than susceptible animals. Twenty-four Single Nucleotide Polymorphisms (SNP) within 11 differentially expressed genes, were tested for association with gastrointestinal nematode resistance in the Scottish Blackface lambs. Four SNP, in 2 genes (SLC30A2 and ALB), were suggestively associated with faecal egg count. In conclusion, a large number of genes were differentially expressed in the abomasal lymph node of resistant and susceptible lambs responding to gastrointestinal nematode challenge. Resistant Scottish Blackface lambs appear to generate an earlier immune response to T. circumcincta. In susceptible lambs this response appears to be delayed. SNP in 2 differentially expressed genes were suggestively associated with faecal egg count indicating that differentially expressed genes may be considered candidate loci for mediating nematode resistance

Design, construction and characterization of a set of insulated bacterial promoters

We have generated a series of variable-strength, constitutive, bacterial promoters that act predictably in different sequence contexts, span two orders of magnitude in strength and contain convenient sites for cloning and the introduction of downstream open-reading frames. Importantly, their design insulates these promoters from the stimulatory or repressive effects of many 5′- or 3′-sequence elements. We show that different promoters from our library produce constant relative levels of two different proteins in multiple genetic contexts. This set of promoters should be a useful resource for the synthetic-biology community