A cross-sectional analysis of undergraduate medical student attitudes towards interprofessional education

No abstract available

The Synthesis and Biological Activity of Iron Binding Motifs

Iron is an essential mineral that plays a key role in the oxygen transporting molecule hemoglobin. Iron also helps muscles store and use oxygen. Excess iron in the body can attract electrons, creating harmful oxygen radicals. Iron overload can be caused by several factors such as genetics, age, gender, and having received multiple red blood cell transfusions. Excess iron can lead to many diseases, such as arthritis, liver cirrhosis, heart disease, and several forms of cancer. Iron-chelating therapies work by binding free iron in the bloodstream and by reducing the amount of iron bound in transferrin, the iron transporting molecule. Current iron therapies are time-consuming, painful, and costly. New, more effective chelation therapies are being researched. The first step in this research is to synthetically produce iron binding motifs modeled after the naturally occurring iron binding protein, adenochrome. The goals in the synthesis are to produce a chelator with increased water solubility and a higher affinity for chelation of iron. The next step is to test the effectiveness of the synthesized chelators to bind free iron, as well as other first row transition elements, such as chromium, copper, nickel, and aluminum. Evidence has shown that accumulation of aluminum in the body may be involved in the formation of senile plaques, which occur in the brains of patients with Alzheimer’s disease, and is therefore a suspect in the initial cause of the disease. The binding of aluminum could be beneficial in the therapy of early Alzheimer’s patients

Uncommon Women And Others And The Story Told Without Words

This project is a documentation of the scenic design process for the Salem State University production of Uncommon Women and Others by Wendy Wasserstein. The production ran between February 14th and February 24th, 2019 in the Callan Studio Theater at Salem State University and was directed by Brianne Beatrice, with assistance from Allyson Kinch. The director’s concept was to force focus on the dialogue within the play by creating a sense of realism and comfort in the environment. This would emphasize the realistic nature of the strong female characters as they attempt to plan their lifelong goals upon their graduation from Mount Holyoke. As the play takes place in the late 1970s as well as the flash-forwards in the early 1980s, the females of the time feel obligated to break their gender norms and become the “uncommon women” who excel in both their education and career choices. The audience watches intimately as they not only attempt to figure out their goals, but as they begin to figure out themselves as empowered individuals. This thesis project will demonstrate step-by-step how I achieved an effective design for this production, as well as exhibit the impact that the scenic environment of a production has on the overall experience of both the audience and the performers

The cardiovascular effects of watercress on human health and performance

The purpose of this thesis is to assess an alternative dietary nitrate supplement as a possible ergogenic aid and to evaluate its therapeutic potential upon cardiovascular markers in healthy young and old age populations. The first experimental chapter of this thesis (Chapter 4) aimed to investigate the efficacy of an alternative dietary nitrate supplement. Watercress juice was compared to beetroot juice, a well-established, commercially available, dietary nitrate supplement, to sodium nitrate and to water, acting as control. The sodium nitrate condition would enable further insights into the mechanism of nitrate rich supplements. The first study aimed to investigate the acute effects of nitrate supplements on cardiovascular and oxidative/nitrosylative stress parameters at rest and following a 16.1 km cycling time trial on a SRM cycle ergometer (16.1 km TT). Participants (n=9) were randomly assigned to consume nitrate matched supplements and water. Plasma nitrate concentration significantly increased at 120 mins post-ingestion for the dietary nitrate conditions, (P 0.05). Watercress supplementation demonstrated a 1.4% performance improvement compared to the water trial and the fastest time (1655.1 (110.2) secs). Compared with beetroot juice (1673.8 (96.0) secs), sodium nitrate (1685 (102.3) secs) and water (1677.9 (129.8) secs). Interestingly, sodium nitrate observed the slowest time. The difference between trials were not significantly different (P = 0.31). However, a critical improvement in performance has been reported small as 0.5 - 1.5 % (Paton & Hopkins, 2006). Using this criterion, it is possible that our findings may be of real-world relevance. Watercress supplementation was the only supplement to indicate an increase in forearm blood flow (+0.18 (0.03) %/min), from baseline to 120 mins post-ingestion but this was not significant (P = 0.73). Beetroot decreased but was equivocal (-0.88 (0.30) %/min) (P = 0.25). Sodium nitrate tended to decrease (-0.60 (0.04) %/min) (P = 0.07) and water significantly decreased (-0.61 (0.01) %/min) (P = 0.03). These results suggest that there is potentially a synergistic effect between the nitrate content and other bioactive components in watercress or there is an effective bioactive component that is not nitrate which may have enhanced cycling performance in a young healthy physically active population.Assessing nitrate supplementation in a cardiovascular compromised population, rather than young, physically active volunteers may provide further mechanistic insights. Therefore, the aim of the second experimental Chapter 5 was to investigate the efficacy of watercress supplementation on cardiovascular and oxidative/nitrosylative stress markers in a normoxic and hypoxic setting in a healthy, physically active, aged population. Participants (n=9) were randomly assigned to consume watercress supplement and water (control) in normoxic and normobaric hypoxic environment. Oxygen saturation significantly decreased (P 0.05). There were no differences in vasodilatory or oxidative/nitrosylative stress measures. Acute watercress supplementation containing 400 mg of nitrate does not improve vascular function or attenuate oxidative stress biomarkers in a healthy aged population at rest under normoxia or hypoxia.With the substantial variation seen in a range of measures in Chapters 4 and 5. The purpose of the third experiment, Chapter 6, was to assess the error of measurement to support the interpretation of the previous findings. Therefore, the aim of this work was to investigate the repeatability of forearm blood flow, 16.1 km cycling TT performance on a SRM cycle ergometer (one week apart) and the change in oxidative/nitrosylative stress markers at baseline and after the TT, in a healthy, physically active, male cohort in normoxic conditions. There was limited difference between 16.1 km TT performance times and the coefficient of variation was low 1% (90% CI; 0.7% -1.9%). Forearm blood flow observed a high coefficient of variation of 39.3% (90% CI; 31.6 – 99.5%). Baseline and post TT for both oxidative/nitrosylative stress markers reported a large variation. For example, baseline protein carbonyls concentration across the two visits showed a high coefficient of variation of 65.5% (90% CI; 43.6 - 136.7%). Therefore, the primary findings from this investigation suggest that a 16.1 km TT, on a SRM cycle ergometer in a physically active, male cohort, is highly repeatable The low CV suggests that this test can enable sports scientists and trainers to better comprehend factors (e.g. ergogenic aids) that may influence cycling performance. In contrast, the repeatability of forearm blood flow was high and oxidative/nitrosylative stress markers, one week apart, demonstrated a high variability. Therefore, using these markers in a repeated measures research design should be used with caution

Can we estimate stature from the scapula? A test considering sex and ancestry

The biological profile is one of the most important things that forensic anthropologists accomplish in their work. This includes the determination of age, race, sex, and stature. These four components of the biological profile aid in the identification of an individual in the forensic context. Since the beginning of the field of physical anthropology, osteologists and anatomists have studied human remains in order to provide new and more accurate ways of building the biological profile. Two published studies have attempted to estimate stature from measurements of the scapula. One previous study found that certain measurements of the scapula were highly accurate in estimating the stature of males and females from an Italian population. However, another study concluded that other measurements of the skeleton were more useful in estimating stature than the maximum scapular breadth for a Chinese population. The current research expands upon both of these previous studies using an American population collected from the Hamann-Todd Osteological Collection at the Cleveland Museum of Natural History. In so doing, this researcher hypothesized that there was a significant relationship between one or more measurements of the scapula and stature. Additionally, I performed a multiple regression analysis of the measurements in order to create regression formulae useful in estimating stature. After taking eleven measurements of the scapula, these variables were regressed against the stature measurements (N=223) provided in the Hamann-Todd Human Collection Database. The results show that several variables, including the length of the scapular spine, the maximum acromion-coracoid distance, the length of the axial border, the length of the coracoid, and the maximum scapular breadth each significantly contribute to stature. Additionally, race significantly contributes to stature. Regression formulae were calculated for populations when race is both known and unknown. After applying each of these formulae to a smaller test sample, results show that, contrary to the findings of previous research, stature could be predicted for all individuals with an accuracy of 27%, for blacks with an accuracy of 50%, and for whites with an accuracy of 36%

Sensing the Present: “Conceptual Art of the Senses”

After Rachel E. Burke briefly introduces the essays presented with a focus on our contemporary relationship to modern subjectivity, Mieke Bal will make the case for the sense of presentness on an affective and sensuous level in Munch’s paintings and Flaubert’s writing by selecting a few topics and cases from the book Emma and Edvard Looking Sideways: Loneliness and the Cinematic, published by the Munch Museum in conjunction with the exhibition Emma & Edvard. It is this foregrounded presentness that not only produces the ongoing thematic relevance of these works, but more importantly, the sense-based conceptualism that declares art and life tightly bound together. If neither artist eliminated figuration in favour of abstraction, they had a good reason for that. Art is not a representation of life, but belongs to it, illuminates it and helps us cope with it by sharpening our senses. As an example, a few paintings will clarify what I mean by the noun-qualifier “cinematic” and how that aesthetic explains the production of loneliness

Chronic Headache Leading to the Diagnosis of Empty Sella

Headaches are one of the most common chief complaints presenting to the Emergency Department. The differential is broad. The workup is tailored to the patient’s history. Here we present the case of a young female who developed headaches over the past year. After numerous imaging studies of her brain, the most recent revealed an Empty Sella diagnosis

Effectiveness of a six-week high-intensity interval training programme on cardiometabolic markers in sedentary males

High-intensity interval training (HIT) has been proposed as an effective, time efficient strategy to elicit similar cardiometabolic health benefits as traditional moderate-intensity endurance training. This is an important consideration as "lack of time" is a common cited barrier to regular physical activity