Customizing Conception: A Survey of Preimplantation Genetic Diagnosis and the Resulting Social, Ethical, and Legal Dilemmas

One in six American couples experience difficulties conceiving a child. With fertility rates at an all time low, the business of treating infertility is booming. However, due to the United States prohibition on government funding for embryonic research, the $4 billion industry of assisted reproductive technologies (ART) has been incompletely monitored and largely removed from oversight. Additionally, due to the fervent abortion debate, in vitro fertilization (IVF) was introduced in the United States without a research phase and procedures have been forced to evolve in the private sector. Thus, the checks and balances on medical innovation that are generally imposed by the federal government for consumer protection are lacking. Decisions about when to go from the laboratory to the clinic are often left solely to the discretion of private physicians. Preimplantation genetic diagnosis (PGD) is just one of many such treatments offered by these clinics. This iBrief examines how, why, and to whom the reproductive procedure of PGD is offered. In addition, it evaluates the prospective effects to society that arise when PGD is used for sex selection and for nontherapeutic or enhancement purposes. Finally, it explores whether and how to regulate PGD in the United States by investigating approaches to policy making that have been adopted by the United Kingdom

MOST Space Telescope Photometry of the 2010 January Transit of Extrasolar Planet HD80606b

We present observations of the full January 2010 transit of HD80606b from the Canadian microsatellite, Microvariability and Oscillations of Stars (MOST). By employing a space-based telescope, we monitor the entire transit thus limiting systematic errors that result from ground observations. We determine measurements for the planetary radius (R_{p}=0.987\pm0.061R_{Jup}) and inclination (i=89.283^{o}\pm0.024) by constraining our fits with the observed parameters of different groups. Our measured mid-transit time of 2455210.6449\pm0.0034 HJD is consistant with the 2010 Spitzer results and is 20 minutes earlier than predicted by groups who observed the June 2009 transit.Comment: 3 figure

FEASIBILITY OF UNDERWATER MEMS DF ACOUSTIC SENSOR FOR NARROWBAND DETECTION

A microelectromechanical system (MEMS)–based directional sound sensor has been developed to operate both in air and underwater. The sensor consists of two wings that are attached to a substrate using two torsional legs at the middle as detailed in several previous theses. Though it was highly successful in operating in the air application, its underwater operation required it to be immersed in a liquid with impedance matching housing. The fluid strongly alters the operating characteristics of the sensor and reduces the sensitivity due to added viscous damping. In this thesis, two new MEMS sensors, designed to operate at 300 Hz and 520 Hz, were characterized both in air and underwater. For the measurements, the MEMS sensors were first integrated with newly designed readout electronics, which were needed to overcome the problems encountered with the off-the-shelf electronics employed in earlier studies. The new electronics were found to be highly stable and operated well when immersed in silicone oil used for underwater packaging of the sensors. The measured frequency responses were found to match with that of the simulations carried out using COMSOL finite element modeling. In addition, the sensors also show expected cosine directional characteristics. The research findings show that the MEMS-based sensors can be successfully operated in an underwater environment for determining the bearing of sound sources.Outstanding ThesisLieutenant, United States NavyApproved for public release; distribution is unlimited

The Anti-Imperialist Empire: Soviet Nationality Policies under Brezhnev

This dissertation argues that the Soviet Union functioned as an empire despite its decidedly anti-imperialist rhetoric. Beginning in the 1920s, Bolshevik policies transformed the former Russian Empire into a new type of empire that was based on Marxist-Leninist ideology. Moreover, the Bolshevik policy of korenizatsiia as well as Marxist-Leninist rhetoric promoted the development of a decolonization process among the non-Russian peoples of the USSR in the 1920s and 1930s. Although Stalin abandoned korenizatsiia in the 1930s in favor of greater emphasis on Russification, the decolonization process continued into the Brezhnev period of the 1960s and 1970s. This decolonization process quickly rose to the surface in the 1980s as a result of Gorbachev\u27s reforms.;This dissertation focuses on the Brezhnev leadership\u27s handling of the Soviet nationality question as this period represents the final effort to maintain and to consolidate further the Soviet Empire. Brezhnev\u27s doctrine of Developed Socialism emphasized the continued rapprochement of the nations of the USSR into a supranational Soviet nation, the importance of the Russian language as the language of inter-national communication within the Soviet Union, the further consolidation of power at the center of the Soviet Union at the expense of Union Republic sovereignty, and the treatment of the USSR as a single economic complex. The tenets of Developed Socialism, then, are imperialist in nature as they promoted the Russian language at the expense of non-Russian languages and they focused on the greater concentration of power in Moscow and the erosion of Union Republic sovereignty. The ratification of a new USSR Constitution in 1977 and of new Union Republic constitutions in 1978 is the high-water mark of Brezhnev\u27s imperialist policies. The Brezhnev leadership\u27s imperialist policies, however, were rooted in Marxist-Leninist ideology as an analysis of the essays written by Lenin and Stalin will show.;Although Brezhnev\u27s policies were imperialistic, they were implemented unevenly across the USSR, resulting in continued diversity within the USSR in terms of nationality policy. Moscow kept a tighter rein on the western republics, such as Ukraine, while maintaining looser control over the Central Asian republics. As evidence of this, the CPSU Politburo removed Petro Shelest from his post as First Secretary in Ukraine for tolerating manifestations of Ukrainian nationalism while Sharaf Rashidov in Uzbekistan kept his post as First Secretary until his death in 1983 despite increasing displays of Uzbek nationalism there in the 1970s.;This dissertation also argues that a decolonization process began in the Soviet Union as early as the 1920s, but that this process is reignited by Khrushchev\u27s policies in the 1950s. The Brezhnev leadership\u27s focus on further consolidating power at the center could not stop this decolonization process and in some ways, it contributed to the continued growth of a decolonization process among the non-Russian peoples of the USSR. In the 1960s, nationalist dissent re-emerged, centered primarily in the western Soviet Union, which continued into the 1980s. Though it did not pose a direct threat to the Soviet regime\u27s stability, nationalist dissent did encourage the Brezhnev leadership to rely further on the tenets of Developed Socialism.;This dissertation also compares Soviet nationality policies with similar policies enacted by other modern empires such as the British and French empires in the 19th and 20th centuries. Thus, much of Chapter One compares the Soviet Union with the British and French empires to demonstrate that the Soviet Union did indeed function as an empire. Moreover, Brezhnev\u27s strategy of re-invigorating Soviet imperial policies through the tenets of Developed Socialism represented the Soviet Union\u27s second colonial occupation. Just as the British sought to rekindle their empire in East Africa and Malaya after World War II, the Soviet Union under Brezhnev acted to renew its imperial control over the Union Republics in the 1970s. The Brezhnev leadership\u27s pursuit of grandiose construction and modernization projects such as the Baikal-Amur Mainline Railway are not unlike Britain\u27s groundnut scheme in Tanganyika after World War II. Through comparing the Soviet Union with other modern empires, this dissertation places Soviet history and practices in a world history context

Emerging in the Image of God: From Evolution to Ethics in a Second Naïveté Understanding of Christian Anthropology

Through a careful integration of theological, philosophical, and the natural scientific sources, the biblical concepts of the image of God and the knowledge of good and evil have the potential to remain important and appropriate descriptors of the human condition, including the possibility and necessity of human morality. This study employs French philosopher Paul Ricoeur\u27s notion of second naïveté understanding to demonstrate the hermeneutical significance of contemporary biocultural evolutionary theory for reinterpreting and reappropriating these ancient symbols of Christian anthropology as terms equipped to encapsulate a morally fruitful and intellectually honest conceptual framework for constructing, conducting, and evaluating theological anthropology and ethics today. Forging and polishing this hermeneutical lens for the purpose of recasting a biblically-based picture of humanity involves alloying these ancient concepts with others from the interrelated fields of cognitive linguistics, evolutionary psychology, and emergence. Viewed through this lens, the dissertationing chapters of Genesis describe human beings as creatures wrought of the creation and embedded within it to the same extent as all other creatures. Though ordinary in every other aspect, human creatures are unique in that they have emerged with an ambivalent condition of freedom through which they bear the vocation to re-present the creative beneficence of the God who shares power and does not create through violence. I defend this thesis in seven chapters. In the first chapter, I introduce the research topic, goals, and hermeneutical procedure for this study. Chapters 2 and 3 describe biocultural evolution and evolutionary psychology within a non-reductive emergentist perspective as sources and resources for contemporary theological anthropology. In chapter 4, I propose an articulation of the doctrine of the imago Dei within this evolutionary worldview. Chapter 5 situates the knowledge of good and evil vis-à-vis biocultural evolution and recent biblical studies. I then construct a proposal in chapter 6 for how this second naïveté understanding of the image of God and the knowledge of good and evil dissertations up new frameworks and frontiers for fundamental theological ethics. Finally, chapter 7 offers a summative and prospective conclusion to this study and its likely impact on my future research

Strategies to Mitigate Supply Chain Disruptions in Miniconvenience Stores

Implementing strategies and polices and maintain standards are essential to improving supply chain systems. The purpose of this multiple case study was to explore strategies miniconvenience store managers used to mitigate supply chain disruptions to sustain productivity and increase profits. The population was 4 managers of miniconvenience stores within gas stations located in the southeastern region of the United States who successfully maintained productivity during a supply chain disruption. The conceptual framework for this study was resource dependency theory. Data were collected using company documents, face-to-face interviews and semistructured, open-ended questions. Two themes were identified from the data analysis: building relationships and effective communication. The findings from this study could contribute to positive social change by providing miniconvenience store managers with strategies to increase supply chain capabilities while reducing the impact disruptions have on business performance, customer satisfaction, and profitability. Store managers who minimize supply chain disruptions might improve organizational operative purchasing, decrease prices, increase customer gratification, and improve the standard of living for customers in the communities served