2018 Scholars at Work Conference Program

Program for the 2018 Scholars at Work Conference at Minnesota State University, Mankato on March 30, 2018

American Thyroid Association Guide to Investigating Thyroid Hormone Economy and Action in Rodent and Cell Models

Background: An in-depth understanding of the fundamental principles that regulate thyroid hormone homeostasis is critical for the development of new diagnostic and treatment ap-proaches for patients with thyroid disease. Summary: Important clinical practices in use today for the treatment of patients with hypothy-roidism, hyperthyroidism, or thyroid cancer, are the result of laboratory discoveries made by scientists investigating the most basic aspects of thyroid structure and molecular biology. In this document, a panel of experts commissioned by the American Thyroid Association makes a se-ries of recommendations related to the study of thyroid hormone economy and action. These recommendations are intended to promote standardization of study design, which should in turn increase the comparability and reproducibility of experimental findings. Conclusions: It is expected that adherence to these recommendations by investigators in the field will facilitate progress towards a better understanding of the thyroid gland and thyroid hormone dependent processes

Environmental toxicants and white matter composition: Understanding the role of thyroid disruption

It is becoming increasingly clear that chemicals present in the environment can interfere with thyroid hormone (TH) action and signaling. This is of great concern because TH is critical for normal brain development and recent evidence suggests that the developing brain is exquisitely sensitive to perturbations in TH action. Developmental exposure to the ubiquitous environmental toxicants, polychlorinated biphenyls (PCBs), is associated with neurological deficits that may be related to ability of these chemicals to alter TH-mediated brain development by interfering with TH action. Thyroid hormone plays an important role of is on the development and maturation of white matter tracts and its glial constituents. Because PCBs are suspected of interfering with thyroid hormone (TH) signaling in the developing brain, and because TH is important in white matter development, this dissertation set-out to critically test the hypothesis that developmental exposure to PCBs alters white matter development by interfering with TH action. In testing this hypothesis, we addressed four main questions: (1) Do PCBs perturb white matter development by causing a relative state of hypothyroidism? (2) Is the severity of TH insufficiency associated with different effects on white matter? (3) Do PCBs have a TH-like effect on white matter composition? (4) Do PCBs and TH insufficiency alter white matter by affecting the same signaling networks? We focused our experiments on postnatal day 15, a time when both myelination and TH levels are at their peak during development, and effects of hypothyroidism on white matter development have been documented. We evaluated the effect of developmental exposure to the commercial PCB mixture Aroclor 1254, TH insufficiency, and TH excess on markers of oligodendrocyte and astrocytes in two white matter tracts, the corpus callosum (CC) and anterior commissure (AC). The results described in this dissertation are consistent with the idea that developmental exposure to PCBs alters white matter composition independent of ability to interfere with TH action. Furthermore, the nature of the experimental designs used in testing our hypothesis provided fundamental information on the role of TH in the differentiation of oligodendrocytes and astrocyte from common precursors

An Affective Music Recommendation System

Given that the affective features of music are often the most relevant criteria in selecting music, we propose in this abstract that a music database should be able to be categorized according to its affective influence, and likewise, music recommendations made with consideration to the user’s current affective state. This can be made possible using pre-existing emotion-measuring technology with new algorithms for selecting music with appropriate affective influence, as proven by several studies. An affective music recommender system could avoid many of the inadequacies of traditional recommender systems.N

Vuzik: Music Creation and Comprehension through Painting

Vuzik is an interface designed to empower users to create digital music by painting. Through an intuitive mapping of sound to visuals designed to be simple enough for a child to comprehend, Vuzik uses a music-painting metaphor to enable users to compose and perform music through simple painting gestures, effectively "seeing" their music as they hear it. Our paper presents the design of Vuzik, details the implementation of the current prototype, and discusses the preliminary user evaluation we performed and how it informs our coming design efforts. We envision that Vuzik will help both the creator and audience better understand music's construction, thereby making the composition of music more accessible to children and novices and opening up new creative approaches for all.N

Wearables And The Internet Of Things For Health: Wearable, Interconnected Devices Promise More Efficient And Comprehensive Health Care

In our recent book Health-e Everything: Wearables and the Internet of Things for Health, we capture in an interactive e-book format some global thought-leader perspectives as well as early examples of case studies and novel innovations that are driving this emerging technology domain. Here, we provide a brief snapshot of key findings related to these novel technologies and use cases, which are driving both health care practitioners and health consumers (patients). As technologists, having a firm understanding of customer-driven innovation and the actual user benefits of interconnective devices for health will help us engineer better solutions that are more targeted to the triple aim of better, faster, and cheaper health solutions