COMPARISONS OF WAIST CIRCUMFERENCE, WAIST-TO-HIP RATIO AND BODY MASS INDEX AND THEIR ASSOCIATIONS WITH TYPE 2 DIABETES IN RURAL AND URBAN INDIA

India has the highest prevalence of diabetes mellitus in the world. Anthropometric measurements (waist circumference (WC), waist-to-hip ratio (WHR) and body mass index (BMI)) are risk factors of Type 2 diabetes mellitus (T2DM). This study examined associations between these anthropometric measures and T2DM among 508 urban Indians in New Delhi and 574 rural Indians in Tamil Nadu. Using a receiver operator curve (ROC) the anthropometric cutpoints most strongly associated with T2DM were determined. Bivariate correlation and the area under the ROC curve showed most significant associations between T2DM and WHR (0.90 cm, 0.86; 0.87, 0.81 urban and rural men and women, respectively) followed by WC (86 cm, 85; 86, 75) and then BMI (24 kg/m2, 21; 25, 22). Results from this study showed large variations in cutpoints between the rural and urban populations and suggest that no single cutpoint should be used in India due to large intra- and inter- regional differences within the country

"How Do We Make This Happen?" Teacher Challenges and Productive Resources for Integrating Engineering Design into High-School Physics

Recent attention on social, civil, and environmental problems has caused policy-makers and advisors to advocate for more integrated science, technology, engineering and mathematics (STEM) instruction. Although integrated STEM education promises to prepare U.S. students to tackle the crises of our times and the future (Lander & Gates, 2010), the integration of engineering design into high-school physics may prove difficult for teachers whether or not they’ve been previously trained in engineering design. This dissertation addresses a gap in classroom observation-based research on engineering integration in physics (Dare, Ellis, & Roehrig, 2014) by drawing on rich, qualitative, participant-observation data to investigate engineering-design instruction in high-school physics. The first study explores tensions that three high-school physics teachers encountered as they planned and executed a terminal velocity engineering design challenge. Separating out physics content came into tension with truly integrated engineering-design instruction as envisioned in the Next Generation Science Standards (NGSS Lead States, 2013d), time and technical constraints came into tension with adequate data collection for making design decisions, and teachers’ supportive classroom routines came into tension with students’ divergent design thinking and agency. The first study concludes that even highly motivated and supported teachers may experience tensions between their regularly productive instructional practices and engineering design that could threaten the authenticity of the engineering design in which students engage. The second study identifies some of teacher “Leslie’s” productive resources (locally coherent patterns of thoughts and actions) activated as she implemented her first engineering design challenge in physics. Leslie called up some of the same resources when she taught engineering design as when she facilitated open, guided, and structured-inquiry investigations. This study suggests that finding and calling upon resources that are assistive in other instruction, such as inquiry instruction, might be useful for science teachers attempting engineering-design integration. Science education reform implementation researchers, teacher educators, and professional development providers need to acknowledge tensions that teachers may face with engineering-design integration, and the role that teachers’ existing resources can play in supporting reform adoption. Finally, this study agrees with other work (Katehi, Perason, Feder, & Committee on K-12 Engineering Education, 2009) emphasizing the need for more research on engineering-design integration in high-school physics

Phagosomal retention of Francisella tularensis results in TIRAP/Mal-independent TLR2 signaling

TLR2 plays a central role in the activation of innate immunity in response to Ft, the causative agent of tularemia. We reported previously that Ft LVS elicited strong, dose-dependent NF-kappaB reporter activity in TLR2-expressing human embryo kidney 293 T cells and that Ft LVS-induced murine macrophage proinflammatory cytokine gene and protein expression is TLR2-dependent. We demonstrated further that Ft can signal through TLR2 from within the phagosome and that phagosomal retention of Ft leads to greatly increased expression of a subset of proinflammatory genes. The two adaptor proteins associated with TLR2-mediated signaling are MyD88 and TIRAP. Although MyD88 is absolutely required for the Ft-induced macrophage cytokine response, the requirement for TIRAP can be overcome through retention of Ft within the phagosome. TIRAP-independent signaling was observed whether Ft was retained in the phagosome as a result of bacterial mutation (LVSDeltaiglC) or BFA-mediated inhibition of phagosome acidification. The requirement for TIRAP in TLR2 signaling could also be overcome by increasing the concentrations of synthetic bacterial TLR2 agonists. Taken together, these data suggest that prolonging or enhancing the interaction between TLR2 and its agonist overcomes the bridging function ascribed previously to TIRAP