Identification of Novel Strains of Pseudomonas lundensis from Food Samples

Honors (Bachelor's)MicrobiologyUniversity of Michiganhttps://deepblue.lib.umich.edu/bitstream/2027.42/147398/1/nkthom.pd

“MY BRAND IS SICK GIRL”: IDENTITY FORMATION IN THE YOUNG ADULT CHRONIC ILLNESS NOVELS THE FAULT IN OUR STARS AND SICK KIDS IN LOVE

This thesis explores the identities of the chronically ill protagonists in The Fault in Our Stars by John Green and Sick Kids in Love by Hannah Moskowitz, specifically by looking at the young protagonist’s self-identity, their relationships with their family members, and the romantic relationship they have with the chronically ill male lead. John Green, who does not identify as chronically ill, writes a novel that ultimately reflects ableist ideas of the medical model of disability, which sees disability as a problem to be solved by medical intervention, and compulsory heterosexuality through the portrayal of Hazel and her relationship with Augustus. Hazel’s life revolves around hiding herself, and her cancer, from the world until she meets Augustus who teachers her how to live her life to the fullest, which involves striving to be as normal as possible. However, Hannah Moskowitz, a writer who does identify as chronically ill writes a teen girl protagonist who, alongside the readers, learns to understand and embrace chronic illness as an identity category, following the social model of disability. The social model states that the problem with disability comes from a society that is unwilling to accommodate disabled people. Isabel learns to demand accommodations, and, in the process, pushes back against the way her doctor father perceives her chronic illness as something to be fixed or denied. My analysis ultimately illustrates the significant impact of novels about disability being written by authors with disabilities

Phonemic Awareness in Children\u27s Books

When children scribble on a paper or a draw a picture to write a story, they are in the early stages of emergent literacy. Emergent literacy is a process which children become aware of written language. Before children write their name, they are learning about print, its meaning, and the relationship it has to language. Along their path towards reading and writing, children then begin to understand another important process, phonemic awareness. My senior thesis is based on the concept of phonemic awareness

A multi-proxy reconstruction of sea ice extent and primary productivity during Marine Isotope Stage 11 in the Bering Sea

The ongoing decline in Arctic sea ice extent has prompted concerns about the fate of sea ice in the future, and the stability of sea ice-dependent ecosystems. By studying the natural variability of sea ice cover during past warm intervals, we can better understand how sea ice might respond to future warming. Sediments from Integrated Ocean Drilling Program (IODP) sites in the Bering Sea provide a record of paleo sea ice extent and productivity during Marine Isotope Stage (MIS) 11 (424-374 ka), an interval of prolonged warming that represents a close analog to the Holocene with respect to orbital parameters. The purpose of this dissertation is twofold; firstly, to examine the effectiveness of sediment grain size as a proxy for the sedimentary history of the Bering Sea, and secondly, to reconstruct variations in sea ice extent and productivity in the Bering Sea during the MIS 12-10 cycle. We show that, with some caveats, grain size parameters, including the volume percent of grains in various size fractions, as well as the statistical measures of mean grain size, sorting, and skewness, can be used to infer past changes in sediment transport, ice rafting and productivity at three core sites in the Bering Sea. We present a new, high resolution, multi-proxy record of MIS 11 from IODP Site U1339 (Umnak Plateau, southeastern Bering Sea), based on sediment grain size, diatom assemblages, stable isotopes, and a new diatom-based proxy for sea ice concentration. The record shows that sea ice was more extensive during MIS 11, in comparison to the Holocene, and advanced over the plateau during an interval of high sea level and high global temperatures. As sea ice declined during deglaciation, there was a spike in productivity, but sea ice and productivity trends are not correlated during MIS 11. We then compare the Umnak Plateau record to new and published records from the Bering slope (sites U1345 and U1343). Sediment grain size, diatom assemblages, and the diatom proxy show that sea ice was present at the slope sites during MIS 11, but there is evidence for considerable regional variability in the timing of ice advance and retreat between the Umnak Plateau and the Bering slope. This variability may be explained by east-west differences in sea level pressure and wind direction, which are controlled by shifts in the geographic position of the Aleutian Low

Junior Recital: Natalie Thompson, viola

This recital is presented in partial fulfillment of requirements for the degree Bachelor of Music in Performance. Ms. Thompson studies viola with Catherine Lynn.https://digitalcommons.kennesaw.edu/musicprograms/1139/thumbnail.jp

The Linguistic Portrayal of Women in Written Afrikaans from 1911 to 2010

This corpus-based study investigated what written Afrikaans had historically been ‘telling’ its readers about gender, and specifically about women. The investigation examined the frequency, collocation and concordance lines of feminine, masculine and epicene nouns in the Historical Corpus of Standard Afrikaans (Kirsten 2016) spanning the time period 1911-2010. The study was conducted because there is limited research available that examines the portrayal of gender in Afrikaans across an extended time period. Corpus linguistics was used as a methodology to extract and evaluate data. The extracted data were analysed using quantitative data analysis, specifically descriptive statistics methods that included normalised frequency and MI score. The data were interpreted using qualitative analysis methods to explain the findings observed in the corpus data analyses. The qualitative analysis method used was content analysis, this method considered context and sociocultural factors within the Afrikaans language community. The findings of the study pointed to Afrikaans’ movement toward gender parity. Firstly, the frequency of the feminine nouns decreased across the time period, with masculine nouns increasingly used to refer to women. Secondly, the most statistically significant collocates emphasised gender marking and highlighted the overall precedence of masculine nouns over feminine nouns. Lastly, the concordance lines indicated the linguistic inequality in the patterns of use, as women were frequently described pejoratively with unfavourable adjectival collocates.Dissertation (MA (Linguistics))--University of Pretoria, 2021.AfrikaansMA (Linguistics)Unrestricte

Beyond Marine Reserves: Exploring the Approach of Selecting Areas where Fishing Is Permitted, Rather than Prohibited

Background:\ud Marine populations have been declining at a worrying rate, due in large part to fishing pressures. The challenge is to secure a future for marine life while minimizing impacts on fishers and fishing communities.\ud \ud Methods and Principal Findings:\ud Rather than selecting areas where fishing is banned – as is usually the case with spatial management – we assess the concept of designating areas where fishing is permitted. We use spatial catch statistics for thirteen commercial fisheries on Canada’s west coast to determine the minimum area that would be needed to maintain a pre-ascribed target percentage of current catches. We found that small reductions in fisheries yields, if strategically allocated, could result in large unfished areas that are representative of biophysical regions and habitat types, and have the potential to achieve remarkable conservation gains.\ud \ud Conclusions:\ud Our approach of selecting fishing areas instead of reserves could help redirect debate about the relative values that society places on conservation and extraction, in a framework that could gain much by losing little. Our ideas are intended to promote discussions about the current status quo in fisheries management, rather than providing a definitive solution

Gaining insight into electron capture dissociation mass spectrometry of peptides and proteins

The study of protein structure is crucial to the understanding of protein function as the two are inter dependent. Protein structure analysis is especially important as misfolded proteins often result in fatal diseases. Gas phase protein structure analysis provides a way to study the forces the effects of solvent and involved in the determination of protein structure. Mass spectrometry (MS) is a rapid and sensitive technique that can be used for the analysis of gas phase protein structure. Electron capture dissociation (ECD) tandem mass spectrometry (MS/MS) has been used in the analysis of primary, secondary, and tertiary gas phase protein structure. ECD MS/MS has proved to be exceptionally applicable in the study of protein structure due to the ability to cleave protein backbone bonds with the retention of noncovalent interactions and small molecule post translational modifications. The work described in this dissertation expands the use ECD and other electron capture techniques for protein structure analysis. All of the experiments were performed using a unique and versatile hybrid linear ion trap / time of flight (LIT/TOF) mass spectrometer capable of multiple ion activation techniques, such as collision induced dissociation (CID), infrared multiphoton dissociation (IRMPD), ECD, hot ECD (HECD), and activated ion ECD (AI ECD). IR activation in conjunction with ECD (AI ECD) to disrupt noncovalent interactions was used to enhance primary structure analysis and monitor changes in tertiary structure via gas phase protein unfolding. The structure of the z type product ions was probed using ion molecule reactions, and the formation different structures was found to depend on the electron capture technique used to dissociate the parent ion. The work described in this dissertation demonstrates the use of AI ECD for analysis of gas phase protein structure. Also, the first analysis of z ion structure from various electron capture techniques is presented. This work highlights the versatility and utility of the LIT TOF for ECD MS/MS as an alternative to the commercial Fourier transform ion cyclotron resonance (FTICR) mass spectrometers