Robot Reporter Website Development

The Robot Reporter Website Development project created a front end interface for interacting with news stories generated by the Robot Reporter script that was originally developed for the Digital Democracy institute at Cal Poly. Various graphs, videos, and other interesting content is displayed to the user in order to create an automated news website focusing on activity in state legislatures

Morgan Papers: Exploring the Correspondence of California’s First Female Architect

Descriptive metadata and full-text transcripts have long been valued for their roles in powering search engines and faceted browsing. But as the morganpapers.org web application demonstrates, such textual data (both structured and unstructured) can be leveraged to build a variety of tools which provide deeper and broader insight than simple searching and browsing. The Robert E. Kennedy Library at Cal Poly recently completed digitization of a unique body of correspondence between architect Julia Morgan and William Randolph Hearst, carried out during the construction of what is now known as Hearst Castle. The structure is a masterpiece and the crown jewel of Morgan’s illustrious career throughout California, where she worked as the state’s first female licensed architect. The collection consists of over 2,500 letters, telegrams, notes, and other documents (totalling over 3,200 pages), spanning the years 1919-1941. The pieces were written in several places across the United States and overseas. As each piece of correspondence was digitized, it was ingested in the library's archival repository along with its MODS-based metadata, and full-text transcripts (for both typescripts and manuscripts)

Comparison of Quantitative Cytomegalovirus Real-time PCR in Whole Blood and pp65 Antigenemia Assay: Clinical Utility of CMV Real-time PCR in Hematopoietic Stem Cell Transplant Recipients

Successful preemptive therapy for cytomegalovirus (CMV) infection in transplant patients depends on the availability of sensitive, specific, and timely diagnostic tests for CMV infection. Although the pp65 antigenemia assay has been widely used for this purpose, real-time quantification of CMV DNA has recently been recognized as an alternative diagnostic approach. However, the guidelines for antiviral therapy based on real-time quantitative polymerase chain reaction (RQ-PCR) have yet to be established. From November 2004 to March 2005, a total of 555 whole blood samples from 131 hematopoietic stem cell transplant (HSCT) recipients were prospectively collected. RQ-PCR was conducted using an Artus® CMV LC PCR kit (QIAGEN). Both qualitative and quantitative correlations were drawn between the two methods. Exposure to the antiviral agent influenced the results of the two assays. Additionally, the discrepancy was observed at low levels of antigenemia and CMV DNA load. Via ROC curve analysis, the tentative cutoff value for preemptive therapy was determined to be approximately 2×104 copies/mL (sensitivity, 80.0%; specificity, 50.0%) in the high risk patients, and approximately 3×104 copies/mL (sensitivity, 90.0%; specificity, 70.0%) in the patients at low risk for CMV disease. Further study to validate the optimal cutoff value for the initiation of preemptive therapy is currently underway

Acyl-Protein Thioesterase 2 Catalizes the Deacylation of Peripheral Membrane-Associated GAP-43

An acylation/deacylation cycle is necessary to maintain the steady-state subcellular distribution and biological activity of S-acylated peripheral proteins. Despite the progress that has been made in identifying and characterizing palmitoyltransferases (PATs), much less is known about the thioesterases involved in protein deacylation. In this work, we investigated the deacylation of growth-associated protein-43 (GAP-43), a dually acylated protein at cysteine residues 3 and 4. Using fluorescent fusion constructs, we measured in vivo the rate of deacylation of GAP-43 and its single acylated mutants in Chinese hamster ovary (CHO)-K1 and human HeLa cells. Biochemical and live cell imaging experiments demonstrated that single acylated mutants were completely deacylated with similar kinetic in both cell types. By RT-PCR we observed that acyl-protein thioesterase 1 (APT-1), the only bona fide thioesterase shown to mediate deacylation in vivo, is expressed in HeLa cells, but not in CHO-K1 cells. However, APT-1 overexpression neither increased the deacylation rate of single acylated GAP-43 nor affected the steady-state subcellular distribution of dually acylated GAP-43 both in CHO-K1 and HeLa cells, indicating that GAP-43 deacylation is not mediated by APT-1. Accordingly, we performed a bioinformatic search to identify putative candidates with acyl-protein thioesterase activity. Among several candidates, we found that APT-2 is expressed both in CHO-K1 and HeLa cells and its overexpression increased the deacylation rate of single acylated GAP-43 and affected the steady-state localization of diacylated GAP-43 and H-Ras. Thus, the results demonstrate that APT-2 is the protein thioesterase involved in the acylation/deacylation cycle operating in GAP-43 subcellular distribution

The rhetoric of restoration: Alexander Campbell and the rhetoric of affect

This work seeks to demonstrate the extent to which Alexander Campbell operationalized an "affective" philosophy of rhetoric which he acquired from the Scottish universities of the late eighteenth century. A significant figure in nineteenth century American religion, Campbell (1788-1866) thus represents a key link between this particular notion of rhetoric and American religious discourse. After tracing the antecedents of this rhetorical tradition, four significant rhetorical episodes in Campbell's career are subjected to close readings: The Sermon on the Law (1816), a series of four articles from "The Restoration of the Ancient Order of Things" which appeared in The Christian Baptist (1825), his responses to "The Lunenburg Letter" which appeared in The Millennial Harbinger (1837), and The Missionary Cause (1860). These case studies present evidence that Campbell consistently employed this "affective" philosophy of rhetoric in a representative and chronologically diverse selection of his discourse and that such a rhetoric is adversarial in its very essence.U of I OnlyETDs are only available to UIUC Users without author permissio

Morgan Papers: Exploring the Correspondence of California’s First Female Architect

Descriptive metadata and full-text transcripts have long been valued for their roles in powering search engines and faceted browsing. But as the morganpapers.org web application demonstrates, such textual data (both structured and unstructured) can be leveraged to build a variety of tools which provide deeper and broader insight than simple searching and browsing. The Robert E. Kennedy Library at Cal Poly recently completed digitization of a unique body of correspondence between architect Julia Morgan and William Randolph Hearst, carried out during the construction of what is now known as Hearst Castle. The structure is a masterpiece and the crown jewel of Morgan’s illustrious career throughout California, where she worked as the state’s first female licensed architect. The collection consists of over 2,500 letters, telegrams, notes, and other documents (totalling over 3,200 pages), spanning the years 1919-1941. The pieces were written in several places across the United States and overseas. As each piece of correspondence was digitized, it was ingested in the library's archival repository along with its MODS-based metadata, and full-text transcripts (for both typescripts and manuscripts)