Green Preservation: Rehabilitating Buildings

The thesis analyzes the incorporation of historic preservation with environmental practices in the rehabilitation of buildings. Case studies are presented which demonstrate the differences between a project that is designed according to historic preservation standards and a project concerned with environmental issues. The building are compared and recommendations given for an \u27ideal\u27 building renovation. Also included is a discussion on the current regulatory information for both rehabilitation approaches.https://dc.uwm.edu/caupr_mono/1024/thumbnail.jp

Music Therapy and the Families of NICU Infants : A Proposed Program for Development and Implementation

This thesis proposes a music therapy program for families whose infants are hospitalized in the neonatal intensive care unit (NICU). The goals of the program include the following: reduction of stress, anxiety and depression; working through trauma responses via the promotion of relaxation and the facilitation of coping skills. A review of the literature leads to the conclusion that families of NICU infants are under-served in terms of populations receiving music therapy as a supportive service. It is important to note that this population is often suffering from the same debilitating symptoms addressed in music therapy treatment of adults with mental health issues. Although the family may suffer from acute symptoms of trauma, anxiety, stress or depression which can both manifest and diffuse quickly, these symptoms occur during the same period when it is vital the family remain healthy for their infant. Music therapy clinical interventions including clinical improvisation, relaxation and songwriting, will systematically address the acute issues presented by the family, member(s) attempting to cope with their infant’s premature birth and subsequent hospitalization

Biomechanics and injury assessment of household falls in children : clinical, anthropomorphic surrogate, and computer simulation studies.

Pediatric short-distance falls, especially from beds or other furniture, are common false histories given by caretakers to cover up abusive trauma. However, short-distance falls are also a common occurrence in young children. Knowledge of the types and severity of injuries that can result from these short falls can aid clinicians in distinguishing between inflicted and non-inflicted injuries. Early detection of abuse may lead to prevention of further escalating injuries and, in some cases, prevent the death of the child. The purpose of this study was to describe relationships between biomechanical measures and injury potential in short-distance household falls. This study involved three components: case-based biomechanical fall assessments, fall simulations using an anthropomorphic test device (ATD), and development/validation of a computer simulation model used to investigate sensitivity of injury outcome measures to fall environment and child surrogate parameters. Overall, the risk of severe or life-threatening injury in short-distance household falls is low. Fractures of the skull and extremities commonly result from these falls (21.5% of falls resulting in Emergency Department visits). 2 of 79 fall cases involved small, contact-type subdural hematomas. These subjects both had unique fall dynamics that contributed to their injuries. Results of ATD experiments supported those from the clinical portion of the study with the exception of neck injury potential. Future studies are needed to both improve ATD neck biofidelity and determine more accurate pediatric neck injury thresholds. Fall environment parameters (fall height and impact surface type) have been shown previously to influence injury potential, but this is the first study to investigate the influence of child or surrogate parameters (body mass index, overall mass, head stiffness, and neck properties) on injury potential. Additionally, through a parametric sensitivity analysis, it was found that fall environment and surrogate parameters that altered fall dynamics had the greatest influence on injury potential. These results highlight the need for obtaining detailed case histories when making injury assessments that include not only environment and child factors, but descriptions of the fall dynamics and orientation of the child upon impact with the ground

Mean Length of Utterance in Relation to Gender and Preschool Activity Area

Factors influencing language development and use are many. Teacher influences such as teacher:child ratio and teaching experience can affect the types of language children produce. Classroom influences including activities, size of the room, and length of the day also play a role in the development of language. All of these areas need to be considered in order to provide the best possible language environment for the preschool child. In this study, the researchers examined the mean length of utterance (MLU) values of preschool children while participating at three areas in a preschool classroom : art, dramatic play, and snack. Gender differences in MLU were also studied. Sixteen children (8 females, 8 males), ranging in age from 50 to 66 months, participated in the study. The children were currently attending the Child Development Laboratory at Utah State University. For the collection of data, the children wore a tape recorder with a microphone until a 5-minute sample from each of the areas was obtained. These audio recordings were then transcribed and calculated into MLU values. Findings from the analysis of variance tests (3[activity : art, dramatic p l ay, snack] X 2 [gender: male, female]) demonstrated that the children had larger MLU values at snack than at art or dramatic play. Snack time has not always been recognized as an activity area for young children to display typical language use. Overall, and at the three individual areas, there were no gender differences found in MLU. Results of this study may be used in planning how to arrange and organize an environment in which the children are comfortable and have opportunities to converse with both adults and other children

Fluorescence Correlation Spectroscopy Reveals Efficient Cytosolic Delivery of Protein Cargo by Cell-Permeant Miniature Proteins.

New methods for delivering proteins into the cytosol of mammalian cells are being reported at a rapid pace. Differentiating between these methods in a quantitative manner is difficult, however, as most assays for evaluating cytosolic protein delivery are qualitative and indirect and thus often misleading. Here we make use of fluorescence correlation spectroscopy (FCS) to determine with precision and accuracy the relative efficiencies with which seven different previously reported "cell-penetrating peptides" (CPPs) transport a model protein cargo-the self-labeling enzyme SNAP-tag-beyond endosomal membranes and into the cytosol. Using FCS, we discovered that the miniature protein ZF5.3 is an exceptional vehicle for delivering SNAP-tag to the cytosol. When delivered by ZF5.3, SNAP-tag can achieve a cytosolic concentration as high as 250 nM, generally at least 2-fold and as much as 6-fold higher than any other CPP evaluated. Additionally, we show that ZF5.3 can be fused to a second enzyme cargo-the engineered peroxidase APEX2-and reliably delivers the active enzyme to the cell interior. As FCS allows one to realistically assess the relative merits of protein transduction domains, we anticipate that it will greatly accelerate the identification, evaluation, and optimization of strategies to deliver large, intact proteins to intracellular locales

Abnormal depth perception from motion parallax in amblyopic observers

AbstractMany similarities exist between the perception of depth from binocular stereopsis and that from motion parallax. Moreover, Rogers (1984, cited in, Howard, I. P., & Rogers, B. J. (1995). Binocular vision and stereopsis. Oxford Claridon, New York.) suggests a relationship between an observer’s ability to use disparity information and motion parallax information in a depth perception task. To more closely investigate this relationship, depth perception was studied in normal observers and amblyopic observers with poor stereo vision. As expected, amblyopic observers performed much worse than normal observers on depth discriminations requiring use of binocular disparity. However, amblyopic observers also performed much worse than normal observers on depth discriminations based on motion parallax. This result provides supporting evidence for a psychoanatomical link between the perception of depth from motion and the perception of depth from binocular disparity