Search results

Title: The integration of an on-line parallel debugger with a visualization methodology for modeling expected behavior
Creator: Sharnowski, Joseph L. (Joseph Lawrence)
Date: 1995
Collection: Electronic Theses & Dissertations

Title: A theoretical and experimental investigation of the mechanisms of the hydrogen-fluoride pulsed chemical laser
Creator: Hough, Joseph J. T., 1946-
Date: 1975
Collection: Electronic Theses & Dissertations

Title: The synthesis of key intermediates for the preparation of cyclooctatetraene-1,5-quinone
Creator: Geraci, Charles Lee, 1948-
Date: 1975
Collection: Electronic Theses & Dissertations

Title: Intercalation and pillaring reactions of layered alkali metal silicates
Creator: Dailey, James Steven
Date: 1991
Collection: Electronic Theses & Dissertations

Title: A comparative study of Basic College grades and effort-interest-attitude ratings for low ability students
Creator: Laws, Leonard Stewart, 1917-
Date: 1953
Collection: Electronic Theses & Dissertations

Title: Hydraulics of spatial pipe flow
Creator: Hu, Wan Wang
Date: 1966
Collection: Electronic Theses & Dissertations

Title: The hypnotic relationship : facilitation and inhibition through indirect procedures
Creator: Wilson, John Gerald, 1936-
Date: 1974
Collection: Electronic Theses & Dissertations

Title: Children's knowledge-based competencies related to recognition and avoidance of potentially abusive situations
Creator: Savage, Margaret Ann
Date: 1995
Collection: Electronic Theses & Dissertations

Title: Quantitative investigations of neuronal architecture and the structural role of the cytoskeleton
Creator: Dennerll, Timothy John
Date: 1989
Collection: Electronic Theses & Dissertations

Title: Academic achievement motivation of Ibo fifth formers
Creator: Amalaha, Bernard Maruwa, 1933-
Date: 1974
Collection: Electronic Theses & Dissertations

Title: Analysis of a constructed typology of wives' values evident in managerial decision situations
Creator: Engebretson, Carol Lucille, 1922-
Date: 1965
Collection: Electronic Theses & Dissertations

Title: Competition in the long-distance market : a comparative study of the United States and Canada
Creator: Jaffery, Naqi Abbas
Date: 1991
Collection: Electronic Theses & Dissertations

Title: THE IMPACT OF ERAP1 FUNCTIONS ON INNATE AND ADAPTIVE IMMUNITY IN HUMAN DISEASE MODELS
Creator: Blake, Maja Kristin K.
Date: 2022
Collection: Electronic Theses & Dissertations
Description: ERAP1 has long been appreciated for its role in antigen presentation during the adaptive immune response. It is a peptidase in the endoplasmic reticulum that trims peptide antigens prior to their loading onto awaiting MHC-1. However, ERAP1 has also been shown to play an important role in innate immune responses, although the mechanisms underlying these associations have been unclear. The ERAP1 gene has also been linked to a number of autoimmune diseases including, but not limited to Multiple...
Show moreERAP1 has long been appreciated for its role in antigen presentation during the adaptive immune response. It is a peptidase in the endoplasmic reticulum that trims peptide antigens prior to their loading onto awaiting MHC-1. However, ERAP1 has also been shown to play an important role in innate immune responses, although the mechanisms underlying these associations have been unclear. The ERAP1 gene has also been linked to a number of autoimmune diseases including, but not limited to Multiple Sclerosis, Ankylosing Spondylitis, and Ulcerative Colitis. In addition, it is known to be altered in various tumor types as a means of immune evasion, and inhibitors for ERAP1 have shown promising results against tumors in vitro. Therefore, ERAP1’s significance in the susceptibility to diverse diseases is vast, and further study into how this protein participates in both innate and adaptive immune response mechanisms is justified. Our lab has previously published that immune cells and animals deficient in ERAP1 display proinflammatory phenotypes. In this dissertation, the mechanism as to how disruptions in normal ERAP1 function leads to proinflammatory phenotypes is studied. First, proinflammatory mechanisms within a critical innate immune cell, macrophages, are discerned using both ex vivo models and an in vivo inducible colitis mouse model. ERAP1 deficiency in the setting of a murine model of autoimmunity is also evaluated, revealing both disturbances in B cell development and function as dependent on normal ERAP1 activity, and that these disturbances can lead to exaggerated neuroinflammation in several murine models of MS. ERAP1 dependent proinflammatory mechanisms within B cells are further studied ex vivo using global RNA sequencing technology along with flow cytometry-based methods. Together, the results of these studies reveal that loss of ERAP1 function causes enhanced ER stress within the cell, leading to UPR activation, increased inflammasome activity, and evidence of increased pyroptosis. Given the broad spectrum of ERAP1 functions on immune cell functions, we capitalized on these insights to determine how ERAP1 inhibition might impact diseases such as cancer. Specifically, our results confirmed that that ERAP1 inhibition promoted NK cell directed tumor killing, a modality that had never been attempted until now. In conclusion, this dissertation capitalizes upon insights gained from human genetic studies associating ERAP1 with a variety of human disease susceptibilities, identifying the molecular mechanisms underlying these associations, and also illuminates possible new therapies for human diseases derived from study of ERAP1.
Show less

Title: IDENTIFYING LEVERAGE POINTS TO CREATE RESILIENCE TO CLIMATE SHOCKS IN DRYLAND SOCIAL-ECOLOGICAL SYSTEMS
Creator: Sharma, Shubhechchha
Date: 2022
Collection: Electronic Theses & Dissertations
Description: Drylands cover approximately 40 percent of the earth’s land area and support more than a billion people, most of whom live in Sub-Saharan Africa (SSA), where agro-pastoralism is the major food system. Climate-related shocks such as drought, water-scarcity, diseases and pests, and food price spikes have profoundly impacted household food security among dryland agro-pastoralists, especially in Tanzania. Thus, there is a need to investigate mechanisms to ensure the future resilience of...
Show moreDrylands cover approximately 40 percent of the earth’s land area and support more than a billion people, most of whom live in Sub-Saharan Africa (SSA), where agro-pastoralism is the major food system. Climate-related shocks such as drought, water-scarcity, diseases and pests, and food price spikes have profoundly impacted household food security among dryland agro-pastoralists, especially in Tanzania. Thus, there is a need to investigate mechanisms to ensure the future resilience of livelihoods and food systems in these regions. The goal of this dissertation is to use resilience thinking approaches to identify points of intervention in dryland SES, to manage both present and future climate risks. Resilience assessment is guided by three major questions: “resilience of what, to what, and for whom”.Paper-I explores “resilience of what, to what, for whom” through the use of systems archetypes for a Maasai dryland agro-pastoralist food system in Northern Tanzania. The paper identified three system archetypes— Escalation, Limits to Growth, and Shifting the Burden—to (1) pinpoint the elements, patterns, and relationships that make up agro-pastoralist food systems; and (2) find leverage points to address the archetypical patterns limiting food security. The paper suggests a need for institutional strengthening and polycentricity to deal with food insecurity among agro-pastoralists. Paper-II explores what shocks Tanzanian food systems are responding to and how, i.e., “resilience of what, to what”. The paper used randomly sampled household data collected at national level through secondary sources to understand how different adaptive capacities influence their ability to deal with climate shocks, particularly with respect to ensuring food security, measured in terms of dietary diversity and household consumption expenditure. Through Structural Equation Modeling (SEM), the paper drew a path model that indicated investment in wealth and income diversification and investment in infrastructure were able to mediate the impact of shocks on food security. Paper-III similarly explores “resilience of what, to what” but using System Dynamics Modeling (SDM). The model allowed the exploration of feedback mechanisms and interactions between the population, livestock, and crop sub-sectors with food security in agro-pastoralist food systems in Naitolia village in Tanzania. The goal of the model was also to evaluate effectiveness of multiple policy scenarios required for food security. Out of four simulated scenarios, the model identified enhancing mechanisms for food production, along with reducing post-harvest losses and livestock predation, as most likely to result in a food sufficient scenario in the future. In creating these analyses and findings, the dissertation recommends four major leverage points to support food security through both present and future climate shocks : (1) maintaining diversity and redundancy in income and assets that provide insurance against failures; (2) fostering connectivity between multiple actors across networks for promoting bridging social capital; (3) ensuring polycentric governance so that the right well-connected institutions at the right time can deal with both agro-pastoralist rights to food and respond to disturbance and uncertainty. The dissertation also creates methodological advancement in the understanding of food security in complex systems under climate shocks, by utilizing a variety of approaches that support system thinking - systems archetypes, statistical modeling, and simulation through a system dynamics model.
Show less

Title: When the War Raged On : Montana Territory, the Politics of Authority, and National Reconstruction
Creator: Andrella, Jennifer
Date: 2022
Collection: Electronic Theses & Dissertations
Description: In July 1861, the US House Committee on Territories drafted the first Reconstruction bill to detail a procedure for readmitting Southern states into the Union. Expecting a quick end to the Civil War, the earliest framers of Reconstruction recommended that rebellious states be assigned into an unorganized status as territories. It was a pragmatic solution that placed the South firmly in the control of a Republican Congress; a plan that complemented the Committee on Territories’ simultaneous...
Show moreIn July 1861, the US House Committee on Territories drafted the first Reconstruction bill to detail a procedure for readmitting Southern states into the Union. Expecting a quick end to the Civil War, the earliest framers of Reconstruction recommended that rebellious states be assigned into an unorganized status as territories. It was a pragmatic solution that placed the South firmly in the control of a Republican Congress; a plan that complemented the Committee on Territories’ simultaneous pursuit of territorial expansion in the trans-Mississippi West. Indeed, between 1861 and 1868 Congress incorporated seven Western territories to consolidate federal power in a growing domain. From the onset of the war, federal actors envisioned Reconstruction as a national process. Yet, the reality on the ground seldom matched their strategic plans. This dissertation analyzes Reconstruction from the vantage point of the Northwestern Great Plains. Using Montana Territory as a case study, I examine how relations between and among Native American nations, settlers, and government officials defined Reconstruction at both local and federal levels. The federal government had enduring political and economic interests in the Northwestern Plains prior to the outbreak of the war. Between 1828 and 1865, the region emerged as the last US stronghold of the global fur trade, cycled through several mining booms, and showed a promising future for homesteading and ranching. The Northwestern Plains were and are the homelands to a mosaic of Native American nations who asserted their rights to sovereignty by demanding federal recognition of their territorial, political, economic, and cultural autonomy. As these lands became contested under the pressure of US settlement, Native actors continued to press for visibility against local and federal modes of authority. The lived experiences of Native actors unveil some of the critical limitations of Reconstruction; that the expansion of citizenship, suffrage, and labor protections coincided with land dispossession, colonization, and erasure. By the time this study concludes in 1883, it becomes apparent that the dissolution of Reconstruction rested in the program’s failure to resolve the nation’s most fundamental questions over belonging, space, and power.I argue that Reconstruction was a process that experimented with federal and local forms of authority, settler colonialism, and state formation which came under stress after the onset of war in 1861. Republican governance throughout the Civil War and Reconstruction introduced new federal economic and political imperatives, destabilized local patterns of power among settlers, and opened new threats to Indigenous sovereignty. Using cartography, personal and mass communication, artwork, literature, and government records, this study portrays a version of Reconstruction that was fluid, chaotic, and often violent as western civil institutions either broke down or competed for primacy. By integrating the historiographies of Reconstruction, Western history, and Native American ethnohistory this study challenges the notion that federal state formation in the West (and state restoration in the South) were linear processes ushered by a collective of federal actors. Moreover, the existing literature on both Reconstruction and Western territorial expansion has overstated the ability of the federal government to produce communal order through efforts like military occupation, property laws, and multitiered administrative systems such as the Bureau of Indian Affairs. By essentializing the scale of local forces that stacked against federal administration in distant, contested spaces like Montana, the ambitious designs to restore and expand the Union ultimately produced a more exclusionary, unstable, and violent nation.
Show less

Title: Synthesis of HIV-1 GP41 Including FP and MPER by Native Chemical Ligation with Applications to SSNMR. Expression, Solubilization, and Purification of SARS-CoV-2 Spike Protein Subunit 2
Creator: Wolfe, Robert John
Date: 2022
Collection: Electronic Theses & Dissertations
Description: AbstractSynthesis of HIV-1 GP41 Including FP and MPER by Native Chemical Ligation with Applications to SSNMR. Expression, Solubilization, and Purification of SARS-CoV-2 Spike Protein Subunit 2 By Rob Wolfe Human immunodeficiency virus type 1 (HIV-1) and Coronavirus 2019 (Covid-19) have caused substantial risk to public health worldwide. Both HIV-1 and severe acute respiratory syndrome coronavirus type 2 (SARS-CoV-2) are membrane enveloped viruses which cause acquired immune deficiency...
Show moreAbstractSynthesis of HIV-1 GP41 Including FP and MPER by Native Chemical Ligation with Applications to SSNMR. Expression, Solubilization, and Purification of SARS-CoV-2 Spike Protein Subunit 2 By Rob Wolfe Human immunodeficiency virus type 1 (HIV-1) and Coronavirus 2019 (Covid-19) have caused substantial risk to public health worldwide. Both HIV-1 and severe acute respiratory syndrome coronavirus type 2 (SARS-CoV-2) are membrane enveloped viruses which cause acquired immune deficiency syndrome (AIDS) and COVID-19 in humans, respectively. The process by which these viruses initiate the infection by membrane fusion of the viral and host cells is similar. However, they differ in which membrane protein is responsible for the fusion process. The HIV-1 glycoprotein 41 (Gp41) is a single-pass integral viral membrane protein containing a ~170-residue ectodomain that is important for membrane fusion between virus and host cells. The ectodomain includes the fusion peptide (FP), N-helical region (NHR), loop, C-helical region (CHR) and viral membrane-proximal external region (MPER). The ectodomain mediates joining (fusion) of the HIV-1 and host cell membranes, which is in an initial step in infection. The ectodomain also adopts different structures, including a final hyper thermostable state. Some data supports a fusion role for this final state. Like HIV-1, SARS2-CoV-2 is enveloped by a membrane that is obtained during budding from an infected host cell. Infection of a new cell requires fusion of the virus membrane with a membrane of the target cell and subsequent deposition of the viral nucleocapsid in the cytoplasm. This process is catalyzed by the Spike (S) protein subunit 2 (S2). My research has focused on the production and characterization of several protein constructs (with or without FP) and the characterization of S2_816-1273, a large S2 protein construct containing all regions including the FP, transmembrane (TM) and the cytoplasmic tail (CT). The expression vector used is pET-24a(+). Biophysical characterization comparisons between S2_816-1273 and shorter constructs including S2_903-998SGGRGG1153-1207 and S2_903-998SGGRGG1163-1207 were performed. Biophysical characterization techniques such as circular dichroism (CD) spectroscopy, size exclusion chromatography (SEC), mass spectrometry (MS), and vesicle fusion assays were used in this study. In addition, this work also describes development and application of native chemical ligation (NCL) methods to produce most of the HIV glycoprotein-41 (gp41) ectodomain. NCL with yields up to 45% were achieved between the chemically synthesized N-terminal FP (gp41512-534) and bacterially synthesized hairpin with MPER (HM) (gp41535-581/SGGRGG/628-683) segments. The hairpin is the NHR-loop-CHR region. These high yields were achieved by solubilizing the HM segment in guanidinium chloride and imidazole which worked together to fully denature the reactants, facilitating the NCL reaction via exposure of the reactant termini. HM was produced with fractional 13C or 2H-labelings that were respectively in the 14-82% and 18% to 54% ranges. The synthesized FP included a non-native N-terminal H6G6D4K tag, which allowed for the binding of FP-HM to a metal-affinity column at the Nterminus to facilitate the separation of unreacted HM. FP-HM was then released from the column by enterokinase-catalyzed cleavage. My work will help future scientists synthesize site-specific 13C and 2H labeled large protein constructs since this is the first time that large Gp41 constructs including full MPER have been synthesized in mg quantities using a combination of bacterial expression system and solid phase peptide synthesis. Furthermore, this methodology is applicable to many proteins that cannot be easily characterized by other methods inside of the lipid bilayer, such as crystallography.
Show less

Title: 3D Printed Fluidic Devices for Biomedical Applications
Creator: Redman, Nathan Abraham
Date: 2022
Collection: Electronic Theses & Dissertations
Description: Antimicrobial resistance represents an imminent and growing threat to global health. It is estimated that antimicrobial resistance will cause 10 million deaths a year by 2050. The testing of clinical infections for susceptibility to antimicrobial drugs is therefore critical. However, current methods of susceptibility testing are prohibitively slow, and they require pathogen isolation and culture. This inability to rapidly screen infections causes serious problems including patient mortality...
Show moreAntimicrobial resistance represents an imminent and growing threat to global health. It is estimated that antimicrobial resistance will cause 10 million deaths a year by 2050. The testing of clinical infections for susceptibility to antimicrobial drugs is therefore critical. However, current methods of susceptibility testing are prohibitively slow, and they require pathogen isolation and culture. This inability to rapidly screen infections causes serious problems including patient mortality by sepsis, over-prescription of broad-spectrum antibiotics, and the accelerated spread of antimicrobial resistance in human pathogens. Faster susceptibility testing is required to more effectively treat sepsis and prevent the unnecessary selection for resistant pathogenic strains more effectively. Quantifying drug susceptibility at the single-cell level on a multiphase chip platform will eliminate the need for culture and enable drug susceptibility screening within minutes. Antibiotics often alter extracellular levels of adenosine triphosphate (ATP) in susceptible microbial cells, while leaving resistant cells mostly unaffected. An individual microbial cell will contain ~1-5 attomoles of ATP, which is only detectable if confined to extremely small reaction volumes. Here we propose a multiphase (immiscible aqueous and ether) microfluidics platform combined with a microcapillary system (Chapters 2,3). This system will confine individual pathogens and challenge drugs inside droplets of nanoliter-scale volume to enable detection of drug-induced alteration of ATP release from susceptible cells. This system will enable more informed and specific prescription of drugs to both improve patient outcomes and relieve unnecessary selective pressure for the spread of antimicrobial resistance.The same 3D printing tools that apply well to multiphase fluidic devices are also leveraged to address biomedical challenges in tangent fields. Progress in the fields of organoid modeling and regenerative tissue printing are discussed (Chapter 4).
Show less

Title: ANALYSIS OF EJECTOR-STYLE MICROBUBBLE GENERATORS : MASS-TRANSFER PROPERTIES, MATHEMATICAL MODELING, AND DESIGN ALGORITHM
Creator: Wang, Ziwei
Date: 2022
Collection: Electronic Theses & Dissertations
Description: Gas-to-liquid mass transfer is a rate-limiting step for many commercial-scale operations in the chemical, biochemical, pharmaceutical, and wastewater-treatment industries. The use of microbubbles with a diameter on the100 μm scale has been shown to provide high volumetric mass-transfer rates due to its high gas contact area per volume. However, the use of microbubbles in commercial processes has been hampered by the lack of design algorithms with which to fabricate high-performance,...
Show moreGas-to-liquid mass transfer is a rate-limiting step for many commercial-scale operations in the chemical, biochemical, pharmaceutical, and wastewater-treatment industries. The use of microbubbles with a diameter on the100 μm scale has been shown to provide high volumetric mass-transfer rates due to its high gas contact area per volume. However, the use of microbubbles in commercial processes has been hampered by the lack of design algorithms with which to fabricate high-performance, microbubble-sparged gas-liquid contacting equipment. The goals of this study were to identify the type of microbubble generator best suited to provide high volumetric mass transfer rates in commercial-scale equipment, characterize the mass-transfer properties, develop models able to predict the mass-transfer rate as a function of the key independent variables, and use the models to develop a design algorithm suitable to use microbubble sparging in industrial processes. The study began with a literature review of microbubble generators that considered factors including the mechanism, safety, cost, and scalability, with the goal of identifying generators suited to cost-effectively provide extremely high mass transfer in commercial-scale equipment. Microbubble generators that used liquid turbulence were found to have the best combination of properties for such applications. In collaboration with the Michigan Biotechnology Institute, a 300-L bioreactor was customized for use with either a RiverForest microbubble ejector and a conventional ring sparger. E.coli batch growth experiments were conducted to compare the growth rates using the two aeration methods. The E.coli growth rate observed during microbubble aeration was about twice that observed with the traditional ring sparger. Mathematical models describing the performance properties of both a microbubble ejector and a Modified Jameson Cell were developed. The models included energy requirements, mass transfer rates, gas and liquid flow patterns, and clearance of spent bubbles. The models predicted that the ejector would be more energy-efficient for applications requiring higher mass-transfer rates and lower gas volume fractions, whereas the Modified Jameson Cell would be more energy-efficient for applications requiring lower mass-transfer rates and higher gas void fractions. Moreover, the ejector generator was considered to have operational advantages over the modified Jameson Cell in terms of surfactant requirement and scalability. Based on these advantages, ejector generators were used for subsequent studies. A novel flow system was developed to measure the mass-transfer rate of microbubble produced by an ejector generator. A mathematical model was developed to reproduce experimental trends and estimate the effective microbubble diameter generated as a function of the gas and liquid flow rates. New axial mixing and two-phase friction factor correlations were developed for the model fidelity. The mathematical model was used to determine the effective microbubble diameter that best reproduced the dissolved oxygen profile for various combinations of gas and liquid velocities. The results were used to develop a correlation to predict the effective microbubble size as a function of system properties. The predictive power of this correlation has utility for industrial process design and scale-up applications. The friction factor and microbubble diameter correlations developed in this study were used to develop additional models to simulate the microbubble mass-transfer in large reactors that are sparged with arrays of microbubble ejectors. The models simulated flow from each ejector using an entrainment model for jet cones. They also simulated arrangement of ejectors into triangular arrays to estimate insufficiently aerated volume and optimize ejector spacing. Collectively, the models developed in this study provide powerful new design tools that enable rational design, optimization, and scale-up of ejector microbubble sparger arrays for commercial-scale reactors that require extremely high volumetric mass-transfer rates.
Show less

Title: SEX DIFFERENCES IN HYPERTENSION AND THE ROLE OF ENDOTHELIAL TRPV4 CHANNELS IN CEREBROVASCULAR AND COGNITIVE FUNCTION
Creator: Chambers, Laura Christine
Date: 2022
Collection: Electronic Theses & Dissertations
Description: Vascular cognitive impairment and dementia (VCID) describes a spectrum of cognitive disorders that have a cerebrovascular origin. VCID can range from mild cognitive impairment to frank vascular dementia. The mechanisms behind VCID development are not fully understood and there are no effective treatments available. VCID arises from functional impairment in the small arteries and arterioles in the brain. Hypertension, which affects nearly half of all American adults, is the leading modifiable...
Show moreVascular cognitive impairment and dementia (VCID) describes a spectrum of cognitive disorders that have a cerebrovascular origin. VCID can range from mild cognitive impairment to frank vascular dementia. The mechanisms behind VCID development are not fully understood and there are no effective treatments available. VCID arises from functional impairment in the small arteries and arterioles in the brain. Hypertension, which affects nearly half of all American adults, is the leading modifiable risk factor for VCID. Hypertension impairs cerebrovascular function that can starve neurons of necessary nutrients, increasing risk of cognitive impairment. My studies focus on cerebral parenchymal arterioles (PAs), which direct blood flow from the pial circulation to the capillaries. Because they lack collateral connections, PAs are considered the weak link in the cerebral perfusion. The occlusion of a single PA creates a discrete column of ischemic tissue that can produce cognitive impairment. PAs are dependent on TRPV4 channels for endothelium-dependent dilation, and there is a strong link between TRPV4 and cognitive function. Previous studies in male rodents showed that hypertension impairs TRPV4-mediated dilation in PAs, and this was associated with memory impairments. When mineralocorticoid receptor (MR) antagonists are administered alongside developing hypertension, these impairments are prevented. However, it is thus far unknown whether MR antagonist treatment can reverse cerebrovascular and cognitive impairments after they have developed. My first aim tests the hypothesis that rats with established hypertension will have impaired TRPV4 function in PAs that is associated with cognitive impairment, and that treatment with the MR antagonist eplerenone can reverse this damage after its development. My second aim focuses on sex differences in hypertension, as this is a major gap in the literature. Thus far, all studies linking TRPV4 function to cognition have been conducted in male mice. Given that estrogen is vasoprotective in other vascular beds, I hypothesize that hypertensive female mice would be protected against impaired TRPV4 function in PAs, and from the associated cognitive deficits observed in male mice. Lastly, my third aim addresses the importance of TRPV4 channels specifically in the endothelium. There is a consistent link between TRPV4 impairment and cognitive dysfunction, but due to the channel’s ubiquitous expression, its role in endothelial cells is unknown. Here, I test the hypothesis that male and female mice with endothelial TRPV4 channel deletion will have cognitive impairment. My studies show that MR antagonism reverses cerebrovascular and cognitive damage in hypertension, and that female sex protects against the development of these impairments. Further, I show that endothelial TRPV4 channel deletion results in cognitive dysfunction and increased inflammation in both male and female mice. My studies show for the first time that young female mice have preserved TRPV4 channel function in PAs that is associated with preserved cognitive function. Further, my data suggest the MR is a promising therapeutic target in hypertensive patients because it not only protects against neurovascular damage but can reverse it after it has developed.
Show less

Title: ANTI-DEFICIT FRAMING TYC TRANSFER STUDENTS’ SELF-EFFICACY AS CONTEXTUALLY IMPACTED BY EDUCATION ENVIRONMENTS
Creator: Wood, Laura
Date: 2022
Collection: Electronic Theses & Dissertations
Description: The work in this dissertation aims to support a more equitable science education culture that better supports students who have historically and continue to be inequitably pushed out of science. Our equity-oriented and anti-deficit research agenda led us to study community college and transfer students as well as their self-efficacy and self-efficacy experiences. This dissertation opens by overviewing the state of STEM education and explaining how research approaches often frame students in...
Show moreThe work in this dissertation aims to support a more equitable science education culture that better supports students who have historically and continue to be inequitably pushed out of science. Our equity-oriented and anti-deficit research agenda led us to study community college and transfer students as well as their self-efficacy and self-efficacy experiences. This dissertation opens by overviewing the state of STEM education and explaining how research approaches often frame students in deficit ways. Chapter 1 introduces the author's researcher positionality and relevant literature to her research approaches. The author's research agenda prioritizes supporting marginalized students in STEM through studying the construct of self-efficacy. After reviewing the research framing, Chapter 2 introduces relevant literature about self-efficacy and two-year college (TYC) transfer student experiences. Chapter 2 ends by addressing how the author's research positionality aligns with and impacts the ways she researches self-efficacy and TYC transfer students. Afterwards, each body chapter (Chapters 3, 4, and 5) opens with a transition situating it in the broader story of the dissertation. Chapter 3 opens by reminding readers of the reasons for our qualitative approach to studying self-efficacy. Then, it describes the development of a qualitative codebook for self-efficacy. Chapter 4 opens by explaining our shift to a narrative analysis case study of a single transfer student. This chapter ultimately diverged from self-efficacy, and Chapter 4 will discuss the reasons and the results of that narrative analysis, stating that supporting characters were instrumental in a transfer student’s success story. The chapter ends with implications for universities to learn from TYCs. The dissertation transitions to Chapter 5 by broadening out from a single student’s case study to a positively impactful course experience at a TYC for STEM students intending to transfer. This chapter describes design considerations learned from the course as well as opportunities the course provided for student self-efficacy experiences. Chapter 6 discusses the story across all three body chapters as situated in the research framing and concludes the dissertation.
Show less

MSU Libraries

Digital Repository

Enabled Filters

Pages

Pages

MSU Libraries

Digital Repository

You are here

Search results

Pages

Pages