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We Gon' Make It Regardless : A Qualitative Study of Black Women's Experiences of Predominantly White Institutions
No full textviii, 64 p.In the US, Black women have been active in teaching themselves and others for centuries. From enslavement to present day, education has been held in high esteem within the Black community and is viewed as a form of liberation, autonomy, and empowerment. However, despite their persistent existence in academia, Black women have not always been afforded that reverence. Over time as they've gained more access to educational positions, their realities within academic institutions have continued to be overwritten and disregarded. This inattention is not only because of their positioning as Black but as women as well. As a Black woman currently in higher education, I've increasingly grown interested in how our realities within education affect our college experiences. Furthermore, I am interested in seeing how Black women navigate PWis given that we all engage with oppression and struggle in different ways. In this study, my research questions are the following: How do Black women students uniquely experience PWis, and how do their identities affect how they navigate these institutions? I conducted ten qualitative interviews with open-ended questions and employed a Grounded Theory approach to answer these questions. Through these methods, I constructed grounded theories that show how Black women navigate PWis. Moreover, I found that Black women students inevitably experience microaggressive environments and behavior. Through their awareness that PWis were not created to support them, they generate persistence strategies that help them move through PWls
2022 YMC Spring Block Party flyer
No full text1 p.Flyer advertising the 2022 Spring Block Party hosted by Young Men of Color. This event was held on May 29, 2022
Ab Initio Investigation of Internal Torsional Barriers in Substituted Terphenyls
No full textvii, 17 p.Ab initio electronic structure methods use solutions to quantum mechanical calculations to model and predict properties of molecular systems. This study uses transition state theory (TST) to investigate multiple phenyl species, including phenyl, biphenyl, and terphenyl structures, as well as the individual contributions of nitrogenous substituents in an organic mechanism of interest. It was determined via bond lengths and molecular energies that -conjugation in -NO2 substituent was weakened about the aryl-aryl bond in phenyl systems and torsion about this bond was found in the imaginary node of transition state structures. In -NH2, the lone electron pair strengthens the -conjugation of the phenyl system and rotation of that substituent alone contributes most to the imaginary node of TS structures. Gibbs free energy was used to quantify relative electronic contributions of partially substituted models and the ortho-substituted biphenyl model was determined to be the most useful. Further studies could investigate other terphenyls in the mechanism or improve the computational method by including a dispersion correction, dielectric constant, and/or new basis
City as Metaphor
No full text6 p.In this article, the author Karen Ghostlaw describes the photographic work of Richard Koenig. While the piece is centered on Koenig’s recent project, “City as Metaphor”, it includes previous photographic works for contextualization. This was published though The Pictorial List, a global on-line photography magazine (July 22nd 2022).Originally published online: https://www.thepictorial-list.com/post/city-as-metaphor-richard-koeni
Prevalence of Heart Failure in Type 2 Diabetic Patients
No full textii, 22 p.Heart failure is a commonly occurring chronic cardiac disease that affects the ventricular filling and cardiac output of a patient. Accumulation of cardiac disease accompanied by comorbid diseases, such as type 2 diabetes mellitus, result in the development of heart failure. Interest in therapeutic interventions regarding heart failure gave rise to implantation of prosthetic materials and synthesis of new drugs to alleviate symptoms of heart failure while reducing the risk of developing closely-related diseases. LVAD implantation is the latest therapeutic intervention that has reduced hospitalization and mortality rates. The question arises whether interventions, such as LVAD, drug synthesis, or lifestyle changes, will reduce the prevalence of heart failure in patients with comorbid diseases, such as type 2 diabetes. Discussion of the etiology and treatment of heart failure, as well as overlapping pathology with type 2 diabetes mellitus will aid in understanding its prevalence
Patriarchy, Masculinity, and Rape Culture: A Theoretical and Personal Reflection
No full text68 p.Twenty-first century Western society is a patriarchal society built upon many different
components: masculinity, gender, gender roles and norms, privilege, humor, rape culture, and
hypermasculinity are some of many. Each of these components, which are all interconnected,
work to maintain each other while reproducing the large patriarchal system. This paper speaks to
individuals with gender privilege, meaning those who benefit the most and are disadvantaged the
least from twenty-first century Western patriarchy. This paper aims to emphasize the need for
those with gender privilege to take responsibility. Responsibility in the sense of becoming better
aware of the system by building a greater understanding of it, thus working towards breaking
down unconscious patterns and influences that perpetuate it. This paper aims to do so in two
sections. The first section analyzes each component theoretically to build awareness and foster a
greater understanding of twenty-first century Western patriarchy. The second section utilizes this
greater awareness and understanding within a personal analysis. The personal analysis is
reflective of a privileged individual life and argues the value of collaboration and as well as the
value of the small unconscious patterns and influences
Researching the Microbiology Concept Inventory at North Dakota State University
No full textiii, 17 p.The purpose of my SIP was to identify student misconceptions at North Dakota State University via a pedagogical tool called the Microbiology Concept Inventory. This past summer I helped continue the work of Dr. Danielle Condry and her research team on using the Microbiology Concept Inventory to improve programmatic curriculum at the undergraduate level. I reviewed data collected from the years 2019 to 2022 to observe whether misconceptions that students hold about microbiology have changed overtime and in tandem with curriculum changes. I found that for undergraduates of all levels, the most common misconceptions were in the categories of metabolic pathways and evolution. This research will aid in continued studies at North Dakota State University that facilitate curricular reform. The experience of working on education research at the graduate-level taught me how to work efficiently with both quantitative and qualitative data, and it taught me how to construct my own research schedule
Evaluating Mass Spectrometry as a Potential Early Ovarian Cancer Recurrence Detection Method Using Bottom-Up Proteomic Analysis of Cancer Biomarker CA125 (MUC16)
No full textvi, 29 p.High-grade serous ovarian cancer (HGSOC) is a commonly recurring form of epithelial ovarian cancer characterized by the detection of recurrent lesions and is frequently fatal (R21 proposal, 2021; Lisio et al., 2019). Early detection of HGSOC recurrence currently relies on a double-determinant immunoassay that analyzes levels of resurgence for ovarian cancer biomarker CA125 (MUC16) (Schuster-Little et al., 2020). Targeted mass spectrometry-based methods may be an attractive alternative to current methods for the ability to reliably identify and quantify low abundance proteins like MUC16 with higher sensitivity and accuracy. Similarly, bottom-up proteomics allows biological samples, such as MUC16, to undergo protein extraction, enzymatic digestion, and tandem mass spectrometry ion fragmentation to determine relevant sequence data. Using ovarian cancer cell line, OVCAR3, cells were cultured with and without fetal bovine serum (FBS) and filtered through 3 and 100 kDa molecular weight cut-off (MWCO) filters. Protein digests and desalting protocols developed by Schuster-Little et al., 2020 were performed to prepare samples for analysis on the Q Exactive (QE) LC-MS/MS mass spectrometer. Samples loaded on the QE were run for 48- and 90-minutes under data-dependent acquisition (DDA) and parallel reaction monitoring (PRM) methods for comparison. Optimized method conditions involved filtering FBS (–) samples through the 100 kDa MWCO filters with 90-minute runtimes using the DDA method. We hope to further optimize the PRM method to apply targeted, bottom-up proteomics and mass spectrometry analysis for various sample types to verify that these methods may provide another early detection method for ovarian cancer recurrence
“Coils, Garden Guerrillas, and Purple Space Suits” : Recentering Black Stories and Knowledge Through Community Gardening for the Future of Humanity
No full textxiii, 44 p.The author uses essays, short stories, and poetry to reflect on food justice, black communities, and the future. Section one is anchored to the science fiction essay: “Community Gardens meet ZORA zr7.” The poems and short story of section two are anchored to the essay: “Can I protest with my gardening gloves on?” The third essay, “Plants, Spaceships and Black Girl Power,” is inspired by the author’s experience working with the Zoo City Farm and Food Network. In the introduction, the author writes “While reading this project, I want readers to know a couple of things. Without the teachings, support, discussions, and literature it would not have been possible. Although I have been wanting to come up with a way to talk about these issues since my science fiction/dead and undead class junior year of high school, I think that without the knowledge I was able to gather at K, I wouldn’t know as much as I do now. But the best part about this experience of working in this project and being able to write about these passions is that the learning is never over. Although this project is finished for now, the knowledge of food systems, environmental racism, black love, and anti-colonialism dialogue is never finished. We are learning new ways of saving this planet every day. Even if that means we must eventually scour space to find one like it. But we must love Earth while we are here. I know that I imagine that I will be able to see people go on space adventures and find new things in new galaxies. However, the likelihood is that me and a lot of other people will not have the money or the resources to actually be a part of going to infinity and beyond. So, this is our home. As well as the home of our ancestors. So, we must take care of it. Whether it’s by learning new ways to take care of the soil without stripping it of its important nutrients. Or whether it’s fighting for a decrease in deforestation projects. We have to find new ways to connect with the land. We must get back to looking at ourselves as kin to the sea mammals. To speaking to plants as if they were our sisters. If I could ask you to take anything away from this project, it would be to know that we can change Earth. Small steps increase into life changing movements. We can do this. We can save ourselves from the grips of a past of colonialism and capitalism. We can save ourselves from a past of oppression and slavery. One community garden at a time.
Construction of gRNA Targeting the Hatching Gland Promoter (hgg) using CRISPR Gene Editing in Transgenic Danio Rio
No full text30 p.The Clustered Regulatory Interspaced Short Palindromic Repeats (CRISPR) system has become a powerful technique for genome editing due to its flexibility, simplicity, and accuracy. It has been discovered that the CRISPR system can be used to perform site-directed mutagenesis in transgenic zebrafish lines while co-injecting a donor plasmid, short guided RNA (sgRNA), and Cas9 mRNA. Few transgenic zebrafish lines report harmful mutations from differences in cellular division processes that result in morphogenesis defects. In zebrafish, one of these mutations is known as the harpy (hrp) mutation. The hrp mutation is characterized by the occurrence of premature stop codons which leads to a cease of cellular division before all stages of development are complete (Riley et al., 2010). In this study, the CRISPR system will be used to genetically edit DNA sequences of hrp mutants by targeting the hatching gland promoter (hgg) responsible for the early arrest mutation. Here I report efficient site-specific DNA integration of target insert minustarget364. Through molecular cloning techniques, polymerase chain reactions (PCR) and sequencing events, cleavage of the donor plasmid and the integration of donor DNA for one out of two vector clones successfully took place. With the integration of target insert minustarget364, future directions may include injecting and observing protein fluorescence in zebrafish that have an upstream activating sequence (UAS) driving a color reporter. This study is representative of the flexibility and simplicity of DNA integration when using the CRISPR system