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A Third Party to Police Activity: How Body-Worn Cameras Impact Police Officer Language and Behavior, and How Officers Use Them
No full textBody-worn cameras were vastly integrated into American policing following the contentious officer-involved shooting deaths of Tamir Rice, Michael Brown, and Eric Garner in the summer of 2014. High start-up and management costs, as well as concerns about both officer and citizen privacy, keep some departments from fully embracing these surveillance devices. Essentially, they question whether the rewards of body-worn cameras outweigh their risks (White & Malm, 2020). This project aims to demonstrate the necessity of body-worn cameras in modern policing through analyzing if and how officers orient their speech and behavior towards these devices in officer-involved shootings, and whether that may benefit them in subsequent investigations. It will also cull findings from existing qualitative research and analyze body-worn camera policies to evaluate the benefits of technology for the police and society generally
Estrogen in Water Supply: An Assessment of the Presence of Estrogenic Compounds in Drinking Water and Associated Human Health Risks
No full textEstrogenic-containing or mimicking compounds in surface or drinking water is of particular interest when seeking answers to whether or not the present levels are adverse. An increase in the use of synthetic estrogen, estrogen mimicking compounds, and endocrine disrupting chemicals such as in pharmaceuticals and pesticides creates a rising concern for human health (Conley et al., 2017). For the purpose of this research, naturally occurring estrogenic compounds are ignored. As society uses more synthetically produced materials containing possible endocrine disrupting estrogenic compounds, a growing risk of negative consequences can result for aquatic life and evidently human health. Investigating the trends in change and sources of the issue allows for a deeper understanding of potential sources of the problem. Although drinking water treatment is substantial, the detectable estrogenic levels that may be present can pose harm such as reproductive problems and cancer (Conley et al., 2017). Current literature lacks the connection between well-established, detected estrogenic levels in water and if these levels pose concern. Determining that the current levels are worrisome by intertwining the research, poses a promise towards increasing reasoning for further research regarding the detected levels in water in order to control and decrease further effects. Compiling the information creates an incentive to argue for change to occur to combat the growing problem of the rise in estrogen such as facilitating more public awareness, increasing research, and proposing extensive use of successful water treatment techniques
Note Disclosures in 10K Reports
No full textNote disclosures are an important component of annual reports, but further research can illustrate how these disclosures differ across industries. Further research into 10K reports can reveal how companies use disclosures to fulfill conciseness and transparency recommendations when communicating with stakeholders. Analyzing recent 10K reports from samples of firms in
different industries can reveal which note disclosures are most prominent, which industries disclose the most, and how prevalent specific types of disclosures, such as sustainability and contingent liabilities disclosures, are across a variety of firms. This analysis focuses on the notes to the financial statements, rather than any other accompanying information in the annual
reports. Results can help establish a spectrum of transparency and disclosure behavior. Benefits from this research include a greater understanding of note disclosures across different industries so companies can compare themselves to competitors, related fields, and other firms in their supply chains. The primary beneficiaries of this research include external 10K preparers, who are typically Certified Public Accountants (CPAs), and internal firm management seeking to view annual reports in the context of their broader industries and the overall scope of 10K report
Capturing Objective Temporality in Narrative Fiction
No full textIn conventional narratives, time is compressed to include only noteworthy events, such that the time spent reading a piece of fiction (“reading time”) is often shorter than the amount of time that passes in the world of the story (“narrative time”). This project has created a new form of narrative that attempts to approximately match reading time and narrative time through applying a calculation similar to that used to measure reading speed and barring certain temporal techniques, such as anachronism. This project has produced five short stories in order to analyze the effects of this new narrative mode and its viability for future works. The results show a massive increase in the time and effort inherent to the writing process, but a promising new perspective when it comes to short-form literature. While this project has laid the groundwork, there is still plenty of unexplored potential utilizing this narrative form
Multi-Resolution Study of Topographical and Zonal Properties of Osteoarthritis in Articular Cartilage Using Microscopic MRI and Polarized Light Microscopy
No full textArticular cartilage is a thin layer of connective tissue found in diarthrodial joints that overlay the opposing ends of bones and acts as lubricating surfaces to distribute stress and reduce friction with the help of synovial fluid. Hyaline cartilage contains an abundance of water molecules that are essential to the behavior and function of cartilage, the negatively charged proteoglycans that influence the biomechanical properties of the tissue, and the collagen fibers that act as the rebar or reinforcement bars to preserve the structural integrity of the tissue. Cartilage supports the applied load and distributes stress based on its intrinsic material properties, together with its underlying bone. At different surface locations of any single diarthrodial joint, the properties of cartilage are prone to have many morphological and molecular variations topographically, which are mainly due to the patterns of mechanical loading for any specific joint. Any change in the morphological and molecular properties of the cartilage and bone is likely to directly impact the clinical diagnoses of joint diseases such as osteoarthritis (OA). In addition to the topographical variations, cartilage also has a number of depth-dependent variations over its thin thickness, which begins in the non-calcified cartilage with articular laminae and the unequal thickness of sub-tissue zones. Conceptually, the non-calcified cartilage is commonly subdivided based on the orientations of collagen fibers and chondrocytes, into three histological zones. They are the superficial (SZ), transitional (TZ), and radial (RZ) zones. The non-calcified cartilage interfaces with the calcified cartilage and subchondral bone plate (SBP) through the tidemark (TM). This dissertation has seven chapters, which describe a number of multi-resolution projects that use high-resolution imaging to determine the topographical and depth-dependent variations in cartilage, in order to diagnose OA at its earliest stages. The dissertation begins with a brief introduction of background and literature review (Chapters 1-2), continues with the description of the materials and methods (Chapter 3), and summarizes three published peer-reviewed journal articles (Chapters 4-6). The dissertation ends with a summary and comments on future directions (Chapter 7). Among the three research projects described in this dissertation, the first project (Chapter 4) investigates the improvement in the OA detection in cartilage by the interpolation of T2 images, in the situation when the native MRI resolution is insufficient to resolve the depth-dependent T2 characteristics in articular cartilage. The second project (Chapter 5) establishes the topographical and zonal T2 patterns of multi-resolution MRI in medial tibial cartilage in a canine model of OA, initiated by an anterior cruciate ligament (ACL) transection surgery, which was studied after 8-weeks and 12-weeks post-surgery. The third project (Chapter 6) quantifies the interface region between the non-calcified cartilage and the subchondral bone plate, which includes the deep portion of the non-calcified articular cartilage and the zone of calcified cartilage (ZCC) using a dual-modality microscopic imaging study
Optimization of Extraction and Purification of Taq Polymerase from E. Coli Cells
No full textThe production of protein-based drugs rely on a basic protein purification method to extract and purify the desired protein from host cells. This research seeks to optimize the protein purification process to isolate Taq polymerase from E. coli host cells, which is used to model the purification of protein-based drugs such as insulin. This research identifies a purification process and subsequently explores the impact of: 1) changing the incubation time and temperature of the initial cell culture, 2) inducing protein expression with different concentrations of IPTG, and 3) changing the flow rate during ion-exchange column chromatography. These changes may introduce more time-efficient steps and/or yield a larger volume of pure, active protein than the traditional purification method. Both of these results would improve the drug industry’s efficiency by allowing companies to produce a large amount of active product in a short amount of time at a low cost