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Company-Centered Culture: Paternalism And Welfare Capitalism On The Marquette Iron Range
No full textPaternalism and welfare capitalism guided the management of the Cleveland-Cliffs Iron Company and many of the iron ore companies on Michigan’s Marquette Range. From 1855 through 1895 the iron producers struggled with economic challenges and labor disputes that prevented profit generation. Following an 1895 strike, Cleveland-Cliffs implemented welfare capitalist management philosophies to foster labor peace within the mines. These efforts were successful to a degree, enabling over fifty years of labor peace. This project explores the different elements of these programs and how they interacted with challenges and crises outside of company control including world wars, influenza epidemic, and economic downturns. At the core of this research is the system of dependence created by one company to maintain labor peace and prevent the outside unionization of a workforce, and how this dependence outlasted the iron industry itself complicating the future of the Marquette Range community
Cannabidiol Partially Mitigates The Consequences Of Neonatal Exposure To Repeated Procedural Pain
No full textRepeated painful procedures in the NICU are associated with a multitude of effects on the neurodevelopment in preterm infants, and current methods of neonatal pain management are unable to prevent the distress or long-term changes induced by these procedures. Cannabidiol (CBD) may be particularly effective for neonatal pain management because it reduces pain unpleasantness ratings, mitigates biological stress responses, and has minimal side effects. However, there is limited research on the effects of neonatal CBD exposure. The present study investigated if pretreating rat pups with low doses of CBD can mitigate a behavioral stress response (ultrasonic vocalizations; USVs) to neonatal pain exposure and prevent the long-term effects that neonatal pain has on neurodevelopment and behavior without CBD itself impairing development. Pain exposure altered USVs in a frequency-dependent manner, increased adult anxiety-like behavior, and in adult females slowed corticosterone recovery after stress exposure. CBD partially mitigated the effect of pain on USVs and corticosterone recovery but not adult anxiety-like behavior. Additionally, CBD had no permanent effects on measurements of neuromotor development, neonatal weight gain, age at sexual maturity, or estrus cycling in adult female subjects. The results indicate that CBD may be able to prevent some consequences of neonatal procedural pain but will be most effective in tandem with another drug that can fill the gaps in CBD’s protective effects
Recovering And Reclaiming Linguistic And Cultural Identities: Revealing Skoo Haints Through The Black Storytelling Tradition
Get PDFThis qualitative study uses the first person, “I” to explore the Black Storytelling Tradition as method and methodology. As a Black scholar I centered my grandfather’s empirical knowledge of haints (a metaphor for demoralizing, oppressive, colonizing, and assimilating societal and educational practices upheld by the dominant class) and my empirical teacher knowledge as an American Descendant of Slavery (ADOS) as the site of inquiry. In utilizing the Black Storytelling Tradition, I share interconnected stories, poems, dreams, “memorys”, “rememorys”, stream of consciousness, and sketches that demonstrate how haints shaped the navigation of my heritage language (African American Language, AAL) and my Black cultural identity. Subsequently, I used a Theatre of the Oppressed (TOTO) theoretical framework (Boal, 1979/1984) to process my inner dialogue as a resistance movement to expel haints and reclaim/recover my linguistic and cultural identity. The findings revealed how ancestral knowledge and stories can inform Black teacher thought yielding an introspective process that guides how we survive and perform in white educational spaces. These tools of liberation include Black Storytelling Tradition, Black teachers’ reflective practice, and Theatre of the Oppressed. The findings further suggest that these tools can be effective for Black teachers to release racial trauma, and work in solidarity to dispel haints. I conclude with a series of letters to my fellow Black teachers which outline the full implications of this work
Do Neighborhood And School Characteristics Impact Students\u27 Attendance Rates?
No full textThis dissertation examines the effects of neighborhood characteristics on Detroit Public School Community District students\u27 attendance rates for the 2018-19 school year. First, I analyze the effects of sunrise time relative to school start time on absences for elementary and middle school students. Getting the recommended amount of sleep can lead to better physical and mental health. By observing the change in sunrise time while keeping school start time constant, I find that average absences decrease when students gain an hour of sleep and increase when they lose an hour of sleep. This implies that a later school start time can lead to academic and social benefits for students. Next, I focus on the effects of crime near a students\u27 home and near a students\u27 school. I find that females and males respond differently to violent crimes near their home and students may be less likely to be absent, following an incident, because school is safer than home. I find that elementary and middle school students are negatively effected by crimes that occur near school, during the school day. These findings can help shape school policy to build the best environment for students
Synthesis Of Multifunctional Ligands For The Treatment Of Parkinson’s And Alzheimer\u27s Disease
No full textParkinson’s Disease (PD) and Parkinson’s Disease with Dementia (PDD) are age-related disorders marked by the degeneration of the nigrostriatal dopaminergic system, and the accumulation of α-synuclein (αSN) into Lewy Bodies and Lewy Neurites. The loss of dopaminergic neurons in the substantia nigra pars compacta (SNpc) produces the cardinal motor symptoms and cognitive decline leading to dementia. While the etiology is not well established, the nature of the disease is complex and multifunctional. Several factors have been implicated in the disease process such as protein aggregation, oxidative stress, and loss of mitochondrial integrity leading to neuronal cell death. However, therapies clinically approved for PD are symptomatic in nature and do not target these factors listed above. Our goal is to design and develop multifunctional dopamine agonists to not only relieve the symptoms of motor dysfunction in PD but also to exert neuroprotective effects via modulating aggregation of αSyn protein to alter the progression of these diseases, an urgent unmet need. This multifunctional template, excluding the dopamine agonist, will be further developed to target hallmarks of Alzheimer’s disease (AD).
AD is an age-related, neurodegenerative disease that is the leading cause of dementia worldwide. This disease is hallmarked by the degeneration of the cholinergic system and accumulation of senile plaques (amyloid-β) and neurofibrillary tangles (NFT’s) leading to cognitive decline. Similar to PD, the etiology of AD is not well-known, but there are several factors implicated in the disease process: Aβ and tau aggregation, oxidative stress, and cholinergic depletion. While current clinical treatments for AD include acetylcholinesterase inhibitors and an NMDA agonist, to enhance cognition they do not slow or modify the disease pathology. Given the complexity of AD, taking a novel approach to target multiple factors could prove useful. Our goal is to utilize the multifunctional template from previous work on D-520. Realizing contribution of biphenyl catechol moiety towards inhibition of amyloidogenic proteins, we seek to truncate the dopamine agonist moiety to develop molecules exclusively targeting amyloid beta peptide and tau protein whose toxicities are implicated in the pathogenesis of AD. Structure-activity relationship studies were explored in this dissertation to find potent leads that encompass the multi-functional dual activities. Furthermore, lead molecules were developed into pro-drugs to enhance pharmacokinetic properties to increase the concentration of the parent molecule in the brain
The Fifth Long Cycle: American Deconcentration And The Coming War For Global Leadership?
No full textThe Twenty-first century brought a period of remarkable change to the distribution of capabilities in the world system. The unipolar American system flourished after the collapse of the Soviet Union, yet a series of events seemed to signal a decline in American world leadership. The wars in Iraq and Afghanistan, 2008 economic crisis, and global reemergence of nationalist politics made evident the delegitimation American leadership had undergone since the 1970’s. The meteoric rise of China has given dissatisfied states the opportunity to balance against the American order, with hopes of disrupting and transitioning into a new Chinese-led global order. By quantifying indicators of global leadership, under the theoretical framework of George Modelski’s long cycles (1987), a clearer picture of the current global distribution of capabilities can be understood to determine whether the United States continues to reign as a unipolar power, or if changes in the distribution of power resemble that of the early 20th Century, creating a similarly unstable system in which global war for world leadership seems likely
Validation Of Orthostatic Vital Signs Measured Using A Wearable Sensor
No full textABSTRACT VALIDATION OF ORTHOSTATIC VITAL SIGNS MEASURED USING A WEARABLE SENSOR by ZIAD ABDELWARET ELHAJJAJI December 2024 Advisor: Dr. Amar Basu Major: Computer Engineering Degree: Doctor of Philosophy
Orthostatic hypotension (OH), a prevalent condition affecting nearly 30% of older adults, is characterized by a drop in blood pressure and cerebral blood flow upon standing, leading to increased fall risk and other health complications. Standard methods for monitoring OH, such as blood pressure (BP) cuffs, are inadequate as they fail to capture the initial orthostatic hypotension (IOH) and other rapid hemodynamic changes during orthostasis. More sophisticated techniques like continuous BP monitoring or cerebral blood flow velocity (CBFV) are expensive and often impractical for routine clinical use or home monitoring. As result OH is often underdiagnosed and poorly managed. This dissertation introduces a novel approach to OH monitoring using TRACE, a wireless earlobe sensor. TRACE offers a unique approach by directly measuring cephalic (head) blood volume, enabling the derivation of a novel biometric called orthostatic hypovolemia (OHV). OHV quantifies the reduction in cephalic blood volume upon standing, which may be directly correlated with dizziness and other presyncope symptoms. TRACE also captures changes in heart rate and motion indicating when a stand up occurred. A signal processing algorithm employing a Savitzky-Golay filter algorithm achieves a 99% success rate in extracting these metrics from TRACE data. This research derived and evaluated several biometrics: 1) OHV1: reflects the immediate loss of cephalic (head) blood volume immediately upon standing and is potentially indicative of IOH; 2) OHV2: reflects the steady state deficit in cephalic blood volume after the body achieves homeostasis upon standing; 3) POT (postural orthostatic tachycardia): the increase in heart rate upon standing, which reflects the ability of the autonomic system to compensate for orthostatic stresses; 4) OPVR1 (Orthostatic Pulse Volume Reduction 1): Immediate change in pulse volume reduction upon standing; 5) OPVR2 (Orthostatic Pulse Volume Reduction 2): Change in pulse volume reduction after initial orthostatic adjustment; 6) PAR1 (Pulse Amplitude Ratio 1): Immediate change in pulse amplitude ratio upon standing; and 7) PAR2 (Pulse Amplitude Ratio 2): Change in pulse amplitude ratio after initial orthostatic adjustment. A proof-of-concept study on 101 older adults demonstrated the effectiveness of these metrics. Participants wore the TRACE device during postural transitions and self-reported orthostatic symptoms. Significant differences were found between individuals with and without symptoms across all metrics: observed for OHV1 (p-value = 0.0002), OHV2 (p-value = 0.0219) and POT (p-value = 1.2 × 10⁻⁶), OPVR1 (p-value = 0.001), OPVR2 (p-value = 0.00003), PAR1 (p-value = 0.00031), and PAR2 (p-value = 0.00026). Combining the metrics in a logistic regression model achieved 90% sensitivity and 81% specificity in predicting symptomatic and asymptomatic individuals. To our knowledge, this is the first report demonstrating that a wearable device can predict orthostatic symptoms. These findings highlight the potential of TRACE to aid clinicians and patients in the diagnosis and evidence-based management of orthostatic disorders, including orthostatic hypotension and dysautonomia. The wearable form factor opens the possibility of doing such diagnosis and management in a home setting or other remote monitoring scenarios
Representing Historically Marginalized Communities in Archives: Moving Beyond LCSH to Create More Inclusive Subject Headings
Get PDFThe Library of Congress Subject Headings (LCSH) are widely used around the world in libraries and archives to add access points for users searching their collections. This can be problematic because LCSH has many embedded issues including inconsistency and complexity, the myth of neutrality that surrounds it, systemic biases, and how slow it is to change. These problems lead to poor descriptions of people, especially those who belong to historically marginalized communities. Archives can move beyond LCSH to create local thesauri, crowdsourced vocabularies, and collaborative partnerships with historically marginalized communities to create more inclusive subject headings
Exploring the Longitudinal Associations Between Diet and Heart Failure with Preserved Ejection Fraction Among Middle-Aged Adults in the CARDIA Study
Get PDFThere is currently limited evidence for the use of pharmacotherapies for heart failure with preserved ejection fraction (HFpEF). Given that diet is a key health behavior, the purpose of this study was to explore dietary predictors of HFpEF among middle-aged adults. All data were obtained from the Coronary Artery Risk Development in Young Adults study, a longitudinal cohort study. We analyzed the data from males and females (n= 2505) who had (1) completed the diet questionnaire at year(Y) 20 of follow-up and (2) undergone Doppler scan at Y30. We then classified participants as having HFpEF or not using three separate operationalizations. Hierarchical binomial logistic regression models were conducted to assess predictors of HFpEF, namely, fructose, sucrose, sodium, and magnesium intake at Y20 and LDL and HDL levels at Y30. Covariates were sex, age, race, BP\u3e130/80 mmHg (irrespective of hypertension diagnosis) at baseline, BMI at baseline, BP\u3e130/80 mmHg at Y20, years of regular cigarette use at Y30, and physical activity level at Y30. When HFpEF was defined as a left ventricular ejection fraction (LVEF) ≥50% and an E/A\u3c0.8 or \u3e2, age and BMI were significant positive predictors. When HFpEF was defined as a LVEF≥50% and a lateral e\u27 velocity \u3c7, fructose, BMI, sodium, and HDL were significant predictors. When HFpEF was defined as a LVEF≥50% and a septal e\u27 velocity \u3c10, age, BMI, sodium, and physical activity were significant predictors. Decreasing fructose and sodium intake, and lowering LDL levels while raising HDL levels, may decrease one’s risk of HFpEF by mid-life
