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Impact of Whey and Soy Protein Supplementation on Resistance Training in Young Adults: A Systematic Literature Review and Meta-Analysis
No full textBackground: Whey protein is a popular supplement in sports nutrition. Soy protein is an alternative to whey protein, often marketed to individuals following a plant-based diet. Evaluating whey and soy protein supplementation\u27s role in resistance exercise is essential for providing evidence-based nutrition guidance.
Objective: The study aim was to conduct a systematic literature review and meta-analysis on randomized control trials (RCTs) on the effectiveness of whey and soy protein supplementation on outcomes of lean body mass (LBM), squat, bench press, and plasma essential plasma amino acid (EAA) levels in young adult men and women.
Methods: The databases searched included: Cochrane, EBSCO Host, PubMed, and Scopus. Inclusion criteria were interventions that included whey or soy protein concentrate or isolate and participants aged 18 to 30 years who engage in resistance exercise. Exclusion criteria were randomized control trials (RCTs), protein supplements with additives, and unspecified protein supplements. Two reviewers independently evaluated 1813 studies based on the inclusion and exclusion criteria. Studies that met these criteria underwent data extraction for LBM, squat, bench press, and circulating EAA. The studies were assessed for risk of bias was assessed using the Cochrane RoB 2 tool for RCTs. A meta-analysis was performed using a random-effects model.
Results: The review included a total of 12 studies with 261 participants. There was no significant effect of supplementing whey or soy protein intervention on LBM mean difference (MD) (1.13; 95% CI: -0.76, 3.02; p=0.22, I2 =55.7%), squat performance (MD 4.06; 95% CI:-5.46, 13.57; p=0.34, I2 =77.5%). However, whey protein supplementation had a significant effect on bench press (MD 5.72; 95% CI:1.30, 10.15; p=0.02, I2 =61.2%).
Conclusion: These findings suggest that while both whey and soy proteins can be part of a resistance training regimen, whey protein may offer a specific advantage in enhancing upper body strength in young adults engaging in resistance training. Due to the small number of studies and sample size, these findings should be interpreted with caution. Further research with larger-powered randomized controlled trials is necessary to provide more definitive conclusions regarding the effectiveness of protein supplements for enhancing strength performance
Transforming the Athlete through Occupational Therapy-Facilitated Mentorship Programming
No full textThere is a high prevalence of role strain experienced among collegiate athletes with increased attention and awareness surrounding its impact on the transition out of sport and into the next phase of their lives. Many colleges and universities throughout the United States have developed career readiness programs focused on mental health, career transitions, and resilience training preparation for life after sport. However, these programs are often delivered in a group format, making it difficult to provide individualized support to student-athletes. This project elaborated on the role occupational therapy serves in both program development and the transition out of sport. This project was two-fold, including a program that matched a student-athlete with a WVU Affiliate that was successful in their field, titled Beyond the Game: Student-Athlete Mentorship and one-on-one career readiness programs to enhance professional social engagement skills in preparation for networking events, titled Preparing Beyond the Game. Beyond the Game: Student-Athlete Mentorship was a pilot study with 15 upperclassman Olympic sport student-athletes and 15 mentors who were recruited from the Summit Society of the Mountaineer Athletic Association. The findings from the mentorship program showed an increase in mentee confidence from pre-test to post-test regarding leadership skills, having someone to turn to for advice, having connections in their field, managing finances, and an increase in perceived preparedness to handle the change to their identify after sport. However, there was a decrease in perceived preparedness to enter the real world after graduation and decreased confidence in networking and applying for jobs. The program results indicate that the student-athletes found value in both programs and perceived that the mentorship program prepared them for transition out of sport and the next phase of their lives
Three Essays on Sustainability Economics
No full textAs global economies face increasing resource dependencies and supply chain challenges, it becomes essential to understand the vulnerabilities that threaten economic stability. This dissertation investigates three empirical issues in agribusiness and critical minerals using econometric models to estimate the following: 1) the impact of supply chain disruptions on stock market returns during COVID-19; 2) the extraction of rare earth elements from acid mine drainage treatment by investigating the impacts of ownership and legislation in West Virginia and Pennsylvania; 3) China-to�FOBb (Free-on-Board) price transmission in rare earth elements markets: a copula-based dynamic tail dependence analysis.
The first essay evaluates how events during the COVID-19 pandemic, related to disruptions in the meat supply chain, impacted meat processing companies’ stock market returns. An event study approach is used to examine these disruptions by looking at the following four events: 1) the announcement of COVID-19 as a pandemic; 2) the first case of an outbreak in a meat processing plant; 3) outbreaks among employees in individual firms, and 4) the lockdowns in various states due to COVID-19. Datasets utilized in the analyses include S&P 500, Google Trends, financial beta, and data collected for 14 publicly traded meat processing companies in the US. The results show that nationwide events had no statistically significant impact on average abnormal returns of meat processing companies. However, individually, firms experienced negative abnormal returns. COVID- 19 related events in individual meat processing companies had a temporary negative abnormal return in the days prior to the event. This research will shed light on the stock market returns of meat processing companies in reaction to supply chain disruptions linked to COVID-19. This essay contributes by using Google trend data and the financial beta to estimate expected returns. Findings provide significant insights to investors on how sensitive stock market returns are to outbreaks that affect human health.
The second essay examines the challenges of and barriers to rare earth element (REE) extraction from acid mine drainage (AMD) treatment in Pennsylvania and West Virginia. These two states differ in terms of legislation regarding REE extraction, West Virginia House Bill 4003 grants commercial ownership of elements extracted from AMD to the extractor. We surveyed AMD treatment operators, representing nonprofit organizations, private companies, and government agencies, operating under various ownership structures, including landowner agreements and surface or coal mineral rights ownership. Although the legal frameworks governing REE ownership differ between the two states, operator views on REE ownership are largely aligned. A simple comparison of survey responses shows that operators in West Virginia are more likely to express an interest in REE extraction investment than Pennsylvania operators. Most operators agreed that entities maintaining the treatment systems should claim ownership rights to the extracted REE, and profits should be directed to support AMD treatment. Our Bayesian logistic regression analysis identified ownership of surface rights as the most influential factor in operator interest in REE extraction investment. Those operators who own the land surface rights where their treatment systems are located are more than twenty-four times more likely to express interest in investing in REE extraction compared to those without surface rights. These findings suggest that, while certain ownership and operational factors promote investment, broader legislative and economic frameworks do not appear to drive state-level disparities in the development of a REE industry.
The third essay examines the dynamic relationship between Chinese domestic (EXW) and global (FOB) prices for rare earth elements (REEs) under extreme market conditions. Using a copula�based dynamic tail dependence approach integrated with an error correction model (ECM), we analyze price transmission and co-movements between these markets. Our focus on tail dependency allows us to assess how prices respond to extreme market events, offering insights into vulnerabilities within the China-World REEs supply chain. The results show a significant tail dependence between EXW and FOB prices, indicating that global prices are highly sensitive to shocks from the Chinese market. The ECM further reveals that, despite the role of China as the leading REE supplier, it acts as a price taker, with its domestic prices responding to global market movements. Volatility analysis using the GJR-GARCH and DCC-GARCH models reveals persistent volatility in global markets, particularly for metals like Cerium and Lanthanum, where market shocks have long-lasting effects. This suggests that disruptions, whether from geopolitical tensions or supply chain issues, slow the market’s return to stability. In contrast, the Chinese domestic market tends to recover more quickly, likely due to internal factors such as government interventions. These findings provide important insights for policymakers and industry participants, particularly in managing risks associated with supply chain disruptions in the REE market. Understanding the dynamic price relationships between China and global markets is important for navigating the broader effects of policy changes on market stability
Assessing the Feasibility of the Virtual Reality Training Protocol for Sport
No full textResearch has supported the use of virtual reality (VR) in sport to train skills such as decision-making and anticipation, as well as aid in injury rehabilitation. Despite this, VR is not commonly used as a training tool in sport. Barriers to its adoption include a lack of understanding, low awareness, and risk of cybersickness. As such, there is a critical need to address these barriers and promote acceptance of VR in sport. The purpose of this single-arm, non-randomized, mixed-methods feasibility trial was to examine the feasibility and acceptability of the Virtual Reality Training Protocol for Sport (VRTPS), which was designed to address barriers to VR use in sport. We assessed pre- and post-training attitudes toward VR using the Attitudes toward Virtual Reality Technology Scale (AVRTS), which uses the Technology Acceptance Model (TAM) as a guiding framework. Participants (n = 18) completed the VRTPS, which included stages of education, acclimation, and application. Exit interviews provided further insights into participant experiences. Results from quantitative and reflexive content analyses demonstrated feasibility of the VRTPS based on recruitment and adherence, acceptability, demand, implementation, and practicality. Descriptive statistics from the AVRTS revealed pre- to post-training increases in overall attitudes toward VR, enjoyment, perceived usefulness, and ease of use, and minimal cybersickness was reported. Our findings demonstrate the feasibility and acceptability of the VRTPS and show promise for its future research and application
Engaging Young Children in Art Museums through Interactive Programming
No full textYoung children can be successfully engaged in art museum programs in many ways. Rather than identifying only one pedagogical strategy that is most effective for them, it is more productive to consider how different approaches affect the experiences of children in a museum. Despite the considerable body of existing research about educational strategies for preschool children, a clear synthesis of various pedagogical methods has not been applied to art museum programming for this age group. This research project used participant observation as its methodology to conduct four case studies attempting to answer the question: “How do different museum educational strategies affect the experience of preschoolers in a museum and their ability to develop both verbal and artistic responses to the works of art on display?” Data collection primarily included handwritten field notes, audio recordings of each session, and photographs of the children’s artwork. Eight children participated in four program sessions at the Art Museum of WVU with each session focused on a different pedagogical strategy: Guided Play, Visual Thinking Strategies, Social and Emotional Learning, and Storytelling. The children worked to construct knowledge through their interactions in each of the sessions and expressed their ideas both verbally and artistically. Each strategy had its unique features that affected the children’s learning and experience that museum educators should consider in planning similar programs. To select an appropriate pedagogy, it is most effective for museum educators to identify the specific goals of their program and use research-based strategies to achieve the desired outcomes
Mourning and Haunting in Irish Gothic Fiction from the Victorian Era to Modernism
No full textThis dissertation explores how three Irish modernist writers, Elizabeth Bowen, Dorothy Macardle, and James Joyce, incorporate and reimagine tropes from the Victorian Gothic Revival to address Ireland’s uneven modernity in the first half of the twentieth century. I argue that the Irish Gothic tradition is essential for these writers to express their reflection and reaction to ongoing cultural and social turmoil in Ireland’s process of modernization during the foundation of the postcolonial Irish state. Extending Sheridan Le Fanu’s Big House Gothic legacy, Elizabeth Bowen creates haunted spaces in The Last September (1929) to describe Anglo-Ireland’s precarious situation during the War of Independence. Danielstown becomes a liminal place where the past and present converge, and the tenants become ghostly characters who are paralyzed and suffocated by their inherited traditions. Through the vampiric figure Marda Norton, Bowen hints at a possible future temporality outside of the Ascendancy colonial order. Drawing upon a tradition of Irish Gothic ghost stories and Celtic Twilight folktales, Dorothy Macardle’s Earth-Bound (1924) and The Uninvited (1942) explore the intersection between sacrificial nationalism and feminism during the Irish War of Independence and the post-revolutionary era. In her short story collection Earth-Bound, Macardle acknowledges the healing power of the dead in stories such as “Samhain” and expresses an ambiguous attitude toward sacrificial nationalism in “The Prisoner” and “The Portrait of Róisín Dhu.” In response to the limitations imposed on women by the 1937 Constitution, Macardle’s The Uninvited uses Gothic tropes to warn of the dangers of a nation that fails to grant women autonomy. James Joyce also wrestles with an Ireland haunted by vampires and ghosts. Through the vampiric ghost of Stephen Dedalus’s mother, May Dedalus, Joyce expresses his ambiguous attitude toward family, nation, and religious practices in the “Circe” episode of Ulysses (1922). Stephen’s rebellion against May suggests the formation of the young man’s artistic agency, which implies a possible Ireland created through Stephen’s art. Simultaneously, in “Circe,” Leopold Bloom’s encounter with his dead son, Rudy, mixes a father’s sorrow for his lost child with a vision of a future multicultural Ireland. My study argues that these modern Irish authors are haunted by the Gothic because of its protean potential to mourn outmoded ideologies of the self and the state while imagining emancipatory futures for the postcolonial nation
A framework for biomimetic robot design applied to the development of a robotic model of Drosophila melanogaster
No full textFor decades, the field of biologically inspired robotics has leveraged insights from animal locomotion to improve the walking ability of legged robots. Recently, “biomimetic” robots have been developed to model how specific animals walk. By prioritizing biological accuracy to the target organism rather than the application of general principles from biology, these robots can be used to develop detailed biological hypotheses for animal experiments, ultimately improving our understanding of the biological control of legs while improving technical solutions. Much of this work involves biologically inspired walking controllers informed by the morphology and dynamics of the insect nervous system, which necessitate a robot with highly animal-like structure to prevent a brain-body mismatch. However, methods for codifying suitable fidelity in biomimetic robots currently vary, with limited generalizable methods for robot design. In this work, I outline a general framework for developing biomimetic robots that ensures kinematic and dynamic similarity between the robot and target animal. I then use this framework to develop and validate the robot Drosophibot II, a meso-scale robotic model of an adult fruit fly, Drosophila melanogaster. The resulting robot is novel for its close attention to the kinematics and dynamics of Drosophila, an increasingly important model of legged locomotion. Each leg’s proportions and degrees of freedom are modeled after Drosophila 3D pose estimation data. The predominant actuators for the robot are characterized to determine their inertial, elastic, and viscous properties and subsequently dynamically scale the robot\u27s motions. I then use a developed program to automatically solve the inverse kinematics and inverse dynamics necessary for walking for the robot\u27s structure and that of a to-scale model of the fly. By comparing the output of these models, I demonstrate that the robot and fly are kinematically and dynamically similar. The robot\u27s electromechanical design is presented, then validated by having the robot’s walk forward, backward, and up an incline via open-loop straight line stepping with biologically inspired foot trajectories. Strain data from locations throughout the robot\u27s legs is also recorded during these tests as an analog for mechanosensory feedback in a freely walking animal. Through these experiments, Drosophibot II demonstrates its utility for neuromechanical investigations by providing plausible neural data currently unobtainable in the animal
Tiny Silent Deaths: A Novel
No full textSet against the backdrop of the AIDS epidemic, Tiny Silent Deaths tells the compelling story of Violetta Collins—the novel’s twentysomething protagonist—whose favorite professor disappears in the wake of a homophobic defacement of his campus office. Violetta vows to figure out what happened to him and who was responsible for the vandalism, embarking on an adventure to solve the mystery even as she seeks to discover herself. An unusual art medium presents itself to Violetta through a childhood memory, and it’s by crafting miniature rooms—particularly, her professor’s university office—that Violetta is able to put the pieces together, ultimately determining what happened to her beloved professor and mentor and where he is now
Late Ordovician evolution of sea scorpions: Eurypterids of the Big Hill Lagerstätte
No full textEurypterids are a group of diverse chelicerates that first appeared during the Middle Ordovician (467.3 Ma) and went extinct at the end of the Permian (251.9 Ma). The fossil record of eurypterids during the Ordovician is relatively sparce, comprising only 12 species representing the Megalograptidae, a ‘waeringopterid’ clade, Rhenopteridae, Onychopterellidae, Adelophthalmoidea, and Eurypteroidea clades. This study describes early eurypterids from the Katian aged (~452 Ma) Big Hill Lagerstätte of Michigan. The described material represents two new species, herein named Machipterus margaritae sp. nov. (based on 21 specimens preserving the ventral prosoma and prosomal appendages, and opisthosoma) and Dikranopterus lysinae sp. nov. (based on 10 specimens preserving a prosomal appendage, paddle, genital appendages, and pretelson with telson). Phylogenetic analysis resolves Machipterus margaritae as a sister taxon to the Mixopteridae and Carcinosomatidae, providing insight into the ground pattern of the two groups; the prosomal appendages are short and robust, the preabdomen is moderately expanded, and the telson is lanceolate. Dikranopterus lysinae resolves within Dolichopteridae based on the angle between podomeres VI-3 and VI-4 being greater than 180º. This work fills in the ghost ranges of carcinosomatoids and dolichopterids and assists in ascertaining the tempo and mode of eurypterid evolution before the end-Ordovician mass extinction event
Multi-Scale Dynamic Modeling, Validation, and Uncertainty Quantification of Radial Flow Fixed Bed Contactors for CO2 Capture
No full textOne of the key sources of carbon dioxide emissions to the environment is fossil fuel combustion for power generation. Post-combustion CO2 capture using amine-based solvents is currently the most matured process. However, amines are corrosive and lead to degradation products at even moderate temperatures generating environmental pollutants, and require high energy for regeneration. Solid sorbents are a promising alternative. They possess lower regeneration energy, thermal stability, and have highly tunable porous structures with large surface area that can help in achieving high loading and high adsorption rates. This work focuses on mathematical modeling of CO2 adsorption/desorption processes using solid sorbents. First, a multi-scale model of an isothermal axial flow adsorber model is developed with submodels for particle-scale and bulk-scales. The sorbent used is the amine-appended metal-organic framework (MOF) that exhibits a steep step-shaped adsorption isotherm and high loading capacity at post-combustion capture conditions, as well as relatively low temperature of around 100°C that is adequate for desorption. The multi-scale model is validated against lab-scale data. A multi-scale model of a radial flow bed is also developed. Due to the spatial variation of surface area and solid sorbent volume in the radial direction, the inlet position of adsorption and desorption gases affects the performance of the radial-flow adsorbers. Therefore, all possible configurations of the inlet and outlet streams during the adsorption and desorption stages are evaluated. Next, an embedded heat exchanger is proposed to improve the bed capture capacity. The process with heat removal is then scaled up to a commercial capacity, and an economic evaluation of the configurations is done based on process conditions of flue gas from a power plant. A Bayesian uncertainty quantification procedure is developed for quantifying uncertainty in the isotherm model. The uncertainties in the isotherm model are propagated through the adsorption model to quantify the uncertainty in the key performance measures such as breakthrough time, desorption time, and energy consumption