16144 research outputs found
Sort by
Neurodegeneration and Neuroinflammation in the Olfactory Bulb of Zebrafish Following Acute Hypoxia
Get PDFHypoxia, the lack of sufficient oxygen in tissues to sustain bodily functions, has a deleterious effect on physiological and behavioral health. Unlike mammalian brains, which are restrained in their capacity to recover following damage and hypoxic injury, zebrafish are an excellent model to study exposure to hypoxia due to substantial neuroplasticity mechanisms within their brain. Specifically, the olfactory bulbs (OBs) display high neuroplasticity and neurogenesis (i.e., generation of new neurons), making it a useful model to study neural responses under stressed environmental conditions such as hypoxia. Here, we establish a new paradigm of hypoxic exposure in zebrafish to uncover the effects of oxygen deprivation on the olfactory system. To induce hypoxia, we displaced dissolved O2 (DO) by perfusing N2 gas into the water until we reached hypoxic levels of 0.6-0.8 mg/mL DO compared to the normoxic (control) DO of 5.0 mg/mL. We then allowed zebrafish to recover for either 1-hour post hypoxia (1 hph) exposure or 1-day post hypoxia (1 dph). To measure the efficacy of our hypoxic conditions, we stained for active mitochondrial dehydrogenase activity, determined by triphenyl tetrazolium chloride (TTC) staining. To assess degeneration in the OBs, we performed immunohistochemistry assays to label astrocytes through Glial fibrillary acidic protein (GFAP) staining and cells undergoing apoptosis through Terminal deoxynucleotidyl transferase biotin-dUTP nick end labeling (TUNEL). We observed decreased TTC staining which suggests mitochondrial activity reduction, (indicative of neural death or damage) caused by hypoxia in the olfactory bulbs. In addition, we found that at 1 dph, the OBs present an increase in astrocyte activation and cells undergoing apoptosis. Overall, these findings validate hypoxia as an injury model for studying degeneration and regeneration in zebrafish. This research can give insights into further understanding of hypoxia’s impact on the body, specifically on olfactory morphology
Hope College Abstracts: 22nd Annual Celebration of Undergraduate Research and Creative Activity
Get PDFThe 22nd Annual Celebration of Undergraduate Research and Creative Activity was held on April 14, 2023 in the Richard and Helen DeVos Fieldhouse at Hope College and featured student-faculty collaborative research projects. This program is a record reflective of those projects between the 2022-2023 academic year
News from Hope College, Volume 55.2: Winter 2023
Get PDFhttps://digitalcommons.hope.edu/news_from_hope_college/1264/thumbnail.jp
Opus: Spring 2023
Get PDFAn issue of Opus from spring 2023.https://digitalcommons.hope.edu/opus_2020s/1003/thumbnail.jp
Does Visual Dominance Influence Looking Patterns in Adults?
Get PDFLanguage acquisition begins with learning names of common objects by discovering the link between the word and the object. Yet even this is difficult because many objects are often in view when an object\u27s name is spoken. Research shows that children hold objects close to their faces, making them larger in view than other objects, which we call visual dominance . Infants learn names of objects better when the object named is visually dominant (Yu & Smith, 2012). We want to test if visual dominance aids word learning even when objects are not being held. We will test this by displaying images of novel objects on a screen and testing whether adults learn their novel names. In 80 training trials, we presented images of three objects at a time, and named one object. For participants in the Dominant condition, the named object ( target ) was always larger than the non-named objects ( distractors ) and for participants in the Equal condition, the target was equal in size to the non-named objects. We hypothesize that adults will look faster and more often to target objects in the Dominant condition. Additionally, we hypothesize that greater looking to the target object will aid in learning the target\u27s names. We examined object name learning based on which object they looked at and/or pointed toward when asked where is the [novel name of the object]? at the end of the study. Preliminary data from 34 undergraduates supports our first hypothesis that participants in the Dominant condition looked more to the target object than the distractors during training trials. Future analyses will investigate whether participants learned more words in the Dominant condition, and how their looking during training relates to their word learning
Compassion Fatigue within Pre-service Teachers: An Analysis within Hope College’s Education Department
Get PDFWith growing signs of burnout along with increased compassion fatigue reported in teachers, we were interested in studying whether this burnout and compassion fatigue begins to show during the student teaching semester. This semester occurs during the last semester of the pre-service teacher\u27s undergraduate studies. This semester should align with the real world of teaching , and set up individuals to get ready to enter the field.
Current research shows a correlation between teacher burnout symptoms to teaching enthusiasm levels. Analysis of previous research proved that gender, seniority, and the teacher burnout symptoms of emotional exhaustion and a decreasing sense of personal accomplishment were significant predictors of both teaching and subject enthusiasm (Dağyar & Kasalak, 2022). Additionally, research by King and Wheeler (2019) explores the dark side of interpersonal communication allowing students to open up about traumatic personal experiences and the stress that can lead to compassion fatigue in teachers. Furthermore, Ziaian-Gafari and Berg\u27s (2019) qualitative research explored compassion fatigue and burnout, which both appeared when general education teachers worked with students with exceptionalities or those students with trauma. Compassion fatigue has been shown to affect one\u27s health-related quality of life negatively (Jackson et al., 2021).
Looking at this previous research, we were interested in exploring when this compassion fatigue begins to show during teaching. Specifically, our research questions are: (1) Do pre-service teachers show signs of compassion fatigue during the student teaching semester? (2) Do pre-service teachers report needing additional assistance (such as mentorship or counseling) during the student teaching semester? To explore these questions, we gave the standardized survey, The Professional Quality of Life Scale (ProQLS) to 55 pre-service student teachers in Spring 2022. Our poster will dive into the qualitative results
Women of Color United Focus Exhibition
Get PDFA poster advertising a focus exhibition of artwork selected by Hope College\u27s Women of Color United (WOCU). The exhibition was held from January 13-May 15, 2023.https://digitalcommons.hope.edu/kam_poster/1065/thumbnail.jp
Identity Development and Empathy Among Pre-Health Students: A Longitudinal Study Employing Latent Class Analysis
Get PDFPre-health students endure rigorous education to prepare for treating patients, but potentially not for every aspect of patient care. Beyond medical knowledge, successful patient interactions often include moral decision making and the possession of traits such as empathy. There is little research on early physician and nurse development, with a substantial gap at the undergraduate level. This is significant as the trend toward a decrease in empathy could begin sooner. We explore this using latent class analysis to categorize participants based upon survey response patterns regarding numerous indicators, the most dominant class indicators being religion and political views
Electrically-evoked Referred Sensations Induce Embodiment of Rubber Limb
Get PDFIntroduction: Electrical stimulation is increasingly relevant in a variety of medical treatments. In this study, the quality of referred sensations evoked using surface electrical stimulation was evaluated using the rubber hand and foot illusions.
Methods: The rubber hand and foot illusions were attempted under 4 conditions: (1) multi-location tapping; (2) one-location tapping; (3) electrical stimulation of sensation referred to the hand or foot; (4) asynchronous control. The strength of each illusion was quantified using a questionnaire and proprioceptive drift, where a stronger response suggested embodiment of the rubber limb.
Results: 45 able-bodied individuals and two individuals with amputations participated in this study. Overall, the illusion evoked by nerve stimulation was not as strong as illusions evoked by physically tapping but stronger than the control illusion.
Conclusion: This study has found that the rubber hand and foot illusion can be performed without touching the distal limb of the participant. Electrical stimulation that produced referred sensation in the distal extremity was realistic enough to partially incorporate the rubber limb into a person’s body image