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What Do We Know About The World? Rhetorical and Argumentative Perspectives
Full text linkThis work appears as volume 1 in the Windsor Studies in Argumentation (WSIA) Series as well as volume 25 in the Digital Library Dissertationes series. Special thanks to Elisa Durante for her editoral work on this volume
An Investigation into Bloodstain Pattern Analysis: The Reliability of Swipe/Wipe and Directionality Determination Approaches
No full textSwipe/wipe patterns are some of the most common bloodstain patterns encountered at bloodied crime scenes. These patterns can be pivotal to describing the events that occurred at the time of a crime, as well as determining the accuracy of a witness statement. Recently, a study from the University of Auckland was published, stating that the overall error rate of swipe/wipe pattern classifications was 32%. This high error rate is a problem because an incorrect pattern classification could have a large impact on the outcome of legal proceedings. The aim of this project is to test current bloodstain pattern analysis (BPA) protocol reliability, to see how much, if at all, the material effects classification accuracy, and to expand on the study from the University of Auckland. Only a small amount of published data is available on this subject, and considering the alarming error rate, more data is needed to ensure bloodstain pattern analysis methods are dependable. To examine this, swipe/wipe patterns were created using 4 different materials. The patterns were then photographed and sent to BPA experts all over Canada, and internationally. All patterns were created by simply deploying the chosen pattern type in a left or right fashion with the chosen material. It should also be noted that all patterns were created by the same researcher. This study is still in progress, to date the error rate for pattern determination is 17.5 %, and the error rate for direction determination is 6.6%. If the data continues to display this trend, a new protocol should be considered to improve the pattern classification error rate. Also, the data will be able to identify any trends associated with a specific material being more likely to cause an incorrect classification. This project could improve the future of BPA protocol
Examining the Interpersonal Context of Intimate Partner Violence: The Role of Emotional Communication and Relationship Distress
Full text linkIn many community samples of couples, intimate partner violence (IPV) can be defined as a dyadic phenomenon that occurs during conflict escalation. Yet, among the risk factors associated with male-to-female (M-F) IPV (i.e., physical, psychological, and sexual violence), the interpersonal context is one of the least understood. Thus, identifying which aspects of communication are associated with IPV is critical to inform emerging models of relational violence.
Although heightened emotional arousal and poor emotion regulation are common experiences reported among individuals who engage in IPV, no investigation has explored patterns of emotional arousal during conversations involving couples with M-F IPV. Therefore, the current study is the first to examine patterns of vocally-encoded emotional arousal during couple conversations between husbands who previously engaged in IPV and their wives (N = 149). Couples were recruited using a 2x2 design that crossed relationship distress and mild physical IPV. Emotional arousal was measured continuously during two problem-solving conversations using vocal fundamental frequency. Three sets of analyses were used to explore different aspects of emotional communication. These included:
-Growth curve models to examine overall trajectories of emotional arousal
-Cross-lagged actor-partner interdependence models to assess emotional reactivity between partners
-Coupled-linear oscillator models to examine emotion co-regulation
Results indicate that male partners in distressed/IPV relationships were responsive to their female partner’s arousal, took longer to return to their typical level of arousal when their partner became upset, and demonstrated continuous increases in arousal across the conversation. This differed from distressed/no IPV and non-distressed/IPV couples: while these partners were also reactive to each other’s arousal and slowed each other’s returns to baseline, both men and women demonstrated overall patterns of de-escalation by the end of the conversation.
These findings suggest a particular gender orientation for the unique impact of relationship distress and IPV on emotional communication: within such interpersonal contexts, men, relative to women, might have greater difficulty down-regulating their emotions—a process that has implications for risk of physical violence. Additionally, in line with the conference theme, these findings provide support for the use of novel methodologies to examine vulnerability factors among couples for whom other forms of violence are a problem (e.g., sexual coercion). Given that individuals who commit acts of sexual aggression also report difficulties in emotional expression and dampening of negative mood states, using tools such as vocal fundamental frequency might offer a window into interpersonal processes that are associated with sexual violence
Apoptotic Potential of Synthite Tea Extract in Multiple Human Melanoma Cell lines
No full text['UNSDG 3: Good Health and Well-being (https://sdgs.un.org/goals/goal3)', 'UNSDG 10: Reduced Inequalities (https://sdgs.un.org/goals/goal10)']Viable, Healthy and Safe CommunitiesMelanoma is the cancer of melanocytes and one of the most common forms of skin cancer worldwide. In modern medicine common treatments for melanoma include chemotherapy, surgery, and radiation therapy. However, these treatments give rise to several problems. Major concerns include that these treatments are non-selective and therefore often toxic to normal cells and that as melanoma develops into its later stages, these therapies grow less effective. Numerous studies have suggested natural health compounds serving as potential anti-cancer agents. Specifically, the ability of Green Tea Extract, from the plant Camellia Sinensis, has been shown to contain anti-inflammatory and anti-carcinogenic properties. In this study, a similar tea, Synthite Tea (GTE), an unprocessed fresh tea extract supplied by Synthite Industries Ltd. is evaluated for its apoptotic ability in multiple human melanoma cell lines. In addition, the interaction between STE and temozolomide (TMZ), the standard chemotherapeutic used for treating melanoma, is investigated. The results show that STE induces apoptosis in multiple human melanoma cell lines in a dose and time-dependent manner. Moreover, the GTE and TMZ combination treatment show a slight increase effect compared to the treatments separately. Further work with in-vivo mice models and targeting stem cells has been conducted. These findings suggest that GTE can be used as an anti-cancer therapeutic alone and in combination with temozolomide. Further studies should investigate the cellular mechanisms behind the anti-cancer activity of GTE
A retrospective single center study investigating the clinical significance of grade in triple negative breast cancer .
No full textBackground: Triple negative breast cancer (TNBC) is a heterogenous cancer type which lacks the receptors for estrogen (ER), progesterone (PR), and human epidermal growth factor receptor (HER-2) proteins. Comparatively, HER-2 positive cancers currently have a 7 year disease-free survival rate of 93% while in triple negative breast cancers, it can be as low as 77%. Purpose: While histological tumor grade or the degree of similarity to normal cells is an important prognostic factor (overall outcome), there is limited information on its predictive value (effect of specific therapeutic intervention). This project aimed to investigate the predictive value of grade in triple negative breast cancer for clinical decision making regarding treatment. Experimental Design: We reviewed 305 patient charts of triple negative breast cancer patients from 2004-2017 at Windsor Regional Cancer Center and the significance of grade with respect to oncological variables, survival-time, and time to relapse were explored. Results: The overall survival rates were 90.12%, 64.4%, and 77.2%, for grade 1, 2, 3 respectively. Comparing only between grade 2 and grade 3, we found that after five years, grade 2 patients had a 5.5-fold increased risk of death (HR = 5.5; 95% CI 1.2-25.6) and 2-folds higher risk of relapse (HR= 1.9; 95% CI 1.1-3.2). Grade 3 does significantly better than grade 2 in time to relapse with relapse rates of 70%, 55.6 %, and 75.6%, respectively for grades 1, 2, and 3 (P= 0.04). Conclusion: Grade can be shown to have positive predictive value in determining relapse with grade 2 showing poorest disease-free survival and faster time to relapse after the 5-year mark with implications in stratifying patients by grade in future clinical trials as further research elucidates more information about molecular differences between grades, as an explanation for these findings
Session 2: Cyber Sexual Aggression within Intimate Partner Aggression: Effects on Young Women
No full textCyber Sexual Aggression within Intimate Partner Aggression: Effects on Young Wome
Spatio-temporal Drivers of Nest Site Selection of the Northern Common Eider (Somateria mollissima borealis), East Bay Island, Nunavut.
Full text linkThe Northern common eider (Somateria mollissima borealis) is an Arctic-breeding sea duck that balances trade-offs between thermal protection and predation avoidance in its nest-site selection. While the landscape features driving these preferences have been characterized, it remains unclear whether nest-site selection has changed in response to warming temperatures and increased risk from novel predators during the breeding season. This study examines long-term patterns of nest-site selection amongst five monitored nesting areas at East Bay Island, Nunavut, from 1999 to 2023, with a focus on habitat (climate and landscape) drivers and changes in nest-site preferences. Our results revealed heterogeneity exists among the five nesting areas on EBI, characterized mainly by differences in landscape attributes; and that over time, eiders switched nesting preferences amongst these sites. We furthermore revealed these shifts were driven by hens increasingly selecting for reduced visibility, denser vegetation, and improved wind cover, indicating a shift toward prioritizing protection against predation. These changes most likely coincide with increased polar-bear predation, suggesting an adaptive response to heightened predation pressures. Interestingly, climate variables were unable to describe site heterogeneity or explain preferences in site quality, suggesting that for nesting eiders, climate may not yet be a significant stressor. This study highlights the complexity of nest-site selection in Arctic-breeding eiders in face of multiple stressors, and underscores the importance of continual monitoring and protection critical habitat features that reflect increasing pressures due to climate change. Understanding these dynamics can inform conservation strategies to support the adaptive capacity of eiders in rapidly changing Arctic ecosystems
System Reconfiguration for Reverse Logistics: A case study
Full text linkWith climate change becoming very concerning in the world today, reverse logistics has become important for several companies with respect to regaining the value of their products and/ or for proper disposal or recycling of returned products. The reverse logistics framework in this paper is inspired by research papers in the literature; reverse logistics plays an important role in the return and the remanufacturing processes of products to meet specific demands. Manufacturers face an increased flow of returned products in their system; hence, they need to effectively address the flow of returned products in their system and the challenges that occur in the remanufacturing processes due to the uncertainty related to the quantities and quality of the returned components. This research focuses on identifying the challenges encountered in a remanufacturing Reverse Logistics (RL) system and are illustrated with an automotive study. Lean Six-sigma techniques are used to find these issues encountered in the RL process or system, and a linear programming approach is taken to reconfigure the system to improve system throughput. The results obtained from the analysis and improvements done show that the facility should invest in additional machine-operator for process improvements and to increase the throughput of the system. After adjusting the various parameters, cost and production strategies, it is observed that the solutions are very similar
Establishing a Biomarker Discovery Platform to Track Progression to Treatment Resistant Neuroendocrine Prostate Cancer
No full textProstate cancer (PC) remains the most common cancer among North American men, with many cases progressing to castration-resistant prostate cancer (CRPC) despite androgen-deprivation therapy. A significant subset of these patients further develops neuroendocrine prostate cancer (NEPC), a highly aggressive and treatment-resistant form of the disease. Early identification of NEPC is crucial to improving patient outcomes, yet current diagnostic methods rely on invasive biopsies that are not routinely performed during disease progression. This study aims to establish a biomarker discovery platform to evaluate circulating tumor RNA (ctRNA) as a non-invasive diagnostic tool for tracking the progression from CRPC to NEPC. Using blood, saliva, and urine samples from prostate cancer patients, we will conduct whole transcriptome sequencing (WTS) to assess whether ctRNA accurately reflects tumor RNA profiles. We will specifically analyze molecular signatures associated with NEPC, including key cell cycle regulators, to determine the feasibility of ctRNA-based diagnostics. Preliminary findings suggest that NEPC exhibits a distinct cell cycle signature that we hypothesize can be detected in ctRNA. If successful, this study will justify a large-scale clinical trial to evaluate the use of liquid biopsies for early NEPC detection. Establishing ctRNA as a biomarker could significantly enhance personalized treatment strategies, enabling earlier intervention, improving survival outcomes, and reducing unnecessary treatments. This pilot study represents a critical step toward transforming prostate cancer management through non-invasive biomarker discovery
A Narrative Inquiry into Young Chinese English Language Learners' Cross-cultural Experiences Between Canada and China
No full textDue to the impacts of internationalization and competition within the global knowledge economy, China has consistently been the leading country to send the highest number of visiting scholars abroad (Institute of International Education, 2018; Ai, 2019), but the group of Chinese visiting scholars' children is often ignored. Will they face similar challenges as Chinese international students or immigrant children? How do they feel during the short stay in Canada and after they go back to China? As young ELLs, how do they adapt to the unfamiliar environment through language and culture? Therefore this research aims to fill the gap by making a narrative inquiry into the cross-cultural experiences of five young Chinese ELLs between Canada and China. The main research purposes are: 1) to understand how the young Chinese ELLs make meaning of their cross-cultural experiences through language and culture; 2) to explore the role that translanguaging plays in the transnational trip, including its changes across time; 3) to reveal the impact of the cross-cultural experiences on Chinese children's language practices and intercultural communication. In that way, the research not only addresses specific questions but also grasps a broader picture of Chinese children's transnational trip