1925 research outputs found
Sort by
The Power of Maps: Utilizing Mapping as an Emergent Method for Food System Assessments
No full textDrawn by the hand of man, maps have been used as tools for centuries. Maps have enabled the stealing of Native lands, the building of nations, the silencing of already marginalized voices, and the further concentration of power. Burgeoning movements are reclaiming maps as tools for transformation. The power of the map is not limited to devastation; maps have the power to bring voice to the marginalized, visibility to the invisible, and to enable deep democracy processes. Such maps provide a ripe opportunity for emancipatory processes within our food system. Food system assessment maps are highly political and cultural agents which are used for funding narratives, policy recommendations, non-government and government programming, relationship building, capitalist development, and community identity. Importantly, food system assessment maps have not yet been methodologically challenged as axes of power and place.
This research used a performative map space theoretical framework to investigate the phase transitions of food system information into food system assessment maps. This research investigated the performance of food system assessment maps through 25 map reviews and 4 corresponding semi-structured interviews with the mapmakers. The purpose of this research was to articulate the power of maps for food system assessment work through a critical review of methods, food system framework, territory type, and emancipatory elements. This research uncovered the work of food system assessment maps and how these mappings perform as active levers of change by actually territorializing food system outcomes. This research shows food system scholars, activists, producers, and eaters have an emergent opportunity to methodologically intervene in the production of food system assessment maps to wield the power of maps for more just food system renderings
Examining suicide education materials to positively impact stigma and helping behavior, moderated by dispositional empathy
No full textSuicide is a major leading cause of death in the world. There are many forms of preventions, interventions, and educations for suicide available and in use, but there is not one type that maximally benefits all groups of people. Empathetic concern and helping behavior, as suggested by previous research, are important factors of suicide education. Stigmatization of suicide deters individuals from seeking various available forms of help. The purpose of this research was to examine a new prevention education material (personal story) and traditional education material to determine which is more beneficial in decreasing stigma and increasing literacy of suicide and helping behavior. The study’s results suggest that measured empathetic concern (IRI) and perspective taking IRI) do not moderate the relationship between the type of education material and stigma. Additionally, results indicated higher measured helping behavior in those in the traditional education group as compared to the new education material. Explanations of the results and direction for future studies are presented
Data-driven and multi-modality modeling of blood flow physics
No full textDynamic mode decomposition (DMD) is a purely data-driven and equation-free technique for reduced-order modeling of dynamical systems and fluid flow. DMD finds a best fit linear reduced-order model that represents any given spatiotemporal data. In DMD, each mode evolves with a fixed frequency and therefore DMD modes represent physically meaningful structures that are ranked based on their dynamics. The application of DMD to patient-specific cardiovascular flow data is challenging. First, the input flow rate is unsteady and pulsatile. Second, the flow topology can change significantly in different phases of the cardiac cycle. Finally, blood flow in patient-specific diseased arteries is complex and often chaotic. On the other hand, high-fidelity patient-specific modeling of cardiovascular flows and hemodynamics is challenging. Direct blood flow measurement inside the body with in-vivo measurement modalities such as 4D flow magnetic resonance imaging (4D flow MRI) suffer from low resolution and acquisition noise. In-vitro experimental modeling and patient-specific computational fluid dynamics (CFD) models are subject to uncertainty in patient-specific boundary conditions and model parameters. Furthermore, collecting blood flow data in the near-wall region (e.g., wall shear stress) with experimental measurement modalities poses additional challenges.The first objective of this study was to overcome applying DMD on cardiovascular flow data challenges using our proposed multistage dynamic mode decomposition with control (mDMDc) method and use this technique to study patient-specific blood flow physics. In the second phase of this study, a computationally efficient data assimilation method called reduced-order modeling Kalman filter (ROM-KF) was proposed, which combined a sequential Kalman filter with reduced-order modeling using a linear model provided by dynamic mode decomposition (DMD). The goal of ROM-KF was to overcome low resolution and noise in experimental and uncertainty in CFD modeling of cardiovascular flows. In the first phase, the inlet flow rate was considered as the controller input to the systems. Blood flow data were divided into different stages based on the inlet flow waveform and DMD with control was applied to each stage. The system was augmented to consider both velocity and wall shear stress (WSS) vector data, and therefore study the interaction between the coherent structures in velocity and near-wall coherent structures in WSS.
First, it was shown that DMD modes can exactly represent the analytical Womersley solution for incompressible pulsatile flow in tubes. Next, our method was applied to image-based coronary artery stenosis and cerebral aneurysm models where complex blood flow patterns are anticipated. The flow patterns were studied using the mDMDc modes and the reconstruction errors were reported. Our augmented mDMDc framework could capture coherent structures in velocity and WSS with a fewer number of modes compared to the traditional DMD approach and demonstrated a close connection between the velocity and WSS modes. In the second phase, the accuracy of the method was assessed with 1D Womersley flow, 2D idealized aneurysm, and 3D patient-specific cerebral aneurysm models. Synthetic experimental data were used to enable direct quantification of errors using a benchmark dataset. The accuracy of ROM-KF in reconstructing near-wall hemodynamics was assessed by applying the method to problems where near-wall blood flow data were missing in the experimental dataset. The ROM-KF method provided blood flow data that were more accurate than the computational and synthetic experimental datasets and improved near-wall hemodynamics quantification
Addressing poverty in Malawi through social entrepreneurship: an analysis of mango fruit farming in Chipampha Village, Lilongwe, Malawi
No full textMalawi is a landlocked country located in the southeastern part of Africa with a tropical climate. The primary employment of the country is agriculture, which is dependent on rain-fed crops. However, the country also has tropical fruits such as mangoes that offer alternative food sources. Even though mango fruits are abundant, they are hardly regarded as commercial fruits that can help smallholder farmers in rural communities to escape poverty. This research aimed to examine why a small population of smallholder farmers hardly practice Mango farming. It also assessed how mango fruit farming could benefit the farmers socially and economically through social entrepreneurship. Individual interviews, focus group meetings, and short surveys were employed with smallholder farmers to collect data on their perspectives about Mango fruit farming and a social enterprise
Coccidioides the causative agent of Valley Fever: characterization of parasitic behaviors in the lab and in the field
Get PDFThe disease San Joaquin Valley Fever (Valley fever, coccidioidomycosis) is caused by the inhalation of arthroconidia of Coccidioides species, which are dimorphic fungi found in arid desert soil. My dissertation research is focused on using microbiological, molecular, and epidemiological tools to investigate the pathogenetic behaviors of these important fungal pathogens. After asexual arthroconidia are exposed the host respiratory system they transform into pathogenic structures termed spherules. The molecular determinants responsible for parasitic morphogenesis are not well characterized. In chapter two, my collaborators and I provide a detailed account of spherule growth using both species of Coccidioides. We investigated spherule density and diameter over time, thus providing a valuable tool which is easily reproducible and can be applied to future studies examining spherule development. Within the host, Coccidioides spherules cyclically rupture and release small structures called endospores. The molecular signaling pathways involved in this key step of development and establishment of infection remain largely obscure. In chapter three, we describe the transcriptome and volatile metabolome active during spherule remodeling and endospore formation. Subsequently, expression of genes of interest were confirmed in an in vivo model using NanoString technology. In summary, our results specify the first list of key target genes for future functional characterization that are active during endospore formation, a critical step in coccidioidomycosis. In chapter four, we conduct the first focused investigation of coccidioidomycosis in Northern Arizona. Arizona has some of the highest number of confirmed cases of coccidioidomycosis nationwide each year, which predominantly occur in the southern part of the state. In moderately or suspected endemic regions such as Northern Arizona, the risk of acquiring disease is lower, but still prevalent. The region may contain habitat which supports Coccidioides survival, but little focus has been placed on the current disease burden. We investigate susceptibility of various populations, geographic origins of infection using genomic epidemiology, and the potential for regions of northern Arizona to support the pathogen. Our goal is to document the region-specific implications for human health in regard to Valley fever, providing a reference for future investigations and public health awareness campaigns
Investigating Coccidioides specific pH response and targeted gene deletion using CRISPR-Cas9
No full textValley fever is caused by the fungal pathogen, Coccidioides, which has two known species, C. immitis and C. posadasii. This xerotolerant fungus is associated with alkaline soils in arid to semi-arid regions of the Americas that have elevated average temperatures and low annual rainfall. Due to the soil being highly alkaline, Coccidioides likely utilizes intracellular signaling mechanisms to survive these conditions. In this study, we describe the first investigation into the pH sensing mechanism in Coccidioides, the pH-responsive Pal/RIM pathway. We tested wild type Coccidioides growth in varying pH environments using both liquid and solid media, as well as generating a PacC knock-out strain using the CRISPR-Cas9 method. RNA expression data was also collected from the varying pH media to compare the Pal pathway transcription factor, PacC, activity. Our study establishes that wild type Coccidioides grows on media ranging from pH 7-9. In vitro-assembled CRISPR/Cas9 was used to create a PacC knockout to investigate functional effects upon loss of PacC function. We were able to successfully delete the PacC transcription factor utilizing our CRISPR-Cas9 method. This study provides novel insight into how this organism utilizes a highly conserved fungal pH sensing pathway and will lead to future insight on the pathogenesis and lifecycle of Coccidioides
My nigga: the potential acceptability of an n-word derivative in Hip-Hop Based Education and university educational contexts
No full textThis purpose of this study was to determine the socio-cultural impact and parameters of Hip-Hop Based Education (HHBE) with the underlying goals of: a) detailing HHBE in relation to previously accepted education paradigms and philosophies; b) detailing the embedded nature of the language of hip-hop in the form of an amalgamation of African American Vernacular English (AAVE) and Hip Hop Nation Language (HHNL) within HHBE; c) determining through acceptability judgments any potential semantic and pragmatic shifts in the lexical item nigga that results in its speciation to a term of kinship from its source lexical item nigger and; d) exploring the acceptability of the lexical item nigga in various university level academic contexts and regulations (e.g., speech codes, safe spaces) due to its embedded nature within AAVE, HHNL, and potentially HHBE curriculum. Due to social distancing COVID-19 requirements, 409 Facebook participants were recruited to engage with a 36-question five-point Likert scale acceptability judgment tool and subsequent focus groups to explore the acceptability of the term nigga as it relates to generation, biological sex, ethnicity, and university level academic contexts. According to the results, a low 36.4% of participants judged it totally acceptable to use the word nigga as a term of kinship with ethnicity, biological sex, and generation as influencers, a low 38.9% of participants judged it totally acceptable that the lexical items nigga and nigger have two different meanings with biological sex and generation as an influencing factor, and focus group participants largely saw the acceptability of the lexical item nigga as context dependent (e.g., ethnicity of the speaker, intent, etc.). These results indicate that curriculum and instruction designers in the field of education should develop explicit parameters for the use of nigga when designing and implementing HHBE programs while considering how ethnicity, generation, and biological gender couple with socio-cultural climate contributes to the acceptability of the word
The Magmatic Evolution of the San Francisco Volcanic Field's Sugarloaf Mountain, Through U-Th Dating and Compositional Analyses
Get PDFRhyolites are the product of some of the largest eruptions in geologic history and come from shallow crustal reservoirs. There is considerable uncertainty as to how these magmas are stored and how they are remobilized for eruption. This can be linked to whether these magmas were stored in a less crystalline, readily eruptible state or in a more crystalline immobile state that becomes eruptible only after the reservoir is recharged by an influx of magma. In this thesis study, the storage conditions and magmatic evolution of a small-volume high-silica rhyolite is investigated using 230U-238Th dating of zircon and allanite surfaces, allanite geochemical analyses, and whole-rock major and trace element data. Sugarloaf Mountain is the youngest entirely silicic eruption within the San Francisco Volcanic Field in northern Arizona and is located at the mouth of San Francisco Mountain’s Inner Basin. This lava dome is composed of high silica rhyolite (>75 wt.% SiO2) that contains sanidine and accessory minerals such as zircon, allanite, and possibly chevkinite. Its sanidine 40Ar/39Ar date of 91±2 ka (Morgan et al. 2010) makes Sugarloaf Mountain an appropriate choice for 238U-230Th dating and compositional analyses. Precise age dating proved to be possible because of Sugarloaf’s zircon exceptionally high UO2 concentrations (0.7-2.3 wt.%). A minor population of zircons yields a weighted mean model age of ~95 ka (n=3; MSWD=~4). Most zircons yield a substantially younger weighted mean model age of ~75 ka (n =28; MSWD= 1.8 to 2.0) and a zircon isochron date of 76.5 ±7.3 ka. The allanites yield a range of slightly older weighted mean model ages from 72.6 ± 0.3 ka (n=61; MSWD=1.7) and 79.7 ± 0.2 ka (n=61; MSWD=1.4). The uniformity of the zircon and allanite surface ages indicate accessory phase co-crystallization and suggests that the younger dates are representative of final crystal rim growth. A zircon-allanite isochron date of 75.4 ± 1.0 ka, therefore, represents an eruption age for Sugarloaf Mountain, one that is ~15 kyr younger than the sanidine 40Ar/39Ar date provided by Morgan et al. (2010).
Compositional analyses of the allanite rims and interiors provide evidence of disequilibrium and chemical fluctuations, indicated by, but not limited to, growth zoning and/or oscillatory zoning. Identification of sector zoning in some of the allanite interiors was an unexpected outcome of this work and is the first to be recorded for volcanic allanite. Cross-sectional analyses of the Sugarloaf allanite interiors to determine chemical melt evolution recorded by covariations between La/Nd and MnO/MgO values proved to be difficult because of the unusually low MgO values and the finding of sector-dependent elemental partitioning. Use of MnO/FeO instead of MnO/MgO as a proxy for differentiation was able to show that allanite interiors have a wider range in composition compared to the surfaces, indicating variable melt composition before eruption related to magma differentiation and recharge.
The largely uniform zircon and allanite surface dates and the compositional uniformity of the allanite surfaces, together with zircon and allanite growth rates, indicate that the grains were immersed in the melt for at least 1.3 kyrs and grew in a single body of magma. The older zircon population could further indicate a previous period of warm storage before the younger-aged zircon and allanites grew after a ~20 ka period of cold storage. This study was able to provide a more precise and younger age for Sugarloaf Mountain, one that aligned with similarly aged eruptions within a ~250 km2 area, and insights into how Sugarloaf magma evolved before the eruption
The role of induction in the development of teacher professional identity: a survey of elementary teachers in international schools in the Middle East
No full textThe number of teachers in international schools is constantly increasing, especially in the Middle East where the international school sector is expanding rapidly. However, the complexities of foreign teachers’ professional identity development in international schools have not been fully explored. Through a non-experimental, ex-post facto design, this study addresses the issue of teacher professional identity of foreign male and female educators in international schools in the Middle East in relation to induction. I analyzed data from a survey to assess whether length of induction impacts foreign teachers’ professional identity development. Furthermore, analyses were conducted to identify whether there are significant differences between male and female foreign teachers in the development of their professional identities. Data was collected from 127 foreign teachers in the Middle East, particularly from Kuwait, Qatar, and United Arab Emirates. Professional identity was examined from the perspective of five constructs: self-presentation, self-image, self-esteem, self-categorization, and self-concept. Findings reveal that length of induction does not have a significant bearing on teachers’ professional identity development in international schools in the Middle East. However, the study was conducted during the Covid-19 pandemic, and the process of induction was not conducted it its traditional form, as aspects of the teaching and learning process took precedent during the current context. As a result, the most indicated length of induction was 0-3 days with many participants indicating that their experiences of induction have been mainly virtual. Further findings reveal significant differences between males and females in their ratings of the various components of professional identity. The Multiple Regression Analysis (MRA) indicated that sex accounts for a small percentage of the variances. Therefore, other factors may explain the significance found in this study. Further investigation into the specific cultural nuances of Middle Eastern international schools and their impact on male and female foreign teachers is recommended. Overall, the results in this study underscore that induction represents a key element in foreign teachers’ accommodation to the international school environment, and school administration should further develop their induction processes ensuring that sufficient time, resources, and efforts are invested
Unaccompanied Migrant Children: Experiences and Challenges
No full textSince 2014, the number of unaccompanied alien children (UAC) immigrating to the United States has increased dramatically. The U.S Custom and Border Protection Department has reported experiencing a crisis alongside the Southwest border due to the massive number of apprehensions of children who are illegally immigrating to the U.S unaccompanied by legal guardians. Due to this influx, it has been impossible for those various governmental agencies who are directly involved with the UAC population to provide legally mandated services, as well as to comply with other directives that have been set forth to protect the security and rights of these children. As a result, there have been allegations of child maltreatment, neglect, and abuse leveled against the Department of Homeland Security and the Office of Refugee Resettlement. From the start, the attention given to this particular issue has generally tended to focus solely on the sheer numbers of youth being apprehended and the failures of the government to adequately provide security and services to them. There, however, has been little research examining the characteristics and experiences of these unaccompanied children, including whether the services stipulated for these children are truly ensuring their safety and well-being. Therefore, this project aims to fill the informational gap concerning the UAC population. Through secondary data analysis and intensive, in-person interviews with youth care workers, who are responsible for meeting the physical, emotional, and legal needs of these children, this research examines who these children are, where they come from, how and why, and the unique challenges they face once they have been apprehended. The study also briefly examines whether there is a gender difference in UACs migration journey and custodial experiences