236 research outputs found
Mishima Yukio's Kyoko no Ie : The Influence of The Embarkation for Cythera
No full textKyoko no Ie is a representative full-length novel written by Mishima Yukio in his mid-career writing. The text is influenced by the painting, The Embarkation for Cythera, which represents the classical theme in Western literature of the 'pilgrimage of love'. The main discussion of the novel is focused on the function of the motif of 'pilgrimage of love'. Analysis concluded that 'pilgrimage of love' is positioned as the journey to the artistic sublimation of the pleasure of death. This setting is considered to reflect the literary status of the author at that time
What Love Doesn't Conquer
No full textThis work was embargoed by the author and will not be publicly available until May 2020.This is a collection of thematically linked narrative essays
Silence
No full textThis work was embargoed by the author and will not be publicly available until April 2030.This thesis is a collection of eight personal essays that the author crafted over the course of three years at George Mason University’s Master of Fine Arts in Creative Nonfiction Program. The essays follow a chronological order. Essay 1, Origin Story, is meant to delve into earlier years; Essay 2, The Iowa Story, jumps to the author’s 22nd year of life; Essay 3, Oxygen, took place two years later. Darien, Connecticut, Essay 4, describes teaching high school in an especially singular environment. Essays 5 and 6 both took place during the Darien years, and are meant to serve as reminders to both the author and the reader that life is made up of no one tone or mood. Essays 7 and 8, Before You Decide and A Kindness, took place in Virginia, where I currently reside. The collection is entitled Silence because to tell many of these stories involves breaking a socially imposed muteness and set of cultural codes. It is my aim to tell the stories that need telling, regardless of such pre-existing constructions, which limit us and keep us alone in our emotions and experience, and thus perpetuate a cycle of stigma and shame.2030-04-3
Development of an in vivo tissue-engineered, autologous heart valve (the biovalve) : preparation of a prototype model
No full textObjective: This study aimed to develop an autologous heart valve without using traditional in vitro tissue-engineering methods, which necessitate complicated cell management protocols under exceptionally clean laboratory facilities. Methods: An autologous heart valve construct composed of trileaflets was prepared using a specially designed mold. The mold was prepared by covering a silicone rod with a crown-shaped tubular polyurethane scaffold containing 3 horns. The mold was implanted in the dorsal subcutaneous space in Japan White rabbits for 4 weeks. After harvesting, the implanted trileaflet valve-shaped structure with an internal diameter of either 5 or 20 mm was obtained by trimming the membranous tissue formed between the horns located around the silicone rod. The valve substitute was examined both macroscopically and histologically. The tensile strength of the leaflets was measured to rupture. The degree of regurgitation in valve function was evaluated using a flow circuit by calculating the ratio of the regurgitation volume to the forward flow volume. Results: After implantation, the mold was completely covered with connective tissue consisting mostly of collagen and fibroblasts. Harvesting of the mold was straightforward, because there was little adhesion between the formed tissue and the native skin tissue. The trileaflet heart valve construct was obtained after withdrawing the inserted rods and trimming the membranous tissues formed between the horns of the scaffold. It was firmly attached to the scaffold, the interstices and surface of which revealed connective tissues composed of components similar to those of the leaflet tissue. Although the mechanical properties of the leaflet tissue were less efficient than those of the native porcine aortic valve leaflets, satisfactory valvular functions were demonstrated under pulsatile conditions using a flow circuit. No regurgitation was observed under retrograde hydrostatic pressures of up to 60 mm Hg, the physiologic pressure acting on the aortic valves during retrograde aortic flow. Conclusions: The biovalve, an autologous, in vivo tissue-engineered, trileaflet, valve-shaped construct, was developed using our novel in-body tissue architecture technology. The biovalve has the potential to be an ideal prosthetic heart valve, with excellent biocompatibility to the growth of the recipient’s heart
The Effects of a Juvenile Hormone Active Oxime Ether Compound on the Metamorphosis and Reproduction of an Anopheline Vector, Anopheles balabacensis (Diptera : Culicidae)
No full textMigrations
No full textMigrations explores the coming of age of a twenty-something woman by refracting her experiences through the lens of nature. Exploring how a close-knit family grows and shifts, this collection of personal essays helps the narrator understand her place in the world. By examining astronomical phenomena, storms and meteorology, the science of pain and empathy, migration patterns, folklore interpretations of animal behavior, among other natural concepts, the narrator makes sense of her emotional truths, charting her growth as she navigates her twenties and her family's changing landscape. This is a collection about family, about storytelling, and about the way the world around us mimics the cycles and patterns of human experience.This work is embargoed by the author and will not be available until May 2, 2028.2028-05-0
Secondhand: Essays
No full text"Secondhand" is a collection of linked essays that centers on the sudden death of the narrator's father in 2005, when she was 21. Each of the eight essays in the collection explores who her father was and the grief she and her family experienced after his death. All of the essays attempt to recreate and understand the father and the narrator's relationship with him from the various things, ideas, and stories he's left behind. The author has incorporated research from primary and secondary sources in her attempt to understand how it is we go about remembering, understanding, and recreating someone we have lost.This thesis has been embargoed and will not be available until February 2030
The Places That Bind
No full textThis thesis has been embargoed for 10 years and will not be available until April 2028 at the earliest.This thesis is a collection of fictional stories that intertwine through place and character. Through these stories, the author has attempted to analyze how we experience certain places and why we’re drawn to those places—whether they are dying cities or candy shops or watershed gorges or dive bars—and how our connections to those places affect us. This collection focuses mainly on the city of Erie, Pennsylvania, where the economy is dying and the Great Lake’s algae blooms have sent its fragile ecosystem into a tailspin. The residents are trapped in the city and most of the people who try to leave usually don’t make it out. With elements of magical realism and mythology throughout, this work attempts to investigate the idea that place can function as a character and also how place can impact characters and their relationships.2028-04-3
Studies on the Effective Attractants of Anopheline Mosquitoes : I. Blood-Feeding, Mating and Flight Activity of Female Anopheles balabacensis (Diptera : Culcidae)
No full textEscape the End
No full textThis thesis is a collection of personal essays that span my entire life. A few concern my childhood, but most of the essays revolve around the past few years, from the ages of twenty-three to twenty-six. The collection poses questions about ideas of homecoming— what “home” means, why we feel the desire to escape, and what, inevitably, brings us back. The centrifugal force behind this work is the passing of my mother, Tina, who died on April 20th 2010. Although I spent years trying to get away from Virginia, traveling to nearly two dozen countries on three continents, living for extended periods of time in Germany and Slovakia, I’ve always come back to where I was from. I currently live in Virginia, tethered to a teaching job and a fiancé; however, in less than a year I will be escaping yet again—south this time, to settle down in Mexico City.This work is embargoed by the author and will not be available until August 2014
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