Electronic Theses and Dissertations
Electronic theses and dissertations of masters and doctoral students submitted to the Graduate School.
Authors retain copyright to their works.
Recent Submissions
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(2022-05-19)Department: Computer ScienceStructural variant detection is an important problem in the field of computational genomics. Structural Variants (SVs) involve long DNA disruptions (e.g. insertions or deletions of more than 50 base pairs), and they are ...
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(2022-05-17)Department: Spanish & PortugueseThis dissertation is the most comprehensive survey of slavery in Afro-Latin American literary narrative to date. Of the approximately 12.5 million Africans trafficked in the Trans-Atlantic slave trade, an estimated 7 million ...
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(2022-05-17)Department: Cancer BiologyThe tumor microenvironment (TME) is rich with proliferating tumor cells and infiltrating immune cells. In these niches, glucose, glutamine, and fatty acids are consumed. However, it was previously underappreciated to what ...
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(2022-05-16)Department: Biomedical EngineeringTriple negative breast cancer (TNBC) is characterized by a lack of estrogen receptor, progesterone receptor, and HER2. Patients with TNBC therefore cannot benefit from treatment with one of the molecularly targeted therapies ...
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(2022-05-16)Department: EpidemiologyChemotherapy can lead to various acute side effects and long-term toxicities, affecting treatment compliance, efficacy, and long-term outcomes. Growing evidence suggests that gastrointestinal (GI) microbiota may influence ...
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(2022-05-16)Department: Biomedical EngineeringNeurodegenerative diseases are increasing in prevalence as the population of the United States ages. There are currently no cures or effective treatments for many of these diseases, likely in part due to the lack of ...
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(2022-05-11)Department: Molecular Pathology & ImmunologyMetabolism determines cell function and fate across tissues and disease states. Proliferative cells upregulate anabolic metabolism to support cell growth, division, and other activities. Glucose and glutamine are critical ...
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(2022-05-16)Department: Cancer BiologyBreast cancer cells frequently disseminate to bone where they proliferate or remain dormant, but the mechanisms controlling entry and exit from quiescence are largely unknown. This dissertation addresses this gap in knowledge ...
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(2022-05-10)Department: Cancer BiologyA crucial challenge in the care of cancer patients is identifying which treatment is most likely to benefit, and least likely to harm, each individual cancer patient. Herein, I present two projects: one which seeks to ...
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(2022-05-16)Department: Microbe-Host InteractionsAlthough the intestinal and skeletal systems are spatially distinct organ systems, they share many overlapping features and are linked by specific cellular and molecular pathways. Works described in this dissertation ...
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(2022-05-16)Department: BiochemistryImmune co-stimulatory and co-inhibitory receptors play a critical role in the maintenance of immune homeostasis. These checkpoint proteins have been proven to be effective targets in a cancer setting where constitutive ...
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(2022-05-16)Department: Cell & Developmental BiologyThe ventral actin cytoskeleton is a dynamic network of actin stress fibers (VSFs) and focal adhesions that produces contractile forces integral in cell polarization, migration and extracellular matrix remodeling. My research ...
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(2022-05-16)Department: Cancer BiologyLung adenocarcinoma (LUAD) is a heterogeneous group of tumors associated with different survival rates, even when detected at an early stage. While screening programs have proven to significantly increase the chance of ...
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(2022-05-16)Department: Microbe-Host InteractionsBacterial pneumonia is a leading cause of morbidity and mortality worldwide, and both host- and pathogen-derived factors contribute to pathogenesis. Acinetobacter baumannii is a Gram-negative pathogen that causes ...
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(2022-05-16)Department: Biomedical InformaticsOpioids are commonly prescribed for chronic pain. However, even when titrated appropriately, opioids may result in opioid-related adverse events (OAEs). Previous studies have defined OAEs categorically (e.g., did/did not ...
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(2022-05-16)Department: NeuroscienceSchizophrenia is a heterogeneous and functionally disabling illness that impacts individuals, their families, and society. Many individuals with schizophrenia do not achieve good clinical outcomes despite receiving optimal ...
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(2022-05-04)Department: Earth & Environmental SciencesEnvironmental change interacts with human mobility in complex ways that depend on interactions between impacts on individual households and on communities. These coupled individual-collective dynamics make agent-based ...
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(2022-05-16)Department: Electrical EngineeringTotal ionizing dose (TID) effects are important to consider for nonvolatile memories used in high-radiation environments. Nowadays NAND Flash memory devices are based primarily on 3D NAND architecture due to their advantages ...
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(2022-05-04)Department: Chemical EngineeringMonoclonal antibodies (mAbs) represent the largest class of biopharmaceuticals, accounting for over 50% of new drug approvals and 65% of global biopharmaceutical sales. Due to their complexity, mAbs are typically produced ...
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(2022-05-14)Department: PharmacologyCatecholaminergic polymorphic ventricular tachycardia (CPVT) is a lethal, stressed-induced cardiac channelopathy. CPVT is characterized by ventricular arrhythmias that are triggered by catecholamines released during exercise ...