cometadata/datacite-titles-descriptions-related-identifiers huggingface dataset:
DOI: 10.25549/usctheses-c3-213298
title: The centromere: replication, recombination, reassembly

description: Normal cell division requires faithful DNA replication and proper DNA segregation in order to generate two identical daughter cells. Within cells DNA is always assembled with positively charged histones to form protein-DNA packaging structures called chromatin. The order of chromatin packaging regulates cellular functions including replication, gene expression and chromosome segregation. The compact chromatin region is called heterochromatin. The centromere is a rigid, gene-silent heterochromatin region and is essential for faithful chromosome segregation. To duplicate a cell, this region needs to be unpacked for replication and further be reassembled to maintain its function. I tackled how cells maintain faithful replication and reassembly at this region in S. pombe. ❧ I found that a replication protein Cdc18/Cdc6 associates with heterochromatin protein Swi6/HP1. A mutation cdc18-I43A that reduces Cdc18 association with Swi6 has no silencing defect at the centromere, but changes Swi6 distribution and accelerates the timing of centromere replication. This interaction is important for replication timing at the centromere through region-specific regulation of Swi6 loading. ❧  Transcription at the centromere at S phase is also crucial for centromere reassembly. The coordination of replication and transcription machineries is important to prevent genome instability generated by collision of these two machineries. I found that the loading of RNA Polymerase II at the centromere is independent from DNA replication. ❧ I also found that the centromere is prone to recombination while unprotected by heterochromatin factors. Also, this region is very sensitive to replication fork stalled. The repetitive sequences at the centromere require fork protector Mrc1/Claspin, S phase checkpoint kinase Cds1 and recombinase Rhp51/Rad51 to insure proper centromere reassembly.
DOI: 10.5281/zenodo.2286542
title: DWD European Weather

description: opendata.dwd.de - OpenData by Deutscher Wetter Dienst

Conditions: https://www.dwd.de/EN/service/copyright/copyright_node.html

dates and times are UTC.
DOI: 10.25549/usctheses-c3-160004
title: Enduring disaster: social theodicy in response to three gulf coast hurricanes, 1900-2005

description: This dissertation defines and advances a theory of social theodicy as a collective response to disorder and misfortune in American society. It advances sociological theories of risk by providing a more cultural model of the risk society, in which risk mitigation efforts are affirmed or critiqued on the basis of their fit with broader institutional logics drawn from civil, religious, and technological arenas, in moments of reflexive ritual. The narratives produced in these ritual moments, I argue, are unique in that they are as much about restoring a shared sense of social reality and establishing meaningful moral worlds, as they are with simply recounting the events of a given disaster.  I employ a comparative historical approach in order to track cultural persistence and change in these narratives, against the backdrop of the growth of state responsibility for disaster management and risk mitigation. ❧ Examining three Gulf Coast hurricanes – the Galveston Storm in 1900, Hurricane Camille in 1969, and Hurricane Katrina in 2005 – I analyze editorials, letters to the editor, organizational records, oral histories, government hearings, and speeches relevant to each storm.  I then focus on master narratives of each storm, through which the broad disruptions to the social order of coastal communities are resolved in public speech. Specifically, I describe narratives that focus on civic virtues as a moral signifier of a shared fate in disaster. Then, I examine the narratives that are produced to explain failures of evacuation; in contemporary societies where state organizations are tasked with managing disasters, the narratives through which their failures are accounted for are increasingly relevant in public debate. Finally, I examine a moment of ritual affirmation of technocratic risk management in the aftermath of Hurricane Katrina, in which notions of civic virtue are intertwined with technical and organizational cultures of preparedness. ❧ Taken together, this analysis suggests that the organizations, polities and other sets of social relations that make up what theorists have described as elements of “risk society” are made real in public settings in part through ritual moments that have grown increasingly reflexive over time. Nevertheless, in these ritual moments non-technical forms of rationality continue to legitimate and help shape the administration of technical expertise as they are brought to bear upon expert administrative settings by social movements, public-minded groups, citizens, and the political actors who must answer to them, as well as in other forms of specifically public speech.
DOI: 10.25549/usctheses-c3-160566
title: Page 48
DOI: 10.25549/usctheses-c3-170660
title: Page 150
DOI: 10.25549/usctheses-c3-177084
title: Page 89
DOI: 10.25549/usctheses-c3-159108
title: Optimal electronic device design

description: A physical model of electron transport through nanoscale semiconductor heterostructures is developed featuring self-consistent solution of the Schroedinger and Poisson equations for the potential. Using this model heterostructure tunnel diodes featuring customized current-voltage characteristics are designed using principles of optimal design. Control over electron transport in these devices, having lengths in the tens of nanometers, is possible by exploiting the wave nature of the electron. Limits of this control are explored using a linear objective function for optimal design of AlεGa₁.
DOI: 10.25549/usctheses-c3-170644
title: Page 134
DOI: 10.25549/usctheses-c3-175732
title: One play, many actors: the many roles coregulators play in nuclear receptor mediated transcription

description: It is becoming increasingly evident that transcriptional coregulators are a diverse group of proteins of central importance to gene expression. Although some appear to be just scaffold proteins used to tether the nuclear receptor to RNA polymerase quite a few possess enzymatic activities that are required for gene expression. Here we explored the roles of various coactivators in nuclear receptor mediated transcription. ❧ Hic-5 is perhaps the least well studied coactivator of the group investigated. A coactivator for both the androgen receptor (AR) and glucocorticoid receptor (GR), its depletion in A549 lung cancer cells failed to show any changes in GR target gene expression for the 25 genes that we examined. Similar results were observed for the depletion of the well known histone and protein methyltransferase PRMT1 in A549 and MCF-7 cells. ❧ The histone acetyltransferases p300 and CBP appeared to be selectively required for androgen-regulated genes in the C4-2B prostate cancer cells. Illumina microarray expression data showed that 47% of androgen regulated genes are p300 dependent, while only 0.3% are CBP dependent. Actually, p300 is important for both androgen dependent pol II and TBP recruitment to the AR target genes, TMPRSS2 and PSA. CBP expression cannot compensate for the loss of p300 on these two genes. Likewise, androgen induced increases in histone H3 Lys 18, Lys 27 and histone H4 acetylation rely on the presence of p300. Although previously thought to have many overlapping functions in gene expression, our data suggests that in C4-2B cells they exhibit many separate and defining roles critical for proper androgen regulated gene expression. Our data also suggests that p300 is the dominant member of the pair, appearing to be more important for androgen-mediated gene expression. CBP depletion in our cell line did not affect the androgen regulated expression of nearly as many genes as loss of p300 did. This suggests a distinct role for p300 in an advanced prostate cancer cell model.
DOI: 10.25549/usctheses-c3-177105
title: Page 110
DOI: 10.25549/usctheses-c3-177108
title: Page 113
DOI: 10.25549/usctheses-c3-160538
title: Page 20
DOI: 10.25549/usctheses-c3-176804
title: Page 22
DOI: 10.25549/usctheses-c3-176816
title: Page 34
DOI: 10.25549/usctheses-c3-177118
title: Page 123
DOI: 10.25549/usctheses-c3-199626
title: Physical activity and risk of B-cell non-Hodgkin's lymphoma among Los Angeles women

description: Study Aim: There have been few studies focusing on the association between physical activity and risk of B-cell non-Hodgkin’s lymphomas (NHL) and their results are inconsistent. This study is designed to assess this association among women in Los Angeles County. Methods: An individually matched population-based case-control design was applied in this study. 990 case participants and their 1:1 matched controls were recruited in total. Exposure information was collected through in-person interviews finished by all the cases as well as the controls. Multivariate conditional logistic regression was used to calculate odds ratios (ORs) and 95% confidence intervals (CIs), which measure the relationship between physical activity and risk of B-cell NHL. Results: Physical activity does not protect against developing B-cell NHL among women in Los Angeles County. The same results were found for the association between physical activity and B-cell NHL risk by race/ethnicity, age at diagnosis, body mass index (BMI) and B-cell NHL subtype. Compared to the inactive women, those who were at the highest physical activity level had 30% lower B-cell NHL risk (OR=0.70, 95% CI=0.52-0.94). However, no dose response was observed with increasing physical activity level (p value for the trend test=0.92). Conclusion: Physical activity was not associated with B-cell NHL risk. Future studies with larger sample sizes were needed to confirm our results.
DOI: 10.25549/usctheses-c3-198063
title: Remain L.A.

description: MacArthur Park-Westlake is the landing place for immigrants in Los Angeles. It’s an area that traditional media does not cover unless there has been a shooting, murder, or protest gone awry. It is a community largely ignored, for all the good things going on in the neighborhood and the problems it still has. This project is a journalistic endeavor to record some of the stories around the park that are going on today in a multimedia format.
DOI: 10.17632/r9tnznzk6z.1
title: Data for: Cropping systems are homogenized by off-farm income – Empirical evidence from small-scale farming systems in dry forests of southern Ecuador

description: Data for variables used in the regression
DOI: 10.21947/1328886
title: Shortwave, Longwave Radiometer - ESRL RadSys, Condon - Raw Data

description: This dataset showcases the role of shortwave and longwave radiation in planetary boundary layer (PBL) development and winds. Radiation budget is part of the energy budget.
DOI: 10.25549/usctheses-c3-160537
title: Page 19
DOI: 10.25549/usctheses-c3-160605
title: Page 87
DOI: 10.25549/usctheses-c3-204763
title: Strategies employed by successful urban superintendents responding to demands for student achievement reform

description: Superintendents engage in reform aimed at increasing student achievement because they are influenced to do so by external and internal forces. The role of the superintendent is successfully managing the organizational change process so that his or her district may achieve the lofty and worthy goals of equity and excellence in student achievement. This effort has proved to be a challenging task for superintendents, and schools continue to falter despite intervention. ❧ This study employed a mixed-methods design to answer four research questions related to superintendents and student achievement reform. Data was collected via a quantitative survey of 85 superintendents and a qualitative interview of five superintendents, and was used to support the four research findings. ❧ First, demands from the community, market pressure and competition, and bureaucratic accountability influence a superintendent’s adoption of student achievement reform. Second, teachers, school-level administrators, the school board, and district-level personnel are important to the reform development process because they bring the professional expertise necessary to designing an effective plan. Third, superintendents support a wide variety of strategies — among them, setting high expectations for student achievement, utilizing student demographic and achievement data to identify student need, providing instructional leadership, fostering collaboration among stakeholders, and facilitating alignment of the district’s and principals’ messages, as well as promoting communication between district and school staff, modeling instructional leadership, and checking professional accountability. Fourth, superintendents use formative assessment, principal evaluation, and monitoring reports for the school board and the community to evaluate and in order to sustain reform aimed at increasing student achievement.
DOI: 10.3886/e107743v1
title: The State of Abstracts in Educational Research - Curran (2016) - AERA Open

description: Replication materials for AERA Open Publication:<br>Curran, F. C. (2016). The State of Abstracts in Educational Research. AERA Open, 2(3), 2332858416650168.<br><br><br>Abstract:<br><br>Background:<br>There is a well-documented divide between education research and practice. In 2004, Mosteller, Nave, and Miech argued for a focus on the research abstract, particularly structured abstracts, to improve the translation of research into practice. Since their call, no study has systematically examined the quality of abstracts in education research or the degree to which structured abstracts are utilized.<br><br>Purpose:<br>This study addresses two questions. First, what are the characteristics of the research abstracts required by journals in the field of education research? Second, to what extent do research abstracts in the field of education research contain the basic components of a research study?<br><br>Data:<br>Original data are drawn from the top 150 education research journals. Data include the instructions to authors regarding abstracts for each journal (n = 150) and a random sample of abstracts (n = 189).<br><br>Methods:<br>Journal instructions and abstracts were coded. Codes included whether they were structured and whether they included components of a research study, such as the data or findings.<br><br>Results:<br>A nontrivial proportion of abstracts fail to include important components of a research study. More than one in three lacked information regarding the background, and a similar proportion lacked information on conclusions. Over one quarter omitted information regarding the data, and a similar proportion lacked information on methodology. Only 7% of the top 150 journals explicitly require a structured abstract.<br><br>Conclusions:<br>The quality of abstracts in educational research could be improved. Suggestions for improving abstracts, such as shifting toward structured abstracts, are offered.<br><br><br>
DOI: 10.21947/1328937
title: Lidar - ESRL WindCube 200s, Wasco Airport - Derived Data

description: The available "readme" file introduces the basics of the Doppler lidar data and offers a detailed description of the variables present in the data files. If you have any further questions about the data and its interpretation, contact either Alan Brewer () or Aditya Choukulkar (). It is highly recommended to discuss any planned use of the data with NOAA-CSD scientists. For more information, refer to the attached readme.
DOI: 10.25549/usctheses-c3-160558
title: Page 40
DOI: 10.25549/usctheses-c3-170652
title: Page 142
DOI: 10.17632/3jtdnyjzfm.1
title: SourceData7_JBG013_timestamp

description: \Data type and description: event-time stamp data. The time at which each event occurred (Y matrix, values 1-4) was stamped with a 10 ms resolution (Z matrix, centiseconds). Y matrix: 1=active response; 2=inactive response; 3=delivered pellet; 4=Magazine entry (time-controlled; consecutive entries within 200ms are not repeatedly stamped). Data were obtained through MED STATE NOTATION (MED Associates)
DOI: 10.25549/usctheses-c3-177121
title: Page 126
DOI: 10.25549/usctheses-c3-198401
title: Scalable object classification using range images

description: Object classification using depth images has been actively studied in robotics and computer vision fields to autonomously recognize 3D objects in the scene even under no or bad illumination based on surface geometry. The traditional protocol of object classification is to manually collect and annotate training image examples and then learn models to explain the annotated examples. However, when a large number of images are given (e.g. content based image retrieval) and/or a system has to learn a sequence of new images into the existing model on the fly (e.g. autonomous robotic exploration), this approach requires a huge amount of human effort in image annotation. ❧ In this thesis, I present an automatic and scalable framework for object classification using range images, which has been rarely discussed before. The proposed system is designed to 1) build a hierarchical structured database from a collection of unlabeled range images, 2) classify a new image, i.e. the partial surface of an 3D object, into one of existing classes or a new class using the hierarchical model of object classes and 3) automatically update the existing model of object classes to insert the new object when its surface characteristic is not well trained in the current model. Each path in the tree corresponds to a group of range images with similar surface characteristics. The class inference and online learning processes can be performed efficiently due to the tree structure of the model. ❧ Another contribution of my research is to utilize two crucial context cues, 1) 3D spatial constraints between objects and large structures and 2) the visibility context, for perception of of 3D objects. The proposed framework has been extensively validated on a large synthetic range image dataset and real depth images acquired from real-time range sensors. ❧ In this thesis, I also present two methods to tackle the problem of object segmentation in range images. The first method segments the partial surface of each object from 3D aerial scans of a vast urban area captured from LIDAR sensors. It enforces the spatial context between large structures and objects. The second work employs prior information of objects in order to deal with cluttered environments. This thesis finally delineates a method of 3D object recognition and pose estimation using the visibility context and demonstrates that the proposed approach outperforms state-of-the-art methods.
DOI: 10.25549/usctheses-c3-207908
title: Strategies urban superintendents employ to successfully implement reform aimed at increasing student achievement

description: This study focuses on understanding the strategies superintendents utilize to meet the diverse and numerous challenges they encounter on a daily basis.  These challenges include external pressures, such as bureaucratic accountability systems, and internal pressures, such as demands from school boards.  In addition to meeting these challenges, superintendents are charged with implementing reform plans aimed at increasing the academic achievement of all students served. ❧ The research questions guiding this study address factors that successful urban superintendents consider when selecting a reform strategy, the key stakeholders urban superintendents include in the reform process, the strategies used to successfully implement reform plans, and the strategies used to successfully monitor and assess reform plans. ❧ This study utilized a mixed-methods approach to validate the current research available on the importance of particular strategies utilized by superintendents to implement and maintain meaningful reform.  Quantitative surveys and qualitative interviews were conducted, which informed the conversation about successful strategies.  The research undertaken in this study elucidates strategies that superintendents have deemed important and useful to the reform process in this current climate of increased accountability.
DOI: 10.25549/usctheses-c3-160542
title: Page 24
DOI: 10.25549/usctheses-c3-170656
title: Page 146
DOI: 10.25549/usctheses-c3-170668
title: Page 158
DOI: 10.25549/usctheses-c3-195610
title: The centromere: replication, recombination, reassembly

description: Normal cell division requires faithful DNA replication and proper DNA segregation in order to generate two identical daughter cells. Within cells DNA is always assembled with positively charged histones to form protein-DNA packaging structures called chromatin. The order of chromatin packaging regulates cellular functions including replication, gene expression and chromosome segregation. The compact chromatin region is called heterochromatin. The centromere is a rigid, gene-silent heterochromatin region and is essential for faithful chromosome segregation. To duplicate a cell, this region needs to be unpacked for replication and further be reassembled to maintain its function. I tackled how cells maintain faithful replication and reassembly at this region in S. pombe. ❧ I found that a replication protein Cdc18/Cdc6 associates with heterochromatin protein Swi6/HP1. A mutation cdc18-I43A that reduces Cdc18 association with Swi6 has no silencing defect at the centromere, but changes Swi6 distribution and accelerates the timing of centromere replication. This interaction is important for replication timing at the centromere through region-specific regulation of Swi6 loading. ❧  Transcription at the centromere at S phase is also crucial for centromere reassembly. The coordination of replication and transcription machineries is important to prevent genome instability generated by collision of these two machineries. I found that the loading of RNA Polymerase II at the centromere is independent from DNA replication. ❧ I also found that the centromere is prone to recombination while unprotected by heterochromatin factors. Also, this region is very sensitive to replication fork stalled. The repetitive sequences at the centromere require fork protector Mrc1/Claspin, S phase checkpoint kinase Cds1 and recombinase Rhp51/Rad51 to insure proper centromere reassembly.