College of Liberal Arts and Sciences Chemistry

11335

“Who Am I to Forget? Los 80 and Collective Memory in Chile's Post-Dictatorship Generation”

"From 1973-1990, Chile lived through the dictatorial regime of General Augusto Pinochet, which restructured the country’s social, economic, and political relations. A series of horrific human rights abuses – such as murder, torture, and disappearance – were systematically committed by the military, which they justified by invoking the need for “economic liberalization.”

After the return to democracy in 1990, Chilean society found itself in the midst of an impasse in its quest to cope with its recent violent history. Half of the population supported the Pinochet regime, while the other half harshly condemned it. Human rights advocates have found ways to bring military criminals to justice, while other actors continue to strive for memorializing Chile’s brutal dictatorship so the future generations do not forget and repeat the same mistakes.

Hence, in 2008 Chile’s second-largest TV channel Canal 13 (Channel 13) launched a TV series called Los 80 (The 80s). It was dedicated to remembering the 1980s from the perspective of a fictional middle-class family who experienced the trauma of the dictatorship. The show turned quickly into a national phenomenon. Los 80 offered a space for Chilean audiences to discuss the violence of the country’s recent past, and helped younger generations to understand what their families had experienced. Consequently, in a context where conversation regarding how to make sense of the dictatorship is a delicate and emotionally loaded topic, my research focuses on understanding how this TV show affects the process of reckoning with Chile’s traumatic past among the younger generations who are viewers of the show and whose accounts of the past have been framed by their family’s experiences. I aim to understand how those who did not experience the dictatorship directly – the post-dictatorship generation – conceive of Chile’s dark history and how the show influences their attitudes toward human rights.

(Flesh-Kincaid Grade Level: 16)"

11329

"Attending a graduate conference at one of the world’s premier music schools is integral to my growth as a musicologist and educator, as it allows me to learn from students and scholars with similar research interests, and further my knowledge of prominent trends, topics, and methods in musicology and neighboring disciplines.

The symposium’s program, though not yet released for this year, has historically contained numerous papers about Renaissance music. As a scholar on women in French Renaissance music, I am the only graduate student in my department at UF that studies this early era of music and have not had an opportunity to learn from and connect with peers in my area. Attending this conference will enable me not only to network with peers but also with faculty specializing in topics relevant to my research, including Dr. Ellie Hisama at Columbia, the conference’s keynote speaker who studies gender in music, and Dr. Julie Cumming and Dr. Peter Schubert at McGill University who study Renaissance music history and analysis. The multi-lingual symposium will also help develop my French conversation and comprehension skills and my knowledge of discipline-specific French terminology. In addition, it will surely introduce me to diverse and innovative approaches to music that I can incorporate into my research and teaching, since the conference features scholarship from many areas of music study including music theory, music technology, music psychology, and music education.

In conclusion, attending the three-day McGill Music Graduate Symposium is crucial to my professional development as a musicologist and teacher. It will expand my knowledge of the specific topics I research, enable me to forge professional relationships with today and tomorrow’s leading scholars in my area, improve my French language skills, develop my effectiveness as a teacher, and broaden my understanding of the field beyond my years as a student at UF. " "The University of Florida’s musicology program is one of the newest in the field and, though flourishing, it has yet to establish a reputation as a top-tier institution comparable to McGill’s Schulich School of Music. The McGill Music Graduate Symposium serves the brightest and best graduate musicians from the most prestigious programs in North America, and the University of Florida’s inclusion in the conference is integral to establishing its reputation as a peer institution. It is crucial not only to the growth and development of UF’s program, but ultimately in achieving the university’s mission of top 10 public research-university status.

Having been both an undergraduate and master’s student at UF, I will serve as spokesperson for the university’s incredible faculty, nurturing environment, and world-class resources in order to increase our program’s visibility and attract the highest caliber of incoming students. Funding is often a principle factor in deciding which institution to attend, and therefore I will make sure to highlight the availability of not only tuition waivers and stipends, but grant programs such as this. Also, as a member and former Vice-President of UF’s Student Society for Musicology, I will foster connections with graduate student leaders to promote UF’s own graduate musicology symposium taking place next year. "

11328

Discover, Encounter, Confront, Reveal: Emotional Realities in the Films of Nuri Bilge Ceylan

"My paper provides close analysis of an important young Turkish filmmaker while grappling with tough questions of film aesthetics and technology.

The cinema has recently undergone a dramatic change in its materiality, a change which prompts significant research questions. Recent and continuing advancements in digital technologies have made celluloid seem a quaint medium of the past. Image capture, editing, reproduction, and distribution are each increasingly managed digitally, and these changes warrant a reassessment of old questions of film theory: what is the ontology of the medium? how does technology influence aesthetics?

My paper pursues those questions by looking at the work of an auteur filmmaker whose acknowledged influences pre-date the digital revolution, but whose own films have all been shot digitally. Nuri Bilge Ceylan's films are consistently celebrated at world festivals and by international critics, and, as his funding increases with each film, so does his post-production manipulation of the image. Looking at recurring devices across his oeuvre, especially his use of close-ups, searching zooms, and pans away, I connect Ceylan's use of the digital image to understood ontologies of filmmaking, especially in the tradition of Andre Bazin, a major advocate for cinematic realism. My paper argues to expand his understanding of film's essence (paraphrased by Dudley Andrew as ""to discover, to encounter, to confront, and to reveal""), as Ceylan's films emphasize the limits of the cinematic gaze. Confronted with his intense close-ups, a viewer must project as much as she discovers, implying that, rather than merely providing a rich connection to the external world, cinema also stages an encounter between the viewer and her own self. (Flesh-Kincaid Grade Level: 20.1)"

11313

Metabolomic Analysis of Skin Lesions for Melanoma by Mass Spectrometry

"Discovery of biological markers at the earliest possible stage of cancer progression is a priority in all aspects of cancer-related research. Earlier detection methods and more accurate markers result in lower mortality rates and higher quality of life for patients. Recent studies have been published revealing an apparent difference between the metabolites detectable when melanoma is present compared to when it is not. However, the methods utilized in these publications require preconcentration and preparation steps, meaning analysis must be performed off-line (as a secondary step, separate from sample collection) and it may be altered in a way that affects accurate identification of species native to the cell environment. Therefore, identification of additional biomarkers to those recently reported, as well as development of a real-time method incorporating little or no sample preparation would revolutionize current melanoma-detection schemes.

This research utilizes ambient ionization techniques (methods for sample analysis that allow detection at room pressure and/or temperature) to study normal melanocytes (skin cells) and malignant melanomas in a manner more closely resembling their native environment. By coupling these ambient methods to an instrument called a mass spectrometer (the sample detector), and processing the resulting data through statistical software, the ability to perform direct, real-time analysis of skin lesions to identify novel markers of melanoma becomes a real possibility. Preliminary results indicate there is a distinct difference in the presence of specific metabolites produced by normal skin cells versus melanoma-afflicted cells. (Flesh-Kincaid Grade Level: 22.4)"

11310

College of Engineering -

"Hopefully, you have never been prescribed a CT-scan by your doctor! But if so, you may have been worried about the amount of cancerous X-ray you will be exposed to!

Several promising researches have been performed to address reduction of X-ray exposure to the patient, by use of computer-based and mathematical methods.

In our research we improved the low-dose CT-scan imaging.

Imagine you are lying on the CT-scan tray, the CT-scan machine rotates a whole circle around the ill section of your body to capture data from the desired organ. In our approach, the machine does not need to rotate a whole circle, but a few positions (certain angles). Therefore, the patient is exposed to much less dangerous X-ray. However, the image that you will get as the result, improves the result of the traditional full circle model.

This is because we used a prior knowledge about the biomedical images, and proposed a novel mathematical method to find the true CT image from far fewer data. Explanation of the algorithm requires knowledge of (scary!) Besov spaces and Bayesian models (in mathematics), which is beyond the scope of this essay. The idea was interesting for the reviewers and they found our imaging model very effective for real CT-scanners. So, the next time you are prescribed a CT scan (hopefully never!) be sure that you will not be exposed to too much radiation, while the results are as good as (even better) than traditional machines.

11299

ROLE OF PERIODONTAL PATHOGENS IN INDUCTION OF ATHEROSCLEROSIS IN LDLR-/- MICE

Periodontal disease is an inflammatory disease of the tissues that surround and support the teeth. The disease is initiated by an immune response to build up of bacterial biofilm on the tooth surface. Periodontal disease has been epidemiologically linked to numerous systemic diseases including atherosclserosis, alzheimers, diabetes, pre-term birth and stroke. This means that patients with these diseases are more likely to have periodontal disease than people without these diseases. However interesting, correlation does not imply causation, so further investigation into how periodontal disease is involved with systemic disease is needed.Research in the dental field has shown that periodontal bacteria can enter the systemic circulation and cause inflammation at distant sites from the oral cavity.I am looking particularly at bacterial involvement in atherosclerosis, which is an inflammatory disease of artery walls, in which there is a build-up of oxidized low-density lipoprotiens, cholesterol, and inflammatory cells, which builds up over time and can occlude blood flow, and can eventually rupture, leading to heart attack or stroke. Low density lipoprotein receptor (LDLR) regulates the level of low-density lipoprotein, i.e. “bad cholesterol” in humans. Dysfunction or deletion of this receptor will result in high levels of plasma LDL cholesterol. LDLR lacking mouse exhibits excessive LDL levels and develops atherosclerosis slowly on non fat diet .Hence it serves as a good animal model to evaluate atherosclerotic changes.Therefore ,I predict that when I infect the LDLR deficient mice with human periodontal pathogens, they will readily colonize periodontal pockets, and will have better opportunities to enter broken blood vessels and enter the systemic circulation. Once in the blood stream, the bacteria can interact with vessel walls and other organs, and initiate atherosclerosis. (Flesh-Kincaid Grade Level: 16)

11297

Ion Mobility Strategies for Separation of Vitamin D Metabolites by LC-MS/MS

"Vitamin D is a class of compounds responsible for regulation of calcium stores in the human body. Deficiency can lead to osteomalacia, and has been implicated in cancer, cardiovascular disease, and diabetes. Several different techniques are regularly used in a clinical setting to quantitate Vitamin D. However, serum also contains a significant concentration of related compounds (epimers), which can interfere with accurate analysis. Although methods capable of distinguishing these interfering compounds have been developed, they can be expensive, time-consuming, and often ambiguous.

My research involves a technique know as ion mobility spectrometry coupled with mass spectrometry (IMS-MS). This technique offers additional analytical capabilities and can distinguish many compounds on the time scale of milliseconds, as opposed to several minutes with other commonly used technniques. Furthermore, the combination of IMS and MS allows a more definite identification of Vitamin D compounds, providing more accurate quantitation and a more complete clinical representation. (Flesh-Kincaid Grade Level: 17)"

11296

College of Fine Arts - Music

"The Italian composer Luigi Boccherini (1743-1805) lived in Madrid for most of his professional life. He composed several Spanish dances which have not been studied. Francisco Goya was the most famous Spanish painter of the century. He painted local scenes of dances and musicians. Both Boccherini and Goya portrayed folk traditions, particularly youngsters called majos and majas. These were idealized cultural figures, similar to gangstas of today. Boccherini and Goya returned to this phenomenon, called majismo, throughout their careers. When Goya painted himself next to Boccherini in a portrait, he suggested that they shared an artistic affinity. Although Goya’s most famous painting La maja desnuda receives critical attention from art historians, Boccherini’s persistent treatment of the majismo topic has never been explored. Hence, scholars have missed the artistic parallels that Goya painted in his portrait. Comparing Boccherini’s and Goya’s perspectives shows us a richer view of Madrid and its culture.

I have analyzed sources for Boccherini’s music that have not been examined since 1822. I have uncovered crucial information about these sources that changes the current view of Boccherini and his relation to Spanish culture. Moreover, I examine paintings by Goya that suggest an affinity with Boccherini. Finally, I connect both of their works to the politics of Madrid in the 1780s and 1790s. For example, the Inquisition confiscated La maja desnuda before Goya’s tribunal. But Boccherini’s Spanish dances were not subject to censorship. Historians sometimes consider Madrid a cultural backwater because of the embargo on Enlightenment works. But during this century especially, Italian and French music freely mingled with Spain's. Therefore, Boccherini’s mix of folkloric and international elements typifies the Spanish Enlightenment. (Flesh-Kincaid Grade Level: 12.8)"

11294

Matrix-Assisted Laser Desorption/Ionization Mass Spectrometric Imaging (MALDI MSI) of Glycolytic and Oxidative Skeletal Muscles

Skeletal muscles are responsible of body movement and support. These are the muscles that can be voluntarily controlled and are important to our health, physical performance, and quality of life. Skeletal muscles are made of repeating units of muscle fibers wrapped together by connective tissues. These muscle fibers can be divided into different types based on their different physiological, morphological, biochemical, and histological characteristics. For instance, different muscle fiber types have different capacity in energy metabolism. Slow-twitch fibers have higher capacity in oxidative metabolism, whereas fast-twitch fibers rely on glycolytic metabolism. Their difference in energy metabolism also relates to their physical function such that slow-twitch fibers are activated for long, endurance type of movement (e.g., posture) while fast-twitch fibers are recruited when short, powerful movement (e.g., sprint running) is performed. Here we present a new method for muscle fiber type analysis, matrix-assisted/laser desorption ionization mass spectrometric imaging (MALDI MSI). This method allows the identification of muscle fiber type along with the analysis of chemical information from the same tissue cross section. (Flesh-Kincaid Grade Level: 15.6)

11286

Correlating the Melatonin (MT) Pathway with Atenolol Associated Glucose Dysregulation in the Pharmacogenomic Evaluation of Antihypertensive Responses (PEAR) Study

Melatonin, a hormone, is important in regulating sleep and blood sugar balance. Genetic variations in the melatonin pathway are consistently linked with risk for higher blood sugar level and diabetes. Atenolol, a commonly used blood pressure lowering medication, lowers melatonin level and increases blood sugar level. However, it is not known whether there is a direct link between atenolol induced increases in blood sugar and the melatonin pathway. Using information collected during the PEAR clinical trial, we studied if atenolol increases blood sugar level by affecting melatonin level and if genetic variations in 18 melatonin-related genes influence this response. We discovered that there was no link between the melatonin and blood sugar response to atenolol treatment. However, a genetic variation in PRKCB, a gene involved in the melatonin and blood sugar regulation, may play a role in determining clinically meaningful atenolol-related high blood sugar level or diabetes. Our discovery, with further confirmation, could provide guidance for blood pressure drug selection to doctors. For patients with this genetic variation, an alternative medication could be used to minimize their adverse blood sugar response. (Flesh-Kincaid Grade Level: 16.5)

11282

Contextual Effects of Disgust in Health Information Avoidance Scenarios

Although people often think of knowledge as power, we often behave as if ignorance is bliss. At times, people may avoid receiving useful, relevant information. People do this for a variety of reasons, particularly to avoid unpleasant emotions, such as disgust. Unfortunately, health information often involves some element of disgust. We sought to understand the effect of disgust on avoidance of health information. In our first study, we presented online participants with information about a novel health condition and then gave them an opportunity to learn their risk for having or developing the condition. We conducted the study this way to mirror common online health information and risk-calculators available to the public. Importantly, we varied the qualities of the health condition described to participants to have disgusting or non-disgusting symptoms, yet otherwise identical features. We found no effect from varying these condition symptoms. Thus, we believe that disgust may not drive avoidance of such abstract health feedback. In a second study, we presented in-lab participants with a similar novel health condition before providing them an opportunity to undergo a screening to learn whether they were at risk for developing or currently had the condition. We varied the qualities of the screening to be disgusting or non-disgusting, yet otherwise similar. We found significantly higher rates of avoidance from participants exposed to the disgusting screening information than those exposed to the non-disgusting screening information. Thus, we believe that disgust plays a role in avoidance of immediate, concrete health feedback. Overall, we conclude that the effect of disgust is nuanced and depends on a variety of contextual factors, such as the source of the disgust and the health information context. (Flesh-Kincaid Grade Level: 13.7)

11270

Impacts of Disturbance Type on Recovery and Expansion of Cordgrass

In recent decades, salt marshes along North America’s east coast have been impacted by a suite of disturbances. These include prolonged drought and invasions of destructive nutria and feral hogs. These events can result in open mudflats that may recover at different rates. To recover after these disturbances, native grasses expand by outward growth of remnant patches. The rate of this growth may be driven by physical and chemical soil characteristics as well as individual patch characteristics. To test how physical and chemical soil properties and patch size may interact to affect marsh recovery, we transplanted patches of different sizes into two mudflats, one generated by drought and the other feral hogs, on Sapelo Island, Georgia, USA. We then characterized the soil by analyzing a suite of physical and chemical properties of extracted soil cores from each site. Over one year, we monitored the rate of outward patch expansion and stem production. We found that although transplant size had no significant effect on patch expansion at either site, transplants grown in the anoxic hog-disturbed soils experienced severely stifled expansion rates compared to transplants grown in drought-disturbed soils. With this study we hope to inform and prioritize salt marsh restoration and management, bolstering recovery and resilience to future impacts. (Flesh-Kincaid Grade Level: 13.7)

11265

"Detritus of the Mind: Noise and Trash in the Films of David Lynch"

In my paper I argue that in "Eraserhead" and "Inland Empire" Lynch’s use of loud, harsh, and complex sounds from experimental music and industrial sources work in tandem with the “visual noise” of his images to immerse the viewer in fictional worlds while at the same time forcing the viewer to remain continually aware of the constructed nature of those worlds. In my paper I employ the work of Salome Voegelin, who argues that noise foregrounds the materiality of phenomena by immersing the viewer in an experience of perception that intensely impacts the physical body. Through noise Lynch confronts the spectator with the status of his or her subjective experience of cinema as absorbable, unstable, and highly susceptible to manipulation. Appropriately, noise’s ability to foreground the push-pull of cinematic illusionism reflects directly on the visual noise of the fictional worlds of "Eraserhead" and "Inland Empire." The protagonists of both films manipulate and become manipulated by environments in which trash—in the form of polluting debris, antique junk, and their own disposable lives—becomes reappropriated and reanimated. Often considered the sonic equivalent of junk, noise undergoes a similar process of reuse and recontextualization in order for its immersive/constructed properties to be simultaneously activated. (Flesh-Kincaid Grade Level: 20.5)