The purpose of this study was to investigate the prevalence and mechanisms of extended-spectrum cephalosporin- (ESC) and carbapenem-resistance in Escherichia coli from the GTA. A total of 526 non-duplicate E. coli clinical isolates were collected during March 1-5, 2010 from 13 participant hospitals. Among these, 71 isolates showed reduced susceptibility (rS, intermediate, and/or resistant phenotype) to cefoxitin (FOX) and/or ESC. No carbapenem resistance was detected. Extended-spectrum ß-lactamase genes detected (n=37; 52.1%) belong to the CTX-M-family, including blaCTX-M-15 (78.4%), blaCTX-M-23 (2.7%), blaCTX-M-14 (18.9%). The only plasmid-mediated ampC gene identified among FOXrS isolates (n=49; 69%) was blaCMY-2 (n=7; 14.3%). Seventeen strains (24%) were negative for all ß-lactamase genes tested. Analysis of the chromosomal ampC promoter revealed mutations associated with AmpC hyperproduction. Other mechanisms of resistance (e.g. impermeability and/or unidentified ß-lactamases) cannot be discarded. The most prevalent clone detected was ST131. IncFIA, FIB and Frep were the most common plasmid replicon types detected.

By way of a series of narrative oral histories, focus group and interviews with Aboriginal Elders, this thesis examines the everyday resistance of Aboriginal women to dehumanization by government agencies. The dehumanization of these Aboriginal women occurs when they are denied their basis human rights guaranteed in the United Nations Universal Declaration of Human Rights. Dehumanization is manifest as the denial of basic subsistence needs, poor treatment in the form of abuse, harassment and discrimination, and the denial of self-determination. Dehumanization is met with resistance in an attempt to restore humanity. Everyday forms of resistance are small acts of daily personal resistance which do not usually challenge the prevailing social order. They are based upon a complex subaltern ideology expressed in private transcripts which are usually hidden from the dominant group. Aboriginal women use the private transcripts as the ideological basis for at least three forms of everyday resistance: direct, indirect and hidden. With direct resistance the private transcript emerges, with indirect resistance a third-party mediates the emergence of partial private transcript and with hidden resistance the private transcript remains hidden. Aboriginal woman also base their resistance on a reciprocal relationship of empowerment between themselves and their communities which becomes more powerful as they age. The increase in the quality of the reciprocal communityindividual empowerment leads to evolution in the quality of everyday resistance strategies, from relatively inefficient emotion-based reactions to more efficient and well-developed strategies.

There are currently more than 33 million people worldwide who are infected with HIV-1 despite development of novel treatments and knowledge of prevention strategies. Within the Pumwani area of Nairobi, Kenya there is a group of commercial sex workers who are highly exposed to HIV-1. A small subset of these women have been classified as resistant to HIV-1 infection as they remain HIV un-infected despite as many as 60 unprotected sexual exposures to HIV each year. A better understanding of such a natural model of HIV resistance would be invaluable to inform the development of a protective HIV vaccine or microbicide. Globally, heterosexual transmission of HIV across mucosal surfaces is responsible for the bulk of new infections and thus it is important to examine both the macro and the micro environments of the vaginal mucosa in efforts to determine what enhances and what thwarts HIV-infection. Previous studies have shown elevated levels of RANTES, a natural ligand for the dominant HIV co-receptor CCR5, in cervicovaginal secretions of HIV-resistant women. Additionally, a novel HIV-inhibitor, Trappin-2 was previously shown to be elevated in cervicovaginal secretions of HIV-resistant women. To test the hypothesis that RANTES and Trappin-2 in cervicovaginal fluid are important mediators of HIV resistance we will: 1) measure RANTES in a much larger group of women from the Pumwani cohort, and 2) measure Trappin-2 levels in samples taken at different time points, and 3) correlate Trappin-2 levels in cervicovaginal fluid with biological confounding variables, and 4) investigate whether SDF-1 plays a role in HIV-disease progression in HIV-positive women. / February 2009

By way of a series of narrative oral histories, focus group and interviews with Aboriginal Elders, this thesis examines the everyday resistance of Aboriginal women to dehumanization by government agencies. The dehumanization of these Aboriginal women occurs when they are denied their basis human rights guaranteed in the United Nations Universal Declaration of Human Rights. Dehumanization is manifest as the denial of basic subsistence needs, poor treatment in the form of abuse, harassment and discrimination, and the denial of self-determination. Dehumanization is met with resistance in an attempt to restore humanity. Everyday forms of resistance are small acts of daily personal resistance which do not usually challenge the prevailing social order. They are based upon a complex subaltern ideology expressed in private transcripts which are usually hidden from the dominant group. Aboriginal women use the private transcripts as the ideological basis for at least three forms of everyday resistance: direct, indirect and hidden. With direct resistance the private transcript emerges, with indirect resistance a third-party mediates the emergence of partial private transcript and with hidden resistance the private transcript remains hidden. Aboriginal woman also base their resistance on a reciprocal relationship of empowerment between themselves and their communities which becomes more powerful as they age. The increase in the quality of the reciprocal communityindividual empowerment leads to evolution in the quality of everyday resistance strategies, from relatively inefficient emotion-based reactions to more efficient and well-developed strategies.

This qualitative case study of eight veteran Texas Regional Education Service Center Multicultural/Diversity Trainers examined their perceptions of structural barriers and teacher resistance to a voluntary program of Multicultural/Diversity Training (MDT). It also explored how they made sense of their roles in light of their social locations. Data were collected through in-depth semi-structured interviews of the trainers, observations of MDT sessions, and examination of relevant documents. Data were analyzed using the constant comparative method. Three themes associated with structural barriers emerged: contextual factors, lack of administrative support, and the Texas system of accountability, particularly high stakes testing. The contextual factors were differences in regional cultures, the autonomy of the Education Service Centers, and the voluntary nature of MDT. Lack of administrative support for MDT is crucial because teachers often take administrative response to school reform as their cue for action or inaction. In Texas, high stakes testing exerts influence at every educational level, particularly on teachers in relation to curriculum, instruction, student placement and professional development choices. Teacher resistance to MDT occurred in the training sessions and in the classroom setting. During the training sessions teachers resisted MDT because it challenged deeply held beliefs and encouraged self-examination, personal disclosure, and discussions of race/ethnicity and culture. Resistance in the educational setting was manifested in maintenance of a Eurocentric perspective, and in school practices such as negative attitudes toward multicultural education and MDT, placement of students of color in special education and lower tracks, and negative attitudes toward all people of color. Ultimately, trainers suggest that they are enmeshed in a system that seeks to maintain the status quo, and that too many teachers have low expectations for students who are different from themselves and conform to a deficit model when dealing with those students.

Produced water and spent drilling fluids from petroleum operations represent a significant expense to companies developing new energy reserves. These spent fluids, seldom recycled, offer a viable source of water resources for oil-field reuse. A major obstacle to reuse is the presence of suspended solid material in the fluids. Such contaminants, if not removed, will not only prevent any reuse but will also impede disposal. The objective of this project was to evaluate membrane filtration as a way to remove suspended and entrained particles to produce re-useable effluents using membranes. Ceramic and Polyvinylidene Flouride (PVDF) hollow fibre membranes were used in laboratory scale experiments in the investigation of the colloidal filtration of field produced spent drilling fluids and produced water. Feed parameter and operational parameter evaluation of ceramic and PVDF hollow fibre membrane filtration of spent drilling fluids and produced water showed that feed concentration, solids in the spent drilling fluid and oil in the produced water, is the most important parameter during membrane filtration. Operational parameter variation showed that high cross flow velocity was beneficial in flux maintenance during spent drilling fluid filtration due to its high solids concentration because of the scouring effect on the cake layer on the membrane surface. Pressure regimens were important in flux decline as relatively high pressures accelerate the consolidation of the concentration polarization layer causing flux decline. High temperatures were generally beneficial for increased flux in the filtration of produced water and spent drilling fluids. Resistance calculations were used to deduce the contribution of individual resistances during the ceramic filtration of produced water and spent drilling fluids and were identified as a real-time tool for monitoring membrane integrity and fouling. Backwashing as a fouling mitigation technique was effective in flux maintenance in ceramic membranes especially in the filtration of produced water; cleaning solutions were effective in flux recovery in ceramic membrane filtration and to a slightly lesser degree in hollow fibre membrane filtration. A methodology in determining the suitability of water based oil field wastes using membranes was developed to help future investigations of this type.

Antibiotics are frequently used in aquaculture for the treatment of bacterial diseases. In this study, bacteria were isolated from the spleen, liver and kidney of grouper from PCG and cobia from EMD and THOD in southern Taiwan. All isolates were cultured on TCBS agar, blood agar, and MacConkey agar. The results showed that the isolates from PCG were 83% (20/24) Vibrio and 13% (3/24) £]-hemolysis¡F76% (22/29) Vibrio and 24% (7/29) £]-hemolysis from EMD¡F100% (6/6) Vibrio and none of £]-hemolysis from THOD. The bacteria were tested for antibiotics resistance by the disc agar diffusion method. 70% bacteria resisted to penicillin, cephazolin, and streptomycin while double resistance to furazolidone/streptomycin increased to with time from 0% to 83% in PCG. In EMD, 70% bacteria resisted to streptomycin and furazolidone, and double resistance to furazolidone/streptomycin increased with time from 0% to 60%. In THOD, 50% bacteria resisted to £]-lactam drugs, 100% bacteria resisted to cephazolin, and 67% bacteria doubly resisted to ampicillin/amoxycillin, cephalexin/cephazolin, cephalexin/streptomycin and cephazolin/streptomycin. Further, the detection of tetB, tetD, tetM, tetS and tetX resistance, tetracycline resistance genes, in the chromosomal DNAs from 17 multiple resistance isolates were performed by PCR. The PCR products were confirmed by digestion of restriction enzymes. The data indicated that J39-1, J39-2, K26-4 and K27-2, strains from THOD, together with N18-5 and M35-2, from PCG, were identified as carrying tetB. From EMD, The tetB and tetM genes were detected in P19-1, P19-3, P32-1 and Q8-3, whereas strain O2-3 carried tetS gene.

No description available.

This thesis is focused on the Foucauldian analysis of power in two of David Mamet¡¦s famous ¡§Business Trilogy¡¨ ¡V Glengarry Glen Ross and American Buffalo. Most of Mamet¡¦s critics concentrate on the negative notion of power, i.e., exploitation and repression, while examining relations of power in the business worlds of these two plays. The primary concern of this study is to explore the positivity of exercises of power in human relationships in Glengarry Glen Ross and American Buffalo and then illuminate the fact that Mamet¡¦s figures of businessmen¡¦s false employment of strategy of power thereupon leads them to fail their self-assertions. Foucauldian analytics of power thoroughly manifests the subtlety of operation of power as well as the productive effects of power in Mametian business world. The introduction mentions the distinctiveness of Mamet¡¦s business plays and explains the connection between these two plays of Mamet and Foucauldian analytics of power. Chapter one deals with an overview of Foucault¡¦s conception of power, which provides a theoretical frame for the body of this study. In this chapter, not only the transformation and the skeleton of Foucauldian power are proffered, but the characteristics of juridical-discursive model of power are also introduced. Therefore, in the following two chapters, the reasons of employing Foucauldian analytics of power for this research are displayed in the process of analyzing exercises of power. The second chapter attempts to exam the power relations from a series of actions of betraying in Glengarry Glen Ross. It is shown that Mamet¡¦s businessmen, for the sake of survival, practice betrayals in the light of exercising resistance in relations of power. Chapter three is chiefly concerned with the conflicts and delicate exercises of power among the characters in American Buffalo. The three main characters¡¦ failure of distinguishing business from friendship causes the distortion of human relations in which material advantages are involved. Throughout the examination of power relations in these two plays of power, the last chapter concludes that David Mamet¡¦s aim of writing plays will be achieved if his readers become to be aware of the danger of wrongly adopting strategies of power in human communities.

Research has shown conflicting results involving interference of strength development with combined resistance and endurance training. Purpose: To examine if endurance training and resistance training performed concurrently would produce different performance and physiological results when compared to each type of training alone. Methods: Forty-five untrained males were recruited and randomly assigned to one of three 12 wk training groups. An endurance training (ET, N=12) group trained by running (2-3 days/week, 20-40 min, 65- 80% HRR), a resistance training (RT, N=13) group performed a resistance training program (2-3 days/week, 3 sets/8 exercises, 6-10 reps, 75-85% 1RM), and a concurrent training (CT, N=16) group performed both the endurance and resistance training programs (5 days/week, even # week 3 endurance/2 resistance workouts, odd # week 3 resistance/2 endurance workouts). All groups were tested for all the following variables prior to and following training: percent body fat, VO2max, isokinetic-maximal torque and avg. power at two speeds, 1RM leg press, 1 RM bench press, vertical jump, lower body power (as calculated by the Lewis formula) and 40-yard dash time. Results: Percent body fat was significantly (p≤.05) decreased in both the ET and CT groups. Only the ET group significantly improved VO2max (+8.24%). Minimal changes were found for any of the isokinetic measurements. The ET, RT, and CT groups demonstrated significant improvements in leg press (20.4, 40.8, and 39.4%) and bench press (7.5, 30.5 and 21.2%) 1 RM. RT and CT 1 RM improvements were similar and significantly greater than the ET group. Only the RT group significantly increased power. No group showed a significant change in vertical jump or 40-yard dash time. Conclusions: Findings indicate that endurance training does not interfere with strength development, but resistance training appears to hinder development of maximal aerobic capacity.