The activity of the enzyme 3-hydroxy-3-methylglutaryl-coenzyme A reductase (HMGR, EC 1.1.1.34) is highly expressed in 4-day-old etiolated seedlings of normal ('DeKalb XL72AA'), dwarf (<u>d₅</u>), and albino (<u>lw₃</u>) maize (<u>Zea mays</u> L.). HMGR activity of maize seedlings appeared to be exclusively associated with the microsomal rather than the plastidic fraction of maize cells. Maize tissues with high meristematic activity such as germinating seeds, leaf bases, root tips, and the site of origin of lateral roots contained high levels of HMGR activity. The activity of HMGR extracted from leaf tips of normal, dwarf, and albino maize seedlings was regulated by light. HMGR activity from leaf tips of 4-day-old maize seedlings was inhibited significantly following exposure to strong light (600 μol/m²/s) for more than 10 h. In contrast, HMGR activity from leaf bases and root tips of maize was not inhibited by exposure to strong light. These results suggest that HMGR may play an important role in cell division and that light may regulate HMGR activity indirectly by increasing cell differentiation. Under conditions of strong light pretreatment with the bleaching herbicides clomazone, norflurazon, fluridone and acifluorfen stimulated by 4-to 7-fold the activity of HMGR extracted from 'Dekalb XL72AA' maize seedlings. / Ph. D.

The purpose of this study was to determine if α1- adrenergic receptor blockade alters the hemodynamic response to exercise in young (<25 yr) male adult borderline hypertensives differently than in young normotensives. Five hypertensive (HTN, MAP>105 mmHg) and 7 normotensive (NTN, MAP<95 mmHg) college-age males underwent two 30 min bouts of cycle ergometry exercise at 50% V02Pk in a warm (25°C, 50% rh) environment; one bout occurred followed α1-receptor blockade with prazosin (HTN-α, NTN-α) and the other following placebo administration (HTN-p, NTN-p). At rest, HTN-p exhibited an elevated cardiac output (Q, p=.024) and MAP (p=.007). Resting Q was similar for HTN-α and NTN-α. Resting heart rate (HR) was elevated more in HTN-α than NTNα (p=.013) and not different for placebo. Resting and exercise forearm blood flows were similar between groups and altered similarly with prazosin. Exercise resulted in greater (p=.035) Q for HTN vs NTN (HTN-u > NTN-α; HTN-p = NTN-p). HR was higher (p=.043) with prazosin for both groups. Regardless of drug treatment, MAP was stable for NTN while it declined after 10 min of exercise in HTN. Rectal temperatures rose above baseline after 10 min. since Q was similar between groups with placebo but not with α1- blockade, and FBF, MAP, and HR were similarly altered between drug trials, it was concluded that young male hypertensives have an elevated blood pressure due to an elevated Q. In this group, α1-blockade may reduce Q by reducing central venous return. / Ph. D.

Solving the inverse problem, finding the applied forces knowing the system characteristics and the response, has been a difficult problem in structural dynamics. Insufficient accuracy in the system identification and uncorrelated content in the response exacerbate the ill-conditioned nature of the indirect-force-determination problem. Numerical techniques for performing the force determination are exploited and compared. The characteristics of the force determination problems are investigated through least squares solution procedures and numerical examples. The credibility of the estimated forces are studied in the numerical examples using the correlations of the matrix condition number and the mode contribution factor with the resulting error. The focus of this research is the improved estimation of the applied forces. The two important factors in reducing the force determination error are accurate system identification and improved conditioning of the system matrix. A variety of techniques are examined to reduce the system identification error and control the response measurement uncertainty. The use of rotational or curvature degrees of freedom as an alternative to the translational degrees of freedom for the response measurements and for the structural dynamics model yields a quite differently conditioned system matrix. The choice of a particular degrees of freedom is shown to depend on the frequency contents of the applied forces. / Ph. D.

An improved dynamic electrothermal model for the Earth Radiation Budget Experiment (ERBE) total, nonscanning channels is formulated. This model is then used to accurately simulate two types of dynamic solar observation: the solar calibration and the so-called pitchover maneuver. Using a second model, the nonscanner active cavity radiometer (ACR) thermal noise is studied. This study reveals that radiative emission and scattering by the surrounding parts of the nonscanner cavity are acceptably small. The dynamic electrothermal model is also used to compute the ACR instrument transfer function. Accurate in-flight measurement of this transfer function is shown to depend on the energy distribution over the frequency spectrum of the radiation input function. A new array-type field-of-view (FOV) limiter, whose geometry controls the input function, is proposed for in-flight calibration of an ACR and other types of radiometers. Finally, the point spread function (PSF) of the ERBE and the Clouds and Earth's Radiant Energy System (CERES) scanning radiometers is computed. This PSF is useful in characterizing the channel optics. It also has potential use for recovering the distribution of the radiative flux coming from the Earth by its deconvolution with satellite measurements. / Ph. D.

The solid/liquid intermolecular transfer (SLIT) flow dynamic nuclear polarization (DNP) experiment potentially provides new methodology for studying interfacial phenomena (e.g., weak hydrogen bonding). In addition, the high efficiency of the transfer also ensures dramatically enhanced NMR signals. These large DNP enhancements could alleviate sensitivity limitations in various flow NMR experiments. Previous studies have established that silica phase immobilized nitroxide (SPIN) radical system are advantageous in the SLIT experiment. In favorable cases (e.g. DCCI₃/SPIN system) a ¹³C DNP enhancement 60 times in excess of the high magnetic field (4.7 T) magnetization has been achieved.¹² However a number of factors still limit the SPIN system presently available. For example, low magnetogyric ratio nuclides, ¹³C, ¹⁵N, which are not dominated by scalar relaxation mechanism require high surface radical concentrations. The focal point of the present study is the preparation and characterization of several new SPIN radical systems and can be divided into two parts: 1). Preparation, EPR, and DNP Characterization of Achiral SPIN Radicals: a number of SPIN samples were prepared in order to examine the dependence of the observed SLIT DNP enhancements as a function of the surface spin concentration and also isotope-substitution of the immobilized radicals. The SPIN samples were characterized by EPR and DNP. The results show that the increase in the spin concentration does not offer any advantage for ¹H DNP studies. In contrast, ¹³C SLIT DNP results in improved SPIN sample demonstrate the possibility of monitoring dipolar dominated ¹³C DNP enhancements as a result of better leakage factors and suppressed three-spin effects at higher radical concentration. The effect of substitution of deuterons for protons in the immobilized radical also suggest an appreciable contribution of a solid-state three-spin effect. 2). Preparation, EPR, and DNP Characterization of Chiral SPIN Samples: This part of the study provides a chiral SPIN radical suitable for monitoring enantioselective ¹³C DNP enhancements. The DNP results suggest that selective enantiomer/chiral SPIN interactions are feasible. Specifically, differences in the ¹³C DNP enhancements for a model system: (R)- and (S)- enantiomers of bromocamphor, and a (R) chiral SPIN sample were observed. / Ph. D.

Star-like lignin-poly(propylene oxide) copolymers were prepared by chain-extending steam exploded lignins (tulipifera liriodendron) with propylene oxide and by subsequent endcapping with ethylene oxide. Epoxidation of these copolymers was carried out with epichlorohydrin at room temperature, using KOH as oxyanion forming reagent. The epoxidized compounds were fractionated by solvent precipitation to remove poly(alkylene oxide) homopolymers and to prepare fractions of narrow molecular weight distributions. The epoxides were cross-linked with meta phenylene diamine yielding thermosets which were, depending on lignin content, either low modulus elastomers, or high modulus materials with considerable ductility. The modulus of elasticity was a strong and linear function of lignin content, whereby the highest value was 1100MPa (57% lignin). The curing reaction was of nth-order type, whereby the reaction order changed from close to one at the beginning of the curing reaction to 2, once the reaction becomes diffusion controlled. Curing induced partial demixing of the lignin and poly(propylene oxide) phases which yielded a secondary structure where lignin rich domains in the order of 10 nm were interspersed in a matrix of lignin poor material. However, from TEM and ¹³C solid state cross-polarized NMR analyses it was evident that the domain structure was not that of a classical micro-phase separated copolymer with well defined phase boundaries, but rather had broad interphases. Additionally, the results of multifrequency dynamic mechanical thermal analysis showed that the lignin containing thermosets have very broad glass transition ranges which most likely were due to transitional phase inhomogeneities and provided these materials with good vibrational damping ability. / Ph. D.

The immunopharmacologic and immunopathologic mechanisms through which hemorrhagic enteritis virus (HEV) induces intestinal lesion formation associated with clinical infection is unknown. These studies were designed to 1) determine differences in age susceptibility to HEV infection and parameters which best indicate severity of virus infection, 2) determine the involvement of specific inflammatory mediators in the formation of intestinal lesions by using anti-inflammatory compounds which directly or indirectly inhibit either the synthesis or the mechanism of action of the mediators, and 3) determine the involvement of immunologically-active cells—basophils, connective tissue mast cells (CTMC), and mucosal mast cells (MMC)—in the formation of HEV-induced lesions. Seven-week-old poults were more susceptible to viral infection when compared to four-week-old poults as judged by HEV antigen presence within the spleen, spleen weight/body weight ratio, heterophil to lymphocyte ratio, and changes in serum lipid and albumin concentration. Of those anti-inflammatory agents used, corticosterone, vitamin E, and indomethacin significantly reduced lesion scores. FPL 55712 and FPL 57231, specific leukotriene receptor blockers, markedly increased lesion scores. Inoculated birds had significantly higher MMC counts than uninoculated birds (120±64 vs. 55±39, respectively). CTMC and basophils were unaffected by viral challenge. In addition to the increase of MMC within the lamina propria of the duodenal villus, there was also a concurrent increase in vascular permeability within the lamina propria which was demonstrated using colloidal carbon and vascular permeability within the lamina propria which was demonstrated using colloidal carbon and ferritin as vascular markers. The results of these studies indicate that vasoactive mediators, such as histamine and the eicosanoids, play a role in lesion formation associated with HEV infection, and that a source of at least some of these compounds appears to be the MMC within the lamina propria of the duodenal villus. Finally, some of the other clinical manifestations of HEV infection, such as decreased serum lipid, protein, and albumin, may be a result of increased vascular permeability which results from vasoactive mediator release and action on the vessels of the lamina propria of the intestinal villus. / Ph. D.

A systematic research approach is necessary to investigate complex systems. This approach should provide a tool for examining multifactors in an efficient manner since a large number of factors is usually involved in the design and evaluation of complex systems. This study is used to develop empirical models which describe the functional relationships of many independent variables in the design of a telephone information system. Such a development is based on integrating several data sets using sequential experimentation. Reanalyses of previous experiments were conducted to examine necessary and sufficient conditions for integrating data sets resulting from previous studies. As a result. an experiment was conducted to investigate the effects of independent variables which were not manipulated in the previous experiments. An additional experiment was conducted to provide a bridge among several data sets. The integrated data set was then used to build second-order empirical models using polynomial regression. Determinant values of X'X matrices served as a statistical criterion for achieving minimum variances of coefficients and prediction variances of the models. Based upon the empirical models developed, optimum configurations of the telephone information system were obtained using a nonlinear programming technique. A separate optimization method was used since the empirical models included both continuous variables and discrete variables. Specific procedures and guidelines are suggested in planning and conducting sequential research which deals with a large number of independent variables in an efficient and systematic manner. The procedures and guidelines are summarized based upon the lessons learned from the dissertation research. These include administrative requirements, alternative experimental designs, methodological considerations on conducting sequential experiments, and other necessary rules and decision criteria for bridging data sets and optimizing empirical models. This approach is expected to provide a tool for obtaining generalizable results in human factors research. / Ph. D.

Predispersed Solvent Extraction (POSE) was used to extract copper ions from dilute acidic aqueous solution. POSE is based on the principle that there is no need to comminute both phases. All that is necessary is to comminute the solvent phase prior to contacting it with the feed. This is done by converting the solvent into aphrons. which are micron-sized globules encapsulated in a soapy film. Since the aphrons are so small, it takes a long time for the solvent to rise to the surface under the influence of gravity alone. Therefore, the separation is expedited by piggy-back flotation of the aphrons on especially prepared gas bubbles, which are somewhat larger than aphrons and are called colloidal gas aphrons (CGA). Polyaphrons of various types were studied extensively. The apparatus used to generate the polyaphrons was upgraded. The residence time distribution of a liquid in the polyaphron generator was determined. The particle size distribution of polyaphrons was determined using photo-microscopy and sedimentation among other methods. Batch tests were done using both conventional and POSE. Results showed that POSE approaches equilibrium much faster than conventional extraction. Equilibrium isotherms were drawn and empirical equilibrium relationships were developed. The dynamics of the kinetics of the extraction was modeled using film theory. Equipment for the POSE process was built. Experiments were carried out in continuous mode and the process was optimized. An empirical statistical equation was developed for the extraction process in continuous mode. Depending on the aqueous to solvent ration, more than 99% copper can be extracted. / Ph. D.

In this study, a new and efficient numerical algorithm is developed to solve both the two-dimensional and three-dimensional compressible hydrodynamic stability problem. A parametric study of free shear flows with two or more supersonic streams is performed. Flows examined included shear layers, jets/wakes, and various geometrical combinations of these flows. The effect of Mach number on the stability characteristics of the flow is studied and found to confirm the work of other researchers who found that increasing the relative (or convective) Mach number increases the stability of the flow. For 2-D mean flows, the most amplified disturbance is shown to be axial for M<1.2 and fully three-dimensional for M> 1.2. Disturbances for three-dimensional mean flows are found here to be axial in the presence of side walls. The variation of the eigenfunctions and flow field disturbances as a function of Mach number and the flow geometry was also studied. Comparisons of the stability code results are also made to several turbulent mixing experiments. The stability code correctly predicts which parameters will accelerate mixing. New correlations of the effects of some important parameters on stability are developed. / Ph. D.