Previous studies have shown that dyslexic individuals who supplement windowed reading practice with intensive small-scale hand-eye coordination tasks exhibit marked improvement in their reading skills. Here we examine whether similar hand-eye coordination activities, in the form of artwork performed by children in kindergarten, first and second grades, could reduce the number of students at-risk for reading problems. Our results suggest that daily hand-eye coordination activities significantly reduce the number of students at-risk. We believe that the effectiveness of these activities derives from their ability to prepare the students perceptually for reading.

The incidence and mortality rate of melanoma have increased greatly worldwide in the last thirty years. There is currently no effective treatment for malignant melanoma. Signal transducer and activator of transcription 3 (STAT3) signaling is constantly activated in human melanoma, which promotes melanoma development and progression. c-Met is a receptor tyrosine kinase (RTK), and hepatocyte growth factor (HGF) is the only known ligand of c-Met. Abnormal activation of HGF/c-Met has been implicated in melanoma metastasis. Both the STAT3 and HGF/c-Met signaling pathways are proposed as melanoma therapeutic targets. The dietary flavonoid quercetin is a bioactive compound that possesses low toxicity and exerts anti-melanoma activities. However, the anti-melanoma mechanisms of quercetin have not been fully understood. In this study, we evaluated the anti-melanoma activities of quercetin and explored the underlying molecular mechanisms. Our results showed that quercetin treatments induced apoptosis, inhibited proliferation, migration and invasion of the melanoma cells. Mechanistic study indicated that quercetin inhibited the activation of STAT3 signaling by interfering with the phosphorylation of STAT3, thus reduced its nuclear localization. Quercetin inhibited STAT3 transcriptional activity, and down-regulated the STAT3 targeted genes such as Mcl-1, MMP-2, MMP-9 and VEGF, which are involved in cell survival, migration and invasion. More importantly, overexpression of constitutively active STAT3 partially reversed the anti-proliferative effect of quercetin, which might be correlated with the impaired effect on quercetin-mediated Mcl-1 and MMP-2 inhibition. Furthermore, quercetin suppressed A375 tumor growth and STAT3 activities in a xenografted mouse model, and inhibited murine B16F10 cells lung metastasis in mice. These findings suggest that inhibition of the STAT3 signaling pathway contributes to the anti-melanoma activities of quercetin. Next we studied the involvement of HGF/c-Met pathway in the anti-metastasis effect of quercetin. Quercetin treatment dose-dependently suppressed HGF-induced migration and invasion of melanoma cells. Further study showed that quercetin down-regulated the mRNA expression level of HGF and suppressed c-Met homo-dimerization. Quercetin also decreased c-Met protein expression, which was associated with reduced expression of fatty acid synthase. In addition, quercetin suppressed the phosphorylation of c-Met and its downstream molecules including Gab1, FAK, PAK and STAT3. Furthermore, overexpression of FAK or PAK significantly reduced the inhibitory effect of quercetin on the migration of melanoma cells. These findings suggest that suppression of HGF/c-Met signaling contributes to the anti-metastatic action of quercetin. Besides c-Met, many other RTKs are activated in melanoma. We then further determined whether quercetin could affect the activity of other RTKs. The phospho-RTK array assay showed that quercetin treatment inhibited the activation of ROR2, Tie2, RYK, ALK, c-Ret, DDR1, DDR2, EphB4, EphA1, EphA2, EphA4 and EphA5 in A2058 cells, and EphA7, RYK, ALK and DDR1 in A375 cells. Further investigations are warranted to verify the array results, and to determine the potential roles of these RTKs in quercetin-mediated anti-melanoma properties. Overall, our results demonstrate that quercetin exerts anti-melanoma activities. The anti-melanoma action of quercetin is, at least in part, due to the inhibition of the STAT3 and HGF/c-Met signaling pathways. Our findings provide further insights into the anti-melanoma activities of quercetin and the underlying molecular mechanisms, suggesting a potential role of quercetin in the prevention and treatment of melanoma.

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Class of 2005 Abstract / Objectives: To describe the physical activity and nutrition status of pharmacy students and determine the level of knowledge that these students have related to prevention of obesity. Methods: This was a descriptive study of the physical activity and nutrition status of pharmacy students and their knowledge related to the prevention of obesity. Data were collected from all the students using a paper and pencil questionnaire (a copy is provided in the Appendix). Students were asked to answer questions related to causes of obesity, definition of obesity using BMI, and physical activity relating to BMI. They were also asked to compare physical activity to drug therapy and define the recommended exercise guidelines by the Institute of Medicine. Students were asked to match physical activities with the intensity of the activity from light to vigorous. Students were also asked to list the fruits, vegetables, unsaturated fats, sweetened drinks, fried foods, and whole-grain foods consumed the day prior. Students listed the frequency of moderate and vigorous activities they participated in the week prior. Students chose the benefits of physical activity most important to them and were asked to rank the importance of physical activity, diet and obesity prevention to their health. Demographic data were collected on age, gender, ethnicity, height and weight. Results: Scores were derived for all questions and mean scores for the three classes were compared using student’s t-test for all groups. Mean scores and student’s t-test were also used to compare responses between genders. Implications: Overall, pharmacy students are lacking education in preventing obesity. By educating pharmacists about healthy eating and physical activity they, in turn, can educate the public on preventing obesity.

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The original purpose of this investigation was to determine if soccer players who performed an agility training program in a specialized training shoe would have a lower incidence of acute ankle sprains as compared to controls. Two elite male college soccer teams participated in the study. The experimental team performed an agility training program two to three days per week over a three month period wearing the Nike Free Trainer. Data on ankle sprain incidence throughout the season was collected, as well as scores on tests of ankle strength, static balance, dynamic balance, agility and self-reports of ankle function. These scores were compared to those of the control team. Statistical analysis showed a statistically significant improvement in the experimental team members in the anteromedial reach direction of the dynamic balance test (p=0.001). This group also showed positive trends in ankle strength ratio and five of the eight other reach directions of the dynamic balance test. Unfortunately, pre-test, post-test statistical analysis was possible for only half of the experimental team subjects. Post-test data was not generated for the other half of these subjects due to unrelated injury or subject noncompliance. Lack of pre-test data due to subject non-compliance in the control team hindered between group statistical comparisons. This study uncovered promising trends as to the potential for gains in dynamic balance as a result of agility training with Nike Free Trainer. This study also established the reliability of three clinical tests of ankle strength, static balance and dynamic balance. Future well-designed studies are recommended to research this area further to discern the effect of this agility training program on dynamic balance and establish its’ effect on ankle sprain incidence. / Education, Faculty of / Kinesiology, School of / Graduate

Parental perspectives on risk and danger are important to consider in children’s injury prevention research, as they influence children’s adoption of safety strategies and influence how children approach risk and danger (Brussoni & Olsen, 2011). Despite single, stay-at-home, and gay fathers’ increasing numbers and the important roles they play in their children’s development, there has been a lack of research on their perspectives on children’s engagement in outdoor risky play until now. This thesis is written in the publishable paper format and is comprised of two papers, which were informed by poststructural feminist theory. In the first paper, I used semi-structured and photo-elicitation interviews and critical discourse analysis to explore single, stay-at-home, and gay fathers’ perspectives of their 4-12 year old children’s engagement in outdoor risky play and how they relate to tension-filled discourses of “good” fathering. In the second paper, I also used semi-structured and photo-elicitation interviews, but I explored single, stay-at-home, and gay fathers’ perspectives of masculinity and its influence on their understanding of their children’s outdoor risky play. Taken together, the findings from both papers showcase the important roles that single, stay-at-home, and gay fathers play in their children’s outdoor risky play.

The purpose of this dissertation is to describe and challenge some of the basic premises, implicit ontological and epistemological beliefs and, by extension, the political values which form the core of the geography of crime. While the discussion concentrates on published research undertaken by geographers, it also introduces relevant research conducted in kindred disciplines utilizing a spatial or environmental perspective (urban sociology and environmental criminology). As a critical theoretical exegesis, the principal focus of the critique is the analytic separation of crime from the control of crime, which characterises much of the geographer's research manifesto. Geographers have tended to study either crime or (much less frequently) the judicial system without any systematic consideration of the impact of the control system on crime patterns. In explaining crime patterns geographers have focused their analyses on the criminal actor or, more commonly, the criminal event. In advocating the advantages of alternatives to the instrumentalist or positivist philosophy guiding the geography of crime, the discussion of interactionist and critical perspectives is designed to show how they facilitate an understanding of the way that control processes exercised by police, the courts, and by elected officials are vital to the explanation of crime patterns. The introduction of these alternative theoretical positions also serves to raise questions about the correctionalist impulse of much of the geography of crime, and its technocratic purpose. The discussion of the philosophical, theoretical and political consequences of research strategies which treat crime and control as analytically separate entities lays the foundation for a geographic perspective on crime in its socio-legal context, for an examination of the effects of criminal justice policy on the actual geography of crime; in short, for an integrated analysis of crime and its control. The effect of the "control environment" is conceptualized at three different levels. The first concerns the influence of various interpretations of official crime statistics on "scientific" images of who the criminals actually are. Conflicting interpretations are reviewed, particularly interactionist and critical perspectives which suggest that maps of crime based on official police statistics may be seriously distorted in a way that geographers have rarely considered; crime maps may be "mental maps" reflecting the selective activity of control agents as much as they represent officially sanctioned criminal behaviour. The second effect of the control environment on criminal behaviour is examined in terms of "ecological labelling", the process through which law enforcement practices may (in part) help shape the "problem" status of various city neighbourhoods or subcultural groups. The third level of analysis concerns the most direct impact of control practice on the configuration of crime. In terms of a geographic perspective at this level of analysis the relationship between crime and control is systematized through the concept of "displacement". Displacement effects are defined as changes of criminal (or related) behaviour in response to changes in legislation, case law, law enforcement policies, or crime prevention programs. In this section the emphasis changes from an analysis of who the criminals are, to an analysis of what certain offenders do (particularly in terms of their adaptive spatial behaviour). A review of research demonstrating the wide-ranging occurrence of displacement phenomena is presented to supplement two empirical vignettes of crime in Vancouver (one on street prostitution patterns, the other on patterns of burglary) which demonstrate the spatial adjustments of offenders to changes in the "control environment". The dissertation concludes by describing the implications of an integrated analysis of crime and control for a philosophical, epistemological and methodological reorientation of the geography of crime. / Arts, Faculty of / Geography, Department of / Graduate

LL.B. / No one definition of terrorism has gained universal acceptance. The lack of agreement on a definition of terrorism has been a major obstacle to meaningful international countermeasures to combat terrorism. There are 12 International Conventions related to terrorism and an explicit definition is still missing. Many states have tried to define terrorism and none of these definitions has been implemented, either by the United Nations or these states. There are many International Conventions, Protocols and Treaties related to state responsibilities to combating terrorism. Many states are not yet part to these legal instruments or not yet implementing them. Following the attack in the United States of America, the United Nations Security Council had passed three Resolutions to combat terrorism. None of these resolutions were implemented successfully. Article 51 of the United Nations Charter gives a state a right to repel on attack that is ongoing or imminent as a temporary measure. This Article has been used by states to eliminate terrorism. International Convention for the Suppression of Terrorist Bombing, enable the State Parties to extradite and exercise jurisdiction over terrorist and to cooperate in the investigation, prosecution, and extradition of persons who engage in terrorist activities by establishing a regime of universal jurisdiction to punish the crime of terrorist bombings. The states must develop and adopt bilateral and multilateral agreements to increase cooperation between them.

Inpatient falls are a leading cause of fatal and serious injuries among hospitalized elderly patients, often with devastating consequences. This quality improvement project was conducted on a geriatric unit in a large southeastern U. S. hospital, following recognition of an increase in the number of falls with several sustained injuries. After an analysis of the previous fall prevention strategies, a panel of stakeholders who formed a falls prevention committee determined that implementing an evidence-based fall risk assessment tool to help identify risk factors, as well as implementing interventions to address those risk factors, would make fall prevention more patient specific and comprehensive. Guided by the IOWA Model, this project was designed to assess the effectiveness of implementing the Morse Fall Scale for a period of 2 months on the geriatric unit. Nurses were educated on the use of the tool and interventions, and 32 (87.5%) shared their perceptions of the effectiveness of the tool using a 5-item questionnaire following tool implementation. Fall rates based on nursing assessments and incident reports were monitored 6 months prior to, 2 months during implementation, and 2 months after the implementation of the MFS ended. The fall rate on the unit decreased by 50% during the implementation of the Morse Fall Scale; 99% of nurses agreed or strongly agreed that the tool was easy to understand, quick to use, identified and increased awareness of fall risks as well as fall prevention strategies, and decreased falls. Nurses leading fall prevention programs supported by evidence can address the serious patient safety issue of falls to decrease the negative impact on patients, families, and health care systems by reducing falls among elderly patients.