Class of 2012 Abstract / Specific Aims: This study was performed to assess the accuracy of the presenting signs and symptoms, diagnostic procedures, and treatments depicted in episodes one through twelve of the fifth season of House, MD. Methods: This study was a descriptive, retrospective evaluation of the accuracy of the first twelve episodes of the fifth season of House, MD. Dependent variables in this study were presenting signs and symptoms, diagnostic procedures, and treatment of the final diagnosis for the primary patient case. A rating of one to four was assigned to each variable, with one being most accurate and four being inaccurate. Statistical analysis consisted of ANOVA and Tukey HSD post-hoc test Main Results: The signs and symptoms had a mean of 2.42 ± 0.669 (95% CI 1.99 to 2.84). The diagnostic tests had a mean of 2.42 ± 1.084 (95% CI 1.73 to 3.11). The treatment had a mean of 1.42 ± 0.9 (95% CI 0.84 to 1.99). ANOVA showed a statistically significant difference among the accuracy ratings of the groups (p = 0.013). Tukey HSD did not show a significant difference between the accuracy of the signs and symptoms and diagnostic tests (p = 1). The test did reveal a statistically significant difference between accuracy of treatment and both the signs and symptoms (p = 0.027) and diagnostic tests (p = 0.027). Conclusions: The treatments shown in House, MD, season five, episodes one through twelve are significantly more accurate than both the diagnostic tests and the presenting signs and symptoms.

Class of 2011 Abstract / OBJECTIVES: To evaluate the degree of accuracy of the information relevant to signs and symptoms, diagnostic procedures used to establish the final diagnosis, and appropriateness of treatment for the last 12 episodes of the 3rd season of the television show, House, MD. METHODS: Twelve episodes were reviewed by three evaluators and the patient’s signs and symptoms, the diagnostic procedures used, and the treatment of the final diagnosis for each episode were recorded and rated based on accuracy. After each evaluator had rated each variable in each episode independently, the ratings were compared and a final rating for each variable was determined. RESULTS: The overall mean rating for signs and symptoms was 2.46. The overall mean rating for diagnostic procedures was 2.38. The overall mean rating for treatment was 1.77. All of these ratings would correlate to a correct, but somewhat unusual presentation. The ANOVA analysis found no statistically significant difference between groups (p=0.078). CONCLUSION: The signs and symptoms, diagnostic procedures, and treatments in the episodes of the second half of season three of House, MD were all portrayed in a manner that was accurate, but with a somewhat unusual presentation.

Class of 2011 Abstract / OBJECTIVES: The purpose of this study is to assess the accuracy of the presentation, diagnostic procedures, and treatment of the main disease in each of the first twelve episodes of the third season of the medical drama House, MD. METHODS: The study is a descriptive retrospective evaluation of the first twelve episodes of season three of the medical drama House, MD. The accuracy of the clinical presentation, diagnostic procedures, and treatment in each episode was rated on a scale of one to four. A rating of one described a correct and usual representation. A rating of two described a correct but somewhat unusual representation. A rating of three described a correct but extremely unusual representation. A rating of four described an incorrect representation. Each of three researchers independently rated the episodes, and then the researchers agreed upon a collaborative rating for each category. RESULTS: Results of the ANOVA test did not show statistical significance between the three dependent variables (p = 0.25). Additionally, a Tukey HSD post-hoc test did not reveal a statistical significant difference between the ratings for the presentation, diagnosis, and treatment. CONCLUSION: In the first twelve episodes of season three of House, MD, there was no difference between the accuracy of the treatment and diagnosis when compared to the signs and symptoms of each episode.

Class of 2012 Abstract / Specific Aims: To assess the accuracy of the presenting signs and symptoms, diagnostic procedures, and treatments presented in the last twelve episodes of season five of the popular medical drama, House, MD. Methods: A descriptive retrospective evaluation of the accuracy and inaccuracies of episodes 13 to 24 in season five of the television series House, MD. The accuracy of the presenting signs and symptoms, diagnostic procedures, and treatment in each episode was rated on a scale of one to four. A rating of one described a correct and usual representation. A rating of two described a correct but somewhat unusual representation. A rating of three described a correct but extremely unusual representation. A rating of four described an incorrect representation. Each researcher independently rated the episodes, and then a collaborative rating was agreed upon by both researchers. Main Results: Results of the ANOVA test demonstrated a statistically significant difference between the three dependent variables (p=0.002). The Tukey HSD post-hoc test confirmed a significant difference between the accuracy of treatment when compared with signs and symptoms (p=0.012), and with diagnostic procedures (p=0.002). The average rating for the treatment variable was 1.58 (±0.9), whereas the average ratings for the signs and symptoms and diagnosis variables were 2.75 (± 0.754), and 3 (±1.128), respectively. Conclusions: The treatments presented in the last twelve episode of season five of House, MD were more accurate than both the presenting signs and symptoms and the diagnosis.

This study tests a model which suggests that the external forces on a firm, the size and age of the firm, the industry and competitive market in which a firm operates, the level of leverage of the firm, as well as whether it has good or bad news regarding future earnings have an impact on whether a firm provides precise forecasts in its MD&A. Furthermore, the model suggests that firms providing precise forward-looking statements in the MD&A have lower forecast errors. Using 2SLS, the proposed model is tested using forward-looking statements regarding sales, earnings per share, cash flow, and capital expenditures extracted from the 2004 and 2005 annual reports of firms listed on the 2002 Fortune 500 list.

Glucokinase (GK) is an enzyme that catalyzes the ATP-dependent phosphorylation of glucose to form glucose-6-phosphate, and it is a tightly regulated checkpoint in glucose homeostasis. The monomeric enzyme possesses a highly exotic kinetic profile, with a sigmoidal dependence on glucose, which has been the source of vigorous investigation and debate in the last several decades. This unique regulatory behavior can be thought of as a remarkable glucose sensor, which may result in hyperglycemia when it is not active enough and hypoglycemia when it is too active. This interdisciplinary study, which draws on small angle X-ray scattering (SAXS) integrated with atomistic molecular dynamics simulations and experimental glucose binding thermodynamics, I reveal the critical regulation of the glucose sensor is due to a solvent controlled switch. Moreover, this solvent controlled switch manifests a regulatory mechanism of GK; a specific local conformational change that leads to an enzyme structure that has a much more favorable solvation energy than most of the protein ensemble. These findings have direct implications for the design of small molecule GK activators as anti- diabetes therapeutics as well as for understanding how proteins can be designed to have built-in regulatory functions via solvation energy dynamics.

<p>The paper examines the 1985 Farm Bill-version of the Conservation ReselVe Program (CRP) as a potential water-quality improvement tool in the Chesapeake Bay region of Virginia. Participation levels. bidding behavior. land use options and other conditions in Richmond county. a predominantly agricultural county in Virginia's Northern Neck region. were analyzed.</p> / Master of Science

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<p>  </p> <p>Architectured metamaterials are artificial systems with unique structural characteristics. They show distinct deformation behaviors and improved mechanical properties compared to regular materials. For example, mechanical metamaterials demonstrate negative Poisson's ratios, whereas regular materials have positive values. In theory, the auxetic behaviors arise from periodic cellular architectures regardless of the materials utilized. While this premise is mostly true for macroscopic metamaterials, it may not work well at a very small lengthscale since chemistry may play a critical role in nanostructures. However, this fundamental idea has not been addressed due to the lack of powerful manufacturing strategies at the nanoscale. The majority of architectured metamaterials are manufactured from top down with their unit size of microns or larger. On the other hand, there are also molecular auxetics which are natural crystals and thus are not designable. Therefore, there is a significant gap in lengthscale from 10 nm to 1 µm. DNA self-assembly is a bottom-up approach that can construct complex nanostructures based on sequence complementarity. Examples include DNA origami structures and DNA tile assemblies. This dissertation bridges the gap in the lengthscale by introducing nanoscale auxetic units from DNA and investigates relevant structural properties and mechanical behaviors. This study addresses the premise of metamaterials and elucidates the structure-property relation. The findings from this work formulate design principles for DNA based auxetic metastructures. </p> <p>In this work, we built several two-dimensional (2D) auxetic nanostructures from wireframe DNA origami. They serve as the model systems to demonstrate the feasibility of constructing nanoscale auxetics via DNA self-assembly. DNA origami structures are commonly constructed by a long ‘scaffold’ strand with many ‘staple’ oligonucleotides. Since the DNA metastructures are too small to directly apply external forces, we implemented chemical deformation by inserting ‘jack’ edges. Like a car jack, the length of the jack edges can be modulated via two-step DNA reactions: toehold-mediated strand displacement and annealing with a new set of jack staples. The DNA nanostructures reconfigure accordingly. To complement the experiment, we performed molecular dynamics (MD) simulations based on coarse-grained models using an open-source oxDNA platform. In the numerical computation, external loads were directly applied to deform the metastructures, providing details of structural deformation. We discovered that the auxetic behaviors of DNA metamaterials can be estimated by architectural designs, however the material properties are also crucial in the structures and deformations. Our mechanistic study provided general design guidelines for 2D auxetic DNA metamaterials. We also designed and constructed a Hoberman flight ring from DNA, a simplified planar version of Hoberman sphere. This structure consists of six equilateral triangles that are topologically organized into two layers, resembling a trefoil knot. The DNA flight ring deploys upon external forces, expanding (open state) or contracting (closed state) by sliding the two layers of triangles. This is the first synthetic deployable nanostructure and offers a versatile platform for topological research.</p> <p>This thesis also investigates 3D effects in DNA assemblies and related mechanics. We used a DNA origami tile designed with an intrinsic twist as a model system and explored its cyclization process using MD simulations. The numerical computation revealed the detailed process where the structure untwists and curves for cyclization simultaneously under external forces. The force and energy required to overcome the initial curvature and cause the 3D deformation were also calculated. The results agree well with the previous experiment and theory, further verifying the simulation method. Direct mechanical forces and DNA responses were realized experimentally with 3D DNA crystals built from triangular DNA tiles. Nanoindentation was performed on macroscopic ligated crystals using atomic force microscopy (AFM). MD simulations were performed in parallel, which revealed the full spectrum of several distinct deformation modes from linear elasticity to structural failure. The combined experiment, computation, and theoretical calculation showed that the complex behaviors can only be understood fully by considering the structure and its components. </p> <p>The scientific findings from this thesis should contribute to the construction of auxetic metastructures, the design methods for DNA based metamaterials as well as the prediction of their structural properties and mechanical behaviors. This thesis will pave the way for building architectured materials from DNA with tailored properties and functionalities, opening the door for new opportunities and unique applications.</p>

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