Application of Sihler’s Stain to Expose Cardiac Conduction Nerve Fibers

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Adam Jorgensen and Jonathan J. Wisco, Department of Physiology and Developmental Biology Introduction Arrhythmia is a serious heart condition that affects 14 million people in the United Statesi, and is characterized by irregular frequency of atrial and ventricular beats.ii The most serious effects of arrhythmia include sudden cardiac arrest and stroke.iii About 383,000 cases of […]

The Effect of Promoter Region Indels on Expression Bias in Polyploid Cotton Species

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Zachary Liechty and Joshua Udall, Plant and Wildlife Sciences Many plants undergo polyploidization events throughout their history, meaning their genome doubles1; the goal of this project was to identify how these polyploidization events lead to changes in gene expression on a nucleotide level. Polyploidization events provide raw material to be acted upon by natural selection, […]

Gene Discovery: Understanding Oat Biosynthetic Pathways through Characterization of the ADP-Glucose Pyrophosphorylase Gene

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Evan Braithwaite and Eric Jellen, Plant and Wildlife Sciences Introduction Grains that are high in soluble hemicellulose fiber, such as oat, provide numerous health benefits to consumers. These benefits include decreased risk of heart disease and lowered cholesterol. For this reason, information regarding genes that are involved in regulating starch and fiber synthesis in oat […]

Identification of the Function of a Unique B4 Mycobacteriophage Protein via in silico and in vivo Analysis

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Cameron Sargent and Dr. Julianne Grose, Microbiology and Molecular Biology Introduction Once the leading cause of death in the United States, tuberculosis still burdens the world as the second deadliest infectious disease worldwide, latently infecting one-third of the world population and causing 1.5 million deaths in 2013 [1]. Tuberculosis is particularly lethal largely because the […]

Association of rs75932628 (R47H) with Vascular Dementia in the Cache County Study

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Emily Sears and Dr. John Kauwe, Biology Introduction Vascular dementia (VaD) is a neurodegenerative disease caused by atherosclerosis, or inadequate blood flow to the brain as a result of the build-up of fat deposits, dead cells, or other cell debris on the inside of arteries. It shortens the lifespan of those affected, and severely impairs […]

Learning Chemistry through Experimentation

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Kyle Long and Jennifer Nielson, Chemistry and Biochemistry Introduction For the past five years, Dr. Jennifer Nielson has conducted research in Kampala, Uganda, located in south-central Africa. I have been able to join her for two of the five years, including this past year for nearly three weeks in August. Our research focuses on teaching […]

Determining if c-Fos Regulates Glucose Stimulated Insulin

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Benjamin Bitner and Jeffery Tessem; Nutrition, Dietetics, Food Science Introduction Increasing a patient’s functional β-cell mass may provide a cure for both types of diabetes. Previous studies have shown that overexpression of the homeodomain transcription factor Nkx6.1 stimulates β-cell proliferation, increases glucose stimulated insulin secretion (GSIS) and decreases apoptosis1. Functional β-cell mass is defined by […]

Isolation and Characterization of Novel Lytic Phage to Treat MRSA

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Tyler White and Bradford Berges, Microbiology and Molecular Biology Introduction: The bacterium Staphylococcus Aureus is the cause of a serious skin disease that is known to cause life-threatening infections such as pneumonia, endocarditis, meningitis, sepsis, bacteremia, and toxic shock syndrome [1]. Nonetheless, most SA infections are readily remedied via antibiotic treatment with methicillin. However, over […]

Alarm Fatigue

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Chalese Adams and Karen Whitt, College of Nursing Alarm fatigue in the hospital setting is a dangerous phenomenon. The very alarms that are designed to alert hospital staff are tuned out or ignored. The purpose of my research was to find literature on the topic of alarm fatigue, in the clinical setting, and nurse’s experiences […]