Stander Symposium Projects

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  Why You Should Care About Book Bans: Book Bans vs. Democracy

  Matthew Chandiles

  This project investigates the hindering effects of book bans as a constraint on the curriculum of real-world problems for America's youth. First, the cause-and-effect relationship of book bans under several rationales of protest, including political, personal, parental, or religious concerns are explored. Next a consideration of limiting the voices of marginalized and minoritized groups as a result of book bans is highlighted. Removing these literary resources and others in schools actively threatens a curriculum that promotes a holistic democratic education that prepares America's youth as informed, functional citizens.

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  Wind at UD Softball Stadium

  Jacob Sekerak

  The purpose of this project is to set up a sensor to collect meaningful data for the final project of ECE 520: Internet of Things. To accomplish this, I am going to record the behavior of wind during softball games at the University of Dayton’s softball stadium. This will be done by utilizing an embedded device along with a sensor that measures wind speed and direction. Wind can have a major impact on how fly balls especially behave during softball games and this could give the softball program better insight into how the wind is behaving just off the Great Miami River.

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  Women Superintendents in the Rural Midwest: Narratives of Challenges and Resistance

  Anne Strothman

  Women represent 76.5% of all teachers in U. S. public schools (Institute of Education Sciences, 2020). Yet, only 26.7% of superintendents leading districts are women (Tienken, 2021, p.19). Although women have made gains in leading schools in larger districts, the same trend is not evident in smaller, rural school systems, which describe the majority of school districts in the United States (AASA: The School Superintendents Association, 2017). Scholars commonly attribute this disparity to gender bias prevalent in rural cultures. Quinlan’s analyses (2013) underscored the gender inequality and sexism that women can face in rural contexts. To help address gender inequalities in educational leadership, schools, districts, and educational leaders must develop an awareness of specific structural and sociocultural barriers to the superintendency faced by women in rural contexts and take proactive steps to understand and mitigate those challenges. This study focuses on the narratives and lived experiences of women superintendents in rural school districts, and of women who aspire to the superintendency in a rural context. This qualitative study also explored the effects that COVID-19 has had on these women’s experiences as rural superintendents, an important aspect of their experience since the pandemic has disproportionally affected women in the United States (AAUW, 2020; Donovan and Labonte, 2020; Hilferty et al., 2021; Karageorge, 2020). This study can help women interested in pursuing careers as rural school district leaders to learn about those challenges and thus prepare themselves better to overcome them. Finally, this study aims to promote gender equity in rural K-12 systems to support women serving in district-level leadership roles in providing leadership models for all students, especially those who identify as female.

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  Working With An Arduino and Sensors

  Abril Robinson

  This project comes from the computer science class "Internet of Things" where we have learned about various microcontrollers. In this project, a sensor is used to collect data and to react automatically to input from an environment. Using an arduino, I can now unlock the door to my house using my phone.

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  Yorkie dependent transcriptional network promotes tumor growth

  Arushi Rai; other authors: Indrayani Waghmare, Amit Singh, Madhuri Kango-Singh

  The Hippo pathway effector, Yorkie (Yki) is a key mediator of signaling interactions and transcriptional addictions in tumor cells and presents an attractive opportunity to study transcriptional dependencies in cancer cells. The RasV12 scrib-/- tumor mosaic model, a well-established model, shows activation of oncogenic Ras in the background of impaired apical-basal polarity. Previously, we have shown that in RasV12, scrib-/- cells Wingless (Wg) act upstream of Caspases, JNK and Yki and via its canonical and non-canonical pathways to interact with Yki to regulate the development and cancer growth. Our goal is to understand further how the two evolutionarily conserved signaling pathways i.e., Hippo and Wingless crosstalk and interact with each other to regulate tumor growth using the RasV12, scrib-/- tumor model in Drosophila imaginal discs. Our data showed that the wg transcriptional reporters and wg transcript levels both are upregulated in RasV12, scrib-/- cells. In other contexts, wg is shown as a transcriptional target of Yki. Therefore, we will test for (a) the effects of Yorkie protein, the main effector molecule of the Hippo pathway, on the transcription and expression of Wg and other Wg pathway components by reporter assays, and qRT-PCR- based approaches, and (b) the effect of wg pathway components (frizzled, TCF) on the intrinsic wingless signaling and also the growth of RasV12, scrib-/- tumor (c)the effect of feedback interactions that promote tumorigenesis using genetic epistasis-, and immunohistochemistry-based approaches. Here, we present our progress on the organization of the molecular network involving Wingless and Yorkie.

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  Youth, Violence, and the Reproduction of Social Inequalities

  Caroline Hauer, Ariana Adkins, Melissa Moore

  Violence -- whether physical or rhetorical -- is a key mechanism by which social groups navigate their status and power. Groups with less power tend to experience disproportionate rates of violence. In this panel, presenters explore the social conditions in which violence emerges; how individuals are impacted and react to violence; and how violence is represented in both mainstream and social media outlets. The first paper investigates how children who experience abuse or trauma go on to enact aggressive behaviors themselves. The second paper investigates how media representations of violent crime committed by American juveniles have evolved since 1980. The third paper investigates inter-generational discourse on TikTok and how adversarial group dynamics contribute to current polarized and politicized identity-based rhetoric on the Internet. Each of these papers is based on original social science research undertaken by presenters for the sociology senior capstone. Taken together, the papers reveal the myriad ways that violence and conflicts emerge in social interactions. This panel should be of interest to folks who are interested in thinking through ways to build a more safe, peaceful, and democratic society.

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  18th Annual Integration Bee, Mathematics College of Arts and Sciences

  Arthur H. Busch

  The students compete in teams of 2-3 people. This is organized in a similar way to the traditional spelling bee. Teams will be evaluating integrals that are projected on a screen. If a team incorrectly evaluates an integral, the team is eliminated from the competition. After the elimination rounds, we will hold the lightning rounds. They first 'y' many teams to correctly evaluate the given integrals will proceed to the next round. We do this until there is a 1st, 2nd, and 3rd place team. First, second, and third place teams will receive math t-shirts. The Department of Mathematics will host a pizza lunch in the Science Center Atrium from 12:00-1:00 PM prior to the Integration Bee.

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  192.Apofasi - novel global events pattern detection engine

  Karthi Balasundaram

  Since the beginning of mankind, global occurrences were found to be directly impacted by the emotions of a common man. However people became aware via newspapers and televisions only after the event had occurred. As technology became instant, faster, and handy, it started impacting the occurrences directly as the tweets/posts posted in the Social media platforms; such as twitter directly initiates conversations about earth shattering events. One such event taken as an experiment is the ongoing war between Russia and Ukraine. Language barrier is a real life challenge and it indirectly impacts the events because of misunderstandings. In this work, a dataset of 10014 tweets posted in 40 different languages from Feb, 21 2022 till Mar, 17 2022 are collected and an attempt to categorize those tweets into positive, negative and neutral sentiments are performed. Upon inferring the pattern using event extraction and sentiment analysis techniques that lie as a branch of natural language processing, it is astounding to note meaningful information. Also, impressive data are collected directly from a community in Africa called “Masakhane” and have been successful in analyzing the sentiments for swahili language. Between the two experiments made using ‘192.Apofasi’ - the engine based out of NLP with nltk python library, found a sentimental correlation exists between the war and the tweets. The real challenge is in gathering and preprocessing the dataset to make it a machine understandable model. As a result, 5094 neutral, 2788 positive and 2132 negative tweets are obtained. It is therefore a strong evidence that by developing and deploying a machine learning model into handheld devices, every human being will be able to understand the patterns of the current events irrespective of the language thereby opening numerous opportunities for its betterment. Keywords : Natural Language Processing, Event extraction, Sentimental analysis, Emotive tweets, Russia, Ukraine

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  3D Printing with Recycled Plastics: Opportunities and Challenges

  Peter Anthony Fabe

  Plastic waste is a significant global health and environmental issue. Inefficiencies and lack of regulated disposal have made waste plastics commonplace in every corner of planet Earth. But what if we could turn waste plastics into any object we want? 3D printing technologies utilize the same base plastics that are readily disposed of in single use plastic applications and can make custom product designs that drive innovative and sustainable solutions. However, there are many barriers that need to be overcome in the path of creating circular economies around plastic waste and 3D printing. This presentation will identify explored mechanisms and methodologies for transforming and using plastic waste in 3D printing applications, important factors in retaining performance and mechanical properties of plastics over repeated use, and infrastructural systems that need to be established to form a truly circular economy around 3D printing and plastic waste.

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  3D Scenes for Visual Attention Data Collection

  Conner Eugene Klawon

  Fixation datasets are commonly used for machine learning. By studying how humans actually look at objects we can help teach computers to look at objects similarly to humans. Additionally, understanding the way human attention works allows us to know and predict biases formed in human attention, such as a blind spots, through computer vision. However this requires teaching computers vision skills first. The method of doing this requires fixation datasets from human subjects. Currently most research is done using 2D fixation datasets, which is where this project looks to step in. The future is computer vision in our 3D world, and it therefore needs fixation datasets with 3 dimensions of space. In this project, we build a dataset of 3D scenes which can be use to extract human fixation data.

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  41 Years of Historical Canopy Gap Dynamics in Hueston Woods Old-Growth Preserve

  Grace Katherine Attea

  Late-successional forests development takes place on the scale of centuries and, therefore, understanding long-term dynamics requires research techniques that unfold over decades. Species-specific data collection in repeatedly sampled permanent plots provides researchers and land managers with a toolset for understanding how forests shift with global change drivers. In this project I will leverage nearly 30 years of numerical and spatial data of Hueston Woods State Nature Preserve. This site is amongst <1% of land in the eastern United States classified as old-growth, making it a relic of midwestern landscape history. It has been the subject of several studies due to its steady, infrequent natural disturbances, known as gap-phase dynamics. This is a process of tree regeneration that happens when a canopy tree falls, puncturing the overstory with a gap that becomes a center for the establishment of seedlings and the growth of extant trees as they vie for new resources of nutrients and light. Archetypes of late-successional forests are theorized to be structured on gap-phase dynamics, as they create a unique mosaic of young and aged forest patches, emblematic of old-growth. Miami University professor Dr. Vankat established our study site in 1981 and resampled it in 1988, 1994, and 2000, for woody species diameter, height, species ID, and location providing a unique standard for exploring shifts in distribution, canopy gap development, and recruitment. Field maps will be georeferenced and digitized in ArcGIS software. Next, we will estimate canopy gaps by using the buffer tool with diameter-based size-classes in ArcGIS. Gap ingrowth and recruitment will then be quantified to better understand long-term forest turnover. Findings will contribute to ongoing research, provide context to manipulative studies, and lay a baseline for land managers, investors, and research ecologists in creating strategic conservation plans in a time of increasing biological pressures on natural systems.

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  Accepting Privilege: Considerations of a White Music Therapist

  Lauren Elizabeth Drzewiecki

  Music therapy is a growing field in the medical and mental health system. As a white identifying student music therapist, I explore the way I can accept my white privilege and use it for advocacy without taking the space of people of color in the field.

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  Access to Proper Sanitation and Water in Impoverished Communities

  Alexandria E. Battaglia, John Paul A. Yoseph

  The importance of handwashing has recently become a growing topic of interest due to Covid-19, but this has always been an issue in undeveloped countries. Hotels across the world throw out bars of soap which have been seldom used every day. For developing countries, these scraps of soap could mean life or death. According to the World Health Organization, the eighth leading cause of death globally is diarrheal diseases, which occur from disease-ridden water and poor sanitation habits. This problem arises from both lack of potable water and lack of soap. The Borgen Project and the Sundara organization are just two of many organizations that gather used soap and shampoo bottles from hotels then sanitize and redistribute them to developing countries to address the lack of soap (Williams 2020). In addition, in developed countries, homeless and impoverished individuals often lack access to bathrooms and showering facilities which cause an increased risk of disease and illness (Leibler). Catholic Social Services and the Miami Valley Housing Opportunities are organizations located here in the Dayton area that provide these resources to those experiencing homelessness and poverty. This poster explores affected populations in developing countries and homeless populations, possible solutions, and critiques problems found with their proposed solutions. These solutions include increasing access to communal showers and survival kits (including soaps, shampoos, toothpaste, etc.), teaching proper washing techniques, and promoting their services, where these establishments can be found, and how to contact them. These projects would lead to a decrease in illnesses acquired due to living circumstances and would reduce this issue.

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  A Comparative Analysis of Federal and State Sex Trafficking Laws and Legal Framework

  Donya D. Mills

  This research explores the current sex trafficking laws in the United States. Sex trafficking is a current form of modern slavery because people engage in sexual activity by force, coericon or fraud. To combat this issue the federal law Trafficking Victims Protection Act was created to prevent and protect victims while prosecuting sex traffickers. The safe harbor law was also created which protects minors from being treated as criminals by the criminal justice system. The problem is that the law differs from state to state. The current study examined how states having different interpretation of sex trafficking laws can make it difficult to address what sex trafficking is and the services that come with them. The design of this study addresses the Trafficking Victims Protection act and safe harbor laws in states while comparing them to the federal law. The sample is of the laws and legal framework of sex trafficking laws. The results showed that some Trafficking Victims Protection act need to be more detailed because some states deal with sex trafficking at a higher rate then other states and it makes it easier to prosecute offenders when the law is worded differently. The results demonstrated that the safe harbor law is not a federal law so it is only in 36 of the 50 states. The safe harbor law was essentially the same in all of the states my research addressed. However, in all of the state's research and federal laws both the specialized services that are included in the laws differ from state to state based on the funding provided.

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  Activation of hippo pathway enhances Tau mediated neurodegeneration in Alzheimer’s Disease

  Prajakta D. Deshpande, Caitlin R. Masters

  Alzheimer’s Disease (AD), the most common progressive neurodegenerative disorder, marked by memory loss and cognition issues, has no cure till date. AD is caused by extracellular accumulation of amyloid-beta 42 (Aβ42) plaques and intracellular accumulation of neurofibrillary tangles (NFTs). NFTs are formed from the hyperphosphorylated forms of Tau, a microtubule-associated protein (MAP). The biological function of this MAP is determined by its degree of phosphorylation. The dephosphorylated version of Tau is responsible for promoting the assembly of microtubules and maintaining their structure, while hyperphosphorylated Tau becomes toxic and loses its ability to assemble microtubules. Intracellular accumulation of NFTs trigger aberrant signaling resulting in neuronal cell death by unknown mechanism(s). We employed the Gal4/UAS system in Drosophila melanogaster to misexpress human Tau mutant (TauR406W) within the developing fly retina, exhibiting AD-like neuropathology. Using candidate based forward genetic screening, we identified hippo (hpo) as one of the genetic modifiers of GMR>TauR406W reduced eye phenotype. Gain-of-function of hpo in GMR>TauR406W background worsens the neurodegenerative phenotype, whereas the loss-of-function of hpo in the GMR>TauR406W background rescues it. Here, we propose that modulating hippo pathway members will affect Tau mediated neurodegeneration in AD.

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  Adaptation controls the 60 million-year stasis of the Drosophila spermtail protein beta 2 tubulin.

  Alexander James Kirkby

  Why do some features evolve while others do not? A fundamental component of Drosophila spermtail, the beta2 tubulin protein, has not evolved in sequence in 60 million years. Is the beta2 protein an ideal configuration maintained throughout the eons by natural selection? Or is beta2 the only configuration able to support the extreme length of the Drosophila spermtail axoneme? Previous tests in which chimeric versions of the beta2 protein were tested for their ability to support a spermtail found that even small changes in beta2 sequence render it non-functional, supporting the hypothesis that beta2 is the only configuration capable of making a spermtail. But it is possible that there are alternate forms capable of supporting function, and beta2 has won competitions over these for 60 million years. Here we test this hypothesis by replacing beta2 with the human spermtail-generating tubulin H. sapiens beta 3, and determine its ability to support a fly spermtail. Preliminary results indicate beta 3 can replace beta 2 function, indicating beta two’s stasis is due to winning competitions through its ability to template exceptionally long spermtails.

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  Advocating for all medical professionals to be trained in geriatric mental health services

  Angela Catherine Galluzzo, Kathryn Mary Pfeiffer

  As HELP volunteers, we have witnessed patients suffering from various mental health issues, including depression, anxiety, or even suicidal thoughts; however, these older patients often do not express these hardships. Various studies have revealed that around 35% of hospitalized elderly patients show depressive symptoms throughout their hospital stay (Koenig et. al). Being able to recognize any signs of struggle allows for the initiation of assistance that patients might need, increasing the quality of their stay and overall quality of life, as supported by a study that found that counseling improved depression scores for depressed hospitalized elders (Mossey, et. al). Backed by this research, it is essential that healthcare professionals receive training, including how to administer a mental health screening tool, that enables them to recognize signs and symptoms of distress, specifically in elderly patients. Currently, many health professional schools, such as medical, PA, and nursing, do not include this type of extensive training on mental health in their curriculum (“Behavioral Health Training for Primary Care Providers”). In this poster, we evaluate the curriculum at the University of Dayton’s PA school and Wright State's Boonshoft School of Medicine to determine what training is included. Then, we determine if this training is incorporated in a hospital setting, specifically in Miami Valley’s HELP program, and we conclude whether there are practical changes to education and implementation that should be made.

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  A Factor-Mimicking Portfolio Weighting Model for the Information Technology Sector: An Empirical Analysis of Information Technology Portfolio Returns (2009-2021)

  Cameron Grant Beachler, Hayden Lee Gray, Kevin McLeeson

  We developed a portfolio weighting model for the information technology sector with consumer spending as the state economic variable and revenue per share as the principal factor loading using the top twenty stocks in the information technology sector as our portfolio. We test the hypothesis that our portfolio weighting model will outperform the market (S&P 500).

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  Africa in the Modern World

  Elyce C. Aldridge, Kylie Jones, Emma K. Mason, Cameron Nowlin, Jada Wamsley

  This panel builds on the last Global Voices Symposium to continue to engage the campus community on Africa in Our Century. It is a topic which is emphasized in the history of modern African course. Presenters in this session address different research topics to help us to understand contemporary Africa. In doing so, they challenge us to more understand the complexity of this continent, and Africa’s contribution to the contemporary world. Topics to be addressed include human trafficking, gender roles, Islam, and more.

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  Ain't no sunshine when they're gone: Pollinators in a solar prairie

  Nicolette A. Engelmeier, Brigid Maeve Morgan

  The solar array at Curran Place in Dayton, Ohio is home to many communities of pollinators and wildlife in the restorative prairie that was planted under the panels in 2019. My research aims to answer the following questions: What is the composition of pollinators using this solar prairie? How are the solar panels affecting the pollinators? Routine maintenance of the solar prairie may also be affecting the pollinator community. The results of my research will be able to show how renewable and sustainable energy resources are impacting the wildlife in the area. So far, it seems like the distribution and abundance of pollinators differ between locations in between rows of solar panels and outside of the panels, but solar panels are not harmful to the pollinators. Instead, the area under the panels went from being unused to a pollinator habitat.

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  Allison Amos: Capstone Artist Presentation

  Allison Nicole Amos

  My presentation will cover my approach to my art making practice:My art practice evolved out of my natural tendency towards overthinking. Painting is a contemplative practice for me; one that has a tangible start and stop, helps to create order out of perceived chaos, and turns intangible thoughts and ideas into real-world creations. Through painting I am able to explore my thoughts as they relate to themes of existentialism and psychology. I often contemplate meaning and purpose.Within existentialism I am particularly drawn to themes of meaning or purpose, and individual experiences. My interest in psychology comes from a desire to understand myself and others. I realized truly objective art is impossible, and there was no way to separate my work from myself and my experiences. My work now focuses a lot on subjectivity, existentialist thought, and memories and moments from my personal life. I approach my painting practice as a time for contemplation, and a way to question the world around me.

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  Anaerobic propionate exposure and its effect on the virulence and pathogenesis of Listeria monocytogenes Strain 07PF0776

  Allison Elizabeth Herceg

  Listeria monocytogenes is a prevalent food-borne pathogen, and a clear understanding of its pathogenesis can enhance our capability to treat infections. L. monocytogenes is ingested through contaminated foods, enters the intestinal lumen, and is able to spread throughout the rest of the body. While the pathogen spreads to tissues outside of the intestines, it resides in macrophages and travels through the bloodstream. It is currently understood that L. monocytogenes is able to disseminate into heart tissues from the intestines, however this aspect of infection is not clearly understood. A cardiotropic strain of L. monocytogenes, 07PF0776, that can cause life-threatening endocarditis has been isolated and can be used to understand pathogenesis in the heart. Dr. Erica Rinehart from Dr. Sun’s lab previously found that short chain fatty acids (SCFAs) have an effect on the pathogenesis of both strains 10403s (a commonly used laboratory strain) and 07PF0776, but there are distinct differences in bacterial growth and efficiency of infection in these two strains. Therefore, I intend to determine the effects of prior anaerobic exposure of SCFAs, specifically propionate, on strain 07PF0776 by using hemolytic assays to measure the activity of secreted LLO as an indication of bacterial virulence. If propionate treatment results in an increase of LLO production, there would be a higher red blood cell lysis in the mixture. Ultimately, this research will help us better understand the role of propionate and its potential applications in promoting cardiac health.

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  Analysis of “St. Joseph Trusting in Dreams” Using Symbolic Convergence Theory

  Karly Ruzicka, Maeve Madden, Ella Doyle, Grace McGinley

  The statue of Joseph and Jesus represents the stories of the humanity of Joseph and the Divinity of Jesus as told in the bible and throughout generations. Dramatism The symbolism of Jesus stretching his arms represents his future of reaching out to the world and mimics the future of the cross. Dramatization could be represented in this statue by Jesus holding out his hands, which depicts that he is open and there for his people to save them from sin. In addition, the way his hands and arms are positioned foreshadows Jesus hanging on the cross.

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  Analyzing Connection Barriers Among Parents and Adjudicated Juveniles in a Midwestern Treatment Center

  Mara Joan Niccoli, Rachel Elizabeth Recker

  Parents of adjudicated juveniles face numerous issues while attempting to maintain communication with youth offenders in treatment facilities. The current study seeks to highlight the various barriers these parents endure. Although previous research has uncovered some of these limitations by analyzing juvenile offenders through surveys and observations, little has been examined from the perspective of the parents. Understanding the parents' experiences of barriers or challenges in their attempt to communicate with their adjudicated children has the potential for contact changes within juvenile correctional settings. A convenience sample of 90 parents of adjudicated male juveniles in a treatment facility was surveyed to examine their experiences in maintaining contact. Results suggest that there are a variety of difficulties that inhibit communication between youth offenders and their parents within treatment centers. Parents reported that work, health, transportation, issues within the treatment center, family, money, and other reasons impair their ability to communicate with their child. Of all responses, work was reported the most as being a limitation. These findings support the notion that there are deterrents concerning communication among parents and youth offenders within treatment centers, and further research must be conducted.

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  Analyzing Mandatory Minimum Laws and their Effects on Incarceration Rate.

  John Andrew Mercs

  The current study aimed to examine four types of mandatory minimum laws (i.e., truth in sentencing, determinate sentencing, presence of mandatory minimums because of drug possession, and the presence of a mandatory minimum because of a drug sale with a firearm) and its effect on incarceration rates. Data: Data used for the study was the Impact of State Sentencing Policies on Incarceration Rates in the United States from 1975 to 2002. For the purposes of this study, only year 2002 data was used. Analysis: T-Tests for independent samples were used to examine the association between each independent variable and the outcome. Results: The statistical results show that there is no significant correlations between the variables suggesting that mandatory minimum laws do not have the desire effect on crime rates. Discussion: Legislators considering this punitive approach should consider further research to see if it has an effect in their specific jurisdiction before implementing these laws.