Delacroix's Voyage to Morocco and Concepts of Orientalism

Research paper submitted to American University in partial fulfillment of the Degree of Master of Arts; approved as non-thesis option</p

Constructions of Beat Culture and Regional Abstract Expressionism in the Work of Jay DeFeo

Research paper submitted to American University in partial fulfillment of the Degree of Master of Arts; approved as non-thesis option</p

Online Prognostics for Fuel Thermal Management System

Modern tactical aircraft subsystems face challenging weight and volume limitations. In addition, power and thermal subsystems have grown increasingly flight critical with each successive generation. Consequently, next generation power and thermal systems must reliably operate under narrower margins to enable electrically and thermally demanding capabilities, such as directed energy weapons. The ability to narrow these margins is ultimately limited by the ability to guarantee mission objectives despite variations and uncertainty in power and thermal system performance. This paper demonstrates online prognostic methods applied to a fuel thermal management system. Furthermore, this paper highlights the need for future research to quantify the effects on mission objectives caused by discrepancies between nominal and actual conditions for aircraft designs based on models of highly integrated systems.</jats:p

Global workspace theory inspired architecture for autonomous structural health monitoring

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Minimal concentrations of retinoic acid induce stimulation by retinoic acid 8 and promote entry into meiosis in isolated pregonadal and gonadal mouse primordial germ cells

In the present study, we demonstrate that minimal concentrations (≤ 1 nM) of retinoic acid (RA), equivalent to the quantity contaminating serum-containing culture medium, are sufficient to promote meiotic entry and progression through meiotic prophase I (MPI) stages in isolated 12.5-days postcoitum (dpc) XX and XY mouse primordial germ cells (PGCs) in culture. Similarly, we found that the same low RA concentration up-regulated or induced stimulation by retinoic acid 8 (Stra8) in such cells, both at mRNA and protein level. In preleptotene/leptotene germ cells, STRA8 was localized in nuclear dots that disappeared at later MPI stages. In addition to Stra8, other meiotic genes such as Dmc1 and Rec8 appeared stimulated by RA directly in PGCs with similar concentration-dependent trends. Finally, we found that RA induced Stra8, Sycp3, Dmc1, and Rec8 transcripts, promoting meiotic entry in culture also in pregonadal 10.5-dpc PGCs of both sexes. When cultured isolated from somatic cells, such PGCs, however, were unable to progress through MPI stages, while after entering meiosis, they progressed through MPI when cultured within aorta/gonad/mesonephros tissues. We conclude that besides RA, germ cell intrinsic factors and other exogenous signals from the surrounding somatic cells are probably necessary for meiotic entry and progression in mouse PGCs

Stimulated by retinoic acid gene 8 (STRA8) interacts with the germ cell specific bHLH factor SOHLH1 and represses c-KIT expression in vitro

STRA8 (Stimulated by Retinoic Acid Gene 8) controls the crucial decision of germ cells to engage meiotic division up and down-regulating genes involved in the meiotic programme. It has been proven as an amplifier of genes involved in cell cycle control and chromosome events, however, how STRA8 functions as negative regulator are not well understood. In this study, we demonstrate that STRA8 can interact with itself and with other basic Helix-Loop-Helix (bHLH) transcription factors through its HLH domain and that this domain is important for its ability to negatively interfere with the Ebox-mediated transcriptional activity of bHLH transcription factors. Significantly, we show that STRA8 interacts with TCF3/E47, a class I bHLH transcription factors, and with SOHLH1, a gonadal-specific bHLH, in male germ cells obtained from prepuberal mouse testis. We demonstrated that STRA8, indirectly, is able to exert a negative control on the SOHLH1-dependent stimulation of c-KIT expression in late differentiating spermatogonia and preleptotene spermatocytes. Although part of this results were obtained only 'in vitro', they support the notion that STRA8 interacting with different transcription factors, besides its established role as 'amplifier' of meiotic programme, is able to finely modulate the balance between spermatogonia proliferation, differentiation and acquisition of meiotic competence