2017 Pioneer Scholars

Cupid and Psyche: Falling in Love with Love

The myth of Cupid and Psyche was rediscovered by recent readers because of its inclusion in Mary Zimmerman’s play Metamorphoses. It premiered on Broadway in 2002 and was nominated for several Tony’s including—Best Play. In the myth, a young woman named Psyche falls in love with a man who can only visit her when she cannot see him. When it is revealed that it is Cupid, she goes mad and goes through a series of tasks in order to be with a God. Dena seeks to link two aims: to trace the curious history of this myth and to understand why it has been overlooked, and to explore its allegorical implications where Cupid and Psyche are characters but also stand in for love and the human mind.

Dena first encountered this myth her freshman year of high school from a book of choice. This myth, along with many others, was never looked at or discussed in great depth in her high school. When Dena started college, this myth reappeared in her CCS 100 class through the book The Golden Ass. This particular myth has always fascinated her because everything is not what it seems, from Cupid himself to the love he shares with Psyche. There is a lot more going on in this piece than a star-crossed love and a vengeful mother. By tracking the history and reading adaptations, Dena hopes to see these hidden themes explored and explained.

The Soul of Truth: a linguo-cultural investigation into the commensurability of the rhetoric of religious experience

The translation of religious texts has long been a contentious issue in religious and philosophical circles, with most of the debate centering around the question of how faithful translations are to the original texts. Brita intends to argue that this debate is not as consequential as it seems. Drawing from Jung’s Psychology and Religion, James’ The Varieties of Religious Experience: A Study in Human Nature, and Otto’s The Idea of the Holy, she will outline why she believes 1) that humanity has a universal inclination for religious experience which can result in the same core, underlying concept being manifested in many different ways in different religious traditions and 2) that non-rational processes play a significant role in any system of religious beliefs. With the aid of Quine’s explanations of linguistic comparative analysis in Word and Object, Brita will explain that taken together, these two points strongly suggest that from a practical standpoint there is no doubt that the vast majority of translated religious texts are sufficiently similar to the original works. The words that we use to describe religious concepts are merely tools to facilitate understanding, they are not the concepts themselves and they cannot by themselves create belief; religious experience should take precedence over religious rhetoric. The debate concerning religious text translation may be intellectually stimulating, but it has little pragmatic significance.

This project will demonstrate, through extensive research into prominent thought on the topic and an analysis of a pertinent case study, that the issue of translation of religious texts is not deserving of the level of contention that it currently enjoys. Much of religious belief stems from non-rational origins and there is a universal propensity for belief in certain religious concepts that facilitates transcultural understanding.

Performance of rats in two-choice probability-learning as a function of time since feeding

In two-choice probability learning (PL) experiments, a subject has two response options, and the chance of predicting the correct response (the one that produces a reward) varies according to preset probabilities. One response option has a higher probability of being correct then the other response option. Subjects in PL experiments typically exhibit one of two response patterns. The first pattern is to “probability match” by distributing responses in approximately the same percentage that each of the two response options have produced reward on previous trials. The second patterns is to “maximize” by exclusively responding to the option that has produced more reward on previous trials.

McMahon and Scheel (2011) found that people who drank root beer containing sugar were more likely to persist at probability matching, whereas those who had drank sugar-free rootbeer exceeded matching. The results suggest that probability matching occurs because people are searching for patterns that might predict correct responses on every trial. However, pattern searching is cognitively demanding, and eventually, people abandon searching for an optimal pattern and simply pick the outcome that has produced reward most often. Hence, sugar, metabolized into glucose, gave people resources that encouraged a more cognitively demanding strategy. The current study would test whether a corresponding effect of blood glucose level might influence rat performance. Rats who have not eaten for 22 hours prior to testing should abandon pattern searching more quickly than rats who ate 4 hours prior to testing. Hence, rats in the 22-hour condition should approach maximizing, and rats in the 4-hour condition should approach probability matching.

Responses to intra and interspecific predation risks in Triops newberryi

Predation is a common interaction among members of ecological communities and it shapes both the population dynamics and many adaptations of both prey and predators. Not only does a predator lower the fecundity and survivorship of prey, predators can kill enough prey that they cause population cycles in the prey. For example, lynx have long been associated with population cycling in hares, which they prey upon (Korpimaki and Krebs 1996). Furthermore, under some conditions, individuals of a species may prey upon other individuals of the same species, called cannibalism. This is one type of a larger phenomenon, called intraguild predation, where individuals of the same trophic level feed on other individuals of the same trophic level, including their own species resulting in cannibalism. This phenomenon complicates our understanding of how predators interact with other members of the biological community. Because cannibalism can profoundly impact communities, there has been reconsideration of prey and predator interactions such as stability and diversity of communities, trophic cascades, niche shifts and species exclusion (Gagnon et. al 2011).

In order to measure the responses of Triops, we will be staggering generations to raise larger triops, while also have a younger generation of Triops available. To test responses to predation risk, we will expose young triops, in a controlled environment, to stimuli produced by intraspecific predators and interspecific predators, older Triops and birds, respectively. To test interspecific responses, we will expose adult Triops to bird silhouettes of species that are known to prey on larger triops at the water surface (as described in Davis and Madison 2000). We will create silhouettes of birds and display them above the Triops in their controlled environment as it has been observed that tadpole shrimp can have light-dark responses, especially adult tadpole shrimp (Davis and Madison 2001). Triops’ responses to predator cues will be digitally recorded and using animal behavior software (such as BORIS - Behavioral Observation Research Interactive Software), each Triops in the sample will be observed for their behavior and data analysis will be performed. We will be looking for behaviors such as digging, hunkering down or hiding, and other active trying to avoidance behaviors. Trials will be repeated through multiple generations to give insight on correlation between biological fitness via defense mechanism and life history.

Effects of the metabolite Emodine produced by the common buckthorn (Rhamnus cathartica) in the loss of the amphibian diversity at Carroll University's Greene Field Station in southeastern Wisconsin

Decline in amphibian populations has been reported around the world for over 20 years [1]. Different threats like loss of habitat [2]; novel infectious diseases [3, 4], and invasive species [5, 6], have been documented as culprits in the decrease of amphibian biodiversity in many places including Wisconsin [7]. However, detailed information of the state of amphibian populations in Southeastern Wisconsin is poor or inexistent. In an effort to determine the make-up of the amphibian community and its population structure of Greene Field Station of Carroll University (GFS) and with the support of the Pio-Scholar program, detailed surveys of the amphibians and reptiles inhabiting the field station were conducted between 2014 and 2016 [8].

Through our research, we expect to find a relationship between the concentrations of Emodine in areas considered optimal for amphibian communities, and the decline of abundance of species like the western chorus frog as well as overall diversity of the amphibian community. Furthermore, we believe that because green frogs have large overwintering tadpoles, this species might suffer some level of hepatocellular lesions, but still survive allowing it to dominate the amphibian community at the GFS.

Ancient Religions and Fundamentalist Politics: The Impact on the Modern Woman in India

Religion, both explicitly and implicitly, has shaped the world in which we live. It has modeled structures of societies and politics both in religious and secular states. In a society like India, where a clear religious majority exists without an official declaration of a state religion, religion's impact can easily be examined in nationalist and fundamentalist nation building. By using English translations of Hindi and Sanskrit writings, Bethany will see how these laws and teachings affect the newly fundamentalist fronted government's position on women's rights. Particularly, after her time on the Philosophies and Religions of Northern India cross cultural experience, gender dynamics are a phenomenon she would like to explore in the context of both ancient text and traditions, as well as their implications in today's conservative BJP Prime Minister Modi's social policies and history. Since independence was gained from British empirical rule, India has not had a fundamentalist leader until the 2014 swearing In of Narendra Modi, which has changed the position of women in society. Using texts such as Wadley's Women in the Hindu Tradition, Uma Chakravati's Beyond the Altekarian Paradigm: Towards a New Understanding of Gender Relations in Early Indian History, and works by Julia Leslie, Wendy Doniger, and other scholars who have written on women in India, Bethany will analyze the materials relating to my topic of research to both cement what has already been written on and what she can build upon. She will also interpret high quality English translations of common Hindu texts (as she does not yet read Sanskrit or Hindi) to characterize the underlying expectations of women in the primary sources. Using newspapers and online sources on political policies and statements from Prime Minister Modi since 2014, she will integrate these other texts to form a coherent understanding of impacts and implications of the new fundamentalist government on women in particular.

Comparison of beta-lactamase genes found in Escherichia coli isolated from hospital sewage or city stage facilities

The rising prevalence of antibiotic resistant organisms poses a global public health risk. The development of antibiotics is one of the most important medical advances without which many of the modern day medical methods will no longer be possible. The prevalence of antibiotic resistance genes (ARGs) is rising due to the over prescription and misuse of antibiotics in humans and livestock. Monitoring the prevalence of different antibiotic resistance genes is an important part of predicting the clinical effectiveness of a particular treatment.

In some of the preliminary work by Matthew and Dr. Schneider, they have found that the proportion of beta-lactam resistant E. coli is higher in hospital sewage than city sewage and that the mechanisms of antibiotic resistance are different. Genes like TEM, SHV, and CTX that we commonly find in resistant E. coli from city sewage are largely absent in resistant E. coli from hospital sewage. Since the hospital is the site where the newest antibiotics are being used, the resistance mechanisms found in the hospital likely reflect the clinically applicable trends for resistance as they evolve. For this reason, they would like to examine these differences in more detail.

The team will begin the study by quantifying the relative abundance of antibiotic resistant bacteria in the different sewage samples. They will then characterize the antibiotic resistance profiles of several isolates from each water source with a focus on lactam drugs. The team will also examine the mechanism of resistance genetically by screening resistant bacteria for the presence of ESBL genes (TEM, SHV, and CTX) or AmpC using multiplex PCR assays (Monstein, HJ. et al. 2007, APMIS 115:1400-8, Pérez-Pérez FJ and ND Hanson. 2002. J. Clin. Micro. 40:2153-62)

Effects of the metabolite Emodine produced by the common buckthorn (Rhamnus cathartica) in the loss of the amphibian diversity at Carroll University's Greene Field Station in southeastern Wisconsin

Decline in amphibian populations has been reported around the world for over 20 years [1]. Different threats like loss of habitat [2]; novel infectious diseases [3, 4], and invasive species [5, 6], have been documented as culprits in the decrease of amphibian biodiversity in many places including Wisconsin [7]. However, detailed information of the state of amphibian populations in Southeastern Wisconsin is poor or inexistent. In an effort to determine the make up of the amphibian community and its population structure of Greene Field Station of Carroll University (GFS) and with the support of the Pioneer Scholars program, detailed surveys of the amphibians and reptiles inhabiting the field station were conducted between 2014 and 2016 [8].

Through Linh and Dr. Brenes's research, they expect to find a relationship between the concentrations of Emodine in areas considered optimal for amphibian communities, and the decline of abundance of species like the western chorus frog as well as overall diversity of the amphibian community. Furthermore, the team believes that because green frogs have large overwintering tadpoles, this species might suffer some level of hepatocellular lesions, but still survive allowing it to dominate the amphibian community at the GFS.

Update

Lihn Nguyen won the Frank G. Brooks award for excellence in student research and the right to represent the district at the national TriBeta honor society meetings in 2020.

• Nguyen, L., and Brenes, R. 2019. Metabolic detoxification of the metabolite emodin produced by the common buckthorn (Rhamnus cathartica) by the Green frog Lithobates clamitans (Ranidae). Tri-Beta biological honor society meetings. Whitewater, WI.

 
She also won the award for best student paper at the 35th International Society of Chemical Ecology meeting in the summer od 2019.

• Nguyen, L., and Brenes, R. 2019. The role of Emodin from common Buckthorn (Rhamnus cathartica) in the loss of amphibian diversity at the at Carroll University’s Greene Field Station in Southwestern Wisconsin. 35th International Society of Chemical Ecology meeting. Atlanta, GA.

Reliability and Validity of Hand-Held Dynamometry for the Measurement of Hip Strength

Hip weakness has been shown to be an important factor in injury and pathology. Hip strength is often measured by hand-held dynamometry, however, the validity of this method compared to a gold-standard has not be investigated. Hip strength has been tested in many different positions in the literature and hip testing position could influence the reliability and validity of these measurements. Therefore, the aims of this study are to 1) determine the reliability of the HHD compared to IKD for hip strength testing across multiple different positions (e.g. angles), 2) determine the validity of the HHD compared to the IKD for hip strength testing across multiple different positions, and 3) determine the best position for hip strength testing for each muscle group measured. Approximately 30 healthy participants will be recruited. Testing will occur over three separate days. On the first two days, participants will complete tests of hip strength of the extensors, abductors, internal and external rotators. Each of these tests will include measurement at 4 different angles for the extensors and abductors and six different angles for the internal and external rotators. Measurements will be randomized and counter-balanced in order to account for the possible influence of fatigue, with half of the measurements occurring on each day. On the third day, participants will return and complete those measures they performed on the second day to assess the reliability of these measurements. Following data collection, the reliability of measurements will be assessed using Intraclass Correlation Coefficients (ICCs). The validity of the measurements will be assessed using linear regression modeling and Bland-Altman plots to determine relationship and agreement between these measurement techniques.

FoodScape

Eating disorders have faced a great deal of stigma in recent years. Glamorized and made into a spectacle in the media, often viewed as simply a "diet gone wrong," and a "phase" that (only) young women go through, eating disorders are often oversimplified and made into a case of poor self-control that is quick and easy to overcome. According to the American Psychological Association, eating disorders often go untreated, with only 13% of adolescents receiving treatment for their disorder. Furthermore, individuals with eating disorders are at a higher risk for comorbidity with other mental health disorders, such as depression, anxiety, and substance abuse (American Psychological Association, 2011). As this disorder continues to be undertreated and misunderstood, the most advice and support people with eating disorders tend to get is to "eat a sandwich" or "have more self-control." In reality, eating disorders like bulimia and anorexia nervosa are much more complex and difficult for outsiders to understand.

A new genre of fiction, called interactive fiction, may be able to resolve the knowledge gap between those with and without eating disorders. Interactive fiction offers a unique opportunity for the reader to make choices for the protagonist, guiding the narrative through a multitude of different paths. This project will be an online hypertext piece created through Twine, a program for writing interactive fiction. The story will center on a character with an eating disorder as they go through their day-to-day life. The reader, or "player," must make choices for the character that pertain to their eating disorder, such as choosing whether to eat a certain food, to discuss their disorder with friends and family, or to seek treatment. The goal of this project is to illuminate the complexities behind eating disorders to non-sufferers and give players/readers more insight into the struggles of people with these disorders. It is also meant to help those currently struggling with eating disorders feel better understood. Annie will be working with her mentor, Professor Best, on the Twine/interactive fiction writing aspect of this piece, and she will consult with Dr. Margaret Kasimatis to ensure the accuracy of the portrayal of the disorder.