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Introduction
Texas ScholarWorks was established to provide open, online access to the products of the University's research and scholarship, to preserve these works for future generations, to promote new models of scholarly communication, and to help deepen community understanding of the value of higher education.
UT Tower and campus image credit: Earl McGehee, CC-BY, https://www.flickr.com/photos/ejmc/7452145850
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Recent Submissions
Dexamethasone intravitreal implants : characterization, manufacture, and elucidation of drug release mechanisms
(2023-08) Costello, Mark Allen; Zhang, Feng, Ph. D.; Lynd, Nathaniel A; Williams III, Robert O; Smyth, Hugh DC
Long-acting injectable products based on the biodegradable polymer poly(lactide-co-glycolide) (PLGA) have been available in the USA since 1989, with more than 20 PLGA–based formulations approved for use to date. Despite the clinical and commercial success of many of these drug products, no generic formulations have gained FDA approval at the time of this writing. The lack of PLGA–based generics can largely be attributed to the technical challenges associated with development of formulations with drug release profiles equivalent to the reference product. Despite extensive study of the drug release mechanisms of PLGA, the inherent complexity of the copolymer is largely to blame for the challenges associated with generic product development.
In this work, the FDA–approved product Ozurdex (dexamethasone intravitreal implant) was used as a model system to help address the challenges associated with generic product development of PLGA–based solid implants. Ozurdex is a small, rod-shaped implant (0.46 mm diameter, 6 mm long) formulated to deliver the corticosteroid dexamethasone to the posterior segment of the eye for 3–6 months. Ozurdex was thoroughly characterized and shown to be a porous implant consisting of a two-phase system of dexamethasone crystals embedded within a PLGA matrix due to a limited drug-polymer interaction. Compositionally equivalent, reverse-engineered implants were produced using a continuous hot-melt extrusion process that required careful control to manufacture implants structurally equivalent to Ozurdex. The drug release mechanisms of the reverse-engineered implants were studied in detail using a variety of analytical techniques to examine the implant throughout the drug release period. This work also demonstrated how sourcing PLGAs with similar, but subtly different, physicochemical properties can affect the manufacture and drug release kinetics of dexamethasone intravitreal implants.
Developing development : fostering culturally relevant player development in basketball culture through adaptable pedagogy and responsive teaching
(2023-08) Isom, Mareik Nadir; Brown, Anthony L. (Associate professor)
My thesis highlights the limited attention given to culturally relevant pedagogy and culturally responsive teaching in basketball player development. Culture impacts behavior and attitudes toward learning and success. By addressing this oversight in literature, we can integrate essential cultural elements into the overall development of basketball players. Five crucial categories emerge in the literature on basketball player development: the linear trajectory of development, the transactional nature of development, the critical traits of successful development, the pivotal role of the teacher/coach, and the need to further develop development. Although I gained valuable insights from the literature regarding theories, methodologies, questions, concerns, and results related to basketball player development, I found that guidance on incorporating culturally responsive teaching and culturally relevant pedagogy needs to be improved. By better understanding and implementing these elements, we can positively impact basketball culture and bring out the best in all participants.
Early events in the infection cycle of bacteriophage T7
(2023-08) Lopez, Linda Letti; Molineux, Ian; Davies, Bryan; McLellan, Jason; Finkelstein, Ilya; Sullivan, Christopher
The emergence of molecular biology as a discipline was dependent on the use of bacteriophages as model organisms. The T-series of phages were first characterized in 1945, and while its members have since been used as tools for probing genetic structure and function, much remains unknown about these phages themselves. This lab has long focused on phage T7, and while we have a superficial understanding about the major processes in its life cycle, in the past decade, advances in imaging technology have allowed not only new insights, but new questions to emerge. In Chapter 1, I provide a brief history of phage biology and background on phage T7. In Chapter 2, I visit the topic of T7 DNA replication, using an alternative method to investigate timing and quantity. In Chapter 3, I describe the observation of an ATP synthase superstructure formed around the phage T7 DNA translocation apparatus, and use a method pioneered in this lab for investigating how ATP synthase might be involved in phage infection. Altogether, this work brings new understanding to the process of phage T7 DNA entry and offers the possibility for the discovery of a new class of biological rotary motors.
Diachrony of the perfect paradigm in Mayan languages
(2023-08) Tandy, James Brenden; Law, Danny, 1980-; Pat-El, Na'ama; Epps, Patience L; Deo, Ashwini S
The purpose of this dissertation is to reconstruct the history of perfect aspect morphology in the Mayan language family of Guatemala, Belize, and Mexico. Using data from descriptive grammars, I reconstruct the form of the proto-Mayan perfect suffix for transitive and intransitive verbs, and I show how this paradigm changed in the descendant languages as suffixes were innovated, lost, or changed function. In doing this, I highlight how language contact has affected the picture of Mayan perfect marking. This dissertation contributes to the understanding of Mayan linguistic prehistory and, more broadly, provides a case study of reconstructing derivational morphology by comparing language-specific contexts of use.
A major claim of this dissertation is that the proto-Mayan perfect was not a canonical inflectional category and instead had derivational characteristics. I argue that the proto-Mayan active and passive transitive perfect constructions were both synchronically based on a patient nominalization, marked with the suffix *(-o)-’m. The widespread perfect suffix -b’il, which Kaufman (2015: 319) reconstructed as the proto-Mayan passive perfect participle, I take to be a Western Mayan innovation that spread to other Mayan languages by contact.
Among other specific claims, this dissertation accounts for the areal spread of the Eastern Mayan -maj perfect suffix, which I argue was innovated in Poqom and spread to other Eastern Mayan languages by way of a previously unrecognized contact zone, the Sacapulas Corridor. I also discuss the proto-Central Mayan *-ooj/-uuj derivational suffix, which has infinitival reflexes in most Mayan languages but marks perfect aspect in Poqom, Tseltalan, and Tojol-ab’al; I reconstruct it as an infinitive and account for its development into a perfect suffix in these subgroups.
Preservice teachers’ digital literacy in educator preparation programs : a literature review
(2023-08) Lim, Mihyun; Hughes, Joan E.
As technology’s potential to transform teaching and learning became clear, shared standards and expectations emerged for teachers to integrate in K-12 classrooms. However, despite the massive influx of classroom technology, there were few noticeable changes to the pedagogical development or curricular sequences. The purpose of this report is to provide a review of literature that explores how preservice teachers learn to conceptualize their own digital literacy during their teacher preparation. More specifically, this review investigates preservice teachers’ learning about digital literacy conceptions in relation to how their learning experiences are embedded in and situated as part of learning activities and teaching practices with technology in teacher education coursework. The results of the literature review provide insight as to what learning opportunities teacher educators can provide when preservice teachers need to be prepared to understand and practice with technology for specific purposes and contexts in classrooms.