FGS - Electronic Theses and Practica
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This collection contains University of Manitoba electronic theses and practica.
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- ItemOpen AccessMi'kmaw Catholicism: oral tradition, transculturation, and resistance in Mi'kma'ki(2023-12-05) Hughes, M.I. Micheline; Thorpe, Jocelyn (History/Women's and Gender Studies); Sinclair, Niigaan (Indigenous Studies); Robinson, Angela (Anthropology, Memorial University of Newfoundland); Trott, ChristopherThe Mi’kmaw Nation has lived in Mi’kma’ki for at least 11,000 years. In the time of early colonial efforts in Turtle Island, the Mi’kmaq submitted Catholicism to processes of transculturation which allowed it to be meaningful and beneficial to them. The decision to adopt and adapt Catholicism was validated by the oral traditions of the Mi’kmaq. Since this time, Mi’kmaw stories have come to reflect the various ways that Mi’kmaw Catholicism is understood, practiced, and valued by this Nation. This dissertation employs Mi’kmaw stories primarily from the mid-to-late 1800s to investigate Mi’kmaw Catholicism. Indigenous methodologies are the foundation of this work. Postcolonial theory and story as theory are used to understand the Mi’kmaq’s perspectives of their religious tradition as well as the role that story played in its process of transculturation. Relationships between story and the uptake of Catholicism, Mi’kmaw identity, agency, resistance, and imagining a path to a just reality are explored. I believe that telling stories that incorporate Mi’kmaw Catholicism was a way to express the lived realities of the Mi’kmaq; a way to preserve voice and resist erasure. It seems that stories provided a location for the transculturation of Catholicism to occur, bringing both Mi’kmaq and Catholic actors into conversation with each other. Ultimately, I believe that stories allowed the Mi’kmaq to imagine a reality in which their religion, their families, and msit no’kmaq, all my relations, flourished.
- ItemOpen AccessInvestigating the relationship between infant feeding practices and inflammation-associated biomarkers of one-year-old infants in the CHILD Cohort study(2023-12-06) Ames, Spencer; Marshall, Aaron (Immunology); Leong, Christine (Pharmacy); Azad, MeghanBreastfeeding and human milk consumption are associated with immune system development; however, the impact of different infant feeding practices on this relationship is unclear. This research aimed to understand how current human milk feeding (HMF) status is related to immune activity, and how history of HMF (HMF duration, exclusivity, and method - directly from the breast, or pumped and bottled) is related to immune development, in one-year-old infants. This study investigated a subset of 605 one-year-old infants from the CHILD Cohort Study, a cohort study that recruited pregnant women from four Canadian provinces. Infant feeding was captured from hospital birth records and parent questionnaires. Ninety-two biomarkers reflecting immune system activity and development were measured in infant serum using the Olink Target 96 Inflammation panel. Associations were determined using multivariable regression (adjusted for sex, time until blood sample centrifugation, and participant study site), with adjustment for multiple comparisons. Nearly half (44%) of infants were still breastfeeding at the time of blood sampling (12.6 ± 1.4 months). Compared to infants who were never breastfed or had stopped breastfeeding, those who were still breastfeeding had higher levels of serum Fibroblast Growth Factor 21 (FGF-21, adjusted standardized β-coefficient=0.56, 95%CI=0.41-0.72), Cluster of Differentiation 244 (CD244, β=0.35, 0.19-0.50), Chemokine Ligand 6 (CXCL6, β=0.34, 0.18-0.50), and Chemokine Ligand 20 (CCL20, β=0.26 ,0.09-0.42), and lower levels of extracellular newly identified receptor for advanced glycation end-products binding protein (EN-RAGE, β=-0.16, -0.29- - 0.03). Among infants not currently HMF, total HMF duration had a marginal positive association with IL-7 serum levels (adjusted standardized β-coefficient =0.05, 0.02- 0.08). Exclusive HMF duration and HMF method (at three months of age) were not associated with any biomarkers in adjusted models. Current HMF status, more so than prior infant feeding practices, is associated with changes in inflammation-associated biomarker profiles at one year of age. In addition to informing new hypotheses about the impact of breastfeeding on immune development and activity, these results highlight the importance of including current HMF status in immune-system-focused infant serum proteomic studies.
- ItemOpen AccessImpact of extruder die temperature and nitrogen gas injection on the physical quality of soybean protein meat analogues(2023-11-27) Ghanghas, Neeraj; Aluko, Rotimi (Food and Human Nutritional Sciences); Paliwal, Jitendra (Biosystems Engineering); Koksel, FilizThe food sector is a major contributor to greenhouse gas emissions, and there is an urgent need to shift low-carbon footprint foods. Incorporating plant-based foods, such as meat analogues, in our diets can help mitigate the environmental impact of animal-based foods. Plant-based meat analogues are most commonly produced using high-moisture extrusion cooking, which transforms plant proteins (e.g., soy protein) into products that resemble the sensory characteristics of meat products. However, developing meat analogues with textural attributes similar to meat products is challenging due to the narrow operating range of extrusion process parameters that can provide texturized products with the desired layered and fibrous structure. This study used a novel gas-assisted high-moisture extrusion technique to explore the potential of this technique to improve the textural quality of soy protein-based meat analogues. The degree of texturization as well as the physical quality of meat analogues were studied as a function of long cooling die temperature (DT) and nitrogen gas injection pressure (GP). All extrusion operating parameters were kept constant except for DT (35, 50 and 65 °C) and GP (0, 1 and 2.5 bar). The texture analysis showed that different combinations of DT-GP led to a wide variation in the transversal cutting force (3.97-5.79 N), longitudinal cutting force (3.73-6.00 N), hardness (143.63-194.27 N), chewiness (106.01-150.49 N) and gumminess (115.15-161.85 N). The lowest density was observed for the meat analogues produced at the treatment combination of lowest DT and highest GP. The X-ray microtomography analyses of bubbles formed in the meat analogues produced at a pressure of 2.5 bar GP revealed that variation in DT impacted the properties of the gas volume fraction in the meat analogues. It was observed that an increase in DT led to an increased maximum structure thickness and sphericity while causing a decrease in the major diameter of the bubbles. These wide variations in textural and microstructural attributes indicate that gas-assisted high-moisture extrusion holds immense potential to improve the sensory properties of meat analogues.
- ItemOpen AccessInvestigating the role of SIRT3 in doxorubicin induced dilated cardiomyopathy(2023-12-04) Tomczyk, Mateusz; Grant, Hatch (Pharmacology and Therapeutics); Katyal, Sachin (Pharmacology and Therapeutics); Goron, Joseph (Nursing); Zordoky, Beshay (University of Minnesota); Dolinsky, VernonDoxorubicin (DOX) is an effective anthracycline anti-neoplastic agent used for the treatment of hematological and solid tumors. Advancements in cancer treatment over several decades have led to increased cancer remission and survival. However, high cumulative dosages of anthracycline chemotherapeutics put patients at risk for the development cardiovascular complications later in life. Specifically, DOX can induce the development of a progressive dilated cardiomyopathy characterized by reduced ventricular wall thickness which can lead to cardiac dysfunction and possibly heart failure. This generates a quandary where physicians must deliberate the consequences of halting cancer therapy prematurely at the expense of neoplastic cell growth and metastasis or administering cumulative dosages that put patients at risk for developing cardiotoxic side effects. The cardiotoxic effects of DOX are attributed to the production of reactive oxygen species and mitochondrial dysfunction. Previous work from our lab showed that in H9c2 rat cardiomyoblasts, DOX reduced protein Sirtuin 3 (SIRT3), the main mitochondrial lysine deacetylase. In the following dissertation we move our findings in vivo, using an animal model of chronic DOX treatment and transgenic mice that have cardiac expression of a truncated M3-SIRT3 and a full length mitochondrial localized M1-SIRT3, to show that SIRT3 expression in the heart can prevent cardiotoxic effects of DOX. Our first study focuses on investigating the effect of DOX on acetylation and SIRT3 regulation of SOD2, a mitochondrial enzyme involved in the detoxification of reactive oxygen species. Our subsequent work develops a narrative of DOX impaired cardiac metabolism. Using mass spectrometry methods, we identified that DOX altered the acetylation of Hydroxyacyl-CoA Dehydrogenase-α, a mitochondrial enzyme involved in the utilization of fatty acids, the main fuel source for the heart. This finding led us to perform a global lipidomic analysis of cardiac tissue revealing DOX reduced myocardial triglycerides in non-transgenic animals. Successively, we performed 1H-NMR spectroscopy and 18F-FDG PET to examine how DOX alters cardiac metabolites and cardiac glucose uptake. Our work embodies an important expansion in our understanding of the cardiometabolic dysfunction leading to DOX induced cardiotoxicity and how SIRT3 may be a potential therapeutic target for the prevention of chemotherapy induced dilated cardiomyopathy.
- ItemOpen AccessFactors influencing capelin (Mallotus villosus) recruitment on the Newfoundland shelf(2023-12-01) Tripp, Ashley; Anderson, Gary (Biological Sciences); Mundy, CJ (Environment & Geography); Pedersen, Torstein (The Arctic University of Norway); Davoren, Gail; Murphy, HannahEnvironmental conditions experienced by marine fish eggs, larvae and juveniles are critical for recruitment into the spawning population, thereby influencing patterns in population fluctuations and year-class strength. Marine fish typically show a type III survivorship curve, where the most vulnerable stage occurs early in life. Capelin (Mallotus villosus) is a small, short-lived (3-6 years) forage fish species that occupies an important middle trophic position in the food web. In the 1980-1990s, capelin population collapses occurred in the three commercial fisheries in Iceland, the Barents Sea, and Newfoundland and Labrador. The Newfoundland population is the only one that has not shown any recovery in the subsequent three decades. The aims of this thesis were to: 1. Determine habitat- and bay-specific larval densities (as a proxy of site quality) (Ch.1) 2. Investigate environmental drivers (prey, predators) of larval densities and condition (Ch.2) 3. Determine the influence of ambient water chemistry on larval otolith chemistry (Ch.3) 4. Investigate connectivity among bays using otolith chemical signatures (Ch.4) In Chapter 1, I found consistent trends in the timing of spawning and annual larval densities in two northeastern Newfoundland bays (Trinity Bay and Notre Dame Bay (NDB)), suggesting coast-wide interannual trends in recruitment. Intertidal and subtidal habitats within NDB were of similar quality based on temperature, egg density, proportion of dead eggs, and larval densities. In Chapter 2, emergent larval densities were correlated with prey biomass, but not predator biomass or temperature, suggesting that larvae are emerging into a favourable prey environment but not necessarily into low predator abundances. Higher variation in larval length and condition was observed between years, with less variation between intertidal and subtidal habitats. In Chapter 3, I found that the concentrations of some non-essential elements increased in capelin embryonic otoliths with increasing environmental concentrations (i.e., strontium), while others do not (i.e., barium). Lastly, in Chapter 4, I found distinct otolith chemistry signatures in recently hatched capelin larvae from five bays throughout coastal Newfoundland that could be classified with high success. Overall, this research is important for the management of the Newfoundland capelin stock to ensure the survival of this critical species.