This thesis examines the evolution, applications, and statistical interpretations of DNA typing as a tool in the field of forensic science as well as in our criminal justice system. The most controversial aspect of DNA typing involves the determination of how likely it is that two people share the same DNA profile. This involves the use of population genetics and databases of allelic frequencies as well as some assumptions about population structuring.

The purpose of this study was to correlate the Vegetation of the Woodbine Sands with the edaphic factors. In the laboratory an analysis of the edephic factors was made of the twenty-two soil types collected from the three formations. The results of these and other analysis are shown in tables and graphs. The results indicate that the vegetational cover of an area that is uniform in its origin and in its resident soil factors is determined by the edaphic factors present.

This investigation was undertaken in order to evaluate the United States Soil Conservation Service program of grassland recovery on the land utilization project in Wise County, Texas.

In July of 1999, I wrote to 24 Texas junior and community colleges (and one four-year institution) describing my thesis agenda of a general biology lecture and laboratory syllabus for introductory biology students. I requested the titles and authors of the general biology textbooks and laboratory manuals they were currently using, the publishers of these texts, and the edition of said texts. I then contacted publishers of the various textbooks who, in turn, directed me to the Dallas-area representatives for further inquiries. I assimilated the various authors' general biology topics into a two-semester syllabus of lecture and one semester of laboratory. The document is not a text manuscript, but an all-inclusive listing of a general biology syllabus broken down by subject.

Wildland fires in the United States are not always confined to wilderness areas. The growth of population centers and housing developments in wilderness areas has blurred the boundaries between rural and urban. This merger of human development and natural landscape is known in the wildland fire community as the wildland urban interface or WUI, and it is within this interface that many wildland fires increasingly occur. As wildland fire intrusions in the WUI increase so too does the need for tools to assess potential impact to valuable assets contained within the interface. This study presents a methodology that combines real-time weather data, a wildland fire behavior model, satellite remote sensing and geospatial data in a geographic information system to assess potential risk to human developments and natural resources within the Austin metropolitan area and surrounding ten counties of central, Texas. The methodology uses readily available digital databases and satellite images within Texas, in combination with an industry standard fire behavior model to assist emergency and natural resource managers assess potential impacts from wildland fire. Results of the study will promote prevention of WUI fire disasters, facilitate watershed and habitat protection, and help direct efforts in post wildland fire mitigation and …

Absence of functional phenylalanine hydroxylase results in phenylketonuria (PKU). Viable treatments remain few, expensive and secondary conditions such as osteopenia occur in most PKU patients. Objective 1: Given the recently described roles of gut microbes to aid host digestion, an orally administered genetically engineered probiotic as the delivery vehicle for enzyme replacement therapy was created. The engineered probiotic, pHENOMMenal, produced phenylalanine ammonia lyase with significant production of trans-cinnamate (phenylalanine cleavage product) in vitro and resulted in a reduction of 515 μM in blood phenylalanine when fed to PKU animals for 14 days (from 2307µM ± 264µM to 1792µM ± 261µM, n = 6, P < 0.05). The control probiotic produced no change in blood phenylalanine. Thus, pHENOMMenal treatment in PKU mice demonstrated engineered microbes could compensate for a metabolic deficiency of the host. Objective 2: Evaluate the PAHenu2 mouse model of PKU for a genetic discrepancy causing ocular enlargement and delayed development observed only after the PAHenu2 mutation was crossed to the C57BL/6J mouse. When compared to healthy littermates, ELISA indicated a consistent but insignificant decrease in plasma IGF-1 and an increase in ocular IGF-1 in PKU animals. SNP screening demonstrated a differential inheritance of IGF-1 alleles in healthy and …

Tissue Factor Pathway Inhibitor (TFPI) is an anticoagulant protein containing three Kunitz domains, K1, K2 and K3. K1 inhibits Factor VIIa, K2 inhibits Factor Xa, and K3 enhances the Factor Xa inhibition by its interaction with Protein S. Since zebrafish is an excellent genetic model, we hypothesized that TFPI regulation could be studied using this model. As a first step, we confirmed the presence of tfpia in zebrafish. Subsequently, we performed knockdown of tfpia, and knockout of tfpia in K3 domain using CRISPR/Cas9. Both the tfpia knockdown and tfpia homozygous deletion mutants showed increased coagulation activities. Our data suggest that zebrafish tfpia is an orthologue for human TFPIα, and silencing it results in a thrombotic phenotype. We then optimized the piggyback knockdown method, where we could simultaneously piggyback 3 or 6 ASOs corresponding to 3 or 6 genes, respectively, using one VMO. These multiple gene knockdowns will increase the efficiency of genome-wide knockdowns. Since there are no studies on chromatin remodeling that control TFPI expression, we hypothesized that the genome-wide knockdowns of the Chromatin Binding and Regulatory Proteins (CBRPs) in zebrafish could help identify novel tfpia gene regulators. We chose 69 CBRPs and subjected them to simultaneous gene knockdowns. Our …