The endothelium is a monolayer of cells which line all of the vasculature where it acts as a barrier to control permeability of water and other molecules out of a blood vessel. Loss of endothelial barrier function resulting in increased endothelial permeability is often seen in pathological inflammation leading to organ damage. The inflammatory cytokine TNF-α activates several different signaling pathways within endothelial cells including the p38 MAPK pathway. TNF-α is known to be elevated in patients with certain inflammatory disorders and is thought to contribute to these disorders by disrupting the integrity of the endothelium leading to increased permeability. Whether TNF-α uses the p38 MAPK pathway to increase permeability remains unknown. The data presented here shows that TNF-α, at least in part, increases permeability by disrupting ZO-1, a key component of the tight junction complex. This data also shows that p38 MAPK activity is not required for the initial increase in permeability (two hours after treatment) caused by TNF-α, but, instead, is essential for the sustained increase in permeability (six hours after treatment). Taken together, our results suggest that targeting the p38 MAPK pathways could provide new therapeutic strategies to block vascular leakage associated with pathological inflammatory conditions and preventing the ensuing organ damage.

In 2014, a storm water pipe located under a coal ash impoundment along the Dan River in North Carolina failed, releasing approximately 39,000 tons of coal ash into the river. To assess the impact of this spill on soil properties, a CURE (Course-based Undergraduate Research Experience) course was taught in 2015 and 2018. In 2015, significant differences were found in the abiotic and biotic properties of impacted soils. This study, resampling the same locations, found significant differences remain in the concentrations of phosphorous, calcium, total exchange capacity, and certain nitrogen species. Impacted sites have significantly lower microbial abundance, significantly different phylogenetic make-ups; similar, but non-significant, decreases in dehydrogenase activity; and significantly different levels of bacterial resistance to low concentrations of chromium. Given the ongoing risk of coal ash spills into North Carolina waterways, including those most recently caused by hurricanes Florence and Michael, these findings could have important implications for the potential impact of such spills upon soil microbes within similar riparian ecosystems.

Human immunodeficiency virus (HIV) attacks the human immune system and if left untreated, causes acquired immunodeficiency syndrome (AIDS). Since its discovery, HIV has quickly become a major public health concern, infecting roughly one million people worldwide each year. HIV employs several immune evasion mechanisms including the targeting of key immune cells, integration of its genome into the host, and infection of uninfected cells through virologic synapses. Advances in antiretroviral therapy (ART) and knowledge of HIV-1 immune evasion strategies have improved our clinical understanding of its pathogenesis and informed new approaches towards developing a vaccine. The primary objective of ART treatment is to lower HIV viral loads and slow the progression to AIDS though the high mutation rate associated with retroviruses facilitates the creation of drug resistant strains. While this presents a challenge to the development of novel drug therapies, there have been several recent breakthroughs using the infusion of broadly neutralizing antibodies (bnAbs) to support ART regimens. Unfortunately, bnAbs are rare and HIV patients have weakened natural immunity to the virus, which complicates vaccine development. Recently, researchers have seen encouraging concentrations of HIV-specific antibodies using a rubella-based live attenuated vaccine in non-human primates though the transition from animal models to human clinical trials has been traditionally cumbersome. Given more recent advancements in our understanding of viral shell disorder, perhaps it is time to consider why the development of an HIV vaccine has been so problematic and to devise new strategies to combat this disease moving forward.

Juvenile social play behavior is one of the most important developmental behaviors for many animals, including humans. Social play facilitates the development of a variety of adult behaviors, including adult sex behavior and aggression. In this study, we redistributed the rat pups into home cages that were either single-sex female, single-sex male, or mixed sex on postnatal day (PN) 13. For this preliminary report, juvenile play behavior was observed in both focal observation and paired encounter paradigms from PN25-PN30. We hypothesized that the sex composition of the litter would have an effect on juvenile play behavior and our preliminary analyses support this hypothesis.

Pollution originating in headwater streams, such as Spring Run that flows next to the Penn State Altoona campus, can negatively affect the water quality of the Chesapeake Bay. The Chesapeake Bay is located on the Atlantic coast of the United States, and is home to diverse flora and fauna. In addition, commercial fishing and tourism industries contribute to the economies of neighboring states, including Maryland and Virginia. Thus, it is important to monitor headwater streams located within the Chesapeake Bay watershed for sources of point pollution. Spring Run flows next to parking lots where commercial deicers containing chloride, potassium, and sodium ions are routinely applied in the winter months. Given the proximity of Penn State Altoona's deicer storage shed to Spring Run, we hypothesized that it could be a source of ion pollution for this headwater stream. Chloride, sodium, and potassium levels were measured at various locations near and within Spring Run. Our results indicate that ion levels close to the location of the deicer storage pile are greater than levels upstream, suggesting that runoff from the deicer pile is contributing to increased ion levels in Spring Run. Alternate locations to relocate the deicer storage shed are suggested.

Caenorhabditis elegans are members of the nematode family and have been used as model organisms of epigenetic studies for many years. C. elegans have a relatively short life cycle; the worms grow from an egg to an adult within the span of about 3-4 days and an overall lifespan of about 2-3 weeks. The worms are very easy to maintain, requiring for survival only nematode growth medium (NGM) agar plates that are kept at a temperature of about 20-25 °C and contain E. coli for food. For this study, which replicates aspects of a study reported by Kishimoto et al. (2017), C. elegans was used to explore the epigenetic effects of stress on longevity. The animals in this study that were subjected to the environmental stressor starvation showed an increase in overall lifespan based on the statistical analysis of a Kaplan-Meier Survivorship test. This increased survival rate was also found to be passed to at least three subsequent generations who were grown under unstressed conditions. These results showcase the hormetic epigenetic effects of starvation in C. elegans.