Peroxiredoxins (Prxs) are dominant peroxide-reducing enzymes with two important roles: they protect all organisms from oxidative damage induced by peroxides, and in eukaryotes, they participate in hydrogen peroxide signaling pathways. This dissertation presents studies aimed at the biophysical characterization of select Prxs and a Prx reductase to elucidate their structure-function...
Tan spot of wheat is an economically significant disease caused by the fungal pathogen, Pyrenophora tritici-repentis. Certain races of the fungus secrete Ptr ToxA (ToxA), a 13.2 kDa proteinaceous host-selective toxin that is responsible and sufficient to cause disease in susceptible wheat varieties. Disease symptoms develop only when the ToxA...
Emerging applications for robotic data collection include ocean monitoring, emergency response and urban search and rescue. At the core of these applications is a robot's ability to make informed decisions on incomplete data. This dissertation addresses this problem by developing novel techniques for modeling and estimating structured environments using deep...
Natural products have long been an important source of resources for humans. Many of these compounds possess unique chemical structures and potent biological properties. By targeting natural products with specific chemical properties, we can gain a better understanding of the roles these compounds play in the environment and their interactions...
Markov Decision Processes (MDPs) are the de-facto formalism for studying sequential decision making problems with uncertainty, ranging from classical problems such as inventory control and path planning, to more complex problems such as reservoir control under rainfall uncertainty and emergency response optimization for fire and medical emergencies. Most prior research...
This dissertation presents an analysis of transportable biomass conversion facility design to evaluate the conceptual and economic viability of a mobile and modular biomass conversion supply chain in the Pacific Northwest, USA. The main goal of this work is to develop a decision support system to more effectively and sustainably...
Life on Earth intimately depends on the function of countless proteins. For the majority of studied proteins, function absolutely depends on conformation (i.e. 3-dimensional shape in solution). The exact nature of how a protein goes from an unfolded linear polypeptide chain to an organized folded molecule is still not known,...
A novel type of model substrates, i.e. immobilized p-aminophenyl-β-D-cellooligosaccharides,
was developed and used in the study of exocellulases. The
two major cellobiohydrolases from Trichoderma reesei, CBH I and CBH II were
used as representative enzymes. p-Aminophenyl derivatives of cellobiose (PAPG₂),
cellotriose (PAPG₃), and cellotetraose (PAPG₄) were synthesized from the reaction...
In a relay network for full truckload (TL) transportation, facilities known as relay points (RPs) serve as exchange points where truck drivers can exchange trailers. This would help carriers to assign more regular tours to drivers when compared to the excessively long tours that exist in the traditional Point-to-Point (PtP)...
This thesis addresses Micro Aerial Vehicle (MAV) control by leveraging learning based techniques to improve robustness of the control system. Applying classical control methods to MAVs is a difficult process due to the complexity of the control laws with fast and highly non-linear dynamics. These methods are mostly based on...