Barrett, The Honors College Thesis/Creative Project Collection

Food is one of the most universal and uniting human experiences. It is a powerful tool to bring communities together and it is a simple way to bring joy to an individual. This project is an exercise in marketing and entrepreneurship that was inspired by these ideas, which culminated in a fundraiser bake sale to benefit Creighton Community Foundation, a local nonprofit.

In January of 2022, 61 women from Afghanistan were accepted to Arizona State University and joined our campus from the Asian University of Women. Of One Heart is a Phoenix based nonprofit which aims to connect refugees with mentors to cultivate intercultural relationships, assist refugees in integrating into a new community, and to empower refugees to utilize their unique perspectives and talents in their new home. In addition to these goals, these relationships aim to connect refugees with the networks their mentor has and to assist them in understanding the new systems and norms of American culture. The relationship is reciprocal in the sharing of background and stories to facilitate trust and to recognize the value refugees have to contribute to society. The mission of this project is to implement the Of One Heart mentoring model onto ASU campus to help facilitate intercultural friendships between our new students from Afghanistan and other ASU students, faculty and staff. In doing so, we hope to create a model demonstrating refugee student success by collecting data through pre and post program surveys to track if involvement in the program improved participants utilization of existing ASU resources, cultural competency, mental health, and participation in community activities and internships/job opportunities. Ideally, we hope to create a program model which is proven to support refugee students to be replicated for future semesters as the program expands to serve not only the students from Afghanistan, but all refugee and asylum seeking students.

Alzheimer’s disease (AD) and Frontotemporal lobe dementia (FTLD) are types of dementia that have distinct differences. To help identify some of the neural differences, researchers use diffusion tensor imaging (DTI) techniques to assist with diagnosing patients and track progression over time. The major objective of this experiment was to use the advanced diffusion tensor imaging techniques of Fractional Anisotropy (FA) and Free water (FW) to help differentiate between AD and FTLD neurodegeneration. The scope of this experiment was to examine literature research on AD and FTLD by gathering the mean values of (FA) and (FW) to identify diffusivity susceptibility in the specific brain regions of the Uncinate Fasciculus (UF) and the Superior Temporal Gyrus (STG). The methods used were the Alzheimer’s Disease Neuroimaging Initiative (ADNI) and the Frontotemporal Lobe Degenerative Neuroimaging Initiative (FTLD): These data repositories provide researchers with study data to define the progression of AD and FTLD. Next, an imaging analysis was used to calculate the average FA and FW through each slice of the brain regions UF and STG in standard space. Then FreeSurfer segmented Superior Temporal Gyrus and the JHU ICBM Atlas of the Uncinate Fasciculus were used as a set of tools for analysis and visualization of structural and functional brain imaging data for processing the cross-sectional and longitudinal data. We calculated 95% Confidence intervals for mean FW and FA at each slice and direction across 21 participants within each dementia group to determine regions of overlap and nonoverlap. Results indicated that for the FA and FW graphs in the x and z directions among UF and STG regions, there were more non-overlap regions between the AD and FTLD in the FW graphs across x and z-directions in particular the UF. Our results indicate that there may be concomitant decline in white and gray matter regions in dementia, and FW may be more sensitive detecting AD related neurodegeneration in the UF and STG regions.