MARS
MARS is a repository service of Mason Publishing and the Data and Digital Scholarship Services (DDSS) at the George Mason University Libraries. MARS provides enduring, stable, well-indexed access to a wide range of scholarship from the Mason community, such as Electronic Theses and Dissertations (ETDs), articles, presentations, reports, and creative work. Learn more about publishing, sharing, and preserving research data with the George Mason University Institutional Dataverse, and our other repository services.
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Recent Submissions
Negative Concord in Farasani Arabic: Evidence for a Uniform Syntactic Agreement Model (USAM)
(2025-11-03) Modaffar, Hussain
This paper develops the Uniform Syntactic Agreement Model (USAM), a framework that advances a decisive shift from the existing theoretical complexity in the analysis of neg-words in Negative Concord (NC) structures toward a more streamlined and principled account of uniformity. It provides a simplified and unified approach to the licensing of neg-words across NC languages, integrating the strict and non-strict NC variation into a single Minimalist framework. Drawing on new empirical data from Farasani Arabic, an under-documented dialect of Saudi Arabia, the study argues that both NC types share an identical syntactic operation: EPP-driven movement of preverbal neg-words to [Spec-NegP] for licensing, with surface variation reducible to a single morphological parameter, ± Overt Neg°.
Acceptability-judgment data demonstrate that Farasani Arabic patterns like non-strict NC languages on the surface (preverbal neg-words independently express negation) but syntactically behaves like strict NC languages, since such neg-words must still undergo movement to [Spec-NegP] for licensing by a null Neg°. Postverbal neg-words, by contrast, require c-command licensing by an overt sentential negator. USAM thus reframes the traditional strict/non-strict dichotomy as a morphological—not syntactic—distinction, aligning with Chomsky’s (2001) view that cross-linguistic variation resides in PF-realization rather than deep structure.
By eliminating excessive theoretical complexity arising from unnecessary mechanisms, lexical ambiguity, and redundant feature assignments associated with neg-words and neg-markers posited in earlier NC frameworks, USAM offers a simpler and more principled account of NC across Arabic dialects and beyond. The model not only advances the documentation of Farasani Arabic but also offers a unified analysis that derives typological variation in NC from a single underlying syntax.
AI-Guided Optimization of an Antimicrobial Peptide targeting Bacillus cereus: Enhancing Activity and Reducing Toxicity Through Machine Learning Tools
(George Mason University, 2025-11-04) Thakker, Shaurya; Lockhart, Chris
The growing threat of antibiotic resistance has underscored the urgent need for alternative therapeutic strategies. Antimicrobial peptides (AMPs), naturally occurring molecules with broad-spectrum activity, present a promising solution but face limitations such as toxicity, instability, and delivery challenges. This study aimed to enhance the safety and efficacy of a low-performing AMP active against Bacillus cereus by utilizing artificial intelligence (AI) and machine learning (ML) tools. Four computational platforms - CAMPr4, ToxinPred3, AlphaFold, and ChatGPT - were used to predict antimicrobial potential, evaluate toxicity, model structure, and streamline peptide design. Starting with an AMP scoring 0.2895 in CAMPr4, sequence modifications were made to increase net charge and decrease toxicity. The final optimized peptide, named Cereus-Black93, achieved a predicted antimicrobial score of 0.93 and a significantly reduced toxicity score of 0.27. Structural modeling confirmed a stable alpha-helical conformation. These results demonstrate the potential of AI-driven approaches to accelerate the design of novel AMPs and pave the way for future in vitro validation and therapeutic development.
Investigating the RIG-1 Receptor: Mechanisms, Behavior, and Parallel Pathways
(George Mason University, 2025-10-27) Ko, Nathan; Tamrat, Makeda; Chen, Samuel; Thirupathi, Vidhur; Hakami, Ramin M.; Piccoli, Anthony
The immune system serves a diverse array of functions, pertaining to protecting its host from foreign organisms, viruses, and other threats, but many do not know of the multiple lines of defense the immune system has set in place to ensure viability. First are the physical and chemical barriers that work to prevent foreign organisms from entering. The second, innate immunity, uses non-specific cellular and molecular responses to fight off invaders. Finally, the third line, adaptive immunity, involves specific lymphocytes and antibodies that target and eliminate pathogens. In this study, however, we are going to delve into the role that RIG-1 receptors have in activating the innate immune system.
Using confidence intervals in forced alignment
(2025-10-18) Kelley, Matt
Forced alignment is a process by which a transcription is automatically aligned in time with a speech signal. In experimental phonetics, forced alignment tools automate the laborious task of creating time-aligned segment-and word-level transcriptions.
Most forced alignment systems calculate only a point estimate of each segment boundary. The time points in the segmentation yield an optimal alignment between the transcription and acoustics. However, in addition to the point estimate of the boundary, the Mason-Alberta Phonetic Segmenter (MAPS, Kelley et al., 2024) can output boundaries with 97.85% confidence intervals (Kelley, 2025). MAPS constructs intervals using order statistics on an ensemble of boundaries produced by several acoustic models. In addition to traditional word- and segment-tiers in a Praat TextGrid, MAPS also yields confidence intervals in a point tier. An example alignment with is given in Figure 1.
The present project aims to show how these confidence intervals on segment boundaries can be used fruitfully in phonetic research. Examples include detecting poor alignments, identifying segment sequences that are difficult to separate, and quantifying the system’s uncertainty in the segmentation. In addition, the process of creating the confidence intervals will be detailed to open more avenues for methodological inquiry into generating confidence intervals for segmentation.
Ground based light curve follow-up validation observations of TESS object of interest TOI 7325.01
(George Mason University, 2025-10-13) Mehta, Rimjhim; Plavchan, Peter; Plavchan, Peter
This paper discusses the results of an observation on TOI 7325.01. This observation was taken at George Mason University’s research hall through the 0.8 m telescope with a red fi lter. The goal of the investigation was to determine whether planetary candidate TOI 7325 was actually a planet and not just a false positive signal found on the telescope observation. We wanted to take the data from the observation session for June 24th 2025 and create a plot so that we can determine the light curve transit to determine if our planetary candidate is a false signal or not. Through the use of fi nder charts for our observation night we can determine light curve transit through the use of software such as Astroimage j. This investigation fi rst had to have telescope images for observation which were taken through the research hall at Geroge Mason university. Luckily June 24th was a good night for observation so a good amount of data could be collected and we used fi nder charts to determine the location of the object of interest to create a plot for. Then we created plots of the transit through usage of reference stars and an NEB plot to determine the existence of possible eclipsing binaries. Through the plots and data collected we found that a transit for TOI 7325 was detected and made it a plausible planetary candidate as well as the seeing profi le further arguing that point. However the RMS was relatively high at 12.71 which may indicate that noise may have aff ected the signals we collected and the NEB plot came back as mostly not cleared which increases the chance that we had eclipsing binaries and may have gotten false signals. As a result of this, follow up would need to be done on this candidate as the results of it being a detection are inconclusive for this study.