Digital Commons Network^™

Sustainably Managing Groundwater - Surface Water Interactions Within The Santa Rosa Plain Basin, Rhianna Frank

Master's Projects and Capstones

In this paper, I designed a strategy for implementation of sustainably managing groundwater-surface water interactions in the Santa Rosa Plain Basin in compliance with the requirements set forth by the Sustainable Groundwater Management Act of 2014. The research objectives for this analysis are: (1) to fully examine the requirements of the Sustainable Groundwater Management Act and the implications that implementation will have on the Santa Rosa Plain Basin, (2) to use technical data gathered regionally coupled with related policy design theory to analyze how groundwater and surface water interactions can be managed to meet the requirements set forth in this …

Toward Real-Time Flip Fluid Simulation Through Machine Learning Approximations, Javid Kennon Pack

Theses and Dissertations

Fluids in computer generated imagery can add an impressive amount of realism to a scene, but are particularly time-consuming to simulate. In an attempt to run fluid simulations in real-time, recent efforts have attempted to simulate fluids by using machine learning techniques to approximate the movement of fluids. We explore utilizing machine learning to simulate fluids while also integrating the Fluid-Implicit-Particle (FLIP) simulation method into machine learning fluid simulation approaches.

Comparative Microbial Community Dynamics In A Karst Aquifer System And Proximal Surface Stream In Northwest Arkansas, Josue Rodriguez

Graduate Theses and Dissertations

Northwest Arkansas has well-developed karst systems, with numerous sinking streams and springs. Karst conduits make it easy for contaminants to enter groundwater systems, degrading the water quality and destroying fragile karst ecosystems. With the increase of urbanization, potential threats in the form of fecal contamination may prove to be more of a problem. The purpose of this research is to compare the difference between microbial communities within two different settings, a karst aquifer and a surface stream. The microbial communities within Blowing Spring Cave and Little Sugar Creek were detected and identified in water and sediment samples. Samples were also …

Adaptive Fluid Simulation Using A Linear Octree Structure, Sean A. Flynn

Theses and Dissertations

An Eulerian approach to fluid flow provides an efficient, stable paradigm for realistic fluid simulation. However, its traditional reliance on a fixed-resolution grid is not ideal for simulations that simultaneously exhibit both large and small-scale fluid phenomena. Octree-based fluid simulation approaches have provided the needed adaptivity, but the inherent weakness of a pointer-based tree structure has limited their effectiveness. We present a linear octree structure that provides a significant runtime speedup using these octree-based simulation algorithms. As memory prices continue to decline, we leverage additional memory when compared to traditional octree structures to provide this improvement. In addition to reducing …

Single-Stage, Venturi-Driven Desalination System, Brandon Proetto

Mechanical & Aerospace Engineering Theses & Dissertations

Water demand is increasing at a rapid pace due to population increase, industrial expansion, and agricultural development. The use of desalination technology to meet the high water demands has increased global online desalination capacity from 47 million m^3/d in 2007 to 92.5 million m^3/d as of June 2017 [49]. Membrane and thermal processes are the two mainstream desalination categories used worldwide for desalination plants. Reverse Osmosis (RO) is the most widely used membrane process and it has become the dominant technology for building desalination plants over recent decades. Thermal distillation, however, has become less and less competitive due to its …

Microtextural Studies Of Feldspar In Ordinary Chondrites, Jonathan A. Lewis

Earth and Planetary Sciences ETDs

Ordinary chondrites contain an important record of events that took place during the earliest period of solar system evolution. These include primary processes, such as chondrule formation, and secondary processes, those that affected asteroids after accretion and modified primary components. Secondary processes include aqueous alteration, thermal metamorphism, and shock effects from impact events. Secondary minerals can provide insight into the chemical and physical conditions that affected their parent asteroids. Feldspar is known to be a secondary mineral that crystallized during thermal metamorphism. The goal of this work is to use the formation and evolution of feldspar to elucidate the conditions …

Application Of Ultraviolet Light Emitting Diodes For The Advanced Oxidation Of Guar Gum, Andrew W. Davenport

Theses and Dissertations

Guar Gum (GG) is one of the problematic water pollutants connected to hydraulic fracturing. There is a pressing need to investigate appropriate unit operations that can be employed to protect the aquatic environment. This study investigated the use of light-emitting diodes (LEDs) in the advanced oxidation process (AOP) of GG. Chemical oxygen demand (COD) removal provided mixed results, depending on the concentration of hydrogen peroxide (H₂O₂) in solution, and was between (0-95%) for H₂O₂-to-GG ratios between 7.0 and 176.3 g H₂O₂/g GG. COD removal was greatest at the …

Knowing Water: Science And The Politics Of Knowledge Production Along The Saw Kill, Carlo Diego Raimondo

Senior Projects Spring 2018

Beginning with globally oriented ideological constructions of water as resource, this project explores the materiality of water and how it comes to understood within our current geological era. Specifically exploring the politics of scientific knowledge production, I follow the methodological processes of the Bard Water Lab as they monitor water quality of a local stream, exploring how different apparatuses of observation are utilized in order to make a stream a legible and knowable object.

Water Dynamics And The Effect Of Static And Alternating Electric Fields, Mohammadmahdi Shafiei Alavijeh

Theses and Dissertations

Having a net dipole moment, water molecules tend to align with an external electric field. The re-orientation of water molecules to align with the field direction can result in structural and dynamic changes in liquid water. Studying these changes can help us to understand the role of an E-field in many biological systems, chemical reactions, and many technological advancements.

In short, the application of static electric fields causes molecules to stay aligned with the field, so, fewer hydrogen bonds break, and molecules have slower dynamics. This type of field can be used when the mobility of water molecules needs to …

Understanding The Nature Of Nanoscale Wetting Through All-Atom Simulations, Oliver Evans

Williams Honors College, Honors Research Projects

The spreading behavior of spherical and cylindrical water droplets between 30Å and 100Å in radius on a sapphire surface is investigated using all-atom molecular dynamics simulations for durations on the order of tens of nanoseconds. A monolayer film develops rapidly and wets the surface, while the bulk of the droplet spreads on top of the monolayer, maintaining the shape of a spherical cap. Unlike previous simulations in the literature, the bulk radius is found to increase to a maximum value and receed as the monolayer continues to expand. Simple time and droplet size dependence is observed for monolayer radius and …

Strategies To Maintain Adequate Hotel Water Supplies, Deborah R. Popely

Walden Dissertations and Doctoral Studies

Hotel guests can use 2 to 3 times more water than community residents. Hotels are water-intensive businesses, and water scarcity presents a pressing problem for managers who rely on an uninterrupted supply of water to meet guests' needs and maintain profitability. Using the resource-based view (RBV) as a conceptual framework, the purpose of this qualitative multiple case study was to explore strategies that hotel managers used to successfully maintain adequate water supplies in the Spanish Canary Islands, an historically arid site and a tourism destination. Data were collected from semistructured interviews and hotel water usage reports. Yin's 5-step approach of …

Bottom-Up Adaptive Management And Stakeholder Participation For Clean Water And Healthy Soils In A Complex Social-Ecological System, Sarah Coleman

Graduate College Dissertations and Theses

Protection of water resources in a changing climate depends on bottom-up stewardship and adaptive management. From the ground up, a vital component is maintaining soil ecosystem services that regulate water, recycle nutrients, sequester carbon, provide food, and other benefits. Interacting spatial, social, and physical factors determine agricultural and stormwater management, and their impact on water. This dissertation explores these dimensions within a complex social-ecological system. The first chapter evaluates a participatory process to elicit solutions to complex environmental problems across science, policy, and practice. The second chapter studies on-farm soil assessment and its role in informing management decisions and supporting …

Pharmaceutical Waste In Vermont: Results From A Survey On Purchasing, Use & Disposal, Christine Hart

Graduate College Dissertations and Theses

Pharmaceutical waste is an emerging form of waste with significant impacts on the environment. This study reports the results of a state-wide phone survey on pharmaceutical purchasing, use and disposal behavior among Vermont residents (n = 421). The objectives of this study were: 1) to compare the demographic nature of populations who purchase and use medicaton to those associated with leftover medication, and 2) to evaluate the impact of disposal behavior in Vermont and to recommend strategies to minimize pollution. The findings of this study showed that approximately 93% of survey participants reported purchasing of medication, 60% reported leftover medication …

Watered Down: The Challenges Of Managing Water Resources In Montana, Beau E. Baker

Graduate Student Theses, Dissertations, & Professional Papers

Like much of the American West, Montana sits in the cross hairs of climate change. State drought resiliency projects and cooperative watershed management are on the rise in the face of decreased snowpack, early runoff, precipitation variability and lower seasonal stream flows. Population growth, land use practices, recreation and tourism all contribute to pressures on state water supplies.

Montana is faced with the arrival of invasive species that threaten the ecological health of its lakes, rivers and streams. State budget constraints and depressed agency capacity are hurting our ability to fend off these threats. There’s a lack of public education …

The Development Of A Simplified Alkalinity Titration Analyzer, Reba Van Beusekom

Graduate Student Theses, Dissertations, & Professional Papers

Alkalinity is the acid neutralizing capacity for water, meaning alkalinity measures how sensitive an aquatic system is to acidic inputs. Currently, there are various measuring systems for alkalinity available including chemical test kits, potentiometric techniques, and colorimetric methods. Commercially available products lack the ease of use combined with precision and accuracy desired for on-line process and environmental monitoring. The goal of this project is to develop a simplified alkalinity titration analyzer, called the easyTMT, to measure alkalinity with precision and accuracy comparable to the best conventional methods. The system, under development, uses the Tracer Monitored Titration (TMT) technique. TMT …