Digital Commons Network^™

Grave Matter: Contestations In Actress Burial, Christine Courtland Mather

LSU Doctoral Dissertations

Death disrupts. The social space accorded to rituals of death and memorialization differs from all other spaces. Actresses disturb. Society contests, determines, and enacts the burial of an actress as her final performance. This study explores the actress burial as a site of meaning. Contestations over the fate of the actress body reveal power structures and the motivations of cultural institutions. This study highlights four actresses—Lecouvreur, Oldfield, Bernhardt, and Duse—whose burials cover a wide range of circumstances. Each chapter gives the relevant biographical information for the actress and the social background for the cultural contestation over the actress body. Traditional …

The Role Of Experience And Active Learning In Web-Based Training For Applying Knowledge, Deborah L. Dunaway

LSU Doctoral Dissertations

The purpose of this study was to test a new method for presenting information on the internet in a format that enhances adaptive learning and transfer to real-world applications. This web-based training method, called Cognitive Toolboxes (Mathews, 2001) involves analyzing course content into goal-based categories (toolboxes) linked to sets of knowledge facets (tools) and applications (cases). Three experiments examined the effects of internet access to different aspects of toolbox content (tools, toolbox names and cases) on subsequent application of the material to real-world problems. Results show that access to the organizational aspects of the method (tools organized into toolboxes) facilitated …

The Time-Course Of Vascular Adaptations Following Localized Short Term Exercise Training, Jason David Allen

LSU Doctoral Dissertations

This is a series of 3 experiments in the area of vasoreactivity. The first study investigated the stability and reproducibility of brachial artery flow-mediated dilation (BAFMD). Twenty-six healthy volunteers underwent 3 scans on 2 days, performed by 2 ultrasonographers, and analyzed by 2 readers. All subjects were tested between 7 and 11am after refraining from food and exercise. Average baseline diameter was 3.48±0.53mm, which increased to 3.71±0.57mm (6.58±4.15%) at peak dilation. ICCC's for days, testers and readers were 0.9188, 0.9394, and 0.8982 respectively. To detect a difference in vasoreactivity of 60% (two-tailed), e.g. 5% vasodilation versus 8% vasodilation, at 90% …

Heavy Metal Distribution For Aqueous And Solid Phases In Urban Runoff, Snowmelt And Soils, Donald W. Glenn Iii

LSU Doctoral Dissertations

At the start of the third millennium, over 50% of the world’s population lives in urban areas. Anthropogenic activities associated with urban development such as traffic generate significant particulate and heavy metal mass loadings. Ten urban highway sites located throughout the metropolitan area of Cincinnati, Ohio were studied. Storm water, snow and transportation land use soil/residual complexes (RSCs) were collected at each site. For the storm water, results are presented for a series of eight rainfall runoff events over a two-year period and included analyses between dissolved and particulate-bound fractions of heavy metals (Pb, Cu, Cd and Zn), and water …

The Association Of Food Cravings And Preferences With Food Intake, Corby Kyle Martin

LSU Doctoral Dissertations

An ubiquitous assumption about food intake behavior is that people eat the types of foods that they crave and prefer. Food preferences reflect hedonic ratings of the degree to which people like certain foods. The present study investigated the association of food cravings and hedonic ratings with food intake behavior, assessed in the laboratory with a Universal Eating Monitor (Kissileff, Klingsberg, & Van Itallie, 1980). The study sample consisted of 162 adults who completed the Food Craving Inventory (FCI; White, Whisenhunt, Williamson, Greenway, & Netemeyer, 2001), a questionnaire that measures craving, including cravings for specific types of foods (i.e., High …

Effects Of Water Color On Food Web Structure In Freshwater Lakes, Bjoern Wissel

LSU Doctoral Dissertations

Water color has multiple effects on freshwater lakes, changing the vertical profiles of light, temperature, and oxygen. Therefore, increased water color should reduce planktivory by visually guided fish, but invertebrate predators such as Chaoborus should become more important. Since fish prefer larger prey but Chaoborus can only ingest smaller zooplankton, increased water color should cause a shift from small to large zooplankton species. To test this hypothesis, I analyzed two lake data sets to examine how water color affects the relative importance of fish and Chaoborus as planktivores. Subsequently, I studied the vertical migration behavior of the zooplankton prey in …

The Synthesis Of Deuterated Arylamine Dna Adducts For Use In The Development Of An Isotope Dilution Lc/Ms/Ms Method, Philip Dmitri Olsen

LSU Doctoral Dissertations

Polycyclic aromatic amines (arylamines) are a class of chemical carcinogens that are prevalent in environmental and industrial settings. In order to study the mechanism of their toxicity a quantitative and qualitative detection method was developed to measure the C8-adenine adducts of benzidine and 2-aminofluorene in DNA samples. To do this a novel synthetic method using a palladium catalyst was developed to prepare authentic and deuterated arylamine adducts to serve as standards. These standards were then used to develop a high performance liquid chromatography, electrospray, tandem mass spectrometry, isotope dilution, detection method. To demonstrate the validity of this method two spike …

Artin-Schreier Families And 2-D Cycle Codes, Cem Guneri

LSU Doctoral Dissertations

We start with the study of certain Artin-Schreier families. Using coding theory techniques, we determine a necessary and sufficient condition for such families to have a nontrivial curve with the maximum possible number of rational points over the finite field in consideration. This result produces several nice corollaries, including the existence of certain maximal curves; i.e., curves meeting the Hasse-Weil bound.We then present a way to represent two-dimensional (2-D) cyclic codes as trace codes starting from a basic zero set of its dual code. This representation enables us to relate the weight of a codeword to the number of rational …

Numerical Simulations Of Dynamical Mass Transfer In Binaries, Patrick Michael Motl

LSU Doctoral Dissertations

We present results from investigations of mass transfer instability in close binary star systems. By unstable mass transfer we mean the exchange of material where the response of the binary to the initial Roche lobe overflow causes the donor to loose even more material. Our work is guided by approximate arguments that dictate the stability boundaries for binary star systems. To proceed further one must explicitly treat extended mass and velocity distributions that are both nitially, and through their subsequent evolution in time, self-consistent. In this dissertation, we present the first three-dimensional, fully self-consistent treatment of mass transfer in close …

Bounding The Wild Set (Counting The Minimum Number Of Wild Primes In Hilbert Symbol Equivalent Number Fields), Marius M. Somodi

LSU Doctoral Dissertations

This dissertation makes a contribution to the study of Witt rings of quadratic forms over number fields. To every pair of algebraic number fields with isomorphic Witt rings one can associate a number, called the minimum number of wild primes. The situation is particularly nice when this number is 0; often it is not 0. Earlier investigations have established lower bounds for this number. In this dissertation an analysis is presented that expresses the minimum number of wild primes in terms of the number of wild dyadic primes. This formula not only gives immediate upper bounds, but can be considered …

Influence Of Short-Term Endurance Exercise Training On Heart Rate Variability, Clarence Matthew Lee

LSU Doctoral Dissertations

The purpose of this investigation was to determine if 8 exercise endurance training (ET) sessions over 2 weeks significantly alters cardiac autonomic modulation, as measured by heart rate variability (HRV). Twenty-four college-aged males were recruited for this study and were randomized into either an exercise group (EX; n=12) or a control group (CT; n=12). EX underwent 2 weeks of ET on a cycle-ergometer (frequency: four times/week; duration: 40 minutes; intensity 80-85% HRreserve), whereas CT was instructed not to alter their previous level of physical activity. Five-minute ECG tracings were collected for HRV under the following conditions: 5 minutes of paced …

Analysis Of Inorganic Materials Using Advanced Nmr And Nqr Techniques, Anthony Adrian Mrse

LSU Doctoral Dissertations

Several advanced solid-state nuclear magnetic resonance (NMR) and nuclear quadrupole resonance (NQR) techniques have been applied to inorganic materials of commercial interest. The specific techniques applied to each system were chosen to solve specific obstacles which impeded the flow of industrial science.

First, the dispersion of brominated flame retardants in polymers is monitored using pulsed ⁸¹Br NQR (nuclear quadrupole resonance) techniques. The NQR spectrometer consists of a homemade NMR console and an automatically tuned loop-gap resonator probe. The two factors which affect the ⁸¹Br NQR transition frequencies of brominated aromatics are: electron-donating and withdrawing substituents on the ring …

Analysis Of Near-Infrared Dye-Labeled Sanger Sequencing Fragments With Gel Electrophoresis Using The Time-Resolved Flourescence Lifetime Indentification Methods, Suzanne Jeanel Lassiter

LSU Doctoral Dissertations

The research presented in this dissertation involves the identification of sequencing fragments with time-resolved methods. For this application, near-infrared heavy-atom tricarbocyanine dyes were developed in our laboratory, which can be excited with a single laser and emission collected using a single detection channel. The dyes have four spectroscopically unique, but relatively short lifetimes that can be altered by the intramolecular heavy-atom they contain. The work described here involves the optimization of dye-primer chemistry for preparing Sanger sequencing reactions for longer reads and the optimization of the separation matrix for capillary gel electrophoresis that produces favorable statistical analysis of the aforementioned …

An Improved In Vitro Model For The Study Of Mycobacterium Leprae/Schwann Cell Interactions, Deanna Alisa Hagge

LSU Doctoral Dissertations

Globally, millions of leprosy patients suffer irreversible peripheral nerve damage resulting in blindness or other disabilities as a consequence of Mycobacterium leprae infection. Schwann cells, the neural target of M. leprae, have a central role in leprosy histopathology including axonotrophy, altered myelin architecture and demyelination. The mechanisms of nerve damage have not been fully elucidated but appear to be the direct result of M. leprae within Schwann cells or a combined effect with an aggressive immune response to M. leprae within the nerves. There is no standardized in vitro model for the study of M. leprae interactions with the Schwann …

"Encourager Le Commerce Et Répandre Les LumiʹEre" : The Press, The Provinces And The Origins Of The Revolution In France: 1750-1789, Stephen Auerbach

LSU Doctoral Dissertations

This dissertation examines the political, intellectual, and cultural significance of France's provincial newspaper press, called affiches, published between 1750-1789. Combining the histories of the press, provincial life, and the public sphere, this dissertation explores the ways in which the affiches became an indispensable part of local economic, cultural, and intellectual life while at the same time articulated a world view that was antithetical to the tenets of monarchical absolutism. The first part of the dissertation focuses on the origins, form and contents of the provincial press. Faced with the twin obstacles of laws governing censorship and privilege, provincial newspapers eschewed …

The Effects Of Wild Pigs (Sus Scrofa) On Woody Understory Vegetation In Lowland Rain Forest Of Malaysia, Kalan Leonard Ickes

LSU Doctoral Dissertations

An increasingly urgent task in the field of conservation biology is to identify changes in abiotic and biotic interactions that result when large areas of forest are converted to small fragments surrounded by anthropogenic landscapes. My research, conducted in lowland dipterocarp rain forest at the 2,500-ha Pasoh Forest Reserve in Peninsular Malaysia, investigated a novel but strongly negative edge effect - namely, a tremendous increase in the density of wild pigs (Sus scrofa) and the resulting deleterious impacts on the understory plant community. The absence of feline predators due to the small size of the reserve and the presence of …