Digital Commons Network^™

Conserving The Land Of The Giants: Critical Threats To Asian Elephant Habitat In Sri Lankan Protected Areas, Christie Sampson

All Theses

Grasslands habitats are hypothesized to be a critical resource for the endangered Asian elephant (Elephas maximus) throughout its range. However, this hypothesis has not been rigorously tested. My study examined elephant habitat selection in Sri Lanka to determine the importance of grassland versus other local habitats, and how livestock abundance, fire, and the invasive plant Lantana camara affect the relative abundance of elephants within habitats. My research was conducted in two protected areas in Sri Lanka, Udawalawe National Park (UNP) and Hurulu Forest Reserve (HR). I used distance-sampling on a total of 50.8 km of dung line-transects in the four …

Development Of Liriodendron Est-Ssr Markers And Genetic Composition Of Two Liriodendron Tulipifera L. Orchards, Xinfu Zhang

All Theses

Liriodendron tulipifera L., commonly known as yellow-poplar, is a fast-growing hardwood tree species with great ecological and economic value and is native to eastern North America. Liriodendron occupies an important phylogenetic position as a basal angiosperm and has been used in studies of the evolution of flowering plants. Genomic resources, such as Expressed Sequence Taq (EST) databases and Bacterial Artificial Chromosome (BAC) libraries, have been developed for this species. However, no genetic map is available for Liriodendron, and very few molecular markers have been developed. In this study, a total of 119 informative genomic SSR markers suitable were identified for …

Managing Fusarium Wilt In Watermelon Production, Zachary Snipes

All Theses

Fusarium wilt of watermelon, caused by Fusarium oxysporum f. sp. niveum , was first described in 1894 in South Carolina and Georgia and has become a limiting factor in watermelon production worldwide. In recent years, restriction on use of the soil fumigant methyl bromide and the recent development of more virulent races of Fusarium oxysporum f. sp. niveum has created a critical need for alternative management techniques. In 2011-2013 field experiments were designed to evaluate the efficacy of incorporating a cover crop of hairy vetch into the soil to manage Fusarium wilt. Colony-forming units (CFU) of Fusarium oxysporum were sampled …

A Study Of The Frothing Capacity Of Whole Milk- 1. A Market Survey Of Conventional And Organic Milks, 2. The Effect Of Clean In Place (Cip) Cleaning Solutions, Sara Stancil

All Theses

Gourmet coffee drink consumption is on the rise (NCAUSA 2013). With most of these coffee drinks including milk and/or milk foam, an emphasis on producing quality foam is of high importance. Recent complaints have been received on the failure of milk to foam to expectations of the coffee house (Randolph & Associates 2013). Identifying the source of this failure could enable the milk industry to provide higher foam quality milk to meet the growing needs of coffee houses.

A two-part study on the frothing capacity of milk was carried out to investigate potential variations in the market place and to …

Methane Prediction By Nutrient Profiles In Ruminal Continuous Cultures Fed An All Forage Diet Of Bermudagrass Or Annual Ryegrass, Kaylin Young

All Theses

Extensive research has been done on the effect of diet on rumen methane (CH4) production, and on developing equations to accurately predict CH4 in cattle. However, the majority of this research has been gathered from feedlot cattle or cattle fed a total mixed ration (TMR). To date, no studies have examined nutrient correlations with CH4 when feeding an all pasture diet of warm season or cool season grasses. This study included two in vitro experiments, one with a warm season forage and one with a cool season forage to see which nutrient characteristics of each forage best correlated with CH4 …

Phytophthora Foliage Blight Of Garden Phlox: Phytophthora Nicotianae On Phlox Paniculata, Daniel Drechsler

All Theses

Phytophthora foliage blight of garden phlox (Phlox paniculata ) - caused by Phytophthora nicotianae - is a devastating disease that has been seen consistently in nursery production facilities in South Carolina. However, this disease has not been characterized previously. This project was composed of three separate studies, each of which followed one of the three major components of the disease triangle (i.e., the synchronous occurrence of a susceptible host and a virulent pathogen within a conducive environment) to investigate the pathogenicity of P. nicotianae on P. paniculata . In one study, the efficacies of three inoculation methodologies to cause …

Development Of Hplc Methods For The Determination Of Water-Soluble Vitamins In Pharmaceuticals And Fortified Food Products, Hung Khiem Trang

All Theses

Though many HPLC methods have been developed and reported in literature for vitamin analysis for the past two decades, applying certain methods directly from literature more than often fails to reproduce the results reported due to many variables of liquid chromatography. This issue was targeted in this project through the examination of chromatographic behaviors of water-soluble vitamins in order to help the analysts better modify methods from literature or even develop new methods from scratch to fit their analytical need with the resources available (e.g., columns, detectors, etc.) in their lab.
The first part of the project investigated the chromatographic …

Glufosinate Tolerance Of Widestrike And Liberty-Link Cotton Varieties And The Recoverability Of Upland Cotton Following Terminal Removal, Jason Sweeney

All Theses

Sweeney, Jason Allen. Glufosinate Tolerance of WideStrike¨ and LibertyLink¨ Cotton Varieties and the Recoverability of Cotton Following Terminal Removal. (Under the direction of Dr. Michael A. Jones).
To evaluate the effects of topical application of glufosinate (Liberty 280SL, 24.5% glufosinate-ammonium salt) on cotton varieties with WideStrike¨ and LibertyLink¨ technologies, two field experiments were conducted in 2011 and 2012 at the Pee Dee Research and Education Center (PDREC) in Florence, SC. In the first experiment, five WideStrike¨ cotton varieties (Phytogen [PHY] 367WRF, PHY 375WRF, PHY 440W, PHY 499WRF, and PHY 565WRF) and three LibertyLink¨ cotton varieties (FiberMax [FM] 1773LLB2, FM 1845LLB2, …

Production Of Biodiesel-Like Components By The Type I Methanotroph Methylomonas Methanica, Megan Diane Burdette

All Theses

Bacteria that utilize methane as a sole source of carbon and energy are referred to as methanotrophs. Industrial uses of these types of organisms include the production of poly-hydroxybutyrate as well as the degradation of some chlorinated hydrocarbons that are considered pollutants in the environment. Methanotrophs also play an important role in methane cycling in the environment. Methane gas has the ability to trap 20 times more heat than carbon dioxide, which makes it a potent greenhouse gas. A defining characteristic of methanotrophs is the production of extensive intracytoplasmic membranes composed of lipids that are 16 or 18 carbons in …

Genetic And Environmental Determinants In The Evolution Of Alternative Mating Strategies In The Sailfin Molly, Poecilia Latipinna (Poeciliidae: Poecilia: Mollienesia), Elizabeth Lange

All Theses

Understanding the genetic and environmental factors responsible for differences in size, morphology and behavior can aid in determining how alternative male mating strategies evolve in natural populations. One important environmental factor is nutrition, as it underlies growth of both body size and morphological traits that are linked to alternative mating strategies in many animals. In sailfin mollies, Poecilia latipinna , male size is fixed at maturity, highly variable within populations and correlated with dorsal fin morphology and expression of alternative male mating behaviors. Large males with exaggerated dorsal fins use courtship behavior while small males with reduced dorsal fins use …

Individual Behavioral Variation Of Juvenile Spiny Lobster (Panulirus Argus) Denning Behaviors And The Role It Plays In Shelter Competition During Habitat Loss, Katherine Heldt

All Theses

Variation in juvenile spiny lobster (Panulirus argus) aggressive and gregarious behaviors may play an important role in structuring population level interactions. Since aggressive and gregarious behaviors were not repeatable and were found to be highly correlated with size, these behaviors were found to be largely driven by a combination of behavioral plasticity and ontogeny. Although larger individuals were found to be the most aggressive and least gregarious individuals, often occupying crevice shelters by themselves, they did not exclude smaller, less aggressive lobsters from crevice shelters. Surprisingly, in shelter limited situations, small, less aggressive individuals were more likely to use dens …

Functional Analysis Of A Glutathione S-Transferase Gene From Reniform Nematode On Soybean, Jing Hou

All Theses

Nematode glutathione S-transferases (GSTs) have been implicated in plant-nematode interactions as effector proteins with an important role in the establishment of feeding sites. Studies with root-knot nematode in Arabidopsis thaliana suggest that GSTs may protect the nematode against oxidative plant defenses and modulate plant responses to parasitism. Our objective was to study the function of a GST from reniform nematode (Rotylenchulus reniformis) in soybean. We used a virus-induced gene silencing (VIGS) system, utilizing a Bean pod mottle virus (BPMV)-based vector and a partial sequence of gsts-1 from Meloidogyne incognita to silence the putative reniform nematode homolog. The effect of silencing …

Diversity Among Isolates Of Phytophthora Cinnamomi From Ornamental Plants In South Carolina, Simon Schreier

All Theses

Phytophthora cinnamomi is a devastating pathogen that can attack over 900 hosts. It is the most common species of Phytophthora isolated from woody ornamental crops in South Carolina but little is known about variability among isolates of P. cinnamomi that attack these plants. Therefore, 142 isolates of P. cinnamomi recovered from diseased plant samples submitted to the Clemson University Plant Problem Clinic between 1995 and 2011 were characterized for mycelium growth habit, growth rate, mefenoxam sensitivity, mating type, and sporangium morphology. Mycelium growth habit on PARPH-V8 selective medium was classified as aerial, appressed, or dwarf; 87% of isolates had the …

Influence Of Compost Particle Size On Pathogen Survival Under Greenhouse Condition, Junshu Diao

All Theses

The number of foodborne pathogen outbreaks related to fresh produce has increased significantly in recent decades. Animal waste directly applied to agricultural field is one of the possible contamination sources for fresh produce. Composting is one of the recommended means for waste treatments to eliminate or reduce pathogens in manure on farms. Although pathogens can be eliminated by proper composting process, pathogens are able to survive, recolonize and regrow on compost heap surfaces under certain conditions. Due to the outdoor nature of composting process, bioaerosols with different particle sizes can be generated on compost surfaces which can carry pathogens, travel …

Humeral Torsion And Shoulder Biomechanics: Comparison Of A Novel Ultrasonographic Technique With The Computed Tomography Benchmark, Bryan Thurston

All Theses

The rotation angle between the proximal and distal axes of long bones is known as torsion, and it is thought to be indicative of the forces applied to the bone during growth. The humerus, for example, develops an internal twist or antetorsion, as daily activities are anterior to the body. However, the strong posterior stress induced by an overhead throwing motion may counteract this internal twist in young athletes and cause prominent bilateral dimorphism.
To measure torsion in these young athletes, a new technique using ultrasound has been developed and implemented in clinical practice. However, before widespread use in diverse …

Biomechanical Testing Of Salter-Harris Fractures Type I And Ii In The Distal Femur And Proximal Tibia, Margeaux Rogers

All Theses

Salter-Harris fractures of the proximal tibia and distal femur are common in pediatric patients that present to orthopedic surgeons. Salter-Harris type I fractures are characterized by breaks that extend only through the physis while Salter-Harris II fractures are the most common, accounting for 85% of Salter-Harris fractures, and extend past the growth plate, exiting through the metaphyseal bone1. Fixation of these fracture types can be accomplished using a variety of methods including the use of Kirschner wires, cannulated screws, and a combination of both materials. Stability of fracture fixation is of utmost importance as persistent motion at the fracture margin …

Nest Success And Habitat Choice Of Wilson's Plovers In Tom Yawkey Wildlife Center Heritage Preserve, South Carolina, Elizabeth Zinsser

All Theses

Little is known about the reproductive ecology of Wilson's Plover (Charadrius wilsonia). I conducted a study of nest site selection and nest success at a critical breeding area in South Carolina, USA. Data from other coastal nesting birds in the region suggest that a suite of environmental factors including flooding and predation may limit nest success in this region. To assess nest success rates of Wilson's Plovers in an area with limited human disturbance I monitored 72 nests during 2012 and 2013 on South Island and Sand Island located in Tom Yawkey Wildlife Center and Heritage Preserve. I measured environmental …

Temporal Analysis Of Field, Ssurgo, And Lidar Derived Site Indices In The Southeastern U.S., Steven Ham

All Theses

Sustainable forest management requires accurate information about site index (SI, tree height at a base age). The objectives of this study were to compare site indices from field inventory data (2008-2009), Soil Survey Geographic Database (SSURGO), and Light Detection and Ranging (LiDAR, 2008), and to determine the uncertainty in the site indices from the southern part of the Clemson Experimental Forest. When LiDAR derived analysis were used to compare to SSURGO there were statistical differences for site indices for all of the tree species in this study: loblolly pine (Pinus taeda), scarlet oak (Quercus coccinea), shortleaf pine (Pinus echinata), white …

Effects Of Late Planting Dates, Maturity Groups And Management Systems On Growth, Development And Yield Of Soybean In South Carolina, Mengxuan Hu

All Theses

Planting date plays a significant role in determining soybean growth, development and seed yield. The objectives of this experiment were to evaluate the effects of late planting date, management system, and maturity group on the growth, development and seed yield of maturity group VII and VIII soybean under dry land conditions in the Southeastern coastal plain of the United States. Plant growth and development, seed yield, yield components, and seed oil and protein concentrations were evaluated throughout the season. These experiments were conducted in South Carolina at the Edisto Research and Education Center near Blackville and the Pee Dee Research …

Effect Of Forage Type And Corn Supplementation On Animal Performance And Meat Quality, Asher Wright

All Theses

Angus x Hereford steers (441 ± 24 kg; n = 32) were used in a 2-yr study (2011 and 2012) to examine forage type (legume species, alfalfa and soybeans LG vs. grass species, tall fescue and sudangrass, GR) and daily corn supplementation (0%, NS, vs. 0.75% BW, CS) on animal performance and carcass quality. Steers grazed (May-August) for a total of 98 d and 105 d in 2011 and 2012 respectively. Upon completion of the finishing period, steers were slaughtered and carcass data were collected. Steaks (2.5 cm thick) from the longissimus dorsi muscle (LM) were collected for measurement of …

Temporal Food Preference And Effectiveness Of Selected Bait Products Against Pachycondyla Chinensis (Emery) (Hymenoptera: Formicidae), Ying Mo

All Theses

Pachycondyla chinensis (Emery), commonly known as the Asian needle ant is a well-established invasive species in urban and woodland areas in South Carolina. Foraging ants are found around or under places such as sidewalks, flowerbeds, mulch, tree bases, stones, and logs where human outdoor activity takes place in urbanized area. It is not an aggressive ant, but it has a powerful sting that causes severe allergic reactions in some people. It also has a negative impact on native ant species in forest environments. Food preference was studied, followed by an evaluation of selected bait products against P. chinensis.
Protein, carbohydrate, …

Evaluation Of Wetland Plants For Susceptibility To Species Of Phytophthora Present In Runoff Water At Ornamental Plant Nurseries, Garrett Ridge

All Theses

Competition between agricultural producers and urban communities for high quality water is increasing; therefore, growers need to adopt water conservation and reuse practices to ensure an adequate supply of irrigation water. One concern with recycled irrigation water is the potential to recirculate propagules of oomycete pathogens. Constructed wetlands are a biologically-based treatment option for nutrient and chemical remediation that potentially also could filter pathogen propagules. The goal of this study was to assess the susceptibility of plants routinely used in constructed wetlands to infection by species of Phytophthora commonly found at ornamental plant nurseries. In laboratory and greenhouse experiments, an …

Bioelectrochemical Reduction Of Carbon Dioxide To Acetate Using A Microbial Consortium Derived From The Cow Rumen, Ryan Hammonds

All Theses

Pure cultures of chemoautotrophic microorganisms have previously been reported to produce acetate from carbon dioxide using reductive electric current. We hypothesized that electrofuel precursors could be produced in a similar manner from a consortium consisting of microbial populations acting as a stable community. This approach might offer improved efficiency and selectivity, greater sustainability, a more diverse group of end products, and more opportunities for community optimization in electrofuel production than is possible with pure cultures. To evaluate this concept, bovine rumen contents were enriched for autotrophic, anaerobic microbes for several generations using hydrogen and carbon dioxide for growth and energy. …

Evaluation Of Pigment-Containing Products On Creeping Bentgrass [Agrostis Stolonifera L. Var Palustris (Huds.)] Performance, James Gann

All Theses

Golf courses continue to explore all options for relief of summer stress on bentgrass [Agrostis stolonifera L. var palustris (Huds.)] putting greens. The use of colorants and other pigment-containing products has recently been suggested as a means of relieving this stress by reducing temperatures and respiration, and increasing photosynthesis. Research supporting these claims is limited, especially on bentgrass putting greens located in stressful environments. The objective of this experiment was therefore to investigate the impacts of pigment-containing products on turfgrass physiology during hot and humid summer months in the Southeastern USA.
Four pigment-containing products were selected for the two 2012 …

Bacterial Recovery, Transfer To Hands And Survival On Restaurant Menus, Ibtehal Alsallaiy

All Theses

Some non-food contact surfaces such as restaurant menus are not routinely cleaned or evaluated for microbial contamination and thus may be a potential contamination risk. The main objectives of this study were to detect bacteria on restaurant menus, test the rate of bacteria transfer from menus to consumers and determine the survival rate of bacteria on the menu surface. Evaluation of samples can 'find' that menus harbored detectable levels of aerobic organisms and Staphylococcus spp. The average mean of Total Plate count (TPC) was 28 CFU/15cm2 per sampling area during busy periods and 15 CFU/15cm2 per sampling area during less …