Digital Commons Network^™

Cybersecurity Integration In Research Stage Connected Devices Within Healthcare Environments, Klemens Koszarek

Master's Theses (2009 -)

The rapid growth of connected devices in healthcare environments has significantly expanded the cybersecurity threat landscape, extending the potential risks beyond traditional hospital networks. Regulatory guidance from the FDA and risk management frameworks such as the NIST Cybersecurity Framework (NIST CSF) provide an approach for managing cybersecurity risk in connected systems. However, these principles are not always applied during early stages of device development. As a result, security consideration may be deferred until later stages of development, allowing for vulnerabilities to persist in systems as they move toward clinical or commercial deployment. This study presents a structured method for integrating …

Empowering Futures: Inspiring Young Girls In Stem Through Comics, Angel M. Griggs

Honors Theses

Women have historically been underrepresented in STEM fields. In my analysis, I explored how children’s literature representing historical women role models empower young girls to possibly pursue STEM careers. I applied Vekiri’s et. al (2024) research on attracting girls to STEM through interactive video games displaying STEM role models to comic books. In this project, I review academic literature, historical sources, and research articles to develop an educational comic book about historical women in STEM to help support the idea that creative activities and resources displaying role models can be influential to young children, specifically young girls. I focused on …

High Germinability Can Facilitate Recovery Of Adelia Vaseyi (Euphorbiaceae), An Imperiled Tamaulipan Thornscrub Shrub, Saroj Dhakal, Bashira Chowdhury, Alejandro Fierro-Cabo

School of Earth, Environmental, & Marine Sciences Faculty Publications

While critical to maintaining dryland biodiversity and drought resilience, reforestation has been limited in subtropical dry forests because of knowledge gaps in seed biology that must be filled to upscale seedling production and ensure recovery of imperiled endemic plants. We characterized seed germination, dormancy, and storage needs for Adelia vaseyi, a threatened endemic shrub commonly included in planting mixes to restore Tamaulipan thornscrub, an imperiled subtropical forest spanning South Texas and Northeastern Mexico. We found A. vaseyi seeds have high germinability (82.0%) and a short mean germination time (3.04 ± 0.08 days). A delia vaseyi seed does not appear …

Understanding The Role Of Tiktok As A Source Of Support For Cyberbullying Victims, Saba Iqbal

Theses and Dissertations

Cyberbullying poses a significant threat to teenagers and young adults, who often seek support and advice online. Little is known about the support and advice shared online for victims of cyberbullying and whether it is helpful. In this study, we used qualitative thematic analysis to examine a sample of 150 TikTok videos that give support or advice for cyberbullying victims. We identify 33 unique pieces of support and advice across 5 categories, with differences in tone and delivery among different types of videos. We then evaluated the quality of 33 unique pieces of cyberbullying advice in a user study with …

Limitations Of Signature-Based Network Intrusion Detection Under Modern Traffic Conditions, Henry Guidry

Cybersecurity Undergraduate Research Showcase

Network Intrusion Detection Systems are tools used to monitor network traffic and alert to suspicious or harmful activity before it can cause harm. Signature-based versions of these systems are a foundation for intrusion detection, operating by finding common patterns and forming malicious signatures. However, three developments in modern network environments have greatly impacted the significance of Network Intrusion Detection Systems. These three developments are the near-complete adoption of end-to-end encryption, the use of sophisticated packet fragmentation techniques, and the processing demands of high-throughput networks. Encryption makes deep packet inspection practically infeasible by transforming inspectable payloads into ciphertext, forcing NIDS to …

Stylemys Nebrascensis Predation Hypothesis, Noah Lohrmeyer, Amanda Peng

SACAD: Scholarly Activities

In 2008 a fossilized tortoise shell was brought into the Sternberg Museum of Natural History. As we prepared the fossil, we observed markings that resembled predation. We are trying to find what species from the White River Formation could preyed on the tortoise. There are few publications on predation for this species. With few publications, we want to find what predator would hunt these species. We cross referenced the site of the tortoise and observed several carnivorous species. We used straight carapace length (Hermanson et al., 2024) and a regression formula (Wilson et al., 2016) to analyze the species we …

David Berkowitz, Enzyme-Assisted Organic Synthesis & Nsf Officer, Mark A. Griep, David B. Berkowitz

Department of Chemistry: Faculty Interviews

Dr. Dave Berkowitz was born in Urbana, Illinois. He earned his bachelor's degree in chemistry from the University of Chicago, where he did undergraduate research. Next, he earned his doctorate from Harvard University. However, his advisor, Steve Benner, moved from Harvard to ETH Zurich, also called the Swiss Federal Institute of Technology. Dave accompanied him to Zurich, where he completed his dissertation work. When Dave returned to the U.S., he did a postdoc with the legendary Samuel Danishefsky at Yale University. In 1991, he joined UNL as an assistant professor of chemistry and quickly rose through the ranks. Dave is …

Application Identification With Pfsense, Snort, And Openappid In Academic Lab Networks, Minh-Khanh Vu

Journal of Cybersecurity Education, Research and Practice

This paper evaluates the practical capabilities and limitations of a widely used open-source network security stack—pfSense firewall, Snort Intrusion Detection System (IDS), and OpenAppID detectors—in academic cy- bersecurity laboratories and small-to-medium enterprise (SME)-like environments. In a controlled virtual testbed, we measure application-level and feature-level identifi- cation performance for major applications (Facebook, YouTube, Zoom) using the pfSense/Snort/OpenAppID configuration. The stack achieves 97% application-level identification accuracy for these applications in our lab dataset, drawing on a library of 3,374 OpenAppID detectors. However, our experiments reveal a substan- tial feature-level detection gap: specific functions such as Zoom file transfers and Facebook messaging can- …

Negotiating Digital Identities With Ai Companions: Motivations, Strategies, And Emotional Outcomes, Renkai Ma, Shuo Niu, Lingyao Li, Alexander Hirth, Ava Brehm, Rowajana Behterin Barbie

Computer Science

AI companions enable deep emotional relationships by engaging a user's sense of identity, but they also pose risks like unhealthy emotional dependence. Mitigating these risks requires first understanding the underlying process of identity construction and negotiation with AI companions. Focusing on Character.AI (C.AI), a popular AI companion, we conducted an LLM-assisted thematic analysis of 22,374 online discussions on its subreddit. Using Identity Negotiation Theory as an analytical lens, we identified a three-stage process: 1) five user motivations; 2) an identity negotiation process involving three communication expectations and four identity co-construction strategies; and 3) three emotional outcomes. Our findings surface the …

Creating Disability Story Videos With Generative Ai: Motivation, Expression, And Sharing, Shuo Niu, Dylan Clements, Hyungsin Kim

Computer Science

Generative AI (GenAI) is both promising and challenging in supporting people with disabilities (PwDs) in creating stories about disability. GenAI can reduce barriers to media production and inspire the creativity of PwDs, but it may also introduce biases and imperfections that hinder its adoption for personal expression. In this research, we examine how nine PwD from a disability advocacy group used GenAI to create videos sharing their disability experiences. Grounded in digital storytelling theory, we explore the motivations, expression, and sharing of PwD-created GenAI story videos. We conclude with a framework of momentous depiction, which highlights four core affordances of …

When Generative Ai Is Intimate, Sexy, And Violent: Examining Not-Safe-For-Work (Nsfw) Chatbots On Flowgpt, Xian Li, Yuanning Han, Di Liu, Pengcheng An, Shuo Niu

Computer Science

Content Warning: This paper contains sexually explicit and violent images and text. User-created chatbots powered by generative AI offer new ways to share and interact with Not-Safe-For-Work (NSFW) content. However, little is known about the characteristics of these GenAI-based chatbots and their user interactions. Drawing on the functional theory of NSFW on social media, this study analyzes 376 NSFW chatbots and 307 public conversation sessions on FlowGPT. Findings identify four chatbot types: roleplay characters, story generators, image generators, and do-anything-now bots. AI Characters portraying fantasy personas and enabling hangout-style interactions are most common, often using explicit avatar images to invite …

Weed Seed Burial And Long-Term Viability Following Soil Inversion, Catherine Borger, Sultan Mia, Gaus Azam, Stephen Davies

Grain and Other Field Crops Research Articles

Strategic soil inversion is advocated as a periodic weed management strategy, typically recommended every 4 to 8 yr if the goal is to delay the evolution of herbicide resistance. It is assumed that the weed seeds buried during the inversion process will lose viability during this period. However, long-term seedbank persistence following soil inversion has not been investigated. If the buried seeds retain viability, subsequent inversions or other deep-tillage operations may return them to the soil surface, potentially replenishing the weed seedbank. The current study identified 30 sites within the wheatbelt of Western Australia (in 2020) that had previously been …

The Promises And Perils Of Using Llms For Effective Public Services, Erina Seh-Young Moon, Matthew Tamura, Angelina Zhai, Nuzaira Habib, Behnaz Shirazi, Altaf Kassam, Devansh Saxena, Shion Guha

Health Services and Informatics Research

Governments are the primary providers of essential public services and are responsible for delivering them effectively. In high-stakes decision-making domains such as child welfare (CW), agencies must protect children without unnecessarily prolonging a family’s engagement with the system. With growing optimism around AI, governments are pushing for its integration but concerns regarding feasibility and harms remain. Through collaborations with a large Canadian CW agency, we examined how LocalLLM and BERTopic models can track CW case progress. We demonstrate how the tools can potentially assist workers in opportunistically addressing gaps in their work by signaling case progress/deviations. And yet, we also …

From Oversight To Insight: Transforming Cybersecurity Governance In Boardrooms, Tooba Aamir, Georgia Psaroulis, Marthie Grobler, Helge Janicke

Research outputs 2022 to 2026

Cybersecurity governance is increasingly critical in a digital economy, with board directors playing a central role in shaping organisational resilience. Directors are pivotal in setting cybersecurity strategies and carrying fiduciary obligations that extend to digital risk oversight. This study examines the cybersecurity literacy and governance practices of Australian board directors through a qualitative interview study with 13 participants. Findings reveal a substantial gap in directors' knowledge and confidence, undermining effective oversight and informed decision-making. This deficit limits their ability to interrogate risk reports, challenge assumptions, and steer investment in line with organisational resilience goals. In response, we propose a Board …

Analysis And Study Of Telemetry Systems For Directional And Horizontal Well Drilling, Jahongir Abdiganiyev Erkin Ugli, Sherali Halloqovich Umedov

Technical science and innovation

The article discusses the issues of reducing non-productive drilling time during the construction of directional and horizontal wells. The main focus is on the analysis of drilling conditions in complex geological and high-temperature environments. Particular attention is paid to drilling conditions in the territory of the Republic of Uzbekistan, with a specific study of data from the Boysun and Ustyurt regions. An analysis and study of the performance of telemetry systems available on the market, as well as their main technical characteristics, have been conducted. Key factors affecting the accuracy of wellbore trajectory measurements under various geological and technical conditions …

Design Of Virtual Impedance Controller For Parallel-Connected Converters In A Microgrid, Manyanda Makoye, Francis Mwasilu, Peter M. Makolo, Jackson Justo

Tanzania Journal of Science

This paper addresses the significant challenge of inaccurate power sharing among Distributed Generators (DGs) in islanded microgrids, which is primarily caused by mismatched feeder and line impedances. Conventional decentralized control solutions often fail to ensure accurate power sharing, especially when line impedances are resistive. To overcome this, the paper proposes a robust, coordinated Virtual Impedance Control (VIC) strategy for DGs. This method implements fixed virtual resistance and virtual inductance to standardize the output impedance characteristics of parallel-connected inverters, thereby minimizing impedance discrepancies and enhancing system stability through increased damping. The theoretical analysis and design of the VIC were validated through …

Pre-Experiential Constraint Reconstruction: A Structural Account Of The Prior Layer In Dialogue With Jung, Griselda Poe

Publications and Research

Experiences commonly described as pre-experiential memory—such as immediate recognition, familiarity without prior exposure, and the sense of "already knowing"—are typically interpreted as the retrieval of stored content. However, this storage-based account does not provide a structurally consistent explanation of how such content is preserved prior to experience or reactivated in a form that aligns with present input.

This paper extends the three-layer cognitive architecture developed in prior work in this series (Poe, 2026n), in which cognition operates across Core processing, Modulation, and an operationally inaccessible Prior layer that supplies constraints to all processing.

This paper proposes an alternative account in …

Does Culture Translate? A Case Study On Artificial Intelligencegenerated Text Concerning Japanese-Style Employment, Kanji Kitamura

Languages, Literatures, and Cultures Faculty Publications

Translation matters to international business when it has a discernible impact on firm performance or critical business processes. Current developments include machine translation, which is evolving in tandem with generative artificial intelligence (AI). On one hand, useful translation apps have become available to help the public communicate internationally. On the other hand, recent research concludes that even machine translation's best output still requires post-editing by a human. This argument implies that a machine-translated, grammatically accurate text may not always make sense to a human audience, possibly because of a semantic-pragmatic issue beyond the lexical level. This paper regards it as …

Artificial Intelligence Moderation In Online Gaming: A Cybersecurity Analysis Of Risks And Defenses, Labib Khan

Cybersecurity Undergraduate Research Showcase

This research paper will examine the role of artificial intelligence (AI) moderation systems in enhancing cybersecurity within online gaming environments. As multiplayer platforms increasingly rely on real-time text, voice communication, and user-generated content, developers have implemented AI-driven tools such as natural language processing (NLP), speech recognition, and behavioral analytics to detect harassment, toxic behavior, cheating coordination, and other malicious activity. These systems enable gaming companies to efficiently monitor large volumes of player interactions, improving response times and helping maintain safer and more controlled digital environments for users across global gaming communities of varying sizes and activity levels.

While these technologies …

A Dynamic Systems Framework For Customer Lifecycle Management: From Latent State Discovery To Robust Control Policy, Ali Nasirzonouzi

Northeast Journal of Complex Systems (NEJCS)

Traditional marketing often relies on static strategies that fail to capture dynamic customer behavior. This paper introduces an integrated framework to model and control the customer lifecycle, bridging the gap between empirical data and computational simulation. Using the Customer Personality Analysis dataset, we implemented a five-stage methodology. We first identified three distinct customer segments (At-Risk, Standard, High-Value) using Gaussian Mixture Models. To address the lack of longitudinal data, we calibrated a normative transition model based on customer inertia principles. Our analysis revealed that marketing effectiveness is highly state-dependent; notably, At-Risk customers exhibited a 33.5% lift when targeted with catalogs. Leveraging …

Escaping Isolation: An Analysis Of Virtual Machine And Container Breakout Vulnerabilities, Felix Iov

Cybersecurity Undergraduate Research Showcase

Cloud computing providers rely on multi-tenant architectures to maximize resource efficiency. This infrastructure depends on virtualization, which provides isolation between clients. This comes primarily in the form of Virtual Machines (VMs) and Containers. However, “breakout attacks” or “escapes” are a critical threat where attackers bypass these isolation layers to gain unauthorized access to the host system and neighboring environments. This paper surveys virtualization escape threats and analyzes three case studies: a runc container escape (Leaky Vessels), a VMware ESXi VM escape (VSOCKPuppet), and an NVIDIA GPU container escape (NVIDIAScape). Each demonstrates different attack surfaces, including file descriptor misuse, kernel driver …

Bio-Cybersecurity: Securing The Healthcare Industry, Amanda D. Coleman

Cybersecurity Undergraduate Research Showcase

Bio-cybersecurity refers to the aspect of cybersecurity that applies to the biological sciences and the protection of digital biomedical information. Today’s healthcare industry has evolved with the enhancement of internet and biomedical technology. While hospitals and private medical providers remain compliant with the Health Information Portability and Accountability Act (HIPAA) through traditional means of securing documented patient information, the emergence of beneficial internet-based healthcare services like virtual appointments and digital patient records requires new policies and healthcare cybersecurity frameworks to protect sensitive information from unauthorized access. This paper examines the role of cybersecurity in healthcare, the vulnerabilities that exist and …

From Stability To Spintronics: A Comprehensive High-Throughput Investigation Of 2d Mf4 Lieb Lattices, Uğur Yorulmaz

Turkish Journal of Physics

The research on two-dimensional (2D) materials which have intrinsic magnetism and exotic electronic struc tures is an important quest in condensed matter physics. The Lieb lattice offers a unique platform for studying strongly correlated electron phenomena. In this work, we systematically investigated the structural, dynamical, mechanical, electronic, and magnetic properties of monolayer transition metal tetrafluorides (MF4, where M = Ag, Cd, Cr, Cu, Fe, Hf, Mn, Mo, Nb, Ni, Pd, Pt, Rh, Ru, Sc, Ta, Ti, V, W, and Y) arranged in a 2D Lieb lattice, using first-principles calculations based on density functional theory (DFT) with Hubbard (U) corrections. Our …

Simple D&D: A Web-Based Character Creation System For Dungeons & Dragons, Brennan M. Bondio, Dalton N. Tate, Landon F. Boyd

ATU Scholars Symposium

Dungeons & Dragons, published by Wizards of the Coast, is a widely played tabletop role-playing game that requires players to create detailed characters governed by structured rule systems. Character creation involves managing interdependent attributes, calculations, and constraints that can be difficult for new players and time-consuming even for experienced participants. These complexities create a barrier to entry and reduce efficiency during gameplay preparation.

This project addresses that challenge through the development of Simple D&D, a web-based character creation system designed to streamline and automate rule-driven character configuration. The system aims to reduce manual calculation errors and setup time while maintaining …

Digitizing Transportation Operations At Safe Haven, Luke S. Garrett, William B. Turk, Clay A. Curtis, Aiden H. Behler

ATU Scholars Symposium

Safe Haven’s transportation department currently relies on a paper-based documentation process that requires physical transfer of records between buildings and repeated manual uploading of documents into storage systems. This workflow creates delays, redundant administrative tasks, and increased risk of misplaced or inconsistent records. Drivers, transportation coordinators, reviewers, and clients all interact with this process, making efficiency and data accuracy critical to daily operations.

This project develops a web-based transportation scheduling system designed to digitize documentation workflows and automate many of the repetitive tasks. The system replaces physical records with digital data management, reducing unnecessary manual handling and improving information accessibility …

From Counting To Advanced Math: How Five Simple Axioms Shape The Mathematical Landscape, Joy Skaggs

ATU Scholars Symposium

In the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries, mathematics faced a foundational crisis: Greog Cantor’s set theory led to an interesting self-referencing paradox in math and questions about the logical consistency of mathematics. From this crisis, two opposing viewpoints emerged: the Formalists and the Intuitionists. The Formalists praised Cantor’s work as a way to place math on a secure logical foundation, ensuring the discipline’s purity, however the Intuitionists despised Cantor’s work and heralded Cantor as a charlatan and corrupter of the youth. The leader of the Formalists, David Hilbert, proposed a formal system of rigorous proofs to build a complete …

Moneyup: A Predictive Financial Management System For College Students, Isaiah J. Adams, Malaya E. Wilburd, Dan V. Le, Joshua P. Golden

ATU Scholars Symposium

College students often lack accessible tools that combine real-time financial tracking, mobile accessibility, predictive analytics, and secure system design, leaving many without structured insight into their spending behavior. MoneyUP is a full-stack financial management platform developed to address these challenges through a secure, data-driven budgeting system deployed as both a web application and a cross-platform Flutter mobile application. The system integrates the Plaid API in its Sandbox environment to synchronize simulated banking data for secure testing without exposing live financial credentials. Transaction data is processed and stored using Supabase with a relational PostgreSQL database structured to enforce normalization, referential integrity, …

Llm-Based Stock Sentiment And Market Intelligence Platform, Joshua Thrower, Andrew Pinkerton, Ian Duggan, Wyatt Lester

ATU Scholars Symposium

Financial markets increasingly react to social media discourse, yet investors lack tools to translate this unstructured commentary into measurable indicators. Platforms such as YouTube host extensive discussions about publicly traded equities, but extracting reliable sentiment trends from high-volume, noisy comment streams remains technically challenging. This project develops a stock sentiment and market intelligence platform that transforms YouTube comment data into aggregated sentiment indicators aligned to specific equities. Comments are mapped to equities using ticker specific keyword identification combined with contextual filtering to reduce false associations from ambiguous or off-topic mentions. The system assigns numerical sentiment scores to individual comments and …

Digital Transformation And Market Microstructure: Analyzing The Impact Of Algorithmic Trading On National Stock Exchange Of India Price Discovery Mechanisms Through Complex Systems Theory., Mukesh Bhaskar Ahirrao, Harshal Anil Salunkhe, Vishal Sunil Rana

Northeast Journal of Complex Systems (NEJCS)

Abstract

This research examines the evolution of market microstructure at the National Stock Exchange of India (NSE) from 2020 to 2024, a period characterized by substantial growth in algorithmic trading from 35% to 44% of total trading volume. Using market microstructure data and analytical techniques grounded in complex systems perspectives, the study documents temporal patterns in price discovery, liquidity, volatility, and market efficiency associated with this digital transformation.

The analysis reveals several notable changes in market characteristics. Transaction costs improved significantly, with bid-ask spreads declining by 23.4% and market depth increasing by 18.1%. Price adjustment half-life decreased by 50%, indicating …

Fully Decentralized Hierarchical Federated Learning At The Edge With Post-Quantum Secure Communication, Tariq Qayyum

Thesis/ Dissertation Defenses

Federated learning (FL) enables collaborative model training without centralizing raw data, but deploying FL at scale in real edge environments remains challenging because iterative training and aggregation must operate over heterogeneous, resource-constrained, and often mobile devices with time-varying connectivity. Conventional hierarchical federated learning (HFL) partially mitigates communication cost by introducing fog/edge aggregation, yet many designs retain cloud-based global aggregation and cloud-centric coordination. This places wide-area network latency on the critical path of every training round, creates a single point of failure, and limits responsiveness as model sizes and federation scale grow. Moreover, moving coordination and aggregation closer to the edge …