Digital Commons Network^™

Application Of Cloud-Based Geospatial Technologies To Flowering Phenology And Environmental Education, Michael Cope

All Dissertations

Cloud-based geospatial technologies are rapidly improving the flow of information from the environment to end-users. Cloud-based photo storage websites were used to create and manage species and spatial-temporal metadata in a digital photographic inventory of plant flowering observations collected at Lake Issaqueena, SC from January, 2012 to December, 2014. Statistical analysis of species and temporal metadata revealed significant (p < 0.05) inter-annual shifts in flowering time among several species during and after extreme high monthly temperature in March, 2012 and extreme high monthly total precipitation in July and August, 2013. An interactive ArcGIS Online map with sampling locations of flowering plants was developed and published. The interactive ArcGIS Online map enables web-based knowledge discovery of flowering phenology by allowing users to filter map contents, view plant pictures, navigate to additional plant information in the USDA PLANTS Database, and render spatial-temporal flowering patterns using the heat map view and time settings. The conceptual workflow for managing, integrating, and mapping plant flowering observations has numerous potential applications in species monitoring, allowing for higher volume and quality data to be collected and shared openly. A Cloud-based ESRI Story Map was developed for teaching Soil Forming Factors: Topography in undergraduate soil science education. Student evaluation of the ESRI Story Map was positive, and responses indicate students broadly preferred the ESRI Story Map as a stand-alone teaching module or as supplemental to PowerPoint slides. Teaching with ESRI Story Maps is very different than GIS education, and is well suited for fostering critical and spatial thinking because students do not need to possess prior skills in GIS software, allowing them to spend more time learning the topic at hand in interactive teaching modules. Teaching with ESRI Story Maps has enormous potential in soil science and other environmental disciplines, but more research is needed to develop specific teaching objectives and exercises using ESRI Story Maps.

Peripheral Biomarkers Of Inflammation Following Blast Exposure In A Clinical Population, Katie Edwards

All Dissertations

Concussions resulting from blast exposures represent a significant source of injury among military service members and the civilian population. Overall, traumatic brain injuries (TBIs) are a significant cause of hospitalization, disability, long-term care, and mortality across all age groups in the United States. Blast induced traumatic brain injury (biTBI) is an increasingly recognized subtype of brain injury, especially among military personnel. Blast exposure may influence a number of neurological processes, such as the inflammatory response, representing a unique biological profile. Outcomes from a TBI vary, even in similar injuries, and biomarkers including proteins and gene expression are increasingly studied to …

Internet Of Things And Intelligent Technologies For Efficient Energy Management In A Smart Building Environment, Guneet Bedi

All Dissertations

Internet of Things (IoT) is attempting to transform modern buildings into energy efficient, smart, and connected buildings, by imparting capabilities such as real-time monitoring, situational awareness and intelligence, and intelligent control. Digitizing the modern day building environment using IoT improves asset visibility and generates energy savings. This dissertation provides a survey of the role, impact, and challenges and recommended solutions of IoT for smart buildings. It also presents an IoT-based solution to overcome the challenge of inefficient energy management in a smart building environment. The proposed solution consists of developing an Intelligent Computational Engine (ICE), composed of various IoT devices …

Affective Gaming: At The Intersection Of Rhetoric, Affect, And Video Games, Joshua A. Wood

All Dissertations

Affective Gaming is an intervention in the field of game studies, designed to address the lack of racial diversity in games. I examine the role that emotion plays in games by melding game studies and rhetorical theory with affect theory and critical identity studies. I build a theory of gaming that is attuned to the way games provoke emotion in players in order to bring a new understanding of identity to game studies. I then turn towards a theory of game design that uses affect toward a rhetorical end, and finally turn this toward games in the classroom. I also …

Development Of Anti-Fouling Membranes For Water Treatment, Steven Weinman

All Dissertations

The goal of my dissertation research was to devise new strategies to combat membrane fouling, which is a major hindrance in water treatment systems. Membrane fouling refers to the blocking of pores and the build-up of material on the membrane surface. There are many types of foulants, including but not limited to bacteria, biopolymers (such as alginate), natural organic matter, oils, proteins, particles, and salts (such as gypsum). Typical ways to combat fouling include expensive pretreatment procedures, physical membrane cleaning, and chemical treatments to the membranes. Chemical treatments tend to decrease the membrane lifetime, especially for nanofiltration and reverse osmosis …

Estimating Animal Abundance By Employing An External Experiment To Account For Detection And Count Bias With An Application To Wintering Ducks In The Mississippi Alluvial Valley, April L. Thomas

All Dissertations

A valid concern when structuring an aerial survey of wildlife populations is the presence of visibility bias. Many studies attempt to correct for visibility bias by including additional parameters in estimators for wildlife abundance. Often these parameters are estimated through data collected during the aerial survey. Some, how-ever, have suggested using an external visibility experiment to estimate parameters being used to adjust for visibility bias. This work considers a bias adjusted estimator, proposed by Pearse et al. (2008), in which the bias correction parameters are esti-mated via an external visibility experiment using decoys in place of the live animals. The …

Novel Methods For Monitoring Glucose Metabolism In Trypanosoma Brucei Using Fluorescent Biosensors, Charles Voyton

All Dissertations

Members of the class Kinetoplastea including Trypanosoma brucei, Trypanosoma cruzi, and Leishmania spp. cause diseases endemic in rural regions of South America, Sub‐Saharan African and the Eastern Asian continent, effecting hundreds of millions of people and livestock. Existing treatments are associated with high toxicity and rates of resistance, are expensive to produce, and are difficult to administer in rural areas. To develop additional treatment strategies, we must better illuminate the pathways amenable for anti kinetoplastid treatments. One pathway susceptible to drug intervention is glucose metabolism, which in kinetoplasts takes place in glycosomes that are specialized organelles related to mammalian peroxisomes. …

Ontology-Based Domain-Specific Semantic Similarity Analysis And Applications, Xuebo Song

All Dissertations

Millions of text data are penetrating into our daily life. These unstructured text data serve as a huge source of information. Efficient organization and analysis of the overwhelming text can filter out irrelevant and redundant information, uncover invaluable knowledge, thus significantly reduce human effort, facilitate knowledge discovery and enhance cognitive abilities. Semantic similarity analysis among text objects is one of the fundamental problems in text mining including document classifi-cation/clustering, recommendation, query expansion, information retrieval, relevance feedback, word sense disambiguation, etc. While a combination of common sense and domain knowledge could let a person quickly determine if two objects are similar, …

Computational Investigation Of The Morphological Design Dimensions Of Historic Hexagonal-Based Islamic Geometric Patterns, Mostafa Waleed Hashem Alani

All Dissertations

This dissertation examines the morphology of Islamic Geometric Patterns (IGP). Using mixed methods, including the simulation of historical designs and content analysis, this dissertation explores the question of how it is possible to mathematically describe the IGP. The study argues that the compositional analysis of geometry is not solely sufficient to investigate the design characteristics of the IGP, and the underlying mathematics and computational nature of the IGP should be considered when investigating historical IGP.

The study presents a parametric description method that captures the reality of the IGP in numeric form and utilizes the form to derive representational codes …

Glucose Sensing In Trypanosoma Brucei, Yijian Qiu

All Dissertations

Trypanosoma brucei is the protozoan parasite that causes human African trypanosomiasis (HAT, also known as sleeping sickness) and nagana disease in livestock. During its life cycle, trypanosomes occupy niches with very different nutrient contents and immune features. They use glucose solely for ATP production in the mammalian bloodstream while switching to amino acid metabolism in the midgut of the tsetse fly vector. A fast and accurate coordination of gene expression with environment alteration is critical for the successful parasitization of the two hosts. My study focuses on the signaling role of glucose in the development and adaptation of T. brucei. …

Water-Electricity Nexus: Assessing Impacts Of Habitat Loss On Freshwater Mussel Assemblages In The Savannah Basin, South Carolina, Snehal Subhash Mhatre

All Dissertations

The environmental effects of energy production are well known, yet its exact impacts on freshwater resources are often difficult to recognize and measure. Freshwater mussels are extremely imperiled organisms which act as sentinels of freshwater streams and are greatly understudied in context of their drastic decline caused in part due to large water demands by the energy sector. I sought to estimate historic, current and forecasted water use by electricity generation at national, regional and local- scale. To relate the impacts of water-use by electricity generation on freshwater mussels, I conducted occupancy surveys for eight freshwater mussel species in Savannah …

High Precision Fret To Study Bimolecular Dynamics With High Temporal Resolution, Junyan Ma

All Dissertations

Förster Resonance Energy Transfer (FRET) is a promising methodology which is used by researchers in determining structural information of biomolecules. Other methodologies such as X-ray diffraction, nuclear magnetic resonance (NMR) and electron microscopy (EM), and X-ray scattering (SAXS) and circular dichroism (CD) can only give snapshots of the functional conformers. In the applications of most cases, FRET can only be used to give a qualitative result such as “yes” or “no” pattern. In our lab, we are able to expand this ability by applying FRET to quantitatively determine the structure and dynamic information in the biological system with high accuracy. …

The Chronic Toxicity Of Ion Mixtures To Freshwater Organisms: Ceriodaphnia Dubia And Pimephales Promelas (Fathead Minnow), Katherine Anne Johnson-Couch

All Dissertations

Dissolved ions are natural components of aquatic systems, the concentration and composition of which are greatly controlled by the surrounding geological material present. Although naturally occurring, many anthropogenic activities, including mountaintop removal mining, road deicing practices, agricultural irrigation and coal-fired power plant effluents, can greatly increase dissolved ion concentrations, as well as alter the ionic composition of freshwater systems. An increase in dissolved ions is positively correlated with an increase in salinity and conductivity. Dissolved ions have many important physiological functions within aquatic organisms, one of which is to create electrochemical gradients within cells. These gradients are necessary for controlling …

Are Cyp2b And Cyp3a Important In Hepatic Lipid Metabolism?, Ramiya Kumar

All Dissertations

The Cytochrome P450s (CYP) in families 1-3 are integral to the metabolism of xenobiotics such as pharmaceuticals, pesticides and plasticizers as well as endobiotics such as hormones, bile salts and fatty acids. Recently, hepatic CYP activity was associated with fatty liver and potentially obesity. The CYPs in the 3A and 2B families are critical in xenobiotic detoxification and are regulated by transcription factors that control toxic responses in addition to energy homeostasis. Therefore, we assessed the significance of CYP3A and CYP2B in obesity and hepatic energy metabolism using Cyp3a or Cyp2b knockout mouse models. Cyp3a-null and Cyp2b-null mice were challenged …

Advanced Manufacturing Of Lightweight Porous Carbide Shapes Using Renewable Resources, Monsur Islam

All Dissertations

This dissertation presents an origami-inspired manufacturing and an additive manufacturing platform for the fabrication of 3D shapes of porous carbide material using renewable biopolymers as the carbon source. Porous carbide materials possess interesting properties including low density, high surface area, high chemical inertness, high oxidation resistance, adjustable electrical conductivity, and high mechanical properties. Due to such properties, they are used in different applications such as high temperature filters, catalytic support, thermal insulators and structural materials. The state-of-the-art to manufacture porous carbide materials includes direct foaming and templating methods. However, shaping of porous materials with these techniques relies on the use …

Mechanisms Of Fluconazole-Based Aneuploidy In Cryptococcus Neoformans, Damiana Altamirano

All Dissertations

Cryptococcus neoformans is an opportunistic fungal pathogen that primarily infects the immunocompromised. It is responsible for approximately 180,000 deaths per year in individuals with HIV. Fluconazole (FLC) is a fungistatic drug widely used to treat cryptococcosis and prevent recurrence. C. neoformans exhibits an intrinsic heteroresistance to FLC, which is an emerging barrier to effective treatment especially in resource-limited regions where FLC is often the only therapy available. Previous studies have demonstrated that C. neoformans cells confer resistance to FLC through aneuploid formation. The mechanisms underlying aneuploid formation during FLC treatment are unknown. This dissertation characterizes the effects of the initial …

The Tiger Vol. 112 Issue 10 2018-04-09, Clemson University

Tiger Newspapers 2018

No abstract provided.

13th Annual Focus On Creative Inquiry Poster Forum Program, Clemson University

Focus on Creative Inquiry

The Focus on Creative Inquiry (FoCI) Poster Forum is an annual event in which CI teams can present their research and project accomplishments through poster and interactive displays. FoCI is a celebration of student and mentor collaboration and accomplishments! FoCI is a great venue for students to develop and hone their communication skills.

The Kitten Vol. 69 Issue 420 2018-04-02, Clemson University

Tiger Newspapers 2018

No abstract provided.

Upic Magazine, Issue 8, Center For Career And Professional Development

UPIC Magazine

Every semester, undergraduate students from every major and staff from every part of Clemson University join together through UPIC internships. These paid internships grant students real, on the job experience in professional fields and offer staff a chance to mentor some of Clemson’s most brilliant students.

To find out more about the UPIC Program, visit career.clemson.edu/internship_programs

UPIC is part of Clemson’s Center for Career and Professional Development

Traditional And Digital Writing, Beth Beschorner, Anna H. Hall

Publications

No abstract provided.

Neonatal Subventricular Zone Neural Stem Cells Release Extracellular Vesicles That Act As A Microglial Morphogen, Mary C. Morton, Victoria N. Neckles, Caitlin M. Seluzicki, Jennie C. Holmberg, David M. Feliciano

Publications

Subventricular zone (SVZ) neural stem cells (NSCs) are the cornerstone of the perinatal neurogenic niche. Microglia are immune cells of the nervous system that are enriched in the neonatal SVZ. Although microglia regulate NSCs, the extent to which this interaction is bi-directional is unclear. Extracellular vesicles (EVs) are cell-derived particles that encase miRNA and proteins. Here, we demonstrate that SVZ NSCs generate and release EVs. Neonatal electroporated fluorescent EV fusion proteins were released by NSCs and subsequently cleared from the SVZ. EVs were preferentially targeted to microglia. Small RNA sequencing identified miRNAs within the EVs that regulate microglia physiology and …

The Tiger Vol. 112 Issue 5 2018-02-19, Clemson University

Tiger Newspapers 2018

No abstract provided.

The Tiger Election Issue 2018-02-19, Clemson University

Tiger Newspapers 2018

No abstract provided.

The Tiger Vol. 112 Issue 4 2018-02-12, Clemson University

Tiger Newspapers 2018

No abstract provided.

The Tiger Vol. 112 Issue 1 2018-01-22, Clemson University

Tiger Newspapers 2018

No abstract provided.

Open Access And You: Transforming The Academic Experience, Lauryn Lehman

A repository of copyright educational resources for higher education

Contains the powerpoint slides for a 30 minute job-talk, the topic of which was "reasons why faculty should consider adopting open access resources."

Supplemental Schedules For The Year Ended June 30, 2017, Clemson University

Annual Comprehensive Financial Report

No abstract provided.

Supplemental Schedules For The Year Ended June 30, 2018, Clemson University Controller's Office

Supplemental Schedules

No abstract provided.

Upic Magazine, Issue 7, Center For Career And Professional Development

UPIC Magazine

Every semester, undergraduate students from every major and staff from every part of Clemson University join together through UPIC internships. These paid internships grant students real, on the job experience in professional fields and offer staff a chance to mentor some of Clemson’s most brilliant students.

To find out more about the UPIC Program, visit career.clemson.edu/internship_programs

UPIC is part of Clemson’s Center for Career and Professional Development