Digital Commons Network^™

Making Of Wars: Analysis Of The Franchise Management Of God Of War And Gears Of War, William Seaton

All Theses

Two of the most prominent franchises in the video game industry are God of War and Gears of War. These franchises, produced by Sony Interactive Entertainment (SIE) and Xbox Game Studios (XGS), respectively, and their presentation through company blogs offer insight into the franchise management strategies and franchise conceptualizations that their parent companies have. Understanding these franchising aspects furthers knowledge on how these companies, two of the three largest video game producers, engage in franchising behaviors through discourse. Utilizing a framework of the discourse of franchise paratexts, this thesis examines those franchising tactics and discursive frames that the companies …

Advancement Of Detection And Treatment For Triple-Negative Breast Cancer And Infectious Disease, Austin Smothers

All Dissertations

Triple-negative breast cancer (TNBC) continues to be one of the leading causes of death in women, making up 7% of all cancer deaths. Tumor-treating electric fields (TTFields) are low-energy, low-frequency oscillating electric fields (OEF) that have been shown to induce an anti-proliferative effect on mitotic cells in glioblastoma multiforme (GBM), non-small cell lung cancer (NSCLC), and ovarian cancer. Currently, tumor-treating field (TTField) therapy utilizes “optimal” frequencies of electric fields to achieve maximal cell death by cell line. However, because of differences in cell size, shape, and ploidy during mitosis, optimal electric field characteristics for maximal cell death may not exist. …

Investigating And Addressing Tiger Conservation In The Himalayas, Pramod Kumar Yadav

All Dissertations

In 2010, tiger conservation received global attention following a dangerously low estimation of 3,200 tigers in the wild. In response, leaders from the 13 tiger range countries committed to doubling the wild tiger population by 2022. In recent years, tiger numbers have increased considerably in the Himalayan region as the species is venturing into higher-altitude landscapes. As the tiger and human populations increase in the region, the probability of the two species interacting also increases. Therefore, this dissertation, comprised of three independent studies, aimed to identify, and address tiger conservation issues in the Himalayan region from a social science perspective. …

Drivers Of White-Tailed Deer (Odocoileus Virginianus) Behavior, Survival, And Population Growth In The Piedmont Of South Carolina, Michael Muthersbaugh

All Dissertations

Prey species adjust behaviors in response to various stimuli, responding to both top-down and bottom-up pressures. Large herbivores must attempt to avoid predation either through adjusting behaviors or seeking spatial or temporal refugia, which can scale up to influence individual fitness and ultimately population dynamics. Specifically, predation risk has a great potential to influence ungulate populations by impacting behaviors and survival. Our objective was to quantify ungulate behavioral and population response to a regionally important predator through a case study – white-tailed deer (Odocoileus virginianus) responses to coyotes (Canis latrans) on private lands in the Piedmont …

Inhibitors Of Human Eno2 Are Potent Anti-Trypanosomal Agents, Danielle Lavigne

Honors College Theses

Kinetoplastid parasite infections remain a global health burden. Here, we have characterized inhibitors of an essential Trypanosoma brucei glycolytic enzyme, enolase (TbENO). We anticipate TbENO inhibitors will be potent anti-trypanosomals, as T. brucei relies on glycolysis for ATP production in the blood of infected mammals. Additionally, the phosphonate enolase inhibitors being considered are well-tolerated in mammals, suggesting their potential in developing novel therapeutics for kinetoplastid infections. TbENO was cloned into the bacterial expression vector, pQE-30, and the heterologously-expressed protein was purified by nickel affinity and assayed in a coupled enzyme assay. Enzyme activity paralleled the abundance …

Nutrient Dynamics In Restored And Unrestored Urban Streams: A Study In The Southern Piedmont Ecoregion Of South Carolina, Emily Jordan

All Theses

The United States invests billions of dollars annually to perform stream restoration projects, yet few studies have investigated the effects ecological manipulation has on nutrient cycling and associated water quality. Water quality improvement remains a substantial motivation for mitigating catchment scale disturbances, especially in urban streams. Various land use practices impact the transfer and transport of nutrients such as ammonium (NH₄-N), nitrate plus nitrite (NO₃-N + NO₂-N) and soluble reactive phosphorus (SRP) from land into the flowing waters of a watershed. The uptake length (S_w), or the distance (m) a dissolved nutrient …

Disinfectant Efficacy Against Sars-Cov-2 Surrogates, Bovine Coronavirus And Human Coronavirus Oc43, On Hard And Soft Non-Porous Surfaces, Breanna Kimbrell

All Theses

The novel human coronavirus (HCoV), severe acute respiratory syndrome coronavirus 2 (SARS-CoV-2), emerged from Wuhan, China in the latter part of 2019. The rapid spread of SARS-CoV-2 amid the most recent COVID-19 pandemic forced countless foodservice establishments (FSEs) across the United States to close, taking a tremendous toll on the foodservice industry. Although primarily transmitted person-to-person, previous studies indicate that the duration of SARS-CoV-2 survival on different environmental surfaces provides adequate time for secondary transmission to occur. To prevent the further spread of SARS-CoV-2, effective disinfection of surfaces in FSEs is necessary. While disinfectants approved for use against SARS-CoV-2 are …

Role Of Salinity In Perfluorooctane Sulfonate (Pfos) Bioconcentration Between Aquatic Species And The Differential Regulation Of Transporters In Fundulus Heteroclitus, Tyler Davis

All Theses

Perfluorooctane sulfonate (PFOS) is a persistent organic pollutant that is known for its surfactant properties and its resistance to degradation. The persistence and lipophilicity of PFOS in surface waters have led to its bioaccumulation in fish, which in turn leads to its accumulation and toxic effects in humans that consume fish. PFOS is also hypothesized to perturb reproduction and survival of low and mid-trophic level zooplankton species such as Daphnia magna that are food for multiple fish species. In this study, a 21-day D. magna chronic toxicity test was performed using 1,10, 100, 1000, and 5000 ppb of PFOS to …

Adapting Cultural Storytelling Styles To Modern Media, Julie Huang

All Theses

In the face of modern media, it is inevitable that certain cultural art forms will fade in popularity. Some may even fade out of existence altogether. However, there are continuous efforts to reframe these cultural gems in contemporary forms to preserve them for the younger generations. Digital media, such as animation and video games, provide the perfect vehicle to bridge the gap between traditional and contemporary. This paper investigates how storytelling practices have been carried through time and the creative ways they have evolved in the face of an ever-changing mediascape.

To support this research, I present a narrative in …

A Narrative Inquiry Of Selected Women’S Career Pathways To State-Level Leadership In Agriculture, Timothy Keown

All Dissertations

In this study, I used a qualitative narrative inquiry to examine stories from three individually selected state-level agricultural sector women leaders as they described their career paths to leadership roles. This purpose of the study was to address the problem of a lack of practical understanding of women leaders’ experiences in pursuing, achieving, and keeping leadership roles within the agricultural industry. The existing literature shows that women are less likely to hold an agriculture leadership role in their career. To establish the research question, I used feminist educational theory. This theoretical framework and the associated epistemology of narrative inquiry served …

Nigella Sative As An Antibiotic Alternative To Promote Growth And Enhance Health Of Broilers Challenged With Eimeria Maxima And Clostridium Perfringens, Vishal Manjunatha, Julian E. Nixon, Greg F. Mathis, Brett S. Lumpkins, Zeynep B. Guzel-Seydim, Atif C. Seydim, Annel K. Greene, Xiuping Jiang

Publications

The poultry industry has significant coccidiosis and necrotic enteritis (NE) challenges, leading to high mortality and unacceptable growth without antibiotic treatment. This research explored supplementing Nigella sativa (black cumin) seed oil in poultry feed to mitigate coccidiosis and prevent or lessen NE in broilers. In vivo studies consisted of 384 and 320 Cobb 500 male broiler chicks distributed in a randomized complete block experimental design for trials 1 and 2, respectively. The first trial compared 3 concentrations (1, 2, and 5 mL/kg) of black cumin seed oil (BCSO), and trial 2 compared 2 concentrations (2 and 5 mL/kg) BCSO, with …

An Agricultural Literacy Assessment Of Social Studies Teachers In South Carolina, Walker Reid

All Theses

Studies in the career development of youth identify middle school as the optimum time for career exploration, as it advances young adolescents’ self-awareness, knowledge of prospective careers, and goal setting. In South Carolina (SC), only 5% (13 of 248) of public middle schools provide agricultural education. The purpose of this study is to measure any increase in agricultural awareness and literacy of South Carolina 8^th-grade social studies teachers participating in a five-day study tour (SOCIAL tour) through mixed method procedures. A pre and post-tour survey given to participants indicated a significant increase in knowledge and perception of agriculture …

An Investigation Into The Origin And Molecular Mechanism Of Species-Specific Craniofacial Sexual Dimorphism In Lake Malawi Cichlids, Ashleigh Brandon

All Theses

Explaining the underlying source that generates the phenotypic diversity ubiquitous in nature has been a major goal of biologists since the time of Darwin. In addition to the phenotypic variation that exists between different species, another potent source of morphological diversity is found within a species, in the form of phenotypic differences that are specific to males and females, termed sexual dimorphism. The largest craniofacial bone, the mandible, exhibits such extreme sexual dimorphism that it may be used to forensically determine sex. This dimorphism occurs in most of the craniofacial complex and contributes to sex-biased disease frequencies, such as a …

Procedural City Generation With Combined Architectures For Real-Time Visualization, Griffin Poyck

All Theses

The work and research of this paper sought to build upon traditional city generation and simulation in creating a tool that both realistically simulates cities and their prominent features and also creates aesthetic and artistically rich cities using assets that combine several contemporary or near contemporary architectural styles. The major city features simulated are the surrounding terrain, road networks, individual buildings, and building placement. The tools used to both create and integrate these features were created in Houdini with Unreal Engine 5 as the intended final destination. This research was influenced by the city, town, and road networking of Ghost …

Gaslight: Attacking Hard-Label Black-Box Classifiers Via Deep Reinforcement Learning, Rajat Sethi

All Theses

Through artificial intelligence, algorithms can classify arrays of data, such as images or videos, into a predefined set of categories. With enough labeled data, a classifier can analyze an input’s components and calculate confidence scores for each category. However, machine learning relies heavily on approximation, which allows attackers to exploit classifiers by providing adversarial
examples. Specifically, attackers can modify their input so that the victim classifier cannot correctly label it, while a human observer would be unable to notice the difference.
This thesis proposes Gaslight, a system that uses deep reinforcement learning to generate adversarial examples against a victim classifier. …

Cú Chulainn's "Vigil On The Hound Fords": The Centrality Of Borders In The Táin Bó Cuailnge, David Atkinson

All Theses

This thesis examines the role of the Irish hero Cú Chulainn as a guardian of both supernatural and human borders in the popular medieval Irish saga, the Táin Bó Cuailnge. As a descendent of both the human inhabitants of Ireland and the supernatural síd, Cú Chulainn is uniquely situated to negotiate the border between the two worlds these peoples inhabit. The ambiguous distinction between these two worlds is reflected by the river borders that divide Ireland into its shifting land holdings and kingdoms. The ambiguity at the heart of this saga has given it enormous potential for adaptation through …

Growth, Mortality, And Movement Of Endemic Bartram's Bass And Invasive Alabama Bass In Upper Savannah River Basin Tributaries, Tyler Zumwalt

All Theses

Bartram’s Bass are an endemic to the Upper Savannah River basin in North Carolina, South Carolina, and Georgia. Bartram’s Bass are facing many risks, primary among them being hybridization with nonnative Alabama Bass. More recently, nonnative Alabama Bass and their hybrid congeners have been observed moving from reservoirs into tributaries where the remaining Bartram’s Bass populations exist. Thus, for Chapter 1 we sought to better understand the threat of nonnative gene spreading in tributary systems. To do this, we 1) quantified the movement of pure Alabama Bass, Bartram’s Bass, and their hybrids, 2) assessed correlations between movement and abiotic variables, …

Kitchen Witch: Animated Independent Property Pitch Bible Research And Development, Kelsey Eaves

All Theses

My thesis project centers around the production process for creating an animated program. My paper is a record of the development of my pitch bible and my efforts to raise outside interest in the property. I intend to use my work here to enter the animation industry as a jumping off point in my career. My research materials include various “Art Of” production books, Creating Cartoons with Character by Rocko’s Modern Life creator Joe Murray, and firsthand interviews from present and former television industry personnel. In this text I explore television animation pre production to highlight the creation of an …

Meta-Analysis Of The Effects Of Endophytes And Their Secondary Metabolites On Herbivory From Insects, Derrick Taylor

All Theses

Endophyte-infected plants have reduced the level of herbivory. The defense to herbivory can vary due to the metabolites in the plant and the method of feeding from the pest. Secondary metabolites produced by the endophytes are mainly alkaloids. The associations between endophytes and some alkaloid groups are studied in greater detail. The lack of research of certain alkaloid groups ultimately means that some alkaloids had more data that could be analyzed. As a result, the alkaloid groups were not evenly represented in the meta-analysis. The meta-analysis analyzed the relative effectiveness of the metabolites or endophytes in each of the articles …

Making The Subconscious Conscious - Showcasing Unresolved Childhood Trauma Through Animation, Alexis Hunter

All Theses

The focus of this work is to shed light on unresolved childhood trauma that can contribute to mental hardships - whether people are aware of its presence in their lives or not. In this paper, I will discuss childhood trauma, its impact on adult life when left unresolved, self-parenting as a method to manage it, and how it is portrayed in various media. Drawing inspiration from my research on trauma and visual storytelling, I will present a proof-of-concept for a 2D animated short film, Strongholds, which visualizes the internal mental struggles through the character dynamics of the personifications of the …

Generation And Characterization Of A Multi-Functional Panel Of Monoclonal Antibodies For Sars-Cov-2 Research And Treatment, Lila D. Patterson

All Theses

The Coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID19) pandemic caused by SARS-CoV-2 is an ongoing threat to global public health. To this end, intense efforts are underway to develop reagents to aid in diagnostics, enhance preventative measures, and provide therapeutics for managing COVID-19. The recent emergence of SARS-CoV-2 Omicron strains with enhanced transmissibility, altered antigenicity, and significant escape of existing monoclonal antibodies and vaccines underlines the importance of the continued development of such agents. The SARS-CoV-2 spike protein and its receptor binding domain (RBD) are critical to viral attachment and host cell entry and are primary targets for antibodies elicited from both vaccination …

Changes In Energy Metabolism Induced By Pfos And Dietary Oxylipins, William Evans

All Theses

Perfluorooctanesulfonate (PFOS), an emerging environmental toxicant in addition to 9- hydroxyoctadecadienoic acid (9-HODE) and 9-hydroxyoctadecatrienoic acid (9-HOTrE), endogenously produced oxylipins from polyunsaturated fatty acids (PUFAs) by Cytochrome P450 2B6 (CYP2B6) have been recently associated with hepatic steatosis and peroxisome proliferator- activated receptor signaling by data produced from our laboratory and others. Given the importance of mitochondrial energy metabolism in the maintenance of lipid homeostasis, an array of extracellular flux assays was performed using HepG2 cells to test for the ability of these compounds to disrupt overall mitochondrial activity and respiration associated with fatty acid oxidation and glycolysis specifically. PFOS and …

Influence Of Cover Cropping And Nitrogen Fertilization On Soil Properties And Cotton Productivity, Christianah Oladoye

All Dissertations

Conservation practices with cover crops have proven to be effective in nutrient enrichment, increased yield, and environmental stability. Field studies were conducted from 2019 to 2022 to evaluate the short-term effect of No cover crop [NC], RYE, a mix of rye + vetch [R+V], and mix of five species (radish, rye, vetch, clover, and lupin) [5W] on short term soil physical, chemical properties, cotton growth, and lint yield. Cover crops were planted in November and terminated in May of each year. Soil dry and wet aggregate fractions (0-0.05 m) and soil compaction (0-0.4 m depth) were measured at termination. The …

Communication In Phelan-Mcdermid Syndrome: Assessment And Genotype-Phenotype Correlation, Sarah Quadri

All Dissertations

Phelan McDermid Syndrome (PMS) is a rare genetic disorder caused by deletions or mutations of the SHANK3 gene on chromosome 22q13.3. Language and communication impairment are hallmark features of PMS, and this dissertation aims to address the lack of consensus on appropriate methods for assessing these abilities and genotype-phenotype correlations of language and communication impairments in PMS.

The first chapter introduces PMS and associated language and communication impairment, identifies gaps in the literature, and shows how this research fills those gaps to advance our understanding of this rare genetic disease. The second chapter identifies and analyzes practices for assessing speech, …

Beyond Just Money Transactions: Redesigning Digital Peer-To-Peer Payments For Social Connections, Lingyuan Li

All Dissertations

Financial activities, such as the exchange of money between individuals, have long been considered a crucial aspect of how people build and maintain their interpersonal relationships (i.e., a strong, deep, or close association/acquaintance between two or more people) with individuals they know because money is a sensitive social construct. In particular, over the past decade, how to conduct, manage, and experience money exchanges and processes between individuals has been dramatically transformed due to the increasing popularity of digital peer-to-peer (P2P) payment services (i.e., performing one to one online money transactions via a digital device). In this sense, digital P2P payments …

3d Printing With Photopolymerizable Polyester Resins For Resorbable Medical Device Applications, Mathew Murphy Stanford

All Dissertations

In the past decade, the healthcare industry has seen a significant increase in the use of additive manufacturing (AM or “3D printing”) with subsequent improvement in clinical outcomes.As an exceptional AM technology, vat-photopolymerization (VP), often called stereolithography, can create complex structures and has thus been adopted for a range of biomedical applications including surgical guides, temporary implants, and resorbable tissue scaffolds.However, limitations remain in the availability of photopolymerizable resin materials with appropriate mechanical performance, biodegradability, and biocompatibility for application to resorbable medical devices.

The objective of this work was to employ novel photopolymerizable polyester-based macromers in the development of resorbable …

Contrasting Public And Private Approaches To Private Land Conservation In The United States: Local Government, Land Trust, And Landowner Viewpoints, Anna Overby

All Dissertations

In the United States (US), low-density, non-contiguous development, termed sprawl, has long been of widespread concern. Since the 1970s, rural residential sprawl, or exurban sprawl, has grown faster than any other development pattern. Exurban sprawl is development beyond the urban/suburban fringe with ties to the urban environment, such as employment and consumption, rather than to rural economies. Exurban sprawl is highly consumptive of land and has implications for conservation, natural resource management, agriculture, and communities. This study explores two main avenues of exurban sprawl prevention in the US: voluntary conservation easements and local government growth management regulations. The use of …

Filth Flies As A Vector For Some Pathogenic Bacteria Transfer, Ahmet Buyukyavuz

All Dissertations

Two separate sets of experiments were conducted to determine the transfer of bacteria by flies. An Escherichia coli ampicillin-resistant strain with a fluorescent gene was used during the experiments. The first set of experiments were divided into two trials to measure the transfer of E. coli by fruit flies to apple slices and bologna during short term exposure. Short time exposure (1, 5 and 15 min) of flies to inoculated apple slices were tested in the first trial to determine the transfer of E. coli to flies. No difference (P>0.05) in the number of bacteria transferred to flies were …

Methyltransferase, Glucose Adaptation, And Import Complex In Trypanosoma Brucei, Emily Knight

All Dissertations

Trypanosoma brucei is a kinetoplastid parasite responsible for human African trypanosomiasis (HAT) and nagana, a livestock wasting disease, which both endemic to sub-Saharan Africa. Unique to kinetoplastids are the specialized peroxisomes, named glycosomes, which compartmentalize the first several steps of glycolysis and gluconeogenesis, nucleotide sugar biosynthesis, and many other metabolic processes. Kinetoplastids are unique in that they have a single mitochondrion. In this work, I present the first study into SET domain proteins in any kinetoplastid parasites. We have characterized a predicted SET domain protein, TbSETD3, that localizes to the mitochondrion and a depletion of the protein results in growth …

Essays On Labor Market Size And Job Match Quality, Lan Lan

All Dissertations

This dissertation is comprised of two essays that delve into the construction of a major-related labor market and its correlation with college graduates’ job match quality. Investigating the job match quality of college graduates for different majors in large cities is crucial, as it provides evidence on which majors tend to yield better job matches. This contributes to the study of the return on major while also shedding light on how city size impacts individuals’ ability to find jobs that align with their educational level and major, thereby enriching the study of the benefits of agglomeration.

The first chapter examines …