Digital Commons Network^™

Inclusion Of American Sign Language In Science And Engineering, Alejandro Mejia-Tejada

Society for American Sign Language Journal

For the general public, deaf people are typically known for their signing skills and living as signers, not speakers. However, there is more to this picture. Specifically, one area of consideration and investigation relates to how American Sign Language (ASL) is used as a language in the domains of science and engineering. The other area of investigation relates to how deaf people contribute to the STEM (science, technology, engineering, and math) fields. It will be demonstrated that deaf community members are making inroads into STEM through working as scientists and engineers, including one deaf person known for participating in training …

Special Issue On What To Learn From Undergraduate Research In Asl/Deaf Studies, Jody Cripps

Society for American Sign Language Journal

No abstract provided.

Standards And Best Practices For Assigning Subject Headings To Moving Images, Scott Dutkiewicz, Tomeka Jackson, Jen M. Jones

Presentations

This presentation discusses principles from assigning subject headings to moving images using case studies. Our focus is on the Library of Congress Subject Headings (LCSH).

The Impact Of Maladaptive Perfectionism On Interpreting Training Sessions: Emotional Competencies And Self-Care, Annachiara La Manna

International Journal of Interpreter Education

This study explores the potential links between emotional competencies and perfectionism in graduate interpreting students. Specifically, the effect of Emotional Intelligence (EI) on maladaptive perfectionism was studied, using two questionnaires and a scale of responses. This current study aimed to clarify the link between Trait Emotional Quotients (TEQs) and maladaptive perfectionism symptoms, since it has emerged that maladaptive psychopathology is closely related to the ability to cope with stressors. A sample of native Italian students from the interpreting course at the University of X were provided with the EQ-i test scale to track the participants’ TEQs. The findings highlighted a …

Growing Identity Over A Decade: Asl-English Interpreter Education, Kimberly Hale

International Journal of Interpreter Education

The employment context of ASL-English Interpretation programs (ASLIPs) has not been analyzed in a decade. In this study, I compared the institutional type and disciplinary category of 38 ASLIPs operating in 2011 and 57 programs operating in 2021 to determine whether there had been a standardization of academic profile. Over half of the programs in 2021 are in doctoral/research granting institutions (52.6%) compared to only 31.6% in 2011. While the number of programs classified under Schools/Colleges of Education has nearly doubled (11 and 20, respectively), the proportion has remained steady (45.8% and 45.5%, respectively). The proportion of language and/or culturally-related …

Integrating Computer Science Education And Ethnic-Racial Identity Exploration Within A Social Justice Youth Development Framework, Steven Worker, Fe Moncloa, Vernelle Mitchell-Hawkins

Journal of Youth Development

No abstract provided.

Newfound Belonging: Reimagining Youth Development Through Culturally Relevant Physical Activity And Literacies, Brittany Pinkerton, Christine L. Craddock

Journal of Youth Development

No abstract provided.

When Hedge Funds Move In: Socioeconomic Consequences Of Single-Family Rentals, Hannah Misurati

All Theses

In this thesis I explore the effect of increased investment in the single-family rental sector on inequality and housing affordability. I measure the effect of the single family rental (SFR) share on Gini indices and median rental prices across the largest U.S. cities. I construct three non lagged and three lagged models for each of the two dependent variables. In my analysis of the relationship between SFR shares and inequality, I do not find a significant relationship after accounting for potential reverse causality. However, the relationship between SFR shares and rent prices is shown to be negative and significant once …

Changes In Near-Field Perception And Reaching Behavior In Virtual Environments Over Time, Kristopher C. Kohm

All Dissertations

Near-field perception and reaching capabilities are fundamental for most interactions in immersive virtual environments (IVEs). To perform actions in IVEs accurately and efficiently, virtual reality (VR) users need to be able to adapt to changes in their perception. Some of these perceptual differences may be inherent to virtual environments, such as the difference in depth perception between the virtual and non-virtual worlds. Others may be deliberate alterations to the user's action capabilities or to their surroundings to make interactions easier. Both the alterations and the user's ability to adjust to them may change over time as they gain experience in …

Exploring Healthcare Chatbot Information Presentation: Applying Hierarchical Bayesian Regression And Inductive Thematic Analysis In A Mixed Methods Study, Samuel Nelson Koscelny

All Theses

High blood pressure, also known as hypertension, significantly increases the risk of heart disease and stroke, which are leading causes of death in the United States. While contributing to over 691,000 deaths in 2021 alone in the United States (U.S.), it also imposes immense economic burden on the healthcare system, costing approximately $131 billion annually. One way to address this issue is for increased self-care behaviors and medication adherence, both of which require sufficient health literacy. Despite the importance of health literacy, 90% of U.S. adults struggle with health-related subjects. Overcoming the issues associated with health literacy requires addressing the …

Engineering The Properties Of Magnesium Aluminate Spinel Through Solid State Solutions, Robin Conner

All Theses

Magnesium aluminate spinel solid state solutions were prepared via the coprecipitation method and calcined in air at 900 °C for 2 h. The manipulation of magnesium aluminate spinel’s microstructure through the formation of solid state solutions with zinc and gadolinium substituting for magnesium was investigated. X-ray diffraction (XRD) and attenuated total reflectance Fourier transform infrared spectroscopy (ATR FTIR) confirmed the formation of a single cubic crystalline phase. The luminescence properties were investigated by radioluminescence (RL) under X-ray excitation and thermoluminescence (TL) measurements. In the case of zinc, all concentrations of the solid state solutions showed similar luminescence with bands at …

I’M A Forest, Not A Saltmarsh, Captain: Carbon And Sap Flow Dynamics In Coastal Forested Wetlands Of The Southeastern United States, Chris Shipway

All Theses

Coastal forested wetlands are identified as some of the highest-priority ecosystems for climate change mitigation. Here, we present two studies conducted in these unique ecosystems.

The first assessed changes in aboveground vegetative C stocks along the estuarine-riverine gradients of the Winyah Bay in South Carolina and the Savannah River in Georgia, using a space-for-time substitution to increase understanding of the impacts to upper estuarine forested wetlands from relative sea level rise. Standing C stocks on the Savannah River averaged 183.6 Mg C ha^-1, while sites on the Winyah system averaged 162.3 Mg C ha^-1. The largest …

Investigations Of Sulfurized Polymers For Their Use In Lithium-Sulfur Cells, Alan M. Rowland

All Theses

With the invention of the Lithium-Ion cell in the latter half of the 20th century, there has been a continued endeavor for innovation in compact energy-storage. Combined with the ever-growing need to move away from fossil fuels, electrochemical energy storage has seen a myriad of research projects in the pursuit of finding the ‘beyond-lithium’ cell. One of these projects that I personally assisted with was lithium-sulfur cells, which allow for a significantly greater energy storage capacity when compared to lithium-ion cells. In investigating a popular cathode in lithium-sulfur cells, sulfurized polyacrylonitrile (SPAN), it was hinted that there may be more …

Unraveling Wetland Ecology: The Effect Of Abiotic Heterogeneity And Habitat Size On Wetland Plant Diversity In The Piedmont, Gregory T. Gilmore

All Theses

Ecosystems around the world are seeing an unprecedented decline in biodiversity. However, to better prevent this decline we cannot only understand the drivers of biodiversity loss, but also the factors that support diversity. Traditional ecological hypotheses such as the Habitat Heterogeneity Hypothesis (HHH) and the Theory of Island Biogeography (TIB) have provided frameworks for understanding biodiversity drivers. However, recent research suggests a more nuanced relationship between heterogeneity, habitat size, and diversity than previously thought. This study looks to bridge existing research gaps by examining the ecologically and conservational important habitat of wetlands. Specifically, the study focuses on the plant diversity …

Silence In Stem? The Impact Of Experienced Social Identity Threats On Women, Madison Brumbaugh

All Theses

Despite making up a similar proportion of the workforce, women are grossly underrepresented in STEM occupations compared to men (65% vs. 35%). Prior research suggests that women’s underrepresentation in STEM results in negative consequences, such as increased psychological burnout and decreased work engagement (Hall et al., 2015; Hall et al., 2018), through the mechanism of social identity threat. Academics have yet to explore how experiencing social identity threat impacts silence behaviors for underrepresented women in STEM. Building off social identity theory and prior research on social identity threat, the current study sought to compare women working in STEM occupations who …

Caught On Camera: Evaluating Wood Duck (Aix Sponsa) Cavity Occurrence And Trapping Efficiency, Cindy L. Von Haugg

All Theses

Wood ducks (Aix sponsa) garner significant ecologic and economic importance as the second most harvested waterfowl species in two of the four migratory flyways in North America, but the accuracy of population monitoring, relative to other duck species, is stifled by the wood duck’s secretive nature and nesting habitat. As an alternate, population models would improve current assessments, but more data on the demographic vital rates of cavity-nesting wood ducks is needed. I aimed to help bridge this knowledge gap by developing a method to increase data collection efficiency, and with it, accomplish two objectives: 1) Calculate the relative abundance …

Evaluation Of Future Sea-Level Impacts Using A Sharp Interface Saltwater Intrusion Model, Caroline Hiott

All Theses

Saltwater intrusion is a growing problem that is being exacerbated by climate change. Saltwater intrusion is the process by which saltwater moves towards freshwater supplies driven by saltwater’s greater density compared to freshwater. Saltwater intrusion can contribute to the salinization of freshwater resources, degradation of underground storage tanks, communication systems, and pipelines, as well as lead to groundwater flooding (Ketabchi et al., 2016). Numerical modeling can be used to simulate saltwater intrusion along coastal areas. One of the more computationally efficient modeling tools is the sharp interface approach, SWI2, that is a part of the MODFLOW 2005 suite (Werner et …

High-Resolution Ion Mobility Analysis Of Isomeric Bile Acids Using Structures For Lossless Ion Manipulations (Slim) Im-Ms, Emmaleigh D. Efird

All Theses

Bile acids are an essential part of the human digestion system and play an important role in lipid absorption, bacteria movement in the small intestine, and regulation of the farnesoid X receptor (FXR) and G protein-coupled bile acid receptors (GPBAR) responsible for homeostasis. They are synthesized in the liver, stored in the gallbladder and the excess is carried on to the small intestine. Many liver and intestinal diseases are diagnosed based on bile acid metabolism pathways and the structures of those bile acids. Therefore, the bile acid structure determines the function of the molecule. Many bile acids are similar in …

Extraction Of Neutron-Gamma Irradiated Diffusion Pump Oils, Cooper L. Tillman

All Theses

This work successfully demonstrates solvent extraction methods for separation of oil from the by-products when two commercially available vacuum pump oils were exposed to an intense neutron and gamma-ray radiation environment. Nuclear fusion power at a commercial scale has accelerated the need for radiation resistant vacuum technology, such as oil-based diffusion pumps. Polyphenyl ether and aromatic silicone oils were irradiated at the Rhode Island Nuclear Science Center (RINSC) up to MGy absorbed doses with neutron and gamma-ray radiation. Solvent extractions were performed using hexane and isopropanol to characterize the oil extraction as a function of total absorbed dose. The by-products …

Using Efficient Vision Transformers To Improve Perception Systems In Autonomous Off-Road Vehicles, Adam S. Pickeral

All Theses

The development of autonomous vehicles has become one of the greatest research endeavors in recent years. These vehicles rely on many complex systems working in tandem to make decisions. For practical use and safety reasons, these systems must not only be accurate, but also be quick to make decisions. In Autonomous Vehicle research, the environment perception system is one of the key com- ponents of development. The environment perception system allows the vehicle to understand its surroundings using cameras, light detection and ranging (LiDAR), and other sensor systems or modalities. Deep learning computer vision algorithms have shown to be the …

First-Order Algorithms For Convex Smooth Optimization Problems With Homogeneous Linear Constraints, Yidan Guo

All Dissertations

The purpose of this dissertation is to explore the first-order methods that can be used to solve an approximate solution for convex smooth problems with homogeneous linear constraints. It consists of three interconnected research projects.

In the first project, we study the problem of computing the projection of a given vector onto the kernel of a symmetric positive semi-definite matrix. The complexity of an algorithm for computing a numerical solution is evaluated by the total number of matrix-vector multiplications required for computing an approximate solution. Such problems arise commonly in consensus optimization, in which the total number of matrix-vector multiplications …

Single Charge Carrier Dynamics In A Single Polymer Chain, Ming Lei

All Dissertations

Understanding how charge carrier move through conjugated polymers is crucial for optimizing the functionality and efficiency of various applications, from organic solar cells and light-emitting diodes (LEDs) to field-effect transistors. Previous studies have demonstrated that tracking the fluorescence centroid displacement provides a method to determine the position of single charge carriers in a conjugated polymer nanoparticle. This method allows the observation of charge carrier trajectories over time and allow researchers to obtain insights into the dynamic processes. In addition, a detailed map of the energy landscape can be constructed by analyzing the fluorescence spectrum. These techniques were previously applied to …

An Equity Centered Analysis Of Course Coordination's Effect On Undergraduate Calculus 1 Students' Mathematics Identity, Tyler Sullivan

All Dissertations

For institutions offering multiple sections of Calculus 1, course coordination allows for consistency among the sections through the reduction of variation of material and/or instructional approaches. Studies on course coordination have shown that a coordinated system can bring benefits to instructors and promote equality for students across multi-section course so they can expect the same instructional treatment as their peers. The benefits to students are often left implicit in current research and usually measured through academic success while the benefits to instructors are well documented. Past studies have also stressed the importance of consistency and fairness across sections brought by …

Optimization Strategies To Enhance Performance In Matrix/Tensor Factorization And Multi-Source Data Integration, Mengyuan Zhang

All Dissertations

Optimization in the realm of machine learning constitutes a fundamental process aimed at refining the parameters of models to enhance their performance. It serves as the backbone of various machine learning techniques, encompassing diverse algorithms and methodologies tailored to address specific tasks and objectives.

In machine learning, datasets are commonly structured as matrices or tensors, making techniques like matrix factorization and tensor factorization indispensable for extracting meaningful representations from intricate data. Furthermore, datasets commonly comprise multiple sets of features, which has inspired our exploration of effective strategies for leveraging information from diverse sources during optimization. Additionally, the interconnected nature of …

Fabrication And Characterization Of Lignin–Pva Hydrogels With Tunable Network Structures, Keturah Bethel

All Dissertations

The ability to directly tune the crosslinked network structure of hydrogels is crucial for their functional applications in various fields, such as water filtration, protein separation, and tissue engineering. By controlling the crosslink density of the hydrogel, one can directly alter the mesh size – i.e., the end-to-end distance between crosslink junctions – and, subsequently, directly alter the hydrogel performance. This work discusses the fabrication and characterization of soft composites containing the biopolymer, lignin, are discussed. Precisely, physically-crosslinked composite lignin–Poly(vinyl alcohol) (PVA) hydrogels were fabricated via the freeze-thaw (F/T) pathway, whereby solutions containing specified amounts of PVA and lignin were …

Cohen-Macaulay Type Of Open Neighborhood Ideals Of Unmixed Trees, Jounglag Lim

All Theses

Given a tree T and a field k, we define the open neighborhood ideal N(T) of T in k[V] to be the ideal generated by the open neighborhoods of all vertices in the graph. If T is unmixed with respect to the total domination problem, then it is known that N(T) is Cohen-Macaulay. Our goal is to compute the (Cohen-Macaulay) type of k[V]/N(T) using graph theoretical properties of T. We achieve this by using homological algebra and properties of monomial ideals. Along the way, we also provide a different characterization of unmixed trees and a generalization of the total dominating …

Degradation Products And Microbial Communities Associated With The Conversion Of Five Long-Chain Fatty Acids Relevant For Anaerobic Co-Digestion Of Fog With Sludge, Claire Funk

All Theses

Anaerobic digestion is a technology that allows wastewater treatment plants to convert sludge to energy by recovering the biogas produced during the breakdown of proteins, carbohydrates, and lipids. Furthermore, adding fats, oils, and greases (FOG) through co-digestion with wastewater sludge can increase energy production as lipids have a higher methane yield than proteins and carbohydrates. However, adding FOG can also lead to operational problems in the digester due to the potential accumulation of certain long-chain fatty acids (LCFAs). Current research is limiting in the degradation pathways of prominent LCFAs in FOG and the microbial communities responsible for their degradation

The …

Hyperspectral Image Classification Of Bacteria Using A Deep Convolutional Neural Network, Bruce S. Vogelsberg Jr

All Theses

Hyperspectral imaging is a non-invasive imaging method capable of collecting both spatial and spectral information. However, because of the large volume of data collected, much of it is redundant or not useful for classification. Deep learning is a subset of machine learning that uses artificial neurons in a multilayered structure to learn representations from data. One of the main advantages of deep learning is the powerful feature extraction capabilities, which allow the model to learn both high- and low-level features. Convolutional neural networks are a type of deep learning model that have alternating convolutional and pooling layers capable of extracting …

Training Uav Teams With Multi-Agent Reinforcement Learning Towards Fully 3d Autonomous Wildfire Response, Bryce Hopkins

All Theses

As climate-exacerbated wildfires increasingly threaten landscapes and communities, there is an urgent and pressing need for sophisticated fire management technologies. Coordinated teams of Unmanned Aerial Vehicles (UAVs) present a promising solution for detection, assessment, and even incipient-stage suppression – especially when integrated into a multi-layered approach with other recent wildfire management technologies such as geostationary/polar-orbiting satellites and CCTV detection networks. However, there remains significant challenges in developing the necessary sensing, navigation, coordination, and communication subsystems that enable intelligent UAV teams. Further, federal regulations governing UAV deployment and autonomy pose constraints on real-world aerial testing, creating a disconnect between theoretical research …

Impact Of Nitrogen Species On Algal Carbon Capture, Lauren J. Todd

All Theses

Increasing global carbon emissions from fossil fuel combustion and the resulting detrimental effects of climate change have created a need for atmospheric carbon drawdown. Biological-based carbon capture not only sequesters carbon dioxide (CO₂) but also provides a sustainable source of biomass for biofuels and biomaterials. Thus, the aim of this research was to examine freshwater green algal growth with total ammoniacal nitrogen (TAN) and nitrate nitrogen (NO₃-N) sources at high pH for improving carbon capture potential. The following objectives were accomplished: nitrogen uptake was identified as simultaneous or sequential, the effect of TAN and NO_{3 …}