Digital Commons Network^™

Gender Differences In Work Values In China, Lulu Nie

All Theses

Based on a nationally representative sample of 10,332 adults from the China General Social Survey 2005 (CGSS2005), this study examines gender differences in work values in China, the mediating effects of marriage and family status, the mediating effects of SES and occupational characteristics and the interaction between gender and family status. Results from ordinal logistic regressions show that women are more likely to rank high earnings, job security, short work time and job autonomy higher, while men are more likely to rank job prestige, job authority, job interest, job promotion, serving others and sense of achievement higher. Marriage and family …

Local Polynomial Regression With Application To Sea Surface Temperatures, Michael Finney

All Theses

Our problem involves methods for determining the times of a maximum or minimum for a general mean function in time series data. The methods explored here involve polynomial smoothing. In theory, the methods calculate a general number of derivatives of the estimated polynomial. Using these techniques, we wish to find a balance between error, variance, and complexity and apply it to a time series of sea surface temperatures. We will first explore the theory behind the method and then find a way to optimally apply it to our data.

Effects Of Physiological Dynamic Compression Loading On Gold Nanoparticle Permeation Of Articular Cartilage, Britton Mccaskill

All Theses

Articular cartilage is essential part of the human body that aids in support and locomotion. It has unique biochemical and biomechanical properties that allow it to act as a shock absorber to disperse and distribute loading of the joints. However, it has a limited capacity to repair itself because it is not vascularized and must receive its nutrients from the surrounding synovial fluid. Articular cartilage damage can lead to many pathological conditions, including osteoarthritis. Currently, there are many surgical treatment methods that repair some of the damage if it is localized, but for widespread degradation seen in osteoarthritis, there are …

Regulation Of Intellectual Property And Contract Structure, Ouida Black

All Theses

This paper seeks to address the newest issue arising between songwriters and their record companies in the music industry which is the underpayment of royalties. This paper will seek to answer if with more and more artists and songwriters suing for compensation due to underpayment of royalties, will artists lose the incentive to create new music and eventually decrease overall production? Clearly defining and regulating intellectual property and the use and efficiency of contracts will be topics for discussion. After testing my hypothesis, some results show no decrease, whereas, other results report some decrease in record company and songwriter incentives …

Developing A Conceptual Framework To Understand Why Local Residents Contribute To Online Travel Communities, Bingjie Liu

All Theses

Online travel communities have reshaped travel behaviors and decision-making of people around the world. In addition to the communication between different travelers, it is noted that local residents also contribute to the information sharing process. Why do local people offer help online? This is a question that has not been answered through a rigorous research process. By exploring why local residents' display helping behavior in online travel communities, the purpose of this study was to develop and test a conceptual framework to understand local residents' contribution to online travel communities. Two models rooted from social psychology to understand the helping …

Biomass And Lipid Production From Heterotrophic And Mixotrophic Fed-Batch Cultivations Of Microalgae Chlorella Protothecoides Using Glycerol, Shwetha Sivakaminathan

All Theses

Chlorella protothecoides is a microalga that can grow both photo-autotrophically and/or heterotrophically under different culture and environmental conditions. In this study both the heterotrophic growth and mixotrophic growth have been conducted. The heterotrophic experiments were conducted completely in the dark while the mixotrophic experiments had the dark cycles with periodic light exposure. The aim of the study was to independently understand the effect of each mode on biomass and lipid yields.
For the heterotrophic experiments, glycerol was used as an external organic carbon source while yeast extract was used as the nitrogen source. The carbon and nitrogen source were added …

Social Capital And Subjective Well-Being: The Case Of Rural Ethiopia, Vanessa Dodd

All Theses

The current study examined the association between social capital and subjective well-being (SWB) in rural Ethiopia. The current study used the 2009 Ethiopian Rural Household Study (ERHS) with a sample of 1277 households. It was hypothesized that social capital is positively associated with SWB, that cognitive social capital would have a stronger association with SWB than would structural social capital, and that the relationship between social capital and SWB will differ by region. The study included an examination of the interaction between regions in Ethiopia, social capital, and SWB. It was found that membership in an equub, generalized trust, and …

Deformation And Adhesion Of Thin Metallic Films On Flexible Substrates, Julia Reid

All Theses

Flexible electronics are conductive circuits, components and lines integrated onto elastic substrates. These systems often consist of metallic thin films deposited onto thin sheets of glass, metals stainless steel or polymeric materials such as polyethylene or polystyrene. These systems are currently being studied for a wide variety of aeronautic and astronautical applications including: electronic skins, solar sails, and antennae structures. For applications include only moderately elevated temperatures (near 200 ¡C) and low strains (insert range), engineers have proposed incorporation metallic lines onto polymeric substrates. Like traditional microelectronic systems with films on hard substrates, the reliability is controlled by the film-substrate …

Software Testability Measure For Sae Architecture Analysis And Design Language (Aadl)Software Testability Measure For Sae Architecture Analysis And Design Language (Aadl), Hung Vo

All Theses

Testability is an important quality attribute of software, especially for critical systems such as avionics, medical, and automotive. Improvement in the early testability of software architecture, the first artifact of the software system, will help reduce issues and costs later in the development process.
AADL, an architecture analysis description language suitable for critical embedded, real-time systems, can be used for design documentation, analysis and code generation. Because the capability of AADL can be extended, it is possible to add new analyses to its core language. Tools such as the Open Source AADL Tool Environment (OSATE) provide plugins for processing AADL …

Development Of Enrichment Cultures For Anaerobic Reductive Dechlorination Of Tetrachloroethene Under Low Ph Conditions, Chen Jiang

All Theses

Bioremediation is an attractive remediation strategy for groundwater contaminated with tetrachloroethene (PCE) since it can result in complete reductive dechlorination to non-hazardous ethene, often at a lower cost than other treatment methods. The optimum pH for microbes that chlororespire chlorinated ethenes is in the range of 6.5-7.5. However, the groundwater at many locations is outside this range, and typically on the low side. Addition of a base to increase the pH is problematic due to the difficulty of achieving homogenous distribution and the potential for clogging caused by precipitation. The objectives of this thesis were 1) to develop anaerobic enrichment …

The Last Thing We Have Left: A Single-Case Study Of A Small, Rural, Mill-Town School Closing, Amy Hallenbeck

All Dissertations

This qualitative, single-case study explored the closing of a small, rural, historic, mill-town school in the southeastern United States and why people were upset with the closing of the school. Through the responses of 12 purposefully selected participants, the study focused on attitudes, perceptions, and values of students and parents, school district employees and affiliates, and community constituents as they relate to functions of school and schooling, culture of school and schooling, the school itself, and relationships between school, community, and individual. Findings indicate that participants fought the closing of their community school not because they perceived the nearby receiving …

Elasto-Capillarity In Fibrous Materials, Daria Monaenkova

All Dissertations

Current advances in the manufacture of nanoporous and nanofibrous materials with high absorption capacity open up new opportunities for the development of fiber-based probes and sensors. Pore structures of these materials can be designed to provide high suction pressure and fast wicking. During wicking, due to the strong capillary action, the liquids exert stresses on the fiber network, thus the stressed state of dry and wet parts of the material differs. In this work the effect of stress reduction in fibrous materials due to the presence of wetting liquid in the pore structure is studied in details for both static …

The Influence Of Land Use On Fish Health And Fish Communities In Wadeable Steams In South Carolina, Andrew Sayer

All Dissertations

In 2011 the State of South Carolina population was over 4.6 million people and has increased at a rate of around 15% (1.5% per year) throughout the last decade. While the population density per square mile is relatively low compared to other US states, it seems certain the population will further increase in years to come. Increasing population density leads to urbanization resulting in an increase in impervious surfaces such as roadways, parking lots, and building roofs. This changing land use can have dramatic effects on smaller streams and creeks which form the upper reaches of watersheds. Although water systems …

Environmental Implications And Applications Of Nanomaterials, Priyanka Bhattacharya

All Dissertations

Recent advances in material science and nanotechnology have given rise to a myriad of developments, while in the meantime call for research into the impacts of nanomaterials on the environment and human health. Although considerable progress has been made in the past decade concerning the behavior of nanomaterials in biological systems, such understanding is critically lacking with respect to the fate of nanomaterials in ecosystems.
Accordingly, this dissertation addresses the interactions between nanomaterials and algae--the major constituent of the aquatic food chain (Part I, Chapter two), and exploits the physicochemistry of nanoscaled synthetic dendritic polymers for environmental applications, especially for …

The Changing Face Of The Game And Golf's Built Environment, David Hueber

All Dissertations

ABSTRACT
The history of golf's built environment in the U.S. has reflected the changing face of the game in terms of the number and type of golf courses built, as well as the demographic profile of those playing the game. This study offers insight as to how various socio-cultural and economic forces have impacted the game and golf course development. Since 2000, the golf industry has experienced significant declines in the key barometers of its economic wellbeing as defined by: the decline in the number of golfers and rounds played and the decrease in the number of golf courses.
The …

Synthesis And Characterization Of Magnetic Solids Featuring 3d-4f Heterometallic Oxides Comprised Of Spin Chains And 3d-6p Noncentrosymmetric Oxides Templated By Acentric Salt Units, Jennings West

All Dissertations

The studies and syntheses presented in this dissertation were primarily aimed at exploring new magnetic solids comprised of special framework oxides with novel magnetic properties. Low-dimensional magnetic behavior has been of great interest, especially pertaining to molecular solids having single magnetic domains where slow relaxation and quantum properties of magnetization are evident. In attempts to mimic molecular magnets and achieve reduced dimensionality of, in this case 3d-;4f magnetic sublattices, diamagnetic oxyanions, XO_mn-, and A-site cations (A = alkali and alkaline-earth metals) were used as nonmagnetic spacers in hopes of disrupting or confining magnetic interactions in certain dimensions. The …

Engineering Single-Molecule, Nanoscale, And Microscale Bio-Functional Materials Via Click Chemistry, Michael Daniele

All Dissertations

To expand the design envelope and supplement the materials library available to biomaterials scientists, the copper(I)-catalyzed azide-alkyne cycloaddition (CuCAAC) was explored as a route to design, synthesize and characterize bio-functional small-molecules, nanoparticles, and microfibers. In each engineered system, the use of click chemistry provided facile, bio-orthogonal control for materials synthesis; moreover, the results provided a methodology and more complete, fundamental understanding of the use of click chemistry as a tool for the synergy of biotechnology, polymer and materials science. Fluorophores with well-defined photophysical characteristics (ranging from UV to NIR fluorescence) were used as building blocks for small-molecule, fluorescent biosensors. Fluorophores …

Factors Influencing Nonprofit Leaders' Intention To Build Capacity, Kimberley Brown

All Dissertations

ABSTRACT
Examining attitudes, norms and behavioral control perceptions can aid in predicting the strength of a person's intentions to engage in any kind of major effort, including nonprofit capacity building, according to Aizen's Theory of Planned Behavior (Aizen, 1991, 2002a, 2006). The purpose of this research was to determine whether the attitudes, norms, and perceived behavioral control beliefs of 470 nonprofit leaders' past and future organizational capacity building had significance in explaining their stated intentions to build capacity. It also sought to determine what respondent and organization characteristics, the presence or absence of trust relationships, board governance practices, and organizational …

Sparsity Regularization In Diffuse Optical Tomography, John Cooper

All Dissertations

The purpose of this dissertation is to improve image reconstruction in Diffuse Optical Tomography (DOT), a high contrast imaging modality that uses a near infrared light source. Because the scattering and absorption of a tumor varies significantly from healthy tissue, a reconstructed spatial representation of these parameters serves as tomographic image of a medium. However, the high scatter and absorption of the optical source also causes the inverse problem to be severely ill posed, and currently only low resolution reconstructions are possible, particularly when using an unmodulated direct current (DC) source.
In this work, the well posedness of the forward …

Investigation Of Prototype Roles In Conceptual Design Using Case Study And Protocol Study Methods, Timothy Hess

All Theses

Prototypes play an important role in the engineering design process. Engineering design textbooks often discourage the use of prototypes early in the design process, citing past research on prototypes in engineering design has focused describing and classifying the prototypes themselves. The gap in this research is the investigation of prototyping processes. While researchers have studied the characteristics of different prototypes and in some cases have tried to tie characteristics to the outcomes of the design process, the actual prototyping activities and the process of building and using the prototypes has not been studied in detail. The work presented in this …

Inventing Laughter: Comedic Writing Practices And The Limits Of Pedagogical Power, Daniel Liddle

All Theses

This thesis conducts an examination of the writing methods used by stand-up comedians using the lens of the rhetorical canon of invention. The study applies the theories of Thomas Rickert, Diane Davis, Ann Berthoff, and Janice Lauer in order to define the relationship between humor and epistemology, and to consider how this comedic-epistemic perspective can inform pedagogical practices in the composition classroom. This study relies mainly on the rhetorical analysis of 'How To' books on writing comedy, the methodologies of schools of comedy, as well as biographies by/about comedians in order to discuss the relationship between comedians and their 'material.' …

Effect Of Temperature On Sensing Intensity Of Basic Tastes: Sweet, Salty And Sour, Keri Lipscomb

All Theses

Twenty semi-trained subjects determined the effect of temperature on basic tastes sweet, salty and sour. The sensory evaluations were performed on each basic taste and on various combinations of the three tastes at serving temperatures 3, 23 and 60¡C. A single intensity level was used for all sensory evaluations and 3 replications of each panel were performed. Results from the panels provided some evidence of temperature affect, both when evaluated singularly and in combination.
The perceived intensity of some sweet and sour samples was affected by a change in temperature. Sensing intensity of the salty samples was not significantly affected …

Determining The Proper Point Size For Display Type On Packaging, Joanna Fischer

All Theses

Through the use of a preference test, the proper point size of display text on a package was evaluated in relation to a package's proportions. The test involved the examination of packaging images displaying the product or brand name in various point sizes by 150 participants who were then asked to choose the option they most preferred. The participants were then provided with a post-survey intended to gather additional information regarding potential preference motives.
The primary purpose of this study was to determine the most preferred display type size of a package based on its relationship with the package's proportions. …

Methods For Producing Stereoscopic Imagery, Matias Volonte

All Theses

This paper describes methodologies for creating computer graphics stereoscopic imagery. This thesis details the positive and negative aspects for producing and post-producing stereoscopic imagery using different stereoscopic tools provided by Autodesk Maya and The Foundry Nuke. Also, in order to increase efficiency and decrease production time, Python tools were developed both for Maya and Nuke. Finally, the methodology proposed in this paper is fully functional and can be adopted by any production.

Oral Delivery Of Peptide Drugs For Mitigation Of Crohn's Disease, Paul Blichmann

All Theses

Protein drugs are typically administered intravenously, but this practice has clear disadvantages such as widespread circulation and swift clearance from the body. Orally delivered protein drugs are not yet available but potentially offer improved distribution, retention, and activity by use of protective matrices and cell-specific targeting. Much work has been done on delayed release formulations for the upper intestine, but there has not been overwhelming evidence of protection of peptides from gastric conditions. In many instances the large intestine may be a better release target due to lower proteolytic activity. Afflictions of the colon such as Inflammatory Bowel Disease and …

Tribiology Of Engineered Surfaces In Aggressive Environments, Nathan Phillip Mitchell

All Theses

To improve the performance of sliding systems, surface modifications and coatings are often applied to opposing surfaces. This thesis focuses on characterizing two tribo-systems (DLC-DLC and steel micropatterns-flat) under their predicted application environments. The first section is focused on friction testing of micropatterned surfaces for orthopaedic device design, the second section elucidates how the sliding of diamond-like-carbon (DLC) coatings changes with temperature and humidity. The experimental design and major results of these sections are as follows.

(1) The use of micropatterning to create uniform surface morphologies has been cited as yielding improvements in the coefficient of friction during high velocity …

Clemson Trustees Minutes, 2012 July 19, Clemson University Board Of Trustees

Minutes

Minutes: Meeting of the Clemson University Board of Trustees. Executive Board Room, Madren Center, Clemson, SC. 9:00 a.m.

Clemson Trustees Minutes, 2012 June 13, Clemson University Board Of Trustees

Minutes

Minutes: Teleconference of the Clemson University Board of Trustees. Executive Board Room, Madren Center, Clemson, SC. 10:00 a.m.

Purification And Characterization Of Aspergillus Niger Α-L-Rhamnosidase For The Biotransformation Of Naringin To Prunin, Hui Ni, An Feng Xiao, Hui Nong Cai, Feng Chen, Qi You, Yun Zheng Lu

Publications

This study was conducted to increase the bioactivity of litchi pericarp polysaccharides (LPPs) biotransformed by Aspergillus awamori. Comparedtothenon-A. awamori-fermented LPP, the growth effects of A. awamori-fermented LPP on Lactobacillus bulgaricus and Streptococcus thermophilus were four and two times higher after 3 days of fermentation, respectively. Increased 1,1-diphenyl-2-picrylhydrazyl radical scavenging activity and DNA protection activity of litchi pericarp polysaccharides were also achieved after A. awamori fermentation. Moreover, the relative content of glucose and arabinose in LPP after fermentation decreased from 58.82% to 22.60% and from 18.82% to 10.09%, respectively, with a concomitant increase in the relative contents of galactose, rhamnose, xylose, …

The Economic Situation, 2012 June, Bruce Yandle

Publications

Quarterly report on the economic situation of the United States and South Carolina.