Digital Commons Network^™

Risk, Responsibility, And Ethics In Professional And Technical Communication, Charley Grant Silvio

LSU Doctoral Dissertations

In this project, I present a novel and alternative approach for considering ethics in professional and technical communication, namely the ethics of responsibility theorized primarily by phenomenologist Emmanuel Levinas. To apply this new approach, I investigate a contemporary example in the rhetoric of investment bank Goldman Sachs before and during the 2008 U.S. Financial Crisis. In the early chapters, I review conventional ethical approaches—traditional and postmodern—in technical and professional communication (TPC) and consider their application to the Goldman Sachs example. This analysis reveals that these approaches, while useful in understanding the report’s general ethical framework, don’t fully describe the ethical …

Fractal Diffusion In High Temperature Polymer Electrolyte Fuel Cell Membranes, Bernhard Hopfenmüller, Reiner Zorn, Olaf Holderer, Oxana Ivanova, Werner Lehnert, Wiebke Lüke, Georg Ehlers, Niina Jalarvo, Gerald J. Schneider, Michael Monkenbusch, Dieter Richter

Faculty Publications

© 2018 Author(s). The performance of fuel cells depends largely on the proton diffusion in the proton conducting membrane, the core of a fuel cell. High temperature polymer electrolyte fuel cells are based on a polymer membrane swollen with phosphoric acid as the electrolyte, where proton conduction takes place. We studied the proton diffusion in such membranes with neutron scattering techniques which are especially sensitive to the proton contribution. Time of flight spectroscopy and backscattering spectroscopy have been combined to cover a broad dynamic range. In order to selectively observe the diffusion of protons potentially contributing to the ion conductivity, …

Micropaleontological Record Of A Preserved, Late Pleistocene Bald Cypress Forest On The Northern Gulf Of Mexico Inner Shelf, Jonathan Thien Truong

LSU Master's Theses

A cluster of previously buried Taxodium distichum stumps are exposed and preserved in growth position at the bottom of a trough on the inner Gulf of Mexico (GOM) continental shelf in 18 m water depth and 13 km offshore Orange Beach, AL. Radiocarbon ages from wood and optically stimulated luminescence (OSL) dating of sediments suggest a Marine Isotope Stage (MIS) 3 age, or older. This study builds on the previous work of Gonzalez (2018) and Obeclz (2017). Five biofacies were identified in vibracore collected in 2015 and 2016: 1) the Holocene Mississippi-Alabama-Florida (MAFLA) sand sheet, 2) a Holocene interbedded sand …

The Interval Dissonance Rate In Chopin’S Études Op. 10, Nos. 1-4: Dissecting Arpeggiation, Chromaticism, And Linear Progressions, Nikita Mamedov

LSU Doctoral Dissertations

Chopin’s twenty-seven piano études display the composer’s poetic musical language, uniting keyboard techniques, virtuosity, and artistic imagery, while preserving Romantic lyricism and songfulness. Each of these studies is unique in its set of pianistic challenges, compositional processes, and difficulty level. Schenkerian analysis provides an interpretation of relationships between the notes that constitute the harmony and the melody. This type of analysis allows one to understand the theoretical aspects that are necessary to play Chopin’s études. The Schenkerian theories can be used to amalgamate pianism and performance with harmony and analysis. Furthermore, the Schenkerian understanding of these études provides an analytical …

Mixed Categories Of Sheaves On Toric Varieties, Sean Michael Taylor

LSU Doctoral Dissertations

In [BGS96], Beilinson, Ginzburg, and Soergel introduced the notion of mixed categories. This idea often underlies many interesting "Koszul dualities." In this paper, we produce a mixed derived category of constructible complexes (in the sense of [BGS96]) for any toric variety associated to a fan. Furthermore, we show that it comes equipped with a t-structure whose heart is a mixed version of the category of perverse sheaves. In chapters 2 and 3, we provide the necessary background. Chapter 2 concerns the categorical preliminaries, while chapter 3 gives the background geometry. This concerns both some basics of toric varieties as well …

A Preliminary Examination Of The Time And Organization Preparation System-College (Tops-C) With Undergraduate Students, Ashley Elizabeth Bordelon

LSU Doctoral Dissertations

Many factors contribute to the educational success of undergraduate students, including personal beliefs, effort, and the ability to self-manage. Many students are not prepared for the rigors of post-secondary education. This need is particularly striking given the limited availability of manualized evidenced based interventions available to support college students with academic task demand management. This study sought to determine the efficacy of the Time and Organization Preparation System-College (TOPS-C), a program aimed to increase study skills, organization, self-regulated learning, and time management through direct instruction, group contingency, and performance feedback. To determine changes in skill level, students completed the Learning …

Reconstruction Of Antarctic Cenozoic Paleoenvironments Through Palynological Analysis Of Subglacial Lake And Ice Stream Sediments, Patrick Baudoin

LSU Master's Theses

The West Antarctic Ice Sheet (WAIS), with a large portion being grounded below sea level, is historically known for its instability. Timing and evaluating the magnitude of WAIS advance and retreat is essential to improve our understanding of control mechanisms. The scarcity of accessible subglacial geology in areas such as the Siple Coast in West Antarctica limits our understanding and ability to gauge WAIS response to environmental changes. To evaluate the ice-sheet history around the Siple Coast, i.e., when it was last covered by vegetation, access to sediment immediately below the ice-sheet is essential. In the absence of large-scale drilling, …

Search For Tensor, Vector, And Scalar Polarizations In The Stochastic Gravitational-Wave Background, B. P. Abbott, R. Abbott, T. D. Abbott, F. Acernese, K. Ackley, C. Adams, T. Adams, P. Addesso, R. X. Adhikari, V. B. Adya, C. Affeldt, M. Afrough, B. Agarwal, M. Agathos, K. Agatsuma, N. Aggarwal, O. D. Aguiar, L. Aiello, A. Ain, P. Ajith, B. Allen, G. Allen, A. Allocca, P. A. Altin, A. Amato, A. Ananyeva, S. B. Anderson, W. G. Anderson, S. V. Angelova, S. Antier, S. Appert, K. Arai, M. C. Araya

Faculty Publications

The detection of gravitational waves with Advanced LIGO and Advanced Virgo has enabled novel tests of general relativity, including direct study of the polarization of gravitational waves. While general relativity allows for only two tensor gravitational-wave polarizations, general metric theories can additionally predict two vector and two scalar polarizations. The polarization of gravitational waves is encoded in the spectral shape of the stochastic gravitational-wave background, formed by the superposition of cosmological and individually unresolved astrophysical sources. Using data recorded by Advanced LIGO during its first observing run, we search for a stochastic background of generically polarized gravitational waves. We find …

Hypothesis Testing And Model Estimation With Dependent Observations In Heterogeneous Sensor Networks, Sima Sobhiyeh

LSU Doctoral Dissertations

Advances in microelectronics, communication and signal processing have enabled the development of inexpensive sensors that can be networked to collect vital information from their environment to be used in decision-making and inference. The sensors transmit their data to a central processor which integrates the information from the sensors using a so-called fusion algorithm. Many applications of sensor networks (SNs) involve hypothesis testing or the detection of a phenomenon. Many approaches to data fusion for hypothesis testing assume that, given each hypothesis, the sensors' measurements are conditionally independent. However, since the sensors are densely deployed in practice, their field of views …

Constraints On Cosmic Strings Using Data From The First Advanced Ligo Observing Run, B. P. Abbott, R. Abbott, T. D. Abbott, F. Acernese, K. Ackley, C. Adams, T. Adams, P. Addesso, R. X. Adhikari, V. B. Adya, C. Affeldt, M. Afrough, B. Agarwal, M. Agathos, K. Agatsuma, N. Aggarwal, O. D. Aguiar, L. Aiello, A. Ain, P. Ajith, B. Allen, G. Allen, A. Allocca, P. A. Altin, A. Amato, A. Ananyeva, S. B. Anderson, W. G. Anderson, S. Antier, S. Appert, K. Arai, M. C. Araya, J. S. Areeda

Faculty Publications

Cosmic strings are topological defects which can be formed in grand unified theory scale phase transitions in the early universe. They are also predicted to form in the context of string theory. The main mechanism for a network of Nambu-Goto cosmic strings to lose energy is through the production of loops and the subsequent emission of gravitational waves, thus offering an experimental signature for the existence of cosmic strings. Here we report on the analysis conducted to specifically search for gravitational-wave bursts from cosmic string loops in the data of Advanced LIGO 2015-2016 observing run (O1). No evidence of such …

Full Band All-Sky Search For Periodic Gravitational Waves In The O1 Ligo Data, B. P. Abbott, R. Abbott, T. D. Abbott, F. Acernese, K. Ackley, C. Adams, T. Adams, P. Addesso, R. X. Adhikari, V. B. Adya, C. Affeldt, M. Afrough, B. Agarwal, M. Agathos, K. Agatsuma, N. Aggarwal, O. D. Aguiar, L. Aiello, A. Ain, B. Allen, G. Allen, A. Allocca, P. A. Altin, A. Amato, A. Ananyeva, S. B. Anderson, W. G. Anderson, S. V. Angelova, S. Antier, S. Appert, K. Arai, M. C. Araya, J. S. Areeda

Faculty Publications

We report on a new all-sky search for periodic gravitational waves in the frequency band 475-2000 Hz and with a frequency time derivative in the range of [-1.0,+0.1]×10-8 Hz/s. Potential signals could be produced by a nearby spinning and slightly nonaxisymmetric isolated neutron star in our Galaxy. This search uses the data from Advanced LIGO's first observational run O1. No gravitational-wave signals were observed, and upper limits were placed on their strengths. For completeness, results from the separately published low-frequency search 20-475 Hz are included as well. Our lowest upper limit on worst-case (linearly polarized) strain amplitude h0 is ∼4×10-25 …

Investigating Trace Metal Sequestration Of Reducing Environments In Modern And Ancient Settings, Adam Charles Turner

LSU Doctoral Dissertations

The incorporation of trace metals into a variety of reducing sediments are important proxies for the oxic state of the water mass in which the sediments form. While much work has been done interpreting these proxies, questions remain on the exact processes and products in which trace metal proxies form. This work employs bulk geochemical techniques to investigate circulation in the Late Pennsylvanian North American Midcontinent Sea (NAMS), and then uses sequential extractions to further understand the chemical phases in which trace metals are incorporated. Sequential extractions are then used to further investigate how trace metals are sequestered in modern …

Endorectal Digital Prostate Tomosynthesis, Joseph Robert Steiner

LSU Doctoral Dissertations

Several areas of prostate cancer (PCa) management, such as imaging permanent brachytherapy implants or small, aggressive lesions, benefit from high image resolution. Current PCa imaging methods can have inadequate resolution for imaging these areas. Endorectal digital prostate tomosynthesis (endoDPT), an imaging method that combines an external x-ray source and an endorectal x-ray sensor, can produce three-dimensional images of the prostate region that have high image resolution compared to typical methods. This high resolution may improve PCa management and increase positive outcomes in affected men.

This dissertation presents the initial development of endoDPT, including system design, image quality assessment, and examples …

What Motivates Children To Respond? Functional Analysis And Intervention Of Math Computation Fluency, Catherine Rose Lark

LSU Doctoral Dissertations

An abundance of research exists supporting the use of functional analyses to assess and treat problem behavior. In contrast, little research has been conducted on the application of functional analysis (FA) procedures to academic behaviors. The current study attempted to fill this research gap by conducting an FA of academic responding for five elementary students with low math fluency. Sessions were conducted using both a traditional reinforcement schedule of a fixed ratio of one (FR-1) as well as a more practical reinforcement schedule of a fixed ratio of ten (FR-10) to examine the effects of the reinforcement schedule on the …

Challenging Local Realism With Human Choices, C. Abellán, A. Acín, A. Alarcón, O. Alibart, C. K. Andersen, F. Andreoli, A. Beckert, F. A. Beduini, A. Bendersky, M. Bentivegna, P. Bierhorst, D. Burchardt, A. Cabello, J. Cariñe, S. Carrasco, G. Carvacho, D. Cavalcanti, R. Chaves, J. Cortés-Vega, A. Cuevas, A. Delgado, H. De Riedmatten, C. Eichler, P. Farrera, J. Fuenzalida, M. García-Matos, R. Garthoff, S. Gasparinetti, T. Gerrits, F. Ghafari Jouneghani, S. Glancy, E. S. Gómez, P. González

Faculty Publications

A Bell test is a randomized trial that compares experimental observations against the philosophical worldview of local realism 1, in which the properties of the physical world are independent of our observation of them and no signal travels faster than light. A Bell test requires spatially distributed entanglement, fast and high-efficiency detection and unpredictable measurement settings 2,3 . Although technology can satisfy the first two of these requirements 4-7, the use of physical devices to choose settings in a Bell test involves making assumptions about the physics that one aims to test. Bell himself noted this weakness in using physical …

Uswhy Does Not The Leaf Weight-Area Allometry Of Bamboos Follow The 3/2-Power Law?, Shuyan Lin, Lijuan Shao, Cang Hui, Yu Song, Gadi V.P. Reddy, Johan Gielis, Fang Li, Yulong Ding, Qiang Wei, Peijian Shi

Faculty Publications

The principle of similarity (Thompson, 1917) states that the weight of an organismfollows the 3/2-power law of its surface area and is proportional to its volume on the condition that the density is constant. However, the allometric relationship between leaf weight and leaf area has been reported to greatly deviate from the 3/2-power law, with the irregularity of leaf density largely ignored for explaining this deviation. Here, we choose 11 bamboo species to explore the allometric relationships among leaf area (A), density (ρ), length (L), thickness (T), and weight (W). Because the edge of a bamboo leaf follows a simplified …

Absence Of Point Spectrum For The Self-Dual Extended Harper's Model, Rui Han

Faculty Publications

We give a simple proof of absence of point spectrum for the self-dual extended Harper's model. We get a sharp result which improves that of [1] in the isotropic self-dual regime.

Event-Based Climatology Of Tropical Cyclone Rainfall In Houston, Texas And Miami, Florida, Jill C. Trepanier, Clay S. Tucker

Faculty Publications

Tropical cyclone (TC) rainfall amounts are compared from 1950-2017 for Houston, Texas and Miami, Florida to estimate the risk of TC rain in both cities. Following the wake of Hurricanes Harvey and Irma in 2017, concern has risen over the future of raininess in these locations. Per-event rainfall amounts are aggregated using tracks taken from HURDAT, time-of-rain gathered from National Weather Service daily weather maps, and rainfall totals taken from airport monitoring stations. Risk analysis tools include descriptive statistics, time series, and return frequencies for Houston and Miami, and spatially interpolated surfaces for Hurricanes Harvey and Irma. The season duration …

A Virtual Screen For Protein Targets: Elucidating Druggability In The Human Proteome With Efindsite, Omar Kana

Honors Capstones

No abstract provided.

Single And Multiparameter Estimation Using Multimode Interferometry And Single Photons, Margarite L. Laborde

Honors Capstones

No abstract provided.

Changes In Physicochemical Properties And Starch Crystallinity Of Sponge Cake Containing Hpmc And Extra Virgin Coconut Oil During Room Temperature Storage, Naratip Poonnakasem, Kalaya Laohasongkram, Saiwarun Chaiwanichsiri, Witoon Prinyawiwatkul

Faculty Publications

Starch retrogradation is an important factor affecting cake firmness. Effects of hydroxy-propyl-methylcellulose (HPMC) at 0.5% (w/w) or extra virgin coconut oil (EVCO) at 20% (w/w), either alone or together, on physicochemical properties and starch crystallinity of sponge cake during storage was investigated. Addition of EVCO increased specific volume and expansion ratio, while addition of HPMC increased water activity of the freshly baked sponge cake. Changes in firmness, moisture, and spin-lattice relaxation time from nuclear magnetic resonance (T1) of sponge cakes followed a first-order kinetic reaction. Use of HPMC and/or EVCO in sponge cake could retard the firmness rate in the …

Stratigraphic Reconstruction Of A Late Pleistocene Bald Cypress Forest Discovered On The Northern Gulf Of Mexico Continental Shelf, Suyapa Michell Gonzalez Rodriguez

LSU Master's Theses

A previously buried bald cypress forest (Taxodium distichum) was discovered on the continental shelf, offshore of Orange Beach, Alabama, USA, in ~20 m water depth. The forest was exhumed by Hurricane Ivan in 2004, and is now exposed as stumps in life position in a trough located in the northern Gulf of Mexico continental shelf seafloor. We are investigating the local stratigraphy, paleo-landscape, and mode of forest preservation of this unique site. In August 2015 and July 2016, submersible vibracores (18 in total) were collected. Core analysis included: bulk density and imaging via Geotek multi sensor core logger, …

Investigating Uranium Incorporation In Modern Carbonates By Sequential Extraction: Applied To The Permian - Triassic Boundary In Lung Cam, Vietnam, Christopher Michael Wray

LSU Master's Theses

The Uranium (U) isotopic system can be used to model the extent of global-scale ocean anoxia by utilizing the 238U/235U ratios as a paleo-redox indicator (δ238U). While recent studies have shown promise with the use of this novel proxy, variability is seen in modern carbonate sediment samples suggesting that more work is needed in order to understand elemental U uptake during early marine diagenesis. This thesis utilizes a sequential extraction methodology in order to understand the distribution of authigenic U within carbonate sediments.

This thesis consists of four parts, (1) an evaluation and modification of a sequential extraction methodology for …

Assessment Of Mercury Content In Louisiana's Freshwater Fish And Its Association To Se Concentrations, Alexander David Reyes-Avila

LSU Master's Theses

Ample evidence has demonstrated the neurotoxic properties of organic Hg to humans. However, recent studies have proposed the protective effects of Se against organic Hg detected in marine fish. Louisiana’s freshwater bodies are exploited by recreational anglers that enjoy fishing as recreational activity and food source. Thus, testing of Hg in Louisiana was resumed in 2017 to update the state advisories. However, before drawing conclusions based solely on organic Hg, it might be useful to see how much Se is present in freshwater fish. The main objective of this study was to determine the Se:Hg molar ratio in Louisiana’s freshwater …

How #Blackgirlmagic Cultivates Supreme Love To Heal And Save Souls That Can Heal And Save The World: An Introduction To Endarkened Feminist Epistemlogical And Ontological Evolutions Of Self Through A Critique Of Beyoncé’S Lemonade, Jeanine Staples

Taboo: The Journal of Culture and Education

No abstract provided.

Distributed Iterative Graph Processing Using Nosql With Data Locality, Ayam Pokhrel

LSU Master's Theses

A tremendous amount of data is generated every day from a wide range of sources such as social networks, sensors, and application logs. Among them, graph data is one type that represents valuable relationships between various entities. Analytics of large graphs has become an essential part of business processes and scientific studies because it leads to deep and meaningful insights into the related domain based on the connections between various entities. However, the optimal processing of large-scale iterative graph computations is very challenging due to the issues like fault tolerance, high memory requirement, parallelization, and scalability. Most of the contemporary …

Towards Cosmological Dynamics From Loop Quantum Gravity, Bao Fei Li, Parampreet Singh, Anzhong Wang

Faculty Publications

We present a systematic study of the cosmological dynamics resulting from an effective Hamiltonian, recently derived in loop quantum gravity using Thiemann's regularization and earlier obtained in loop quantum cosmology (LQC) by keeping the Lorentzian term explicit in the Hamiltonian constraint. We show that quantum geometric effects result in higher than quadratic corrections in energy density in comparison to LQC, causing a nonsingular bounce. Dynamics can be described by the Hamilton or Friedmann-Raychaudhuri equations, but the map between the two descriptions is not one to one. A careful analysis resolves the tension on symmetric versus asymmetric bounce in this model, …

Corrigendum To: “Nonlinear Muckenhoupt–Wheeden Type Bounds On Reifenberg Flat Domains, With Applications To Quasilinear Riccati Type Equations” [Adv. Math. 250 (2014) 387–419] (S0001870813003630) (10.1016/J.Aim.2013.09.022)), Cong Phuc Nguyen

Faculty Publications

N.C. Phuc, Nonlinear Muckenhoupt–Wheeden type bounds on Reifenberg flat domains, with applications to quasilinear Riccati type equations, Adv. Math. 250 (2014), 387–419. The proof of Theorem 1.6 in the above paper contains a gap. In general, the continuity of the map S stated in Lemma 5.8 may fail. This error was inherited from our earlier work [28, Theorem 3.4], which has now been corrected in the erratum [2]. The purpose of this note is to fix this gap following the main idea of [2]. We shall use the same notation as in the paper. Given a nonnegative locally finite measure …

Geometric Design, John Marceaux

Honors Capstones

No abstract provided.

Signature Of Charge Migration In Modulations Of Double Ionization, François Mauger, Paul M. Abanador, Adam Bruner, Adonay Sissay, Mette B. Gaarde, Kenneth Lopata, Kenneth J. Schafer

Faculty Publications

We present a theoretical investigation of charge migration following strong-field ionization in a multielectron system. We study a model homonuclear molecule with two electrons, each restricted to one dimension (1+1D), interacting with a strong, static electric field. We show that in this system charge migration results from the interplay between multiple ionization channels that overlap in space, creating a coherent electron-hole wave packet in the cation. We also find that, in our case, charge migration following the first ionization manifests as a modulation of the subsequent double-ionization signal. We derive a parametrized semiclassical model from the full multielectron system and …