Blue Oval Sk Battery Park Environmental Impact And Community Guide, Warren Rummage

Theses and Dissertations--Public Health (M.P.H. & Dr.P.H.)

This Capstone Project Paper will discuss the potential effects of the BlueOval SK Battery Park being constructed in Glendale, Kentucky based on knowledge attained from open records requests and available publicly online. Based on the process of attaining said information, a Community Guide has been generated and is available to distribute to concerned community members. It is the hope that this work will enable those in Hardin County, and possibly beyond, to ensure their environment and community health are prioritized during the construction phase and eventual operation of the EV-battery manufacturing faciliities on this massive 1,500 acre plot of land.

Pfas Clinical Guidance, John Bingham

Theses and Dissertations--Public Health (M.P.H. & Dr.P.H.)

Introduction

A broad category of synthetic organic compounds, per- and polyfluorinated alkyl substances (PFAS), forms the impetus for this project. Known compounds in this category are numerous and diverse, with over 4700 identified molecular entities (Panieri, Baralic, Djukic-Cosic, Buha Djordjevic, & Saso, 2022). Their only commonality is the presence of at least one carbon atom that is saturated with fluoride groups. These chemical bonds are exceptionally difficult to break (Tansel, 2022), which incepts both the utility of PFAS compounds and the concerns they raise for human health (Cousins et al., 2020). While PFAS are …

The Relationship Between Maternal Depressive Symptoms And Unsafe Infant Sleep Practices In A Low-Resource Community, Rebecca D. Day, Ketrell L. Mcwhorter, Hartley C. Feld, Steven R. Bronwing

Theses and Dissertations--Public Health (M.P.H. & Dr.P.H.)

Objectives: To determine the relationship between maternal depressive symptoms and unsafe infant sleep intention and practices during and after pregnancy.

Methods: This study recruited 100 women from a small clinic in a low-resource community of Santo Domingo, Ecuador from 2018 to 2020. Information on intention to practice safe sleep was collected during the third trimester of pregnancy and safe sleep practices were assessed at 1 month and 6 months postpartum via survey. Depressive symptoms were measured using the Patient Health Questionnaire 2 (PHQ-2). Using log-binomial regression, we estimated prevalence ratios (PR) and 95% confidence intervals (CI) cross-sectionally at …

Effects Of Video Modeling With Voice-Over Narration Versus No Voice-Over Narration, Kennedy Carpenter

Theses and Dissertations--Early Childhood, Special Education, and Counselor Education

In the current study, the effects of video modeling with voice-over narration (VMW) was compared to the effects of video modeling with no voice-over narration (VMN) when learning the acquisition of a vocational skill. Four high-school students within a public school who spent most of their school day in a special education classroom participated in the study. An adapted alternating treatments design was used to compare the VMW and VMN conditions and then a best alone condition was conducted for each participant that used the video modeling procedure that demonstrated superiority during the comparison. A modification of the inclusion of …

Gambling On Growth: An Analysis Of The Early Impact Of Historical Horse Racing On Kentucky’S Thoroughbred Industry, Barrett W. Kerr

Theses and Dissertations--Agricultural Economics

With a continuous decline in on-track wagering on Thoroughbred racing, racetrack operators are exploring alternative revenue sources to fund purses and create better quality racing. Historical Horse Racing (HHR), which represents one of the most recent advancements in parimutuel wagering, has become a popular system used by many states to offset the live wagering decline. Proponents of HHR suggest that this alternative wagering option will benefit the live racing industry. Using data from Kentucky racetracks from 2002 – 2021, this study examines the relationship between HHR wagering and key industry metrics, such as purses, on-track wagering, sales prices, and foal …

Personality Traits Of Dairy Calves And Their Relationship With Feeding Behavior, Activity, And Performance, Emily A. Michalski

Theses and Dissertations--Animal and Food Sciences

Detection of individual differences in personality traits of animals may prove beneficial for producers to help tailor management for individuals and to make selection decisions. Therefore, the objectives of this thesis were to

1) review and evaluate literature on relationships between individual cattle personality traits and feeding behavior, activity, and performance; and

2) evaluate and develop tests suitable for characterizing crossbred dairy-beef calves’ personalities and associations with behavioral patterns and performance.

The existing literature indicates that growth, intake, activity, and milk production measures from precision technologies have associations with cattle personality traits and behaviors identifiable through standardized tests. This indicates …

The Effects Of Exogenous Enzyme Supplementation On The Performance, Bone Quality, And Nutrient Utilization Of Broiler Chickens, Megan Bauer

Theses and Dissertations--Animal and Food Sciences

Two experiments were conducted to examine the effects of Allzyme® Spectrum supplementation to a reduced nutrient diet on the growth performance, energy and nutrient digestibility and utilization, bone quality, and jejunal digesta viscosity in broiler chickens. Each experiment used 300 one-day old Cobb by-product breeder chicks with 5 treatments, 10 replicates, and 6 birds per replicate cage in a randomized complete block design. The only differences between the two experiments were experiment 1 lasted for 21 days using a corn-soybean meal-based diet and experiment 2 lasted for 22 days using a wheat-soybean meal-based diet. The 5 treatments included a positive …

Trademarks, Nfts, And The Law Of The Metaverse, Michael D. Murray

Law Faculty Scholarly Articles

This Article discusses the early encounters of NFTs, trademarks, and the legal system. This work will examine the areas where NFT creators are getting into or are likely to get into trouble with the law and policy of trademark infringement, trademark dilution, and the related legal causes of action of false endorsement and false designation of origin. United States law is being applied in lawsuits that already are being adjudicated in the real world concerning subject matter that exists only in cyberspace, the pre-cursor to the metaverse.

Nft Ownership And Copyrights, Michael D. Murray

Law Faculty Scholarly Articles

Non-fungible tokens (NFTs) have made enormous waves in the art, music, entertainment, and collectibles world, but the backwash of this blockchain technology has inundated and overwhelmed many peoples’ understanding of intellectual property (IP) law in general and copyright law in particular when it comes to NFTs and blockchains. Artists and creatives who mint NFTs often have very different understandings and expectations from collectors and investors who purchase and use them when it comes to the copyrights associated with the content linked to an NFT. Art law attorneys may not have gone fully down the rabbit hole that is the current …

Therapeutic Neutralizing Monoclonal Antibody Administration Protects Against Lethal Yellow Fever Virus Infection, Michael J. Ricciardi, Lauren N. Rust, Nuria Pedreño-Lopez, Sofiya Yusova, Sreya Biswas, Gabriela M. Webb, Lucas Gonzalez-Nieto, Thomas B. Voigt, Johan J. Louw, Fernanda D. Laurino, John R. Dibello, Hans-Peter Raué, Aaron M. Barber-Axthelm, Kimberly Chun, Samantha Uttke, Lidiane M. S. Raphael, Aaron Yrizarry-Medina, Brandon C. Rosen, Rebecca Agnor, Lina Gao, Caralyn Labriola, Michael Axthelm, Jeremy Smedley, Justin G. Julander, Myrna C. Bonaldo, Laura M. Walker, Ilhem Messaoudi, Mark K. Slifka, Dennis R. Burton, Esper G. Kallas, Jonah B. Sacha, David I. Watkins, Benjamin J. Burwitz

Microbiology, Immunology, and Molecular Genetics Faculty Publications

Yellow fever virus (YFV) is a reemerging global health threat, driven by several factors, including increased spread of the mosquito vector and rapid urbanization. Although a prophylactic vaccine exists, vaccine hesitancy, supply deficits, and distribution difficulties leave specific populations at risk of severe YFV disease, as evidenced by recent outbreaks in South America. To establish a treatment for patients with severe YFV infection, we tested 37 YFV-specific monoclonal antibodies isolated from vaccinated humans and identified two capable of potently neutralizing multiple pathogenic primary YFV isolates. Using both hamster and nonhuman primate models of lethal YFV infection, we demonstrate that a …

3-Dimensional Muscle Constructs: Using Hydrogels In Order To Model The Effects Of Exercise In Disease Conditions, Mark Mchargue

Theses and Dissertations--Biomedical Engineering

Currently, there is no standard in vitro model for studying the effects of mechanical stimulation on muscle in type II diabetes. Existing models primarily utilize electrical stimulation, which does not fully recapitulate the effects of exercise. In this thesis, we create a standardized in vitro model of murine muscle that can recapitulate the benefits seen in exercise when mechanically stimulated. Moreover, we show that a type II diabetes environment has similar effects on the muscle in vitro as well as in vivo.

Multiscale And Multimodality Optical Imaging Of Brain Hemodynamics And Function, Mehrana Mohtasebi

Theses and Dissertations--Biomedical Engineering

Frequent measurement of cerebral hemodynamics is crucial for continuous assessment of brain function and health. Low-frequency oscillations (LFOs; < 0.1 Hz) have shown promise as an indicator of altered neurologic activity in the abnormal brain. Moreover, quantification of temporal correlations in LFOs across distinct brain regions enables mapping of regional neurovascular disorders. Portable diffuse optical techniques such as near-infrared spectroscopy (NIRS) and diffuse correlation spectroscopy (DCS) enable noninvasive and continuous measurements of cerebral oxygenation and cerebral blood flow (CBF), respectively. However, most NIRS/DCS systems use limited numbers of discrete light sources and detectors and thus lack combinations of high temporal/spatial resolution and large field-of-view (FOV) for brain imaging. Recent development of an innovative noncontact speckle contrast diffuse correlation tomography (scDCT) in our lab provides a low-cost and portable tool for high-density imaging of CBF distributions over large FOVs. The scDCT uses a galvo-mirror to remotely deliver coherent point near-infrared light to multiple source positions and a CMOS camera as a high-density 2-D detector array to quantify spatial fluctuations of diffuse laser speckles, resulting from movement of red blood cells. Boundary CBF data were input to a unique finite-element-method (FEM)-based reconstruction algorithm for 3-D imaging of CBF distributions. However, scDCT was hindered for extracting LFOs due to its low sampling rate. In this study, scDCT was optimized to achieve high sampling rates and fast image reconstructions by use of moving window algorithms with parallel computations (Project 1). Power spectral density (PSD) analysis was performed to investigate altered LFOs during transient cerebral ischemia in neonatal piglets. Transient cerebral ischemia caused reductions in both CBF and PSD, supporting inclusion of scDCT in the growing field of LFO analysis. One remaining limitation was the long computational time required for 3-D reconstruction, which prohibited real-time applications. To overcome this limitation, a depth-sensitive diffuse speckle contrast topography (DSCT) method was developed for analyzing scDCT data to achieve fast and high-density 2-D mapping of CBF distribution without the need of complex and time-consuming 3-D reconstructions (Project 2). New head-simulating phantoms with known optical/geometric properties were designed and fabricated to evaluate the spatial resolution and depth sensitivity of DSCT method. In-vivo experiments verified the capability of DSCT in tracking dynamic changes in CBF at different depths during CO₂ inhalation and transient cerebral ischemia in rats. In addition to preclinical studies, a low-cost, wearable, fluorescence eye loupe (FLoupe) device was invented for intraoperative visualization of brain tumor margin in the clinic (Project 3). Consistent results were observed against an expensive, large, standard fluorescence operative microscope for the guidance of tumor resection. Overall, through 3 projects this dissertation demonstrated a variety of noninvasive noncontact optical technologies (scDCT, DSCT, and FLoupe) that enabled multiscale (rodents, piglets, and humans) and …

A Wearable Fiber-Free Optical Sensor For Continuous Measurements Of Cerebral Blood Flow And Oxygenation, Xuhui Liu

Theses and Dissertations--Biomedical Engineering

Wearable technologies for continuous monitoring of cerebral hemodynamics in freely behaving subjects not only advance our understanding of cognitive processing and adaptive behavior, but also provide vital information for diagnosis and therapeutic assessment of cerebral diseases associated with hypoxia/ischemia. Wearable near-infrared diffuse optical techniques have been used at the bedside to probe deep cerebral hemodynamics, including near-infrared spectroscopy (NIRS) for cerebral oxygenation measurement and diffuse correlation spectroscopy (DCS) for cerebral blood flow (CBF) measurement, respectively. However, most systems are relatively large and expensive, and use rigid fiber-optic probes that significantly constrain subject’s movement. A novel, wearable, fiber-free diffuse speckle contrast …

Quantitative Microbial Risk Assessment (Qmra) For Urban Stormwater Reuse After Treatment Through A Bioretention System, Isaac Oluk

Theses and Dissertations--Civil Engineering

Bioretention, also referred to as a stormwater biofilter, is an extensively used low-impact development technology for both stormwater management and water quality gains. However, little attention has been paid to the acceptability and uncertainty of human health risks associated with the treatment performance of bioretention filter media, and non-potable water reuse scenarios to guide decision-making and system design. This study uses bioretention mechanistic modeling paired with quantitative microbial risk assessment (QMRA) under uncertainty to evaluate human health risks from two reference pathogens – Campylobacter jejuni and Cryptosporidium. Consumption of irrigated green salad, consumption of raw green salad washed with effluent, …

Prediction Of Chlorine And Disinfection Byproduct Concentration In Water Distribution Systems Using Kypipe And Tthm Regression Models: Application To Two Systems In Kentucky, Yogesh Gautam

Theses and Dissertations--Civil Engineering

The main objective of this research is to study if the hydraulic and water quality models can be used for water quality analysis of chlorine decay and TTHM formation at various locations across a water distribution system. This is particularly important because it is not always easy or economical to take multiple field samples and analyze them in the laboratory. In this study, models of two different water distribution systems (one more urban and efficiently managed system located in a relative flat topography, and other more rural and less efficiently managed system located in a mountainous topography) were developed in …

Together Now, Alfonso Zapata

Theses and Dissertations--English

Together Now is a collection of poems by Alfonso Zapata, with work written between 2021 and 2023 at the University of Kentucky. This thesis contains poems which examine the close relationship between families, art, and the histories each contain. These poems use these subjects in order to illustrate the emotional and physical impact communities have upon those who live in them; art can evolve a person, shape them in beautiful ways, and give us the ability to process tragedy together; on the other end of the spectrum, societal neglect, environmental crisis, and food insecurity can rip these communities apart potentially …

Kill On The Left Foot, Daniel Collins

Theses and Dissertations--English

This collection of essays and short stories represents experiences during and related to my military service as a Tactical Air Control Partyman in the United States Air Force. Recurrent themes in this collection involve patriotism, fatherhood, masculinity, trauma, and recovery. The work itself represents the study and practice of the elements of fiction and foundational concepts related to creative nonfiction.

Emerging Hues: Essays From The Teneral Stage, Lucy Jayes

Theses and Dissertations--English

This collection of essays features work created and revised over two years in the Masters of Fine Arts in Creative Writing Program. They reflect a period of intense evolution in the author’s life and delve into topics of modern-day motherhood and cycles of intimate partner violence.

Conceive And Control: Cultural-Legal Narratives Of American Privacy And Reproductive Politics, Emily Naser-Hall

Theses and Dissertations--English

Law and literature share a foundation in narrative. The literary turn in legal scholarship recognizes that the law itself is a form of narrative, one that simultaneously reflects socio-cultural norms and creates social and political regulations with a complex matrix of power. Cultural narratives from the 1950s to the mid-1970s pertaining to reproductive politics, domesticity, and national identity both produce and are productive of legal rulings that govern and restrict private acts of sexuality and speech. The Supreme Court used cases concerning sex and reproduction to enumerate, explicate, and complicate the right to privacy, which appears nowhere in the U.S. …

Stick With Me: Essays, Clay Shields

Theses and Dissertations--English

A small-town Appalachian deviant confronts the frequent, recurrent grief of the opioid crisis and its mortal, psychological, and communal consequences. This collection endeavors to explore substance use, addiction, geopolitical exploitation of Kentucky, central Appalachia, and surrounding areas, while also celebrating the lives of individual loved ones lost to deaths by suicide, drug overdose, and alcoholism. Here, the common narrative of depravity surrounding addiction is challenged through the rendering of full characters capable of love, trust, friendship, humor, mental health management, and personal growth. Time and place factor fundamentally into the stories told here—whether based in central Kentucky or central Appalachia, …

Ovid's Caeneus As A Queer Hero: Understanding Gender And Gender Variance In The Ancient Mediterranean., Rj Palmer

Theses and Dissertations--Modern and Classical Languages, Literature and Cultures

Caeneus, as written in Ovid’s Metamorphoses, is a notable blend of ancient and Hellenistic versions of the myth. Ovid’s Caeneus can be understood as a transgender man, since he was assigned female at birth, but asks for his gender to be changed by the god Neptune, and goes on to live the rest of his life with the body, appearance, and social roles of a man. Ovid incorporates Caeneus’ trans identity with his use of grammatical gender endings for Caeneus, using masculine gender for Caeneus except when discussing his pre-transition childhood, or when the centaurs address him mockingly while fighting. …

Exploring The Molecular Basis Of Touch: A Comparative Analysis Of Gene Expression In Sensory Corpuscle-Rich And Corpuscle-Poor Skin Regions In The Duck, Thomas Hart

Theses and Dissertations--Biology

Cutaneous touch is facilitated by discrete cellular complexes composed of non-neuronal cells associated with mechanoreceptor neuron endings. The non-neuronal cells of these cutaneous end organ complexes (CEOCs) are believed to contribute to touch, but their role in touch sensation remains unclear. To better understand the function of CEOC cells, we sought to characterize the transcriptional profile of CEOC-rich tissue and identify genes expressed in CEOC cells. Bill skin of the tactile foraging Pekin duck (Anas platyrhynchos) is dense with CEOCs, specifically the avian analogs of mammalian Pacinian and Meissner corpuscles, while corpuscles in duck foot skin are scarce. Using RNA …

Hypogene Speleogenesis In The Grand Canyon; Observational, Mineralogical, And Geochemical Investigations From The Bopper Cave System, Sierra Heimel

Theses and Dissertations--Earth and Environmental Sciences

One of the most prominent features of the Grand Canyon is the iron-stained Redwall Limestone, which has been documented to contain extensive cave systems with significant storage potential in the karstic Redwall-Muav (R-M) aquifer. The hydrogeologic relationships between the R-M aquifer and cave formation in the Grand Canyon via descending (epigenic) surface waters have been well documented. However; the potentially large role of deeply sourced (hypogenic) waters rising from depth in relation to cave formation is poorly understood. The Bopper Cave System (BCS) is a relict feature of the ancient abandoned hydrologic system at Grand Canyon and displays unique network …

Variation In Behavioral Strategies For Coping With Environmental Uncertainty, Allison Mclaughlin

Theses and Dissertations--Biology

My dissertation investigates how animals behaviorally respond to environmental change, especially when there is limited information about that change. Uncertainty about the environment comes in various forms, including food resources which vary unpredictably and novel cues which present an unknown level of potential risk or benefit. Various behavioral strategies help animals cope with such uncertainty. Tactics to manage unpredictable variation in food include gathering information to reduce uncertainty (sampling) and strategically adjusting preference or aversion to variation in resources (variance-sensitivity). To manage the uncertainty of a novel cue, animals may generalize their previous experience with similar cues, or they may …

Picturing The Future City: Digital Mediation And Creative Placemaking, Jessica Mccallum Breen

Theses and Dissertations--Geography

Creative placemaking is an arts-oriented community development policy that focuses on the potential for art, artists, and cultural organizations to generate social, economic, and cultural vibrancy in their communities and is a primary tool of culture-led (re)development practices (Markusen & Gwada, 2010). Despite the focus of creative placemakers on the local impacts of their work, creative placemaking is more than local, it is both translocal and transcalar. In this dissertation, I examine the role that digital mediation plays in creative placemaking and how it makes visible these translocal and transcalar connections. I begin by outlining a methodology for tracing replicated …

‘A Category Of Their Own’: Quantitative Methods In The Use Of Pile-Sort Data In Perceptual Dialectology, Zachary Ty Gill

Theses and Dissertations--Linguistics

The purpose of this study is to investigate how Mississippi Gulf Coast Creoles perceive language differences in their home area. A pile-sort task was carried out in which respondents were given stacks of cards with local communities written on them and instructed to stack together the regions where people “talk the same.” Once the piles were made, the fieldworker discussed their sortings with the respondents. The stacks were analyzed by means of a hierarchal agglomerative cluster analysis and non-parametric multidimensional scaling with k-means cluster analysis overlays to extract the perceived dialect areas. The groupings reveal that respondent strategies are based …

Perceptual Dialectology Of Tulsan Speakers Of English, Andrew Carter

Theses and Dissertations--Linguistics

The present study analyzes new interviews from fifteen Tulsan speakers of English and maps produced by draw-a-map tasks. The interviews and subsequent map tasks were conducted over the course of the winter of 2021 for the purpose of this thesis and have been analyzed for folk linguistic information about the perceptions of Tulsa and the rest of the state. The study finds that Tulsan speakers hold similar dialectal perceptions about both their own city and other locations as their fellow Oklahomans, and also provides evidence of a deteriorating faith among Tulsans in the existence of the northern-southern dialectal divide compared …

Taken: Slavery, Forced Migration, And Environment In The Early United States, Christopher L. Leadingham

Theses and Dissertations--History

This work examines the development and collapse of the slave trade in Kentucky. It pushes readers to think about the slave trade in an environmental context. The development of the slave trade in the state depended on the violent acquisition of Indigenous lands. The networks of credit and capital that settler colonists established—wealth concentrated in land, stock, crops, and people—fueled the development of a slave system west of the southern mountains. That system increasingly relied on the forced movement of enslaved people in and through Kentucky. The state’s legal system and other institutions worked to support slave trading companies especially …

Enduring The Elements: Civil War Soldiers’ Struggles Against The Weather, Cameron Boutin

Theses and Dissertations--History

This dissertation is an environmental history that studies the variety of ways that soldiers in the American Civil War experienced the pressures of weather over the course of their military service. For the troops of the U.S. and Confederacy, the weather was more than simply a passive backdrop to their time in the military, but a central preoccupation. This dissertation analyzes how weather intersected with some of the most central experiences of soldiering – tent camping and winter quarters, marching, bivouacking, manning sentry posts and field fortifications, and fighting in battles. Life in Civil War armies consisted of all of …

From Displaced To Displacers: Scottish Crofters, First Nation Peoples And Commons Enclosure From The 1700s To The 1800s, Anna Herrington

Theses and Dissertations--History

In the 18^th and 19^th centuries, the enclosure of common systems shaped the displacement of people on a global scale whilst bringing the people---Scottish Highland crofters and Mi’kmaq First Nation Canadians from the margins where they have dwelled for centuries in historical scholarship to of the centre of not just their history, but our collective history. Both populations experienced attacks on their ties to their lands, resources, and culture through enclosure. The enclosure process lasted over two centuries and was interspersed with violent protest, proactive resistance, interspersed with periods of acceptance and determination against their forced removals. Investigating …