Digital Commons Network^™

Preparing For A Northwest Passage: A Workshop On The Role Of New England In Navigating The New Arctic, Katharine A. Duderstadt, Catherine M. Ashcraft, Jennifer F. Brewer, Elizabeth Burakowski, Jaed M. Coffin, Jack E. Dibb, Lawrence C. Hamilton, Nancy E. Kinner, Larry A. Mayer, Jennifer L. Miksis-Olds, Joseph Salisbury, Kerri D. Seger, Ruth K. Varner, Cameron P. Wake

All Materials

Preparing for a Northwest Passage: A Workshop on the Role of New England in Navigating the New Arctic (March 25 - 27, 2018 -- The University of New Hampshire) paired two of NSF's 10 Big Ideas: Navigating the New Arctic and Growing Convergence Research at NSF. During this event, participants assessed economic, environmental, and social impacts of Arctic change on New England and established convergence research initiatives to prepare for, adapt to, and respond to these effects. Shipping routes through an ice-free Northwest Passage in combination with modifications to ocean circulation and regional climate patterns linked to Arctic ice melt …

Phosphorus Limitation Of Aboveground Production In Northern Hardwood Forests, Shinjini Goswami, Melany C. Fisk, Matthew A. Vadeboncoeur, Mariann Garrison-Johnston, Ruth D. Yanai, Timothy J. Fahey

All Materials

Forest productivity on glacially derived soils with weatherable phosphorus (P) is expected to be limited by nitrogen (N), according to theories of long-term ecosystem development. However, recent studies and model simulations based on resource optimization theory indicate that productivity can be co-limited by N and P. We conducted a full factorial N × P fertilization experiment in 13 northern hardwood forest stands of three age classes in central New Hampshire, USA, to test the hypothesis that forest productivity is co-limited by N and P. We also asked whether the response of productivity to N and P addition differs among species …

Carbon Fluxes And Interannual Drivers In A Temperate Forest Ecosystem Assessed Through Comparison Of Top-Down And Bottom-Up Approaches, Andrew P. Ouimette, Scott V. Ollinger, Andrew D. Richardson, David Y. Hollinger, Trevor F. Keenan, Lucie C. Lepine, Matthew A. Vadeboncoeur

All Materials

Despite decades of research, gaining a comprehensive understanding of carbon (C) cycling in forests remains a considerable challenge. Uncertainties stem from persistent methodological limitations and the difficulty of resolving top-down estimates of ecosystem C exchange with bottom-up measurements of individual pools and fluxes. To address this, we derived estimates and associated uncertainties of ecosystem C fluxes for a 100-125 year old mixed temperate forest stand at the Bartlett Experimental Forest, New Hampshire, USA, using three different approaches: (1) tower-based eddy covariance, (2) a biometric approach involving C flux measurements of individual ecosystem subcomponents, and (3) an inventory approach involving changes …

Hydrological Niche Segregation Defines Forest Structure And Drought Tolerance Strategies In A Seasonal Amazon Forest, Mauro Brum, Matthew A. Vadeboncoeur, Valeriy Ivanov, Heidi Asbjornsen, Scott Saleska, Luciana F. Alves, Deliane Pinha, Jadson D. Dias, Luiz E O C Aragão, Fernanda Barros, Paulo Bittencourt, Luciano Pereira, Rafael S. Oliveira

All Materials

1. The relationship between rooting depth and above‐ground hydraulic traits can potentially define drought resistance strategies that are important in determining species distribution and coexistence in seasonal tropical forests, and understanding this is important for predicting the effects of future climate change in these ecosystems.
2. We assessed the rooting depth of 12 dominant tree species (representing c. 42% of the forest basal area) in a seasonal Amazon forest using the stable isotope ratios (δ¹⁸O and δ²H) of water collected from tree xylem and soils from a range of depths. We took advantage of a major ENSO‐related …

University Of New Hampshire Graduate Academic Catalog, 2018-2019, University Of New Hampshire

Graduate Catalog

No abstract provided.

Tracking The Evolution Of The Companionate Marriage Ideal In Early Modern Comedies, Madison L. Pierce

Honors Theses and Capstones

This thesis examines the socially constructed ideal of companionate marriage in Elizabethan and Jacobean England through four dramas by Christopher Marlowe, William Shakespeare, John Fletcher, Thomas Dekker and Thomas Middleton. It probes the question of how these theatrical productions of early modern England fit within or defy the emerging social trends regarding companionate marriage. It uses socioeconomic statuses, religious affiliations, and emerging notions of race as lenses through which to analyze the romantic couples depicted in these plays. The results of this study indicate that, while exact authorial intentions remain unknown, these plays served as proponents of the companionate marriage …

Electrochemical And Spectroscopic Study Of Peptide-Template Melanins, Daniel Courter, Olivia Rossi, Zhen Tian

Honors Theses and Capstones

Melanins are organic polymers made up of 5,6-dihydroxyindole carboxylic acid (DHICA) and 5,6-dihydroxyindole (DHI). Biochemical systems synthesize melanins through a complex reaction pathway. Previous research exhibited that naturally-occurring melanins (NatMel) and their synthetic analogues (SynMel) can potentially serve as electrode materials for aqueous charge storage devices. Small surface area creates technical challenges for these melanins as charge storage materials. This research herein demonstrates that the structure of melanins can affect the charge storage capacities of monovalent Na⁺cations and divalent Mg²⁺ cations. 2-D sheet-like peptide melanins (PepMel) were synthesized into tripeptides consisting of aspartic acid (D), phenylalanine (F), …

Detection Of Borrelia Burgdorferi In Historic Tick Samples And Its Relevance To The White-Tailed Deer Population In New Hampshire, Tasya Rakasiwi

Honors Theses and Capstones

The cases of Lyme disease in New Hampshire have increased over time. There are speculations that increasing number of Lyme disease cases in New Hampshire are due to environmental factors, such as warmer climate, white-footed mouse population, white-tailed deer population, opossum population, and forestation coverage. In this study, we processed whole tick samples from 2000, 2001, and 2003 for Borrelia burgdorferi by Real-Time TaqMan PCR. In addition, we also processed homogenized tick samples from 2010, that previously tested positive for B. burgdorferi and had been stored at -80°C since 2010, for repeat B. burgdorferi testing by Real-Time TaqMan PCR. Then, …

Comparing Bird Communities Within Shrubby Transmission Line Rights-Of-Way Managed By Mowing Or By Selective Herbicide Application In Maine And New Hampshire, Kathleen P. Wadiak

Honors Theses and Capstones

In the northeastern U.S., thousands of miles of shrub-dominated transmission line rights-of-way (ROW) extend across the landscape and provide some of the largest and most stable shrubland habitats in the region. These ROW are used as nesting and post-fledging habitat by the region’s entire community of shrubland-dependent songbirds, but evidence for how ROW are used by songbirds that require other habitats for nesting is lacking. Mist-netting surveys conducted in regenerating clearcuts indicate that adult and fledgling mature-forest songbirds comprise a large proportion of the bird community in clearcuts during the post-fledging portion of the breeding season, a time when juvenile …

Characterization Of Palmitoyltransferase Proteins In Arabidopsis Thaliana, Danielle Mcginty

Honors Theses and Capstones

No abstract provided.

Why Do Makers Make? Examining Designer Motivations On Thingiverse.Com, Courtney H. Shaw

Honors Theses and Capstones

Technological advancements have made a once fictitious dream into a reality. 3D printing has become a popular manufacturing and design technique used all over the world. As this industry becomes more popular, users of these 3D printers are reaching out across the web to share designs, seek help, and build communities of users with similar interests. This study is meant to look at what motivates 3D printing users to participate in online user innovation communities such as Thingiverse.com. This study will explore motivations such as personal needs, financial gains, approval of peers, skill development, and enjoyment. Moreover, it will assess …

The Molecular Analysis Of Hawaiian Bird Diets, Alissa C. Scinto

Honors Theses and Capstones

The aim of this project is to utilize high-throughput molecular methods to investigate the diets of three non-native and one native Hawaiian bird species. Next-generation sequencing (NGS) has made it possible to produce thousands of sequencing reads of DNA in a relatively short amount of time. This metabarcoding technology has been used to identify a range of different taxa, from bacteria in the human gut to fungi in the soil. More recently, this approach has been used to identify insects in the diets of birds and other species, including bees and bats. Samples underwent genomic sequencing using a targeted approach …

Understanding Self-Reported Sexual Violence Perpetration: Correlates And Prevention Participation, Jacqueline F. Klatt

Honors Theses and Capstones

Bystander prevention programs seek to educate individuals on the nature of sexual violence and increase bystander efficacy. This study seeks to evaluate the effectiveness of the Bringing in the Bystander (BITB) prevention program through self-reports of perpetration behaviors as well as risk factors associated with perpetration. The bystander prevention program was implemented on a rural mid-sized public university and first-year students were surveyed three times at separate time points (2 weeks, 5 months, and 12 months) after the program conclusion. Results from a correlational and logistic regression analysis show that endorsement of violent peer norms, rape myth acceptance, and rape …

Implementation Of Donor Human Milk In A Newborn Nursery: A Quality Improvement Initiative To Increase Exclusive Breast Milk Feeding, Emily Bombard

DNP Scholarly Projects

Background: At the site of this quality improvement project, exclusive breast milk feeding rates before discharge from a newborn nursery were behind benchmark goals. The aim of this project was to improve exclusive breast milk feeding rates by implementing a Pasteurized Donor Human Milk (PDHM) Program for breastfeeding newborns requiring medically indicated supplementation. The study site was a Level I newborn nursery of a 20-bed, labor, delivery, recovery, and postpartum unit within a 100-bed community hospital (i.e., the agency).

Methods: This retrospective pre-post cohort study used the Plan, Do, Study, Act (PDSA) framework for rapid cycle change to assess the …

Applying Lean Methodology To Improve The Response And Management Of Postpartum Hemorrhage, Caroline Siefken

DNP Scholarly Projects

Postpartum Hemorrhage is an obstetric emergency that can lead to substantial maternal morbidity and mortality. Lean methodology is an improvement framework that addresses processes and identifies opportunities to eliminate waste and introduce efficiencies. The North Shore Medical Center uses an improvement framework modeled after the Toyota Production System that uses lean methodology to assess processes. This framework is called the North Shore Production System. This quality improvement project used the lean methodology tools from the North Shore Production System and applied them to interdisciplinary, simulated drills at the North Shore Medical Center Birthplace. After analysis of the tools, a postpartum …

Applying Lean Methodology To Improve The Response And Management Of Postpartum Hemorrhage, Caroline Siefken

DNP Scholarly Projects

Postpartum Hemorrhage is an obstetric emergency that can lead to substantial maternal morbidity and mortality. Lean methodology is an improvement framework that addresses processes and identifies opportunities to eliminate waste and introduce efficiencies. The North Shore Medical Center uses an improvement framework modeled after the Toyota Production System that uses lean methodology to assess processes. This framework is called the North Shore Production System. This quality improvement project used the lean methodology tools from the North Shore Production System and applied them to interdisciplinary, simulated drills at the North Shore Medical Center Birthplace. After analysis of the tools, a postpartum …

Development Of Fluorescent Sensors Based On Molecularly Imprinted Biomimetic Polymers, Rongfang Yang

Doctoral Dissertations

Molecular recognition can be thought as the process in which two or more molecules bind to one another in specific geometry through noncovalent bonding. Bioreceptors, such as antibodies, enzymes, and DNAs can specifically bind to its target with high binding affinity and selectivity. However, the bio receptors are suffering from low stability and tolerance to extreme pH, temperature and organic solvents.

To overcome the disadvantages of the bioreceptors, novel biomimetic molecularly imprinted polymers (MIPs) were developed by Seitz group. Different from the conventional MIPs with high percentage of covalent crosslinking, the biomimetic MIPs contain less than 5% mole percent covalent …

Improved Sound Speed Control Through Remotely Detecting Strong Changes In The Thermocline, Jose Maria Cordero Ros

Master's Theses and Capstones

Internal waves are a common phenomenon associated with stratification developed in shallow tidal seas during summer time. From a hydrographic point of view, they result in very rapid undulations in the main velocline which, if not accounted for, will result in significant refraction errors in multibeam echo sounder data. Mechanical sound speed profiling, both static and mobile, cannot sample this structure adequately (Hughes Clarke, 2017). Thus, an alternate means of detecting and accounting for that variability is needed.

Within the oceanographic community, it has long been recognized that a distinct acoustic volume scattering layer is often associated within or close …

Applying Lean Methodology To Improve The Response And Management Of Postpartum Hemorrhage, Caroline Siefken

DNP Scholarly Projects

Postpartum Hemorrhage is an obstetric emergency that can lead to substantial maternal morbidity and mortality. Lean methodology is an improvement framework that addresses processes and identifies opportunities to eliminate waste and introduce efficiencies. The North Shore Medical Center uses an improvement framework modeled after the Toyota Production System that uses lean methodology to assess processes. This framework is called the North Shore Production System. This quality improvement project used the lean methodology tools from the North Shore Production System and applied them to interdisciplinary, simulated drills at the North Shore Medical Center Birthplace. After analysis of the tools, a postpartum …

Abundance Data Change Geographic Estimates Of Terrestrial Invasive Plant Risk In The Contiguous United States, Mitchell W. O'Neill

Master's Theses and Capstones

Invasive plants pose severe threats to ecosystems worldwide. Geographic invasion risk is often assessed using occurrence-based species distribution modeling, which estimates where species can occur but cannot represent variation in abundance, a crucial component of impact. I assembled an ordinal abundance dataset for 155 terrestrial invasive plant species in the contiguous United States based on reports to the Early Detection & Distribution Mapping System, a georeferenced invasive species data repository. I used maximum entropy models to estimate range boundaries and ordinal regression to estimate abundance within ranges. I predicted the areas where establishment is possible (potential establishment ranges), and where …

The Evaluation Of A Breast Cancer Screening Decision Aid In The Community Setting., Kimberly Gibbons

DNP Scholarly Projects

Breast cancer screening (BCS) has been recommended to women by healthcare providers as well as professional organizations and non-profit awareness organizations for over four decades. Recently, attention is being paid to quantification of the actual benefits and harms of BCS with mammography. The harms include overdiagnosis, overtreatment and mandate of mammography screening that may not be in alignment with the individual values and preferences of women ages 40-69. This evidence translation project developed a resource for practice that was evaluated by community participants for alignment with personal value and preference-based educational needs about BCS. This project piloted a clinical practice …

Implementation Of A Physical Activity Group At A Community Mental Health Center: A Pilot Quality Improvement Project To Reduce Depressive Symptoms In Adolescents With Major Depressive Disorder, Nancy Gallagher

DNP Scholarly Projects

Major Depressive Disorder is a debilitating illness that affects millions of Americans, including adolescents. The majority of adolescents with Major Depressive Disorder (MDD) do not receive treatment. There may be a variety of reasons for this including stigma, access to care, and potential adverse reactions. People suffering from MDD are known to be at high risk for suicide. Lack of treatments adds the risk of suicide for adolescents with MDD. Identifying and implementing treatment options that are more acceptable and accessible are of the utmost importance. Although there is limited research regarding exercise/physical activity, depressive symptoms, and adolescents with MDD, …

2017 U.S. Globe Partner Yearbook, Globe U.S. Coordination Office

Partner Yearbooks

No abstract provided.

Algorithms And Automation: Fostering Trustworthiness In Artificial Intelligence, Andrew B. Ware

Honors Theses and Capstones

No abstract provided.

Effects Of The Mortalin Inhibitor Mkt-077 On The Tumor Suppressor P53 In Neuroblastoma Imr-32 Cells, Yusuf Ebrahim

Honors Theses and Capstones

The tumor suppressor protein, p53, is an important cell cycle regulator in humans. Over half of all human cancers involve disruption of p53 function. One way this is achieved is by tethering p53 to the mitochondrial 70 kilodalton heat shock protein (Hsp70), mortalin, in the cytoplasm, and preventing p53 from entering the nucleus. The mortalin inhibitor, MKT-077, binds competitively to the p53 binding site in mortalin, and disrupts the p53-mortalin complex in cancer cell lines, allowing p53 to enter the nucleus and promote apoptotic cell death. Previous research reported that cytoplasmic tethering of p53 occurs in certain human neuroblastomas. Thus, …

A Dynamic Life Cycle Economic And Environmental Assessment Of Green Infrastructures, Taler Bixler

Master's Theses and Capstones

As stormwater and its embedded nutrients continue to impede our nation's waterways, green infrastructures (GIs) have been increasingly applied in urban and suburban communities as a sustainable alternative to the combined sewer systems. Although GIs have been widely studied for their life cycle impacts and benefits, most of these studies adopt a static approach which is not transferrable to other environments on a spatial or temporal scale. This research utilizes a dynamic life cycle assessment (LCA) to evaluate seven different GIs through both an economic and environmental perspective by integrating the conventional LCA with a system dynamics model simulating the …

Four Years Of Unmanned Aerial System Imagery Reveals Vegetation Change In A Sub-Arctic Mire Due To Permafrost Thaw, Jessica Delgreco

Master's Theses and Capstones

Warming trends in sub-arctic regions have resulted in thawing of permafrost which in turn induces change in vegetation across peatlands both in areal extent and composition. Collapse of palsas (i.e. permafrost plateaus) has also been correlated with increases in methane (CH4) emission to the atmosphere. Vegetation change provides new microenvironments that promote CH4 production and emission, specifically through plant interactions and structure. By quantifying the changes in vegetation at the landscape scale, we will be able to scale the impact of thaw on CH4 emissions in these complex climate-sensitive northern ecosystems. We combine field-based measurements of vegetation composition and Unmanned …

The Microbiome Of Four North American Nicrophorus Species (Coleoptera: Silphidae): Implications For Parental Care Behavior In Insects, Morgan Olmstead

Master's Theses and Capstones

Nicrophorus (Coleoptera: Silphidae) are a unique genus of beetles in which both parents exhibit parental care. The female parents maintain the carcass resource for the young and directly feed growing larvae, while often the males maintain the carcass and prevent usurpation from congeners and conspecifics in search of the ephemeral resource. The beetles in this genus are known to compete with both animal carcass microbiota and soil microbiota, thus developing several mechanisms to combat these microbes. In this study, four North Americanus Nicrophorus spp. microbiomes were characterized and compared to each other in effort to determine the core Nicrophorus microbiome. …

Depot Pond, Cooperative Extension

UNH Cooperative Extension

No abstract provided.

Bow Lake, Cooperative Extension

UNH Cooperative Extension

No abstract provided.