Digital Commons Network^™

Muskets In Misery Swamp: An Investigation Into A King Philip's War Battle, Laura Damon

Open Access Master's Theses

On August 12, 1676, Benjamin Church, an English colonizer and military leader, led a company of Englishmen and Indian allies in an attack on a group of Wampanoags with the goal of killing the Wampanoag sachem known as Metacomet, Metacom, or King Philip. According to colonial records, the attack took place at Mount Hope in Bristol, Rhode Island during King Philip’s War. This conflict began in southern Massachusetts in June 1675 and eventually engulfed most of New England. The Wampanoags and English fought on opposing sides.

This study will analyze the attack that resulted in Philip’s death, guided by the …

Solid Waste Management In Coastal Ghana, Ivy Akuoko

Open Access Master's Theses

Solid waste management is a major problem in most areas of coastal Ghana, where waste is dumped into drains that discharge into the sea or is dumped directly onto beaches. This is as a result of inadequate waste management infrastructure, low patronage of the few infrastructure available, and poor management. The consequence is an increase in vulnerability to sanitation related diseases such as malaria, typhoid and cholera as well as threatened coastal ecosystems’ health. Improper solid waste disposal practices are usually counter-productive to the many benefits and uses of the coast and directly impact the livelihoods and businesses that are …

Metabolism And Gas Phase Reactions Of Peroxide Explosives Using Atmospheric Pressure Ionization Mass Spectrometry, Kevin Colizza

Open Access Dissertations

The toxicity or pharmacodynamics of many of the nitrated explosives have been well documented. Trinitrotoluene (TNT) is known to cause liver toxicity while nitrate esters (nitroglycerine) are known vasodilators. One class of explosive that has been on the rise due to the ease of manufacturing from household products are the peroxides. Of particular interest are the cyclic peroxides used for many home-made explosives (HME): triacetone triperoxide (TATP) and hexamethylene diamine triperoxide (HMTD). Very little is known about the toxicity or potentially beneficial effects of these compounds. This may be primarily due to the difficulty in detecting or working with these …

Effect Of Non-Alcoholic Fatty Liver Disease (Nafld) On Hepatic Drug Metabolism Enzymes In Human, Rohitash Jamwal

Open Access Dissertations

Significant changes in dietary habits have led to a rampant increase in metabolic disorders. Non-alcoholic fatty liver disease (NAFLD) is one such disorder characterized by the excess buildup of fat in hepatocytes of people who drink little or no alcohol. If not managed, NAFL (simple steatosis) progress into nonalcoholic steatohepatitis (NASH) and further deteriorate to cirrhosis leading to severe illness or even death. Drug disposition proteins (enzymes and transporters) in liver control the systemic exposure of drugs and xenobiotics in human and drive the efficacy as well as adverse events in the body. Therefore, it is critical to address the …

Calibrating Amino Acid Δ13C And Δ15N Offsets Between Polyp And Protein Skeleton To Develop Proteinaceous Deep-Sea Corals As Paleoceanographic Archives., Kelton W. Mcmahon, Branwen Williams, Thomas P. Guilderson, Danielle S. Glynn, Matthew D. Mccarthy

Graduate School of Oceanography Faculty Publications

Compound-specific stable isotopes of amino acids (CSI-AA) from proteinaceous deep-sea coral skeletons have the potential to improve paleoreconstructions of plankton community composition, and our understanding of the trophic dynamics and biogeochemical cycling of sinking organic matter in the Ocean. However, the assumption that the molecular isotopic values preserved in protein skeletal material reflect those of the living coral polyps has never been directly investigated in proteinaceous deep-sea corals. We examined CSI-AA from three genera of proteinaceous deep-sea corals from three oceanographically distinct regions of the North Pacific: Primnoa from the Gulf of Alaska, Isidella from the Central California Margin, and …

Gulf Stream Rings May Rival Atmospheric Iron Supply To The North Atlantic Subtropical Gyre, Tim M. Conway, Jaime B. Palter, Gregory F. De Souza

Graduate School of Oceanography Faculty Publications

Substantial amounts of nitrogen fixation occur in the North Atlantic subtropical gyre, due to the activity of cyanobacteria with high iron requirements. Iron is delivered to this region by dust from the Sahara Desert. However, this dust deposition is typically localized and episodic. Therefore, other sources of iron may also be important. Here, we report observations of dissolved iron concentrations in a Gulf Stream cold-core ring, which transported iron-rich water from near the continental slope into the subtropical gyre. We find that iron concentrations were elevated in the ring compared with subtropical waters, reflecting its source waters. Using iron data …

Time Trends Of Polybrominated Diphenyl Ethers (Pbdes) In Antarctic Biota, Erin Markham, Emily K. Brault, Mohammed Khairy, Anna R. Robuck, Michael E. Goebel, Mark G. Cantwell, Rebecca M. Dickhut, Rainer Lohmann

Graduate School of Oceanography Faculty Publications

Polybrominated diphenyl ethers (PBDEs) are “emerged” contaminants that were produced and used as flame retardants in numerous consumer and industrial applications for decades until banned. They remain ubiquitously present in the environment today. Here, a unique set of >200 biotic samples from the Antarctic was analyzed for PBDEs, including phytoplankton, krill, fish, and fur seal milk, spanning several sampling seasons over 14 years. PBDE-47 and -99 were the dominant congeners determined in all samples, constituting >60% of total PBDEs. A temporal trend was observed for ∑₇PBDE concentrations in fur seal milk, where concentrations significantly increased (R^{2 …}

Amino Acid Isotope Discrimination Factors For A Carnivore: Physiological Insights From Leopard Sharks And Their Diet, John P. Whiteman, Sora L. Kim, Kelton W. Mcmahon, Paul L. Koch, Seth D. Newsome

Graduate School of Oceanography Faculty Publications

Stable isotopes are important ecological tools, because the carbon and nitrogen isotopic composition of consumer tissue reflects the diet. Measurements of isotopes of individual amino acids can disentangle the effects of consumer physiology from spatiotemporal variation in dietary isotopic values. However, this approach requires knowledge of assimilation patterns of dietary amino acids. We reared leopard sharks (Triakis semifasciata) on diets of squid (Loligo opalescens; 1250 days; control sharks) or squid then tilapia (Oreochromis sp.; switched at 565 days; experimental sharks) to evaluate consumer-diet discrimination factors for amino acids in muscle tissue. We found that control …

Demonstrating Feminist Metic Intelligence Through The Embodied Rhetorical Practices Of Julia Child, Lindy E. Briggette

Open Access Dissertations

The concept of metis reinserts the body and its intelligences into the ways in which rhetoric is understood, harnessed, and performed. Originating from the wisdom of Greek goddess Metis, the concept of metis is commonly understood as cunning intelligence that is deployed in order to escape an adversary, trick an opponent, or dupe its victim. When metic intelligence is read through the helping acts of Metis and her daughter, goddess Athena, however, an expanded version of its ways of operating begins to emerge. Through her efforts to debunk French cuisine using rule-based approaches meant to empower home chefs in their …

Integrated Clinical Experiences (Ices) In Physical Therapy: Impact On Communication Skills And Professionalism Prior To First Full-Time Clinical Internship, John Mclinden

Open Access Dissertations

The purpose of this study was to investigate student and programmatic factors that may influence doctor of physical therapy (DPT) students’ communication skills and professionalism before and after participating in a first time integrated clinical experience (ICE). Clinical education is an important component in healthcare education, including physical therapy (PT) education. It can take many forms including internships, co-ops, clerkships, and integrated clinical experiences (ICEs). The ICEs have been given specific attention in physical therapy because the Commission on Accreditation in Physical Therapy Education (CAPTE) has mandated their inclusion in DPT curricula. Best practices for ICEs, however, have not been …

Analysis Of Band Pair Formation In Elasmobranch Vertebrae With Implications For Fisheries Management, Kelsey James

Open Access Dissertations

Sharks, skates, and rays are particularly sensitive to over-exploitation due to their life history traits (slow growth, late age at maturity, small litter size, and extended longevity). It is important to know the age of sharks, skates, and rays because it has implications for our ability to assess the status of populations and to manage fisheries. They are aged most often using the concentric bands that alternate in appearance: opaque and translucent in their vertebral centra. An opaque and translucent band together (a band pair) is assumed to represent one year of growth and is counted to estimate an individual’s …

Collective Synchrony In Team Sports, Daniel Martin Smith

Open Access Dissertations

Collective synchrony is the simultaneous occurrence of behavior, cognition, emotion, and/or physiology within a group of three or more people. In this dissertation, I draw from various literatures to inform exploratory empirical and methodological investigation of collective synchrony in team sports. These include physiological synchrony, which has been examined primarily in dyads, and collective behavior in sports teams.

In Manuscript 1, I present a conceptual framework of collective synchrony in team sports. I argue that three possible antecedents (copresence, shared task, and coordination) underlie the interindividual matching of emotion, behavior, and cognition. This matching contributes to collective behavioral synchrony and/or …

Strike 3000: Standing Electric Trike, Mikhail Hyde, Mike Offord, Nick Ladyga, Craig Smith, Frank Zingarelli

Mechanical Engineering Capstone Design Projects

In the past decade there has been much research conducted on maintaining a healthy lifestyle, even in sedentary activities. It is clear to see this trend in the rising popularity of standing desks, ergonomic mice and keyboards, and the plethora of applications that remind the user not to stay inactive for too long. Ken Howes suggests that this revolution be brought to the world of motor vehicles with his proposed concept of the Strike 3000: an electric-powered three-wheeled vehicle that keeps the operator in a standing position while still maintaining all of the functionality and reliability of a standard automobile. …

Development And Modeling Of A Biomimetic Punting Unmanned Underwater Vehicle, Matthew Perkins

Open Access Master's Theses

This thesis details the development of a novel propulsion system for unmanned underwater vehicles (UUV's) inspired by the punting locomotion of the `Little Skate'. The hybrid legged, gliding and punting gait is a potential enabling technology for UUV access to complex littoral environments. Design, development and initial trials with the prototype vehicle are presented. A combination of video motion capture and on-board inertial sensing is validated and used for preliminary analysis of a limited set of punting gaits. The results indicate the importance of matching vehicle morphology and kinematics to achieve effective locomotion and that the prototype is viable to …

Decriminalization Of Prostitution: The Soros Effect, Jody Raphael

Dignity: A Journal of Analysis of Exploitation and Violence

This article explores the activities of George Soros and his charitable organization, Open Society Foundations (OSF), in advocating for the full decriminalization of the sex trade industry. Research finds that OSF spends only a small amount of money on grass roots “sex worker” groups around the world advocating for full decriminalization, but the foundation awards larger amounts of funds to large human rights groups whose reports and policies have a wider reach. OSF’s rationale for full decriminalization fails to consider violence and coercion in the sex trade industry, misreads research, and does not include research from venues where full decriminalization …

In Vitro Drug Metabolism And Population Pharmacokinetics As Tools For Elucidating Pharmacokinetic Variability, Enoch Cobbina

Open Access Dissertations

Pharmacokinetic variability is an important consideration in pharmacotherapy to ensure safety and efficacy of medications, thus the understanding of the sources of variability in drug concentrations in the body is imperative. The goals of this dissertation were: (1) To use in vitro drug metabolism tools to characterize the influence of non-alcoholic fatty liver disease (NAFLD) on Cytochrome P450 2B6 (CYP2B6)-mediated hydroxylation of bupropion in human liver microsomes; and (2) To use population pharmacokinetics to characterize the pharmacokinetics of PF-5190457, an inverse agonist of the growth hormone secretagogue receptor (hGHSR1a). This work has been organized in two parts. Part one is …

Use Of Radiation To Kill Cancer By Nanoparticles And In A Biodosimeter Using Gene Expression Analysis, Samana Shrestha

Open Access Dissertations

The use of radiation is broad in biological systems, in different areas of research mostly in health.

Radiation is used to kill cancer. In radiation therapy proper calculation is done so that a maximum dose is delivered to the cancer. Inspite of this precaution, radiation effects healthy tissue. This effect is especially dangerous when the tumor is located near important organs. Thus in radiation therapy, it is important to reduce the dose and the damage to the healthy tissues and organs. The damage on the healthy tissues due to radiation therapy in cancer could be reduced by reducing the radiation …

Regulation Of Ubiquitin Specific Peptidase 2 Expression By Farnesoid X Receptor In Hepatocellular Carcinoma, Christina Nadolny

Open Access Dissertations

Liver cancer is in the ten leading cancer types for estimated new cases and deaths in the United States in 2018, and is often detected at late stages when it is rapidly fatal. Of the types of liver cancers in humans, hepatocellular carcinoma (HCC) is the most lethal and prevalent. An important factor in the development of HCC is Farnesoid X Receptor (FXR). FXR acts as master regulator of bile acid homeostasis, and is involved in lipid, cholesterol, and glucose homeostasis. In addition, it plays a protective role against HCC, the precise mechanisms of which has yet to be identified. …

Characterizing The Functional Role And Regulated Assembly Of Protein Polymers Mind And Ftsa During Escherichia Coli Cell Division, Joseph Jake Conti

Open Access Dissertations

It is an immense undertaking for any organism, including a bacterium, to self-replicate. Accurate and rapid division is essential for bacteria to proliferate and produce progeny, especially in environments where there is competition for resources. The nucleoid, the region of the cell that contains the DNA, harbors the genetic information required to achieve robust division, but it is the assembly of the cell division machinery, collectively referred to as the divisome, that produces and coordinates the mechanical force necessary to divide a cell. The hallmark of prokaryotic cell division is the formation of a protein super-structure, called the Z-ring, which …

Experimental And Numerical Simulations For Fluid Body Interaction Problems, Amin Mivehchi

Open Access Dissertations

This dissertation focuses on the experimental and numerical modelling of fluid structure interaction (FSI) problems. The main objective of this work was to develop state-of-art experimental and numerical tools to investigate a variety of Fluid-Structure Interaction problems. This topic is of critical importance to Naval Hydrodynamics and offshore applications, such as in ship design, floating offshore wind platforms and offshore ocean energy systems.

On the experimental modelling of FSI, this dissertation includes detailed of state-of-art hydrodynamic testing tank system for studying biomimetic fluid-structure interaction problems. This system was employed to study unsteady ground effect for pitching and heaving flapping foil …

Universal Target‐Enrichment Baits For Anthozoan (Cnidaria) Phylogenomics: New Approaches To Long‐Standing Problems, Andrea M. Quattrini, Brant C. Faircloth, Luisa F. Dueñas, Tom C.L. Bridge, Mercer R. Brugler, Iván F. Calizto-Botía, Danielle M. Deleo, Sylvain Forêt, Santiago Herrera, Simon M.Y. Lee, David J. Miller, Carlos Prada, Gandhi Rádis-Baptista, Catalina Ramirez-Portilla, Juan A. Sánchez, Estefanía Rodriguez, Catherine S. Mcfadden

Biological Sciences Faculty Publications

Anthozoans (e.g., corals, anemones) are an ecologically important and diverse group of marine metazoans that occur from shallow to deep waters worldwide. However, our understanding of the evolutionary relationships among the ~7,500 species within this class is hindered by the lack of phylogenetically informative markers that can be reliably sequenced across a diversity of taxa. We designed and tested 16,306 RNA baits to capture 720 ultraconserved element loci and 1,071 exon loci. Library preparation and target enrichment were performed on 33 taxa from all orders within the class Anthozoa. Following Illumina sequencing and Trinity assembly, we recovered 1,774 of 1,791 …

Slow And Deliberate Cooperation In The Commons, Chris Brozyna, Todd Guilfoos, Stephen Atlas

Environmental and Natural Resource Economics Faculty Publications

We test how fast and slow thought processes affect cooperation for sustainability by manipulating time pressure in a dynamic common-pool resource experiment. Sustainable management of shared resources critically depends on decisions in the current period to leave enough stock so that future generations are able to draw on the remaining limited natural resources. An intertemporal common-pool resource game represents a typical dynamic for social dilemmas involving natural resources. Using one such game, we analyse decisions throughout time. We find that people in this context deplete the common resource to a greater extent under time pressure, which leads to greater likelihood …

Independent Introductions And Sequential Founder Events Shape Genetic Differentiation And Diversity Of The Invasive Green Anole (Anolis Carolinensis) On Pacific Islands, Sozos N. Michaelides, Rachel M. Goodman, Ronald I. Crombie, Jason J. Kolbe

Biological Sciences Faculty Publications

Aim: Natural range expansions and human‐mediated colonizations usually involve a small number of individuals that establish new populations in novel habitats. In both cases, founders carry only a fraction of the total genetic variation of the source populations. Here, we used native and non‐native populations of the green anole, Anolis carolinensis, to compare the current distribution of genetic variation in populations shaped by natural range expansion and human‐mediated colonization.

Location: North America, Hawaiian Islands, Western Pacific Islands.

Methods: We analysed 401 mtDNA haplotypes to infer the colonization history of A. carolinensis on nine islands in the …

Treating Outer Space Like A Place: A Case For Rejecting Other Domain Analogies, Elizabeth Mendenhall

Marine Affairs Faculty Publications

The creation and augmentation of the outer space governance regime during the twentieth century was guided by the use of analogies with other planetary domains. These analogies compare the “target” domain of outer space with various “source” domains, especially airspace, the seabed, the high seas, and Antarctica. These analogies, highlighted at different times to provide guidance on the regulation of existing and emerging space activities, shaped the fundamental principles and rules of the Outer Space Treaty. A survey of contemporary literature demonstrates that analogies continue to be used to structure thinking about outer space activities. This paper argues that such …

Utilization Of Probiotics To Manage Epizootic Shell Disease In American Lobsters, Homarus Americanus, Melissa Hoffman

Open Access Master's Theses

Epizootic shell disease (ESD) in the American lobster, Homarus americanus, has a major impact on the southern New England lobster industry, yet there are no practical tools for managing the disease. The goal of this study was to identify bacterial probiotics that could be used to manage ESD in wild lobster populations. Candidate bacterial isolates (n = 24) were previously isolated from lobsters in Narragansett Bay and identified as having probiotic characteristics against ESD-associated bacteria Thalassobius sp. and Aquimarina macrocephali, or the fish pathogen Vibrio anguillarum. Healthy lobster post-larvae were exposed to five of the candidate strains …

Life History Parameters Of Blue Sharks, Katherine Viducic

Open Access Master's Theses

The blue shark, Prionace glauca, is a pelagic elasmobranch that is found globally in tropic, sub-tropic, and warm temperate seas including the Mediterranean. Blue shark populations are not considered to be threatened, but a rapidly changing climate and uncertainties in fishing mortality are causing concern for changes in life history characteristics. Yet, no studies have examined such parameters for this species in over 35 years. We used 858 blue shark specimens, ranging from 1971 to 2016, to determine fork length, age, and weight at maturity, as well as measurements of reproductive organs (e.g., teste length, egg diameter) for both …

Effort Control In The Artisanal Canoe Fishery Of Ghana: Implications And Likelihood Of Success, Rosina Cobbina

Open Access Master's Theses

One of the major ways to reduce pressure on a declining fishery is through effort controls and this most often is seen to have both positive and negative effects on the people whose livelihoods depend on the fishery, specifically in instances where the control of effort leads to the exclusion of fishers out of the fishery. This study looks at some of the factors that will affect artisanal Ghanaian fishers’ willingness to exit a declining fishery. It looks at what these fishers perceived to be their alternative livelihood options. The study found that fishers in an urbanized and developed area …

Bodies Of Water: Designing Resilient Dive Tourism Through Underwater Sculpture, Rennie Meyers

Open Access Master's Theses

As marine ecologies at global and local scales respond to the manifold impacts of global climate change, so too must the dive tourism industry adapt to new ocean dynamics. To be resilient in the face of ongoing change these adaptations are necessarily local, environmentally aware, and systematic. On Lanzarote, a volcanic island at the northern end of the Canary Island archipelago, tourism developers have long claimed a particular skill in implementing environmentally aware, adaptive tourism infrastructure projects on land. At the peak of package tourism development in the 1960s, Lanzarote’s tourism board invested in César Manrique’s particular brand of Modernist …

Port Decision Maker Perceptions On The Effectiveness Of Climate Adaptation Actions, Adolf K.Y. Ng, Huiying Zhang, Mawuli Afenyo, Austin Becker, Stephen Cahoon, Shu-Ling Chen, Miguel Esteban, Claudio Ferrari, Yui-Yip Lau, Paul Tae-Woo Lee, Jason Monios, Alessio Tei, Zaili Yang, Michele Acciaro

Marine Affairs Faculty Publications

Effective adaptation to climate change impacts is rapidly becoming an important research topic. Hitherto, the perceptions and attitudes of stakeholders on climate adaptation actions are under researched, partly due to the emphasis on physical and engineering aspects during the adaptation planning process. Building on such considerations, the paper explores the perceptions of port decision makers on the effectiveness of climate adaptation actions. The findings suggest that while port decision makers are aware of potential climate change impacts and feel that more adaptation actions should be undertaken, they are skeptical about their effectiveness and value. This is complemented by a regional …

Occupancy Of Freshwater Turtles Across A Gradient Of Altered Landscapes, Scott W. Buchanan, Bill Buffum, Gavino Puggioni, Nancy E. Karraker

Natural Resources Science Faculty Publications

Turtles are one of the most threatened groups of vertebrates worldwide. In the northeastern United States, a legacy of centuries of dramatic landscape alteration has affected freshwater turtle populations, but the relationships between the current landscape and distributions and abundances of freshwater turtles remain poorly understood. We used a stratified random approach to select 88 small, isolated wetlands across a gradient of forest cover throughout Rhode Island, USA, and systematically sampled freshwater turtles in these wetlands. We report estimates of relative abundance and used a canonical correspondence analysis to investigate relationships between species relative abundance and environmental covariates. We also …