Digital Commons Network^™

Nutrition And Genes Associated With Orofacial Cleft Birth Defects In Utah, Huong Dieu Meeks

All Graduate Theses and Dissertations, Spring 1920 to Summer 2023

Orofacial clefts (OFCs) are facial malformations that happen during early pregnancy and have a complex and heterogeneous etiology, involving both genetic and environmental risk factors. This project examined the association between maternal nutrition, folate-related biomarkers, candidate genes involved in one-carbon metabolism (OCM), and OFCs in order to achieve more comprehensive knowledge of how nutrition and genetics influence OFC risk. All studies performed in this project used the data collected in the Utah Child and Family Health Study (UCFHS) and the Johns Hopkins International Cleft Consortium.

Neither maternal periconceptional multivitamin use nor healthy dietary pattern score alone was individually associated with …

Calculating Willingness-To-Pay As A Function Of Biophysical Water Quality And Water Quality Perceptions, Carlos G. Silva

All Graduate Theses and Dissertations, Spring 1920 to Summer 2023

When estimating economic value associated with changes in water quality, recreation demand models typically depend upon either (i) biophysical measures of water quality as collected by natural scientists or (ii) the perception of water quality by recreationists. Models based upon biophysical metrics (such as oxygen concentration, pollutant concentrations, Secchi depth measurements, etc.) operate on the assumption that people can perceive and respond to these metrics, or respond to factors that are, indeed, correlated with the biophysical measure. Economists have often estimated willingness-to-pay (WTP) measures associated with unit changes in biophysical measures without examining the degree to which the measures are …

Understanding Local Perceptions And The Role Of Historical Context In Ecotourism Development: A Case Study Of St. Kitts, Amber Greening

All Graduate Theses and Dissertations, Spring 1920 to Summer 2023

Ecotourism is a popular tool for the conservation of fragile ecosystems and local development of the communities surrounding them. It is widely argued that the key to effective and sustainable ecotourism programs relies on the depth of community involvement and support. This research reveals a better understanding of community members’ perceptions of ecotourism and conservation, and how these perceptions potentially influence participation in current and future ecotourism projects within the villages of Cayon and Keys on the Caribbean island of St. Kitts. Data were collected through several qualitative methods including: face-to-face surveys with Cayon and Keys villagers; interviews with government …

Stem Development, Seeding Rate, And Establishment Of Birdsfoot Trefoil (Lotus Corniculatus) For Organic, Grazing-Based Dairies, Sara Hunt

All Graduate Theses and Dissertations, Spring 1920 to Summer 2023

Birdsfoot trefoil (BFT, Lotus corniculatus L.) is a non-bloating, productive forage legume well suited to grazing-based ruminant production. This thesis presents three studies conducted in the Mountain West applicable to organic management and cultivation of BFT. The first is an analysis of lignification in BFT stems that supports recommendations to harvest BFT at approximately 6 weeks of regrowth, or early bloom. Lignification decreases digestibility and is correlated with high shear force required for grazing animals to break BFT stems. The process of stem lignification was observed by harvesting increasingly mature stems; cutting thin sections of the sixth stem internode, which …

Plant And Animal Performance In Tall Fescue And Tall Fescue/Legume Pastures, Troy J. Bingham

All Graduate Theses and Dissertations, Spring 1920 to Summer 2023

Tall fescue is the one of most common grasses in irrigated pastures throughout the Intermountain West. Two limitations of tall fescue are a decrease in productivity during hot summer months and the need for supplemental nitrogen (N). The objective of this research was to compare tall fescue-alfalfa (TF+ALF), tall fescue-birdsfoot trefoil (TF+BFT), tall fescue-nitrogen fertilizer (TF+N), and tall fescue without nitrogen fertilizer (TF-N) on forage yield, nutritional quality, and livestock performance. Research plots were established at the Utah State University Pasture Research Facility in Lewiston, UT in 2010 and grazed in 2012 and 2013. Treatments were arranged in a randomized …

Molecular Systematics, Historical Biogeography, And Evolution Of Spider Wasps (Hymenoptera: Pompilidae), Juanita Rodriguez

All Graduate Theses and Dissertations, Spring 1920 to Summer 2023

The study of the diversity and classification of any group of organisms provides a foundation for further scientific studies in ecology, evolution, and conservation. Insects are among the most diverse organisms that inhabit the planet, but knowledge of their diversity and classification is still limited. One understudied group of insects is spider wasps. These are solitary parasitoids that use one spider to lay a single egg. There are approximately 5,000 described species, and many more to be described. Unfortunately, fewer than 10 scientists worldwide study these insects. One reason the group has not been very well studied is the difficulty …

She Was Our Mother: Manifest Destiny And Misconceptions In New Mexico, 1845-48, Greg Merrill Palmer

All Graduate Plan B and other Reports, Spring 1920 to Spring 2023

The story of how New Mexico became part of the United States is well known, along with many of the different legends. In an effort to shine new light onto this historical stage I took many of the same documents that other scholars have used and studied them from a colonial viewpoint. New Mexico appeared to be further along in its nationalism and economic development than other areas of the continent before the United States took an interest in it, but the American movement west can, and should, be read as an early United States colonial expansion. This new reading …

Alice's Adventure Through Second Language Acquisition: An Educator's Perspective, Jessica Pryor Lee

All Graduate Plan B and other Reports, Spring 1920 to Spring 2023

The author employs narrative writing to illustrate annotated bibliographies, classroom observations, research and research proposals, and self-reflections for second language learning. Elementary, secondary, adult, and college-level teachings are addressed. The author focuses on communicative language teaching, brain-based teaching, and dual language immersion with content based instruction. She addresses the importance of writing, authentic materials, task-based activities, communication, and the recognition of heritage learners. The main character is Alice and she travels through Argentina and Chile. Footnotes are used to keep the narrative style of the portfolio coherent. While the storyline is fictitious, all information included is based on the author’s …

Blackface Shakespeare: Racial And Gender Anxiety On The American Stage, Kristen Hutchings

All Graduate Plan B and other Reports, Spring 1920 to Spring 2023

Early scholars of blackface minstrelsy have often over-simplified and rebuked nineteenth-century American Negro minstrel shows for their racially barbed gibes at African Americans. Though it recognizes minstrelsy’s blatant racism against the newly freed slaves of the 1860s, this study agrees with many modern scholars in recognizing deeper cultural themes Negro minstrels highlighted onstage during the years surrounding the Civil War. The study focuses specifically on the rich literary contribution of two afterpieces (the final act of the minstrel show) burlesquing Shakespeare’s Othello: Desdemonum and Othello; A Burlesque. Using the racist jargon as a tool, this study examines how …

Csilm: Interactive Learning Modules For Computer Science, Srinivasa Santosh Kumar Allu

All Graduate Plan B and other Reports, Spring 1920 to Spring 2023

CSILM is an online interactive learning management system designed to help students learn fundamental concepts of computer science. Apart from learning computer science modules using multimedia, this online system also allows students talk to professors using communication mediums like chat and implemented web analytics, enabling teachers to track student behavior and see student’s interest in learning the modules,. Integrating social media in to the existing portal also makes it possible for students to share the modules they have created, helping students work together.

Bridging Music And The Early Childhood Curriculum In Listening And Spoken Language Programs For Children Who Are Deaf Or Hard Of Hearing, Whitney Wright

All Graduate Plan B and other Reports, Spring 1920 to Spring 2023

Music is an integral aspect of human life. Its impact weaves through arts, culture, communication, recreation, and education. In addition to benefits of enjoyment and entertainment, music is a vital component of early childhood educational settings. Educators routinely utilize music as an embedded component of instruction to meet both group and individual needs of young children in early childhood classrooms. In fact, specialized musical instruction can be particularly beneficial for children with disabilities, including those who are deaf or hard of hearing (DHH) (Gfeller, Driscoll, Kenworthy, & Van Voorst, 2011). Children who are DHH are at significant risk for speech, …

The Infrastructure Of The Fur Trade In The American Southwest, 1821-1840, Hadyn B. Call

All Graduate Plan B and other Reports, Spring 1920 to Spring 2023

Careful study of the published history of the American Southwest reveals that historians have not provided a comprehensive analysis of the infrastructure that enabled the fur trade in the American Southwest to thrive. Analysis of that infrastructure unveils an amalgamation of blended characteristics derived from the French, British, and American systems along with characteristics derived from the Southwest’s own evolutionary development over time and space. This paper will detail and explain the shared characteristics of the Southwestern fur trade’s infrastructure, emphasizing the animals, people, depots, and supplies, during the era of the soft fur trade, which dealt primarily with beaver …

The Development And Validation Of An Isokinetic Calibration System For Multiple Aerosol Instruments, Wendy Michelle Merkley

All Graduate Plan B and other Reports, Spring 1920 to Spring 2023

A multi-port calibration xture for the cross calibration of aerosol point sensors has been developed. The system was designed for comparative calibrations of instruments using differing measurement methods such as optical particle counters, aerodynamic impactors, etc. Four isokinetic sampling ports are attached to a laminar ow plenum such that all four sampling ports sample identical aerosol concentrations under identical ow conditions. Correlation and correction factors are applied to each instrument creating a standard method. This standard method can be applied to inter-compare and calibrate aerosol sensing instrumentation and/or to characterize the microphysical properties of a test aerosol. The performance of …

Everybody Has The Be Someplace: Twentieth-Centure Pedagogies Of Place And Curricular Possibilities For The Intermountain West, Jacob Sheetz-Willard

All Graduate Plan B and other Reports, Spring 1920 to Spring 2023

In 1977, riding a wave of environmental enthusiasm that had crested in the United States over the course of the previous decade, Wendell Berry published his classic agricultural jeremiad, The Unsettling of America. Berry, a novelist, poet, essayist, and farmer decried the environmental and cultural consequences of the large-scale, commercial agriculture that had overtaken the American landscape in the postwar years. He characterized the shift away from a producerist economy of independent farmers to a society oriented around consumption and growth as a Faustian bargain, an agricultural “colonialism” that devalued the individual and ravaged the land in the name of …

The Optimal Release Of Sterile Males In Pest Management, Sergio Ramirez

All Graduate Plan B and other Reports, Spring 1920 to Spring 2023

With an application of the sterile insect technique, it is our goal to know the optimal rate of production of sterile males in order to control an insect pest invasion and protect crops. Starting with a fundametal relationship between costs of production and feeding rates, we construct an objective functional. We then use the relationships between the dierent stages of female reproduction to build the state equations. Once, we have dened the optimal control problem, we use the simulated annealing algorithm to determine the amount of sterile males to be released at each discrete time event. Multiple calculations are made …

Should Ranchers Value Sagebrush? Why We Need Sagebrush, Beth Burritt, Thomas Monaco, Eric Thacker

All Current Publications

This fact sheet describes the value of sagebrush to ranchers. Big sagebrush is beneficial to grasses and forbs growing under its canopy by supplying them water, nutrients,organic matter and protection from overgrazing. It provides food and cover for a number of birds, reptiles, small mammals and beneficial insects. It can provide winter forage for both wildlife and livestock. Lastly, it is an important plant for revegetation efforts in the West.

Nutritional Value And Toxins In Various Noxious Weeds, Beth Burritt, Rae Ann Hart

All Current Publications

Teaching animals to eat noxious weeds may be a solution to reducing noxious weeds. Grazing animals often avoid eating weeds due to novelty even though weeds are often as nutritious as many of our planted pasture and rangelands species. This fact sheet provides livestock producers with the nutritive values of many common weeds. These values were summarized from a variety of peer-reviewed journal articles.

The Utah Statesman, April 22, 2014, Utah State University

The Utah Statesman

Weekly student newspaper of Utah State University in Logan.

Data From: Genotyping-By-Sequencing For Populus Population Genomics: An Assessment Of Genome Sampling Patterns And Filtering Approaches, Paul G. Wolf, Martin P. Schilling, Aaron M. Duffy, Hardeep S. Rai, Carol A. Rowe, Karen E. Mock, Bryce A. Richardson

Browse all Datasets

Continuing advances in nucleotide sequencing technology are inspiring a suite of genomic approaches in studies of natural populations. Researchers are faced with data management and analytical scales that are increasing by orders of magnitude. With such dramatic advances comes a need to understand biases and error rates, which can be propagated and magnified in large-scale data acquisition and processing. Here we assess genomic sampling biases and the effects of various population-level data filtering strategies in a genotyping-by-sequencing (GBS) protocol. We focus on data from two species of Populus, because this genus has a relatively small genome and is emerging …

The Utah Statesman, April 8, 2014, Utah State University

The Utah Statesman

Weekly student newspaper of Utah State University in Logan.

Curriculum Subcommittee Agenda, April 3, 2014, Utah State University

Educational Policies Committee

Department of Agricultural Systems Technology and Education

• Prefix Change

School of Applied Sciences, Technology and Education

• USU-Eastern Non-Credit Courses for Northstar to Banner Conversion

Department of Art and Design

• New Course
• Prerequisite Change
• Course Description Change
• Prerequisite Change, Course Description Change
• Title Change, Course Description Change
• Course Number Change, Prerequisite Change
• Course Number Change, Title Change
• Course Number Change, Title Change, Prerequisite Change, Course Description Change
• Delete Course

Department of Psychology

• New Course

Department of Biological Engineering

• New Course
• Title Change
• Prerequisite Change

Department of Civil and Environmental Engineering

• Prerequisite Change

Department of Mechanical and Aerospace Engineering

• Prerequisite Change
• Title …

The Utah Statesman, April 3, 2014, Utah State University

The Utah Statesman

Weekly student newspaper of Utah State University in Logan.

Curriculum Subcommittee Minutes, April 3, 2014, Utah State University

Educational Policies Committee

Department of Agricultural Systems Technology and Education

• Prefix Change

School of Applied Sciences, Technology and Education

• USU-Eastern Non-Credit Courses for Northstar to Banner Conversion

Department of Art and Design

• New Course
• Prerequisite Change
• Course Description Change
• Prerequisite Change, Course Description Change
• Title Change, Course Description Change
• Course Number Change, Prerequisite Change
• Course Number Change, Title Change
• Course Number Change, Title Change, Prerequisite Change, Course Description Change
• Delete Course

Department of Psychology

• New Course

Department of Biological Engineering

• New Course
• Title Change
• Prerequisite Change

Department of Civil and Environmental Engineering

• Prerequisite Change

Department of Mechanical and Aerospace Engineering

• Prerequisite Change
• Title …

Utah State Magazine, Spring 2014, Utah State University

Utah State Magazine

The quarterly magazine for friends and alumni of Utah State University.

Liberalis, Spring 2014, Utah State University

Liberalis

Freedom to Think, Discover, and Create. The alumni magazine for the College of Humanities and Social Sciences at Utah State Univeristy.

A Functional Framework For Improved Management Of Western North American Aspen (Populus Tremuloides Michx.), Paul C. Rogers, Simon M. Landhausser, Bradley D. Pinno, Ronald J. Ryel

Wildland Resources Faculty Publications

Quaking or trembling aspen (Populus tremuloides Michx.) forests occur in highly diverse setting across North America. However, management of distinct communities has long relied on a single aspen to-conifer successional model. We examine a variety of aspen dominated stand types in the western portion of its range as ecological systems; avoiding an exclusive focus on seral dynamics or single species management. We build a case for a large-scale functional aspen typology based on existing literature. Aspen functional types are defined as aspen communities that differ markedly in their physical and biological processes. The framework presented here describes two “functional types” …

An American Enterprise? British Participation In Us Food Relief Programmes (1914-1923), Tammy M. Proctor

History Faculty Publications

This article examines a particularly fraught zone where the British and American conceptions of food aid and moral guidance conflicted – the former enemy nations of Austria and Germany. These countries were considered special cases for food relief, not only because the British and American public had little interest in feeding their former foes, but also because each was seen by aid officials as societies that might succumb to social revolution if food security was not established. While the Americans had established a massive child-feeding operation in Europe under the auspices of the American Relief Administration's European Children's Fund and …

The Utah Statesman, April 1, 2014, Utah State University

The Utah Statesman

Weekly student newspaper of Utah State University in Logan.

Herbivory Strains Resilience In Drought-Prone Aspen Landscapes Of The Western United States, Paul C. Rogers

Aspen Bibliography

Aims: Aspen forests around the northern hemisphere provide rich biodiversity compared to surrounding vegetation types. In both North America and Europe, however, aspen are threatened by a variety of human impacts: clear-felling, land development, water diversions, fire suppression, and both wild and domestic ungulate herbivory. We conducted a landscape assessment of quaking aspen (Populus tremuloides) for the purpose of identifying key components of resilience. Specifically, we strove to test novel measures linking plant-animal interactions, compare crucial functional differences in aspen types, and make appropriate restorative recommendations based on the outcome of these assessments. Location: The Book Cliffs region of eastern …

Halogeton (H. Glomeratus) Poisoning In Cattle: Case Report, Kerry A. Rood, Kip E. Panter, Dale R. Gardner, Bryan L. Stegelmeier, Jeffery O. Hall

Animal, Dairy, and Veterinary Science Faculty Publications

Historically, the most significant losses from halogeton poisoning have been reported in sheep, with multiple catastrophic deaths documented. While recorded death losses in cattle from halogeton poisoning are less common than in sheep, recent cases, including 2 reported here, and anecdotal reports from other ranchers suggest that the impact of halogeton losses in cattle herds in the western United States is much more widespread than originally thought. Halogeton may accumulate up to 30% oxalates; a small amount of the plant (300 g) is enough to cause death in sheep. Oxalates precipitate calcium from the blood, resulting in hypocalcemia, formation of …