Digital Commons Network^™

Decline Of An Ecotone Forest: 50 Years Of Demography In The Southern Boreal Forest, Joseph D. Birch, James A. Lutz, E. H. Hogg, Suzanne W. Simard, Rick Pelletier, George H. Laroi, Justine Karst

Wildland Resources Faculty Publications

Variation in tree recruitment, mortality, and growth can alter forest community composition and structure. Because tree recruitment and mortality events are generally infrequent, long‐time scales are needed to confirm trends in forests. We performed a 50‐yr demographic census of a forest plot located on the southern edge of the Canadian boreal forest, a region currently experiencing forest die‐back in response to direct and indirect effects of recent severe droughts. Here, we show that over the last 30 yr biomass, basal area, growth, and recruitment have decreased along with a precipitous rise in mortality across the dominant tree species. The stand …

The Impact Of Demographic Transition (Elderly Dependency Ratio) On Fiscal Balance, Patrick Nartey

Student Research Symposium

The united states currently is the third populous nation in the world after china and India. This represents about 4.5% of the world's population. the U.S population was estimated at 308.7 million during the 2010 census. The share of the population that is 65 and over keeps rising over the years .Over the last ten years the 65 and over population has jumped from 12.55 to 15%.This paper seeks to find the relationship between the fiscal balance and the demographic variables. Proper understanding of this dynamics enables policy-makers to develop pragmatic projection with regards to government expenditure on some essential …

Addressing Perinatal Mortality, Jamal-Jared Alexander, Sara Margetts, Emily Lowe

Student Research Symposium

Our research presents a proposed public health program which will address and provide activities related to training mental health providers, establish a perinatal-specific mom-baby inpatient treatment unit, and incorporate FDA approved pharmacological treatments alongside standard evidence-based treatment modalities. This evidence-based treatment program will be available near but separate from all inpatient psychiatric treatment facilities (i.e. our target population) as a long-term goal, but our program aims to pilot a program in a single large metropolitan hospital psychiatric ward (i.e. our recipient audience). We will take an innovative approach that requires a local early-adopter to demonstrate its feasibility and value before …

To Frack Or Not To Frack: Hearing The Voice Of The People, Megan Aagard, Mo Uasike

Student Research Symposium

Over the course of the the last decade Hydraulic Fracturing or Fracking has become an increasingly popular practice throughout the United States, specifically in rural areas. This industry has been the cause of expanded debates in communities that are nearby fracking site locations. The citizens opinions on fracking can be affected by factors such as environmental consequences, personal and public health concerns, employment opportunities, tax increase and decrease, state and county income and population fluctuation. The focus of our study is to incorporate qualitative analysis data by collecting information found by using interviews conducted with employees of fracking sites and …

Konaway Nikka Tillicum Native American Youth Academy: Cultural Identity, Self-Esteem, Academic Optimism, Tammie Barrett

Student Research Symposium

Through using a Positive Youth Development framework and culturally based education program, Konaway Nikka Tillicum Native American Youth Academy aspires to mentor and prepare Native youth through high school and on to higher education. This community-based participatory research partnership investigated cultural identity, self-esteem, and academic optimism of Native American youth attending the academy. The variables examined were found to be significantly related to one another and to have increased significantly from baseline to post-intervention. Additionally, none of the measured factors were predictive of participants overall GPA at baseline. Lastly, the relationship between cultural identity and academic optimism appeared to be …

From Chod To Feeding Your Demons: A Western Approach To Tibetan Tantra, Tanner Mcalister

Student Research Symposium

"From Chod to Feeding Your Demons: A Western Adaptation of Tibetan Tantra Tanner McAlister and Dr. Dominic Sur (Mentor), Religious Studies. This research examines how Chod, a tantric Buddhist ritual traced to eleventh-century Tibet, has been altered in the West by Buddhist teacher, Lama Tsultrim Allione. The analysis aims to uncover whether the soteriological dimension of Chod has been altered from buddhahood to psychological well-being. Chod's transmission to the West and its scope as a non-traditional practice is a recent phenomenon tracing back to just the last decade of the twentieth century. Although publications on Chod as practiced in Tibet …

Health Care Provider Recruitment And Retention In Millard County, Utah, Ron Draper

Student Research Symposium

Millard County, Utah with its remote rural location and low population density has experienced recurring problems with recruiting and retaining primary care health care providers. By conducting a series of in-depth interviews with current and past health care providers as well as administrators involved in the recruitment efforts, this research aims to improve the understanding of the root causes of provider recruitment and retention failures in Millard County. Findings of this study will help us design more effective methods of recruiting and retaining health care providers in the county. Lessons learned from Millard County may also provide valuable insights for …

Impact Of The Introduction Of Black Raspberries In A Standard Western-Style Diet On Colitis And Colorectal Cancer Risk In Mice, Daphne Rodriguez, Korry Hintze

Student Research Symposium

Approximately 1.4 million people suffer from inflammatory bowel disease, which is major risk factor for developing colitis associated colorectal cancer (CAC). Dietary interventions with the goal to reduce colon inflammation and encourage gut microbiome homeostasis may be a strategy to reduce the risk of CAC. The antioxidants and antiinflammatory compounds present in black raspberries (BRB) have demonstrated protective effects in the colon epithelium and may alter the composition of the gut microbiome. Previously, we showed that dietary supplementation with black raspberries significantly suppressed coliti and colon tumorigenesis promoted by the consumption of a Western type diet in mice. The goal …

The Effects Of Ovarian Somatic Cells On Post-Menopausal Health, Tracy Habermehl, Kyleigh Tyler, Mckenna Walters, Steven Gawrys

Student Research Symposium

The Effects of Ovarian Somatic Cells on Post-Menopausal Healt Tracy L. Habermehl, Kyleigh A. Tyler, McKenna R. Walters, Steven T. Gawrys, Jeffrey B. Maso Department of Animal, Dairy, and Veterinary Sciences, School of Veterinary Medicine, Utah State University, Logan, Utah Reproductively cycling females have a significant health advantage over similarly aged males. At menopause, their ovaries become senescent and the risk of health-related diseases increases. Transplantation of young, intact ovaries into aged mice increased longevity. Germ cell-depleted ovarian transplants displayed a further extension of life and health span. Replacement of young, ovarian somatic cells allows the ovaries to support increased …

Socioenvironmental Factors And The Birthplace Effect: An Exploration Of Community "Sweet Spots" In Elite Level Basketball, Jaxson Webb, Marcus Myers

Student Research Symposium

Past research has indicated that both the population and population density of an athlete's hometown can impact their chance of reaching the elite levels of their sport. Termed the birthplace effect, this phenomenon is sport-specific, with varying population parameters leading to elite performance across sports and cultures (Côté et al., 2006; Hancock et al., 2017; Imtiaz et al., 2014). Vierimaa, Hancock, and Budziszewski (2018) recently studied the birthplace effect in basketball, and found that cities with populations ranging from 100,000 to 999,999 and with population densities between 1,000 and 4,999 sq/km were especially adept at cultivating elite players. The present …

Response Inhibition And Reactive Balance In Older Adults, Derek England

Student Research Symposium

Response inhibition involves stopping undesired and automatic actions allowing for behavioral flexibility. This ability is theoretically able to contribute to fall prevention, which older adults are known to have difficulty with. Although much has been learned from cognitive psychology regarding response inhibition, translation to the challenge of balance recovery is unclear. Recently a correlation has been found between performance on a standard test of response inhibition called the Stop Signal Task (SST) and a balance test that required inhibition of a reactive step in young adults. This highlights a neural mechanism for stopping action across different behavioral contexts in young …

"Get Tough!": A Case Study On The Development Of The Sport Ethic In Youth Lacrosse, Ross Budziszewski

Student Research Symposium

While participation in youth sport is often linked with positive psychosocial and physical outcomes (Holt et al., 2017), this context can also cultivate ideals that lead to the development of unethical beliefs and unsafe sport practices (Al-Yaarbi & Kavussanu, 2017). The sport ethic is described as the deviant overconformity by an athlete to fit societal expectations of a sport's high-performance culture (Hughes & Coakley, 1991). Strong beliefs in the sport ethic can lead to moral disengagement, antisocial behavior, and treating sport like warfare (Shields, Funk, & Bredemeier, 2015). Although the sport ethic has been widely studied in competitive adult sport, …

Mind The Gap: Exploring Mindfulness As A Tool For Tutors, Students, And Everyone In Between, Ashley Thompson

Tutor's Column

Tutors, students, and anyone else involved in academics tend to shoulder oversized cognitive loads. Those who are under stress need tactics for dealing with emotional burdens in order to continue functioning and performing at the highest level. In writing labs and other peer-headed facilities for academic help, tutors can use mindfulness to increase their own emotional capacity while helping students regulate their own emotions as well. Simple strategies and mindfulness practices can be implemented by individuals at the front lines of tutoring centers to accomplish goals of stress relief and emotional health. By implementing simple practices to refocus on the …

Hemp Research Underway At Utah State University, Utah Water Research Laboratory

News

Scientists at Utah State University are studying cultivation practices to optimize the yield and quality of hemp for botanical medicines.

The Role Of Tourism Impacts On Cultural Ecosystem Services, B. Derrick Taff, Jacob Benfield, Zachary D. Miller, Ashley D'Antonio, Forrest Schwartz

Environment and Society Student Research

Parks and protected areas are recognized for the important ecosystem services, or benefits, they provide society. One emerging but understudied component is the cultural ecosystem services that parks and protected areas provide. These cultural ecosystem services include a variety of benefits, such as cultural heritage, spiritual value, recreation opportunities, and human health and well-being. However, many of these services can only be provided if people visit these parks and protected areas through tourism opportunities. However, with this tourism use comes a variety of inevitable resource impacts. This current research connects potential impacts from tourism in parks and protected areas to …

‘‘Can You Take The Heat?’’ Heat-Induced Health Symptoms Are Associated With Protective Behaviors, Emily D. Esplin, Jennifer R. Marlon, Anthony Leiserowitz, Peter D. Howe

Environment and Society Faculty Publications

The risks associated with extreme heat are increasing as heat waves become more frequent and severe across larger areas. As people begin to experience heat waves more often and in more places, how will individuals respond? Measuring experience with heat simply as exposure to extreme temperatures may not fully capture how people subjectively experience those temperatures or their varied impacts on human health. These impacts may also influence an individual’s response to heat and motivate risk-reduction behaviors. If subjectively experiencing negative health effects from extreme heat promotes protective actions, these effects could be used alongside temperature exposure to more accurately …

Building Community, Fostering Collaboration, And Engaging Bridge Program Students With A College’S Historical Archives, Russell Michalak, Monica D. T. Rysavy, Gregory C. Thompson

Journal of Western Archives

Similar to smaller archives, this college’s archives have not been traditionally accessible online. Two instructors sought to teach summer bridge program (Boot Camp) students basic archival practices and quantitatively measure their information literacy skills through using the Information Literacy Skills (ILA) and Students’ Perceptions of their Information Skills-Questionnaire (SPIL-Q) instruments (cite). Boot Camp students’ average perceived confidence with IL skills as assessed by the SPIL-Q instrument increased from 4.00 to 4.77 (+19.2%) on the post-training SPIL-Q. By adding the ILA and SPIL-Q instruments to the course curriculum, combined with end of course reflection questions, the instructors were able to quantitatively …

Documenting Disasters: A Focus On Floods, Patricia J. Rettig

Journal of Western Archives

A more thorough understanding of disasters can help archivists assemble and acquire collections of depth that will be of wide use to scholars, survivors, and others. To investigate the broader context of disasters, the focus of this article is on natural disasters, looking at floods in particular, with the hope that the information can be applied to other tragedies. The article includes an in-depth examination of disaster studies literature of assistance to archivists, along with accounts of experiences working with flood collections.

Usu’S Center For Persons With Disabilities To Collaborate On Mental Health Grant, Sue Reeves

Blog Posts

The blog post is about CPD’s collaboration on a mental health grant.

Tree Resprout Dynamics Following Fire Depend On Herbivory By Wild Ungulate Herbivores, Eric M. Lamalfa, Duncan M. Kimuyu, Ryan L. Sensenig, Truman P. Young, Corinna Riginos, Kari E. Veblen

Wildland Resources Faculty Publications

1. Savanna tree cover is dynamic due to disturbances such as fire and herbivory. Frequent fires can limit a key demographic transition from sapling to adult height classes in savanna trees. Saplings may be caught in a ‘fire trap’, wherein individuals repeatedly resprout following fire top-kill events. Saplings only rarely escape the cycle by attaining a fire-resistant height (e.g. taller than the minimum scorch height) during fire-free intervals.
2. Large mammalian herbivores also may trap trees in shorter size classes. Browsing herbivores directly limit sapling height, while grazing herbivores such as cattle facilitate sapling growth indirectly via grass removal. Experimental studies investigating …

Use Of Surface-Enhanced Raman Scattering (Sers) Probes To Detect Fatty Acid Receptor Activity In A Microfluidic Device, Han Zhang, Wei Zhang, Lifu Xiao, Yan Liu, Timothy A. Gilbertson, Anhong Zhou

Biological Engineering Faculty Publications

In this study, 4-mercaptobenzoic acid (MBA)-Au nanorods conjugated with a GPR120 antibody were developed as a highly sensitive surface-enhanced Raman spectroscopy (SERS) probe, and were applied to detect the interaction of fatty acids (FA) and their cognate receptor, GPR120, on the surface of human embryonic kidney cells (HEK293-GPRR120) cultured in a polydimethylsiloxane (PDMS) microfluidic device. Importantly, the two dominant characteristic SERS peaks of the Raman reporter molecule MBA, 1078 cm⁻¹ and 1581 cm⁻¹, do not overlap with the main Raman peaks from the PDMS substrate when the appropriate spectral scanning range is selected, which effectively avoided the …

Efficacy Of A Ml336 Derivative Against Venezuelan And Eastern Equine Encephalitis Viruses, Colleen B. Jonsson, Xufeng Cao, Jasper Lee, Jon D. Gabbard, Yong-Kyu Chu, Elizabeth A. Fitzpatrick, Justin G. Julander, Dong-Hoon Chung, Jennifer Stabenow, Jennifer E. Golden

Animal, Dairy, and Veterinary Science Faculty Publications

Currently, there are no licensed human vaccines or antivirals for treatment of or prevention from infection with encephalitic alphaviruses. Because epidemics are sporadic and unpredictable, and endemic disease is common but rarely diagnosed, it is difficult to identify all populations requiring vaccination; thus, an effective post-exposure treatment method is needed to interrupt ongoing outbreaks. To address this public health need, we have continued development of ML336 to deliver a molecule with prophylactic and therapeutic potential that could be relevant for use in natural epidemics or deliberate release scenario for Venezuelan equine encephalitis virus (VEEV). We report findings from in vitro …

Curriculum Subcommittee Minutes, April 4, 2019, Utah State University

Educational Policies Committee

Program Proposals

• Offering a Bachelor of Science in Human Experience Design and Interaction
• Discontinuing all K-6 degree programs leading to licensure
• Changing the specialization name in Literature and Writing to Creative Writing
• Restructuring Climate Adaptation Science
• Changing the department name from Geology to Geosciences

Semester Course Approval Reviews

Other

• Appoint committee chair for 2019-2020 academic year

Curriculum Subcommittee Agenda, April 4, 2019, Utah State University

Educational Policies Committee

Program Proposals

• Offering a Bachelor of Science in Human Experience Design and Interaction
• Discontinuing all K-6 degree programs leading to licensure
• Changing the specialization name in Literature and Writing to Creative Writing
• Restructuring Climate Adaptation Science
• Changing the department name from Geology to Geosciences

Semester Course Approval Reviews

Other

• Appoint committee chair for 2019-2020 academic year

Educational Policies Committee Agenda, April 4, 2019, Utah State University

Educational Policies Committee

• Curriculum Subcommittee
• Academic Standards committee
• General Education Subcommittee
• Appoint committee chair for 2019-2020 academic year.

Educational Policies Committee Minutes, April 4, 2019, Utah State University

Educational Policies Committee

• Curriculum Subcommittee report
• Academic Standards Subcommittee report
• General Education Subcommittee report
• Appoint committee chair for 2019-2020 academic year

Wild Bee Diversity Increases With Local Fire Severity In A Fire‐Prone Landscape, Sara M. Galbraith, James H. Cane, Andrew R. Moldenke, James W. Rivers

All PIRU Publications

As wildfire activity increases in many regions of the world, it is imperative that we understand how key components of fire‐prone ecosystems respond to spatial variation in fire characteristics. Pollinators provide a foundation for ecological communities by assisting in the reproduction of native plants, yet our understanding of how pollinators such as wild bees respond to variation in fire severity is limited, particularly for forest ecosystems. Here, we took advantage of a natural experiment created by a large‐scale, mixed‐severity wildfire to provide the first assessment of how wild bee communities are shaped by fire severity in mixed‐conifer forest. We sampled …

Low-Cost, Open-Source, And Low-Power: But What To Do With The Data?, Jeffery S. Horsburgh, Juan Caraballo, Maurier Ramírez, Anthony K. Aufdenkampe, David B. Arscott, Sara Geleskie Damiano

Civil and Environmental Engineering Faculty Publications

There are now many ongoing efforts to develop low-cost, open-source, low-power sensors and datalogging solutions for environmental monitoring applications. Many of these have advanced to the point that high quality scientific measurements can be made using relatively inexpensive and increasingly off-the-shelf components. With the development of these innovative systems, however, comes the ability to generate large volumes of high-frequency monitoring data and the challenge of how to log, transmit, store, and share the resulting data. This paper describes a new web application that was designed to enable citizen scientists to stream sensor data from a network of Arduino-based dataloggers to …

Climate And Lawn Management Interact To Control C4 Plant Distribution In Residential Lawns Across Seven U.S. Cities, Tara L. E. Trammell, Diane E. Pataki, Christopher J. Still, James R. Ehleringer, Meghan L. Avolio, Neil Bettez, Jeannine Cavender-Bares, Peter M. Groffman, Morgan Grove, Sharon J. Hall, James Heffernan, Sarah E. Hobbie, Kelli L. Larson, Jennifer L. Morse, Christopher Neill, Kristen C. Nelson, Jarlath O'Neil-Dunne, William D. Pearse, Et Al.

Ecology Center Publications

In natural grasslands, C₄ plant dominance increases with growing season temperatures and reflects distinct differences in plant growth rates and water use efficiencies of C₃ vs. C₄ photosynthetic pathways. However, in lawns, management decisions influence interactions between planted turfgrass and weed species, leading to some uncertainty about the degree of human vs. climatic controls on lawn species distributions. We measured herbaceous plant carbon isotope ratios (δ¹³C, index of C₃/C₄ relative abundance) and C₄ cover in residential lawns across seven U.S. cities to determine how climate, lawn plant management, or interactions between …

How Virtual Reality Impacts The Landscape Architecture Design Process During The Phases Of Analysis And Concept Development At The Master Planning Scale, Todd Johnson, Benjamin H. George, Drew M. Hill

Landscape Architecture and Environmental Planning Faculty Publications

Virtual reality (VR) can offer many benefits for designers. In the field of landscape architecture, the technology is primarily being used as a tool for design review in the late stages of the design process, yet many of the benefits that make VR valuable in the later stages of the design process suggest that VR may be equally valuable when used in earlier stages such as analysis and concept development. This research examined incorporating VR into the design phases of analysis and concept development, and integrated its use with traditional landscape architecture methods to measure its impacts on a large …