Digital Commons Network^™

Imaging Spectrometer Implementation On A Small Satellite Platform For Aquatic Ecosystems Science, Corrie Smeaton, Ronald Lockwood, Michael Chrisp, Charles Bachmann, Laura Kennedy, Steve Gillmer, Linda Fuhrman, Derrick Brouhard, Jade Wang

Small Satellite Conference

The implementation of Imaging spectrometers with state-of-the-art performance on small satellites is challenging due to the size, weight, and power (SWaP) limitations. We have recently developed a compact form, the Chrisp Compact VNIR/SWIR Imaging Spectrometer (CCVIS), that facilitates their usage without sacrificing performance. The CCVIS enables a modular implementation that, combined with a freeform telescope, produces a wide field of view with high signal to noise ratio (SNR) performance. The targeted scientific application is the study of aquatic ecosystems. The imaging spectrometer is designed to address carbon sequestration in coastal margins and wetlands, kelp and seagrass studies, coral reefs, harmful …

Scouts Missions: Esa New Program For Science Mission Based On Small Satellite, Massimiliano Pastena, Jean-Pascal Lejault, Dominique Gilliéron

Small Satellite Conference

This paper presents the main characteristics of the new Scout framework in ESA's Earth Observation directorate aimed to exploit and support the New Space initiative in Europe in the frame of Earth science missions. In particular, details will be provided to explain the subtle balance between the commercial new space aspects and the science traditional aspects of the Scout framework. An overview of the 4 missions selected during the first consolidation round will be given as well as the one under development highlighting for each one the innovations, applications as well as the challenges and the achievements of the development …

The Pandora Smallsat: Mission Overview, Jordan Karburn, Pete Supsinskas, Hilary Johnson, Maricris Schneider, Elisa Quintana, Jessie Dotson, Knicole Colon, Tom Barclay, Christina Hedges, Jessie Dotson

Small Satellite Conference

The NASA Pioneers Program is tasked with performing compelling astrophysics science at lower cost, with smaller hardware, compared to Explorers Program missions. The Pandora SmallSat was selected as an inaugural Pioneers mission. Pandora uses an aluminum, 45-cm, dual channel Cassegrain telescope as its scientific instrument. The instrument will obtain the first dataset of simultaneous, multiband, long-baseline observations of exoplanets and their host stars. The goal is to use these data to reliably characterize planetary atmospheres by disentagling star and planet signals in transmission spectra.

Early in project formulation, the Pandora team developed a suite of high-fidelity parametrized simulation and modeling …

How Do Different Market-Oriented News Organizations Portray News Coverage About The Cares Act?, Michelle Rossi

Journalism and Communication Faculty Publications

Drawing from CARES Act news coverage, this study investigated how different market-oriented news organizations modulated the debate on the most expansive stimulus bill in modern U.S. history, released in 2020, during the coronavirus pandemic. A comparative approach was used, between news articles produced by a strongly market-oriented and a weakly market-oriented news outlet, both national news outlets, based in the United States. Using market theory as a guide to explore published news content, this study focuses on showing the range of debate, news sources, and journalistic role performances employed in coverage of the same topic, coming from differently funded newsrooms. …

The Radfxsat-2 Mission To Measure Seu Rates In Finfet Microelectronics, Chloe A. Champagne, Brian D. Sierawski, Rebekah A. Austin, James M. Trippe, Kevin M. Warren, Andrew L. Sternberg, Robert A. Reed, Robert A. Weller, Eric Skoog, Gerald W. Buxton Iii, W. Burns Fisher, Robert Davis, Christopher E. Thompson, Mark L. Hammond

Small Satellite Conference

The RadFxSat-2 mission was launched January 17, 2021 with Virgin Orbit's LauncherOne under the NASA ELaNa-20 initiative. RadFxSat-2 carries a radiation effects payload designed to investigate single event upsets (SEUs) in sub-65 nm commercial memories, including a FinFET-based memory. Sub-65 nm technologies have demonstrated enhanced sensitivity to low-energy protons, but current models have not considered low-energy protons as a source of SEUs. Missions utilizing the latest commercial technologies could experience a higher error rate than predicted. RadFxSat-2 was designed to assess SEU rates for FinFET SRAMs operated in low-Earth orbit (LEO), a proton-heavy environment. Details of the mission and data …

The Esa Φsat-2 Mission: An A.I Enhanced Multispectral Cubesat For Earth Observation, Nicola Melega, Valentina Marchese, Agnė Paškevičiūtė-Kidron, Bernardo Carnicero Dominguez, Nicolas Longepe, Oriol Aragon Casaled, Irina Babkina, Alessandro Marin, Hano Steyn, Léonie Buckley, Jakub Nalepa, Sofia Oliveira, Giorgia Guerrisi

Small Satellite Conference

As part of an initiative to promote the development and implementation of innovative technologies on-board Earth Observation (EO) missions, the European Space Agency (ESA) kicked off the first Φsat related activities in 2018 with the aim of enhancing the already ongoing FSSCAT project with Artificial Intelligence (AI).

The selected Φsat-2 concept will provide a combination of on-board processing capabilities (including AI) and a medium to high resolution multispectral instrument from Visible to Near Infra-Red (VIS/NIR) able to acquire 8 bands (7 + Panchromatic) provided by SIMERA SENSE Europe (BE). These resources will be made available to a series of dedicated …

Saturn: A Technological Demonstration Mission For Distributed Sar Imaging, Matteo Battilana, Giulia Capuani, Vito Lamarca, Luca Maioli, Vincenzo Mancini, Maria Lucia Tampellini, Fabio Gerace, Davide Giudici, Pietro Guccione, Julien Marini, Luciano D’Agristina, Domenico Di Lanzo, Andrea Monti Guarnieri, Alberto Fedele, Roberto Luciani, Francesco Tataranni, Silvia Natalucci

Small Satellite Conference

The OHB-Italia S.p.A-led consortium is in the midst of Phase B of SATURN (Synthetic AperTure radar cUbesat foRmation flyiNg), part of ALCOR, an Italian Space Agency (ASI) programme promoting the development of the next generation Italian CubeSats. SATURN is a demonstration mission that features Multiple-Input-Multiple-Output (MIMO) technology applied to a Swarm of CubeSats equipped with Synthetic Aperture Radar (SAR) for Earth Observation. MIMO is based on cooperative active sensors, where each one transmits signals and receives the illuminated common area backscatter related to the entire swarm, increasing measurement performances with a trend approximatively equal to the square of …

Designing A Rubric For Evaluating Curricular Resources In Montana's Indian Education For All Repository: A Design-Based Research Approach, Megan M. Hamilton

All Graduate Theses and Dissertations, Spring 1920 to Summer 2023

The purpose of this research study was to create an initial rubric to evaluate social studies lesson plans prior to their addition to Montana Office of Public Instruction’s online repository for Indian Education for All (IEFA) curriculum. In the first phase of this study, I examined Montana’s IEFA curriculum thematically to gain a better understanding of how Indigenous histories and perspectives are being represented using combined theoretical lenses of Tribal Critical Race Theory and culturally sustaining/ revitalizing pedagogy. In the second phase of this study, I used my thematic findings to inform the design of a theory-informed evaluative rubric. The …

By Other Means: The Political And Economic Motivations For The Formation Of The Anglo-Japanese Alliance Of 1902 In The United Kingdom, David Cornell

All Graduate Theses and Dissertations, Spring 1920 to Summer 2023

This thesis is an attempt to answer the question of why British political leaders made the Anglo-Japanese Alliance of 1902. To answer this question, I have used primary sources such as government communications, newspaper articles, and articles from scholarly journals. Also, I have consulted the works of past historians to better understand the complex topic of the Anglo-Japanese alliance. This thesis is divided into three chapters. Chapter One explains the events that led up to the creation of the treaty between Britain and Japan and clarifies why this treaty was so unusual for the British Empire in the early 1900s. …

“Whan The Turuf Is Thy Tour”: Analyzing Gender Codes Of Burial Monuments In Late Medieval And Early Modern England, Shelbie Durrant

All Graduate Theses and Dissertations, Spring 1920 to Summer 2023

The cultural pressures of gender conformity and "norms" have lasted as long as the social constructs of gender themselves. Gender is present and can be analyzed in symbols within material culture such as the Russell family funerary monuments located in their private chapel in Chenies, London. Gender, although not always transparently at the front of consciousness, was interacted with, performed, and memorialized in life and death, especially for families that were high status. The presence of gender in these funerary monuments illuminates how expected conformity of gender norms were in this time — so present that they were literally set …

Centering Indigenous Knowledge: Reimagining Research Methods, Pedagogies, And Sustainability With Niitsitapi Awaaáhsskataiksi (Blackfoot Elders), Sandra Bartlett Atwood

All Graduate Theses and Dissertations, Spring 1920 to Summer 2023

My research sought to better engage with Indigenous ways of knowing and being (IWKB). Specifically, I collaborated with Blackfoot Elders (and Hawaiian Kupuna) to better understand 1) their perspectives towards land, 2) what factors instigate and perpetuate these perspectives, 3) how these perspectives play out in terms of identity; well being; daily life; education; environmental concern, behavior, and stewardship, and 4) ways that these perspectives towards land can inform and transform Western perspectives on land and perhaps lead to better and more equitable social-ecological outcomes. I approached this from three angles. First, I described a method for braiding Indigenous and …

Contextualization Of El Salvador’S Need For A Powerful Executive: A Lockean Analysis Of Nayib Bukele's Approach To Public Security In A Historical, Political, And Social Synthesis, Manuel Agresio Girón Alemán

All Graduate Theses and Dissertations, Spring 1920 to Summer 2023

For most of the three decades that have presided over the Salvadoran Civil War, El Salvador has been a state tormented by high levels of crime, especially the country's homicide rate, a product of the strong presence of criminal organizations such as MS-13 and 18th Street Gang. The current president of El Salvador, Nayib Bukele, who took office in 2019, has declared war on gangs under a state of emergency where the human rights of suspected criminals are violated, particularly their due process guarantees. This has caused Bukele’s government to draw strong condemnation and criticism from foreign governments and human …

Temporally Weighted Averaging: The Effects Of Test Delay On Spontaneous Recovery Of Choice, Jack Van Allsburg

All Graduate Theses and Dissertations, Spring 1920 to Summer 2023

Foraging animals in natural environments must track the value of different behavioral options in order to make decisions that maximize their food intake. The process by which they track this value is poorly understood, but holds relevance for our understanding of how animals make choices in general. In a series of experiments conducted in operant chambers, we put rat subjects in a choice scenario where they could press two levers, one of which would intermittently produce the delivery of food pellets on a rich (more frequent) schedule, while the other would do the same on a lean (less frequent) schedule. …

#Bodypositivity Or #Bodypolitics?: A Rhetorical Analysis Of The Body Positivity Myth Formed By Narratives Of Political Myth, Sydney Berenyi Lasike

All Graduate Theses and Dissertations, Spring 1920 to Summer 2023

The Body Positivity movement is well-known for advocating for the acceptance of all body types—including size, shape, color, and ability. Images online in support of the movement often showcase stretch marks, cellulite, and other “unattractive” bodily features to protest against the thin-ideal and strict standards of beauty placed upon women. Despite the goal to inspire self-love and celebration of all bodies, the hashtag #BodyPositivity has been taken-over by white, female influencers who have the idolized, female body. They contradict the original message of the movement through their posts on Instagram that centralize white feminine features and thin, Eurocentric bodies. This …

Making Space For Student Agency: A Multilayered Exploration Of Agency And Writing In A First‐Grade Classroom, Kara Decoursey

All Graduate Theses and Dissertations, Spring 1920 to Summer 2023

Early literacy learning is crucial for later success in reading and writing. We have a limited understanding of generative writing (i.e., expressing ideas in writing) in first grade and further research is warranted. The socially situated nature of writing justifies a study of student agency during writing.

In this study, data were collected before, during, and after 10 writing sessions in a first-grade classroom. Students took a pre- and post-survey that revealed their self-perceptions of their agency and confidence as literacy learners. The participating teacher was interviewed three times and the teacher’s talk was recorded during all 45- to 60- …

All Good Women Are Mothers: Exploring Gender Binaries In How I Met Your Mother, Jessica Marinho

All Graduate Theses and Dissertations, Spring 1920 to Summer 2023

Television is thought to be a form of entertainment through its many genres from comedy to drama, however, it is more than a relaxing pastime. Television series construct messages that influence audiences to accept specific behaviors. In this thesis, I analyzed the portrayal of the two main female characters in the popular television series How I Met Your Mother (2005-2009) and I argued how their depiction served to represent childless women as unwomanly and mothers as the ideal woman.

A Statewide Evaluation Of Fuel Treatment Effectiveness In Altering Wildfire Outcomes On Public Lands In Utah, Jamela Charmaine Thompson

All Graduate Theses and Dissertations, Spring 1920 to Summer 2023

Fuel treatments are land management activities that reduce living and dead flammable materials on the landscape to mitigate undesirable wildfire behavior and effects. Common treatments in the western United States include mechanical methods such as thinning and mastication, prescribed burns, and chemical methods, such as herbicide application. Treatments usually have multiple objectives, including reducing fire intensity, protecting natural and cultural resources, slowing or disrupting a potential future fire’s path, supporting ecosystem health, and reestablishing low to mid severity fire cycles in ecosystems. Although treatments can potentially modify fire behavior and ecological health, they generally cannot prevent fires from igniting, eliminate …

A Scalable, Cost-Oriented Approach For Computing Charge Plans For Electric Bus Fleets, Daniel T. Mortensen

All Graduate Theses and Dissertations, Spring 1920 to Summer 2023

Recent attention for reduced carbon emissions has pushed transit authorities to adopt battery electric buses (BEBs). One challenge experienced by BEB users is extended charge times, which create logistical challenges and may force BEBs to charge when energy is more expensive. Furthermore, BEB charging leads to high power demands, which can significantly increase monthly power costs and may push electrical infrastructure beyond its present capacity, requiring expensive upgrades. This work presents a novel method for minimizing the monthly cost of BEB charging while meeting bus route constraints. This method extends previous work by incorporating a more novel cost model, effects …

Volatile Cycling And Metasomatism In Flat-Slab Subduction Zones Of The Central Andes, Coleman Hiett

All Graduate Theses and Dissertations, Spring 1920 to Summer 2023

Flat-slab subduction, where an oceanic plate subducts horizontally below a continental margin for hundreds of kilometers, is an enigmatic but prevalent tectonic configuration in which chemical cycling and alteration of the continental plate is poorly constrained. Geochemical investigations in regions of modern and ancient flat-slab subduction in the Central Andes afford an opportunity to study this process. Certain elements naturally occur with varying number of neutrons in their nuclei (isotopes), and measurements of isotope ratios within geologic materials inform on chemical sources and geologic processes. This research leverages stable isotope analyses and other geochemical tools to investigate volatiles and other …

Population Physiology, Demography, And Genetics Of Side-Blotched Lizards (Uta Stansburiana) Residing In Urban And Natural Environments, Spencer B. Hudson

All Graduate Theses and Dissertations, Spring 1920 to Summer 2023

Wildlife populations across the globe are poised to lose their natural habitat to urbanization, yet there is limited information on how different species handle living in cities. Animals in urban environments are often susceptible to novel stressors, which can threaten their individual health and population viability. The physiological characteristics of animals, such as those related to metabolic hormones, oxidative stress, and immunity, are expected to be important for survival in this context. If so, animals persisting in urban areas may demonstrate physiological differences from their natural counterparts, perhaps due to evolutionary change. These potential outcomes have been documented in birds …

Subduing The Wolf: Utah Pioneer Identity And The War On Wolves Between 1852 And 2020., Mason Lytle

All Graduate Theses and Dissertations, Spring 1920 to Summer 2023

Utah has a unique history of pioneer settlement connected to the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints. This history has become a source of pride that began with the first white settlers. I have come to call this the “deseret pioneer” identity, to differentiate from other western settlers. From the nineteenth to the twenty-first century, politicians and agriculturalists used this “deseret pioneer” identity to thwart federal protections for wolves and respond to wilderness policies that made Utah the only “rocky-mountain” state to not have wolves in the twenty-first century.

Navigating Cultural Identity In The Classroom, Caroline V. Phillips

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

As of 2016, ~25% of children in the United States are the children of immigrants (Nibbs & Brettell). Many of these youths struggle with the feeling that they belong neither to their parents’ cultural community nor to the locality in which they have been raised (Brockett, 2018). Furthermore, little academic research exists wherein these students share their experiences and engage in the processes of meaning making. This knowledge is essential for multicultural scholars and also for the (overwhelmingly white) population of K-6 teachers who help these youth construct personal identities. This project accomplishes the following:

1. I interview second-generation immigrants …

Community Space Planning And Design Guide For Enhanced Wildfire Resilience In Heber, Utah, Devin Macfarlane

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

The wildland urban interface (WUI) is the fastest growing land type in the conterminous United States. These areas are prone to catastrophic wildfire events. In response to rapid population growth, Heber City, Utah is planning a significant amount of development within the WUI. This thesis project is aimed at proactively addressing wildfire risk in the WUI of Heber through two main strategies: regional geospatial planning and public space design to create wildfire resilient communities. Researching principles of wildfire adaptive practice and planning for defensible space led to the development of a list of criteria. This list was developed in the …

Accuracy Vs. Energy: An Assessment Of Bee Object Inference In Videos From On-Hive Video Loggers With Yolov3, Yolov4-Tiny, And Yolov7-Tiny, Vladimir A. Kulyukin, Aleksey V. Kulyukin

Computer Science Faculty and Staff Publications

A continuing trend in precision apiculture is to use computer vision methods to quantify characteristics of bee traffic in managed colonies at the hive's entrance. Since traffic at the hive's entrance is a contributing factor to the hive's productivity and health, we assessed the potential of three open-source convolutional network models, YOLOv3, YOLOv4-tiny, and YOLOv7-tiny, to quantify omnidirectional traffic in videos from on-hive video loggers on regular, unmodified one- and two-super Langstroth hives and compared their accuracies, energy efficacies, and operational energy footprints. We trained and tested the models with a 70/30 split on a dataset of 23,173 flying bees …

C···O And Si···O Tetrel Bonds: Substituent Effects And Transfer Of The Sif3 Group, Zhihao Niu, Qiaozhuo Wu, Qingzhong Li, Steve Scheiner

Chemistry and Biochemistry Faculty Publications

The tetrel bond (TB) between 1,2-benzisothiazol-3-one-2-TF₃-1,1-dioxide (T = C, Si) and the O atom of pyridine-1-oxide (PO) and its derivatives (PO-X, X = H, NO₂, CN, F, CH₃, OH, OCH₃, NH₂, and Li) is examined by quantum chemical means. The Si···O TB is quite strong, with interaction energies approaching a maximum of nearly 70 kcal/mol, while the C···O TB is an order of magnitude weaker, with interaction energies between 2.0 and 2.6 kcal/mol. An electron-withdrawing substituent on the Lewis base weakens this TB, while an electron-donating group has the opposite …

The Utah Statesman, July 24, 2023, Utah State University

The Utah Statesman

Weekly student newspaper of Utah State University in Logan.

Exploring The Transformative Impact Of Language Teachers' Autoethnographies In A Teacher Education Course, Ekaterina Arshavskaya, Nefi Reyes De La Paz

World Languages and Cultures Faculty Publications

Benefits of teachers' autoethnographies are well-documented in current research. This study adds to the research literature by directly analyzing how the insights gained through writing autoethnographic essays may impact second language (L2) teachers' classrooms. To collect the data, the study incorporated autoethnographic essays into a graduate course for language teachers and asked the participating teachers to design lessons that reflected the insights they gained about themselves through this project. Adopting the transformative learning theory (Mezirow, 1978, 1997) that scaffolds teachers' self-reflection, this paper explores the transformative potential of teachers' autoethnographies through tracking qualitative changes in the teachers' narratives and practice …

Hidden Power Of "Thank You": Exploring Aspects, Expressions, And The Influence Of Gratitude In Religious Families, Joe M. Chelladurai, Loren D. Marks, David C. Dollahite, Heather H. Kelly, David B. Allsop

Human Development and Family Studies Student Research

Gratitude has been extensively studied over the past two decades. Among several predictors, aspects of religiosity and spirituality have been consistent predictors of gratitude. To explore the religious motivations and processes that foster the practice of gratitude, we under took a systematic thematic analysis using interview data from a national qualitative project of 198 highly religious families. Participants (n = 476) included mothers, fathers, and children from various socioeconomic backgrounds and from diverse religious, racial, and ethnic backgrounds in the United States of America. Semi-structured interviews were conducted in the participants’ homes. Data for this study were analyzed using …

Contributions Of Community Organizations To Personal Outcomes For People With Intellectual And Developmental Disabilities: A Study Of Special Olympics Program Participation, Seb M. Prohn, Parthenia Dinora, Kayla Diggs Brody

Developmental Disabilities Network Journal

Community organizations can enhance the intellectual and developmental disability (I/DD) service system’s ability to improve the health, wellness, and participation of people with I/DD. This study added an item about Special Olympics (SO) participation to the 2019-2020 National Core Indicators In-Person Survey to predict active SO participation and to determine whether personal outcomes differed for SO participants. Results of a multinomial logistic regression showed that people who were younger or who did not require mobility aids were more likely to participate in SO. Compared with people who never or formerly participated in SO, current SO athletes had better personal outcomes. …

On Correspondences Between Feedforward Artificial Neural Networks On Finite Memory Automata And Classes Of Primitive Recursive Functions, Vladimir A. Kulyukin

Computer Science Faculty and Staff Publications

When realized on computational devices with finite quantities of memory, feedforward artificial neural networks and the functions they compute cease being abstract mathematical objects and turn into executable programs generating concrete computations. To differentiate between feedforward artificial neural networks and their functions as abstract mathematical objects and the realizations of these networks and functions on finite memory devices, we introduce the categories of general and actual computabilities and show that there exist correspondences, i.e., bijections, between functions computable by trained feedforward artificial neural networks on finite memory automata and classes of primitive recursive functions.