Digital Commons Network^™

Multimodal Characterization Of Degradation In Lithium-Ion Battery Electrodes, Hernando Jesus Gonzalez Malabet

Dissertations

The further development of the lithium-ion battery (LIB) for transportation applications requires increased energy density paired with the capability for fast charging. This development needs to keep pace with the increasing market share projection for electric vehicles. New generation electrodes that can increase the cell energy density and capacity, have been studied and developed throughout the past years by changing active materials and microstructural geometries. These new materials present a range of challenges covering areas of performance, reliability, and sustainability. Among these challenges, battery degradation limits the performance and reliability of current LIBs. Furthermore, degradation may hinder development of batteries …

Baccalaureate Nursing Students' Lived Experiences Of A Leadership Role During Clinical Practicum, Gisela E. Schmidt

Dissertations

Problem

Leadership is an essential component of professional nursing practice used in many aspects of the Registered Nurse (RN) role. Baccalaureate nursing (BN) programs have the responsibility of preparing graduating nursing students with leadership orientation and practice. Excellent professional preparation of RNs starts with their education during nursing school. The fast-paced and high-demand healthcare environment needs RNs who can be accountable for patient care that enables excellent patient outcomes and sound patient-centered care. Taking this into consideration, nursing educators are in a special position to promote nursing education which prepares their students with leadership education and training. The purpose of …

A Multiple Case Study Of The Training Of Instructors Teaching Inclusive Postsecondary Education Students In Typical College Courses, Enoh Nkana

Dissertations

Problem

Limited research exists regarding the professional development program processes and components used to train instructors to equip students with intellectual and developmental disabilities to receive greater support and access to the benefits of a postsecondary educational experience.

Purpose of the Study

The principal purpose of this research was to conduct a multiple case study of inclusive postsecondary education (IPSE) programs known as Transition Programs for Students with Intellectual Disabilities (TPSID) and/or Comprehensive Transition Programs (CTP) at institutions of higher education across the United States to examine training provided to instructors teaching students with intellectual and developmental disabilities (IDD) who …

Vocabulary Learning Strategies Used By Esl Saudi Students In The United States, Alya Abdullah K. Suliman

Dissertations

Problem

The purpose of this study was to discover the preferred and used English vocabulary learning strategies of Saudi Arabic-speaking English as a Second Language (ESL) learners. In the light insufficient empirical and theoretical studies exploring the complex structure of vocabulary learning by Arabic-speaking ESL learners, this study investigated which strategies students viewed as significant in assisting them in learning new English vocabulary. Finally, the study sought to identify Saudi Arabic-speaking student attitudes toward and motivations for learning English as a second language; and whether these attitudes influenced which vocabulary learning strategies they preferred and used commonly.

Method

The research …

The Relationship Between Teacher Preparation And Attrition In The Teaching Field, Gerardo Trujillo

Dissertations

In this study, the researcher investigated the relationship between the preservice preparation and attrition in the field of teachers employed at Chicago Public Schools. The researcher administered a survey to teachers working in Chicago and its neighboring suburbs, and their responses revealed their perceptions about their preparation program and their real-world experiences in the classroom. The results indicated that new teachers need coursework in the areas of classroom management, social-emotional skill integration, and cultural competence. The expectation is that the findings will support the creation of a uniform policy for all universities to implement nationwide. Such a program could result …

Adequately Generating Captions For An Image Using Adaptive And Global Attention Mechanisms., Shravan Kumar Talanki Venkatarathanaiahsetty

Dissertations

Generating description to images is a recent surge and with latest developments in the field of Artificial Intelligence, it can be one of the prominent applications to bridge the gap between Computer vision and Natural language processing fields. In terms of the learning curve, Deep learning has become the main backbone in driving many new applications. Image Captioning is one such application where the usage of Deep learning methods enhanced the performance of the captioning accuracy. The introduction of the Encoder-Decoder framework was a breakthrough in Image captioning. But as the sequences got longer the performance of captions was affected. …

Improving A Network Intrusion Detection System’S Efficiency Using Model-Based Data Augmentation, Vinicius Waterkemper Lodetti

Dissertations

A network intrusion detection system (NIDS) is one important element to mitigate cybersecurity risks, the NIDS allow for detecting anomalies in a network which may be a cyberattack to a corporate network environment. A NIDS can be seen as a classification problem where the ultimate goal is to distinguish between malicious traffic among a majority of benign traffic. Researches on NIDS are often performed using outdated datasets that don’t represent the actual cyberspace. Datasets such as the CICIDS2018 address this gap by being generated from attacks and an infrastructure that reflects an up-to-date scenario.

A problem may arise when machine …

An Evaluation On The Performance Of Code Generated With Webassembly Compilers, Raymond Phelan

Dissertations

WebAssembly is a new technology that is revolutionizing the web. Essentially it is a low-level binary instruction set that can be run on browsers, servers or stand-alone environments. Many programming languages either currently have, or are working on, compilers that will compile the language into WebAssembly. This means that applications written in languages like C++ or Rust can now be run on the web, directly in a browser or other environment. However, as we will highlight in this research, the quality of code generated by the different WebAssembly compilers varies and causes performance issues. This research paper aims to evaluate …

A Hybrid Neural Network For Stock Price Direction Forecasting, Daniel Devine

Dissertations

The volatility of stock markets makes them notoriously difficult to predict and is the reason that many investors sell out at the wrong time. Contrary to the efficient market hypothesis (EMH) and the random walk theory, contribution to the study of machine learning models for stock price forecasting has shown evidence of stock markets predictability with varying degrees of success. Contemporary approaches have sought to use a hybrid of convolutional neural network (CNN) for its feature extraction capabilities and long short-term memory (LSTM) neural network for its time series prediction. This comparative study aims to determine the predictability of stock …

Identifying Significant Features For Player Evaluation In Nfl Comparing Anns And Traditional Models, Ronan Walsh

Dissertations

The evaluation of player performance in sports is popular and important in modern sports, enabling teams to use real data in the construction of their rosters. This dissertation proposes to apply machine learning algorithms to predicting the player evaluations from a leading NFL analytics company who use a combination of statistics and expert evaluation. In addition, it will investigate what features are significant in the evaluation of a position. Data for the dissertation is obtained from multiple online sources - Pro Football Reference and Pro Football Focus (the the NFL analytics company). These data sets are combined and analysed before …

Identifying Roles Of Software Developers From Their Answers On Stack Overflow, Dean Power

Dissertations

Stack Overflow is the world’s largest community of software developers. Users ask and answer questions on various tagged topics of software development. The set of questions a site user answers is representative of their knowledge base, or “wheelhouse”. It is proposed that clustering users by their wheelhouse yields communities of similar software developers by skill-set. These communities represent the different roles within software development and could be used as the basis to define roles at any point in time in an ever-evolving landscape of software development. A network graph of site users, linked if they answered questions on the same …

Can Generative Adversarial Networks Help Us Fight Financial Fraud?, Sean Mciver

Dissertations

Transactional fraud datasets exhibit extreme class imbalance. Learners cannot make accurate generalizations without sufficient data. Researchers can account for imbalance at the data level, algorithmic level or both. This paper focuses on techniques at the data level. We evaluate the evidence of the optimal technique and potential enhancements. Global fraud losses totalled more than 80 % of the UK’s GDP in 2019. The improvement of preprocessing is inherently valuable in fighting these losses. Synthetic minority oversampling technique (SMOTE) and extensions of SMOTE are currently the most common preprocessing strategies. SMOTE oversamples the minority classes by randomly generating a point between …

Feature Highlighting Visualization, Sui Gong

Dissertations

This dissertation presents a collection of visualization techniques that highlight features (i.e, certain visual aspects that are interesting to the viewers, such as sharp corners on a boundary). These include three Marching Squares extensions: (1) Sharp Corner Sensitive Marching Squares (SCS-MS) that recovers sharp corner features in isocontours, (2) Dual Marching Squares (DMS) that recovers curved features in isocontours and (3) Fine Feature Sensitive Marching Squares (FFS-MS) that recovers small and narrow areas enclosed by boundaries. Also included is a novel motion visualization technique that generates speedlines that mimick the speedline style of Manga artist Osamu Tezuka. Experimental results and …

The High Confidence Data Classification Method With Near Zero Classification Error, Truong Xuan Tran

Dissertations

Many machine learning applications require a high degree of confidence in the correctness of the classification results. Ideally, no decision made by the classification model should be a misclassification. However, no classifier can guarantee to provide a correct classification for all data items. Therefore, it is reasonable to allow the classification model to classify a data item only when the certainty level is high and reject to make a decision if the certainty level is not high. In this dissertation, a high confidence data classification method is developed. The method helps the classification model avoid classifying data items that are …

Secure Data Integrity In Wireless Ad Hoc Networks, Elbasher O Esalmi Elmahdi

Dissertations

Wireless ad hoc networks (WANETs) have become increasingly popular in our everyday business and personal lives. As long as nodes in the network belong to the same organization and share the same goal, it can generally be expected that all nodes can be trusted. So, without any security measures in place, any node is capable of compromising the integrity of the data it forwards. It is necessary to save or secure data transmission in WANETs to achieve effective communication because most of the routing protocols proposed for WANETs assume a trusted and reliable environment and they do not consider the …

Effects Of Altering Variable, Basic Residues Of Ribosomal Proteins Ul4 And Ul22 Facing The Ribosomal Exit Tunnel On Growth, Resistance,And Gene Expression In Escherichia Coli: Focus On Ul22 K90d, Elizabeth A. Franklin

Dissertations

Mutational changes in bacterial ribosomes that confer antibiotic resistance decrease cell fitness. Determining the genetic factors that interconnect antibiotic resistance and cell fitness is critical in the fight against bacterial infections. This study describes gene expression and phenotypic changes presented in Escherichia coli cells carrying a uL22 K90D mutant ribosomal protein, which showed growth defects and resistance to macrolide antibiotics. Other uL4 and uL22 mutation, in basic, non-conserved residues, were examined for phenotypic changes, however the uL22 K90D mutation displayed the most consistent phenotypes when compared to the wild type strain, and thus was the focus of this study. Ribosome …

Energetic Neutral Atom Flux From The Inner Heliosheath And Its Connection To Termination Shock Properties, Bishwas L. Shrestha

Dissertations

The energetic neutral atom (ENA) fluxes observed by the Interstellar Boundary Explorer (IBEX) spacecraft show power-law-like spectra in the energy range ~0.5 to 6 keV. However, the temperature of the thermal core solar wind (SW) protons in the inner heliosheath (IHS) measured by Voyager 2 spacecraft is too low to create keV ENAs with Earth-directed trajectories. On the other hand, the temperature of the pickup ions (PUIs) that are reflected and energized in the upstream motional electric field of the heliospheric termination shock (HTS) is too high to create a significant number of ENAs in the IBEX-Hi energy range. Instead, …

An In Depth Analysis Of Ic And Cg Lightning From The Perspective Of Glm, Jacquelyn S. Ringhausen

Dissertations

The Geostationary Lightning Mapper (GLM) detects total lightning continuously from space without distinguishing intra-cloud (IC) from cloud-to-ground (CG) lightning. This research focuses on improving our understanding of the differences between CG and IC lightning as detected by GLM with the potential for classification of these flashes. First, we explore optical differences in flash characteristics for CG and IC lightning by implementing a Random Forests (RF) model to predict flash type, with Earth Networks Total Lightning Network (ENTLN) acting as truth. The results show the most important flash characteristic for distinguishing flash type is the maximum-group-area while other important features include …

Event-Driven Servers Using Asynchronous, Non-Blocking Network I/O: Performance Evaluation Of Kqueue And Epoll, Lorcan Leonard

Dissertations

This research project evaluates the performance of kqueue and epoll in the context of event-driven servers. The evaluation is done through benchmarking and tracing which are used to measure throughput and execution time respectively. The experiment is repeated for both a virtualised and native server environment. The results from the experiment are statistically analysed and compared. These results show significant differences between kqueue and epoll, and a profound impact of virtualisation as a variable.

Political Justificationism: A More Realistic Epistemology Of Political Disagreement, Randolph Jay Carlson

Dissertations

Disagreement is probably the most salient feature of our contemporary political environment. This project aims to examine political disagreements from the perspective of the recent discussions of the epistemology of disagreement more generally. Some, known as conciliationists, argue that when confronted with a disagreement with someone who is equally knowledgeable and well-informed as you are on the issue (known as an "epistemic peer"), one should become substantially less confident in that antecedently held belief. While some have tried to straightforwardly apply the conciliationist approach to political disagreements, I argue that such an approach makes us vulnerable to significant cognitive biases …

Disrupting The School-To-Prison Pipeline: A Mixed-Methods Systematic Review Of Alternative Discipline Practices To Reduce Exclusion And Promote Equity, Cara Diclemente

Dissertations

Zero tolerance policies were designed to create safety by implementing automatic exclusion (e.g., suspensions, expulsions) for misbehavior in response to rising school violence in the United States. However, evidence over the past four decades shows that these policies fail to increase objective and subjective safety, and instead foster poor school climate and disproportionate rates of minority groups in the school-to-prison pipeline. Previous research and literature reviews suggest there are a host of developing Multi-Tiered System of Supports (MTSS) practices that have promising potential to reduce exclusionary outcomes and foster equitable treatment of vulnerable student populations, such as Positive Behavioral Intervention …

Ecological Systems In The Contexts Of Foster Care And Parental Incarceration, Lauren A. Hindt

Dissertations

This bundled dissertation sought to advance research about children in the contexts of foster care and/or parental incarceration. The first study, “Developmental Differences in Children's Visits with Their Parents in Jail,” expanded upon previous research of young children's experiences visiting jail by including a sample of 3-17-year-olds. The study described children's visitation through quantitative (measured by the Jail-Prison Observation Checklist) and qualitative (themes gleaned from observations of children's visits with parents in jail) analyses with an ecological systems framework. The second longitudinal study, “Visits with Fathers Involved in the Criminal Justice System and Behavioral Outcomes among Children in Foster Care,” …

Calibration Of The Extreme Universe Space Observatory, Malek Mastafa

Dissertations

The most energetic particles in the universe are ultra high energy cosmic rays UHECRs with energies up to 3×10^20 eV eV. However, their flux is strongly suppressed at the highest energies (~1 particles /〖km〗^2 /century for E = 10^19.75 eV), leaving the sources and the acceleration mechanisms unknown. The detection of UHECRs from space via fluorescence method is very compelling because of the large area that can be observed. The Extreme Universe Space Observatory on a Super Pressure Balloon (EUSO-SPB) collaboration is developing and flying balloon-brone prototypes of a satellite instrument to make such observations. The EUSO-SPB1 instrument is the …

Improved Isosurfacing Through Compression And Sparse Grid Orientation Estimation, Brian Wood

Dissertations

This dissertation focuses on increasing isosurfacing speed through novel compression approaches. The compression occurs on a cell-by-cell basis during isosurface extraction, as opposed to compressing the mesh in a post-processing step. The compression is applied to isosurfacing on cluster computers, and it postpones scalability plateauing of prior parallel isosurfacers by reducing communication on cluster computers (versus the prior state of the art). A novel view-dependent isosurface mesh decompressor and improved isosurface orientation estimator for sparse datasets via quadratic splines fit to tetrahedral decompositions of the datasets are also described. Experimental results for all efforts, which quantify their effectiveness, are also …

Verification And Validation Methods For Extended Petri Nets Modeling Cyberattacks, Walter Alan Cantrell

Dissertations

Verification and validation are crucial to establishing the credibility of the results of a modeling and simulation project. Conclusions drawn from an unverified and unvalidated model are at best unconvincing, and at worst have the potential to be dangerous if decisions are made based on outputs from an incorrect model. In general, the most effective methods of verification and validation involve comparisons of simulation results with data from observations of the system or event being simulated. However, such methods cannot be used if system data is not available. This is often true of cyberattacks, because the victims of cyberattacks conceal …

The Effect Of The Vocabulary Spelling City App On Student Performance In Spelling, Vocabulary, And Reading Comprehension In Grades 5-8 At Glenview Adventist Academy, Fernando Oleynick Lista

Dissertations

Problem and Purpose

Students in fifth through eighth grades at Glenview Adventist Academy (GAA) presented difficulties in the subjects of spelling, vocabulary and reading comprehension. The school had not followed the previous 10-year trend of technology implementation in the classroom, in spite of conclusive research on its advantages. This study was conducted to determine to what extent teaching methodology and the use of technology could affect academic performance in the areas of spelling, vocabulary, and reading comprehension. Research on the implementation of software and the use of tablets (iPad Minis) in the classroom has been scarce and contradictory in the …

Marketing Adventist Higher Education In North America : College Choice - Motivators And Barriers, George Charles Dart Jr.

Dissertations

Purpose/Problem

It is estimated more than 75% of Seventh-day Adventist (SDA) college-bound students (rising freshmen) who live in the North American Division (NAD) do not attend an SDA college/university. This is a major challenge for the NAD colleges/universities. Discovering motivators and barriers for SDA college-bound students is vital in understanding what influences this population in their college choice selection.

Method

This is a quantitative, cross-sectional, comparative study. An electronic survey using Qualtrics was sent to over 14,000 students with 461 respondents as the sample size. Respondents were sorted into four study groups, using the type of high school attended and …

How Faculty And Student Preferences For Active And Traditional Instructional Methods Relate To Their Beliefs, Quantity, And Quality Of Experiences, Knowledge Of The Benefits, And Professional Training, Tammy R. Shilling

Dissertations

Purpose

The complexity of preparing students for clinical practice and the mitigating factors that influence pedagogical preferences impact the current realities of health professional education. The purpose of this quantitative, correlational study is to explain the relationships between faculty preferences and student preferences for active over traditional methods and their beliefs, the frequency and positiveness of their experiences, and the amount and extent of the knowledge or training they have had regarding active and traditional teaching methods. Results may further inform and refine health professional education infrastructure changes to support faculty in pedagogical change as they prepare students with the …

Healthcare Leadership In The Context Of Cognitive Diseases Of Aging: A Community-Based Participatory Research Model, Dean Sherzai

Dissertations

The Problem

The world is facing a tsunami of chronic diseases of the brain such as dementia, Parkinson's, and stroke. But all populations are not affected equally. Though we are all at greater risk of developing these diseases, minority communities such as the Black and Hispanic populations are at much greater risk of succumbing to these conditions. To date we have spent billions of dollars on research and public health measures that have repeatedly failed, but over the last decade it has become evident that much of these diseases can simply be averted through effective public health and community-based measures …

An Analysis And Comparison Of The Missional Doctrine Hermeneutics Of Kevin J. Vanhoozer And Veli-Matti KäRkkäInen, With Emphasis On Their Notions Of God, Eschatology, And Mission, Elmer Arrais Guzman

Dissertations

This dissertation analyzes Veli-Matti Kärkkäinen’s and Kevin J. Vanhoozer’s theological method, in order to understand its structural elements, and thereby to facilitate comprehension of their missional doctrinal hermeneutics, and the ramifications of those hermeneutics for the construction and development of Christian theology. Missional doctrinal hermeneutical models conceive the missional dimension of doctrine in various ways. Some privilege the maintenance of theological identity cohering with the foundational sources of theological authority. Others privilege theological constructions that assimilate the context and the missional situational framework of understanding. This dissertation strives to examine the diverging missional hermeneutics of Kärkkäinen and Vanhoozer, the foundational …