Digital Commons Network^™

Pluralisms About Truth And Logic, Nathan Kellen

Doctoral Dissertations

In this dissertation I analyze two theories, truth pluralism and logical pluralism, as well as the theoretical connections between them, including whether they can be combined into a single, coherent framework. I begin by arguing that truth pluralism is a combination of realist and anti-realist intuitions, and that we should recognize these motivations when categorizing and formulating truth pluralist views. I then introduce logical functionalism, which analyzes logical consequence as a functional concept. I show how one can both build theories from the ground up and analyze existing views within the functionalist framework. One upshot of logical functionalism is …

Log-Sobolev Inequality For The Wright-Fisher Diffusion And Optimal Investment With Random Endowments Under Anticipation, Berend Coster

Doctoral Dissertations

We prove a Log-Sobolev inequality for the one-dimensional Wright-Fisher diffusion by proving a $\Gamma_2$ lower bound for this diffusion. The result is extended to the two-dimensional case. In subsequent chapters an explicit formula is derived for the value of weak information in a discrete time model that works for a wide range of utility functions including the logarithmic and power utility. We assume a market with a finite number of assets and a finite number of possible outcomes. Results are given for complete and incomplete markets with random endowments. Explicit calculations are performed for a binomial model with two assets. …

On Generalization Of Tweedie Distribution: A Bayesian Perspective, Tairan Ye

Doctoral Dissertations

With nonnegative support and discrete mass at zero, the Tweedie model becomes a popular method to analyze the continuous zero-spike data, which is fairly common in fields of insurance, biostatistics, epidemiology, economics, and geography. Several research articles had discussed other approaches to model data with mass zeros, especially the zero-inflated exponential family of distributions, including the zero-inflated gamma model and the zero-inflated log-normal distribution. However, no systematical comparison has been conducted to select the best model for the excess-zero data, which motivated us to propose a model comparison between the Tweedie model and other zero-inflated models under the Bayesian framework. …

An Examination Of The Relationships Between Message Framing, Regulatory Focus, And Psychological Reactance On Risky Health Decision-Making Among College Students, Mallory B. Garza

Doctoral Dissertations

Excessive alcohol use and risky sexual behaviors are common health-related concerns among college campuses throughout the United States. Previous efforts to thwart such risky health behaviors have resulted in limited success. Therefore, it is crucial that researchers learn how to effectively communicate with college students in ways that increase healthy behaviors and decrease unhealthy behaviors among this particular population. The purpose of the current study was to examine the effects of message framing, regulatory focus, and psychological reactance on motivating college students to take a more proactive approach in regard to their health and wellbeing. Data from this study were …

Organically Modified Inorganic Nanoparticles For Halochromic Ionophores And Nucleic Acids, William Johnston

Doctoral Dissertations

In this dissertation, four nanoparticle reaction schemes were developed as substrates for halochromic dyes or nucleic acids. The reaction schemes include the use of two substrates: silica nanoparticles and halloysite nanotubes. The protocols can incorporate silica (SiO2) nanoparticles and halloysite aluminosilicate (AlO2SiO2) nanotubes due to the presence of silane groups on the surface of either substrate. The reaction schemes are presented along with detailed protocols which were written to facilitate both reproducibility and to serve as an aid to further study and for easy modification of the protocol to suit a researcher's needs. The data is discussed in the materials …

Increasing The Functionality Of Additive Manufacturing Through Atmospheric Microplasma And Nanotechnology, Alexander Jon Ulrich

Doctoral Dissertations

Additive Manufacturing (AM) has been changing the manufacturing landscape for the last 20 years. As the interest and demand for both polymer and metal-based 3D printing has grown, the materials and machines used have increased in capabilities. Despite the growth and advancement, there are still a large number of improvements that can be made to add functionality to 3D printers. Metal AM, a subcategory of 3D printing, has garnered much attention among industrial applications with large companies such as General Electric trying to implement the technology to increase innovative designs for motors. Some of the limitations on AM have to …

Simulation And Balloon-Borne Observation Of Energetic Radiation And Electromagnetic Fields From Thunderstorms And Lightning, Mahdi Bagheri

Doctoral Dissertations

With more than 250 years after Benjamin Franklin’s experiments, we still do not know how lightning works at the most fundamental levels. Recently, observations of high energy radiations produced during lightning activities, such as TGFs, X-rays and Gamma-ray Glows, have opened a new path for the study of lightning-related phenomena known as High-Energy Atmospheric Physics. TGFs are short and bright bursts of gamma rays associated with the early stages of positive intra-cloud lightning, while gamma-ray glows are long lasting emissions of gamma rays which would be terminated by the occurrence of lightning flash. It has been suggested that these radiations …

Study Of Post-Necking Hardening Identification And Deformation-Induced Surface Roughening Of Metals, Pavlo Knysh

Doctoral Dissertations

This thesis covers topics at two fundamental scales at which plastic deformation is occurring – macroscopic and microscopic.

The first topic is related to the localization of deformation and subsequent necking that happens in metals during deformation, e.g., sheet metal during forming. The open fundamental question is – what happens to the material properties inside of the localized region. The localization process is very challenging to analyze, even using a conventional tension test since several effects such as material hardening as well as effects of strain-rate and temperature are strongly coupled. In this thesis we propose a novel approach that …

On Non-Commutative Continuous Functions And Asymptotic Symmetric Gauge Norms, Shayathorn Wanasawat

Doctoral Dissertations

This dissertation has two parts. The first part deals with Don Hadwin’s non-commutative continuous functions of countably many variables and shows that every separable C^∗-algebra can be described in terms of countably many generators x_1, x_2, ... and a single relation \varphi’(x_1, x_2, ...) = 0 where \varphi is a non-commutative continuous function. The second involves representation of operator algebras on spaces of Banach space valued measurable functions and groups of measure preserving transformations. The main emphasis concerns describing asymptotic norms based on symmetric gauge norms on L^\infty[0,1]

Invariant Operator Ranges And Similarity Dominance In Banach And Von Neumann Algebras, Ali Zarringhalam

Doctoral Dissertations

\begin{Abstractpage}

\setlength{\baselineskip}{1.5\baselineskip} { Suppose $\mathcal{M}$ is a von Neumann algebra. An \textbf{operator range in

}$\mathcal{M}$ is the range of an operator in $\mathcal{M}$. When

$\mathcal{M}=B\left( H\right) $, the algebra of operators on a Hilbert space

$H$, R. Douglas and C. Foia\c{s} proved that if $S,T\in B\left( H\right) $,

and $T$ is not algebraic, and if $S$ leaves invariant every $T$-invariant

operator range, then $S=f\left( T\right) $ for some entire function $f$.

In the first part of this thesis, we prove versions of this result when $B\left( H\right) $ is replaced with a

factor von Neumann algebra $\mathcal{M}$ and $T$ is …

Long-Term Forest Growth And Decadal Soil Chemistry Change Across The White Mountain National Forest, Olivia L. Fraser

Doctoral Dissertations

Forest ecosystems are subject to a variety of stressors including human land use, air pollution and climate change. A challenge for detecting temporal change, however, is disentangling heterogeneity at multiple spatial scales. Therefore, we need a better understanding of the mechanisms influencing forest growth and soil formation, how to improve existing long-term sample designs, and quantify variability at multiple spatial scales. Identifying the areal extent of bedrock outcrops and shallow soils has important implications in understanding the spatial dynamics of surrounding vegetation, stream chemistry gradients, and soil properties. Manual methods of delineating bedrock outcrops and associated shallow soil are still …

Physics And Modeling Of Turbulent Advective Transport In Turbulent Boundary Layers, Juan Carlos Cuevas Bautista

Doctoral Dissertations

\setlength{\baselineskip}{1.5\baselineskip} {Recent studies reveal that at large friction Reynolds number $\delta^+ = u_{\tau}\delta/\nu$ the inertially dominated region of the turbulent boundary layer is composed of large-scale zones of nearly uniform momentum segregated by narrow fissures of concentrated vorticity. Here $u_{\tau} = \sqrt{\tau_{\omega}/\rho}$, where $\tau_{\omega}$ is the shear stress at the wall and $\rho$ the fluid density, $\delta$ is the boundary layer thickness and $\nu$ is the kinematic viscosity of the fluid. The aim of this thesis is better understand the role of this binary structure with respect to the wall-normal transport of momentum and heat in turbulent boundary layers at …

Linear Methods For Joint Analysis Of Multivariate Genomics Data, M. Henry Linder

Doctoral Dissertations

The rise of Big Data has enabled sophisticated analysis of the human genome in unprecedented detail. Large datasets are now collected as a matter of routine, and their scope spans multiple data types and multiple functional units at the molecular level of the cell. The breadth and depth of these data offer the opportunity for complex experiments and extensive structural modeling. But, given the intricacies of these data and the nuanced challenges they pose, robust and rigorous methods are essential to ensure the value and validity of the resulting scientific research. In this dissertation, we consider statistical methods for networks, …

Investigating The Relationship Between Hydrological Variation, Land Use/Cover Change And Climate Change At Regional And Local Scales Under Future Scenarios, Hui Wang

Doctoral Dissertations

The connections between environmental change and human activities are complex. Scientists have been working on understanding the interactions between hydrological processes, land use/cover change (LUCC) and climate change in both qualitative and quantitative ways for several decades. Although previous studies show that interactions between these three aspects are typically multidimensional and occur in multiple spatial and temporal scales, a systematic investigation of their historical and future relationships is still lacking at a local scale, especially when considering the non-stationarity of LUCC. This doctoral dissertation applies quantitative research methods, such as hydrological and LUCC modeling methods, to cover two general study …

Dynamic Retirement Financial Planning Model, Qintian Sun

Doctoral Dissertations

We developed a retirement financial planning strategy based on Markov chain modeling of retirement health conditions and Geometric Brownian Motion modeling of asset values. The annual living expenses of a retiree are modeled as basic expenses plus discretionary expenses. Our goal is to solve for the maximum discretionary expenses while healthy, which was obtained using a closed-form solution and quantile optimization technique. The highlight of this model is the use of Kalman Filter for annual recalibration. It allows the model to automatically adjust the suggested amount of discretionary expenses by looking at daily fund values from previous year. After running …

Tracking Highly-Maneuvering Targets And Data Fusion From Imm Estimator Tracks, Radu Visina

Doctoral Dissertations

Maneuvering targets are of special interest in remote tracking because of the difficulty in modeling the changes in their dynamic behavior. Sharp maneuvers present challenges. For some targets, such as those moving in a 2D plane, the proposed White Noise Turn Rate (WNTR) model should be included as one or more modes in an Interacting Multiple Model (IMM) estimator. This model is similar to the conventional coordinated-turn (CT) model, also known as the Wiener Process Turn Rate model, but with non-zero mean turn rate process noise, instead of zero-mean turn rate process noise. Such an IMM design, possibly coupled with …

Fundamental Understanding Of Microstructural Properties Of Electrolyte System For Nox Exhaust Gas Sensing, Khawlah Kharashi

Doctoral Dissertations

The nitrogen oxides (NOx) sensors available on the market are unable to detect minute concentrations of NOx (<10 ppm) and, as a result, they are unable to meet the new US standards, i.e. Tier 3 standards for the period of 2017-2025. As per these standards sensors should be highly sensitive and capable of determining NOx on the order of single parts per million. As compared to gasoline engines, diesel engines have greater efficiency per unit quantity of fuel consumed, but they emit more smog causing NOx.

The three-way catalyst systems in modern diesel engines are ineffective in chemically reducing nitrogen oxides in the presence of excess air. Even though a number of NOx abatement systems have been developed over the years, the after- treatment systems in vehicles require a highly sensitive NOx sensor capable of monitoring low concentrations of NOx in the exhaust gases. The solid state electrochemical sensors, having porous yttria-stabilized zirconia (YSZ), along with dense electrodes, exhibit enhanced NOx sensitivity. Porous electrolytes support gas diffusion, while …

Model-Based And Population-Based Optimization Of Abdominal Aortic Aneurysm Surveillance And Surgery Protocols, Farid Heidarnejad

Doctoral Dissertations

Abdominal aortic aneurysm (AAA) is indicated when the diameter of the abdominal aorta is larger than 30 mm. The primary risk associated with AAA is an increased risk of aortic rupture, which is fatal in 68-90% of cases. Once a patient is diagnosed with AAA, the AAA is monitored via abdominal ultrasound. The rationale for the regular surveillance is that the risk of rupture is low for AAA, less than 55 mm in size, but increases dramatically in diameter larger than 55 mm. Early surgery on patients with smaller AAA diameters (lower risk of rupture) has a higher mortality rate …

Unobtrusive Location-Based Access Control Utilizing Existing Ieee 802.11 Infrastructure, Hosam Alamleh

Doctoral Dissertations

Mobile devices can sense several types of signals over the air using different radio frequency technologies (e.g., Wi-Fi, Bluetooth, cellular signals, etc.). Furthermore, mobile devices receive broadcast messages from transmitting entities (e.g., network access points, cellular phone towers, etc.) and can measure the received signal strength from these entities. Broadcast messages carry the information needed in case a mobile device chooses to establish communication. We believe that these signals can be utilized in the context of access control, specifically because they could provide an indication of the location of a user's device. Such a “location proof” could then be used …

Catalysis By Design: Predicting Materials With Fischer Tropsch Catalytic Activity, Suraj Gyawali

Doctoral Dissertations

Experimental work has been extensive in the catalysis field; however, the cost to move nano-engineered catalysts from the laboratory to industry using only experimental research is prohibitively high. Macroscopic phenomena (i.e. melting, defect formation, miscibility) can be understood in terms of the nano-scale mechanism using molecular simulations. Thus, using molecular simulations in combination with experiments lowers the costs related to design, as simulations can be used to rapidly screen candidate materials, so that experimental efforts can be limited to the catalyst candidates deemed as most promising by simulations. This work employs molecular simulation tools to predict the relative effectiveness of …

The Storm Time Response Of The Inner Magnetosphere During Coronal Mass Ejection And Corotating Interaction Region Driven Storms, Samuel Bingham

Doctoral Dissertations

Coronal mass ejections (CMEs) and corotating interaction regions (CIRs) are the most common drivers of geomagnetic storms, influencing the dynamics of the inner magnetosphere and the response of the radiation belts. The main outer radiation belt acceleration mechanisms are inward radial diffusion and local acceleration by chorus waves, while magnetopause shadowing and by pitch angle scattering by electromagnetic ion cyclotron (EMIC) waves and other wave modes are the main true loss mechanisms. The link between these mechanisms and the solar interplanetary structures is the ring current response to these drivers. The different characteristics of the two solar wind drivers, CMEs …

Pseudometrics, The Complex Of Ultrametrics, And Iterated Cycle Structures, Eric Robert Kehoe

Doctoral Dissertations

Every set X, finite of cardinality n say, carries a set M(X) of all possible pseudometrics. It is well known that M(X) forms a convex polyhedral cone whose faces correspond to triangle inequalities. Every point in a convex cone can be expressed as a conical sum of its extreme rays, hence the interest around discovering and classifying such rays. We shall give examples of extreme rays for M(X) exhibiting all integral edge lengths up to half the cardinality of X. By intersecting the cone with the unit cube we obtain the convex polytope of bounded-by-one pseudometrics BM(X). Analogous to extreme …

Asymptotic And Spectral Analysis Of The Bending-Torsion Vibration Model With Nondissipative Boundary Conditions, Laszlo Peter Kindrat

Doctoral Dissertations

This dissertation is concerned with mathematical results on the initial boundary-value problem for the coupled bending-torsion vibration model, which is important in different areas of engineering sciences (e.g. design of bridges and tall buildings, aerospace engineering, etc.). Mathematically, the model is given by a system of two hyperbolic partial differential equations equipped with a 3-parameter family of nonselfadjoint (linear feedback type) boundary conditions. The system is represented as a first-order-in-time evolution equation in state space, a Hilbert space of 4-component Cauchy-data. It is shown that the dynamics generator is a nonselfadjoint matrix differential operator with a compact resolvent. The spectral …

Beurling Theorems And Approximate Equivalence In Von Neumann Algebras, Wenjing Liu

Doctoral Dissertations

The main part of the thesis relates to generalized Beurling-Helson-Lowdenslager theorems on the unit disk, in multiply connected domains, and in finite von Neumann algebras. I have also obtained results on approximate unitary equivalence of representations of separable ASH C*-algebras in a semifinite von Neumann algebra, extending results of D. Voiculescu. In the last part of the thesis, I give two characterizations of tracially nuclear C*-algebras.

Experimental Investigations Of Thermal Pulsatile Boundary Layer Flow, Drummond Biles

Doctoral Dissertations

The need to reliably analyze, predict, and control the transport of mass, momentum, and energy in turbulent boundary layers is critically important across a broad spectrum of technological applications and scientific disciplines. While there has been extensive–and continuing– research investigating laboratory-scale canonical wall-bounded flows, beyond the scope of these well-studied flows there exists a broad range of application relevant flows that are far less studied. The theme of this dissertation research is to study a non canonical flow, specifically to study coupled momentum and thermal transport in pulsatile boundary layer flows.

The primary contributions of the present work are (1) …

General Reflexivity For Absolutely Convex Sets, Mahtab Lak

Doctoral Dissertations

In 1994 D. Hadwin introduced the notion of a reflexivity triple (X,Y,E) and defined a very general notion of reflexivity, called

E-reflexivity, for a linear subspace of the vector space X. Hadwin's general version included many special versions (algebraic reflexivity,

topological reflexivity, approximate reflexivity, hyperreflexivity) that had been studied for linear spaces of linear transformations on a vector space or Hilbert space. In this thesis we extend Hadwin's notion and define and study

the abstract notion of reflexivity for an absolutely convex subset of X. We have extended many of Hadwin's results and obtained some new ones. We have also …

Investigation Into The Flow Physics Of Large Experimental Offshore Wind Farms In A Turbulent Boundary Layer Wind Tunnel, John James Turner

Doctoral Dissertations

Large offshore wind turbine array power plants will soon be appearing along the United States' eastern seaboard. With recent advances in technology, turbines have been growing in diameter and arrays have been growing in scale, but not without technical challenges. There exist knowledge gaps in the fluid dynamics that govern the interaction of the incoming atmospheric boundary layer with the wakes of the turbines and the sequential wake-wake interactions that result in an unavoidable decreased bulk power production compared to predicted capacity from the array.

Wind farm experiments were conducted with scale model wind turbines in a high Reynolds number …

Design, Mechanical Experiments And Modeling On A New Family Of 3d Printed Hybrid Chiral Mechanical Metamaterials With Negative Poisson’S Ratio, Yunyao Jiang

Doctoral Dissertations

Emerging in the last decade, mechanical metamaterials have many engineering advantages due to unusual mechanical properties. Auxetic (with negative Poisson’s ratio) mechanical metamaterials, as an important family of these materials, have broad engineering applications including the design of new materials with increased indentation resistance, shear resistance, energy absorption capability and variable permeability.

Chiral auxetic mechanical metamaterial is a sub-family of the auxetic material, which is with a geometry that is non-superposable on its mirror image. Compared to symmetric auxetic materials, such as re-entrant honeycombs or periodic porous materials, which have random handedness after instability, chiral materials have deterministic handedness and …

Sharp Trudinger-Moser Inequalities On Riemannian Manifolds And Heisenberg Groups, Jungang Li

Doctoral Dissertations

Archival abstract submitted

Methods In Homology Inference, Nicholas J. Cavanna

Doctoral Dissertations

In this dissertation we introduce novel techniques to infer the shape of a geometric space from local data. The major contribution of this research is that the techniques aim to minimize the hypotheses of the sample and the space compared to existing results in the field.

We first prove an equivalence between the two standard geometric sampling methods: adaptive and uniform. From this we create a collection of topological interleavings derived from this equivalence, which we use to compute the homology of an arbitrary Euclidean compact set only assuming a bound on the weak feature size of the domain and …