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Electrical Sensing In Non-Excitable Cells To Promote Galvanotaxis And Tissue Survival, Anyesha Sarkar Jan 2021

Electrical Sensing In Non-Excitable Cells To Promote Galvanotaxis And Tissue Survival, Anyesha Sarkar

Electronic Theses and Dissertations

Weak DC fields have been shown to induce polarity, cell migration and cell proliferation in 2D cultures in vitro. To understand the mechanism by which non-excitable cells sense such weak EFs, we have investigated the mechanism of cathode-directed water flow (electro-osmosis) in the boundary layer of cells by reducing it with neutral, viscous polymers. Our results indicate that low molecular weight polymers decrease cathodal migration and promote anodal migration in a concentration dependent manner. High molecular weight polymers do not affect directionality and can be explained using porosity and hydraulic permeability between the polymers. These results provide the first evidence …


Interrogating The Socio-Ethical Dilemmas Of Precision Agriculture Technologies, Ayorinde Ogunyiola Jan 2021

Interrogating The Socio-Ethical Dilemmas Of Precision Agriculture Technologies, Ayorinde Ogunyiola

Electronic Theses and Dissertations

Farming has moved into a digital age where data and information are available to farmers to make informed agronomic and financial on-farm decisions. The development of precision agriculture (PA), such as big data technologies and machine learning algorithms is transforming the agricultural food production system in diverse ways, economically, environmentally, and socially. Despite benefits afforded by PA to agricultural productivity and environmental sustainability, these technologies can raise unintended societal challenges that can also limit their adoption among farmers. PA is changing how farming is done, reconstructing farmers’ social identities, and influencing relationships between farmers, agronomists, and technology developers. This dissertation …


Detection Of Change Points In Pseudo-Invariant Calibration Sites Time Series Using Multi-Sensor Satellite Imagery, Neha Khadka Jan 2021

Detection Of Change Points In Pseudo-Invariant Calibration Sites Time Series Using Multi-Sensor Satellite Imagery, Neha Khadka

Electronic Theses and Dissertations

The remote sensing community has extensively used Pseudo-Invariant Calibration Sites (PICS) to monitor the long-term in-flight radiometric calibration of Earth-observing satellites. The use of the PICS has an underlying assumption that these sites are invariant over time. However, the site’s temporal stability has not been assured in the past. This work evaluates the temporal stability of PICS by not only detecting the trend but also locating significant shifts (change points) lying behind the time series. A single time series was formed using the virtual constellation approach in which multiple sensors data were combined for each site to achieve denser temporal …


Pheasant Ecology In An Agricultural Landscape Of South Dakota, Sprih Harsh Jan 2021

Pheasant Ecology In An Agricultural Landscape Of South Dakota, Sprih Harsh

Electronic Theses and Dissertations

Habitat loss and fragmentation are the greatest threats to wildlife conservation. Grasslands are among the most threatened ecosystems worldwide. The large-scale conversion of North American grasslands to cultivation has been strongly associated with declines of grassland bird populations. The ring-necked pheasant (Phasianus colchicus) is a common grassland bird which is negatively impacted by the conversion of grassland to cropland. Though pheasants are non-native to South Dakota, they have become naturalized in most of the state. However, with increases in agricultural intensification in South Dakota, indices of pheasant abundance from brood route surveys suggest that pheasant populations have declined to historically …


An Evaluation Of The Bighorn Sheep Population In Badlands National Park, Austin J. Wieseler Jan 2021

An Evaluation Of The Bighorn Sheep Population In Badlands National Park, Austin J. Wieseler

Electronic Theses and Dissertations

Within the last century, bighorn sheep (Ovis canadensis) in the badlands ecosystem of western South Dakota have been subjected to complete extirpation, reintroduction, disease die-offs, genetic bottlenecking, and population augmentation. Subsequently, the population in Badlands National Park (BNP) appears to have recovered, but it was unknown to what degree past events had influenced the population. From 2017-2019, we conducted research on 5 subherds within 2 management units in BNP to 1) survey for the presence of respiratory pathogens and estimate the prevalence of other potentially infectious diseases; 2) assess adult and lamb survival and cause-specific mortality; 3) estimate population size …


Laboratory Measurements Of Bed Shear Stress In Open Channel Flow And Soil Erosion Rate In Cohesive Soils, Gunnar Schurmann Kern Jan 2021

Laboratory Measurements Of Bed Shear Stress In Open Channel Flow And Soil Erosion Rate In Cohesive Soils, Gunnar Schurmann Kern

Electronic Theses and Dissertations

The relationship between soil erosion rate and bed shear stress is an important problem in sediment transport and scour. However, reliable measurements of the soil erosion function are challenging, both in the field and in the laboratory. The objective of this study is to investigate an experimental setup for conducting bed shear stress and soil erosion rate measurements using an open channel flume with a rough bed. These experiments were performed in an A-8 Hydraulic Channel with a fixed gravel bed. The flow discharge was kept constant at 0.158 ft.3/s, and bed shear stress was varied by changing the channel …


Exploring The Determinants Of Aspects Of Rotational Grazing In The U.S. Great Plains, Iftekhar Uddin Ahmed Chowdhury Jan 2021

Exploring The Determinants Of Aspects Of Rotational Grazing In The U.S. Great Plains, Iftekhar Uddin Ahmed Chowdhury

Electronic Theses and Dissertations

Pasture and rangeland make up about 45 percent of the agricultural land in the U.S. Great Plains and one of the most common form of mismanagement of this pasture is overgrazing. Which results in many detrimental effects on environment. Many practitioners endorsed Rotational grazing (RG) as an improved grazing management practice over season-long continuous grazing. The overall goal of the current study is to assess the certain aspects of using RG in the U.S. Great Plains. Using mail survey data of the of 874 beef cattle producers of North Dakota, South Dakota, and Texas, the study found that neighborhood practice, …


An Exploration Of The Application Of Spatial Network Screening Methods On Iowa Rural Road Crashes, Rosanna Maria Novellino Suarez Jan 2021

An Exploration Of The Application Of Spatial Network Screening Methods On Iowa Rural Road Crashes, Rosanna Maria Novellino Suarez

Electronic Theses and Dissertations

Safety on the roadway system is important due to its usage on mobility and accessibility, especially on rural roads in the state of Iowa. Single vehicle run off road crashes have been increasing in the United States and studies and research has increased due to the concern with those. For this effort, a spatial-temporal method of traffic safety network screening is utilized in order to evaluate the concerning type of crashes in particular locations. The study of single vehicle run off road crashes using the proposed method is important since distributions and clusters of crashes along roadways can be observed …


A Hydrologic Climate Study For An Arid Region, Ali Alsubeai Jan 2021

A Hydrologic Climate Study For An Arid Region, Ali Alsubeai

Electronic Theses and Dissertations

Water is the most precious natural resource in arid regions due to the limitation of water resources, expanding population, and increasing volumes of industrial and domestic waste. The purpose of this research was to evaluate methods to estimate water quantity in an arid region. The research consisted of three separate studies. In the first study, hydrologic models used to estimate water quantity were evaluated for suitability of use in arid regions. Most hydrologic models that have been used in arid regions were originally developed for humid regions. Rainfall events in arid regions can be characterized as short-term, high intense rainstorms …


Cross-Layer Optimization On Wireless Visual Sensor Networks For 3d Indoor Monitoring: A Top-Down Approach, Zhonghui Wang Jan 2021

Cross-Layer Optimization On Wireless Visual Sensor Networks For 3d Indoor Monitoring: A Top-Down Approach, Zhonghui Wang

Electronic Theses and Dissertations

As one of the latest advances in wireless sensor network (WSN), wireless visual sensor network (WVSN) bears a number of distinct features compared to its predecessor, mainly due to its directional visual coverage on the sensing field. This also renders previous solutions proposed for WSN may not work well for WVSN. For example, k-coverage has been introduced to WSNs for fault tolerance and high monitoring quality by omni-directional sensors but becomes incapable to cope with the directional coverage of sensors in WVSNs. Moreover, compared to scalar data in WSNs, visual data are much larger, difficult to aggregate and usually streamed …


Influences Of Alumina Particles On Hydroxyl Macrostate Estimates In A High-Speed, Reacting Flow, Jonathan Herlan Jan 2021

Influences Of Alumina Particles On Hydroxyl Macrostate Estimates In A High-Speed, Reacting Flow, Jonathan Herlan

Electronic Theses and Dissertations

Line-of-sight spectral observations in the near ultraviolet regime are made of the high-speed afterburning exhaust plume from a lab-scale rocket simulator which reacts gaseous H2 with gaseous O2. In the plume, afterburning results from energetic, unspent fuel (H2) reacting with the external Air. Hydroxyl (OH) is a dominant intermediate product in the reaction zone and is probed using broadband, near UV absorption spectroscopy to estimate the macrostate parameters of the exhaust plume. Molecular energy transition data from the HITRAN online database is used to model the absorption spectra as a bivariate function of the macrostate parameters temperature, T, and molecular …


Effectiveness Of Seismic Bearings On A Typical Isolated Two-Column Rc Bridge Pier Located In North Mississippi, Hemant Raj Joshi Jan 2021

Effectiveness Of Seismic Bearings On A Typical Isolated Two-Column Rc Bridge Pier Located In North Mississippi, Hemant Raj Joshi

Electronic Theses and Dissertations

The 2020 ASCE infrastructure report card has assigned a letter grade of D- for bridges in Mississippi based on poor to fair condition ratings with many approaching the end of their useful service lives. Bridges in northern Mississippi lie up to 100 miles from the New Madrid Fault and fall into the Region 3 Seismic Performance Category defined by AASHTO. The primary objective of this study is to evaluate the performance of commercially available bridge bearings on a common bridge pier type used in northern MS under the combined action of superstructure gravity and lateral seismic loads. The use of …


Quantification Of Climate Variability And Extreme Events In The Great Plains, Angelinah Ntsieng Rasoeu Jan 2021

Quantification Of Climate Variability And Extreme Events In The Great Plains, Angelinah Ntsieng Rasoeu

Electronic Theses and Dissertations

Climate variability and extreme events continue to worsen resulting in significant impacts to society and the environment. Quantifying precipitation variability, streamflow, and extreme events at local scale is crucial for local planning and management due to spatial and temporal precipitation variability which influences streamflow and thus, water resources. This study uses statistical tools to analyze 1895-2019 (125 years) of historical precipitation data to examine how long-term precipitation varies annually, seasonally, and monthly, and create climate classifications. The results show that annual precipitation is increasing linearly over time ranging from 13.2 in (1976) to 43.1 in (2010) and 5 climate classes …


Lightweight Encryption Based Security Package For Wireless Body Area Network, Sangwon Shin Jan 2021

Lightweight Encryption Based Security Package For Wireless Body Area Network, Sangwon Shin

Electronic Theses and Dissertations

As the demand of individual health monitoring rose, Wireless Body Area Networks (WBAN) are becoming highly distinctive within health applications. Nowadays, WBAN is much easier to access then what it used to be. However, due to WBAN’s limitation, properly sophisticated security protocols do not exist. As WBAN devices deal with sensitive data and could be used as a threat to the owner of the data or their family, securing individual devices is highly important. Despite the importance in securing data, existing WBAN security methods are focused on providing light weight security methods. This led to most security methods for WBAN …


Assessing The Effectiveness Of Cfd To Solve An Inverse Problem Of Thermal Profiles For The Protodune-Sp Neutrino Detector, Cecilia Anne Streff Jan 2021

Assessing The Effectiveness Of Cfd To Solve An Inverse Problem Of Thermal Profiles For The Protodune-Sp Neutrino Detector, Cecilia Anne Streff

Electronic Theses and Dissertations

Computational fluid dynamics (CFD) is a branch of fluid mechanics which is employed to numerically solve complex fluid, heat transfer, and multiphysics problems. Traditionally, CFD techniques are used to solve “forward” problems—using some known information of a system as inputs to a representative model to predict experimental measurements or expected system behavior. The work presented here demonstrates how CFD may be used to solve an “inverse” problem—given limited experimental data and some model, predict (previously unidentified) “input” system (or system model) parameters. The case study for this research uses a validated CFD modeling approach of the liquid argon (LAr) region …


Novel Acetylcholine Chloride Based Water Immiscible Deep Eutectic Solvent: Formulation, Characterization And Application In Drug Solubilization, Shiksha Subedi Jan 2021

Novel Acetylcholine Chloride Based Water Immiscible Deep Eutectic Solvent: Formulation, Characterization And Application In Drug Solubilization, Shiksha Subedi

Electronic Theses and Dissertations

Deep eutectic solvents (DESs) are the emerging class of new and inexpensive solvents composed of two or three safe components capable of self-association through hydrogen bond interaction. The depression in the melting point characterizes DESs compared to those of the individual components. These solvents have properties like the traditionally used ionic liquids (ILs), but they can offset the significant drawbacks of ILs, such as biodegradability, toxicity, and complex synthesis. Due to these remarkable advantages, the research in DESs is increasing exponentially. However, current deep eutectic solvents still have limitations to apply to the real chemical industries due to hydrophilicity and …


Study On The Human Gut Bacteria Under Different Ecological Conditions: Antibiotic Perturbation And Dietary Quercetin, Shruti Shashidharan Menon Jan 2021

Study On The Human Gut Bacteria Under Different Ecological Conditions: Antibiotic Perturbation And Dietary Quercetin, Shruti Shashidharan Menon

Electronic Theses and Dissertations

The human intestine encompasses a vast community of microorganisms known as the gut microbiota that play a crucial role in maintaining health. Common perturbations such as changes in the normal diet, antibiotic treatment, and changes in environmental conditions can alter the gut microbiome. This can create dysbiosis in the gut leading to disease conditions. Therefore, it becomes important to determine the forces that influence the gut microbial ecology. In the first study, we focus on antibiotic perturbations on microbial succession and resilience in a synthetic consortium consisting of the most prevalent gut bacteria in humans. In addition, we investigated the …


Human-Robot Collaboration Enabled By Real-Time Vision Tracking, Travis Deegan Jan 2021

Human-Robot Collaboration Enabled By Real-Time Vision Tracking, Travis Deegan

Electronic Theses and Dissertations

The number of robotic systems in the world is growing rapidly. However, most industrial robots are isolated in caged environments for the safety of users. There is an urgent need for human-in-the-loop collaborative robotic systems since robots are very good at performing precise and repetitive tasks but lack the cognitive ability and soft skills of humans. To fill this need, a key challenge is how to enable a robot to interpret its human co-worker’s motion and intention. This research addresses this challenge by developing a collaborative human-robot interface via innovations in computer vision, robotics, and system integration techniques. Specifically, this …


Human Activity Recognition Based On Wearable Flex Sensor And Pulse Sensor, Xiaozhu Jin Jan 2021

Human Activity Recognition Based On Wearable Flex Sensor And Pulse Sensor, Xiaozhu Jin

Electronic Theses and Dissertations

In order to fulfill the needs of everyday monitoring for healthcare and emergency advice, many HAR systems have been designed [1]. Based on the healthcare purpose, these systems can be implanted into an astronaut’s spacesuit to provide necessary life movement monitoring and healthcare suggestions. Most of these systems use acceleration data-based data record as human activity representation [2,3]. But this data attribute approach has a limitation that makes it impossible to be used as an activity monitoring system for astronavigation. Because an accelerometer senses acceleration by distinguishing acceleration data based on the earth’s gravity offset [4], the accelerometer cannot read …


Analysis Of Metabolites And Therapeutics For Toxic Inhaled Agent Exposure, Abigail Bemah Donkor Jan 2021

Analysis Of Metabolites And Therapeutics For Toxic Inhaled Agent Exposure, Abigail Bemah Donkor

Electronic Theses and Dissertations

The inhalation of toxic inhaled agents (TIAs) such as methyl isocyanate and cyanide can compromise an individual’s general health due to their extremely toxic nature. Nonetheless, these gases are used extensively in the electronics, chemical, welding, electroplating industries, etc., increasing the risk of exposure to both civilians and industrial workers. It is therefore very crucial to develop analytical methods for TIA metabolites and therapeutic agents. Methyl isocyanate (MIC), an intermediate in the synthesis of carbamate pesticides is a toxic industrial chemical that causes irritation and damage to the eyes, respiratory tracts, and skin. Due to its reactivity with proteins, protein …


Classification And Evaluation Of Extended Pics (Epics) On A Global Scale For Calibration And Stability Monitoring Of Optical Satellite Sensors, Juliana Maria Fajardo Rueda Jan 2021

Classification And Evaluation Of Extended Pics (Epics) On A Global Scale For Calibration And Stability Monitoring Of Optical Satellite Sensors, Juliana Maria Fajardo Rueda

Electronic Theses and Dissertations

As targets for the calibration and monitoring of optical satellite sensors, historically stable areas across North Africa have been used, known as Pseudo Invariant Calibration Sites PICS. However, two major drawbacks exist for these sites; first is the dependency on a single location to be always invariant, and second is the limited amount of observation achieved using these sites. As a result, longer time periods are needed to construct a dense data set to assess the radiometric performance of on-orbit optical sensors, and be convinced that the change detected is sensor-specific rather than site-specific. This work presents a global land …


Comparison Of Software Packages For Detecting Differentially Expressed Genes From Single-Sample Rna-Seq Data, Rong Zhou Jan 2021

Comparison Of Software Packages For Detecting Differentially Expressed Genes From Single-Sample Rna-Seq Data, Rong Zhou

Electronic Theses and Dissertations

RNA-sequencing (RNA-seq) has rapidly become the tool in many genome-wide transcriptomic studies. It provides a way to understand the RNA environment of cells in different physiological or pathological states to determine how cells respond to these changes. RNA-seq provides quantitative information about the abundance of different RNA species present in a given sample. If the difference or change observed in the read counts or expression level between two experimental conditions is statistically significant, the gene is declared as differentially expressed. A large number of methods for detecting differentially expressed genes (DEGs) with RNA-seq have been developed, such as the methods …


Spatial And Temporal Patterns Of Sympatric Bobcats (Lynx Rufus) And Coyotes (Canis Latrans) In An Agricultural Landscape, Marlin M. Dart Jan 2021

Spatial And Temporal Patterns Of Sympatric Bobcats (Lynx Rufus) And Coyotes (Canis Latrans) In An Agricultural Landscape, Marlin M. Dart

Electronic Theses and Dissertations

Bobcat (Lynx rufus) populations experienced declines in the Midwest during the 20th century due to land conversion for agriculture and over exploitation and were practically nonexistent in areas by the 1970-80s. Populations have been recovering following changes in land-use practices and habitat improvement. Eastern South Dakota was closed to bobcat harvest in 1977 but reopened in 2012 to select counties. Bobcats are elusive, have large home ranges, and occur at low densities, making monitoring their populations difficult. Camera trapping is an effective tool for monitoring elusive carnivores but can be burdened by low detection rates. Researchers often employ …


Revegetating Salt-Impacted Soils In The Northern Great Plains, Abigail P. Blanchard Jan 2021

Revegetating Salt-Impacted Soils In The Northern Great Plains, Abigail P. Blanchard

Electronic Theses and Dissertations

In the northern Great Plains (NGP), an estimated 10.6 million hectares of land are affected by naturally occurring salt-impacted soil. Naturally occurring salt impaction results when rainfall causes salts in parent material to move upward through the soil profile and remain in the root zone causing osmotic and ionic stress, negatively affecting seed imbibition, germination, and plant growth. Common methods to remediate saltimpacted soils were developed in the irrigated soils of the Southwestern U.S., are ineffective in the non-irrigated soils of the NGP, and can exacerbate the problem. Therefore, new methods to remediate salt-impacted soil in the NGP are needed. …


Cascaded Deep Learning Network For Postearthquake Bridge Serviceability Assessment, Youjeong Jang Jan 2021

Cascaded Deep Learning Network For Postearthquake Bridge Serviceability Assessment, Youjeong Jang

Electronic Theses and Dissertations

Damages assessment of bridges is important to derive immediate response after severe events to decide serviceability. Especially, past earthquakes have proven the vulnerability of bridges with insufficient detailing. Due to lack of a national and unified post-earthquake inspection procedure for bridges, conventional damage assessments are performed by sending professional personnel to the onsite, detecting visually and measuring the damage state. To get accurate and fast damage result of bridge condition is important to save not only lives but also costs.
There have been studies using image processing techniques to assess damage of bridge column without sending individual to onsite. Convolutional …


Effects Of Predator Management And Parasitism On Over-Water Nesting Diving Duck Production In Southwestern Manitoba, Trenton E. Rohrer Jan 2021

Effects Of Predator Management And Parasitism On Over-Water Nesting Diving Duck Production In Southwestern Manitoba, Trenton E. Rohrer

Electronic Theses and Dissertations

Nest survival of upland nesting waterfowl (e.g., mallard [Anas platyrhynchos], blue-winged teal [Anas discors]) has been studied extensively in the Prairie Pothole Region (PPR) of North America. Conversely, over-water nesting diving ducks’ nest survival is poorly understood, likely because over-water nests are more challenging to find, may be less concentrated, and searching for these nests is physically demanding. Nest depredation is considered a leading cause of duck nest failure and is considered a limiting factor on upland nesting waterfowl production in the PPR. Similar factors limiting upland nesting duck production may limit over-water nesting duck productivity, but studies of this …


Use And Improvement Of Remote Sensing And Geospatial Technologies In Support Of Crop Area And Yield Estimations In The West African Sahel, Kaboro Samasse Jan 2021

Use And Improvement Of Remote Sensing And Geospatial Technologies In Support Of Crop Area And Yield Estimations In The West African Sahel, Kaboro Samasse

Electronic Theses and Dissertations

In arid and semi-arid West Africa, agricultural production and regional food security depend largely on small-scale subsistence farming and rainfed crops, both of which are vulnerable to climate variability and drought. Efforts made to improve crop monitoring and our ability to estimate crop production (areas planted and yield estimations by crop type) in the major agricultural zones of the region are critical paths for minimizing climate risks and to support food security planning. The main objective of this dissertation research was to contribute to these efforts using remote sensing technologies. In this regard, the first analysis documented the low reliability …


What Am I?": Navigating Running Identity During Covid-19, Joshua Yeager Jan 2021

What Am I?": Navigating Running Identity During Covid-19, Joshua Yeager

Electronic Theses and Dissertations

This thesis attempted to answer how collegiate student-athlete runners navigated their running identity through the COVID-19 pandemic. This international health crisis served as an identity threat to the participants in this study as it cancelled outdoor track and field season in the spring of 2020. The main goal was to investigate how student-athlete runners navigated their athletic identity during COVID-19 and the social and psychological costs associated with said navigation. Utilizing in-depth semi-structured interviews, I collected data from five male and five female collegiate distance runners, from the same university. With grounded theory approach and identity theory as a theoretical …


Development Of A Probabilistic Multi-Class Model Selection Algorithm For High-Dimensional And Complex Data, Madeline Anne Ausdemore Jan 2021

Development Of A Probabilistic Multi-Class Model Selection Algorithm For High-Dimensional And Complex Data, Madeline Anne Ausdemore

Electronic Theses and Dissertations

The development of quantifiable measures of uncertainty in forensic conclusions has resulted in the debut of several ad-hoc methods for approximating the weight of evidence (WoE). In particular, forensic researchers have attempted to use similarity measures, or scores, to approximate the weight of evidence characterized by highdimensional and complex data. Score-based methods have been proposed to approximate theWoE for numerous evidence types (e.g., fingerprints, handwriting, inks, voice analysis). In general, scorebased methods consider the score as a projection onto the real line. For example, the score-based likelihood ratio evaluates and compares the likelihoods of a score calculated between two objects …


Quantifying The Impacts Of Land Use, Management And Climate Change On Water Resources In Missouri River Basin, Arun Bawa Jan 2021

Quantifying The Impacts Of Land Use, Management And Climate Change On Water Resources In Missouri River Basin, Arun Bawa

Electronic Theses and Dissertations

A location-specific evaluation of hydrological landscape responses concerning past and projected climate and land use land cover (LULC) changes can provide a powerful intellectual basis for developing efficient and profitable agroecosystems, and overcoming uncertain and detrimental consequences of LULC and climate shifts. This dissertation assessed the impacts of land use, management, and climate change on water resources in the Missouri River Basin (MRB) through four specific studies that included: (i) to study the responses of leached nutrient concentrations and soil health to winter rye cover crop (CC) under no-till corn (Zea mays L.)-soybean [Glycine max (L.) Merr.] rotation, (ii) to …