Digital Commons Network^™

The Development Of A Rag-Based Artificial Intelligence Research Assistant (Aira), Hamid Vakilzadeh, David A. Wood

Faculty Publications

No abstract provided.

Navigating Together: The Conav Testbed And Framework For Benchmarking Cooperative Localization, Rohith Boyinine, Jayanth Ammapalli, Anusna Chakraborty, Rajnikant Sharma, Kevin Brink, Clark N. Taylor

Faculty Publications

This paper presents CoNaV, a comprehensive framework for creating a multi-vehicle cooperative localization (CL) testbed designed to support the benchmarking, development, and deployment of cooperative navigation algorithms. Given the essential role of CL in improving localization accuracy for both defense and civilian applications, CoNaV provides a robust environment for rigorously validating algorithms under real-world conditions. By establishing a benchmark for CL algorithms, CoNaV lays a foundation for advancing research into more sophisticated and distributed CL solutions. This framework highlights the potential of cooperative navigation to enhance multi-vehicle operations and offers a scalable, practical approach for future developments in CL technology.

High-Speed Aircraft Stability And Control Metrics, Timothy T. Takahashi, Jack A. Griffin, Ramana Grandhi

Faculty Publications

This review paper identifies key stability and control screening parameters needed to design low-risk, general-purpose high-speed aircraft. These derive from MIL-STD-8785C, MIL-STD-1797, and older AGARD reports, and are suitable for assessing conceptual high-speed vehicles. We demonstrate their applicability using published ground test, computation, and flight test data from the Bell X-2, North American X-15, Martin X-24A, Northrop HL-10, Lockheed Blackbird (YF-12/SR-71), and North American XB-70 as well as the Rockwell Space Shuttle Orbiter. The relative success of the X-15 and Blackbird and the performance limitations of the others indicate the need to scrutinize lateral-directional stability at the preliminary design phase. …

The Space Rescue Professional: Operationalizing Guardians For The Future, Benjamin Johnis, Robert Bettinger, James Dean

Faculty Publications

The escalating competition in space exploration demands a dedicated space rescue capability. This article argues for the establishment of a space rescue professional (SRP) career field within the Department of Defense and the US Space Force. By harnessing existing US Air Force combat rescue expertise and partnering with the National Aeronautics and Space Administration, the Space Force can rapidly develop a robust SRP program with the warrant officer corps as its backbone. This article addresses a critical gap in national space policy to outline a cost-effective dual-service training pipeline and SRP operational roles. Such an investment safeguards astronauts, bolsters US …

Individual, Family, Peer, And Religious Community Predictors Of Adolescent Religious Deidentification, Sam A. Hardy, Russ Amelang, Michael Goodman

Faculty Publications

This study examined individual, family, and peer religiosity, and religious community supportiveness as predictors of adolescent religious deidentification. The longitudinal study involved two waves of data, two years apart, from U.S. families (1,021 families; religious adolescents from 11–17 years of age), with measures of dimensions of religiosity at Time 1 and changes in religious identification from Time 1 to Time 2. Within each domain, at least one dimension of religiosity at Time 1 predicted religious deidentification at Time 2. Specifically, youth higher in individual, family, and peer religiosity, and religious community supportiveness, were less likely to leave religion. These relations …

Customer Service Operations: A Gatekeeper Framework, Maqbool Dada, Brett A. Hathaway, Evgeny Kagan

Faculty Publications

Customer service has evolved beyond in-person visits and phone calls to include live chat, AI chatbots and social media, among other contact options. Service providers typically refer to these contact modalities as “channels”. Within each channel, customer service agents are tasked with managing and resolving a stream of inbound service requests. Each request involves milestones where the agent must decide whether to keep assisting the customer or to transfer them to a more skilled – and often costlier – provider. To understand how this request resolution process should be managed, we develop a model in which each channel is represented …

Disclosure Benchmarking By Lawyers: Evidence Fromthe Ipo Setting, Michael S. Drake, Jeff Mcmullin, Kenneth Merkley, Chase Potter, John Treu

Faculty Publications

Lawyers play an important advisory role in drafting financial reports, yet empirical evidence documenting the influence of external legal counsel on this process remains sparse. This study focuses on a specific aspect of lawyers’ drafting process: the practice of reviewing disclosures previously filed by other issuers—a practice termed “disclosure benchmarking.” Using initial public offering (IPO) disclosures as the setting, we find that disclosure benchmarking is associated with amore efficient Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) review process. We further find that it is associated with several measures of disclosure quality, including disclosures that are less likely to be revised in subsequent …

The Information Content Of Private Information Acquisition: Evidence From Foia Requests To The Sec, Dichu Bao, Janja Brendel, Michael S. Drake, Lixin (Nancy) Su

Faculty Publications

We analyze Freedom of Information Act (FOIA) requests submitted to the Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC), focusing on the value-relevance hypothesis and the directtrading hypothesis. Our empirical analysis reveals nuanced value relevance associated with different types of requests: Requests related to ongoing investigations and submitted by anonymous requesters are negatively correlated with future returns, while requests from investment firms and intellectual property firms predict positive future returns. Our findings also provide some support to the direct-trading hypothesis, showing that investment firms increase holdings of stocks for which they have filed FOIA requests, and short sellers exhibit heightened activity following requests …

Signaling Innovation: The Nontax Benefits Of Claiming R&D Tax Credits, Bradford F. Hepfer, Hannah W. Judd, Sarah C. Rice

Faculty Publications

Using the IPO setting, we test whether firms signal the quality of their investments in innovation activities by claiming R&D tax credits. We find the presence and amount of the R&D credit are each associated with lower information asymmetry and with higher investor demand at IPO. Conservatively, we estimate that sample firms realize additional IPO proceeds of 32–45 percent of their creditable R&D expenditures, indicating economically significant non-tax benefits associated with the R&D credit. We verify the R&D credit signal by showing its positive association with firms’ future patenting activity, patent citations, and post-IPO stock returns. Results from these tests …

Timing Is Everything: Congruence, Controllability, And Performance Measure Weighting, Hayden T. Gunnell, Gary Hecht, William B. Tayler, Kristy L. Towry

Faculty Publications

We investigate whether the weights managers place on performance measures for performancebased compensation depend on whether weights are determined at the beginning or end of the performance period. We propose that managers frame the weighting decision differently depending on timing. Specifically, prior to employee effort, managers frame the decision as intended to align employee effort to firm objectives, whereas after employees have exerted effort, managers frame the weighting decision as intended to evaluate employee effort. Thus, we expect, and find, that managers weight measures that are more congruent with firm objectives more heavily when weightings are determined ex ante (before …

Variation In Early 20th Century Rural Utah English, Joseph A. Stanley, Hallie Davidson

Faculty Publications

Utah English Pronunciation

Early 20th Century Utah English:

• Early work (Cook 1969, Helquist 1970) compares rural Utah to Salt Lake City.
• Bowie (2003, 2008, etc.) analyzes archival recordings of religious sermons.
• Primary focus in those studies: the decline of the CORD-CARD merger.

Introducing the Kohler Tapes

Background:

• Norm Kohler, a middle school teacher in Heber in 1980s–2000s.
• He had students to interview a local older person, like a grandparent.
• He provided questions to ask, akin to sociolinguistic interviews.
• Collected 1200+ cassette tapes.
• Intended to write a history based on these oral narratives.

Processing:

• Digitized in 2021 at BYU’s Office of …

Encouraging Self-Regulation In An Online University Course For Preservice Teachers: An Intervention Study, Karen T. Arnesen, Charles R. Graham, Heather Leary, Alison I. Mcmurry

Faculty Publications

Although self-regulation (SR) has long been seen as an important educational concept, we know little about how to foster it in higher education online student populations. This research addresses this need by introducing an SR intervention into a preservice teacher course. The 30 students who participated used an intervention consisting of weekly student goal setting and self-reflection. Using data collected from a self-regulation survey, weekly reflections, final exam reflections, and interviews, all but one student indicated that the process of setting a goal weekly and especially reflecting on their actions during the week increased their self-regulation abilities. More than half …

Sources Of Influence In Marriage And Parenting For Interfaith Couples, William D. Stanford, Justin J. Hendricks, Ted G. Futris, Loren D. Marks, David C. Dollahite

Faculty Publications

Interfaith marriages are increasingly common, yet research on their family dynamics and sources of influence in family functioning remains limited. Relatedly, although research highlights religion’s influence on family processes, most studies only include same-faith couples. Subsequently, we qualitatively explored the experiences of 32 happily married interfaith couples, examining their sources of guidance in marriage and parenting, reasons for rejecting influences, and the role of religion in their family functioning. We identified one theme of rejecting outside influence and five key themes/sources of influence: one another/themselves, family, friends, media/professionals, and spiritual sources. Findings emphasize similarities between interfaith couples and American families …

Testing The Effect Of Speech Separation On Vowel Formant Estimates, Joseph A. Stanley, Lisa Morgan Johnson, Earl Kjar Brown

Faculty Publications

While recent advances in sociophonetic data processing have made it possible to analyze large datasets and audio not originally intended for linguistic analysis, overlapping speech in recordings with multiple speakers continues to be an issue that results in lost data. We evaluate whether current source separation models produce audio that is clean enough to produce reliable measurements for sociophonetic analysis. We compare formant estimates from a pair of pristine recordings and merged-and-separated versions of those same recordings using the Libri2mix, Whamr16K, and WSJ02mix source separation models. Based on auditory inspection of the separated files, visualization of vowel formant estimates, and …

Complementary Pre-Lateral Mergers Across Ethnicities And Generations In Georgia, Margaret E. L. Renwick, Jon Forrest, Joseph A. Stanley, Lelia Glass

Faculty Publications

No abstract provided.

Testing The Effect Of Speaker Diarization And Speech Separation On Vowel Formant Estimates, Joseph A. Stanley, Lisa Morgan Johnson, Earl Kjar Brown

Faculty Publications

No abstract provided.

How Overcoming Linguistic Discrimination Benefits The World, Joseph A. Stanley, Lisa Morgan Johnson, Eve Okura Koller, Vashti Wai Yu Lee, Hallie Davidson, Valeria Prieto Hurtado, Sam Keddington, Hazel Mattson, Abigail Mueller, Sydney Jo Pederson, Maryn Perschon, Reese Rugg, Eliza Whiting

Faculty Publications

What is linguistic discrimination?

• Restricting access or opportunities based on speech (e.g., accent, pronunciation, grammatical system, tone or pitch)
• One of the last socially acceptable discriminatory practices in the international community
• A source of injustice that impacts many of God’s children every day

Linguistic discrimination is real! Here’s what it looks like…

In Healthcare:

• More questions about insurance coverage; later appointments (Wisniewski and Walker 2020)
• Lower access to mental health services (Kugelmass 2016)
• More referrals for speech therapy (Charity Hudley et. al. 2018)

In Education:

• Students receiving negative judgments from teachers (Bowie & Bond 1994; Cecil 1988; Wheeler 2019)
• Teachers …

Designing For Relational Ethics In Online And Blended Learning: Levinas, Buber, And Teaching Interfaith Ethics, Michael Hubbard Mackay, Jason K. Mcdonald, Andrew C. Reed

Faculty Publications

Online and blended learning (OBL) overemphasize the process of creating artifacts, producing strategies, or otherwise utilizing a “making” orientation in education. As an alternative to this making-orientation, we offer a model for relational course design founded in the philosophies of Emmanuel Levinas and Martin Buber. We examine an OBL course design focused on interfaith leadership and ethics that lends itself to the need for relational pedagogy. The focus on asymmetrical and symmetrical relationships that separate Levinas and Buber’s philosophies enable rich ways of designing relational pedagogies and for resisting the making orientation. By focusing on human relationships, we demonstrate design …

Instructional Designer Perspectives On The Pursuit Of Quality In Online Course Design, Jason K. Mcdonald, Stephen C. Yanchar

Faculty Publications

In this qualitative study we investigated the experiences of instructional designers as they sought to build quality into online courses. Through semi-structured interviews, we explored what enabled and hindered their pursuit of quality, how they experienced their efforts in this regard, what mattered to them, and complexities that accompanied this pursuit. Our analysis of participant experiences suggested four themes: (1) connections between quality and designers’ ability to act autonomously; (2) connections between quality and collaborative, team-based relationships; (3) ambivalence due to tensions between autonomy and collaboration; and (4) ways of coping with limits on autonomy and collaboration. We conclude our …

Actuator Disk Model For Aeropropulsive Coupling Effects In Vortex Particle Method, Eduardo Alvarez, Vineet Ahuja, Vinod Lakshminarayan, Aaron Perry, Ryan Anderson, Andrew Ning

Faculty Publications

Blown lift and distributed electric propulsion aircraft pose strong aeropropulsive coupling effects that cannot be ignored during the early stages of design. In this study, we develop an advanced actuator disk model (ADM) for aeropropulsive coupling effects of ducted fans with the vortex particle method (VPM). The advanced ADM consists of (1) an actuator disk at the rotor plane, (2) a surface vortex sheet modeling the mixing and convection of blade tip vorticity along walls, and (3) a powered wake at the exhaust. With these three components, a propulsion jet with an arbitrary velocity profile is formed and interactions with …

Generative Ai Applied To Aac For Aphasia: A Pilot Study Of Aphasia-Gpt, Dallin J. Bailey, Francesca Herget, Derek Hansen, Forrest Burton, Grant Pitt, Tyson Harmon, David Wingate

Faculty Publications

Background

People with aphasia may be supported by augmentative and alternative communication systems, but further development is necessary to improve the communication support such systems provide. Advances in artificial intelligence methods of natural language processing may provide improved support for people with aphasia, but development and testing involving people with aphasia is critical.

Aims

The purpose of the study is to describe the development and pilot testing of a new AAC system for people with aphasia, a mobile web app named Aphasia-GPT.

Methods & Procedures

Aphasia-GPT is specifically designed to receive spoken input from a user with aphasia; it then …

Is Increased Mutation Driving Genetic Diversity In Dogs Within The Chornobyl Exclusion Zone?, Megan N. Dillon, Allison N. Dickey, Reade B. Roberts, Jennifer A. Betz, Timothy Mousseau, Norman J. Kleiman, Matthew Breen

Faculty Publications

Environmental contamination can have lasting impacts on surrounding communities, though the long-term impacts can be difficult to ascertain. The disaster at the Chornobyl Nuclear Power Plant in 1986 and subsequent remediation efforts resulted in contamination of the local environment with radioactive material, heavy metals, and additional environmental toxicants. Many of these are mutagenic in nature, and the full effect of these exposures on local flora and fauna has yet to be understood. Several hundred free-roaming dogs occupy the contaminated area surrounding the Chornobyl Nuclear Power Plant, and previous studies have highlighted a striking level of genetic differentiation between two geographically …

Is Increased Mutation Driving Genetic Diversity In Dogs Within The Chornobyl Exclusion Zone?, Megan N. Dillon, Allison N. Dickey, Reade B. Roberts, Jennifer A. Betz, Timothy Mousseau, Norman J. Kleiman, Matthew Breen

Faculty Publications

Environmental contamination can have lasting impacts on surrounding communities, though the long-term impacts can be difficult to ascertain. The disaster at the Chornobyl Nuclear Power Plant in 1986 and subsequent remediation efforts resulted in contamination of the local environment with radioactive material, heavy metals, and additional environmental toxicants. Many of these are mutagenic in nature, and the full effect of these exposures on local flora and fauna has yet to be understood. Several hundred free-roaming dogs occupy the contaminated area surrounding the Chornobyl Nuclear Power Plant, and previous studies have highlighted a striking level of genetic differentiation between two geographically …

Challenges And Opportunities In Implementing And Enforcing India’S Loose Cigarette Sales Ban: A Qualitative Stakeholder Analysis, Mayank Sakhuja, Daniela B. Friedman Ph.D., Mark M. Macauda Phd, Mph, James R. Hebert Scd, Mangesh S. Pednekar, Prakash C. Gupta, James F. Thrasher Ph.D., Ma, Ms

Faculty Publications

Introduction Several Indian states have banned the sale of loose cigarettes, and India is considering a national ban. This study examines the perceptions of policymakers, implementers, and law enforcement officials regarding the implementation and enforcement of this ban. Methods Between May–October 2022, we conducted in-depth interviews with 26 key stakeholders involved in tobacco control in two Indian cities, Delhi (where the ban was not implemented) and Mumbai (where the ban was in effect). Participants included representatives from various government departments such as police, municipal corporations, FDA, health, and civil society organizations / NGOs such as Vital Strategies, World Health Organization, …

Effect Of Improving Food Security On Parenting Practices And Caregiver–Adolescent Relationships: Qualitative Findings Of An Income-Generating Agricultural Intervention In Rural Kenya, Maricianah A. Onono, Lila Sheira, Edward A. Frongillo Jr., Gladys Odhiambo, Pauline Wekesa, Amy Conroy, Elizabeth A. Bukusi, Craig R. Cohen, Sheri D. Weiser

Faculty Publications

Background

Despite the recognised links between food insecurity and parenting, few studies have evaluated the perceived impacts of livelihood or food security interventions on parental practices, intra-household functioning, adolescent behaviour and psychosocial outcomes in HIV-affected households in sub-Saharan Africa.

Aims

The study aimed to understand the perceived effects of food security on parenting practices and how this was experienced by both adolescent girls (aged 13–19 years) and their caregivers in rural Kenya.

Method

We conducted semi-structured, individual interviews with 62 caregiver–adolescent dyads who were participants in the adolescent Shamba Maisha (NCT03741634), a sub-study of adolescent girls and caregivers with a …

Editorial: Infrastructure Maintenance And Monitoring For Sustainable Cities, Yonas Kassa, Saeed Eftekhar Azam, Deepak Khazanchi, Brian Ricks

Faculty Publications

As cities continue to grow and evolve, maintaining and monitoring their infrastructure becomes an 2 increasingly challenging problem, requiring multidisciplinary approaches. This problem is as critical for 3 developing countries that are rapidly building their infrastructure (Gurara et al., 2018Ede et al., 2019) 4 as it is for already developed countries with aging infrastructure (Van Breugel, 2017). Researchers have 14 Such developments can also be integrated into digital twinning-a technology approach that creates 15 virtual replicas of physical infrastructure elements, systems, and cities-that offers a dynamic framework 16 for real-time monitoring and predictive maintenance through data integration and simulation. The …

Evaluation Of Impact Energy In Composites Using Acoustic Emission Sensing Technique, Li Ai, Tanner Mesaric, Sydney Flowers, Sydney Houck, Joshua Widawsky, Paul Ziehl

Faculty Publications

A major challenge faced by composite materials is impact, which can result in unexpected damage and degradation. Impact events can cause significant structural damage that may not be immediately visible, leading to a reduction in the material’s mechanical properties and overall performance. This paper presents an impact assessment method using acoustic emission (AE) sensing technology. The primary goal of this approach is to determine the extent of impact damage on composite components by analyzing AE signals produced under operating stress conditions. An advanced algorithm is proposed to predict the probability that the damage falls into various damage categories, providing a …

Editorial: Artificial Intelligence For Smart Health: Learning, Simulation, And Optimization, Bing Yao, Nathan Gaw, Hyo Kyung Lee

Faculty Publications

With rapid developments in medical sensing and imaging, we now live in an era of data explosion in which large amounts of data are readily available in clinical environments. The fast-growing biomedical and healthcare data provide unprecedented opportunities for data-driven scientific knowledge discovery and clinical decision support. Our Research Topic aims to catalyze synergies among biomedical informatics, machine learning, computer simulation, operations research, systems engineering, and other related fields with three specific goals: (1) develop cutting-edge data-driven models to accelerate scientific knowledge discovery in biomedicine using healthcare data collected from laboratory systems, imaging systems, and medical and sensing devices; (2) …

Dynamic Analysis Of Additively Manufactured Tensegrity Structures, Keivan Davami, Russell A. Rowe, Ben Gulledge, Jesse Park, Ali Beheshti, Anthony N. Palazotto, Fariborz Tavangarian, Sadie Beck

Faculty Publications

Herein, we present an analysis, design, and experimental testing of modular prestressed pin-jointed structures constructed from bistable units and inspired by the classical triangular tensegrity prism. Tensegrity structures, characterized by a combination of tension members (cables) and compression members (bars) in a self-equilibrated state, have gained significant attention in engineering over the past two decades due to their unique nonlinear mechanical behavior. The discontinuity of the compression members in tensegrity structures leads to a slightly different failure behavior compared to their lattice structure counterparts, with unprecedented applications. However, traditional fabrication and assembly methods have posed challenges for their widespread adoption. …

Molten Flux Synthesis Of Plutonium (Iv) Silicates K2Pusi2O7 And Rb2Pusi6O15, Travis K. Deason, Gregory Morrison, Amir Mofrad, Jake Amoroso, David Diprete, Theodore M. Besmann, Shanna L. Estes, Hans Conrad Zur Loye

Faculty Publications

Few plutonium containing silicates have been reported in the literature and only one other tetravalent plutonium silicate structure has been reported using the flux growth method. With the goal of understanding actinide incorporation into silicates, we describe herein two new plutonium (IV) silicates, Rb2PuSi6O15 and K2PuSi2O7, synthesized using a mixed alkali chloride/alkali fluoride flux growth. Both structures crystallize in the C2/c space group with lattice parameters a=24.2980(10) Å, b=7.1466(3) Å, c=17.2025(8) Å and 96.6560(10)° for Rb2PuSi6O15, and a=9.9478(2) Å, b=5.59820 (10) Å, c=13.1848(2) Å, and 105.7400(10)° for K2PuSi2O7. Comparisons to the synthesis of other reported alkali actinide silicates (Ce, U, …