Digital Commons Network^™

Sustainability In A Changing Landscape: Identifying The Effects Of Land Use On Vegetation And Mammal Communities, Christopher Paul Hansen

Graduate Student Theses, Dissertations, & Professional Papers

Increases in habitat loss and fragmentation from anthropogenic disturbance present substantial threats to global biodiversity; thus, sustainable land management will be crucial to support current and future generations of humans and wildlife. In the western United States, approximately 70% of the land is grazed by domestic cows (i.e., “cattle”), and urban development is increasing rapidly. These land uses may affect vegetation composition and mammal communities, which could alter ecosystem function through bottom-up or top-down processes. Therefore, understanding the responses of vegetation and mammal communities to these practices is important when considering socio-ecological sustainability.

In this dissertation, I evaluated how cattle …

Using Formulation To Unlock Vaccine Adjuvant Efficacy For Toll-Like And C-Type Lectin Receptor Agonsts, Kristopher Kenneth Short

Graduate Student Theses, Dissertations, & Professional Papers

Ligands for pattern recognition receptors (PRRs) have been isolated or synthesized for use as adjuvants in order to improve the magnitude and quality of the immune response of vaccines. In particular, basic research of toll-like receptor (TLR) and C-type lectin receptor (CLR) families has culminated in the production of novel ligands with agonist activity. To use these PRR agonists as vaccine adjuvants, it is necessary to properly formulate them in delivery systems to unlock their agonist activity. The objective of this work was to develop liposomal and oil-in-water (O/W) emulsion formulations for TLR4 and TLR7/8 agonists and to develop O/W …

Monitoring The Wetland Landscape: White-Faced Ibis (Plegadis Chihi) Breeding Habitat As A Model Assemblage, Shea P. Coons

Graduate Student Theses, Dissertations, & Professional Papers

Wetlands structure landscape biodiversity by providing critical habitat to numerous fish and wildlife species. However, climate change, growing human populations, and shifting land use practices strain limited water supplies that sustain wetlands in the semi-arid western US. Conserving a wetland network with prominent value to wildlife is paramount to ensure future security of habitat and ecosystem processes. Here, I use white-faced ibis (Plegadis chihi; hereafter ‘ibis’) breeding colonies as a model system to identify and monitor a landscape-scale wetland network across the semi-arid western US. Ibis serve an important role in marking ecologically important wetland networks because they require a …

Ensemble Protein Inference Evaluation, Kyle Lee Lucke

Graduate Student Theses, Dissertations, & Professional Papers

The Protein inference problem is becoming an increasingly important tool that aids in the characterization of complex proteomes and analysis of complex protein samples. In bottom-up shotgun proteomics experiments the metrics for evaluation (like AUC and calibration error) are based on an often imperfect target-decoy database. These metrics make the inherent assumption that all of the proteins in the target set are present in the sample being analyzed. In general, this is not the case, they are typically a mix of present and absent proteins. To objectively evaluate inference methods, protein standard datasets are used. These datasets are special in …

Collaborative Conservation And Backcountry Weed Control: A Case Study Of The Great Burn Proposed Wilderness, Christopher James Prange

Graduate Student Theses, Dissertations, & Professional Papers

Noxious weeds have become a management priority on public lands in the United States. Managing invasive weed populations in natural areas with complex ecosystems presents issues that need a systems-wide approach over long temporal and spatial scales. This broad-scale problem increasingly demands collaborative efforts. While collaborative conservation has become a tool in natural resource management during the 21^st century, it is less commonly applied in weed control in backcountry wilderness areas. Programs that have been initiated are understudied. Accordingly, this research was conducted through semi-structured interviews to gather perspectives of weed professionals involved in a collaborative backcountry weed program …

Linking Habitat, Populations And Policy For Caribou In The Face Of Increasing Disturbance, Eric Charles Palm

Graduate Student Theses, Dissertations, & Professional Papers

In North America’s boreal forest, wildfire has long been the dominant form of natural disturbance. However, the human footprint in the region is steadily growing. Large-scale forest harvest and energy development have fragmented late-successional forests, leading to habitat loss for species such as caribou (Rangifer tarandus) that rely on these ecological communities. Caribou have experienced widespread population declines and local extirpation throughout the western boreal forest in recent decades. I first analyzed caribou resource selection responses to fires in >685 female caribou across 15 populations that span a wide gradient of fire frequency but are exposed to relatively little human …

Transient Tertiary Interactions And Persistence Of Interhelical Turns In The Denatured State Of A Helical Protein, Dustin Corey Becht

Graduate Student Theses, Dissertations, & Professional Papers

Protein folding is the natural process through which a linear polypeptide, originally encoded by a gene, adopts a distinct, three-dimensional structure capable of biological function. Over the last several decades, the denatured state ensemble (DSE), one of the two major populations adopted by a protein along with the native state, has been a topic of interest. Classically, the DSE has been interpreted as a collection of random-coil conformations devoid of any structural features. However, numerous studies have demonstrated that residual structure persists in the denatured state of proteins and may dictate the earliest stages of the protein folding process. Characterization …

It’S The Little Things: An Exploration Of Small Rnas And Selfish Genetic Elements Of The Human Bacterial Pathogens Coxiella Burnetii And Bartonella Bacilliformis, Shaun Gregory Wachter

Graduate Student Theses, Dissertations, & Professional Papers

Coxiella burnetii is a Gram-negative gammaproteobacterium and zoonotic agent of Q fever in humans. Previous work in our lab has demonstrated that C. burnetii codes for several small RNAs (sRNAs) that are differentially expressed between in vivo and in vitro growth conditions. sRNAs serve as post-transcriptional regulatory effectors involved in the control of nearly all biological processes. We demonstrated that several of the identified sRNAs, namely Coxiella burnetii small RNA 3 (CbsR3), Cbsr13, and CbsR16, represent members of two novel families of miniature inverted-repeat transposable elements (MITEs), termed QMITE1 and QMITE2. Furthermore, we have characterized a highly expressed, infection-specific sRNA, …

Evaluation Of The Watershed Education Network's Fish Week Program, Rennie Ann Winkelman

Graduate Student Theses, Dissertations, & Professional Papers

The Watershed Education Network (WEN) is a nonprofit environmental education program that aims to foster knowledge, appreciation, and awareness of watershed health through water-based education programs and field science experiences. Their Fish Week program for 7^th graders at Washington Middle School has an overarching theme of watershed and ecosystem health and includes an introduction to aquatic invertebrates, native fish, fish habitats, bugs and dry fly comparison, and an introduction to fly fishing. This is a formative, outcome-based evaluation of the Fish Week program. I used pre and post program survey data from 2017 and 2018 as well as survey …

Evaluations Concerning The Halogen Bond And Hydrogen Bond Relationship, Daniel Adam Decato

Graduate Student Theses, Dissertations, & Professional Papers

The chemical advances of this century are likely to be driven by the ability to predict and control noncovalent interactions. While the hydrogen bond continues to captivate the interests of scientists, the development of non-traditional noncovalent interactions offers unique solutions to tackle chemical problems. Understanding the interplay between the ubiquitous hydrogen bond and other noncovalent forces will further fundamental knowledge thereby accelerating novel functional designs. This dissertation examines the nature of the hydrogen bond and halogen bond relationship.

With a renaissance in the early 2000’s, the halogen bond has become a functional alternative to the hydrogen bond. The halogen bond, …

Change Is The Only Constant: A Snowpack Retention Analysis And Climate Vulnerability Road Map For The Skalkaho Creek Sub-Basin, Zachary Freeman Goodwin

Graduate Student Theses, Dissertations, & Professional Papers

Climate change is impacting the whole of North America, although the impacts differ depending on regional geography. In the Intermountain West, climate change is contributing to lower overall snowpack totals and diminished late season streamflows. These changes will likely contribute to vulnerabilities in how much water is available to irrigators, municipalities, and fisheries dependent upon a consistent yearly flow of meltwater. This paper explores how snowpack retention has changed via the NASA dataset Daymet, which provides gridded estimates of weather parameters including Snow Water Equivalent in the Bitterroot River Basin of western Montana. This analysis showed that snowpack retention from …

The Nmda Receptor Coagonists L-Glutamate And D-Serine, Denis Mikhailovich Shchepakin

Graduate Student Theses, Dissertations, & Professional Papers

Glutamate is the predominant excitatory neurotransmitter in the mammalian central nervous system. Glutamate release and reuptake control both tonic activation of glutamate receptors and phasic signaling during synaptic transmission. Here we study different aspects of the system. The first three chapters focus on the most abundant glutamate transporters found in the brain, excitatory amino acid transporters 1-3 (EAAT1- 3/SLC1A3,2,1). The last chapter is devoted to a paralogous neutral amino acid transporter (ASCT1/SLC1A4) and its role in transport of D-serine, a coagonist of the N-methyl-Daspartate (NMDA) glutamate receptor.

In the first chapter, we discuss the existing discrepancy in estimates of EAAT1-3 …

Impacts Of Environmental Variables On Deer Mouse Survival In The Southwestern United States, Emily C. Weidner

Graduate Student Theses, Dissertations, & Professional Papers

North American deer mice (Peromyscus maniculatus) are the primary reservoir for Sin Nombre orthohantavirus, and they play a significant role in the maintenance and transmission of disease across the landscape. Vital rates, such as survival, are a key component to understanding how disease spreads in a population. Understanding environmental factors that influence survival may allow for development of a predictive model that can assess disease risk in deer mice and, thus, a corresponding increased disease risk for humans. Our work explored the relationship between deer mouse survival and environmental variables at three long-term small mammal trapping sites in …

Family Environment And Attachment In Relation To Complex Trauma And C-Ptsd, Susan Elizabeth Ocean

Graduate Student Theses, Dissertations, & Professional Papers

Childhood traumatic experiences occurring during critical developmental stages are strongly linked to poor mental health outcomes during adulthood, including PTSD. Yet, individuals who have experienced multiple traumas (and across developmental stages) report a profile of symptoms that is not well-represented by traditional PTSD diagnostic criteria. Recent research suggests that resulting post-traumatic stress after the experience of complex trauma should be considered a separate, yet related, disorder from the well-established PTSD. Since traumatic experiences are commonplace and often detrimental, establishing which factors contribute to risk and resilience is of great importance. Having secure attachment to a primary caregiver and family cohesion …

Developing Tools To Understand Stress And Nest Abandonment In Birds, Hannah Elena Beyl

Graduate Student Theses, Dissertations, & Professional Papers

No abstract provided.

An Exploration Of The Adaptive Capacity Of Community-Based Organizations In Northern Botswana In Response To A Hunting Ban, Katherine Kellam Coe

Graduate Student Theses, Dissertations, & Professional Papers

Trophy hunting serves as a large economic sector in several African countries and has been considered important for wildlife conservation and local rural development. In many parts of Africa, local communities’ attitudes and decisions can affect the fate of conservation efforts outside of protected areas and it is thought that benefits from trophy hunting tourism can influence pro-conservation behavior at local scales. In Botswana, recent mandates, such as a 2014 nation-wide hunting ban and a 2019 lifting of the ban, have disrupted the relationships between wildlife conservation and rural livelihoods, resulting in adverse economic, social, and ecological impacts at various …

Binegative Minority Stress, Psychological Processes, And Disordered Alcohol Use: Disparities Among Sexual Minority Womxn, Kinsie Jean Dunham

Graduate Student Theses, Dissertations, & Professional Papers

Sexual minority womxn (i.e., woman-identified persons) tend to report more harmful alcohol use and more negative alcohol use outcomes than heterosexual women—a pattern not consistently observed in man-identified populations. Further, bisexually-oriented, hereafter called nonexclusively-oriented, womxn (NOW) report more negative alcohol use outcomes and meet criteria for alcohol use disorder at higher rates than both lesbians and heterosexual women (or exclusively-oriented womxn; EOW). These disparities require further investigation to explicate the antecedents and mechanisms impacting alcohol use for this at-risk population. This project examines the incremental negative effects of binegativity as a specific minority stressor and antecedent of disordered alcohol use. …

The Built Environment At Plaza H, Cahal Pech: A Study In Resiliency, Rachel A. Steffen

Graduate Student Theses, Dissertations, & Professional Papers

This thesis seeks to understand the human response to extreme environmental, social, and political change during the Terminal Classic (750-1050 CE) at Cahal Pech. Across the Maya lowlands, this period is distinguished by the end of divine kingships, the cessation of new monumental architecture, rapid changes in prestige goods and trade networks, and population decline at many major centers. Cahal Pech, a medium-sized ceremonial center, experienced great shifts in political power and access to resources during the Terminal Classic. This thesis attempts to understand the last occupation of the site, prior to abandonment. Field data for this study is derived …

A Conservation Marketing Toolkit: Systematic Literature Mapping, Microtargeting Conservation Easements, And Conservation Corridor Prioritization, Hannah Josie Leonard

Graduate Student Theses, Dissertations, & Professional Papers

In a changing world with limited resources for conservation efforts, conservationists, wildlife managers, and land managers must look for creative ways to realize conservation goals. A new wave of conservationists is investigating how other disciplines, namely psychology and marketing, might improve our ability to understand and change conservation-related human behavior. In this thesis, I review existing applications of “conservation marketing” and apply a subset to advance two specific conservation challenges. In Chapter 1, I present a systematic mapping of the conservation marketing literature to understand the lay of the land in how conservationists have already applied marketing techniques to conservation, …

Hear Me Roar, Abigail R. Seethoff

Graduate Student Theses, Dissertations, & Professional Papers

Hear Me Roar, a compilation of personal essays interspersed with short forms, grapples with the nuances of compliance versus autonomy in the context of the male gaze, beauty standards, and pop culture. The collection also explores what it means to treasure something—another person, an object—and how to express and deepen that affection.

Modeling Twitter Sentiment As A Function Of Particulate Matter 2.5 For Communities Impacted By Wildfire Across Montana And Idaho, Matthew Kelly

Graduate Student Theses, Dissertations, & Professional Papers

Fine particulate matter (PM2.5) is a known pollutant with clinically detrimental physiological and behavioral effects. We consider Twitter sentiment as a potential indicator for well-being in communities impacted by wildfire-associated PM2.5 across Montana and Idaho spanning 5 years (2014-2018). From these geospatial air quality data and geo-tagged tweets, we trained county level models to examine the power of Twitter sentiment as a function of PM2.5. For all 24 counties sampled, we found between 1 and 8 affective dimensions where a positive �� 2 was detected with a significant F-statistic (�� < 0.05). Specifically, we show that sentiment for anticipation in the wildfire-prone county of Missoula, MT yielded respective training/test set �� 2 of 0.0958 and 0.0686 with a p-value for the F-statistic of 3.09E-07. These analyses support social media sentiment as a potential public health metric by showing one of the first observations of a relationship between PM2.5 and Twitter sentiment.

Influence Of Locally Produced Wood Biochar On Soil Nitrogen And Phosphorus Dynamics In The Northwestern Us, Si Gao

Graduate Student Theses, Dissertations, & Professional Papers

Wildfire cause a rapid and sometimes dramatic loss of carbon and nitrogen from forest ecosystems, but it also leaves behind ash and charcoal on the soil surface, both of which affect soil properties, processes, and function. Some of these effects may be induced by applying charcoal or biochar to surface soils. Biochar is the term given to the carbon rich product of thermochemical decomposition of organic material in an oxygen limited environment that is explicitly intended for soil application. Producing biochar from wood residues from timber harvest and applying it to nearby soils may represent a means of reducing carbon …

A Snapshot Of Care: Creating Models Of Care For Individuals Included In The Terry Collection, Felicia Robyn Sparozic

Graduate Student Theses, Dissertations, & Professional Papers

Utilizing the bioarchaeology of care model, this research formulates a model of care based on ethnohistorical and skeletal markers of pathologic conditions. The index of care is the method used to create models of care, and this requires social, cultural, economic, environmental, and mortuary contexts to determine the resources required to aid a person through injury or disability. This paper investigates the impact of known medical, occupational, and morgue records that accompanied each selected individual in the skeletal collection. This additional information, beyond what is gained from skeletal analysis, generates a complex model of care. A more complex model of …

"Black Colorism And White Racism: Discourse On The Politics Of White Supremacy, Black Equality, And Racial Identity, 1915-1930", Hannah Paige Mcdonald

Graduate Student Theses, Dissertations, & Professional Papers

The following study unravels how Garveyite black nationalists, black integrationists, and Virginian white supremacists understood the race problem and its solution between 1915 and 1930. The racial identity and experiences of these three distinct groups, each informed how they understood the race problem and its solution. The divergent notions about the source of and solution to the race problem coalesced with colorism, sowing seeds of intraracial and interracial conflict and cooperation between the Garveyite black nationalists, black integrationists, and Virginian white supremacists as they navigated how to redress white supremacy and black equality. According to black integrationists and Garveyite black …

"A Pressure Not To Be Resisted Or Evaded": Military Occupation, Reform, And The Incorporation Of Northern Montana, 1879-1916, Hayden Nelson

Graduate Student Theses, Dissertations, & Professional Papers

This thesis explores Fort Assinniboine’s role as an extension of the federal government’s military arm in the Northern Plains. It argues that the military occupation of northern Montana served to incorporate the northern borderland region and peoples into the American mainstream as a part of the national reconstruction processes following the Civil War into the twentieth century. In a period of half a century, north-central Montana transformed from a Native American common hunting ground lacking any major white settlement to a rapidly developing agricultural region. Fort Assinniboine played a central role in this transformation, hastening the economic collapse of the …

Characterization Of The Influences Of Human Cytomegalovirus Glycoprotein O (Go) Expression On Gh/Gl Complexes Assembly And Its Polymorphisms On Cell-Free And Cell-To-Cell Spread, And Antibody Neutralization., Le Z. Day

Graduate Student Theses, Dissertations, & Professional Papers

Human cytomegalovirus (HCMV) is widely spread throughout the world and immunocompromised individuals can suffer severe diseases from HCMV infection. Once the infection is established, HCMV can spread through the body and infect many major somatic cell types. The glycoproteins H and L (gH/gL) on HCMV envelope can be bound by either gO or the UL128-131 proteins to form complexes gH/gL/gO and gH/gL/UL128-131 that are critical for viral entry and spread, and these two complexes are important targets of neutralizing antibodies. Strains of HCMV vary considerably in the levels of gH/gL/gO and gH/gL/UL128-131. gO is one of the most diverse loci …

Influence Of Livestock And Electrified Fences On Livestock Depredation And Habitat Selection By Grizzly Bears In The Mission Valley, Montana, Kari Lynn Eneas

Graduate Student Theses, Dissertations, & Professional Papers

Balancing protection between livestock and carnivores has been a long-standing challenge in conservation. When encounters between carnivores and livestock or humans result in conflict or livestock depredation, the safety of both wildlife and humans are at risk. Reducing livestock depredation by grizzly bears (Ursus arctos horribilis) will be important as populations continue to recover and expand beyond public lands in the Northern Continental Divide Ecosystem. We used GPS locations from 8 female grizzly bears spanning 5 years in the Mission Valley, Montana, to evaluate the effect of livestock on habitat selection of grizzly bears. The Mission Valley is located on …

Investigating The Coordinate Regulation Of Stem Cell Proliferation And Differentiation By Fbf Proteins, Xiaobo Wang

Graduate Student Theses, Dissertations, & Professional Papers

Balance of stem cell proliferation and differentiation is important for maintaining tissue homeostasis, and uncovering the mechanisms regulating the balance of proliferation and differentiation of stem cells helps us understand the causative factors for ageing, cancer and various degenerative disorders. Pumilio and FBF (PUF) family RNA-binding proteins are conserved mRNA regulators controlling stem cell development in eukaryotes. FBF-1 and FBF-2, two PUF family proteins in C. elegans, are expressed in the mitotic region of the germline and are important for maintaining germline stem cells. FBF-1 and FBF-2 are very similar in primary sequence and share most of the target mRNAs, …

A Policy Analysis Of Lead Paint Disclosure Implementation In Residential Homes In Missoula Montana, Marissa Lein Lehner

Graduate Student Theses, Dissertations, & Professional Papers

Using Weimer and Vining’s (2017) framework and interviews with key actors, this policy analysis evaluates the implementation of federal lead paint disclosure requirements in Missoula Montana. Lead based paint was commonly used in homes built prior to 1978. Disclosure requires landlords and any persons selling a home to disclose known lead-based paint hazards to buyers and renters. The policy was enacted to promote informed decisions to avoid or reduce the risk of lead paint exposure. Lead paint disclosure serves a critical purpose to inform citizens of risk of lead paint in older housing, because any lead exposure is particularly detrimental …

The Space Between Points And Their Navigational Reference, Darla Pienciak

Graduate Student Theses, Dissertations, & Professional Papers

“The path of self-fulfillment means “pushing oneself beyond oneself”, in a relationship with the community where generosity, giving and the search for the common good are included and cultivated in everyday life.” (Menditto, 2014)

The Space Between Points and Their Navigational Reference represents specific points in time as well as all the moments that take place between those points. Each point is a person or a specific moment in time; they are individual people or noteworthy memories which, for one reason or another, have left a significant imprint in the memory of the individual or of society. The space between …