Digital Commons Network^™

Preparation Of Perylene Bisimide Acceptors With Ethylcarboxyl And Pyrenylcyclohexyl Imide Groups, Michael Cashen Stark

Honors Theses

Multiple attempts were made to deprotect TBDMS-protected (tert-butyldimethylsilyl protected) serinol and swallowtailed PBI (Compound 2), synthesized by past researcher Tarrah Frederick, to generate Compound 1. The theoretical Compound 1 product is intended for use in molecular rectification of electricity because the perylene core acts as a good acceptor with high electron affinity, and it does not require an electron donor group. Many rectification molecules are amphiphilic Donor-σ-Acceptor compounds, which allow for electron transfer through localized molecular orbitals when placed between electrodes (Langmuir-Blodgett Method). However, PBIs can transfer electrons from one electrode, through the LUMO of perylene, and to the other …

Just Country: A Magazine Prototype And Business Plan, Clare Wojciechowski

Honors Theses

Through this thesis, I have aimed to understand how a print magazine can be successful in the digital age of 2021. In coming up with the concept of Just Country, I saw an area of popular interest that is not served well in the magazine industry. Through thorough research of magazines and country music, I have developed a business plan as well as a prototype for Just Country: The 21^st Century Country Music Magazine.

A Spectroscopic And Computational Study Of Diacetyl And Water Clusters, Margaret Baldwin

Honors Theses

Diacetyl, otherwise known as 1,2-butadione or biacetyl, is a flavor additive used in microwave popcorn, and more importantly as of late, e-cigarettes. The compound is known to cause lung disease for those who have been exposed to a large quantity of the buttery smelling molecule. As such, the characterization of diacetyl’s vibrational modes when it interacts with water are pivotal to understanding the effects it has on human lung tissue. In this research, the intermolecular interactions between water and diacetyl and the effects they have on one another’s vibrational modes are explored. While some experimental data is presented, the spectra …

Reconceptualizing Cannabis, Julia Peoples

Honors Theses

Inflammatory rhetoric and increasingly punitive drug policies dominated marijuana politics in the past. Today, as 36 have legalized cannabis in some form and 17 states have legalized recreational marijuana, the federal government continues to perpetuate policies of the past. The following analysis investigates rhetoric and policies that led to the War on Drugs as well as their outcomes, the dramatic shift in public opinion as states began to legalize marijuana, and the successes and failures of state cannabis programs to identify gaps within the MORE Act, the ideal policy, and politically viable incremental change. State programs are incapable of …

Tractorcade: Investigating The Relationship Between Group Theory And The American Agriculture Movement's Attempt At Policy Change, Hanna M. Metzler

Honors Theses

This thesis aims to investigate the relationship between The American Agriculture Movement (AAM) and group theory, with a focus on AAM’s usage of Tractorcade as a tool to promote policy change. Gathering data through a myriad of sources - including existing literature, oral histories, newspaper articles, documents, and journal entires - this thesis analyzes AAM’s Tractorcade demonstration as a social movement aimed at influencing policy change. Utilizing Charles Tilly’s worthiness, unity, numbers, and commitment (WUNC) social movement framework, we find that although AAM employed strong unity and numbers, they failed in displaying substantial worthiness or commitment, ultimately leading to a …

Associations Between The Chemical Constituents Of Fine Particulate Matter And Human Health Outcomes: A Literature Review, Lenora Davis

Honors Theses

Exposure to fine particulate matter, PM_2.5, a component of air pollution, has known systemic effects on the human body. Research on the specific chemical constituents of PM_2.5 that impact human health is fairly new, however. This literature review aims to draw connections between the chemical constituents of PM_2.5 and their implications on human health. We conducted an online search for scholarly articles using a number of key-terms, and created a system to filter the search results. We focused on 69 articles pertaining to PM_2.5 and its effects on different health systems. We found positive associations …

Impact Of The Covid-19 Pandemic On Chhs Students, Macey Seal

Honors Theses

The 2020 COVID-19 pandemic has impacted students in various ways. Students around the world / in the U.S have been impacted in financial, emotional, mental, and physical ways as COVID-19 continues to change the way the world is navigated. The purpose of this thesis is to explore the feelings and vulnerabilities of students at the College of Health and Human Services (CHHS) building during the 2020 Pandemic. In order to succeed in school, students need to feel financially stable, physically stable and mentally stable. While many students have struggled with this balance in the past, the effect of COVID-19 has …

Impact Of The Covid-19 Pandemic On Chhs Students, Linnea Wood

Honors Theses

The 2020 COVID-19 pandemic has impacted students in various ways. Students around the world / in the U.S have been impacted in financial, emotional, mental, and physical ways as COVID-19 continues to change the way the world is navigated. The purpose of this thesis is to explore the feelings and vulnerabilities of students at the College of Health and Human Services (CHHS) building during the 2020 Pandemic. In order to succeed in school, students need to feel financially stable, physically stable and mentally stable. While many students have struggled with this balance in the past, the effect of COVID-19 has …

An Evaluation Of The Historical Interactions And Epistemologies Of Science And Christianity, Tyler Partridge

Honors Theses

No abstract provided.

A Renaissance Man, Anthony Pierotti

Honors Theses

No abstract provided.

Speech And Sovereignty: A Kantian Defense Of Freedom Of Expression, Alec Greven

Honors Theses

This thesis critically examines the moral foundations of free expression and offers a framework for evaluating morally justifiable forms of censorship. This investigation has three parts. The first section argues that rational considerations constrain how moral principles for censorship can be structured methodologically. It concludes that moral principles must be universally coherent and consistently applied. The second section considers several existing justifications for censorship that fall short of these methodological requirements and arbitrarily apply extensionally inadequate moral principles. To be rational, these approaches must either abandon these inconsistent justifications or commit to more consistently authoritarian moral principles. The third section …

Development Of An Immunoblot To Detect Human Antibodies Against Sars-Cov-2 Virus Proteins, Shivum Desai

Honors Theses

Severe Acute Respiratory Syndrome Coronavirus 2 (SARS-CoV-2) is a virus that infects cells in the lungs, nasal passages, and intestines via the ACE2 receptors of the host, and leads to the coronavirus disease (COVID-19). Since the occurrence of the pandemic in December 2019, there have been 114 million cases worldwide in which 2.5 million lives have unfortunately been taken away.

Being diagnosed with a past infection stems questions among those that have tested positive through antibody testing. The problem here is that patients were notified that they have antibodies resulting from a SARS-CoV-2 infection, but in fact they may not …

The Influence Of A Mindfulness-Based Curriculum On Executive Function In Four-Year-Olds, Victoria Mccann

Honors Theses

Research on the effectiveness of mindfulness as a method for improving a variety of psychological, social, and emotional skills has grown throughout the last decade. Extensive literature reviews show promising results for the improvement of executive function skills utilizing mindfulness-based interventions, though the current literature is primarily focused on adults, adolescents, and older children. Preliminary work has suggested that training executive function skills using mindfulness-based interventions in early childhood would be beneficial, but few studies investigating mindfulness-based interventions for young children exist. The purpose of this study was to examine whether a 12-week mindfulness-based curriculum using yoga had an impact …

Exploring The Lived Experience Of Adolescent Caregivers, Abbigale Laurentius

Honors Theses

In today’s society, the population is aging, and any member of the family could find themselves in the role as an informal caregiver. Adolescents between the ages of 12 and 18 years old may have these caregiving responsibilities, and it is imperative that healthcare professionals recognize and support this change of roles. A literature review revealed a general lack of research from within the last five years regarding adolescent caregivers. Those studies that were analyzed in the review presented themes of depression, anxiety, lack of education, and insufficient social supports for the adolescent. An unfolding case study was then designed …

Do Autocratic Regimes Excel In Natural Disaster Relief? A Case Study Of Political Institutions And Covid-19 Exposure, Jane Kay

Honors Theses

The COVID-19 pandemic of 2020 has challenged what we know about the politics of public health. In this research study, I investigate the COVID-19 pandemic as a natural disaster and hypothesize if authoritarian governments are more adequate at disaster control and relief. I hypothesize that the more autocratic a government structure, the better they would be at handling COVID-19 exposure and outbreaks due to their centralized decision making, unified media, and their ability to make unpopular decisions without repercussions. In order to test this theory, I gather data from the Johns Hopkins database for three key dates in the pandemic …

Investigating The Economic Effects Of Food Affordability, Food Access, And Education On Obesity Rates In Mississippi Counties, Youssef Osman

Honors Theses

The growing rate of obesity across the United States is a topic of great concern considering both the health and financial costs associated with the disease. Many researchers have sought to determine the major causes of obesity so that policy suggestions can be made to reduce its occurrence. Some of the referenced drivers of obesity include high food costs, poor access to healthy food, and a lack of knowledge regarding nutrition. This thesis seeks to find the effects of county-level food prices, income, food access, and education level on obesity rates in Mississippi counties. The analysis uses cross-sectional data from …

The Impact Of Technology On The Developing Visual And/Or Auditory Memory In School-Aged Children, Cameron Mayer

Honors Theses

This study aimed to determine whether time spent on technology impacts the developing auditory or visual memory in school-aged children. A survey was completed with the child participants to acquire a catalog of time spent on both technological devices and non-technological activities. Tests included a visual and auditory memory assessment adapted from the Preschool Language Scales Fifth Edition (PLS-5). The results indicated that there was no significance between the time spent on technology and the visual and auditory memory scores. However, the researchers did find that the auditory mean scores were significantly different from the visual mean scores across the …

Enamel Corrosion Levels On Squirrel Teeth From The Fox Canyon Locality, Pliocene Of Kansas, Emma Tennyson

Honors Theses

The enamel of teeth may be corroded after death, especially if the teeth pass through the digestive tract of a predator with low gastric pH. This study characterized enamel corrosion of fossil squirrel teeth from two species (Otospermophilus rexroadensis and Ictidomys meadensis) obtained from the Fox Canyon locality of Kansas. Using microscopic imaging, I categorized teeth based on corrosion level. Overall, 45% of specimens exhibited heavy to extreme corrosion. There were no significant differences in the distribution of corrosion categories between both upper and lower teeth of either species (O. rexroadensis: X2 (3, N = 140) = .562, p= .905; …

Comparisons Of Silver Nanoparticle Synthesis Methods By Microwave And Non-Microwave Using Hydrogen Gas As A Reducing Agent, Sofia Erech Hanapin

Honors Theses

Synthesis and characterization of silver nanoparticles are of current interest. This research project describes a simple and rapid synthesis of silver nanoparticles upon reduction of Silver (I) oxide (Ag2O) by molecular hydrogen (H2) at elevated temperature (70 – 100 °C) and a pressure of > 1 atmosphere by heating the aqueous mixture using a common kitchen microwave. This reaction generates naked silver colloids that contain no foreign stabilizers other than metal particles in aqueous media. Its application of an antibacterial effect was monitored by using biological cultures using the Kirby-Bauer Test.

Thermodynamic Analysis Of Pamam Dendrimer Synthesis, Ryutaro Einar Jacobson

Honors Theses

The objective of this research was to determine kinetic and thermodynamic data about the reaction between ethylene diamine and methyl acrylate which is used in the production of PAMAM dendrimers. Establishing a rate law and finding values such as rate constant, activation energy, and Arrhenius coefficient will help in determining the best possible conditions for the reaction. A rate law was established through the method of initial rates, comparing the rates of reactions with different initial concentrations to one another. Additional reactions were run with active cooling to observe the effects on rate and reaction progress, and finally reactions were …

A Note On Cannibalism And Synchrony In Seabird Egg-Laying Behavior, Yosia Nurhan

Honors Theses

During years of high sea surface temperature, food resources for glaucous-winged gulls (Larus glaucescens) are scarce. In response, male gulls cannibalize the eggs of neighbors. When this occurs, female gulls in dense areas of the colony adopt a tactic of egg-laying synchrony, in which they lay eggs synchronously on an every- other-day schedule. Field observations show that the first laid egg of each clutch is the most likely to be cannibalized. In this paper, we analyzed a discrete-time model of egg-laying behavior that tracks egg order in the nest. Using Jury Conditions, we found that the equilibrium destabilizes into a …

Finding Optimal Opa-Iblc Derivatized Amino Acid Analysis Parameters With Three-Dimensional Fluorometric Scans For Hplc Method Validation, Aaron Jacobs

Honors Theses

Three-dimensional fluorometric scans of OPA-IBLC derivatized glutamic acid and histidine solutions revealed that decreasing concentration maintained maximum λem but produced different maximum λex. In pH 0.4 M sodium borate buffer (pH 10.4), 50 μM derivatized amino acid solutions had maxima around 350- to 450-nm λex-λem where 12.5 μM solutions had maxima around 230- to 450-nm λex- λem. In the lower concentration, the λex peak at 230 nm was about 80% higher than 350 nm. Thus, collecting spectra with 230 nm λex would provide better LOD and LOQ. Results inform HPLC standard concentrations since differential quenching effects may produce non-linear calibration …

Evaluation Of Phonotactic Behavior In Male-Exposed Female Cricket Acheta Domesticus, Janelle An

Honors Theses

Phonotaxis is defined as the movement of organisms in response to an auditory stimulus. It plays an important role in helping animals find a potential mate, and thus it is worthwhile to understand what factors may influence phonotaxis. Phonotactic behavior in virgin female cricket Acheta domesticus has been the focus of multiple studies, which have reported a degree of variability among individuals. Several factors that have been reported to influence such variability include age, environmental temperature, and the presence of certain neuromodulators. This study investigated possible changes in the behavioral responses of young females when raised with males but not …

The Exploration And Analysis Of Mancala From An Ai Perspective, Trevon J. Hunter

Honors Theses

Through the study of popular games such as Chess and Go, countless artificial intelligence (AI) research has been conducted in an attempt to create algorithms equipped for adversarial search problems. However, there are still a plethora of avenues that offer insight into further development. Mancala is traditionally a two-player board game that originated in the East and offers a unique opponent-based playing experience. This thesis not only attempts to create a competitive AI algorithm for mancala games by analyzing the performance of several different algorithms on this classic board game, but it also attempts to extract applications that may have …

Comparison Of Enamel Microstructure Of Ictidomys Tridecemlineatus Formed During Hibernation Versus The Active Season, Amanda Cho

Honors Theses

Ground squirrel incisors grow continuously, preserving a record of their most recent weeks of life. Previous research demonstrated that an abnormality in the surface of incisor enamel and dentin of thirteen-lined ground squirrels (Ictidomys tridecemlineatus) corresponded with hibernation. Using scanning electron microscopy, we compared internal microstructure of incisor enamel deposited during and outside of hibernation to determine if surface disruptions corresponded to differences in internal microstructure. For one specimen, hibernation enamel displayed irregularities in microstructure that were not present in non-hibernation enamel, but this difference was not observed in other specimens. Given these inconclusive results, further research is warranted.

Socioeconomic Status And Ethnicity As Predictors Of Childhood Career Aspirations, Sydney Saint-Jean

Honors Theses

Beginning at an early age, children discuss what they want to be when they grow up. This is known as their career aspirations. There are multiple factors that influence the career aspirations of children. Some of which includes familial income level, grade level and ethnicity. Although studies suggest that there is a relationship between income level and career aspirations, there is a gap in the literature when examining the relationships between socioeconomic status, ethnicity, grade level, and their effects on the career aspirations of children. This study explores this multi-level relationship on what a child wants to be when they …

One Writer, Two Genres: Composing And Analyzing Creative Nonfiction And Fantasy, Kara Herrera

Honors Theses

Creative writers face a wide range of options when they sit down to craft art out of words. Available to them are many genres, each with their own characteristics or traits. Additionally, many writers have accomplished self-reflection in interviews, Q&A sessions, and in print. It is not unusual to find writers taking their craft and turning it into their subject matter. This project aims for the same. In order to analyze the similarities and differences in the writing process across genres, a “writing about writing” essay is included along with four creative nonfiction essays and a young adult fantasy novel …

Modulation Of Apoptosis In Breast Cancer Cells Mda-Mb-157, 93a And 93b By Aqueous Extract Of Chinese Medical Herb Scutellaria Barbata, Nathaly Manrique

Honors Theses

Scutellaria barbata (S. barbata), a Chinese herb used in Traditional Chinese Medicine has been known to contain anti-cancer properties. SB has been investigated as a potential treatment for multiple types of cancer including colon cancer, glioblastoma, and ovarian cancer. Breast cancer cell lines MDA-MB-157 and its APC-mutants 93A and 93B are more resistant to treatment due to genetic modifications. In this study, the effectiveness of S. barbata in apoptotic modulation of breast cancer cell lines MDA-MB-157, 93A, and 93B was investigated. Assessments were performed using green/red/blue fluorescent Apoptosis/Necrosis Detection Kit and the Human Apoptosis Antibody Array - Membrane (43 Targets) …

Computational Difficulty And Invariants Of The Snake Cube Puzzle, Adrian Negrea

Honors Theses

The snake cube is a popular puzzle that has been analyzed for its computational difficulty and shown to be NP-complete. Conceiving of the puzzle as a Hamiltonian path in an n x n x n graph, we offer a novel mathematical analysis by considering invariants of the puzzle. This allows us to determine necessary conditions for a particular snake cube to be solvable and eliminate a large class of possible puzzles as unsolvable. In particular, we establish upper and lower bounds on the possible number of straight components in solvable snake cube puzzles.

Producing Music Using Negative Harmony, Jeremy Ahn

Honors Theses

This project uses Negative Harmony as a basis and reference point for producing original songs in the style of instrumental jazz and funk. Negative harmony is a loose term that describes a technique of reharmonization made popular by musician Jacob Collier. While negative harmony is best understood as a reharmonization technique, writing new songs and chord progressions that strive to replace common chord progressions with their negative harmony counterparts can also be an effective way to demonstrate negative harmony. Music can be made with unconventional sounding but harmonically viable chords that challenge both the musician and the listener to grow …