Digital Commons Network^™

The Development Of An Electronic Data Collection Tool And Comparison Of The Electronic And Manual Methods Of Land Use Inventory, Wesley M. Catanzaro

Master's Theses

An important component of Planning Information Systems for municipal planning agencies is a comprehensive land use inventory that provides information on the location, distribution, and intensity of land uses throughout a community. This data is a necessary prerequisite for the informed creation of planning documents such as General Plans, Specific Plans, Housing Inventories, and Climate Action Plans. Beyond location, distribution and intensity of land uses, planners may also wish to incorporate additional information at the parcel level, such as the number of housing or commercial units, building condition, and/or access and connectivity to adjacent streets. Because some of this information …

Urban Agriculture Stormwater Management In California Cities, Rachel L. Cohen

Master's Theses

Cities within California are beginning to incorporate urban agriculture into their land use designations. Prompted by residents and local organizations, cities are hoping to capture the benefits that urban agriculture provides. Research has shown that urban agriculture renews and beautifies neighborhoods, provides healthy food choices, increases public health, has the potential to help with stormwater runoff, creates jobs, and fosters community. In the last few years, several California cities have made headlines as they have adopted new zoning codes that include urban agriculture.

In reviewing these new zoning codes and exploring the topic of urban agriculture, it became evident that …

Eye "R" Glasses: Development Of An Infrared Sensor System For Detecting The Human Body, Rick Wong

Master's Theses

Throughout the years, sensors have been an integral part of automation, alert, and medical systems. Many of these systems measure physiological characteristics of the human body to alert themselves of their current conditions. Drowsy driver systems, for instance, measure the eyes and facial movements with a camera to determine if the driver is falling asleep at the wheel. Electroencephalography (EEG), electrooculography (EOG), and electromyography (EMG) employ electrodes on the human body to measure electrical activity of a patient’s REM sleep cycle patterns. Pulse oximeters use optical light through a process called photoplethysmography (PPG) to measure heart rate.

As diverse as …

Characterization Of The Effects Of A Sun-Synchronous Orbit Slot Architecture On The Earth's Orbital Debris Environment, Connor David Noyes

Master's Theses

Low Earth orbit represents a valuable limited natural resource. Of particular interest are sun-synchronous orbits; it is estimated that approximately 44% of low Earth satellites are sun-synchronous. A previously developed sun-synchronous orbit slot architecture is considered. An in-depth analysis of the relative motion between satellites and their corresponding slots is performed. The long-term evolution of Earth's orbital environment is modeled by a set of coupled ordinary differential equations. A metric for quantifying the benefit, if any, of implementing a sun-synchronous architecture is developed. The results indicate that the proposed slot architecture would reduce the frequency of collisions between satellites in …

Tracking Points On A Pacing Lead In A Beating Heart, Avinash Ramesh Varma

Master's Theses

Heart failure is a common condition during which the pumping action of the heart is affected because the heart does not contract or relax properly. Heart failure affects about 5 million Americans, with 550,000 new cases diagnosed each year. Cardiac resynchronization therapy (CRT) is used to treat symptoms and other complications associated with a heart failure. While performing CRT, Implantation of a pacing lead in the left ventricle of the heart is a very challenging surgical procedure performed with fluoroscopy. The target location is often difficult to reach through the tortuous coronary venous anatomy, which varies greatly among individuals. Placement …

Distribution Of Conflict Detection Of Aircraft For Next Generation Flight Management Systems, Scott H. Kuroda

Master's Theses

As the number of aircraft is expected to triple in the coming decades, the manual process used to safely route aircraft while in flight will become insufficient. There already exist work to algorithmically detect safe and unsafe routes between aircraft. This thesis extends that system such that the computation is distributed across multiple machines. In addition it also supports the detection of an unsafe route as it is actively modified by a third party. Furthermore, the system supports providing safe or unsafe route notification to multiple interested clients.

Design Of Portable Dc Light Bulb For The Dc House Project, Jan Marvin Perez Macairan

Master's Theses

This thesis focuses on the design and implementation of the Portable DC Light Bulb system for Cal Poly San Luis Obispo’s DC House Project. The DC Portable Light Bulb highlights the NiMH battery charging circuit, buck converter, and boost converter. The system is intended as a flashlight adaptor placed in between the dimmable DC light bulb and its screw base. The adaptor adds a portability feature to the DC light bulb to provide lighting wherever the user pleases. The Portable DC Light Bulb system is designed to operate with an input range of 24V-60V and regulate an output voltage of …

A Novel Unit Cell Antenna For Highly Integrated Phased Arrays In The Shf Band, Timothy Bryan Ogilvie

Master's Theses

Phased arrays are electromagnetic antenna systems comprised of many radiating elements and processing electronics. Radiating elements are typically positioned in an orderly grid within the antenna aperture. In the receive mode of operation, radiating elements capture some of the signal energy from incoming radiation and guide these signals to processing electronics. Signals are filtered and amplified to maintain the desired sensitivity and complexly weighted using circuits with reconfigurable amplification gain and phase delay. Finally, all signals are combined. The summation of these complexly weighted spatial samples forms a spatial filter in the same way complexly weighted temporal samples establish a …

High School Athletic Directors Perceptions Of Athletic Trainer's Professional Knowledge And Competence Based On Attire, Raechel N. Cunningham

Master's Theses

Very little research is available to identify how attire in the athletic training field impacts perceptions of professional knowledge and competence. The purpose of this study was to identify the effect of attire on high school athletic directors’ perceptions of an athletic trainer’s professional knowledge and competence. The researcher emailed a questionnaire to ninety-four high school athletic directors from the state of California. The questionnaire measured the effect of attire on the perceptions of skills, knowledge, approachability, experience, education level, overall competence, and representation of an athletic trainer and focused on the difference between khaki attire, professional attire, and workout …

Planning Sacramento's Cleantech Zone: A Case Of Policy, Practice, And Place Branding, Nicole M. Streegan

Master's Theses

Clean technologies that create a positive impact on global climate change are developed in cities and regions throughout the United States. The City of Sacramento aims to capitalize on this market trend by building partnerships between regional actors such as universities and venture capital groups, as well as identify land, and subsequently specific land uses and development guidance, to support growth in this industry. This research paper uses the single case study methodology to identify the major dynamics working to build and sustain Sacramento’s Cleantech Zone, as well as their relationship between urban planning and economic development tools.

Cuda Enhanced Filtering In A Pipelined Video Processing Framework, Austin Aaron Dworaczyk Wiltshire

Master's Theses

The processing of digital video has long been a significant computational task for modern x86 processors. With every video frame composed of one to three planes, each consisting of a two-dimensional array of pixel data, and a video clip comprising of thousands of such frames, the sheer volume of data is significant. With the introduction of new high definition video formats such as 4K or stereoscopic 3D, the volume of uncompressed frame data is growing ever larger.

Modern CPUs offer performance enhancements for processing digital video through SIMD instructions such as SSE2 or AVX. However, even with these instruction sets, …

Uav Formation Flight Utilizing A Low Cost, Open Source Configuration, Christian W. Lopez

Master's Theses

The control of multiple unmanned aerial vehicles (UAVs) in a swarm or cooperative team scenario has been a topic of great interest for well over a decade, growing steadily with the advancements in UAV technologies. In the academic community, a majority of the studies conducted rely on simulation to test developed control strategies, with only a few institutions known to have nurtured the infrastructure required to propel multiple UAV control studies beyond simulation and into experimental testing. With the Cal Poly UAV FLOC Project, such an infrastructure was created, paving the way for future experimentation with multiple UAV control systems. …

The Effect Of A Triphasic Pulse On Scs To Icd Crosstalk, Ryan James Wensley

Master's Theses

It is a known problem that a Spinal Cord Stimulator (SCS) can interact with an Implantable Cardioverter Defibrillator (ICD) when both devices are implanted in the same patient. Interactions between the SCS and ICD can cause inappropriate therapy which can be harmful to the patient. While ICD devices have a distinct narrowband sensing bandwidth, the pulse configurations that current SCS devices deliver were not designed with this frequency region in mind. In this thesis, I recommend a new pulse configuration for SCS devices that will minimize the interaction between the two devices. I produce a theoretical equation for each pulse …

Designing Anti-Islanding Detection Using The Synchrophasor Vector Processor, Ruth Christiana Huang

Master's Theses

ABSTRACT

Designing Anti-Islanding Detection Using the Synchrophasor Vector Processor

Ruth Huang

The need for distributed generation (DG) has become more and more popular because of the adverse effects of fossil fuels and the fear of running out of fossil fuels. By having DG, there are less transmission losses, voltage support, controllability of the system, decreased costs in transmission and distribution, power quality improvement, energy efficiency, and reduced reserve margin. The adverse effects of DG are voltage flicker, harmonics, and islanding. Islanding occurs when the DG continues to energize the power system when the main utility is disconnected. Detecting islanding is …

An Investigation Into The Efficacy Of Alarm Fatigue Reduction Strategies, Jeffrey Thomas Peterson

Master's Theses

Modern hospitals are plagued by excessive alarms generated by patient monitoring technologies with very high sensitivity and low selectivity leading to high rates of false and clinically irrelevant alarms. Multiple studies have shown that these false and clinically irrelevant alarm rates can negatively impact patient care and lead to "alarm fatigue". Alarm hazards have been named the number one health technology hazard by ECRI Institute for 2012 and 2013. A review by the FDA revealed 566 alarm related deaths in a recent four year period.

At a large, teaching hospital in Massachusetts, a quantitative, database driven approach to alarm management …

Response Of Phragmites Australis To Black Plastic Treatment, Jeremy D. Willcox

Master's Theses

Physiological responses of Phragmites australis (Phragmites) to the covering of black plastic were studied from 2011 to 2013 in Schoolhouse Brook Park, Mansfield, Connecticut. Nine 6 x 6 m plots were randomly established as either control, early-mid season covered, or late season covered within a monotypic Phragmites stand. Black plastic was applied from March to July 2011 and again from June to September 2012 (early-mid season). Another treatment was in place from September to November 2011 (late season). Rhizomes were sampled for their concentration of total non-structural carbohydrates (TNC) within each plot. Monthly rhizome samples were taken from a control …

The Effects Of Hydration Status On Pacing And Performance During An Ironman Triathlon, Tracy L. Hicks

Master's Theses

Context: Dehydration can negatively impact aerobic performance. Objective: To observe the effect of hydration status on Ironman Triathlete performance and their ability to maintain pace; and to observe the effect of hydration status on pacing and performance for athletes who monitor heart rate for pacing feedback. Design: Observational ironman triathlon study Setting: Lake Placid Ironman racecourse (WBGT, 22.1±2.0 °C). Participants: 41 (30 males, 7 females) triathletes (age, 39±7 yrs; height, 174.0±9.9 cm; pre-race weight, 72.4±10.1 kg; body fat, 15.3±5.6%.) divided into groups based on use(HR) or no use(NHR) of heart rate as pacing feedback, and hydrated(HY) or dehydrated(DHY); based on …

A Perspective On Work Life Balance In The Ncaa Division I Setting: From The Female Athletic Trainer, Elizabeth M. Ferraro

Master's Theses

Factors and Strategies that Contribute to Work Life Balance of Female Athletic Trainers Employed in the NCAA Division I setting

Ferraro EM, University of Connecticut, Storrs, CT

Context: Work life balance (WLB) can be challenging particularly for female athletic trainers (ATs). Evidence suggests female-ATs persist in the profession because of job enjoyment, increased autonomy, and social support networks. Departure factors such as long hours, travel, and inflexibility of schedules often comprise issues with WLB. Time management, support networks, and setting boundaries are strategies used to find WLB, however, little is known about the strategies female-ATs use to maintain WLB in …

Contextual Influences On Phonetic Categorization In Developmental Populations, Jean Alexandra Campbell

Master's Theses

A major goal of research in the domain of speech perception has been to describe how listeners recover individual consonants and vowels from the speech stream. A major challenge to this task is explaining how this is possible given the extreme variability present in the speech signal. In healthy adults, findings have repeatedly demonstrated that the key to healthy perceptual processing system is dynamically adjusting phonetic boundaries to accommodate contextual influences in speech production. The current study seeks to determine if school-aged children demonstrate the same functional plasticity for systematic variation. Collectively, we found that older children (8-10 years of …

Advanced Techniques In Emergency Preparedness And Geoprocessing, Dean P. Chauvin Jr

Master's Theses

No abstract provided.

Grotesque Drag Queens And Toxic Matriarchs: Motherhood And The Subversive Female Body In Disney Animated Films, Allison Footit

Master's Theses

No abstract provided.

Effects Of A Hospital-Wide Quality Improvement Initiative On 30-Day Readmissions For Patients With Heart Failure, Senthilraj Ganeshan, Raj Ganeshan

Master's Theses

No abstract provided.

A Method For Network Clustering And Cluster Based Routing, Jonathan Adelson

Master's Theses

Social networks and sensor networks are two very different types of networks that have been made possible by modern technology. Portable wireless devices, including laptops and cell phones, have made social networks part of our daily lives. Similarly, cheap, fast, portable devices are ideal for sensor networks. The common thread is the underlying graph structure, which is decentralized and can naturally form groups. However, human groups are messy, and can best be modeled by graph clusters that can be allowed to overlap with each other. We apply this idea to the identification of pre-existing groups as well as discovering a …

The Pilot Study Of Students’ Perception On Teachers’ Moral Character Scale In Indonesia, Ifa H. Misbach

Master's Theses

The purpose of this study is to develop a new instrument of Students’ Perception on Teacher’s Moral Character Scale (SPoTMCS). The sample consisted of 12^th grade Indonesian students (n=228), completing the SPoTMCS using a-paper-and-pencil format. This report describes the results of the inter-correlation of items, and Cronbach’s Alpha to calculate and estimate of the internal reliability. To support a questionnaire development of SPoTMCS, factor analysis procedures were also undertaken to determine the number of factors necessary to explain the interrelationship among a set of dimensions of moral character and the underlying dimensions of the construct of moral character in …

The Influence Of Neurocognitive Impairment On Hiv Risk Reduction Intervention Outcomes Among Drug Dependent Methadone‐Maintained Patients, Maryam Sadeghi-Najafabadi

Master's Theses

Injection drug users (IDUs) represent a significant vector for contracting and transmission of HIV infection, which occurs through preventable drug- and sex-related risk behaviors. Accordingly, IDUs remain a target population of HIV risk reduction behavioral interventions. Previous findings show that it is feasible to provide a brief behavioral risk reduction group intervention to high risk HIV-infected IDUs in a community-based setting to reduce HIV risk-related outcomes. In order for behavioral interventions to be effective, a relatively high level of cognitive abilities is required. Evidence shows that chronic drug use can affect the central nervous system and this may result in …

The Efficacy Of Freshplace Project Manager’S Use Of A Stages Of Change Assessment Form And Motivational Interviewing, Matthew E. Brennan

Master's Theses

No abstract provided.

Nmr Assignments And Structure Of The I-Domain From The Bacteriophage P22 Coat Protein, Alessandro A. Rizzo

Master's Theses

The P22 coat protein has the HK97 fold at its core, but also has an additional domain on the surface of the capsid. Two recent cryo-EM structures at ~8 Å and ~4 Å resolution show different folds for this domain. The structure and function of this domain has been debated in the literature.

NMR spectroscopy was used to determine a high-resolution structure of this domain. Here, the domain is called the ‘insertion’ domain (I-domain). The structure is a six-stranded β-barrel with a small helix and belongs to a reductase/isomerase/elongation factor folding family.

Compared to the previous cryo-EM reconstructions, the NMR …

Does Child Sponsorship Have A Positive Impact On The Quality Of Life And Social Behavior Of Sponsored Children? Evidence From Indonesia, Mario Carrillo

Master's Theses

Relaxing an internal constraint of an individual at early stages of life is an approach that complements traditional policy interventions aimed to alleviate poverty. The Compassion International child sponsorship program focuses their work on the emotional, social, and spiritual development of sponsored children. This study investigates the impacts of child sponsorship on the quality of life and social behavior of sponsored children using age-eligibility as an instrument for sponsorship, a time preference experiment and a trust game. The study looks specifically at self-esteem, optimism, social trust, educational outcomes, patience and reciprocity of 286 sponsored children and 234 non-sponsored children between …

Organized Camp And Character Development 2013, Veronica Ripp

Master's Theses

The purpose of this study was to examine the relationship between organized camp and character development. In particular, it looked to determine to what extent organized camp affected campers' character, including how much change in character campers' experienced in a week at camp, what aspects of character were most influenced, and what factors about camp had the most impact on campers' character. The study was multimodal in design, using the Values in Action Inventory for Youth (VIA-Youth) as a pre and posttest for quantitative analysis and camper interviews, staff interviews, and researcher observations for qualitative analysis. Seven completed VIA-Youth pre …

An Investigation Of Preferred Versus Imposed Exercise, Personality Traits, And Motivation On An Exercise Dependent College Aged Sample 2013, Chelsea M. Norton

Master's Theses

The purpose of this study was to: (a) investigate personality traits and motivation among an exercise dependent sample by using and examining theoretically based assessment tools and (b) measure feeling states under different types of physical activity among those who were considered to be exercise dependent. Four hundred twenty-three college students (54.4% male, 45.6% female) who met the inclusion criteria completed the Exercise Dependence Scale-Revised (EDS-R; Symons Downs, Hausenblas, & Nigg, 2004), Exercise Addiction Inventory (EAI; Terry, Szabó, & Griffiths, 2004), Exercise Identity Scale (EIS; Anderson & Cychosz, 1994), Behavioral Regulations in Exercise Questionnaire-2 (BREQ-2; Markland & Tobin, 2004), and …