Digital Commons Network^™

The Buzzard In The Abolitionist Sea; An Examination Of Maritime Suppression, Imperial Policy, And The Slave Trade Through The Royal Navy’S Hms Buzzard, 1830s-1840s, Sean Joaquim Coudray-Pereira

Master's Theses

Analysis of the Royal Navy through the microhistory of the HMS Buzzard following the abolition of the slave trade between 1807 and the 1840s by Great Britain offers insight into the moral ambiguities and complexities of the humanitarian mission. The historiography of the slave trade has primarily focused on the moral and economic ideology behind its abolition, pitting one against the other. Applying a micro-historic approach highlights the nuances of both arguments, and through the HMS Buzzard’s crew, captives, disease, voyages, and legal battles accentuates the blend of both argument approaches. The case study of its longevity through all six …

Chemical And Physical Characterization Of Verbenaceae Essential Oils Using Modern Analytical Methods And Chemometrics, Aleksandra N. Hilliard

Master's Theses

Essential oils have been used for generations to treat various health issues, including mitigating insomnia, reducing stress, inflammation, and preserving foods, to mention a few. Essential oils have complex chemistry, which defines the essence of the host plant. Recently, increased commercial uses of essential oils have prompted attention at the governmental level to monitor the chemical, physical, or biological activity of essential oils. This study is an attempt to add new information for consumers to the understanding of the composition of essential oils.

Modern analytical techniques including FTIR-ATR, GC-MS, LC-MS-MS, multivariate analysis statistics, and physio-chemical techniques (electrochemistry, DPPH, TRC, and …

Humanizing The Icu: Implementation Of Personalized Communication Boards In The Sicu Drives Enhanced Patient And Family Experience, Stephen D. Hoefler

Master's Theses

Objective: Research has established the importance of personalized communication in critical care settings, where standardized tools like whiteboards can improve patient and family engagement.

Aim: This project aims to develop a personalized communication board in the surgical intensive care unit (SICU) at a Bay Area academic quaternary care facility that, once implemented, will achieve at least 75% utilization in patient rooms by May 2025, enhancing communication and patient experiences.

Methods: Surveys were conducted with patients, families, and staff to gather stakeholder input and guide the design of a new standardized whiteboard model with personalized elements. Results: Based on stakeholder feedback, …

Regulation Of Spermatogenesis By The Notch Signaling Pathway, Emma O'Flaherty

Master's Theses

The Notch signaling pathway plays a significant role in gonad development and spermatogenesis, but little is known about its specific targets in the testis. The Drosophila testis contains two populations of stem cells: germline stem cells and cyst stem cells, which give rise to differentiating germline and somatic cyst cells, respectively. Notch signaling is activated in the somatic cyst cells by the Delta ligand from the germline in a region of the testes coined the “transition zone”, where somatic cyst cells progress from early cyst cells surrounding gonialblasts and 2-cell germline cysts to late cyst cells surrounding 16-cell spermatocyte cysts. …

Loss Of Neuropeptide F (Npf) Signaling Reduces The Strength Of Circadian Rest-Activity Rhythms But Not Feeding-Fasting Rhythms, Katelyn Ann Wendt

Master's Theses

The circadian system governs crucial physiological and behavioral processes, dictating activities like movement, hormone release, and sleep patterns over a 24-hour cycle. Disruptions to these rhythms can lead to various health problems, including cardiometabolic dysfunction. Research has demonstrated the presence of circadian rhythms of feeding behavior in diverse organisms, but the specific molecules involved are not yet identified. Neuropeptide Y (NPY) influences metabolic activity in mammals, and its counterpart, NPF, affects locomotor activity and feeding in Drosophila melanogaster. Our study aims to investigate whether NPF, its receptor (NPFR), and NPF-expressing cells play a role in regulating circadian rest-activity and feeding-fasting …

The Impact Of Child And Parent Trauma Exposure On A School-Based Trauma-Focused Child Intervention, Andrea Donis

Master's Theses

National statistics demonstrate that vast majority of Latine youth living in low-income neighborhoods in the United States experience on-going trauma exposure throughout their life. However, most trauma-focused therapies were designed without considering the impact that experiencing new trauma exposure during treatment may have on treatment effectiveness, limiting our understanding of the potential attenuation caused by new traumatic experiences. In addition, most youth research has focused on the impact of child trauma exposure, with little attention given to the impact of parental trauma exposure on child treatment outcomes despite the salient role that parents play in child development. In particular, little …

Two Leading Female Figures Of The Anti-Colonial Struggle In Africa, Marie-Ange Anezi Djie

Master's Theses

The Eurocentric and male narrative of the anti-colonial struggle in Africa during the twentieth century marginalized women’s contributions and presented them as passive victims of colonialism. Therefore, this study offers a more comprehensive historical account of women's leadership in Africa and a more inclusive and liberated narrative of the anti-colonial movement. Achieving this goal involves delving into the roles and contributions of two prominent female figures in the anti-colonial resistance in Northern and Sub-Saharan Africa during the twentieth century: Huda Shaarawi from Egypt and Funmilayo Ransome-Kuti from Nigeria. Furthermore, this study aims to demonstrate that the actions and strategies of …

The Gay Dating Experience: Partner Selection And Self-Compassion In Short And Long-Term Dating Application Behaviors, Vinchenzo Vassalotti

Master's Theses

This study examined the potential of a self-compassion mindstate intervention on queer men’s virtual partner selection behaviors to encourage resilience in offset to previous unfavorable experiences. This study also explored how partner-seeking contexts (short-term, “hook-up”, and long-term, romantic) influence judgement. Participants were randomly assigned to a self-compassionate mindstate induction or a control group. Afterward, using a within-subjects, repeated measures approach, participants evaluated faux profiles within both partner-seeking contexts on a series of measures (“Attractiveness” ratings, “Confidence of Pursuit” ratings, and “Yes” swipes). The initial hypotheses were unsupported. When including identity-relevant covariates in the model, I found main effects of education …

Family Matters: Experiences Of Family Stigma, Addiction Recovery & The Role Of Self-Compassion, Kennedy Hoying

Master's Theses

Addiction and substance use is currently one of the most stigmatized disorders in society, creating a barrier to treatment and recovery. This study explored the role of family stigma, the stigmatization processes of family members of otherwise stigmatized individuals, within families of substance users to examine how stigma might affect family support behaviors. Two hundred and twenty-two U.S. adults who have a substance using family member completed an online survey regarding their experiences of family stigma, attributions of responsibility for addiction, self-compassion, and any supportive recovery behaviors they engage in to help their family member’s addiction. Results of correlation analysis …

Anthropogenic Litter In Freshwater Ecosystems: Effect On Ecosystem Processes And Spatial Distribution, Emily Johnson

Master's Theses

The rapid increase of plastic production and disposal into the environment has resulted in anthropogenic litter (i.e., trash; AL) becoming a global problem. In aquatic ecosystems, macro- and microplastics are long-lived, mobile, and interact with the physical and chemical components of aquatic ecosystems. Our objectives were to: (1) assess the impact of microplastic pollution on the ecosystem processes of ecosystem metabolism and N2 flux in an oligotrophic lake and (2) to assess the abundance and assemblage of anthropogenic litter in a large urban river. For objective (1), we added microplastics at a range of concentrations to littoral mesocosms. Ecosystem metabolism …

Returning To Simplicity In Early Daoist And Ancient Greek Thought, Abdulaziz Abdulrahman Alfailakawi

Master's Theses

Underlying both the voluntary simplicity and minimalist lifestyle movements is the sentiment that living a simple life leads to tranquility. Despite purported instances where tranquility is experienced through simple living (Hitz, 2020), one can identify instances where, despite living simply, one does not experience tranquility. If living simply is not sufficient for tranquility, what is? In this project I argue that “simplicity” is the inner condition necessary and sufficient to experiencing tranquility. While some argue that simplicity is a practical virtue (Compte-Sponville, 2001; Gambrel and Cafaro, 2010; and Martin, 2012), I argue that simplicity, what is linguistically defined as the …

Early Social Experience And Biased Attention To Threat-Related Emotion In Infancy, Cidnee Hall

Master's Theses

By 7 months of age, infants typically develop a bias toward threatening facial expressions, such as fear and anger (Leppänen & Nelson, 2009; Leppänen et al., 2018; Peltola et al., 2009; 2013). However, individual differences in threat-related attention biases in adulthood are related to socioemotional functioning across a broad range of outcomes, including racial biases and psychological well-being. Links between attention and socioemotional development may begin in infancy, with prior evidence demonstrating that both maternal well-being and race may bias visual processing of emotional expressions (Morales et al., 2017; Vogel et al., 2017; Quinn et al., 2018; 2020). Thus, the …

The Mechanisms Of Heterogenic Necrotic And Apoptotic Cell Death Fates In Human Epidermal Keratinocytes Following Uvb Exposure, Madeline Zoe Tara

Master's Theses

UVB radiation is a carcinogen that triggers inflammation and contributes to skin carcinogenesis. Although UVB exposure can induce apoptosis, this form of cell death is non-inflammatory and thus cannot explain the inflammatory response observed following UVB. Necrotic regulated cell death (RCD) pathways, namely necroptosis, pyroptosis, and PANoptosis, are inherently pro-inflammatory, and thus this study focused on characterizing these in irradiated human epidermal keratinocytes. Keratinocytes were irradiated, treated with cell death inhibitors, and analyzed for apoptotic and necrotic RCD markers using immunofluorescence (IF). Despite uniform UVB exposure, keratinocytes displayed heterogeneous cell death responses, and these findings were validated in ex vivo …

A Novel Approach To Treat Trastuzumab Resistant Her2+ Breast Cancer: Activation Pkcδ, Maria Grazia Mejia Monroy

Master's Theses

In the United States, approximately one in eight women will be diagnosed with invasive breast cancer in her lifetime and one in forty will die from breast cancer. From among all the different subtypes of breast cancer, HER2+ can be found in approximately 20% of breast cancer tumors. HER2 overexpression has been associated with an aggressive form of breast cancer, increasing the risk of metastasis or recurrent tumors in 50% of patients. The standard of care for HER2 positive breast cancer, trastuzumab, has been effective for some patients; however, others develop resistance over time, leading to disease progression and metastasis. …

Novel Electrospinning Techniques For Fabricating Scaffolds To Model Intracranial Atherosclerotic Disease In Tissue Engineered Blood Vessel Mimics, Isaac "Squeaky" Buentipo

Master's Theses

Novel Electrospinning Techniques for Fabricating Scaffolds to Model Intracranial

Atherosclerotic Disease in Tissue Engineered Blood Vessel Mimics

Isaac “Squeaky” Buentipo

Dr. Kristen Cardinal’s Tissue Engineering Lab at California Polytechnic State University specializes in fabricating customized vascular models, known as Blood Vessel Mimics (BVMs), for medical device testing. BVMs are simplified in vitro vascular models designed to bridge the gap between bench testing and in vivo evaluation of intravascular medical devices. BVMs are produced by combining a polymer scaffold with human vascular cells. Through novel scaffold fabrication techniques, such as silicone injection molding, silicone dip casting and electrospinning, the capabilities of …

Evaluation Of Antibiotic Testing Protocols For Biofilm-Forming Escherichia Coli In A Microfluidic Platform, Caleb R. Telander

Master's Theses

Catheter-associated urinary tract infections remain an ongoing clinical problem due to biofilm persistence and antibiotic resistance. Standard antibiotic susceptibility testing cannot accurately reproduce flow conditions and the spatial complexity of the in vivoenvironment and is thus questionable in relevance to device-related infections. This study examines a microfluidic device designed to simulate physiologically relevant wall shear stress and antibiotic gradients in Escherichia coli biofilms. The polydimethylsiloxane-based system integrates a 16-well culture chamber with a gradient generator. Biofilm growth was observed using fluorescence microscopy of green fluorescent protein-labeled bacteria. Simulations performed using COMSOL Multiphysics software estimated the appropriate range of wall …

Efficacy Of Monophasic And Biphasic Pulsed Field Ablation Waveforms: A Model Study, Natalia Dekock

Master's Theses

Cardiac arrhythmias are conditions where the heart’s normal sinus rhythm is interrupted by accelerated or premature rhythms. The most prevalent of these rhythms is atrial fibrillation (AF), where disorganized impulses cause the atria to quiver and pump blood inefficiently. As of 2025, AF affects over 10 million people. Aside from invasive surgical treatments, antiarrhythmic drugs, or one time cardioversions, atrial fibrillation is treated with catheter ablation. The longstanding ablation solutions for AF have been the cryoballoon or radiofrequency catheter ablation. However, limitations for these two ablation modalities are due to the nature of cell destruction; both thermal methods pose a …

Effect Of Foot Strike Pattern On Joint Kinetics On A Downhill Slope, Evan Manley

Master's Theses

With recent increases in participation in outdoor running events, there is a need for research in downhill gait biomechanics. One change that could impact joint loading is foot strike pattern. Foot strike patterns have been categorized into rearfoot-strike (RFS), midfoot-strike (MFS), and forefoot-strike (FFS) [1]. While 75-99% of distance runners naturally RFS on level surfaces, they tend to move towards FFS when it is necessary to reduce vertical loading conditions at the knee [1]. The purpose of this study was to examine differences in peak vertical knee and ankle forces, knee moment, and ankle power, as well as cumulative force …

Balance Assessment Of Disc Golf Players By A Smartphone, Joshua Paul Kannankunni

Master's Theses

Disc golf is an underrepresented sport in biomechanics research, even though it could have effects on gait and balance. Forward and side lunges performed while throwing discs can improve static and dynamic balance. The purpose of this study was to explore the effects of playing disc golf on various static and dynamic balance metrics. Static and dynamic balance experiments were done on 20 disc golf players and 20 control participants to record their RMS of acceleration during the double leg, tandem, and single leg static poses, as well as their gait speed, cadence, stride length, right step length, left step …

Smart Glove Pitch Type Discrepancy Detection Algorithm For Youth And Collegiate Baseball Pitchers, Ethan B. Hemmerlin

Master's Theses

Pitch tipping refers to unintentional variations in a pitcher’s motion that reveal the pitch type, often due to inconsistent arm speed when throwing off-speed pitches like changeups. This issue is common in youth players with underdeveloped mechanics and makes it easier for batters to predict pitches. Wearable sensors, such as Inertial Measurement Units (IMUs), provide a non-invasive way to quantify these subtle motion discrepancies. This study analyzed linear acceleration data from a glove arm IMU for 14 pitchers, evenly split between high school-aged (13-15 years) and college-aged (18-23 years) groups. The aim was to examine the linear accelerations of the …

Effects Of Spirulina And Nannochloropsis Supplementations On The Meat Quality And Sensory Properties Of Broiler Carcasses, Shreyash S. Patel

Master's Theses

Microalgae are a promising feed ingredient due to their high content of proteins, lipids, polysaccharides, vitamins, pigments, and enzymes. This study evaluated the effects of algae as a dietary supplementation on the appearance, quality, and sensory attributes of broiler carcasses. In each of experiment I and II, a total of 54 Ross-708 broilers were randomly obtained from the pool of 270 broilers in the 18 floor pens of soybean-mealbased diets at 0, 2.5%, and 5% Spirulina (Experiment I) and Nannochloropsis (Experiment II) supplements in the Poultry Unit at California Polytechnic State University (Cal Poly, San Luis Obispo, CA). Broiler carcasses …

Opensim Analysis Of The Aymara Indigenous People Performing Ancestral Tasks: Exploring Trends Of Muscle Activity With Tiwanaku Skeletal Indicators, Noah M. Taylor

Master's Theses

The Tiwanaku civilization (AD 500-1100) of the Andean highlands exhibited occupational specialization in communities, with archeological evidence suggesting the existence of labor- and residential-communities, or “taskscapes”, based on an individual’s livelihood. Prior bioarcheological studies have examined Tiwanaku skeletal remains for musculoskeletal stress markers, osteoarthritis, and cross-sectional geometry to infer activity patterns. Their descendants, the Aymara Indigenous people, currently live in the same highlands and until recently lived a lifestyle like their ancestors. Over the past 20 years, the global quinoa demand has risen, thrusting the Aymara into globalization and moving them away from the traditional tasks previously performed. This study …

Acoustic And Hemodynamic Analysis Of Phantoms: Roughness And Flow Dynamics, Ethan Erik Olof Sundberg

Master's Theses

The purpose of this study was to determine whether different vascular phantoms, with and without a surrogate arm, could serve as effective analogs to the human brachial artery for assessing endothelial dysfunction, an early indicator of cardiovascular disease, particularly atherosclerosis. Atherosclerosis is characterized by plaque buildup and endothelial damage, which precede more severe clinical events and are often detectable through changes in vascular function. A 40” water tower was used to simulate diastolic pressure, enabling water flow through each phantom. Strain gauge pressure transducers were placed at both ends of the phantoms to measure pressure drop, while a microphone captured …

A Manufacturing Process For Interdigitated Microelectrodes On Glass Wafers, Wyatt W. Warfield

Master's Theses

This study presents work done to optimize the process parameters to produce interdigitated electrodes on a borosilicate wafer. Using designed experiments and statistical analysis, the error in pattern transfer was minimized using for key process steps including exposure time, develop time and post exposure bake duration. Similarly, statistical analysis was used with profilometry data to fine tune the develop times. Qualitative analysis was used to assess thin film deposition. The resulting process produced wafers with improved pattern transfer and adequate film adhesion

Video Game Hacking, A General Problem With Generalized Solutions, Luke Rowe

Master's Theses

As video games continue to get more popular and lucrative, the number of malicious actors seeking to exploit them grows with it. As this industry expands, so does the importance of securing games against cheating and abuse. This thesis aims to educate developers to help mitigate the abuse of video games by these malicious actors. The goal of this thesis is to provide a foundational framework for thinking like a hacker and how to make games harder to abuse once a hacker bypasses conventional anti-cheat software.

This thesis outlines some of the most common cheating methods and provides general context …

Optimizing Microfluidic Murine Fibroblast And Human Epidermal Keratinocyte Cell Culture In 70Μm Microwells, Christian Navarro

Master's Theses

Cell culture is an essential technique utilized in biotechnology and medicine to remove systemic influences to study cellular behavior and morphological development of individual cell lines. However, conventional cell culture is two-dimensional and static meaning it can’t easily mimic in vivo conditions such as multicellular cell to cell interactions, fluid perfusion, or 3D structures which might alter cellular behavior and morphology. Microfluidic cell culture allows for the incorporation of in vivo conditions such as perfusion and chemical gradients allowing for more physiologically accurate models. The goal of this study is to develop a protocol for testing a microfluidic chip designed …

Evaluating The Viability Of Shared Electric Vehicle Fleet Services For A Higher Education Campus Through An Assessment Of Current Commuter Behaviors, Gabriel Denson

Master's Theses

The transportation sector remains the largest contributor to greenhouse gas emissions in the United States, with single-occupant personal automobile travel accounting for a significant portion of total emissions. While sustainable mobility solutions such as electric vehicles (EVs) and shared transportation services have emerged as potential strategies to reduce environmental impact, adoption rates remain slow due to behavioral, economic, and infrastructural barriers. This research explores the feasibility of a shared electric vehicle fleet service to reduce vehicle miles traveled (VMT) and improve mobility in and around college campuses, using California Polytechnic State University, San Luis Obispo, as a case study.

Through …

Thermally Perfect Augmentation Of A Supersonic Inlet Design Tool That Uses Method Of Characteristics, Mario V. Guardado

Master's Theses

This work is the first in a series to augment a supersonic air inlet design tool based in Python 3 to incorporate new models that increase the range of applicability of the tool. This effort focuses on improving the thermodynamics model by incorporating a thermally perfect gas model. This tool utilizes method of characteristics to solve the governing equations for an inviscid, irrotational, isentropic, steady, supersonic flow field. Multiple test cases are used to assess the accuracy of all new models. A comparison is made between the original code’s test case for a supersonic inlet at low temperatures to verify …

Reverse Engineering Bring Up And Profiling Of Multi-Fpga Systems, Henry A. Evans

Master's Theses

FPGAs have long been used for prototyping and verifying high-speed digital designs in industry and in academic research. As ASIC designs have grown in complexity and size, prototyping those designs on FPGAs has required multiple FPGAs that sometimes span multiple servers. Western Digital donated multiple FPGA-based systems to Cal Poly in 2023. These servers contain multiple high-end AMD FPGAs that are ideal for prototyping large high-speed digital designs, however the full documentation on how to use the servers and how the servers work was not provided. The servers did not come with any information on how to program the FPGAs, …

The Degrees Of The Irreducible Representations Of The Symmetric Group With Respect To Primes, Vanessa F. Beeler

Master's Theses

In this thesis, we explore the relationship between the degrees of irreducible matrix representations of the symmetric group and prime numbers. We start by building up the required background necessary to construct our results. We dive into topics of discrete mathematics including matrix representations, characters of representations, integer partitions, conjugacy classes, class functions, and tableaux. Some other key ingredients in our work include using character tables to classify the irreducible rep- resentations of the symmetric group and the hook-length formula to easily compute the degrees of these representations. Once we have laid the groundwork for our in- vestigation, we begin …