Digital Commons Network^™

A Survey Of Diatom Assemblages Of North Dakota: Identification, Enumeration, And Assessment Of Stream Health With Environmental Variables, Cole Tilford

Masters Theses

Diatoms have been used as biological indicators for assessing the environmental health of waterways for over a century. Their low motility and responsiveness to environmental changes makes them ideal for this purpose. North Dakota oil extraction has undergone a massive transformation as hydraulic fracturing across the Bakken Formation and the Williston Basin has increased over the last 20 years. Hydraulic fracturing increased the potential for environmental pollution of North Dakota’s waterways, especially in the form of highly saline hydraulic fracturing liquid. Many North Dakota streams are already saline and additional salinity could cause drastic changes in aquatic ecosystems. North Dakota …

Species Responses To Habitat Edges And Fragmentation Per Se: A Cross Taxa Meta-Analysis, Rachel Snyder

Masters Theses

Aim We examined the scale equivalency of fragmentation effects at the patch scale and landscape scale to determine if patch level effects scale up to landscape level effects. First, we examined species responses to fragmentation effects at the patch scale and landscape scale. Second, we evaluated whether there is a difference in response between taxonomic groups and across latitudes. Finally, we analyzed the data at the level of individual species in order to determine how species respond to edge effects and fragmentation effects. Location Data for 71 studies were gathered from the BioFrag database. Studies used were located in 48 …

Prediction And Root-Cause Analysis For Smart Speaker Intentional Electromagnetic Interference Attacks, Tanner Fokkens

Masters Theses

"Smart home and Internet of Things (IoT) devices have become ubiquitous in homes over the past decade. The smart speaker itself is often the device that interfaces all these devices together. Because of this, the smart speaker can become a point of attack for someone trying to exploit or hack into the smart home devices. In the past few years, it was discovered that smart speakers with microwave electromechanical system (MEMS) microphones are susceptible to intentional electromagnetic interference (I-EMI) attacks by modulating an audio command to a high-frequency carrier signal. This attack allows for command recognition for long-distances and smart …

Area Average Surface Transfer Coefficient In Unit Cell Geometries, Benjamin Gabriel Mackey

Masters Theses

"Honeycombs, metal foams, and lattice structures all provide a way to increase heat transfer due to better fluid mixing and larger surface area. Specifically, lattice structures can be a great way to provide heat transfer enhancement due to the ability to customize and optimize the unit cell geometry. In this research, a novel yet simple unit cell geometry is chosen for study. Four different configurations are tested in a lower Reynolds number range, 300–1800: single unit cell, two-unit cells in series, three-unit cells in series, and a 3x3 unit cell array. The Sherwood number of each configuration is found by …

The Application Of Statistical Modeling To Identify Genetic Associations With Mild Traumatic Brain Injury Outcomes, Caroline Schott

Masters Theses

"Traumatic brain injury (TBI) is a growing health concern, with millions of TBI diagnoses in the United States each year. The vast majority of TBI diagnoses are mild traumatic brain injuries (mTBI), which can be challenging to manage due to variation in symptoms and outcomes. Most individuals with mTBI successfully recover quickly, but a small subset has a delayed recovery. Although the factors that contribute to this variation in recovery are not clearly understood, it is possible that genetic differences may play a role. Very few studies have investigated the association between single nucleotide polymorphisms (SNPs) with mTBI outcomes and …

Environmental Dna Metabarcoding As A Tool For Fish Community Assessment In Wetlands, Eric Ludwig

Masters Theses

"Environmental DNA (eDNA) metabarcoding is a genetically based method of assessing biodiversity in aquatic environments. While the efficacy of eDNA surveys has been well documented in riverine and marine systems, it has been relatively underemployed in freshwater wetland environments. In this study, we conducted an eDNA metabarcoding survey of fish diversity and its seasonal variation in a wetland along the Mississippi River in the Missouri Bootheel. Samples were collected from both permanent and seasonal water bodies including oxbow lakes, a shallow, man-made lake, a ditch, and a slough. For each of the 28 sites in this study, three water samples …

Incorporating Novel Sensors For Reading Human Health State And Motion Intent Into Real-Time Computing Systems, Adam Sawyer

Masters Theses

"Integrating sensors that read states of the human body into everyday life is an increasing desire, especially with the rise of deep learning which requires vast stores of data to make predictions. This work explores integrating these sensors into the human experience through two methods and recording the results. The first of these methods integrates a MXene based field-effect transistor sensor for the 2019-nCov spike protein with a mobile app. This allows the user to read how saturated their breath is with Covid-19. The second method integrates 3D-printed pressure sensors, and a motion capture system, into a glove to read …

Flight Software Development For A University-Class Microsatellite Mission, Yumeka Nagano

Masters Theses

"The purpose of this research is to present the software development process used by the Command and Data Handling (C&DH) subsystem as a part of a microsatellite mission underway at the Missouri University of Science and Technology. The mission's objective is to evaluate the performance of an innovative cold gas propulsion system for use in formation flying applications and the incorporation of a stereoscopic imaging sensor used to measure the satellite pair's relative position and velocity vectors in real time. C&DH uses a Raspberry Pi 3 Model B as the flight computer running a Linux environment, and the flight code …

A Network Of Low-Cost Multi-Pollutant Air Quality Sensors For Evaluating Fine-Scale Exposure Disparity In Twin Cities, Mn, P M Varuni Abhayaratne

Masters Theses

"Poor air quality is detrimental to health and is a leading environmental risk factor for early death globally. The massive scale of urbanization and population growth has led urban air quality to become a global concern as the release of air pollutants into the atmosphere continues to increase. Air quality has traditionally been monitored using reference-grade monitoring stations that are expensive and sparsely distributed. Low-cost sensors can complement existing regulatory networks to provide more spatial detail, capturing fine-scale variations. This study investigates spatiotemporal pollutant patterns, exposure disparities and environmental justice using data collected from a two-year (2019-2021) deployment of a …

Tropospheric Correction For Insar Using Machine Learning, Ngo Hi Kenny Yue

Masters Theses

"Interferometric Synthetic Aperture Radar (InSAR) is a popular technique for studying Earth's surface deformation caused by phenomena like earthquakes and subsidence. However, its accuracy is limited by tropospheric delays caused by water vapor in the atmosphere. This limitation can be overcome by using methods that correct for tropospheric noise, such as statistical, empirical, and predictive approaches. This study explores the potential of using machine learning algorithms to predict the zenith total delay caused by tropospheric effects in InSAR measurements. The study employs two different machine learning algorithms, random forest and neural networks, to learn the relationship between numerical weather prediction …

Computer Vision In Adverse Conditions: Small Objects, Low-Resoltuion Images, And Edge Deployment, Raja Sunkara

Masters Theses

"Computer vision based on deep learning is an essential field that plays a significant role in object detection, image classification, semantic segmentation, instance segmentation, and other applications. However, these models face significant challenges in adverse conditions, such as small objects, low-resolution images, and edge deployment. These challenges limit the accuracy and efficiency of computer vision algorithms, making it difficult to obtain reliable results.

The primary objective of this thesis is to assess the performance of deep learning- based computer vision models in challenging conditions and provide viable solutions to overcome the obstacles. The study will specifically address three key challenges, …

Meta-Analysis Of Mesenchymal Stem Cell Gene Expression Data From Obese And Non-Obese Patients, Dakota William Shields

Masters Theses

"The prevalence of gene expression microarray datasets in public repositories gives opportunity to analyze biologically interesting datasets without running the laboratory aspect in house. Such experimentation is expensive in terms of finances, time, and expertise, which often results in low numbers of replicates. Meta-analysis techniques attempt to overcome issues due to few biological or technical replicates by combining separate experiments together to increase statistical power. Proper statistical considerations help to offset issues like simultaneous testing of thousands of genes, unintended hybridization, and other noises.

Microarrays contain light intensities from tens of thousands of hybridized probes giving a measure of gene …

Microscopic Traffic Simulation Modeling And Communication Tool For Post-Disaster Evacuation Routing, Nicholas Kutheis

Masters Theses

"This research evaluated the effectiveness of conducting traffic simulation models and developing a mobile application to serve as a communication channel for emergency evacuation preparation and routing. An iOS and Android app was developed to display emergency events to users with suggested routes for evacuation and a microscopic traffic simulation model was conducted for the St. Louis (MO) metropolitan region that analyzed various road networks with projected evacuation demand.

A mobile application coded in Swift (Apple) and Kotlin (Android) featured an emergency notification screen that displayed the type of emergency warning (e.g., earthquake, flood, or no warnings) with provided routes …

Application Of Nitrate To An Anaerobic Subsurface Bioremediation, Cassie Marie Roberts

Masters Theses

"The highly contaminated subsurface matrix of the Baird and McGuire Superfund site is currently threatening the health and safety of the surrounding environment of Holbrook, MA. Contaminants of significant concern due to high concentration are inorganic arsenite and petroleum hydrocarbons, such as naphthalene. Parsons Corporation and the Massachusetts Department of Environmental Protection have implemented a bioremediation pilot to attempt to degrade the hydrocarbons and arsenic with the application of nitrate. The nitrate would act as an electron acceptor for biodegradation of the hydrocarbon contaminants, produce nitrite that would oxidize reduced iron, and iron oxides would sequester arsenic. Preliminary data showed …

Evaluation Of Mesenchymal Stem Cells In Autoimmune Disease: A Systematic Review And Meta-Analysis, Hailey Nicole Swain

Masters Theses

"Mesenchymal stem cells, also known as multipotential stem/progenitor cells and mesenchymal stem/progenitor cells, are denoted by the acronym MSCs. MSCs can differentiate into multiple lineages from different germ layers in vitro, and in limited situations, in vivo. MSCs have broad anti-inflammatory and immune-modulatory properties, which is the greatest focus of MSCs in clinical testing. Despite their promise and use in over 950 clinical trials, pivotal questions remain unanswered. Recent clinical trials have demonstrated that when MSCs are harvested from autoimmune patients, they show a reduction in their therapeutic efficacy in comparison to MSCs from a healthy person. Identifying quality MSCs …

Designing Exterior Lighting For Safety And Comfort While Minimizing Light Pollution, Energy Consumption, And Cost, Stephen Michael Simmons

Masters Theses

"Artificial light at night brings many benefits to society. However, these benefits do not come without costs. One environmental issue that is often overlooked in the design of public spaces and infrastructure is light pollution. At the expense of large amounts of energy, light pollution causes numerous harmful effects on human health, ecosystems, and the night sky. Today, the problem is becoming more widespread, especially with the increasing use of bright, white LED luminaires. Thus, it is imperative for designers and engineers to create smarter lighting designs that not only allow for safety and comfort at night but also promote …

Development And Testing Of A Hyperbaric Aerodynamic Levitator For Containerless Materials Research, Sydney Elizabeth Boland

Masters Theses

"This research focused on the development and testing of a hyperbaric aerodynamic levitator for container less materials research of specimens at temperatures greater than 2000°C and pressures up to 10.3 MPa (1500 psi). The effect of specimen size, specimen density, pressure, and flow rate on the levitation behavior was studied. Lightweight specimens demonstrated two stable levitation regimes that were speculated to be associated with a change in the turbulent wake structure. The hyperbaric aerodynamic levitator was also used to determine the effect of pressure on the heat transfer by studying the melting behavior of a levitated 3.0 mm diameter alumina …

Optimizing The Placement Of Multiple Uav--Lidar Units Under Road Priority And Resolution Requirements, Zachary Michael Osterwisch

Masters Theses

"Real-time road traffic information is crucial for intelligent transportation systems (ITS) applications, like traffic navigation or emergency response management, but acquiring such data is tremendously challenging in practice because of the high costs and inefficient placement of sensors. Some modern ITS applications contribute to this problem by equipping vehicles with multiple light detection and ranging (LiDAR) sensors, which are expensive and gather data inefficiently; one solution that avoids vehicle-mounted LiDAR acquisition has been to install elevated LiDAR instruments along roadways, but this approach remains unrefined. The eventual development of sixth-generation (6G) wireless communication will enable new, creative solutions to solve …

Rapid-Throughput Analysis Of 1,4-Dioxane In Plants By Centrifugal Sampling And Phytoforensic Analysis For Site Delineation And Assessing Enhanced Rhizodegradation, Anthony Eberechukwu Oha

Masters Theses

"Owing to its broad use and environmental persistence, 1,4-dioxane (dioxane) poses a notable threat to public health and is recalcitrant to traditional remedial systems. Dioxane moves readily in an aqueous environment and is an emerging contaminant in drinking water, surface water, groundwater, and wastewater. The extent of dioxane in the biosphere is also difficult to delineate, particularly in the subsurface. Phytoremediation has demonstrated the potential for dioxane groundwater remediation. Recent findings indicate that plant-microbial symbiosis may be more advantageous for limiting potential transport and transfer into plant tissues and the atmosphere. Bioaugmentation of the rhizosphere paired with soil amendments has …

Dynamic Discounted Satisficing Based Driver Decision Prediction In Sequential Taxi Requests, Sree Pooja Akula

Masters Theses

"Ridesharing platforms rely on connecting available taxi drivers to potential passengers to maximize their revenue. However, predicting the stopping decision made by every driver, i.e., the final task performed during a given day, is crucial to achieving this goal. Unfortunately, little research has been done on predicting drivers’ stopping decisions, especially when they deviate from expected utility maximization behavior. This research proposes a Dynamic Discounted Satisficing (DDS) heuristic to model and learn the task at which human agents will stop working for that day, assuming that the human agents are taking sequential decisions based on their preference order. We apply …

Mat: Genetic Algorithms Based Multi-Objective Adversarial Attack On Multi-Task Deep Neural Networks, Nikola Andric

Masters Theses

"Vulnerability to adversarial attacks is a recognized deficiency of not only deep neural networks (DNNs) but also multi-task deep neural networks (MT-DNNs) that attracted much attention in the past few years. To the best of our knowledge, all multi-task deep neural network adversarial attacks currently present in the literature are non-targeted attacks that use gradient descent to optimize a single loss function generated by aggregating all loss functions into one. On the contrary, targeted attacks are sometimes preferred since they give more control over the attack. Hence, this paper proposes a novel targeted multi-objective adversarial ATtack (MAT) based on genetic …

Zoom Fatigue And Virtual Interviewing: The Effects Of Interpersonal Distance, Lillian Rose Schell

Masters Theses

"This research examines breaches of interpersonal distance, one of the proposed causes of Zoom fatigue, within the context of a job interview. It is proposed that when an interviewer perceives a job applicant to be close to them, Zoom fatigue increases and ratings of the applicant decrease. Participants completed a Zoom Exhaustion and Fatigue scale before and after watching an asynchronous video interview in which the size of the job applicant’s face varied between conditions. It was found that breaches of interpersonal distance did not influence self-reported Zoom fatigue. However, breaches of interpersonal distance did influence ratings of the job …

Board Games: A Perfect Match For Reading Comprehension, Christopher Allen Frazier

Masters Theses

Analog board games greatly benefit students’ development and overall well-being. Board games offer opportunities for early learning, help boost language skills, sharpen students’ ability to focus, teach the value of teamwork, and soothe anxiety. Integrating board games with literacy skills allows students to assimilate information and develop into lifelong learners. Without solid literacy skills, the future is bleak for most students. To compound the problem, a trend today is to replace traditional board games as an educational tool with digital alternatives. This trend has seen a downward correlation with students having significant reading deficiencies in their reading comprehension in grades …

Is The Kalam Cosmological Argument's Second Premise Defendable?, Mark Karapetyan

Masters Theses

Contrary to the skeptic's rejections, the second premise of the cosmological argument can be defended via scientific and philosophical arguments.

On Natural Evil: Augustine, Plantinga, And Hick, Andrew James Delaney

Masters Theses

This paper examines the philosophical problem of natural evil. Natural evil in the world creates a stumbling block between people and their faith in God. What can be said of the coexistence of God and evil in the world? The purpose of this paper is to address the criticisms of Christianity in light of natural evil and to share several theistic responses to the problem of natural evil. Specific considerations are made to the greater context of the story of humanity. Alvin Plantinga's free-will defense is evaluated first as a foundation for discussion. Contributions from Augustine, John Hick, William Rowe, …

Researching Technological Advancements Through Alternative Methods Of Music Education To Engage Students In The Digital Age, Olivia Thornton Thompson

Masters Theses

While the music industry has significantly incorporated technology into music composition and production, music education is slow to teach how to use these technical methods for students living in the digital age. Current music education methods have established successful results in past music compositions; however, those methods are becoming impractical. Although music education taught in schools has been primarily successful through traditional methods, students learning in the digital age have yet to learn how to strengthen their musical abilities through technology. This secondary analysis aims to look at the different studies on incorporating technology in a music education setting to …

The Importance Of Art In Cross Discipline Education, Shaye E. Beeman

Masters Theses

For years, art has been pushed under the rug. Especially in education, art is seen as less advantageous than other courses such as math, English, and science. This thesis explores the advantages of utilizing art in cross-discipline classrooms to help students learn and develop skills that will improve their physical, mental, and spiritual health. This thesis will bring into account other sources of information and data including research, case studies, and visual analyses to show: How will art improve the physical health of students? How does art increase the mental health of students? How does art improve the spiritual health …

The Criteria Of Liturgical Worship And Analysis Of Wesley‘S Theology And How His Approach Challenges Contemporary Christians, Especially In Terms Of Worship, Eunice H. Ahn

Masters Theses

Although liturgical traditions were introduced during the Modernism Era, they continue to play an influential role in churches today. The worship and teaching practices applied in Roman Catholic Churches reflect how important traditional liturgy is in the Post-Modernism Era. While many catholic congregations are aware of the significance of liturgy, many Christian and Protestant Churches are not. There is missing knowledge regarding liturgical traditions in these churches. This study will propose liturgical worship in contemporary Christian and Protestant congregations as an alternative proposal from the perspective of John Wesley. This proposal will discuss the criteria of liturgical worship and analyze …

Hey Girl, Feel My Thesis. Know What It's Made Of? Research Material., Mya Lynn Pritts

Masters Theses

As Generation Z becomes the newest generation to enter adulthood, it is valuable to understand their thought processes and communication patterns. Individuals of Generation Z are known to be digital natives, as they were born into a world of technology with the internet at their fingertips. Understanding Generation Z's use of memes is an area where little research has been done so far. The purpose of this study was to determine how Generation Z interprets and communicates with memes on the internet and social media platforms. Unlike previous research, this study analyzed the participants' perceptions, which further contributes to an …

Weight Of The Sword And The Hero's Journey, Chase Baylor Moore

Masters Theses

Chapter 1 Review: This chapter outlines the artist’s statement on his motivation behind the project. This presents a history of engagement with the fantasy medium with the artist and how the fantasy genre has inspired him throughout his childhood and into his adult life. The artist discusses his fascination with the genre and how fantasy provides a safe medium which allows for people to engage in difficult and testing experiences in a setting which they can learn empathy. Chapter 2 Review: This chapter details Joseph Campbell’s Monomythic structure in the form of the Hero’s Journey before engaging with how Christopher …