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State Estimation And Optimization Of Large-Scale Dynamic Systems With Improved Particle Filters, Xiaoran Shi Apr 2015

State Estimation And Optimization Of Large-Scale Dynamic Systems With Improved Particle Filters, Xiaoran Shi

Open Access Dissertations

This thesis explores novel methodologies for improving the particle filtering algorithm and tackles state estimation and optimization problems of large-scale dynamic systems through the use of the improved particle filters. First of all, an importance density selection scheme for the particle filtering algorithm is first proposed based on the minimum relative entropy and the theorem of Taylor series expansion. By considering both the transition prior (previous states) and the likelihood (measurements), the proposed density selection scheme improves the performance of the particle filters especially when the measurements appear in the tail of the prior or the prior differs significantly from …


Role Of Hematogenous Macrophages In Formation Of The Fibrotic Scar After Spinal Cord Injury, Yunjiao Zhu Apr 2015

Role Of Hematogenous Macrophages In Formation Of The Fibrotic Scar After Spinal Cord Injury, Yunjiao Zhu

Open Access Dissertations

After spinal cord injury (SCI), a fibrotic scar forms at the injury site that is best characterized by accumulation of perivascular fibroblasts and microglia/macrohpages as well as deposition of extracellular matrix proteins such as fibronectin. While the fibronectin marix plays a critical role in non-central nervous system (CNS) organ wound healing, whether or how fibronectin forms a matrix after SCI is not known. The mechanism by which perivascular fibroblasts are recruited to the fibrotic scar after SCI is also not clear. Using mutant mice and bone marrow transplantation in a mouse model of contusive SCI, we demonstrate that the fibrotic …


Observations Of Meandering And Upwelling Events In The Agulhas Current At 34°S, Greta M. Leber Apr 2015

Observations Of Meandering And Upwelling Events In The Agulhas Current At 34°S, Greta M. Leber

Open Access Dissertations

Over three separate cruise, we collected direct velocity and hydrographic observations across the Agulhas Current at approximately 34◦S. These transects included the first ever full-depth observations of a solitary meander. We use these data to explore how the solitary meander affects the transport, velocity structure and instantaneous water mass distribution of the current. Although we find that the meander is in geostrophic balance, the meander’s fast propagation along the line causes sampling bias in the geostrophic velocities such that direct velocity measurements are necessary to observe the meandering current’s structure. We find that the meandering current broadens and weakens, thereby …


Molecular Mechanisms Of Myosin Light Chain Mutation-Induced Cardiomyopathies, Wenrui Huang Apr 2015

Molecular Mechanisms Of Myosin Light Chain Mutation-Induced Cardiomyopathies, Wenrui Huang

Open Access Dissertations

In this proposal, I have studied the HCM (hypertrophic cardiomyopathy) and DCM (dilated cardiomyopathy) disease causing mechanisms associated with mutations in the myosin regulatory (RLC) and essential (ELC) light chains. Specifically, four HCM mutations, RLC-A13T, RLC-K104E, ELC-A57G and ELC-M173V and one DCM mutation, RLC-D94A were studied. The RLC-A13T, RLC-K104E and ELC-A57G mutations were primarily investigated in transgenic (Tg) mice using in vitro and in vivo approaches, while RLC-D94A and ELC-M173V were studied in reconstituted system because of no Tg mice available in the laboratory (Specific Aims 1&2). In addition, the effects of RLC/ELC serine phosphorylation on the structure and function …


Privacy-Preserving Social Network Analysis, Christine Marie Task Apr 2015

Privacy-Preserving Social Network Analysis, Christine Marie Task

Open Access Dissertations

Data privacy in social networks is a growing concern that threatens to limit access to important information contained in these data structures. Analysis of the graph structure of social networks can provide valuable information for revenue generation and social science research, but unfortunately, ensuring this analysis does not violate individual privacy is difficult. Simply removing obvious identifiers from graphs or even releasing only aggregate results of analysis may not provide sufficient protection. Differential privacy is an alternative privacy model, popular in data-mining over tabular data, that uses noise to obscure individuals' contributions to aggregate results and offers a strong mathematical …


Profiling Gene Expression During Early Gametophyte Development And Sex Determination In Ceratopteris Richardii, Nadia Atallah Apr 2015

Profiling Gene Expression During Early Gametophyte Development And Sex Determination In Ceratopteris Richardii, Nadia Atallah

Open Access Dissertations

In the fern Ceratopteris richardii, every spore has the potential to develop as either a male or hermaphroditic gametophyte. Gametophyte sex is determined by a GA-like pheromone (ACE) that is secreted by hermaphrodites approximately 6 days after spore inoculation and induces male development in other juvenile gametophytes. Our goal is to better understand the genetic and molecular mechanisms involved in sex determination and to identify sex determination genes in Ceratopteris. RNA-Seq was used to create de novotranscriptome assemblies from gametophytes grown, with or without ACE, during the time that their sex is determined, and from male gametophytes in early …


Exploring Knowledge And Beliefs Of Human Papillomavirus (Hpv) Infection And Hpv Vaccination Among U.S. Chinese International Students, Haijuan Gao Apr 2015

Exploring Knowledge And Beliefs Of Human Papillomavirus (Hpv) Infection And Hpv Vaccination Among U.S. Chinese International Students, Haijuan Gao

Open Access Dissertations

The Human Papillomavirus (HPV) vaccine provides an effective prevention strategy against HPV infection, cervical cancer, and genital warts. As increasing numbers of Chinese international students (CIS) are living and studying in United States, this specific ethnic group has become the candidate for HPV vaccination promotion. Despite an increased awareness and knowledge of HPV infection and HPV vaccine among U.S. college students, studies focused on CIS as a unique ethnic group regarding HPV vaccine promotion were limited. This project is the first time aimed to examine CIS's awareness, knowledge and beliefs about HPV infection, HPV vaccine, cervical cancer and genital warts. …


The Law And The Lady: Consent And Marriage In Nineteenth-Century British Literature, Heather Lea Nelson Apr 2015

The Law And The Lady: Consent And Marriage In Nineteenth-Century British Literature, Heather Lea Nelson

Open Access Dissertations

While many scholars have written on women and marriage in nineteenth-century British history and fiction, this dissertation, The Law and the Lady: Consent and Marriage in Nineteenth-Century British Literature, is the first to apply consent theory to those unions. Modern consent theory dictates that for individuals to consent, they must be autonomous, capable, educated, mature, and volunteering, and they must express consent with opportunities to retract those expressions. This dissertation asserts that because nineteenth-century British women usually lacked these components, their marital consent was partial, illegitimate, or absent. Fiction frequently equivocated about this social problem of contemporary female marital consent. …


Developmentally Regulated Sumoylation In The Ciliate Tetrahymena Thermophila, Amjad M. Nasir Apr 2015

Developmentally Regulated Sumoylation In The Ciliate Tetrahymena Thermophila, Amjad M. Nasir

Open Access Dissertations

The Small Ubiquitin-like MOdifier (SUMO) protein regulates numerous nuclear events such as transcription, mitosis and meiosis and DNA repair. These processes are critical to the programmed nuclear events of conjugation in ciliates and provide the potential to investigate developmentally regulated SUMOylation. We predicted a developmental increase in SUMOylation during late conjugation based on the extensive genome remodeling in the developing macronucleus (anlagen) ofTetrahymena thermophila. Immunoblotting of cell lysates from vegetative and mating cells using anti-SUMO antibodies revealed distinct developmental differences and an increased signal correlated with formation of the anlagen. Immunofluorescence of mating Tetrahymena cells with the same antibody …


Laboratory Studies On The Production Of Alpha-Pinene-Derived Organic Nitrates And Their Atmospheric Fate, Joel David Rindelaub Apr 2015

Laboratory Studies On The Production Of Alpha-Pinene-Derived Organic Nitrates And Their Atmospheric Fate, Joel David Rindelaub

Open Access Dissertations

Currently, the formation yields of organic nitrates from the oxidation of biogenic volatile organic compounds, such as α-pinene, is highly uncertain, negatively impacting our knowledge on tropospheric ozone production and the fate of atmospheric NOx. To lower this uncertainty, we quantified the organic nitrate yield from the OH radical oxidation of α-pinene under high NOx conditions. The α-pinene- derived nitrates created in chamber experiments readily partitioned to the aerosol phase and underwent particle phase hydrolysis, indicating that these processes are likely a sink for atmospheric NOx. The hydrolysis of organic nitrates was found to be …


Nurturing Transitions: Housewife Organizations In (Colonial) Indonesia, 1900-1972, Liberty P. Sproat Apr 2015

Nurturing Transitions: Housewife Organizations In (Colonial) Indonesia, 1900-1972, Liberty P. Sproat

Open Access Dissertations

From 1900-1972, housewife organizations in the Netherlands Indies and Indonesia assisted the population of the archipelago in adapting to the political upheaval that attended Indonesia's national liberation from the Netherlands. Under the Ethical Policy (1900-1942), the Association of Housewives sought to "uplift" indigenous society in the Netherlands Indies through teaching women household management skills including proper sanitation, hygiene, and food preservation methods. Through educational and social welfare initiatives, Dutch housewives maintained the Netherlands' control over the territory while promoting Dutch development efforts. At the same time, the Indonesian women's movement aligned with the Indonesian nationalist movement, as exemplified in the …


The Impact Of Early Life Adversity On Later Life Health, Abigail R Howard Apr 2015

The Impact Of Early Life Adversity On Later Life Health, Abigail R Howard

Open Access Dissertations

The preponderance of the literature on early life adversity suggests that adversity has negative effects on later life health; however, an emerging body of literature suggests that early life adversity may develop a sense of resilience in individuals. Drawing from life course perspective, the present research seeks to address this by asking how 16 early life adversities affect individuals' health over a 20 year period in adulthood. Further, the present research seeks to understand how individuals' perceptions of their health over the next few years may actually impact their health seven years later. In general, the more adversity a person …


Development And Application Of Quantitative Methods For Ecosystem Services, Rebecca A. Logsdon Apr 2015

Development And Application Of Quantitative Methods For Ecosystem Services, Rebecca A. Logsdon

Open Access Dissertations

Ecosystem services are benefits that people receive from the environment. Despite recent exponential increases in ecosystem service research, the ecosystem service framework has made little impact on policy and land management decisions, especially in the United States. Two of the main limitations for a lack of ecosystem service considerations in both policy and land management decisions are a need for more advanced quantification methods and the lack of engagement of key stakeholders who are responsible for making land management decisions. This research seeks to address these two limitations by testing and improving quantification methods of ecosystem services and by evaluating …


Uncertainty Quantification And Calibration Of Physical Models, Xian He Apr 2015

Uncertainty Quantification And Calibration Of Physical Models, Xian He

Open Access Dissertations

An ecosystem model is a representation of a real complex ecological system, and is usually described by sophisticated mathematical models. Terrestrial Ecosystem Model (TEM) is one of the ecosystem models, that describes the dynamics of car- bon, nitrogen, water and other vegetation related variables. There are uncertainties in the TEM which are attributed to inaccurate input data, insufficient knowledge of the parameters, inherent randomness and simplification of the physical model. Quantification of uncertainty of such an ecosystem model is computationally very heavy. Bayesian calibration method has been used as an efficient way to calibrate and quantify uncertainties of the computer …


Development Of Experimental And Instrumental Systems To Study Biological Systems, Amanda J Hemphill Apr 2015

Development Of Experimental And Instrumental Systems To Study Biological Systems, Amanda J Hemphill

Open Access Dissertations

Chapters 1-4 of this thesis describes the development of an experimental system to measure diffusion-limited reaction kinetics in a biological environment. About 100 years ago, the relationship between reaction rate and diffusion in homogenous solution, ie water or buffer, was described as a linear relationship by Smoluchowski. Applying this theory naively would suggest that since the diffusion coefficients drop by factors of 4-100 then the rates of reaction would drop by the same amount. However, recent theory and simulations suggest that this does not hold. Even though biological diffusion coefficients drop to 0.1-20% of that in buffer, these recent studies …


Discrete Epidemic Models With Arbitrarily Distributed Disease Stages, Nancy Hernandez Ceron Apr 2015

Discrete Epidemic Models With Arbitrarily Distributed Disease Stages, Nancy Hernandez Ceron

Open Access Dissertations

The use of discrete-time models (or discrete models) in the field of mathematical epidemiology has been limited while continuous-time models (or continuous models) are often times preferred, particularly because disease dynamics do occur continuously in time and more mathematical tools are available for model analysis. How- ever, discrete models are not only more tractable and easier to understand, but also more directly related to data, particularly when the disease stage distributions are arbitrarily distributed (e.g., when the data cannot be fitted by distributions from a parametric family). Under these circumstances continuous models usually lead to complex system of integral equations. …


Elementary Preservice Teachers' Beliefs About Teacher Effectiveness, Mauricio A Herron Gloria Apr 2015

Elementary Preservice Teachers' Beliefs About Teacher Effectiveness, Mauricio A Herron Gloria

Open Access Dissertations

The purpose of this study was to explore elementary preservice teachers' beliefs about effective classroom instruction and the characteristics and behaviors of effective teachers, and to examine how these beliefs may vary across teacher education. Participants were 24 students enrolled in a teacher education program at a large mid-west university in the United States. Data were collected using an intensive interview protocol consisting of semi-structured questions, and analyzed using grounded theory strategies (Charmaz, 2006, 2012). Using a constructive/interpretive framework (Lincoln & Guba, 2013), the analysis of the data indicated that participants' beliefs about teacher effectiveness dwell around 12 overreaching categories; …


Understanding Mechanical Environment Changes And Biological Responses To Canine Retraction Using T-Loop, Feifei Jiang Apr 2015

Understanding Mechanical Environment Changes And Biological Responses To Canine Retraction Using T-Loop, Feifei Jiang

Open Access Dissertations

Jiang, Feifei. Ph.D., Purdue University, May 2015. Understanding Mechanical Environment Changes and Biological Responses to Canine Retraction Using T-loop. Major Professors: Jie Chen, School of Engineering and Technology, Anil Bajaj, School of Mechanical Engineering. Predictability of tooth displacement in response to specific orthodontic load system directly links to the quality and effectiveness of the treatment. The key questions are how the tooth's environment changes in response to the orthodontic load and how the biological tissues respond clinically. The objectives of this study are to determine the mechanical environment (ME) changes and to quantify the biological tissues' response. Eighteen (18) patients …


Characterization Of Hessian Fly From Israel, Alisha J Johnson Apr 2015

Characterization Of Hessian Fly From Israel, Alisha J Johnson

Open Access Dissertations

Mayetiola destructor Say, the Hessian fly, is a gall midge and a member of the Dipteran family Cecidomyiidae. It is a common pest of wheat found throughout all of the major wheat growing areas of the world and poses a serious economic threat to the United States (US), particularly in the Southeast winter wheat region. Damage to wheat is done solely by feeding first and second in-star larvae. Hessian fly (Hf) infestations result in a loss in grain yield by the stunting and/or killing of seedling wheat plants in the winter and by causing breakage at the nodes of the …


Molecular Diagnosis Of Cancer Using Ambient Ionization Mass Spectrometry, Kevin S Kerian Apr 2015

Molecular Diagnosis Of Cancer Using Ambient Ionization Mass Spectrometry, Kevin S Kerian

Open Access Dissertations

My dissertation focuses on advancing the development and application of ambient ionization mass spectrometry methodology and technology to the biomedical field. The primary ambient ionization method used in my studies is desorption electrospray ionization mass spectrometry (DESI-MS) imaging, which has been previously used to analyze and differentiate disease state (i.e. tumor and normal) and in some cases tumor subtype of human liver, kidney, bladder, testicular, prostate, and brain cancers. DESI-MS imaging is an ideal method for disease diagnosis, because it can be used to directly correlate disease state with histopathology to develop and validate MS libraries built using the molecular …


Role Of Syk In The Regulation Of Cytoskeleton And Stress Granules In Breast Cancer, Mariya Krisenko Apr 2015

Role Of Syk In The Regulation Of Cytoskeleton And Stress Granules In Breast Cancer, Mariya Krisenko

Open Access Dissertations

The Syk protein-tyrosine kinase, a well-characterized modulator of immune recognition receptor signaling, also plays important, but poorly characterized, roles in tumor progression, acting as an inhibitor of cellular motility and metastasis in highly invasive cancer cells. Multiharmonic atomic force microscopy (AFM) was used to map nanomechanical properties of live MDA-MB-231 breast cancer cells either lacking or expressing Syk. The expression of Syk dramatically altered the cellular topography, reduced cell height, increased elasticity, increased viscosity, and allowed visualization of a more substantial microtubule network. The microtubules of Syk-expressing cells were more stable to nocodazole-induced depolymerization and were more highly acetylated than …


Polarization-Dependent Nonlinear Optical Microscopy Methods For The Analysis Of Crystals And Biological Tissues, Emma L. Kerian Apr 2015

Polarization-Dependent Nonlinear Optical Microscopy Methods For The Analysis Of Crystals And Biological Tissues, Emma L. Kerian

Open Access Dissertations

The ability to solve a high-resolution protein structure is largely dependent on the successful generation and identification of protein crystals prior to X-ray diffraction (XRD). For novel protein targets, high-throughput crystallography often involves generation of multiple targets and thousands of crystallization trials per target to generate diffraction-quality crystals. Second harmonic generation (SHG) imaging has been developed as a fast, non-destructive and sensitive method for the selective identification of protein crystals, even in highly scattering environments. Polarization-dependent SHG microscopy methods were developed to assess the presence of multidomain crystals to provide a handle on crystal quality. In addition, polarization-dependent two-photon excited …


A Novel In Vivo Tumor Oxygen Profiling Assay: Combining Functional And Molecular Imaging With Multivariate Mathematical Modeling, Chung-Wein Lee Apr 2015

A Novel In Vivo Tumor Oxygen Profiling Assay: Combining Functional And Molecular Imaging With Multivariate Mathematical Modeling, Chung-Wein Lee

Open Access Dissertations

Purpose: The objective of this study is to develop and test a novel high spatio-temporal in vivo assay to quantify tumor oxygenation and hypoxia. The assay implements a biophysical model of oxygen transport to fuse parameters acquired from in vivo functional and molecular imaging modalities. ^ Introduction: Tumor hypoxia plays an important role in carcinogenesis. It triggers pathological angiogenesis to supply more oxygen to the tumor cells and promotes cancer cell metastasis. Preclinical and clinical evidence show that anti-angiogenic treatment is capable of normalizing the tumor vasculature both structurally and functionally. The resulting normalized vasculature provides a more efficient and …


Computational Optical Imaging: Applications In Synthetic Aperture Imaging, Phase Retrieval, And Digital Holography, Dennis Joseph Lee Apr 2015

Computational Optical Imaging: Applications In Synthetic Aperture Imaging, Phase Retrieval, And Digital Holography, Dennis Joseph Lee

Open Access Dissertations

Computational imaging has become an important field, as a merger of both algorithms and physical experiments. In the realm of microscopy and optical imaging, an important application is the problem of improving resolution, which is bounded by wavelength and numerical aperture according to the classic diffraction limit. We will investigate the resolution enhancement of phase objects such as transparent biological cells. One key challenge is how to measure phase experimentally. Standard interferometric techniques have the drawback of being sensitive to environmental vibrations and temperature fluctuations, and they use a reference arm which requires more space and cost. Non-holographic methods provide …


Improvement Of Simulating Bmps And Lid Practices In L-Thia-Lid Model, Yaoze Liu Apr 2015

Improvement Of Simulating Bmps And Lid Practices In L-Thia-Lid Model, Yaoze Liu

Open Access Dissertations

Best management practices (BMPs) and low impact development (LID) practices are popular approaches used to reduce the negative impacts of urbanization on hydrology and water quality. To assist planners and decision-makers in urban development projects, user-friendly tools are needed to assess the effectiveness of BMPs and LID practices on water quantity and quality. To address this need, the Long-Term Hydrologic Impact Assessment-LID (L-THIA-LID) model was enhanced with additional commonly used BMPs and LID practices represented in the model, improved approaches to estimate hydrology and water quality, and representation of practices in series. The tool was used to evaluate the performance …


Quantitative Mrna Detection With Advanced Nonlinear Microscopy, Jing Liu Apr 2015

Quantitative Mrna Detection With Advanced Nonlinear Microscopy, Jing Liu

Open Access Dissertations

Cell-specific information on quantity and localization of key mRNA transcripts in single-cell level are critical to the assessment of cancer risk, therapy efficacy, and effective prevention strategies. While current techniques are not capable to visualize single mRNA transcript beyond the diffraction limit. In this thesis, two nonlinear technologies, second harmonic super-resolution microscopy (SHaSM) and transient absorption microscopy (TAM), are developed to detect and quantify single Human edimer receptor 2 (Her2) mRNA transcripts. The SHaSM is used to detect single mRNA transcript beyond the diffraction limit, while the TAM is employed to detect mRNA without the interference of fluorescence background. The …


Investigation Of Dried Distillers Grains With Solubles (Ddgs) Susceptibility To Red Flour Beetle (Tribolium Castaneum (Herbst)) Infestation, Mahsa Fardisi Apr 2015

Investigation Of Dried Distillers Grains With Solubles (Ddgs) Susceptibility To Red Flour Beetle (Tribolium Castaneum (Herbst)) Infestation, Mahsa Fardisi

Open Access Dissertations

Protecting livestock feed from insect infestation is a common challenge that feed facility managers and farmers have to deal with. It becomes an issue of importance because insect infestation degrades feed quality and quantity. Dried Distillers Grains with Solubles (DDGS) is added to livestock feed because of its high protein content. As DDGS usage in animal feed increases, understanding the susceptibility of DDGS, when mixed with livestock feed, to insect infestation is necessary for safe feed storage. This research addressed four questions. The first looked at the susceptibility of DDGS, when stored as a raw ingredient, to Tribolium castaneum (Herbst) …


Studies Of The Interaction Of Biogenic Volatile Organic Compounds And Nox In Forest Environments, Kevin M. Mcavey Apr 2015

Studies Of The Interaction Of Biogenic Volatile Organic Compounds And Nox In Forest Environments, Kevin M. Mcavey

Open Access Dissertations

Ozone is a pollutant that causes crop damage, adverse health effects, and is a contributor to global climate change. Ozone concentrations are predicted to rise over the next half-century along with global temperature. Ozone production is controlled by the chemistry between biogenic volatile organic compounds and NOx (NO + NO2), and therefore, a greater understanding of NOx + BVOC chemistry along with their sources and sinks is needed. One large uncertainty in understanding NOx + BVOC chemistry is the production of organic nitrates (RONO2), which act as a radical termination step in the …


Structural And Biophysical Analysis Of The Proteasomal Deubiquitinase, Uch37, Marie Elizabeth Morrow Apr 2015

Structural And Biophysical Analysis Of The Proteasomal Deubiquitinase, Uch37, Marie Elizabeth Morrow

Open Access Dissertations

Ubiquitin carboxyl-terminal hydrolase 37, or UCH37, is a deubiquitinating enzyme associated with the 26S proteasome, the primary protein degradation machinery in eukaryotic cells. UCH37 is responsible for the disassembly of polymeric ubiquitin chains, or polyubiquitin, which have been ligated onto proteins in order to target them for degradation. The 26S utilizes two associated deubiquitinating enzymes, UCH37 and USP14, and one intrinsic, Rpn11, to remove polyubiquitin chains from substrate proteins as they are unfolded and translocated into the proteolytic core of the proteasome, where proteins are cleaved into small peptides and then released for recycling by the cell. UCH37 associates with …


Freezing-Induced Deformation Of Biomaterials In Cryomedicine, Altug Ozcelikkale Apr 2015

Freezing-Induced Deformation Of Biomaterials In Cryomedicine, Altug Ozcelikkale

Open Access Dissertations

Cryomedicine utilizes low temperature treatments of biological proteins, cells and tissues for cryopreservation, materials processing and cryotherapy. Lack of proper understanding of cryodamage that occurs during these applications remains to be the primary bottleneck for development of successful tissue cryopreservation and cryosurgery procedures. An engineering approach based on a view of biological systems as functional biomaterials can help identify, predict and control the primary cryodamage mechanisms by developing an understanding of underlying freezing-induced biophysical processes. In particular, freezing constitutes the main structural/mechanical origin of cryodamage and results in significant deformation of biomaterials at multiple length scales. Understanding of these freezing-induced …