Digital Commons Network^™

Evaluating The Relationship Between Derived Relational Responding, Verbal Operant Development, And Linguistic Structure: Correlating The Peak-E-Pa, The Ablls-R, And The Told-I:4, Bridget Munoz

Theses

The increasing prevalence of Autism Spectrum Disorder has produced a longstanding relevance for continued progressive measures towards a systematic approach to the treatment of deficient language repertoires. Current behavior analytic assessments, such as the Assessment of Basic Language and Learning Skills-Revised (ABLLS-R), have demonstrated utility in providing relative measures of the functional characteristics of an individual’s language and learner repertoire, as consistent with a traditional Skinnerian approach. Further assessments have been created under other existing theoretical frameworks, such as the Test of Language Development (TOLD), and the Promoting the Emergence of Advanced Knowledge Relational Training System (PEAK). Each assessment was …

Carbon Nanotube Arrays For Intracellular Delivery And Biological Applications, Masoud Golshadi

Theses

Introducing nucleic acids into mammalian cells is a crucial step to elucidate biochemical pathways, modify gene expression in immortalized cells, primary cells, and stem cells, and intoduces new approaches for clinical diagnostics and therapeutics. Current gene transfer technologies, including lipofection, electroporation, and viral delivery, have enabled break-through advances in basic and translational science to enable derivation and programming of embryonic stem cells, advanced gene editing using CRISPR (Clustered regularly interspaced short palindromic repeats), and development of targeted anti-tumor therapy using chimeric antigen receptors in T-cells (CAR-T). Despite these successes, current transfection technologies are time consuming and limited by the inefficient …

Connecting For Better Health: Discovering Differences In Self-­‐Reported Preference In The Environment Of Social Media In Healthcare Communications, Ashley Zeh

Theses

Though working as a vital service to the community, health care companies have the same

challenges as other businesses needing to remain competitive in the marketplace. Health care providers, however, have the additional challenge of providing healthcare communications that are valuable to society. Social media presents a new environment for healthcare providers to communicate and form a relationship with their patient community. Better insights into this new environment are necessary in order to establish how patients self-report differences in preference for the different types of technology-mediated communications. Through survey methods, this study looks into the differences in self-reported claims of …

Gaze Guidance, Task-Based Eye Movement Prediction, And Real-World Task Inference Using Eye Tracking, Srinivas Sridharan

Theses

The ability to predict and guide viewer attention has important applications in computer graphics, image understanding, object detection, visual search and training. Human eye movements provide insight into the cognitive processes involved in task performance and there has been extensive research on what factors guide viewer attention in a scene. It has been shown, for example, that saliency in the image, scene context, and task at hand play significant roles in guiding attention.

This dissertation presents and discusses research on visual attention with specific focus on the use of subtle visual cues to guide viewer gaze and the development of …

Investigation Of Methods For Machine Learning Associations Between Genetic Variations And Phenotype, Amanda M. Hartung

Theses

The relationship between genetics and phenotype is a complex one that remains poorly understood. Many factors contribute to the relationship between genetic variations and differences in phenotype. An improved understanding of the genetic underpinnings of various phenotypes can help us make important advances in testing for, preventing, treating, and curing a number of diseases and disorders.

The recent popularization of direct-to-consumer sequencing services, coupled with consumers releasing their genetic information for public use, has led to an unprecedented level of access to genetic information. Crowd-sourcing the problem of developing robust genome-wide association techniques for ever larger amounts of data is …

Limitation Of Invasive Plant Colonization By Native Shrubs During Forested Wetland Restoration, Kaitlyn E. Moranz

Theses

Rapid colonization by invasive plants can lead to failures of wetland restoration, particularly in forested wetlands where mature plant communities are slow to develop. To develop more effective methods for reducing the spread of invasive plants, I tested the hypothesis that planting native shrubs during the early stages of wetland creation can provide an alternative to herbicides by enhancing competition for light and other resources with invasive herbaceous plants, such as Phalaris arundinacea (reed canary grass). Planting native shrub live stakes in two created forested wetlands in Western New York State, USA, increased overall native herbaceous plant cover and biodiversity …

An Evaluation Of The Silicon Spectral Range For Determination Of Nutrient Content Of Grape Vines, Grant W.F. Anderson

Theses

The grape industry relies on in situ crop assessment to aid in the day-to-day and seasonal management of their crop. In the case of soil-plant chemistry interactions, there are six key nutrients of interest to viticulturists in the growing of wine grapes: nitrogen, potassium, phosphorous, magnesium, zinc, and boron. Traditional methods of determining the levels of these nutrients are through collection and chemical analysis of petiole samples from the grape vines themselves. In this study, however, we collected ground-level observations of the spectra of the grape vines using a hyperspectral spectroradiometer (0.4-2.5µm range; 1nm resampled spectral interval) at the same …

Techno-Environmental Analysis Of Generating Animal Feed From Wasted Food Products, Melissa Hall

Theses

The scope of this thesis was to investigate the technological and environmental parameters related to producing animal feed from wasted food products (FFP). An analysis was conducted to understand both the global and local (New York) factors affecting food waste diversion to feed. In the case of New York, the State has great potential resources for FFP, however, it is currently lacking in both visibility and a motivating factor to incentivize industry growth.

Published literature was analyzed to understand deployment of FFP operations in other global regions, including Japan, Korea, and Europe. Food waste resources available in New York State …

Re-Thinking The Urban Form Of Social Housing In Brazil: A Search For Urban Sustainability, Lis Moreira Cavalcante

Theses

During the last decade, Brazil has witnessed the construction of an unprecedented number of social housing developments, due to an ambitious federal program named “My House My Life” (Minha Casa Minha Vida - MCMV). In seven years, it has contracted 4.2 million of housing units, and 2.6 million of them were already delivered to beneficiaries. The program is currently in its third phase, and it covers three different ranges of income with two main goals: to boost the construction sector and reduce the housing deficit of the country by encouraging homeownership. However, the resultant large scale developments are providing residents …

Exploring Tripadvisor Online Reviews: The Case Of George Eastman Museum, Mussab Aljahdali

Theses

Different studies have looked at visitor related motivations and experiences under different contexts in the tourism industry. The museum-related experiences remain one of the important elements which are sought by visitors to the museums. Therefore, this study purposes to investigate and determine personal context, social context and physical contexts of George Eastman museum visitors. More importantly, the study utilised a content analysis approach in its research. The specific data about visitors to George Eastman House was obtained from the social media website TripAdvisor. The findings of the study were based on three important elements: personal context, social context and physical …

An Analysis Of Saudis International Pleasure And Leisure Travel Behavior, Fawaz Alreshaidan

Theses

The past decade has seen the rapid increase of tourist flows from Middle East countries (World Tourism Organization, 2015). One of these countries is the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia. According to Tourism Information and Research Centre (2006-2012), the number of Saudi outbound tourists has been increasing continually in the last ten years. The Tourism Information and Research Centre reported 2 million outbound trips in 2006, while 21 million trips were reported in 2015. However, little is known about Saudi tourists and it is not clear what factors motivate them to travel abroad and what activities they participate in. This research …

Sense Of Place In Urban Transformation, Gentrification And Preventing Displacement: A Case Study Of The Marketview Heights, Aya Alfonso

Theses

This thesis is a case study of the Marketview Heights neighborhood in the city of Rochester, NY, the main target of the City’s Urban Renewal District Plan (2014). Citizens of Marketview provided input for this plan that used participatory strategies in its creation. The citizens of this neighborhood are primarily people of color who experience relatively high rates of poverty. The Marketview Heights Collective Action Project (CAP) is a community-based organization that has organized and empowered the community with initiatives and programs, like the creation of community gardens and participation in planning of policies that affect their community. CAP is …

A Qualitative Analysis Of Effectiveness, Efficiency And Equity Of Payment For Ecosystem Services In A User-Financed And A Government-Financed Program, Tanya Williams

Theses

Payment for Ecosystems Services (PES) programs which are considered as incentivized mechanisms has been implemented in Latin America as a strategy to reduce deforestation by rewarding landowners (sellers) to protect forests and to provide ecosystem services to ecosystem users/beneficiaries (buyers).

Two common management structures for PES programs have been implemented in Latin America: Government-financed and User-financed. User-financed PES programs are promoted as being more environmentally effective and cost-effective compared with Government-financed programs. Government-financed PES programs are perceived as less effective than User-financed PES due to the inclusion of equity as a critical policy outcome of PES.

In this thesis, an …

Patient History Elicitation And Diagnostic Decision Making, Nicholas Iuliucci

Theses

Technology has changed the way people communicate, and communication between patients and medical professionals has not been exempt from these developments. Clinicians are now text messaging, emailing, and video conferencing patient. Understanding the impact of the new modalities on communication patterns is imperative to ensure quality care. Thirty-two medical professionals of varying experience conducted a patient interview with two confederate patients over an instant messaging system. The first interview was 15 minutes and the second 7 minutes, the latter condition inducing time pressure. The results demonstrated that time pressure has an adverse impact on the medical professionals’ communication patterns. The …

Android Malware Detection Using Category-Based Machine Learning Classifiers, Huda Ali Alatwi

Theses

Android malware growth has been increasing dramatically along with increasing of the diversity and complicity of their developing techniques. Machine learning techniques are the current methods to model patterns of static features and dynamic behaviors of Android malware. Whereas the accuracy rates of the classifiers increase with increasing the quality of the features, we relate between the apps' features and the features that are needed to deliver the category's functionality. Differently, our classification approach defines legitimate static features for benign apps under a specific category as opposite to identifying malicious patterns. We utilize the features of the top rated apps …

An Electromechanical System For Characterization Of Piezoelectric Materials, Ahmet Sait Asan

Theses

Piezoelectric materials have been used in medical applications for a long time due to their unique characteristics, which is to respond to mechanical stimulation by producing an electrical current and vice versa. They perform a pivotal role in medical applications both for diagnostic and therapeutic purposes. In this regard, characterizing the piezoelectric properties of these materials is crucial for their usage. In this particular study, an electromechanical system for measurement of piezoelectric output signals is designed and tested. The project is motivated by the question: can the piezoelectric properties be characterized by applying different mechanical stimulation waveforms and frequencies. Two …

Infrared Imaging - Case Studies And Applications, Shuang Du

Theses

Recent advancements in the manufacture of solid state detectors have led to significant improvements in the use and applications of infrared (IR) imaging. Compared with traditional imaging in visible light, infrared imaging has abilities to convey significant additional information. Applications in medicine require wavelengths in the range of 0.8 to 25 microns while metrology and astronomy, traditionally, require wavelengths in the range of 25 microns to 1 mm.

In this study, infrared imaging has been used as a tool to characterize a variety of objects and systems. Some of these case studies have been considered under conditions of thermodynamic non-equilibrium. …

Antibacterial Efficacy Of Nanometals In Conjunction With Electrical Stimulus, Syed A. Hussain

Theses

Hospital related infections generally result from the combined effect of preexisting bacteria on the patient and invasive devices. This demonstrates the significance in improving these medical devices to increase the quality of life of the patients that require them. This study will attempt to evaluate the antibacterial efficacy of nanocopper particles and an electrical stimulus for the usage in medical device development and the hospital environment.

For devices such as catheters, infections typically result from bacteria entering the body from the outside. This is accomplished by bacteria attaching themselves to the exterior of the device and producing biofilm which allows …

Effectiveness Of Water Quality Benefits Provided By Stormwater Management Facilities/Infiltration Basin, Vinicius Rodrigues De Mattos Barreto

Theses

Stormwater Best Management Practices (BMP) and devices are systems frequently built under assumed design performances, but rarely verified after construction. Their effectiveness in protecting the environment against pollutants carried by stormwater runoff has been extensively questioned and investigated. This research presents a case study of an infiltration basin in Medford, NJ to verify if the 80% expected Total Suspended Solids (TSS) removal as stated in the New Jersey Stormwater BMP Manual is actually achieved. A sampling pit was installed on the site and infiltrated water samples were collected during three rain events and TSS measurements were compared with the inflow. …

Continuum Mechanical Analysis Of Space And Time Dependent Deformation Pattern Of Brain With Blunt Injury, Chen Miao

Theses

Deformation of human brain due to acceleration impact has been widely accepted as the direct connection to the Trauma Brain Injury (TBI). However, the limitation of obtaining deformation data of TBI is a major obstacle to understanding TBI mechanism. This experiment mainly focuses on developing a method to measure deformation pattern of brain with blunt injury. First of all, displacement data of markers on sagittal plane of an injury head model was collected using 3D reconstruction software after an impact test. Second, the displacement data was used to calculate 2D Lagrangian strain tensor and the principal strain. The temporal and …

Response Of Stretch-Injured Schwann Cells, Stephanie Iring

Theses

Axon fibers are covered by myelin sheath. After axonal damage, demyelination follows with the production of debris. In the Central Nervous System many studies have been performed to observe and analyze stretch injured axons, but very little has been done to study the white matter axonal tracts, oligodendrocytes. Schwann cells can help take a first look into stretch injured glia cells from the Peripheral nervous system. In order to observe changes in Schwann Cells a stretch injury device is used to produce the effects of severe and moderate injuries. Schwann Cells are stretch injured in both their undifferentiated and differentiated …

Effect Of Melt Method On Thoracolumbar Connective Tissue, Faria Sanjana

Theses

Approximately, 31 million adults in the United States suffer from low back pain (LBP). Altered connective tissue structure has been identified in adults with chronic LBP. Numerous novel treatments are being developed targeting the connective tissue and nervous system to relieve people from LBP. One such self-care treatment is the MELT method. The objective of this study was to determine whether thickness of thoracolumbar connective tissue and other biomechanical and viscoelastic properties of myofascial tissue in the low back region change in subjects with chronic LBP as a result of MELT.

Using ultrasound imaging and an algorithm developed in MATLAB, …

Multisensory Integration In Weakly Electric Fish, Andrea Roeser

Theses

Animals integrate information from across sensory systems, such as vision and hearing, to improve perception. To understand how neural circuits in the central nervous system integrate information from different senses, the responses of midbrain neurons to two categories of electrosensory stimuli in Eigenmannia virescens were studied. The first category of stimulus is electrical signals with frequencies below 50 Hz that are encoded in the activity of ampullary receptors. The second category is amplitude modulations of the electric organ discharge, which are encoded by p-type tuberous receptors. Six multisensory neurons were found that responded to both categories of stimuli. However, when …

The Influences Of Different Socioeconomic Scenarios In Bioinformatics And Biotechnology Research: The Ethical Issues Arising From Technological Advances, Marcia Miki Sato

Theses

In the last couple decades, we could see the combination of technology and biology taking large steps in science. As new fields, bioinformatics and biotechnology also led to important discussions between excited scientists and social thinkers. The divergent opinions argue about the amazing possibilities of human advances and the social issues that follow the progress. This paper discusses ethical matters of new developments and compares policy choices with respect to research and use of biotechnology and bioinformatics in different countries. Even though the world is increasingly globalized, the comparisons suggest that different cultures have different ethical responses and public policies …

Pen+: An Emotional Expression Device And A Mobile Application For Emotional Health, Mi-Hee Hong

Theses

Emotional health is an essential element in advancing towards one's life goals and is inextricably connected with physical and social well-being. Since emotions involve physiological, behavioral, and cognitive changes, emotional problems can cause serious problems throughout one's life.

Understanding one's emotional states precisely and suitably expressing emotions are the most salient methods for maintaining emotional health. However, managing and comprehending complicated changes in emotions can be personally challenging and demanding.

This thesis not only concentrates on the process of design thinking to determine how to enhance personal emotional intelligence but also proposes the use of both a digital device for …

Drivers Of Hotel Employee Motivation, Satisfaction And Engagement In Riyadh, The Kingdom Of Saudi Arabia, Abdulaziz Alqusayer

Theses

A large and growing body of literature has investigated job satisfaction among hotel employees. However, far too little attention has been paid to the level of job satisfaction among hotel employees in the kingdom of Saudi Arabia. This research obtained data which may help to address this research gap. The research therefore explored and provided a review of the literature on job satisfaction, motivational factors, and engagement among hotel employees. Specifically, the research investigated the motivational factors, level of job satisfaction and engagement among hotel employees in Riyadh. The research employed a quantitative approach in the form of a survey, …

Perception Of Software Employees Towards Human Resource Development Roles, Functions, And Professionals, Bhagyashree Barhate

Theses

The purpose of this research was to explore the perception of employees working in the software industry towards Human Resource Development (HRD) roles, functions, and professionals. This research adopted a quantitative methodology and administered a survey to understand how the employees perceive the different HRD roles and their importance in the organization. The research also studied the different perceptions employees may have towards the HRD professionals and their competencies. The participants in this study belonged to the software industry and have been working in their current technical job roles for atleast a year. A survey was used to collect data …

Wearable Wonderland: Using Interaction Design And Wearable Technology To Motivate People To Stay Active, Xi Yang

Theses

Wearable Wonderland is an interactive game about a boy's wonderful journey. The game is a mobile app that works with wearables. The goal of the thesis is to promote a healthy lifestyle using wearable technology. The target audience is young people who want to build a healthy lifestyle and become more active, ranging from ages 18 to 30.

Staying active and maintaining enough sleep is important to one’s overall wellbeing. Today, many fitness trackers and fitness apps have appeared on the market to encourage doing exercise. They can track people's activities easily. However, most of these apps cannot engage users …

Scare Tactics, Tiago Martines, Gabriel Ortega, Karan Sahu, Lucas Pereira Vasconcelos, Henrique Silva Chaltein De Almeida

Theses

It is the purpose of this document to describe the design and development processes of Scare Tactics. The game will be discussed in further detail as it relates to several areas, such as market analysis, development process, game design, technical design, and each team members’ individual area of background research. The research areas include asymmetrical game design, level design, game engine architecture, real-time graphics, user interface design, networking and artificial intelligence.

As part of the team’s market analysis, other games featuring asymmetric gameplay are discussed. The games described in this section serve as inspirations for asymmetric game design. Some …

Heteronormativity And The Ideal Family, Ashton R. Snider

Theses

Abstract: In this work I argue that the heteronormative nuclear family (HNF) should not be considered the ideal family form as it has been in the past. The HNF assumes that the ideal family should include a monogamous heterosexual couple and their offspring. I argue that the HNF should not be used as an ideal by which to judge family health as there are many different family arrangements outside of the heteronuclear. The HNF should not be confused with particular heteronuclear households as the HNF as an ideal does not refer to any specific family. As some ideal by which …