Digital Commons Network^™

The Effect Of Natural Elicitors And Cold Storage Period On Quality Improvement Of Uae Date Palm Fruits (Phoenix Dactylifera, Cv. Barhi), Fatima Yaaqoub Yousef Al Shaibani

Theses

Date palm is an agricultural crop of economic importance in most Arab countries. Among the different varieties of date palms grown in the United Arab Emirates, the Barhi variety is extremely popular and is often consumed at the bisr stage (first edible stage). However, the major challenge for this fruit at bisr stage is to maintain its quality over a long period after harvest and during marketing. The objective of this study was to evaluate the synergistic effect of preharvest spraying with a natural elicitor, namely chitosan (Ch) 1%, alone and in combination with salicylic acid (SA) 2 mM and …

Preparation And Evaluation Of Crocetin-Coated Biodegradable Polymer On Top Of Magnetite Nanoparticles For Their Anticancer Effects, Sulafa Saeed Abdelhalim

Theses

Liver cancer is still one of the leading causes of cancer-related deaths worldwide. This is due to many reasons including lack of effective drugs, late diagnosis of this type of cancer due to the overlapping of symptoms with many other liver diseases, and lack of effective screening tests. Targeted drug delivery systems offer many promising advantages compared to conventional chemotherapy. Targeted delivery will mitigate the bad side effects of chemotherapy such as drug resistance, low therapeutic value since the drug mostly will be administered through an IV affecting healthy and cancer cells alike, and that leads us to an important …

Comparison Of Three Different Woody Plant Species For Their Ability To Utilize Nutritional Elements Supplied In The Form Of Biosolids And Mineral Fertilizers, Fatima El-Telib Hassan

Theses

Crop production systems of the future will need to focus on recycling rather than flow- through of mineral nutrients. Much of the nutrients that leave agricultural systems with crop products eventually end up in household waste and sewage. Returning nutrientrich products from wastewater treatment to agricultural soils must be done in an environmentally sound and culturally acceptable manner. More than 300,000 hectares of forest have been planted in the United Arab Emirates (UAE), consisting mainly of native species, such as Prosopis cineraria (Ghāf) and Vachellia tortilis (Samr). It has been proposed that sewage sludge, the dry residue from wastewater treatment, …

Letting Go: How Newly-Graduated Registered Nurses In Western Canada Decide To Exit The Nursing Profession, Kathryn M. Chachula

Theses

The Canadian Nurses Association predicts the nursing shortage will rise to an estimated 60,000 Registered Nurses (RNs) by the year 2022. Further compounding this issue is the approximate 14-61% of nursing graduates who will change nursing roles or exit the profession within two years of practice. Using the Glaserian grounded theory method, the purpose of this study was to examine the basic psychosocial process labelled Letting Go involved in how newly-graduated RNs in western Canada arrive at the decision to exit the nursing profession within five years of entry into the workforce through semi-structured interviews.

Examining Mentorship In The Field Of Sign Language Interpreting: An Application Of Relational Dialectics Theory, Hanna Hoekman

Theses

Using relational dialectics theory, this study examined mentoring approaches and dialectical tensions that occur in mentoring relationships in the field of sign language interpreting. The traditional function of a mentor is to provide guidance or support to someone who has less experience than themselves. This study focuses on a deeper understanding of the dynamics of mentoring relationships in the field of sign language interpreting. Using a qualitative approach, I conducted semi-structured interviews with sign language interpreters who have been in the role of mentor and mentee. The results, based on interviews with mentors and mentees, show that mentors and mentees …

The Impact Of Short Papers On Clinical Decision Making Skills Of Nursing Students, Tara R. Hayes

Theses

Clinical decision making and critical thinking are fundamental skills to ensuring the success of undergraduate nursing students. Nursing faculty, and specifically clinical nursing faculty, are responsible for encouraging the development of these types of skills as students work in direct patient care. Traditional methods of clinical evaluation include lengthy case studies, concept mapping, and discussion board participation. While these methods have been in effect for some time, clinical short paper assignments are a fresh, innovative way to challenge students as they refine their critical thinking and clinical decision making abilities. No statistically significant difference was found between the perceived level …

Meaningful Use Of The Ehr-Evaluating The Internal And External Factors Affecting The Timeliness Of Patient Referrals, Beverly J. Schacherbauer

Theses

This project aimed to evaluate specialty referral wait times in a large academic medical center. Internal (organizational) as well as external (patient specific) factors were examined. Additionally, although specific to this QI project, the need to examine the accuracy of EHR data was identified and included. A retrospective review of one month of referral data to five medical specialties was completed (n=752). Logistic regression and multivariable analysis was used to determine whether age, race, insurance, specialty, or days from referral to appointment were associated with delays to timely access. Referrals with significant delays were further reviewed to identify additional factors …

Central Nervous System: Development, Function, And Applications Of The Glymphatic System (With Additional Neuroscience Topics), Austin Fisher

Theses

The presence of accumulated toxic protein aggregations such as amyloid-β, tau, and α- synuclein are implicated in the development of neurodegenerative diseases such as Alzheimer’s (Soto 2003). Thus, the clearance or removal of these harmful byproducts in healthy brain aging previously represented an unknown system whose functionality is likely to be clinically significant. The finding that directional flow of CSF and interstitial fluid through the brain ensures brain clearance sparked numerous research projects which sought to elaborate on what is now known as the glymphatic system. After initial research revealed the fundamentals of the glymphatic system, scientist J. Iliff defined …

Can Providing Positive Interactions With Snakes Change A Person’S Perception Of Dangerous Wildlife Interactions?, Bethany Walker

Theses

Due to a long co-evolutionary history between placental mammals and reptiles, primates demonstrate aversive responses to snakes. In humans, this can result in ophidiophobia, or the fear of snakes which can arise due to cultural backgrounds, traumatic experiences, or fear instilled by others. However, these reptiles fill essential roles in ecosystems. Conservation and outreach efforts are important to help our population understand snakes’ role in our lives and the state’s broader biodiversity. Negative experiences or preconceptions about snakes can make this message hard to share with the public. Educators can help prevent intentional harm to some of these organisms through …

South To South: Connections In The Ordinary, Fostering Empathy By Encouraging Travel Through Design, Bethany Wetzel

Theses

South 2 South: Connections in the Ordinary, explores similarities between South Korea and Alabama through a designed sensory experience that allows users to engage in cross-cultural information in an inviting and familiar way with the use of recognizable motifs in order to reduce fear, foster empathy, and encourage travel. The creation of South 2 South was informed by research on travel fears, empathy, and transnational relations between the two regions. South 2 South helps facilitate the beginnings of these interactions by presenting new cultural information directly to the more insular communities of northeast Alabama. My hope is that South …

Where Are The Women? A Feminist Field Guide To The Museum, Taylor Weaver

Theses

Linda Nochlin’s seminal 1971 essay, “Why Have There Been No Great Women Artists?” was at the fore of the great battle cries of many feminist scholars that drew attention to the limitation’s that female artist’s face in the art world. Women have systematically been left out of the art historical narrative while their male counterparts remain at the forefront.

There are many women that are very prominently represented in museums. They are largely nude and have been represented by male artists. While I do not argue that nudity in paintings should not exist, I do insist that museum goers become …

Assessing The Impacts Of Sea Level Rise On Land-Use Across The North-Eastern Parts Of The Uae Coastal Areas Using Remote Sensing Technology, Khawla Ali Mohammed Albedwawi

Theses

The consequences of global warming and climate change would result in a considerable rise in sea level. Other larger consequences on coastal lands, agriculture, buildings, and facilities are expected. The goal of this study is to assess the effects of Sea-Level Rise (SLR) on various land uses in the UAE's North-Eastern coastal districts (Fujairah and Kalba cities). Four SLR scenarios will be developed through the QGIS platform and the Landsat images that have been acquired from the USGS Earth Explorer. The area will be observed over 20 years (2000 – 2020). The second goal of this study is to develop …

Assessment Of Heavy Metals In Sharks From The Arabian Gulf Waters, The United Arab Emirates, Noor Alali

Theses

Metals occur naturally in the environment however anthropogenic activities have contributed to their increase in the marine ecosystem. As elements have the ability to bioaccumulate, biomagnify and transfer between biological compartments throughout the food web, they pose a great threat to living biota. The characteristics of the Arabian Gulf make it a harsh environment for marine species especially when multiple stressors are acting together. Rhizoprionodon acutus (milk shark) and Carcharhinus sorrah (spot-tail shark) are essential compartments of the Arabian Gulf ecosystem. As they are found up in the food chain and considered a predator species they are under the threat …

The Red Palm Weevil In The Uae: Morphological Diversity And Rnai-Mediated Gene Silencing Of Two Cuticle-Related Genes, Safa Hashem Mohammed Musaed

Theses

Red Palm Weevil (RPW), Rhynchophorus ferrugineus (Coleoptera: Curculionidae), threatens palm trees worldwide. A better understanding of this insect can help with designing an adequate management strategy. This study aimed to a better understand the morphological diversity of RPW and examined RNAi-mediated gene silencing of two cuticle-related genes, vestigial (vg) gene, and Laccase (Lac2) gene by injecting the last larval stage with double-stranded RNA (dsRNA). For the morphological diversity study, adults of RPW were collected and classified by their prothoracic spots. Additional morphological characters were measured such as Pronotum Length (PL), Pronotum Width (PW), Elytra Length (EL), Elytra Width (EW), and …

Role Of Limonene In An Experimental Model Of Rotenone Induced Parkinson’S Disease, Lujain Mohamad Bader Eddin

Theses

Parkinson's disease (PD) is one of the prevalent neurodegenerative diseases in elderly population. The symptoms of PD often begin with motor and cognitive impairment that are attributed to the dopaminergic neurons degeneration. Rotenone (ROT) is a naturally derived pesticide that is used in agriculture to control pests. It is a neurotoxin well-established for use in resembling PD symptoms in research. Limonene (LMN) is a plant derived monoterpene extracted from citrus peel with a wide range of therapeutic effects. Due to the shortage in available therapeutic agents that can cure or halt the progressive degeneration of PD, the main aim of …

Social Media Practices For Churches, Jordyn Helgen

Theses

This project focuses on providing a resource for churches and similar nonprofit organizations to utilize in order to maximize their social media strategy and generate ideas for content. Furthermore, it will help these organizations to better understand social media and how they can use social media tools to accentuate their religious values and accomplish their mission.

Semantic Segmentation And Change Detection In Satellite Imagery, Raaga Madappa

Theses

Processing of satellite images using deep learning and computer vision methods is needed for urban planning, crop assessments, disaster management, and rescue and recovery operations. Deep learning methods which are trained on ground-based imagery do not translate well to satellite imagery. In this thesis, we focus on the tasks of semantic segmentation and change detection in satellite imagery. A segmentation framework is presented based on existing waterfall-based modules. The proposed framework, called PyramidWASP, or PyWASP for short, can be used with two modules. PyWASP with the Waterfall Atrous Spatial Pooling (WASP) module investigates the effects of adding a feature pyramid …

Data Augmentation For Automatic Speech Recognition For Low Resource Languages, Ronit Damania

Theses

In this thesis, we explore several novel data augmentation methods for improving the performance of automatic speech recognition (ASR) on low-resource languages. Using a 100-hour subset of English LibriSpeech to simulate a low-resource setting, we compare the well-known SpecAugment augmentation approach to these new methods, along with several other competitive baselines. We then apply the most promising combinations of models and augmentation methods to three genuinely under-resourced languages using the 40-hour Gujarati, Tamil, Telugu datasets from the 2021 Interspeech Low Resource Automatic Speech Recognition Challenge for Indian Languages. Our data augmentation approaches, coupled with state-of-the-art acoustic model architectures and language …

The Public Poster: An Exploration Of Storytelling In Poster Design, Elizabeth Hiler

Theses

Research suggests that it is incredibly difficult for a person to change their mind. Confirmation bias and echo chambers are just a few of the reasons people do not give themselves the opportunity to explore new stories, ideas, beliefs. It is now our challenge to connect with people in unconventional ways and explore storytelling in new spaces to give difficult topics more accessibility to public discourse. The Public Protest Poster can be found at the start of most movements for social and political change by creating a simplified statement with a strong graphic for instant impact. Yet, protest posters rely …

Paid Time Off And Work-Life Balance In An Ambulatory Surgical Center, Elizabeth S. Harmon

Theses

To investigate what was considered important to the staff regarding the current paid time off method used in an ambulatory surgical center with the purpose of discovering what works well for an acceptable work-life balance. Considerable research has shown that an adequate work-life balance in the nursing profession is necessary for job satisfaction and retention. The method to request paid time off is often cumbersome and unreliable, resulting in frustration of the nursing staff. Alternatives for granting paid time off requests in an outpatient facility have not been investigated. A non-experimental, two-step study was conducted using qualitative and quantitative methods.

The Importance Of Shifting From Massive To Sustainable Tourism Model: The Case Study Of The City Of Dubrovnik, Niko Katusic

Theses

Tourism is currently one of the largest economical income generators for Croatia and especially for the city of Dubrovnik. Desired worldwide for its economic benefits tourism is going to double during the next 20 years. Considering mass tourism as the main definition for tourism in 21 century that cannot be neglected by current efforts to implement sustainable tourism, this paper draws attention to improved satisfaction that sustainable tourism can provide to locals and tourists operating in the city of Dubrovnik. The question of satisfaction level for stakeholders in tourism destinations is connected to the psychological characteristics and motivation of tourists …

Tuberculosis Screening And Education In The Urban Public School District, Nikolaos S. Moraros

Theses

Tuberculosis (TB) is the world's deadliest curable communicable infectious disease. The eradication of TB is a significantly important intractable global public health challenge for health agencies at all levels. Global migration, cultural-socioeconomic factors and increase of multidrug-resistance tuberculosis (MDR-TB) affect the epidemiology of TB in the United States and other countries worldwide. Studies have shown that increase in TB knowledge and understanding contributes to early TB screenings/diagnosis, interventions and treatments, result in reducing MDR-TB, rates of TB transmissions, relapse, morbidity and mortality. The purpose of this project is: (1) to develop a TB screening risk assessment protocol for the Urban …

An Ethnographic Study Of Pre-Graduate Precepted Nursing Student Clinical Placements In Long-Term Care Homes, Fran M. Meloche

Theses

Long-Term Care (LTC) home recruitment challenges and nursing student disinterest in such clinical placements and careers, underscore this study's urgent need. This qualitative focused ethnography explored preceptor, faculty advisor, and pre-graduate student beliefs, values, and practices contributing to positive LTC home clinical placements.

منھج الرؤى السلوكیة في السیاسات العامة ومدى إمكانية تطبيقه في المؤسسات الحكومية في دولة الامارات العربیة المتحدة, خلیفة عبد لله علي الربیعي

Theses

انطلقت ھذه الدراسة من إشكالیة ندرة الدراسات المحلیة عن منھجیة الرؤى السلوكیة كإحدى الأدوات الجديدة للسياسات العامة، والتي تكمل الأدوات والمنھجیة التقلیدیة للسياسات العامة والتي تتميز بإمكانية اختبار السیاسات العامة قبل تطبیقھا، ومدى إمكانية استخدامها في المؤسسات الحكومية في دولة الامارات العربیة المتحدة.

فقامت الدراسة بدایة بتناول نشأة الإدارة العامة ونشأة السیاسات العامة والارتباط الوثيق والمتكامل بین المفهومين. بعد ذلك ناقشت الرسالة نشأة الإدارة العامة وتطورها في دولة الامارات ثم تطرقت بعد ذلك الى مناقشة أنواع مؤسسات الإدارة العامة المعنية بصنع السیاسات العامة في دولة الامارات العربیة المتحدة، ثم تناولت نشأة مفھوم الرؤى السلوكیة وتطوره خلال عقد من الزمن، وكذلك …

Impact Of Sodium Dichloroacetate Alone And In Combination Therapies On Lung Tumor Growth And Metastasis, Aya Mudhafar A. Al-Azawi

Theses

Lung cancer is the second most common form of cancer with the highest mortality rate worldwide in 2020 despite the advances in targeted- and immuno-therapies. Metabolic reprogramming has been recognized as an essential emerging cancer hallmark in which altered metabolic pathways represent an attractive therapeutic target. Sodium Dichloroacetate (DCA), a pyruvate dehydrogenase kinase (PDK) inhibitor, effect has been investigated in various tumors. Building on the already published data, this pre-clinical study aims to explore the anticancer potential of DCA in lung cancer alone and in combination with chemo- and targeted therapies using two non-small cell lung cancer (NSCLC) cell lines …

Environmental Assessment Of The Impact Of Land-Based Discharges On Marine Water And Sediment Quality In Dubai, Uae, Ayman Fathy Halawa

Theses

The current seawater and Creek – Canal waterway in the Emirate of Dubai, UAE, is under tremendous pressure because of continuous urban water discharges from land-based sources. Therefore, the impact of urban water discharges on marine water and sediment quality in the Emirate requires a thorough assessment. The main objective of this study is to assess the impacts of effluent discharges on the quality of water and sediment in the open sea and Dubai Creek. The land-based sources include the power and desalination plants, industrial sector, sewage treatment plant, and stormwater runoff. To achieve the stated objective, relevant data on …

Comparing Adobe’S Unsharp Masks And High-Pass Filters In Photoshop Using The Visual Information Fidelity Metric, Nhung T. Pham

Theses

The present study examines image sharpening techniques quantitatively. A technique known as unsharp masking has been the preferred image sharpening technique for imaging professionals for many years. More recently, another professional-level sharpening solution has been introduced, namely, the high-pass filter technique of image sharpening. An extensive review of the literature revealed no purely quantitative studies that compared these techniques. The present research compares unsharp masking (USM) and high-pass filter (HPF) sharpening using an image quality metric known as Visual Information Fidelity (VIF). Prior researchers have used VIF data in research aimed at improving the USM sharpening technique. The present study …

Drug Releasing Hydrogels For Opioid Use Disorder, Kaytlyn M. Crowe

Theses

Ease of access to prescription opioids and the strength of synthetic opioids have contributed to the rise in over use disorders, overdose, and death rates during the opioid epidemic. The current overdose standard of care, rescue NLX (NLX), is a competitive antagonist to the μ-opioid receptor but has a relatively short period of action compared to opioid agonists, especially synthetic agonists. Rises in the abuse of these synthetic and semi-synthetic agents in recent years have shown the weaknesses of rescue NLX, as it can leave overdose patients vulnerable to renarcotization and precipitated withdrawal. To prevent both from occurring, we developed …

Subgroups Of Patients Undergoing Chemotherapy With Distinct Cognitive Fatigue And Evening Physical Fatigue Profiles, Lisa Morse

Theses

Purpose was to model cognitive fatigue and evening physical fatigue together to determine subgroups of patients with distinct cognitive fatigue AND evening physical fatigue profiles. Once these profiles were identified, differences among the subgroups in demographic and clinical characteristics, co-occurring symptoms, and quality of life outcomes were evaluated.

A Cost Analysis And Policy Review Of Digestate When Deemed A Waste Product And A Fertilizer., Sarah Chandrika Cannon

Theses

Food waste is a multifaceted issue that has proposed solutions as complex as the problem itself. New York State recently announced a food waste ban, effective January of 2020, that will require large scale food waste producers to manage the waste through alternative methods as opposed to disposal in a landfill. One of those methods is through Anaerobic Digestion, a process in which organic matter chemically reacts with bacteria to produce a biofuel along with an associated byproduct, namely digestate. The biofuel in most cases is used to produce electricity to feed back to the grid acting as a net …