Digital Commons Network^™

Ammonium Perchlorate Manufacturing Effects On Propellant Burning Rate, Erin Faith Wallace

Theses

This thesis investigates the effect of ingredient variations on the burning rate of reduced smoke, low burning rate composite solid propellant. The effort focused on identical propellant formulations which presented significant burning rate differences correlated with the ammonium perchlorate (AP) source. A series of 1-gallon propellant mixes were prepared and tested utilizing both Manufacturer A and Manufacturer B ammonium perchlorate to investigate the propellant burning rate and pressure exponent shift anomaly and correlate those findings to the differing ingredient properties between the two AP lots. Each propellant mix was evaluated for burning rate utilizing subscale test motors and a scanning …

Factors Affecting Freshwater Fish Communities In Two North Alabama Counties, Joshua Fitts

Theses

This study examined how physical habitat characteristics influence freshwater fish diversity in streams of Madison and Limestone Counties, Alabama. Ten 150-meter stream reaches were sampled using backpack electrofishing and seining, with habitat variables measured at fixed transects. Principal component analysis identified four main habitat gradients representing flow and substrate, channel size, gravel dominance, and canopy–bedrock conditions. Although overall species richness and Shannon diversity were not significantly related to these gradients, species-specific correlations revealed clear ecological preferences. Regression models showed that root wads, herbaceous vegetation, and riprap modestly increased richness, emphasizing the role of structural diversity. These findings highlight the importance …

The Line, Tyler Delaney Bischoff

Theses

“The essence of good design is revealing the invisible structure that holds everything together, allowing us to see beauty in strength." - Frank Lloyd Wright This Thesis investigates the transposition of architectural principles into ceramic art, drawing inspiration from Western New York’s late 19th century and early 20th century architectural and craft traditions. Through an exploration of symmetry and proportion, surface texture, materiality, and the dynamic interplay between light and shadow, this research examines how architecture influences not only the physical aesthetics of ceramic art, but also its atmospheric and emotional presence. Recognizing how form is never static but continuously …

Ink And Internment: The Wartime Artistry Of Japanese Americans And Spaniards During World War Ii, Avery Calvert

Theses

World War II displaced millions of people around the world. “Ink and Internment: The Wartime Artistry of Japanese Americans and Spaniards During World War II” evaluates the internment experiences of Japanese Americans and Spaniards through the lens of art with a special focus on two artists: Miné Okubo and Josep Bartolí. Okubo, a Japanese American artist born in 1927, experienced internment in the United States as a young adult. Her artwork reveals her personal experience as well as that of her fellow internees. Okubo created her art memoir, Citizen 13600, to share the internment experience of Japanese Americans with others. …

A Comparative Study Of Classical And Deep Feature Learning Methods For Prediction Of User Request Patterns For Cloud Resources, Swaroopa Ammenadka

Theses

Large-scale cloud storage systems managing petabyte-scale data face cost challenges due to sparse, irregular file access patterns. Traditional attribute-based methods often fail to capture dynamic temporal and event-driven behaviors. This thesis compares classical statistical and deep learning approaches for predicting file access patterns using five months of real-world access logs from Tsinghua University’s FTP server (2.9 million events). Five forecasting models—ARIMA, SARIMA, Exponential Smoothing, Prophet, and 1D CNNs—are evaluated across 1,161 files. A novel hybrid clustering method combines time series similarity with forecasting accuracy metrics. Results show ARIMA significantly outperforms deep learning (2.3× better accuracy: 0.0188 vs. 0.036 MAE) for …

Gai Research - A Case Study On The Implications Of Generative Artificial Intelligence (Gai) On Teaching Within An Irish Technological University., Moya Cronin

Theses

The rapid emergence of Generative Artificial Intelligence (GAI) has introduced a transformative age of technology, gaining prominent attention in higher education. This mixed-methods case study examined how GAI was understood, applied, and managed within an Irish Technological University at a time of turbulence when no official GAI policies were available as a point of reference. Lecturing and research staff were invited to participate in an online survey (𝑛 = 145) and semi-structured interviews (𝑛 = 8) to share their experiences with GAI technology within the case study university. Lack of guidance was seen to affect staff’s confidence and adoption, but …

Jamaica: The Stories We Never Told, Vinnette Gibson

Theses

Jamaica: The Stories We Never Told is a memoir project that describes the realities of Jamaican life through personal narratives that detail the cultural and social nuances of Jamaican experiences. Its purpose is to broaden the global perception of Jamaican culture beyond tourism, beaches, music, and sports by representing everyday realities of Jamaican life, often overlooked by the global community. It details multifaceted experiences, including challenges and positive encounters, the transition from youth to adulthood, and complex emotions throughout. This project documents the author’s lived experiences and reveals cultural nuances, including friendships, family dynamics, and the use of Patois to …

Estimating Surface Sulfur Dioxide Concentrations Over Eastern China Using Omi Satellite Data, Zachary Watson

Theses

Sulfur dioxide (SO2) is a key air pollutant as it contributes to negative health effects, acid rain, and aerosol formation. Using satellite data to monitor surface SO2 concentrations can fill in the gaps of ground-based air quality networks in less populated areas. In this study, SO2 retrievals from the Ozone Monitoring Instrument (OMI) were employed to estimate annual and seasonal average surface SO2 concentrations over eastern China, a major anthropogenic source region, from 2015 to 2018. The OMI-derived surface SO2 concentrations had a similar spatial distribution and temporal trends as ground-based measurements from an air quality monitoring network, but they …

Concentrated Benefits And Dispersed Costs: The Contributions Of Pareto, Olson, And Ostrom, Nathan John Cuthbertson

Theses

Concentrated benefits and dispersed costs (CBDC) is a central concept in the field of public choice as well as economics more broadly. The phrase concentrated benefits and dispersed costs refers to a situation in which economic benefits are concentrated and the associated costs are borne by a larger group. This thesis argues that the elements of CBDC are common in the literature without the term being used directly. This study is an exercise in the history of economic thought. The study is structured into three case studies, with each dedicated to the work of an influential economist: Vilfredo Pareto (1848-1923); …

Negotiating With-Ness: Midwives' Lived Experiences Of Gender, Inclusive Language, And Professional Identity., Kimberley-Ann De Wet

Theses

This research investigated midwives lived experiences of using gender-inclusive language in public maternity care, examining how linguistic practices intersect with professional identity, ethical commitment, and institutional constraint. Informed by feminist theory and guided by descriptive phenomenology with a constructivist paradigm, the study explored how midwives navigate the profession’s foundational ethos of being ‘with woman’ while responding to the ethical imperative to provide inclusive care in an increasingly diverse society. Semi-structured interviews were conducted with eight practising midwives in Western Australia, generating rich descriptions of how inclusive language is enacted, negotiated, and constrained in practice. Reflexive thematic analysis produced three overarching …

Sigrid Undset: Nordic Catholic Apologist, Brendan Edward Arthur

Theses

This thesis explores the depth and breadth of Sigrid Undset’s non-fiction Catholic writing, a substantial body of work that has largely remained inaccessible to all but readers of Norwegian. Through original translations and analysis, it synthesises these texts into broad themes while situating them within their historical contexts of the intellectual and cultural debates in early twentieth-century Norway. The study addresses three research questions: (1) the general themes in Undset’s Catholic non-fiction; (2) the contemporary relevance of these writings; and (3) whether Undset merits the designation “Catholic apologist.” In its method, the thesis employs textual analysis of Undset’s essays, articles …

A Framework For Mixed Reality Within Healthcare Education, Benyamin Ebadinia

Theses

Understanding complex three-dimensional systems and spatial relationships is a recurring difficulty in healthcare education, where students are often expected to reason about internal structures and multi-system processes from 2D diagrams, textbook figures, and static mannequins. This thesis presents the design, implementation, and mixed-methods evaluation of Systems Simulation, a reusable mixed reality (MR) application intended to help undergraduate nursing students explore human anatomy and pathophysiology using immersive 3D visualization.

Built in C# with the StereoKit framework for Microsoft HoloLens 2, Systems Simulation organizes nine anatomical body systems within a shared application. Learners can select a system, anchor the model in their …

Rebecca’S Silence: The Rebecca Riots And Why They Vanished For Three Years, Andrew Carl Finch

Theses

No abstract provided.

Leadership In The Digital Economy: An Investigation Into How Digitalisation Is Changing The Role And Practice Of Leadership In The Australian Defence Industry, Rhogan Aitken

Theses

Digitalisation is a phenomenon that is transforming society and is the process that moves an organisation to become digital. Research was conducted on senior leaders in the Australian defence industry with the purpose of investigating how the role and practice of leadership was changing because of digitalisation. A two-phased qualitative methodology was employed. An initial Delphi study on 13 experts in digital transformation was adopted to gain consensus on key issues, with the results informing a second stage of semi-structured interviews with 32 senior leaders in the Australian defence industry. The results identified factors that were influencing leadership, including increased …

Motherhood Or Work: Why Not Both? Representations Of Femininity In Australian Wartime Radio Serials, Emma Price

Theses

War is a gendering activity. As media is one of the many sites where gender is constructed, this study aims to investigate through a discourse analysis of serials produced by women for radio in the 1940s, the ways these programs represented or challenged social and cultural expectations placed on women. The themes female dramatists explored through the genre of radio serials, and the statements these programs made about life as a woman during the Second World War, are under-researched areas in Australian scholarship. While it must be acknowledged that the war was not a turning point in the status of …

The Implementation Of The Queensland Health Smoking Cessation Clinical Pathway In A Western Australian Private Hospital Setting: A Feasibility, Leah Jane Epton

Theses

As smoking is prohibited on most hospital grounds, hospitalisation presents a valuable opportunity for healthcare professionals to identify smokers, administer smoking cessation treatments, and ensure appropriate inpatient support, as well as continued follow-up on discharge. It has been reported both anecdotally and in published research that encouragement from a health professional is a significant external prompt for a smoker to attempt quitting. It has also been noted in the inpatient setting, one in every 33 conversations will lead to the successful cessation of smoking.

More broadly, a 2012 Cochrane review on smoking cessation interventions for inpatients identified that they are …

Defining Barriers In Pulmonary Hypertension: Pulmonary Hypertension In Remote And Rural Settings In Australia: An Epidemiologic Study Aided By Echocardiography, Pyi Naing

Theses

Pulmonary hypertension (PH) is a common, complex, and potentially lethal haemodynamic condition with many underlying aetiologies. It is poorly understood, and diagnosis is usually made late in the disease process resulting in poor outcomes even in the developed world. An innovative universal framework is required to achieve early and accurate diagnosis for improved outcomes, especially in remote and rural areas. The thesis documents my substantial body of work that unlocks a collective framework to assist patients with PH, particularly in areas not classically serviced by tertiary level PH care.

The first chapter of my thesis outlines the history, important milestones …

Surveillance Report​: Che-Wei Hsu​, Che-Wei Hsu

Theses

Face ID: A Surveil of Che-Wei Hsu is a lens based artistic investigation and experience into the nature of surveillance in modern society. Through performance, photography, and installation, my work explores the dynamics between being watched and watching, questioning how surveillance influences human behavior and identity. In my art practice, I think about the behavior that people would not do in front of other people or violate the social norm and perform in the public as a way to experience how surveillance influences how we act in the public, for example eating a sandwich on the ladder in front of …

Uncertainty-Aware Meta-Learning For Learning From Limited Data, Deep Shankar Pandey

Theses

Deep Learning (DL) models have achieved great success in large data fields ranging from computer vision and natural language processing to digital arts and robotics. However, the effectiveness of the DL models is challenged by many real-world limited data problems (e.g., medicine, healthcare, and security intelligence) where data for model training is scarce. Unlike DL models, humans can use the prior knowledge stored in their brains to quickly learn new tasks with limited data. Inspired by such human learning, various meta-learning models have been developed that aim to address the challenge of learning from limited data. However, existing models are …

Fake News Detection In Arabic Media Using Machine Learning And The Afnd Dataset, Hussain Ali Bahri

Theses

The proliferation of fake news in digital media poses a significant challenge to information credibility, particularly in linguistically diverse regions such as the Arab world. This study addresses the critical problem of detecting fake news in Arabic media by leveraging advanced natural language processing (NLP) techniques and the AFND dataset, which contains over 600,000 news articles categorized into "credible," "not credible," and "undecided" classes. The research focuses on developing a robust system using AraBERT, a transformer-based model specifically pre-trained for Arabic text. Key contributions of this work include a comprehensive preprocessing pipeline tailored to Arabic linguistic complexities, incorporating stopword removal, …

A Public For The Problem: Vocabularies Of Belonging At The Climate Precipice, Louisa Stredwick

Theses

This study proposes the central concepts of belonging and vocabulary to critically analyse and recompose current approaches to more-than-human relationship that are inadequate and counterproductive. Contemporary vocabularies of belonging are inadequate because they fail to account for the practicalities of an expansive human and more-than-human ‘we’, and they are underpinned by extractivist or idealist logics. They are counterproductive because they carry embedded dualisms that often directly counter intended messages of inherent relationality. A largely theoretical work, the thesis is informed by a field philosophy approach in the Environmental Humanities, working alongside the Martuwarra (Fitzroy) River, in North-Western Australia, and its …

Leading To Serve: Participants' Perception Of A Servant Leadership Program In Anglican School Contexts, Keith Charles Peterson

Theses

This PhD study researched the impact of a servant leadership development program on the culture and practice of two Anglican faith schools. The intent was to document and enhance these schools’ culture and practice through the design, application and outcomes of this developmental process. The rationale for this study stems from the increasing awareness of servant leadership as a formatively based approach that has depth and integrity of alignment with the relationally set values of care, community and service implicit to faith-based education. By demonstrating the alignment between the intent for servant leadership and its actual application and outcomes, this …

Nursing Students' Clinical Placement Experience In A Residential Aged Care Facility: A Comparative Study, Nitasha Aarni Narayan

Theses

Nursing education programs play a significant role in preparing future nurses to care for the growing number of older people who will require health care. A key component of this preparation is the learning that nursing students acquire through clinical placement experience in a residential aged care facility. This clinical placement provides them with opportunities to experience caring for older adults. However, many students are reportedly reluctant to accept clinical placement in aged care and are ill-prepared for the challenges of the residential aged care facility environment. Hence, it is important for the development of future nursing programs and the …

The Perceptions Of Principals And Faith Leaders Regarding The Transmission Of Presentation Charism In Australian Presentation Schools, Gemma Louise Thomson

Theses

This purpose of this research was to explore the perceptions of Principals and Faith Leaders regarding the transmission of Presentation charism in Australian Presentation schools. In particular, the study investigated how Principals and Faith Leaders perceive the nature of Presentation charism, as well as how it is evidenced in their leadership approaches in Catholic schools in the Presentation tradition. Furthermore, the study explored the perceptions of Principals, Faith Leaders and Presentation Sisters of what is required to formally and informally transmit the Presentation charism in Australian Presentation schools. The study’s review of literature identified four areas of literature that formed …

The Changing Nature Of Outdoor Play Spaces In West Australian Primary Schools: An Exploratory Case Study. Exploring Play Opportunities, Design And Utilisation Of An Intentionally Designed Nature Play Space (Idnps)., Catherine Fitzhardinge

Theses

The development, wellbeing and learning of children is of global importance; opportunities that promote healthy childhood development have long lasting social and economic impacts. Play is the primary occupation through which children develop; nature play provides opportunities for physical, cognitive, social and emotional skill development. West Australian (WA) schools are installing intentionally designed nature play spaces (IDNPS) to support outdoor play opportunities and connection to nature. However, there is little contextual evidence regarding how these spaces are designed and utilised to support child development, wellbeing and learning.

This exploratory, mixed methods case study examined how children aged 4-7 years old …

Talking The Talk And Walking The Walk: A Bronfenbrennerian Interrogation Of The Complementarity Between Tertiary Catholic Ethos And Teaching As Perceived By Teachers Of First Year Undergraduate Students, Christine Anne Gietz

Theses

This study explores the relationship between an Australian Catholic university’s talk about its ethos and the walk of pedagogic practice. In particular, this study focuses on the talk of Catholic ethos at the macro level of the University as an organisational entity and the walk of teaching first year undergraduate students at the micro level of teachers as individual entities.

The ecological systems theory of Bronfenbrenner (1979) and the bioecological Process Person Context Time Model of Bronfenbrenner and Morris (2006) were utilised to interrogate this relationship. Along with a Bronfenbrennerian lens, the method of analysis adopted in this study was …

The Effects Of Email Advertising On Consumer Response In Australian Online Fashion., Trent Curtis

Theses

Email advertising continues to grow as an essential card in the playbook of current day digital marketers, especially within the hyper competitive world of online fashion. This thesis examines the multifaceted effects of email advertising on consumer response within Australia, drawing new insights from the recent influence of personalised email advertising content.

Employing a mixed methods approach, qualitative analysis first utilises thematic coding to uncover key insights drawn from interviews with current day fashion marketing professionals. These interviews explore the perceptions of email advertising effectiveness, preferences in personalised content, and the behavioural trends of online fashion shoppers.

The quantitative analysis …

Exploring The Perceived Impact Of Hearing Impairment On The Mental Health And Well-Being Of Adults, Jacinta Ruth Marks

Theses

This thesis explores the perceived impact of hearing impairment on the mental health and well-being of Australian adults, responding to a growing need to understand how hearing challenges affect people beyond clinical or audiological measures. While hearing impairment is commonly framed through medical or functional models, its psychosocial effects remain underexplored, particularly in relation to stigma, identity, and mental well-being. This study addresses that gap by centring lived experience and examining how adults with hearing impairment navigate everyday life, social expectations, and systemic barriers. Grounded in a constructivist-interpretivist paradigm and informed by a disability studies lens, the research investigates the …

Learning To Be 'With Woman': The Lived Experience Of Studying Midwifery, A Phenomenological Study, Ashlee Guerin

Theses

At the heart of midwifery lies a philosophy grounded by the principle of being ‘with woman’. This core philosophy defines the profession itself, reflected in the etymology of the word midwife, derived from the Anglo-Saxon terms mid (with) and wif (woman), reflecting a tradition of relational care embedded within the profession. Understanding and embodying this philosophy is fundamental for midwifery students, as it shapes their professional identity, informs clinical decision-making, and underpins the provision of care that is safe, respectful and in partnership with women across their childbearing journey. Learning to be ‘with woman’ fosters respect, advocacy, and partnership, ensuring …

The Wellbeing Experiences Of Newly Employed Teachers At High-Fee-Paying, Independent, Pre-Kindergarten To Year 12 Schools In Perth, Western Austalia, Helen Mary Aguiar

Theses

The purpose of this research was to explore the wellbeing experiences of newly employed teachers at high-fee-paying, independent, Pre-Kindergarten to Year 12 schools in Perth, Western Australia. The research explored two factors: experiences that enhance teacher wellbeing and experiences that diminish the wellbeing of newly employed teachers in these schools.

The review of literature highlighted four areas that formed the conceptual framework for the thesis. These four areas were the role of the teacher, wellbeing defined, the factors enhancing teacher wellbeing and the factors diminishing teacher wellbeing. These areas led to the development of the primary research question and the …