Digital Commons Network^™

The Development Of Occupational Standards For Use By Ngos Pertaining To The Inclusion Of People With Disabilities In Sports Based Programmes In Developing Countries, Thabo Philmon Tsiki

Theses

The research on both the IT Tralee UNESCO Chair programmes as aligned to articles of the Charter on Physical Education, physical activity and sport (UNESCO, 2015) and MINEPS V Resolutions in Berlin 2013 (UNESCO, 2013), regarding the inclusion of people with disabilities in sports. Therefore, this project focuses on setting up best practices for the inclusion of people with disabilities in sports based programmes in developing countries through developed occupational standards. The aim is to address the lack of inclusion of people with disabilities in sports based programmes in the developing countries.

A qualitative approach is employed to generate data …

Prevalence And Distribution Of Gastrointestinal Nematode Parasites And Dung Beetles Associated With Upland And Lowland Grazing Of Irish Native Dexter Cattle, Noel Dineen

Theses

Diseases such as parasitic gastroenteritis are very common in cattle and can have detrimental economic consequences on agricultural productivity. This study was conducted to establish the prevalence and distribution of gastrointestinal nematode parasites associated with Dexter cattle under an organic lowland grazing regime and an extensive upland system. A secondary aim to the study was to investigate dung beetle assemblages in upland and lowland sites and their interactions with gastrointestinal nematode parasites as they offer an alternative method of natural control to organic farming systems in particular.

Cattle weights were recorded and faecal samples were collected at the beginning and …

Microalgae Cell Quantification Using Electrical Parameters, Leena Osama Fahmi Saqer

Theses

Electrical properties of living cells have been proven to play a significant role in understanding and characterizing the different biological activities of the cell. The objective of this work is to develop an electrical based technique for determining and estimating the number of microalgae cells in a suspension without the need for any sample treatments or pre-processing.

The proposed technique is based on the direct use of electrical capacitive model. The basic premise behind this idea is the electrical polarization of microalgae particles that get charged due to the application of an electric field. This wouldn’t cause any distortion or …

Preparation Of Novel Steroidal Conjugates As Potential Diagnostic And Therapeutic Agents With An Emphasis On Quinoid And Halogenated Moieties, Nuha Obaid Juma Alsoom

Theses

Steroids bonded to pharmaceutically active molecules are interesting candidates as therapeutic agents. In this work, a number of potentially bioactive residues, which include the quinoid moiety, have been synthesized as a simple steroid quinone hybrid, where the steroid component will be estradiol derived or the steroid cholesterol derived. For this purpose, two novel reactions have been explored namely, the modification of the APPEL reaction to connect residues by using PPh3/BrCCl3 for amidation and esterification of carboxylic acids. Another one is the hydrogenation reaction of alkenes by using NaBH4, AcOH, Pd/C and toluene or benzene in the presence of benzyl groups …

Examining The Growth And Performance Of The Effect Of Uv-B Radiation On United Arab Emirates Date Palm Tree (Phoenix Dactylifera), Saeedallah Abdulwali Niazwali

Theses

The stratospheric ozone depletion and elevated solar UV-B radiation have a negative effect on living life forms. UV radiation is one of the unsafe components that cause hindrance to both flora and fauna on the earth. This will have important implications for ecosystem processes and food production. The present study has been designed with primary objective of the effect of UV-B radiation on five numbers of most cultivated Emirates varieties (i.e., BARHI, FRDWT, NBTSF, FRDRD and KHD). After 4 and 8 hrs/day UVB treatment the Shoot, Root and total Plant length, Total plant fresh weight, Shoot and Root fresh and …

A Case Study Of An Intervention Program For Students With Dyslexia In A Primary School In The Uae, Elazab Mohamed Elazab Elshazly

Theses

The study aims to investigate the impact of an iPad programme on the performance of students with dyslexia on reading, writing and spelling skills in two classes of a public primary school in Al -Ain, UAE. The study follows a mixed method approach (questionnaire; face-to-face interviews; pre-posttests). Twenty (20) 3rd graders male students with dyslexia, attending English as a Foreign Language (EFL) classes were the participants of the study. Students’ performance on spelling, reading and writing skills were tested after instructed through an iPad intervention programme with multisensory applications. The experimental group’s performance (10 students with dyslexia) was compared to …

In Vitro Regeneration And Marker Assisted Evaluation Of Genetic Fidelity In Endangered Tree Species Moringa Peregrina (Forsk) Fiori, Salama Mohammed Al Dhaheri

Theses

Moringa peregrina is a native plant in the United Arab Emirates; it is called “Shua”.It is an endangered species with important nutritive and medicinal properties. It shows high adaptability to the arid condition with short germination time after irrigation. Unmanaged grazing and slow regeneration rate after browsing leads to the endangerment of the species causing erosion in biodiversity. One way to protect these rare species is by multiplying the planting material through tissue culture system and re-introducing at the habitat. Micro propagation is an in vitro method used for plant clonal multiplication under controlled condition. This technique allows conserving the …

Policy Recommendations For Economically And Socially Valuable Asteroid Mineral Resource Exploitation Activities, Anthony Hennig

Theses

Asteroids are quickly moving from a speculative resource to potentially economically valuable deposits of a variety of mineral resources. There is a potential for a large scale disruptive innovation within the fundamental resource base, and at the same time policy does little to ensure that asteroid resource exploitation is socially and economically valuable. Existing international policies were put into place to prevent militarization of space and related basic risks, and the first national policies focusing on basic ownership rights are only now being put into place.

We identify five major technology, policy, and social issues that must be addressed: surveying …

Validating Color Doppler Ultrasound Performance Via A Quantitative Comparison With Particle Image Velocimetry, Allan Alexander Andranikian

Theses

Color Doppler Ultrasound (CDUS) is a method of non-invasive fluid velocity measurement that is used for regular cardiac screenings as well as during complex surgeries such as valve replacements. A Color Doppler image is a contour map of the velocity field and can thereby indicate the presence of abnormal flows or be used to quantitatively measure velocities. CDUS is inexpensive and completely non-invasive. It is for these same reasons that CDUS has the potential to be a powerful tool not only in the medical field, but in the industrial and engineering research fields as well. While there are many devices …

Estimates Of Emissions From Heavy Duty Diesel Vehicles (Hddv) And Control Strategies Related To Transport Activities Supporting High Volume Hydraulic Fracturing Wells In The Marcellus Shale Formation, Rachel M. Zoyhofski

Theses

This project examined estimated emission reductions from implementing advanced control technologies in heavy duty diesel engines and to assess potential emission impacts from trucks supporting the High Volume Hydraulic Fracturing (HVHF) industry in Pennsylvania’s portion of the Marcellus Shale Formation. Models were run examining mitigation strategies, including retrofit devices and alternative fuel strategies. Results compare estimated emissions associated with current HVHF truck transportation and potential emission reductions from control technologies. Models utilized the Geospatial Intermodal Freight Transport (GIFT) model. Results suggest that while some retrofits, such as diesel particulate filters, are able to reach emissions reductions comparable to newly manufactured …

Sampling And Counting Crossing-Free Matchings, Wenbo Sun

Theses

Sampling of combinatorial structures is an important statistical tool used in applications in a number of areas ranging from statistical physics, data mining, to biological sciences. Of comparable importance is the computation of the cor- responding partition function, which, in the case of the uniform distribution, is equivalent to the problem of counting all such structures. For self-reducible combinatorial structures, once we can produce an almost uniform sample from them, then we can approximately count them.

Using a Markov chain Monte Carlo method, this thesis presents polynomial-time algorithms to approximately count and almost uniformly sample crossing-free matchings for certain input …

A Scalable Flash-Based Hardware Architecture For The Hierarchical Temporal Memory Spatial Pooler, Lennard G. Streat

Theses

Hierarchical temporal memory (HTM) is a biomimetic machine learning algorithm focused upon modeling the structural and algorithmic properties of the neocortex. It is comprised of two components, realizing pattern recognition of spatial and temporal data, respectively. HTM research has gained momentum in recent years, leading to both hardware and software exploration of its algorithmic formulation. Previous work on HTM has centered on addressing performance concerns; however, the memory-bound operation of HTM presents significant challenges to scalability.

In this work, a scalable flash-based storage processor unit, Flash-HTM (FHTM), is presented along with a detailed analysis of its potential scalability. FHTM leverages …

Implicating E. Coli Pal In The Pathogenesis Of Gram-Negative Sepsis, Bethany R. Novick

Theses

Just under half of all sepsis cases are caused by Gram-negative bacterial infections. Sepsis occurs when an infection results in a systemic inflammatory response, which can lead to organ dysfunction and death. Studies have shown that some outer membrane proteins, lipoproteins, and lipopolysaccharides are released from Gram-negative bacteria during sepsis; those proteins and LPS toxins are thought to induce the over-exuberant host inflammatory response, which is characteristic of sepsis. The ability to detect those proteins and determine the role they play in the development and severity of sepsis infection would be a powerful tool for immunotherapy. Escherichia coli (E. coli) …

Phenotypic Studies Of Pho13Δ In Saccharomyces Cerevisiae, Courtney Kellogg

Theses

PHO13 in Saccharomyces cerevisiae (budding yeast) is a para-nitrophenyl phosphatase (pNppase) of the haloacid dehalogenase (HAD) superfamily. A biological substrate for PHO13 had remained undiscovered while a knockout phenotype has only been observed in strains engineered to grow on D-xylose. The purified enzyme has been identified in our lab to specifically hydrolyze 2-phosphoglycolate, classifying it as a phosphoglycolate phosphatase (PGPase). In photosynthetic organisms, 2-phosphoglycolate (2-PG) is generated by the oxygenation reaction of ribulose-1,5-bisphosphate carboxylase (RuBisCO) in the Calvin Cycle. To be recycled back into general metabolism, photosynthetic PGPase converts 2-PG to glycolate. In non-photosynthetic yeast, 2-PG must be generated by …

Equipoise: An Animated Short Film About Positiveness And Negativity., Gung-Kai Koo

Theses

Equipoise is an animated short about positiveness, negativity and the opposite but complementary relationship between them. The two opposite attitudes of an individual’s personality not only affect but also establish emotions, decisions and behaviors. Positiveness reinforces positive thinking while pessimistic assumptions and hardship are driven by negativity. A person who has an imbalanced mind may live in pain or lead to high risks.

To have a great mental condition, both positiveness and negativity have to be involved to establish the balance. However, the importance of negativity, in one case, pessimism was frequently ignored as a result of education that focuses …

Down, Down, Baby, Ciara M. Duffy

Theses

The series Down, Down, Baby is a visual diary, a documentation of the transitory period of my youth: the moments of freedom, debauchery, and recklessness I experienced with my closest companions. These individuals exist in these moments as a symbol for an undeniable attitude within youth culture that is greater than themselves. Down, Down, Baby illustrates our early reactions to independence and the animals we wanted to be and were, as well as the desire to stay young and relative by creating spectacles of ourselves. This way of living defies the logic of refined sensibility, political correctness, and good taste …

The Inter-Rater Reliability Of The Psychopathy Checklist-Revised In Practical Field Settings, Yuko Matsushima

Theses

This paper examined the inter-rater reliability of psychological assessments in practical field with 42 inmates’ PCL-R scores. As results, this study showed similar ICC and SEM values to those from PCL-manual. Concerning PCL-R structure, factor 2 showed higher ICC value than factor 1, and facet 4 showed higher ICC value than facet 1, 2, or 3. Especially, facet 2 showed low ICC value. Those are consistent with previous studies. However, ICC yielded by factor 2 only and both factor 1 and 2 showed similar ICC values. Considering theoretical and clinical aspects, it was recommendable to use PCL-R total score as …

Effects Of Streptozotocin-Induced Diabetes On Gene And Protein Expression In Sinoatrial Node Of Rat Heart, Zannatul Ferdous

Theses

Diabetes mellitus is one of the most common endocrine disorders and its global prevalence is increasing at an alarming rate. Cardiovascular disease is the major cause of morbidity and mortality among diabetic patients. In addition to defects in contraction, the diabetic heart also frequently suffers from disturbances to the electrical conduction system. This study investigates the effects of diabetes on the sinoatrial node (SAN) of the rat heart. Previous in vivo and in vitro experiments have demonstrated reduced heart rate, longer SAN action potential duration, prolonged pacemaker cycle length and Sino-atrial conduction time in streptozotocin (STZ) - induced diabetic rat …

Biological Efficiency Of Recycling Organic Waste With Edible Fungi, Yusra Matar Al Shamsi

Theses

Mushrooms has been known as important cultivars for their nutritional and medicinal values, the species Pleurotus sajor caju and Calocybe indica were selected in this investigation for being used in previous studies to be grown on different lignocellulosic materials. Cultivating mushrooms on plant wastes is value-added way to produce a source of human food and is an efficient way to recycle those residues. Date palm leaf waste, date palm bunch waste and mowed turf grass waste were used as mushroom growing substrates. Date palm is the most important plant grown in the UAE and it produce tons of wastes every …

The Effect Of Using Flipped Classroom Instruction On Students’ Achievement In The New 2016 Scholastic Assessment Test Mathematics Skills In The United Arab Emirates, Khaled Mohammed Abdel Baki Mohammed Diab

Theses

The flipped classroom instruction considered as the focus of many researchers and teachers in the recent years, many teachers around the word tried the flipped classroom instructions in different ways, different tools, to teach different subjects with different grades. Taking in the consideration, applying the flipped classroom teaching methods needs a lot of preparation and technological tools. This study utilized a quasiexperimental method research design to investigate the effect of flipped classroom instruction on students’ achievements in the new SAT 2016 mathematics skills (Heart of Algebra, Problem solving and data analysis, and Passport to Advanced Math) for the eleventh grade …

Carbon Dioxide Capture By Steel-Making Residues In A Fluidized Bed Reacto, Suhaib Mohammad Hameedi

Theses

Global warming is one of the most challenging problems facing societies these days, and it is known to be caused by the increasing emissions of Green House Gases (GHG's), mainly CO₂, from various human activities. To solve such a problem, or at least minimize its effects, several actions have been considered. One of these actions is carbon capture, which has many different options and techniques. This research focuses on the capture of CO₂ through reactions with steel-making residues, an alkaline solid by-product of the steel-making process. The aim is to sequester CO₂ and form carbonates, which …

The Big Five And Adhd: An Investigation Of Subtypes And Emotional Regulation, Gabriel Casher

Theses

Attention-Deficit/Hyperactivity Disorder (ADHD) is a commonly occurring neurodevelopmental disorder in children, affecting 3-7% of children (APA, 2000). Despite the high prevalence of ADHD, conceptualization of its subtypes, ADHD-PI and ADHD-C, remains under debate. One method of describing psychopathology is through the use of personality traits. The current study evaluated relationships between ADHD subtypes, ADHD symptoms, and the Big Five in 83 children between 8 and 12 years of age. Children with ADHD were consistently rated as having lower Agreeableness, Conscientiousness, and Openness than children without ADHD. Additionally, children with ADHD-PI had the lowest Openness, and children with ADHD-C had the …

Aggression Dynamics And Hormone Fluctuations In Black And White Ruffed Lemurs (Varecia Variegata), Alicia N. Marty

Theses

Black and white ruffed lemurs (Varecia variegata) are critically endangered primates from the Northeastern rainforests of Madagascar. This species shows clear female dominance in both feeding and social contexts. In captivity, this dominance hierarchy can lead to heightened aggression between females during the breeding season, which can result in animal separation or group reconfiguration. The objectives of this study are to determine the scope of this species-specific management strategy throughout AZA-accredited zoos, determine the influence of two types of feeding enrichment on aggression levels, and determine the effect of aggression on stress levels by measuring fecal glucocorticoids (fGC). Understanding aggression …

Biomimicry: A Source For Architectural Innovation In Existing Buildings, Thomas Button

Theses

Today designers, manufacturers and industries are seeking to find sustainable solutions to improve design processes and products that will reduce their environmental impacts. However, they often develop architecture in counterproductive ways by investing time and resources into unproven novel solutions. Yet, there are often better solutions, through biomimicry, that identify successful adaptations found in the natural environment and in biology that can serve to better inform design solutions. Through an in depth investigation of biomimicry, several design strategies are identified, and through a selective process, a few select examples are applied to a renovation of an existing headquarters for the …

Sitting Cane Design: For Older People, Qi Liu

Theses

The proportion of elderly people in the developed world is rapidly increasing. The book When I'm 64: how boomers will change health care mentioned that Older adults are among the fastest growing age groups, and the first “baby boomers” (adults born between 1946 and 1964) will turn 65 in 2011. More than 37 million people in this group (60 percent) will manage more than 1 chronic condition by 2030. The number of elderly and the retired population is on the rise and they represent a more selective consumer group that is more highly educated and financially secure than past generations …

It’S All In Your Head: A Solution To The Problem Of Object Coincidence, Graham Louis Renz

Theses

It’s uncontroversial that artifacts like statues and tables are mind-dependent. What’s controversial is what this dependence entails about the ontic status of artifacts. I argue this mind-dependence entails that the extra-mental world contains no artifacts or artifact joints. In support of this claim I respond to recent arguments proffered by defenders of the mind-independent existence of artifacts, viz. those of Lynne Rudder Baker, Crawford Elder, and Amie Thomasson. I argue the most plausible story about artifacts is that they’re in our minds, not the world; they are merely projections onto a world of “indifferent materials”. With this established, I show …

Binary Metal Oxides Based On Fe (Iii) And Ti (Iv) As Efficient Catalysts For Total Oxidation Of Volatile Organic Compound Pollutants, Said Abdullah Sulaiman Almamari

Theses

Fe (III)-modified Titania and Fe (III)-Ti (IV) binary oxides have received much less attention as possible catalysts compared to their parent single-metal oxides, Fe₂O₃ and TiO₂. This could be due to the difficulty of obtaining pure desired monophases. In addition, the effect of different preparative conditions on the textural properties of sol-gel-prepared Ti-Fe mixed oxides was rarely studied. Furthermore, the effect of the composition on the reducibility and the catalytic activity of these composites was never studied. In the present work, Ti-Fe mixed oxides were prepared using a modified sol-gel method and their textural properties …

Anti-Breast Cancer Effect Of Rhus Coriaria Extract, Khawlah Najib Athamneh

Theses

Plants have been shown to be an excellent source of new drugs, including anticancer agents. Rhus coriaria, commonly known as sumac, a plant that is known to possess different therapeutic values including anti-oxidant and anti-microbial activities. Here, we investigated the anti-cancer effect of R. coriaria on triple negative MDA-MB-231 cell line. We demonstrated that Rhus coriaria ethanolic extract (RCE) inhibits the proliferation of MDA-MB-231 cell line in a time- and concentration dependent manner. RCE induced senescence and cell cycle arrest at G1 phase. Moreover, no proliferative recovery was detected after RCE removal. Annexin V staining and PARP cleavage analysis revealed …

A Comparative Study Of Aromatic Pollutants Degradation Using Two Different Peroxidases, Aysha Hamad Muftah Ai Neyadi

Theses

Enzyme based degradation of organic pollutants is a promising new remediation approach due to the promiscuous nature of the technique, the wide range of available enzymes, and the scalability of the process. Oxidoreductases, specifically, peroxidases are the most popular class of enzymes that have been used for the degradation of organic pollutants. It is generously assumed that all peroxidases behave similarly and produce similar degradation products. Our main objective was to test the hypothesis that related peroxidases may act differentially towards the degradation of aromatic pollutants. Therefore, in this study, we have carried out detailed degradation studies on three model …

Numerical Analysis For The Hemodynamics In Unruptured Cerebral Aneurysms, Hashem Mhd Hicham Alargha

Theses

A cerebral aneurysm is a vascular disorder characterized by abnormal focal dilation of a brain artery which is considered as a serious and potentially life-threatening condition. Cerebral aneurysms affect around 2%-5% of adults and they are fatal and can rupture with an overall mortality rate of more than 50%. Through computational fluid dynamics investigation, this study is offering a closer look into the initiation growth and rupture of cerebral aneurysms. Four focus points are studied in this thesis which are sensitivity analysis of blood viscosity in aneurysms, the effect of cerebral aneurysm size on wall stresses and strain, hazard effects …