Digital Commons Network^™

Use Of A Towed Camera System For Estimating Reef Fish Populations Densities On The West Florida Shelf, Sarah Elizabeth Grasty

USF Tampa Graduate Theses and Dissertations

Reef fish species tend to reside over high relief habitat which makes them difficult to sample with traditional gears such as nets and trawls. Therefore, implementing and understanding the strengths and weaknesses of new approaches which incorporate acoustic and optical methods has become a priority for reef fish stock assessment. Beginning in June of 2013, a towed camera system known as the Camera-Based Assessment Survey System (C-BASS) has been used to visualize over 500 kilometers of transect and record more than 80 hours of video over several habitats in the Gulf of Mexico. Surveys have been completed on the West …

Teaching With The End In Mind: A Teacher's Life History As A Legacy Of Educational Leaders, Daryl Adam Ward

USF Tampa Graduate Theses and Dissertations

The purpose of this study was to understand the life history of a female teacher by examining her beliefs about leaving a teaching legacy and by analyzing the narratives of four educational leaders as they reflect on the generative behaviors of this teacher. The research questions guiding this study were: (a) What elements of this teacher's life history contributed to creating a legacy of educational leaders? (b) What are the perspectives of the educational leaders impacted by this teacher as they relate to crafting an educational legacy? (c) How do the life stories of the teacher and educational leaders intersect …

Applicator Exposure To Glycol Derivatives And Total Volatile Organic Compounds During The Application Of Spray Polyurethane Foam Insulation, Michael Brian Kaniuga

USF Tampa Graduate Theses and Dissertations

There is currently high demand for new building materials which are considered "environmentally friendly" or "green" for both new construction and renovations. Spray polyurethane foam (SPUF) insulation has gained significant acceptance by both consumers and the construction industry due to its high R-value, which results into significant energy savings among other things. Despite its acceptance by consumers and the construction industry, consideration must be given to potential chemical exposures to applicators installing these products.

This study sought to determine, through quantitative experimentation, if there was a release of glycol derivatives including, diethylene glycol (DEG), ethylene glycol (EG), and propylene glycol …

Wastewater Nutrient Recovery Using Anaerobic Membrane Bioreactor Permeate For Hydroponic Fertigation, Jorge Luis Calabria

USF Tampa Graduate Theses and Dissertations

The imbalance between global population growth and resource consumption is indicative of unsustainable practices and foreshadows a grim future of continued resource depletion, food and water scarcity, social inequality, and deteriorating public and environmental health. Meanwhile, the urban centers of the world continue to experience exponential growth resulting in overwhelmed food, water, and sanitation infrastructure. Decentralized and satellite wastewater treatment technologies capable of resource recovery, such as anaerobic membrane bioreactors (AnMBR), foster synergistic opportunities to help manage the food, energy, and water sectors of urban environments. Specifically, the nutrient concentration and high effluent quality of permeate produced by AnMBR systems …

Etruscan Trade Networks: Understanding The Significance Of Imported Materials At Remote Etruscan Settlements Through Trace Element Analysis Using Non-Destructive X-Ray Fluorescence Spectrometry, Patrick T. Woodruff

USF Tampa Graduate Theses and Dissertations

The Etruscan civilization was rich in local and interregional trade. Its exchange networks were vital in establishing relationships with other societies, importing exotic materials and goods, as well as disseminating and assimilating information. However, there is little understanding of the participation of smaller inland settlements in the act of exchange. This research answers questions pertaining to the purpose of trade within these self-sustaining communities, the reliability of identifying geographic locations of the clay used in ancient ceramics through the use of non-destructive X-ray Fluorescence (XRF) spectrometry without sampling current regional clay sources, and the materiality of the ceramics being exchanged …

An Exploration Of The Health Experiences Of Youth Who Were Trafficked For Sex, Christine Ann Meister

USF Tampa Graduate Theses and Dissertations

This pilot study used photovoice methodology to explore the current health needs of youth who were trafficked for sex and are now living in an alternative family care setting. The goals of this study were to add to the current literature regarding the health needs of victims of domestic minor sex trafficking and to add a qualitative aspect to the evaluation of the Citrus Helping Adolescents Negatively Impacted by Commercial Exploitation (CHANCE) program. Disposable cameras were distributed to a group of adolescent girls enrolled in the program who were then tasked with taking pictures of things that made them feel …

Genres Of Children's Websites: A Comprehensive Methodology For Analyzing Digital Texts, James L. Welsh

USF Tampa Graduate Theses and Dissertations

This study establishes a comprehensive methodology for analyzing children's website content, based on both linguistic and rhetorical data, by employing defensible criteria to evaluate both qualitative and quantitative data. By employing genre theory as a prism for examining form, substance, and rhetorical action within children's websites, this study applies that methodology to a purposeful sample of five children's websites. Results of the analysis document the complex multimodal and multilinear nature of the websites studied and identify a possible new genre, the pop culture carousel website.

Monitoring And Use Of Social Media In Emergncy Management In Florida, Leila Martini

USF Tampa Graduate Theses and Dissertations

The emergence of mobile technologies and social media applications has led to a shift in the emergency/disaster related communication environment. Citizens are playing an increasingly important role in providing real time information to emergency organizations. This shift has resulted in an expectation by the public that emergency management (EM) organizations monitor and respond to calls for help disseminated via these applications. The purpose of this study is to explore the extent to which Florida EM agencies have incorporated the monitoring of social media into their organizational processes.

The state of social media use in Florida is under researched. In this …

Assessments Of Surface-Pelagic Drift Communities And Behavior Of Early Juvenile Sea Turtles In The Northern Gulf Of Mexico, Robert F. Hardy

USF Tampa Graduate Theses and Dissertations

Knowledge of species distribution and habitat associations are essential for conservation measures. Such information is lacking for many marine species due to their occupancy of broad and ephemeral habitats that are difficult to access for study. Sea turtles, specifically the surface-pelagic juvenile stage of some species, are a group for which significant knowledge gaps remain surrounding their distribution and habitat use. Recent research has confirmed the long-standing hypothesis that the surface-pelagic juvenile stage occurs within surface-pelagic drift communities (SPDC). Within the North Atlantic and surrounding basins, the holopelagic macroalgae Sargassum spp. dominates SPDC and serves as a remotely-detectable indicator of …

Human Mirna Sequence Based Variations Database, Nadim Georges Bou Zeidan

USF Tampa Graduate Theses and Dissertations

MicroRNAs (miRNAs) are studied as key genetic elements that regulate the gene expression involved in different human diseases. Clinical sequence based variations like copy number variations (CNVs) affect miRNA biogenesis, dosage and target recognition that may represent potentially functional variants and relevant target bindings.

To systematically analyze miRNA-related CNVs and their effects on related genes, a user-friendly free online database was developed to provide further analysis of co-localization of miRNA loci with human genome CNV regions. Further analysis pipelines such as miRNA-target to estimate the levels or locations of variations for genetic duplications, insertions or deletions were also offered. Such …

Novel Therapeutic Strategies In Lung Cancer, Courtney A. Kurtyka

USF Tampa Graduate Theses and Dissertations

Lung cancer is the leading cause of cancer-related death and the second most diagnosed cancer in the United States. Unfortunately, many patients either do not have any common mutations for which there are already targetable agents, or they eventually become resistant to these compounds. As such, there is a high demand for new, effective methods of treating this disease as well as predicting patient prognosis and potential benefit from chemotherapy. In this work, numerous strategies for treating lung cancer are explored.

The first method described here is through the use of a pan-early 2 factor (E2F) inhibitor, HLM006474, which is …

Differentiating Geo-Spatiotemporal Aquatic Larval Habitats Of Anopheles Gambiae Complex In Urban Agriculture And Urban Non-Agriculture Environments In Accra, Ghana, Samia Mckeever

USF Tampa Graduate Theses and Dissertations

To meet the rising food demands of communities in Accra,Ghana, urban agriculture has been popularized as a way to increase food security and improve nutrition (Donovan et al., 2012). Urban agriculture is defined as "the cultivation of crops at both the subsistence and commercial levels including the keeping of livestock in open spaces in urban areas (Adjaye, n.d.). In Accra, urban agriculture covers 1,091 hectares, employs over one thousand people, and supplies residents with 90% of its vegetables ("Accra Metropolitan", n.d.). Further, 60% of households in Accra participate in backyard farming ("Accra Metropolitan", n.d.). Although urban agriculture provides many benefits …

Changing Landscapes: End-Of-Life Care & Communication At A Zen Hospice, Ellen W. Klein

USF Tampa Graduate Theses and Dissertations

This dissertation examines end-of-life experiences at a small Zen hospice in the Pacific Northwest region of the United States. Through an exploration of how end-of-life communication, sense-making, decision-making, and care in this setting differ from that of typical clinical settings, this project highlights and interrogates the experiences of dying as spiritually, rhetorically, narratively, relationally, and communally bound events.

Keywords: Zen hospice, end of life, narrative sensemaking, medical-ethical decision making, spirituality, healing rhetoric, communities of practice

Ontogenetic Diet Shifts And Prey Preference Of A Generalist Predatory Fish, Brittany Jalene Scharf

USF Tampa Graduate Theses and Dissertations

Marine ecosystems are highly dynamic and contain a diverse faunal assemblage that are subject to various natural and anthropogenic variability. Globally, seagrass ecosystems are located adjacent to coastal areas that are heavily impacted by human development and urbanization potentially altering the community structure within these ecosystem. Complex food webs connect many components of these systems, often in unexpected ways, and are ultimately based on one of two pathways: benthic (i.e., seagrass, epiphytes, microalgae, detritus) and planktonic (i.e., phytoplankton). Understanding the pathway which the food web is based gives further insight regarding the biological balance of the ecosystem; thus it is …

Risk Of Compliance: Tracing Safety And Efficacy In Mef-Lariam's Licensure, Julie Marie Gerdes

USF Tampa Graduate Theses and Dissertations

The Walter Reed Institute of Army Research developed the antimalarial drug mefloquine then collaborated with Hoffman-La Roche to produce the drug under its brand name "Lariam," after Food and Drug Administration (FDA) approved licensure in 1989. For over twenty years, the Army used this pill as its "drug of choice" for soldiers deployed to endemic regions until 2009, and in 2013 the Food and Drug Administration warned that the drug's neurotoxic effects could be lasting, if not permanent. The sociopolitical exigence of developing a new biochemical antimalarial drug rushed the development and licensure processes, and the modern craving for certainty …

"Wake Up The Knowledge That You Have": An Assessment Of Community Food Security In Fellsmere, Florida, Susan Marie Tyler

USF Tampa Graduate Theses and Dissertations

In the global industrial agricultural system many people lack access to high-quality nutritious foods and food production techniques are often inefficient and reliant on harsh chemical inputs. While numerous strategies exist to address the disparities present in the global food system, increasingly researchers and practitioners are looking to local food systems for solutions to strengthen community food security (CFS). CFS emphasizes small-scale production strategies such as farmer's markets, community gardens, and consumer supported agriculture. As these efforts evolve, research is needed to understand how these strategies affect communities. To explore a local CFS initiative, qualitative data were collected from community …

Four Women: An Analysis Of The Artistry Of Black Women In The Black Arts Movement, 1960s-1980s, Abney Louis Henderson

USF Tampa Graduate Theses and Dissertations

This project honors and recognizes the art and activism of four Black woman--Nina Simone, Nikki Giovanni, Elizabeth Catlett, and Ntozake Shange that contributed to the revolutionary movements of the 1960s through the early 1980s. This thesis examines the works and political challenges of Black women by asking what elements in their artistry/activism addressed issues specifically related to Black women's unique position in America during the Black Revolution and feminist movements? Both primary and secondary sources such as literature from advocates of the Black Arts Movements and the lyrics, poetry, and visual art of the four Black women artists were used …

Development Of An Efficient Human Hepatocyte Culture Platform For Assessing Novel Therapeutic Efficacy Against Plasmodium Liver Parasites, Steven Patrick Maher

USF Tampa Graduate Theses and Dissertations

Malaria is a critical and global public health problem, affecting over 200 million people every year, resulting in over 500,000 deaths. A vaccine is not currently available and only one drug, primaquine, is effective against the dormant stages of Plasmodium vivax. Preclinical assessment of novel therapeutic drugs and vaccines is hampered by the lack of an in vitro liver model for P. falciparum and P. vivax. To provide a stable human hepatocyte-based culture platform for parasite development, we engineered a microfluidic bilayer device capable of both simple and complex culture methods, including perfusion and co-culture, to better understand the requirements …

Connecting Institutional Discourses And Everyday Understandings Of Climate Change: Viewpoints From A Suburban Neighborhood In Tampa, Florida, Christopher Metzger

USF Tampa Graduate Theses and Dissertations

Despite a general consensus regarding anthropogenic global climate change across the international scientific community, many of the major greenhouse gas producers in the world, especially the United States, are hesitant to implement strict emissions regulations. According to some prominent atmospheric scientists, such as James Hansen and Michael Mann, if industrialized countries continue to produce carbon emissions at current rates, an irreversible planetary tipping point of raising temperatures 2°C above pre-industrial levels could be reached in less than 40 years. Societies have a wealth of information from the natural sciences to understand the climate problem and currently possess the technological means …

A Multi-Scale Approach To Study Predator-Prey Interactions And Habitat Use Of Pinfish, Lagodon Rhomboids, Dinorah Helena Chacin

USF Tampa Graduate Theses and Dissertations

Biological processes like species interactions and patterns such as abundance and distribution observed in nature can vary depending on the scale at which the subject of interest is evaluated. Knowing that there is no single natural scale at which systems should be studied, in this thesis, I conducted a series of basic and applied ecological approaches in order to examine the phenomena that can occur at different scales of space, time, and ecological organization.

Species abundances can vary over large spatial and temporal scales. By studying the habitat use of an abundant species, which uses a wide range of habitats, …

Interpolating Beach Profile Data Using Linear And Non-Linear Functions, Lance Calloway Croft

USF Tampa Graduate Theses and Dissertations

ABSTRACT

Beach and nearshore surveys are conducted in a variety of ways, the most commonly used being the level-and-transit method; because it is inexpensive, time conducive and highly accurate. Specifically, beach surveys are conducted to better understand cross-shore, long-shore sediment transport processes, as well as to quantify volume changes, which are used to evaluate beach performance. In this study, a section of the beach on Sand Key, FL was surveyed using rod-and-transit. In addition to the commonly used linear data analysis, a non-linear analysis was conducted using NURBS (Non-Uniform Rational B-Splines).

Survey data was collected within a short time window …

Bi-Directional Signaling Between Melanoma And The Microenvironment Generates A Protective Niche That Mediates Therapeutic Escape, Inna Fedorenko

USF Tampa Graduate Theses and Dissertations

Very few cancer patients are cured through drug therapy alone, with the majority exhibiting acquired resistance. To date, most studies of therapeutic escape have focused upon tumor-intrinsic mechanisms of drug resistance with little attention paid to the role of normal host cells in preventing complete tumor eradication. In the present study we implicate co-operative bi-directional signaling between melanoma cells and fibroblasts in the generation of a pro-survival niche that mediates drug resistance. Mass-spectrometry based phosphoproteomics was used to show that BRAF inhibition and chemotherapy drugs enhanced the survival of both melanoma cells and fibroblasts through the induction of fibronectin (FN)/integrin …

A Comparison Study On Violent Video Games: Explained By The Gamers Themselves, Christopher John Kneifer

USF Tampa Graduate Theses and Dissertations

This qualitative focus groups analysis examines the harmful effects of violent video games on emotions and behavior by comparing violent video game player's responses to that of non-violent video game players of the same age group. Research on the effects of video games has been done since the 70s, yet more research is needed to better understand the potentially harmful emotional and behavioral effects of playing violent games, especially from the gamers' perspectives. This thesis presents a qualitative analysis of data obtained from focus group sessions among undergraduate college students. Results of the analysis supports the presence as well as …

Evaluating The Effectiveness Of Tagteach For Teaching Yoga Postures To Novice Yoga Practitioners, Jessica Sade Andrews

USF Tampa Graduate Theses and Dissertations

Abstract

Over the past few years there has been an increasing number of people practicing yoga. There also have been reports of injuries as a result of practicing yoga. Many injuries have been attributed to poor teaching which can result in improper alignment. This study utilized a teaching technology, TAGteach to aide in skill acquisition of novice yoga practitioners. The current study focused on teaching three beginner asanas (poses) to novice practitioners. The intervention included the asanas being broken down by task analysis and the steps tagged one by one. The intervention was assessed by a multiple baseline across behaviors …

Feeding Performance Of King Mackerel, Scomberomorus Cavalla, Amber Rose Ferguson

USF Tampa Graduate Theses and Dissertations

Although bite force is a commonly used metric of feeding performance, other factors such as bite pressure and strike speed are also likely to affect prey capture. Therefore, this study investigated static bite force, dynamic speeds, and predator and prey forces resulting from ram strikes, as well as bite pressure of the king mackerel, Scomberomorus cavalla, in order to examine their relative contributions to overall feeding performance. Theoretical posterior bite force ranged from 14.0-318.7 N. Ram speed, recorded with a rod and reel incorporated with a line counter and video camera, ranged from 3.3-15.8 BL/s. Impact forces on the …

Bartonella Henselae Infection And Host Response In The Zebrafish Embryo Model, Amorce Lima

USF Tampa Graduate Theses and Dissertations

The Gram-negative bacterium Bartonella henselae (Bh) is an emerging zoonotic pathogen that has been associated with a variety of human diseases including bacillary angiomatosis which is characterized by vasoproliferative tumor-like lesions on the skin and internal organs of some immunosuppressed individuals. Several virulence factors associated with Bartonella-induced pathogenesis have been characterized. However, the study of those virulence factors has been limited to in vitro cell culture systems due to the lack of a practical animal model. Therefore, we wanted to investigate whether the zebrafish embryo (Danio rerio) could be used to model human infection with Bh. We investigated …

Localized Expansion Of Pedicle Screws For Increased Stability And Safety In The Osteoporotic Spine, Thomas Michael Shea

USF Tampa Graduate Theses and Dissertations

When a patient is diagnosed with various spinal injuries, deformities, or advanced degeneration, it is commonly suggested that he/she undergoes surgery for spinal fusion. Most current procedures in spinal fusion restrict mobility in one or multiple levels of the spine so that, over time, new bone will grow between the levels creating a single motionless unit of bone. The bilateral pedicle screw system (BPSS) has long been considered to be the "gold standard" in spinal fusion. However, for patients with osteoporosis, adequate fixation within the bone-screw interface has continuously been difficult to achieve or has come with high risk of …

Can Anyone With Low Income Be Food Secure?: Mitigating Food Insecurity Among Low Income Households With Children In The Tampa Bay Area, Edgar Allan Amador

USF Tampa Graduate Theses and Dissertations

In the US over the last few years, approximately 14.5% of households experience food insecurity at some point throughout the year. While studies on food insecurity in the US have determined that household income and specifically income available to spend on food is of critical importance to food security, it is still unclear why some households with low income are able to maintain food security while others experience food insecurity in a pattern characterized as not constant but recurrent. This dissertation compares households with children at different levels of food security and insecurity using the USDA Core Food Security Module …

Analysis And Application Of Passive Gait Rehabilitation Methods, Ismet Handzic

USF Tampa Graduate Theses and Dissertations

Human gait is elegant and efficient in propelling the body forward. While a healthy human gait is symmetric, any deviation from symmetry can cause inefficiencies to the entire body. Such asymmetries may present themselves in hemiplegic patients, prosthetic users, lower limb injuries, limb height and weight discrepancies, or abnormal overground foot rolling. In this dissertation, practical passive methods to alleviate such asymmetric walking dynamics are presented. The novel concepts presented in this manuscript can all be related and applied to passive gait rehabilitation, that is, the rehabilitation of a person's gait through methods that do not require external power. One …

Are Gopher Tortosies (Gopherus Polyphemus Daudin) Comapatible With Cows?, Thomas William Hentges

USF Tampa Graduate Theses and Dissertations

Many Gopher Tortoise populations are in steep decline throughout Florida, and various measures have been attempted to curb the trend. One such measure is to relocate tortoises to protected recipient sites on private lands. The majority of private lands in Florida are used for cattle, however, production and the effect of cattle production on tortoises is not known. Here, I tested six parameters of tortoise behavior by monitoring 1403 gopher tortoises released at the Barthle Brothers Ranch, Pasco County Florida, between August 2009 and December 2012. The parameters tested were (1) burrow density, (2) burrow spacing, (3) burrow relocation, (4) …