Digital Commons Network^™

Can Waters Around Durney Key, Pasco County, Florida, Support Coral Recruitment To Artificial Substrates?, Kelley L. Anderson

USF Tampa Graduate Theses and Dissertations

To determine whether an artificial reef installation is feasible, there must be a thorough characterization of the habitat. An understanding of both small-scale and large-scale environmental processes is needed to determine factors that potentially will influence the reef. Large-scale processes include coastal circulation, wave climate, and sediment dynamics that take place over spatial scales of tens to hundreds of kilometers in the region of the reef. Small-scale processes include the physical characteristics in the immediate vicinity of the reef - the local current, wave and tide characteristics, temperature, salinity, and suspended and bottom sediments at a proposed reef site.

The …

Cancer Patients With Pain: Examination Of The Role Of The Spouse/Partner Relationship In Mediating Quality Of Life Outcomes For The Couple, Mary Ann Morgan

USF Tampa Graduate Theses and Dissertations

A diagnosis of cancer, regardless of type or site, raises much fear and loss of control for patients and their spouses. While being married is associated with lower mortality from a wide range of illnesses, including cancer, the quality of marital interactions and the relationship is the stronger predictor of health outcomes, rather than marital status. When people are faced with their greatest life challenges, they attach great importance to the behavior of their intimate partner, with trust being a key component of relationship quality, thus lending stability, and emotional and practical support. The purpose of this study was to …

Design And Testing Of A Lightweight Modular Seven-Degree-Of-Freedom Robot Arm For Mobile Use, Peter J. Schrock

USF Tampa Graduate Theses and Dissertations

Wheelchair-bound individuals who have limited or no upper-limb usage have difficulty with picking and placing of objects, opening doors, and other activities of daily living (ADLs), such as turning on a light switch or drinking from a cup. A wheelchair-mounted robot arm (WMRA) would aid individuals with completing ADLs and increase their independence, therefore an improved WMRA has been designed. Building upon previous WMRA research and incorporating research from industrial robot arms, carbon fiber tubing is the main component for the structure of the arm, a novel development for WMRAs. Factors that go into WMRA design include weight, speed, safety, …

Effects Of Age And Hearing Loss On Perception Of Dynamic Speech Cues, Mei-Wa Tam Szeto

USF Tampa Graduate Theses and Dissertations

Older listeners, both with and without hearing loss, often complain of difficulty understanding conversational speech. One reason for such difficulty may be a decreased ability to process the rapid changes in intensity, frequency, or temporal information that serve to differentiate speech sounds. Two important cues for the identification of stop consonants are the duration of the interruption of airflow (i.e., closure duration) and rapid spectral changes following the release of closure.

Many researchers have shown that age and hearing loss affect a listener's cue weighting strategies and trading relationship between spectral and temporal cues. The study of trading relationships between …

Blank Power: The Social And Political Criticism Of Blank Fiction And Cinema, Ashley Minix Donnelly

USF Tampa Graduate Theses and Dissertations

This dissertation explores a style of literature known as "blank" fiction that became popular in the United States in the mid-1980s, focusing on its stark, limited form, its minimal plots, its focus on commodification, and its scenes of graphic violence. The author presents the argument that filmmakers were producing pieces of cinema during the same time period that are similar in both form and content to the works of blank fiction. These films are a part of a style she labels "blank" cinema.

Blank fiction and cinema are politically charged and highly critical of the social and political situation in …

Monocytes As Gene Therapy Vectors For The Treatment Of Alzheimer’S Disease, Lori Ann Lebson

USF Tampa Graduate Theses and Dissertations

The accumulation of amyloid-ß; protein (Aß) in Alzheimer's disease (AD) is a well known pathological event. Decreasing the production or increasing the degradation of Aß; is therefore thought to serve as a potential therapeutic intervention in AD. Recent in vitro and in vivo studies have suggested that certain proteases may be involved in the catabolism of Aß; and defects in the degradation of Aß; could contribute to AD disease progression. Studies implicating the homing of monocytes to regions of CNS damage have led to the idea that it may be possible to use genetically modified monocytes to carry exogenous genes …

Investigation Of Visual Fields And Visually-Mediated Behavior In The Bonnethead Shark (Sphyrna Tiburo), Amy L. Osmon

USF Tampa Graduate Theses and Dissertations

The goal of this dissertation was to further examine the visual system and its importance to the bonnethead shark (Sphyrna tiburo). This species of hammerhead shark possesses the least amount of lateral cephalofoil expansion. Better understanding of their visual system and potential visually-mediated behaviors may increase understanding regarding adaptive benefits of their unique head shape. The dissertation revealed four factors regarding this species' visual system: 1) the extent of their optical visual fields span between 68-72 degrees laterally and cover their visual horizon, 2) they possess a fairly large (approximately 112 degree) blind spot directly in front of …

Culture Learning In Spanish Companion Book Websites: An Analysis Of Tasks, Angela Cresswell

USF Tampa Graduate Theses and Dissertations

The Internet with its World Wide Web feature opened up a whole new frontier for language-culture learning that foreign language textbook authors have integrated into their programs. Designing tasks that progress beyond promoting learners' passive consumerism and reiteration of facts remains a goal and a challenge. Thus, three research questions characterized this study that sought to examine the on-line tasks associated with six current Spanish textbook programs. The design focused on an analysis of these tasks in light of prevailing culture learning concepts and other pedagogical paradigms posited by reputable foreign language educators to determine if they filled the gap …

Owss And Mimo-Stc-Ofdm: Signaling Systems For The Next Generation Of High Speed Wireless Lans, Dinesh Divakaran

USF Tampa Graduate Theses and Dissertations

The current popularity of WLANs is a testament primarily to their convenience, cost efficiency and ease of integration. Even now the demand for high data rate wireless communications has increased fourfold as consumers demand better multimedia communications over the wireless medium. The next generation of high speed WLANs is expected to meet this increased demand for capacity coupled with high performance and spectral efficiency. The current generation of WLANs utilizes Orthogonal Frequency Division Multiplexing (OFDM) modulation. The next generation of WLAN standards can be made possible either by developing a different modulation technique or combining legacy OFDM with Multiple Input …

Reburb: Redefining The Suburban Family Unit Under A New Construction Ecology, Matthew A. Lobeck

USF Tampa Graduate Theses and Dissertations

“Our structures might be machines for living in, but there was no longer much about them that was alive.”

-William McDonough, Cradle to Cradle

Home ownership is a significant driver within American culture. In Florida single-family homes represent one of the largest components of our built surroundings, significantly impacting the environment through material use and energy consumption. Currently, homes typically are built with little regard to the environmental context. By designing for the immediate goal of separation from the elements, they do not provide for convenient spatial expansion or adaptability, using material assemblies that do not lend themselves to be …

Re-Establishing Place Through Knowledge: A Facility For Earth Construction Education In Pisco, Peru, Hannah Jo Sebastian

USF Tampa Graduate Theses and Dissertations

Human vulnerability can be characterized as people living with uncertain livelihood options, precariously settled in structurally unsafe buildings. A striking aspect of this vulnerability is the large number of people living in earthen structures within seismically active zones. This reality is exemplified by the earthquake which occurred this past summer around Pisco, Peru. The earthquake caused enormous damage to more than 80% of the adobe buildings. Although confined masonry is the preferred construction technique for families who can afford it, adobe is still the only economically viable alternative for most.

Presently reconstruction efforts are focused on encouraging residents to build …

Fault-Tolerant Adaptive Model Predictive Control Using Joint Kalman Filter For Small-Scale Helicopter, Carlos L. Castillo

USF Tampa Graduate Theses and Dissertations

A novel application is presented for a fault-tolerant adaptive model predictive control system for small-scale helicopters. The use of a joint Extended Kalman Filter, (EKF), for the estimation of the states and parameters of the UAV, provided the advantage of implementation simplicity and accuracy. A linear model of a small-scale helicopter was utilized for testing the proposed control system. The results, obtained through the simulation of different fault scenarios, demonstrated that the proposed scheme was able to handle different types of actuator and system faults effectively. The types of faults considered were represented in the parameters of the mathematical representation …

Discrete Linear Constrained Multivariate Optimization For Power Sources Of Mobile Systems, Stelios G. Ioannou

USF Tampa Graduate Theses and Dissertations

Unmanned ground and aerial vehicles (UGVs and UAVs) have strict payload limitations, limited free space affecting on board power availability resulting in limited endurance and operational range. This limitation is exacerbated by the addition of sensors, actuators and other related equipment needed to accomplish mission objectives in diverse applications.

Two energy sources are mainly available for mobile applications; batteries and fuel cells. Batteries are a relatively cheap, tested technology with good performance under varying loads. On the other hand, fuel cells offer fast and easy refueling solutions. Furthermore, preliminary studies have shown that a hybrid system can combine the advantages …

The Virtual Landscape Of Geological Information Topics, Methods, And Rhetoric In Modern Geology, Sarah Elizabeth Fratesi

USF Tampa Graduate Theses and Dissertations

Geology is undergoing changes that could influence its knowledge claims, reportedly becoming more laboratory-based, technology-driven, quantitative, and physics- and chemistry-rich over time. This dissertation uses techniques from information science and linguistics to examine the geologic literature of 1945-2005. It consists of two studies: an examination of the geological literature as an expanding network of related subdisciplines, and an investigation of the linguistic and graphical argumentation strategies within geological journal articles.

The first investigation is a large-scale study of topics within articles from 67 geologic journals. Clustering of subdiscipline journals based on titles and keywords reveals six major areas of geology: …

Talking With Exotic Pet Owners: Exploratory Audience Research On Wildlife Television And Human-Animal Interactions, Susannah L. Smith

USF Tampa Graduate Theses and Dissertations

This qualitative grounded study explores the potential relationship between wildlife TV viewing and human-animal interactions for exotic pet owners. The method involved 13 in-depth interviews and a qualifying open-ended questionnaire with 37 individuals. The interviews gathered viewers' interpretations of two different human-wildlife interactions on TV and served as a launching point for discussion. Findings supported the literature in that wildlife TV was an important source of information, emotion, and contradictory messages. Themes also emerged regarding participants' characterizations of their relationships with their pets. Drawing from social cognitive theory, this thesis suggests the following potential motivators for participants to model animal …

Socializing Housing Phased Early Response To Impromptu Migrant Encampments In Lima, Peru, Raul E. Mayta

USF Tampa Graduate Theses and Dissertations

Every year hundreds of people migrate from the highlands of Peru to the coastal capital of Lima searching for economic and social stability. These groups of people have similar characteristics that keep them together they come from the same city, are members of the same family, have the same religion, have similar goals, and so on. Once in Lima they take possession of the only free areas left in the city: the mountains. Due to a lack of economic resources, poor urban planning and unsuitable site conditions the settlements grow for years in a disorderly, unsafe and unsanitary way, creating …

Beyond Risk Factors: The Theoretical Contextualization Of Illicit Adhd Medication Use Among High School Students, William Christopher Watkins

USF Tampa Graduate Theses and Dissertations

Prescription ADHD medication has been shown to be on the rise as a drug of abuse among young people. Unlike other drugs that serve only the purpose of achieving a high, this particular substance can also be perceived as useful and beneficial by those who abuse it. It is these positive attributes given to the illicit use of these drugs that make them so dangerous, especially in the hands of youths. To date extant research has made little effort to contextualize this type of drug use within theories of deviance. This study looks to fill that void as well as …

High-Level Synthesis Framework For Crosstalk Minimization In Vlsi Asics, Hariharan Sankaran

USF Tampa Graduate Theses and Dissertations

Capacitive crosstalk noise can affect the delay of a switching signal or induce a glitch on a static signal causing timing violations or chip failure. Crosstalk noise depends on coupling parasitics, driver strength, signal timing characteristics, and signal transition patterns. Layout level crosstalk analysis techniques are generally pessimistic and computationally expensive for large designs due to lack of design flexibility at lower-levels of design hierarchy. The architectural decisions such as type of interconnect architecture, number of storage and execution units, network of communicating units, data bus width, etc., have a major impact on the quality of design attributes such as …

Reconstructions: The Contemporary Southern Landscape By Its Photographers, Natalie Kersey Gillis

USF Tampa Graduate Theses and Dissertations

The purpose of this thesis is to examine the work of landscape photographers living and working in the Southern region of the United States and to explore what their images visually communicate about their relationship to the Southern land and its distinctive history. This objective is accomplished through an analysis of the work of three contemporary landscape photographers who reside in the South, and work primarily within their local hometowns.

This thesis examines the work of photographers William Christenberry, Sally Mann, and John McWilliams. Each is a photographer who is native to the American South and has used his or …

Protecting The Self: An Ethnographic Study Of Emotion Management Among Child Protective Investigators, Aaron Christopher Howell

USF Tampa Graduate Theses and Dissertations

The question that I investigate here is what emotion work is performed by child protective investigators in order to be successful at their work, and how do they manage these emotional challenges within a community of their peers? Many different workers, from airline employees (Hochschild, 1983) to mortuary science students (Cahill, 1999) to 911 operators (Shuler & Sypher, 2000), have been studied to examine strategies and effects of emotion management. Yet scholars do not agree on whether emotion management at work is positive or negative.

For my research, I conducted interviews with ten investigators and observed a night unit of …

Thin Film Metal-Insulator-Metal Tunnel Junctions For Millimeter Wave Detection, Subramanian Krishnan

USF Tampa Graduate Theses and Dissertations

Millimeter wave imaging systems are the next generation imaging systems being developed for security and surveillance purposes. In this work, thin film metal-insulator-metal (MIM) tunnel junction based detector using Ni-NiO-Cr has been developed for the first time for millimeter wave detection operating at 94 GHz. Extensive process development has been carried out to fabricate the MIM junctions. Arrays of MIM junctions with 1 µm² contact area and ultra-thin insulator layer of ~3 nanometer have been developed using e-beam lithography and reactive sputtering, respectively. MIM diodes were also fabricated in a bulk-micromachined diaphragm configuration to minimize surface wave loss.

DC and …

Nanomanufacturing Of Silica Nanowires: Synthesis, Characterization And Applications, Praveen Kumar Sekhar

USF Tampa Graduate Theses and Dissertations

In this research, selective and bottom-up manufacturing of silica nanowires on silicon (Si) and its applications has been investigated. Localized synthesis of these nanowires on Si was achieved by metal thin film catalysis and metal ion implantation based seeding approach. The growth mechanism of the nanowires followed a vapor-liquid-solid (VLS) mechanism. Mass manufacturing aspects such as growth rate, re-usability of the substrate and experimental growth model were also investigated. Further, silica nanowires were explored as surface enhanced Raman (SER) substrate and immunoassay templates towards optical and electrochemical detection of cancer biomarkers respectively. Investigating their use in photonic applications, optically active …

The Process Of Change Experienced By Pre-Service And In-Service Social Studies Teachers In An Online Content Area Reading Course, Aimee L. Alexander-Shea

USF Tampa Graduate Theses and Dissertations

With the passing of the No Child Left Behind Act of 2001 and subsequent high-stakes tests, including the Florida Comprehensive Assessment Test (FCAT), literacy has become top priority in the field of education (Florida Department of Education [FDOE], no date a; NCLB, 2002). Though social studies was not mentioned in NCLB, nor is it tested by the FCAT, social studies teachers are expected to teach literacy skills in their classrooms. Social studies teachers' accountability for literacy enhancement is evidenced by the fact that some states, including Florida, now require social studies teachers to complete a course in reading integration to …

Involvement Of Mesolimbic D2 Receptors And Accumbal Dopamine Levels In The Reinstatement Of Cocaine Place Preferences In Developing Rats, Kimberly A. Badanich

USF Tampa Graduate Theses and Dissertations

Psychostimulant-induced reinstatement of place preferences have been used to investigate underlying physiological mechanisms mediating drug-seeking behavior in adolescent and adult rodents; however, it is still unclear how psychostimulant exposure during adolescence affects neuronal communication in the mesolimbic dopamine (DA) pathway and whether these changes would elicit enhanced drug-seeking behavior later in adulthood. The aim of the present study was to investigate the effects of intra-ventral tegmental area (VTA) or intra-nucleus accumbens septi (NAcc) DA D2 receptor antagonist infusions on cocaine-induced reinstatement of cocaine place conditioning in high and low responders for cocaine reward. Adolescent rats were exposed to cocaine place …

Supervision In School Psychology: Assessing The Relationship With Professional Practices, Vicki Dumois Papaemaneul

USF Tampa Graduate Theses and Dissertations

The present study examined the relationship between the occurrence of reported supervision and the professional practices of school psychologists. Information provided by more than 1,700 school psychologists in response to the National Association of School Psychologists: Demographic and Professional Practices Survey 1999-2000 School Year - NASP-DPPS 2000 survey were used to create the 1999-2000 national database (Curtis, et al., 2000) and served as the basis for secondary analyses in the current study. The NASPDPPS 2000 collected information regarding the demographic characteristics, employment conditions and professional practices of school psychologists the United States.

Correlational and multiple regression analyses were completed to …

Investigation And Evaluation Of A Bi-Polar Membrane Based Seawater Concentration Cell And Its Suitability As A Low Power Energy Source For Energy Harvesting/Mems Devices, Clifford Ronald Merz

USF Tampa Graduate Theses and Dissertations

It has long been known from Thermodynamics and written in technical literature that, in principal, instant energy can be made available when dilute and concentrated solutions are mixed. For example, a river flowing into the sea carries with it a physical-chemical potential energy in its low salt content, some of which should be recoverable. As also known, a naturally occurring, diffusion-driven, spontaneous transport of ions occurs throughout a solution matrix, thru barrier interfaces, or thru ion-selective membranes from the side containing the salts of higher concentration to the compartments containing the more dilute solution to effect the equalization of concentration …

The Social Context Of Stress And Social Support Among Immigrant Latinas Diagnosed With Breast Cancer, Dinorah Martinez Tyson

USF Tampa Graduate Theses and Dissertations

Social support plays a crucial role in both the physical and mental adjustment to the diagnosis of breast cancer and its treatment. However, the mediating effects of social support are embedded within the larger, social and cultural contexts in which support given and received. Due to language, culture and economic issues, immigrants may find themselves without the social support and networks that had previously enabled them to cope with illness and disease. This research grounds our understanding of social support and breast cancer within that larger context that includes the social environment and the experience of health disparities.

Ethnographic methods …

Gender, Sport & Nationalism: The Cases Of Canada And India, Courtney Glass

USF Tampa Graduate Theses and Dissertations

This research seeks to explore the gendered nature of nationalisms and the ways that they can be challenged and perhaps transformed through the participation of women in sport at the national level. Nationalism is part of the public sphere, while women have historically been relegated to the private sphere. However, many scholars argue that women do in fact taken part in nation building primarily as biological reproducers of the nation. This has led scholars to conclude that nationalism is indeed gendered. Sport has traditionally been a masculine domain where conceptions of hegemonic masculinity as well as the nation are developed …

Development Of A Software-Defined Integrated Circuit Test System Using A System Engineering Approach On A Pxi Platform, Alfonso S. Flores

USF Tampa Graduate Theses and Dissertations

There are various types of test performed on Integrated Circuits, (IC), for detecting and locating defects and faults during failure analysis. Functional, logic, parametric and I_DDQ tests are among the most common. Functional IC tests are designed to verify whether the IC performs its intended function. Logic tests verify the logic operation of gates and registers. AC and DC parametric tests are used to measure time, voltage and current-varying parameters associated with the operational limits of the IC. Test parameters in parametric testing include, among others, propagation delay, operating current and signals rise and fall time.

Currently, almost all …

Seepage Rates In Closed Basins, Volha Martysevich

USF Tampa Graduate Theses and Dissertations

Seepage is an important component of the water budget in closed basins that do not have surface water drainage features. In the shallow water table environment of Florida, internal drainage of soil controls flooding. With the recent rapid population growth and urban development in the state, a simple, field-based method is needed to estimate seepage rates. In this study five locations in Hillsborough County, Florida, were instrumented with wells with pressure transducers measuring water level fluctuations at 1 minute resolution. For closed basins with lakes, evaporation (E) rates were determined using data from a weather station and Penman-Monteith FAO56 method, …