Digital Commons Network^™

Building Community: An Environmental Approach To Crime Prevention, Gustavo A. Barreto

LSU Master's Theses

Crime cannot be understood as a single-solution problem. Participation of the community is important to complement and make more efficient any program of crime control by police authorities or any other law enforcement agency. This thesis is intended to create consciousness among designers of the urban environment of their social role. Cities must include places to promote community interaction and formation of social bonds. As social bonds among residents increase, and bonds with the place begin building a sense of territoriality in the community, the residents become active defenders of the place against crime. A theory summary presents different and …

Development Of Low-Fat Sugar-Free Orange Sherbet Containing Soy Protein, Jonathan Aaron Walker

LSU Master's Theses

Consumer interest in healthy eating and self-medication is not just a passing fad. Soy-based products have become increasingly popular and gradually moved into the mainstream market. Many consumers associate soy with a healthy consumption pattern. Development of frozen desserts that indulge consumers’ eating desire, yet provide potential health benefits, is a challenge. Product appraisal to identify specific sensory attributes driving product acceptance is vital to the introduction of this new product. This thesis research was designed to develop low-fat sugar-free orange sherbet products containing soy protein and to determine the consumer sensory profile driving product acceptance and purchase intent. Two …

Glacial Deposits, Vol. 30, 2001-2002, Department Of Geography-Geology

Glacial Deposits

Newsletter of the Department of Geography-Geology

Mixed-Symmetry Shell-Model Calculations In Nuclear Physics, Vesselin Gueorguiev Gueorguiev

LSU Doctoral Dissertations

Advances in computer technologies allow calculations in ever larger model spaces. To keep our understanding growing along with this growth in computational power, we consider a novel approach to the nuclear shell model. The one-dimensional harmonic oscillator in a box is used to introduce the concept of an oblique-basis shell-model theory. By implementing the Lanczos method for diagonalization of large matrices, and the Cholesky algorithm for solving generalized eigenvalue problems, the method is applied to nuclei. The mixed-symmetry basis combines traditional spherical shell-model states with SU(3) collective configurations. We test the validity of this mixed-symmetry scheme on ²⁴Mg and …

Standing Liberty And Other Stories, Richard Buchholz

LSU Master's Theses

This miscellany represents the pick of the vignettes, tales, and anecdotes the author has gathered and spun out over the past few years. Personal experience, with the exception of a few inessential details, is not represented. The influence of ragtime music, which played with relentless syncopation in the author's head as he composed with pencil and yellow pad, may be discernable to those who take the trouble to read the sentences aloud.

Tapered Liga Mold Insert, Ryan Anthony Turner

LSU Master's Theses

The applications of microstructures produced by the LIGA process are useful in a broad range of fields including: microfluidics, heat transfer, and mechanics. The Microsystems Engineering Team at Louisiana State University has used the LIGA process as a foundation for the team’s productivity in these areas. Many advances in the processes involved in producing these microstructures have been made in the past increasing the efficiency of the entire process. A modified exposure technique in the lithography stage of the LIGA process is being developed to produce microstructures with a draft angle as opposed to the standard straight walled structures. Electroformed …

Synthesis And Study Of New Materials For The Visual Detection Of Biomolecules, Ming He

LSU Doctoral Dissertations

The visual determination of saccharides has been of interest for well over a century. Sugars are a relatively challenging class of compounds to analyze. They exhibit great structural similarity as well as transparency in the visible region. The sensing of specific saccharides could aid the monitoring of disease or industrial fermentation products. Herein I present new methods allowing for simple and rapid visual detection of sialic acid, fructose and a homologous series of prototypical neutral oligosaccharides, the linear maltodextrins, containing up to seven glucose residues. The new methods allow for selective color detection of fructose in a large excess of …

Making The Grade: Some Principles Of Comparative Grading, Jeffrey E. Stake

Articles by Maurer Faculty

No abstract provided.

Experience-Based Language Acquisition: A Computational Model Of Human Language Acquisition, Brian Edward Pangburn

LSU Doctoral Dissertations

Almost from the very beginning of the digital age, people have sought better ways to communicate with computers. This research investigates how computers might be enabled to understand natural language in a more humanlike way. Based, in part, on cognitive development in infants, we introduce an open computational framework for visual perception and grounded language acquisition called Experience-Based Language Acquisition (EBLA). EBLA can “watch” a series of short videos and acquire a simple language of nouns and verbs corresponding to the objects and object-object relations in those videos. Upon acquiring this protolanguage, EBLA can perform basic scene analysis to generate …

Sugar Cane Yield Monitoring System, Caryn Elizabeth Benjamin

LSU Master's Theses

This project involved the design and testing of a sugar cane yield monitoring system during the 1999 and 2000-harvest seasons. The system was mounted on a CAMECO CH 2500 1997 sugar cane combine. The sugar cane yield monitoring system consisted of a scale, a data acquisition system, and a differential global positioning system (DGPS). The scale consisted of a weigh plate supported by load cell(s). The load cell(s) were supported by a protective box, which mounted to the frame of the harvester. The scale, which was mounted in the floor of the elevator, directly recorded instantaneous measurements of the sugar …

Television And Video Game Violence: Age Differences And The Combined Effects Of Passive And Interactive Violent Media, Kelly Stephen Meyers

LSU Doctoral Dissertations

The present research examined the combined effects of violent video games and violent TV programs on third and sixth-grade boys’ thoughts and behavior. In individual sessions, demographic information about the children’s television viewing and video game playing habits was collected. Participants were exposed to one of six following media conditions for 15 minutes; a) watch a violent (wrestling) or a non-violent video segment (basketball), b) play a violent or a non-violent game, or c) watch a violent or non-violent video segment and then play a video game containing the same characters and content. The potential for violent media to prime …

Social Exchange And Customer Service: The Relationship Between Perceived Organizational Support, Leader-Member Exchange, And Customer Service Behavior, Lisa Michelle Polly

LSU Doctoral Dissertations

As the economy continues to shift from the production of goods to the delivery of services, one way in which an organization might set itself apart from its competition is through the delivery of high quality customer service. Therefore, a critical question for organizations becomes how to elicit the appropriate level of service from its employees. The purpose of the current study was to propose and test a social exchange based model of customer service. Specifically, it was suggested that the quality of the organization-service employee and manager-service employee relationships would be related to employee customer service behavior through their …

Hybridity, Piracy, And The Liumang (Hooliganism) In Modern Chinese Culture, Kerry Fender

Undergraduate Theses and Senior Projects

No abstract provided.

Contemporary Portraiture, Sharon Ennis

Undergraduate Theses and Senior Projects

No abstract provided.

How The Media Are Portrayed In Print Advertisements: A Content Analysis Of Magazine Advertisements Throughout The Twentieth Century, Kathryn Elizabeth Burke

LSU Master's Theses

This study examines the portrayal of media within print advertisements found in Harper's Magazine between 1931 and 2000. This study evaluated a number of categories to provide understanding of the role of media within society, specifically the portrayal of gender and media use, how media are used in society and the perceived class within the advertisements featuring media products. The study also looked at the Diffusion of Innovation Theory, which states that a socioeconomic elite group are the first people within a society to adopt new ideas or technologies. A content analysis, both quantitative and qualitative, of Harper's Magazine produced …

Predicting Electron Insert Output Factors At Nominal And Extended Source To Surface Distance, Ahmet Bulut

LSU Master's Theses

Two Varian linear accelerators were used to test the modified sector-integration method. This method can predict the electron insert factor for arbitrary inserts at different source to surface distances (SSD). The effective source distances (SSD_eff) and insert factors (IF) for several accelerators are compared. The relationship of IF and SSD_eff for machine type, energy, cone size, insert size and SSD is presented. The results were fed into the electron output determination module of an existing monitor unit calculator (MUCalc) which uses the modified sector integration method. Prediction and measurements were compared for various clinical inserts at several …

The Blues In Three Parts: A Collection Of Poetry, Short Stories, And A Screenplay, Desha Tolar Kelly

LSU Master's Theses

This thesis is entitled, “The Blues in Three Parts: A Collection of Poetry, Short Stories, and a Screenplay.” The first part, a collection of poetry, contains themes of childhood and adolescence, love and loss, life struggles, writing, and death. The second part, a collection of short stories, contains five stories centered on similar themes. The third and final part, a screenplay entitled “Cow”, contains elements of the first two parts as well. The epigraph, which contemplates the idea that the blues is not only music, but all the ups and downs of life, sets the stage for the central thread, …

Characterization And Localization Of The Genes Encoding The Human And Mouse Isoforms Of Succinyl-Coa Synthetase, Brian Thomson

Undergraduate Theses and Senior Projects

No abstract provided.

The Effect Of Initial Selections In Estimating The Missing Comparisons In An Incomplete Ahp Matrix, Sugeng Setiawan

LSU Master's Theses

One of the most widely used methods in decision-making is the Analytic Hierarchy Process (AHP). With its technique of comparing the alternatives by means of a sequence of pairwise comparison matrices, the AHP is both easy to understand and very versatile. This research aims at contributing some insights on this method, in particular, regarding to what is known as the incomplete AHP. The core of this research is to investigate whether the initial comparisons used to extract the data for a multi-criteria decision making problem, will play a role in producing a relatively accurate estimation of the ranking of the …

American Transcendental Vision: Emerson To Chaplin, Bill R. Scalia

LSU Doctoral Dissertations

Ralph Waldo Emerson's publication of Nature in 1836 began a process of creating a new condition of American thinking, severed from European cultural and intellectual influences. The subsequent lectures The American Scholar and The Divinity School Address furthered this process, calling for an original American literature. Emerson's writing called consistently for poets with the ability to "see" past the material, apparent world to the world of eternal forms, which shaped nature in accordance with a divine moral imperative. Through this connection, man-as-poet would discover God in himself. In short, Emerson effectively transferred divinity from Unitarian doctrine to the individual, thereby …

Organizational Culture's Contributions To Security Failures Within The United States Intelligence Community, Troy Michael Mouton

LSU Master's Theses

The institutions that comprise the United States intelligence community have organizational cultures that are unique from other government agencies. These cultures encourage the development and retention of traits that are necessary to mission accomplishment, yet these exclusivities also hamstring organizations and may contribute to significant security failures. This thesis isolates elements of organizational culture that are specific to the United States intelligence community and explores the extent to which the culture is responsible for security and/or counterintelligence shortcomings. The author selected three governmental organizations with intelligence collection and analysis functions; they include the Naval Investigative Service (NIS), Central Intelligence Agency …

Analysis Of Diagnostic Testing Of Sustained Casing Pressure In Wells, Rong Xu

LSU Doctoral Dissertations

Over 8,000 wells in the Gulf of Mexico exhibit sustained casing pressure (SCP). SCP is defined as “any measurable casing pressure that rebuilds after being bled down, attributable to cause(s) other than artificially applied pressures or temperature fluctuations in the well”. The Minerals Management Service (MMS) regulations consider SCP hazardous and, in principle, require its elimination. In some cases the agency may allow continuing production at a well with SCP by granting a temporary “departure” permit. The departure permits are based on diagnostic tests involving pressure bleed-down through a 0.5-inch needle valve followed by closing the valve and recording pressure …

The Effects Of Songs In The Foreign Language Classroom On Text Recall And Involuntary Mental Rehearsal, Claudia Smith Salcedo

LSU Doctoral Dissertations

This study investigated the effect of music on text recall and involuntary mental rehearsal (din) with students from four college-level Beginning Spanish classes. Two groups heard texts as songs, one group heard the same texts as speech, and one group was the control group. For the text recall variable, a cloze test was administered at the end of each song treatment to determine total words recalled. Students from one of the music groups heard the melody of the song while testing. For the din variable, students were asked to report on the amount of this phenomenon experienced. Data was collected …

Aspects Of Cognition In Human Mate Selection, Michael J. Stasio

LSU Doctoral Dissertations

Evolutionary perspectives on human mating have provided testable hypotheses regarding what qualities people desire in their mates and why they want them. One study was conducted to replicate previous findings in mate preference using a more sophisticated paired comparison methodology to develop scales. Paired comparison scaling generally replicated gender differences in mate preferences consistent with evolutionary predictions. Further, decision-making reaction time (ms) suggested the presence of an underlying psychological continuum of selection criteria. A series of studies were then conducted applying the information processing approach (IPA) to investigate attention and knowledge organization in mate preference. The dot-probe paradigm was used …

A Study Of The Effect Of Multisensory Writing Instruction On The Written Expression Of The Dyslexic Elementary Child, Carolyn Williams Gore

LSU Doctoral Dissertations

Dyslexic students struggle to read and write at a level commensurate with their intellectual ability. This study examines the impact of remedial instruction on reading and writing progress of six fourth grade students chosen from three different schools within one school district. These six students, all males, had been previously identified as having characteristics of dyslexia as defined by the protocol in their school district. The remedial instruction for these students was provided in a pullout setting by one itinerant teacher. The instruction was administered in two forty-minute sessions over a period of thirteen weeks. Project Read Written Expression was …

Delayed Phytotoxicity Syndrome In Louisiana Rice Caused By The Use Of Thiobencarb Herbicide, Chiliang Chen

LSU Doctoral Dissertations

Thiobencarb (TB), widely used for the control of broadleaf weeds, grasses, and sedges in rice fields, is considered safe for rice plants when used at recommended rates. TB's reductive dechlorination product, dechlorinated thiobencarb (DTB), is highly toxic to rice. TB is naturally transformed into DTB in field soils in certain areas in Japan and the United States. The resultant syndrome is called delayed phytotoxicity syndrome (DPS). This research was conducted to characterize DPS in Louisiana, to compare the toxicity of TB and DTB to rice, to determine uptake and retention rates of TB and DTB by rice, to confirm that …

The Threepenny Opera: Designing Lights With Brecht A Production Thesis In Theatre Design And Technology, Brent Landry Glenn

LSU Master's Theses

The lighting design for this production of The Threepenny Opera by Bertolt Brecht was selected and approved for my thesis in the autumn of 2001. This thesis represents a written account of the lighting design as it was conceived, developed and executed. It contains a brief analysis of Brechtian theory, a production journal describing the major events of the design process, a cue description, records of research, photographic and literary evidence of the realized product, and a personal evaluation of both the process and outcome.

Anticompetitive Concerns Of Internet Bases B2b Marketplaces: Information Sharing, Collusion And Monopsony Power, Michael Stajer

UC Law Journal

One estimate puts the number of B2B marketplaces currently in existence at over 700, with a growth to 5000 within 2 years, while Jupiter Research has estimated that up to 1500 such marketplaces are currently in existence. Marketplaces serving the aeronautics, automobile, farming, consumer products, paper, medical products and retailing industries have been announced or are already operating. The rush to develop exchanges that promise lower procurement costs, lower cost of goods, and efficiencies in developing and marketing products has enabled many marketplaces to develop without much attention to potential anticompetitive problems.

In their rush to market these marketplaces failed …

Seeing Double: The Ethics Of Human Cloning, Margaret R. Mclean

UC Law Journal

No abstract provided.

Is There A Constitutional Right To Clone, Cass R. Sunstein

UC Law Journal

Recent scientific innovations, and proposed legislation have raised - questions about the nature of the constitutional right to reproductive freedom, and in particular about whether there is a constitutional "right to clone." This Essay urges that as a matter of substantive due process, rationality review is probably appropriate, and that restrictions on both reproductive and therapeutic cloning would and should survive constitutional scrutiny. At the same time, many of the arguments for banning both forms of cloning are based on ignorance, myths, and speculation. It is extremely important to distinguish between reproductive and nonreproductive cloning, and it is equally important …