Digital Commons Network^™

Rend: Reliable And Energy-Efficient Node-Disjoint Paths In Wireless Sensor Networks, Siva Yanteru

Computer Science

In wireless sensor networks, finding most reliable and most efficient paths between source node and destination node is considered NP hard problem. We can increase reliability by ability to find node-disjoint alternate path when there is any disruption in the path from source to destination. If we can find reliable paths by keeping efficiency in consideration then we can increase both reliability and efficiency of paths between source and destination. In this paper, we present routing protocol for finding two node-disjoint paths between each pair of nodes in a wireless sensor networks. In proposed protocol, each and every node has …

Athletic Fundraising And University Development Offices: A Structurational Relationship, Keith Michael Dickhudt

Computer Science

This case study examines the working relationship between an athletic department and a central development office within a university. This study focuses primarily on the coordination of fundraising efforts between the two offices. A qualitative approach, using a structuration theoretical framework, presents the working relationship at Midwestern State University (MWSU) through in-depth interviews. Results suggest the two offices could improve the coordination of fundraising efforts. Recommendations, based on the results and theoretical framework, are given.

Achieving A Sustainable Concrete Design And Construction, Ankush Satishchandra Agrawal

Construction Management and Engineering

Concrete is one of the key materials in the construction industry. But today, the use of concrete and its production has become a matter of environmental concern throughout the world. This statement is true especially for the manufacturing process of cement. One of the major problems is emission of CO2 gas into the atmosphere during the manufacturing of cement. Every ton of concrete produced leads to emission of one ton of carbon dioxide gas. Hence replacement of cement by alternative materials has been investigated by many researchers. In the past, fly ash has been the most common replacement. This study, …

Voter Disenfranchisement, Timothy Walter Peterson

Criminal Justice and Political Science

This paper examines the policy of voter disenfranchisement and how it disproportionately affects minorities. Voter disenfranchisement is the denial of voting rights to the criminally convicted. The research indicates African Americans are significantly disproportionally affected by this policy when compared to white Americans. Currently, the United States Supreme Court has allowed states to incorporate their own policy for disenfranchising felons residing in their state. The recommendation of this paper is to create a uniform policy for voter disenfranchisement among the fifty states, which would allow for any eligible voter living in the community to vote. The policy would only deny …

Arts In Architecture, John Holten

Architecture Theses

The fine arts can be viewed as divine marker to a cultural identity. As a non-essential activity to the survival of man, arts are infused with all of the free thought of the contemporary. More specifically, theatre is a direct correlation between the arts, architecture, and the human body; making a direct connection between culture and the built form. Even as cultural evolution transends generations the link between arts and architecture will be finite. Grand Forks, North Dakota has an ever-expanding culture of arts. Rapid growth brings the possibility of great change and has the potential to spark new ideas. …

Maintaining The Integrity Of The Public Library Building In The Digital Age, Alexander J. Engle

Architecture Theses

Today’s public library building sits in a peculiar position as media changes from the tactile to the digital. The thesis aims to illustrate the continued importance of the library as a physical place within the community. No longer a place simply to store books, the library has become a place for human interaction, a place for public discourse, and a place for continued education. Far from obsoletion, the public library building will continue to be a crucial place within the community for many years to come. A Mixed Method approach to research will be used, gathering both quantitative and qualitative …

Methods For Ethanol Production From The Enzymatic Hydrolysis And Fermentation Of Sugar Beet Pulp, Rachel Elizabeth Rorick

Agribusiness and Biosystems Engineering

Sugar beet pulp (SBP), the residue remaining after sucrose extraction, is currently sold as an animal feed. Humans cannot digest the cellulose in the pulp unlike ruminant animals. The pulp is primarily comprised of cellulose, hemicellulose, and pectin which can be hydrolyzed with commercial enzymes into fermentable sugars such as, glucose, arabinose, galacturonic acid, xylose, and galactose. These sugars can be fermented to produce ethanol. This research tested the variation of several enzymes, enzyme loading rates, solids loading rates, and fermenting organisms to increase ethanol yields from sugar beet pulp. Several commercial enzymes (cellulases, hemicellulases, pectinases, and proteases) were tested …

Introduction To America's Four Gods: What We Say About God And What That Says About Us, Paul Froese, Christoper Bader

Sociology Faculty Books and Book Chapters

Despite all the hype surrounding the "New Atheism," the United States remains one of the most religious nations on Earth. In fact, 95% of Americans believe in God--a level of agreement rarely seen in American life. The greatest divisions in America are not between atheists and believers, or even between people of different faiths. What divides us, this groundbreaking book shows, is how we conceive of God and the role He plays in our daily lives.

America's Four Gods draws on the most wide-ranging, comprehensive, and illuminating survey of American's religious beliefs ever conducted to offer a systematic exploration of …

The Religious Divide: Why Religion Seems To Be Thriving In The United States And Waning In Europe, Steven Pfaff

Sociology Faculty Books and Book Chapters

"In the decades following the Second World War, most social scientists expected convergence among the Western industrial democracies. Modernization was expected to bring prosperity and opportunity, initiating a “culture shift” to posttraditional values and lifestyles.

However, in recent years observers have remarked on a growing divide between Europeans and Americans. This divergence may be nowhere greater than in the religious sphere. While faith is loudly proclaimed and a bustling diversity of religious organizations jostles for attention in all arenas of public life in the United States, the European Union (EU) is described as thoroughly secularized, comprised of societies in which …

Elements Of The Office Workspace, Michael Stueven

Architecture Theses

When examining office buildings in the world today, it is proper to look deeper at the correlation between productivity and the environments in which people work. In analyzing the office spaces, studies have shown that elements, such as the amount of natural light and views seen from each individual space can influence productivity. Designing an office environment in a manner that incorporates the natural environment works toward increasing productivity of workers occupying the building. Focusing on the qualitative aspects of the working environment, this research is directed towards the productivity of the office environment in relation to the natural environment. …

Our Top 12 "Key Instructional Elements" That Help To Build An Excellent Lesson And High Quality Physical Education Program, Robert S. Christenson, David C. Barney

Faculty Publications

One of the most fundamental issues in teaching, arguably the biggest, is discovering the most effective lesson elements for each group of learners. This includes a solid curriculum, performance objectives, age-appropriate pedagogical ingredients, ability-level activities and assessments focused on measuring learning to create a great lesson. When these elements are blended artistically with a variety of classroom management skills, necessary equipment, instructional support resources, behavior management rules and high expectations in a nurturing environment, the teacher has created the best possible learning atmosphere for each individual student.

Below, the authors have identified twelve important instructional elements for teachers to incorporate …

Pedesign, Jean Beaupre

Landscape Architecture Theses

This thesis sets out to explore planning alternatives that function for pedestrians instead of vehicular traffic. Setting new standards and development process will help for a long and successful community but understanding that does not always come with low price tag is a fact of life. Large scale changes like infrastructure of roads down to signage requirements are changes that need to be implemented in order to result in a pedestrian friendly community. The introduction of mass-transit to a economical well rounded area can be risky but will only value and integrity to the entire metro area. The most important …

Factors Influencing The Implementation Of Community-Wide Recycling Programs, Brian James Fier

Natural Resources Management

The purpose of this study was to determine how the social, economic, political, and administrative factors within a community influence the implementation of community-wide recycling programs. More specifically, this study examined how factors such as urban or rural character, population size, and public/private partnerships influence recycling decisions. The study explored the steps that could be taken to implement a community-wide recycling program and examined how factors such as the size ofthe community's population and its urban or rural nature influence decisions to implement community-wide recycling programs. A mixed methods approach, with a focus on interviews with recycling officials, was used …

Assessment Of Ecotourism On Community Development: Case Of Ecotourism And The Ely Community, Boubacar Hassane Oumarou

Natural Resources Management

This study evaluated ecotourism in Ely, Minnesota, gateway to the Boundary Waters Canoe Area Wilderness and the International Wolf Center. The study used Flora and Flora's (2008) community capitals framework to assess ecotourism effects on the community's capitals namely, natural, cultural, financial, built, human, social, and political capitals. For each of these capitals; postal and email correspondences, phone calls, and internet searches were used to collect government surveys, statistics, and documentary and photographic data. These data were presented in tables and analyzed using a descriptive method. The analyses revealed a positive effect of ecotourism on all the capitals and suggested …

Relationship Between Visual Obstruction Reading And Herbage Production For Ecological Sites In A Semi-Arid Climate Of The Northern Plains, Derek Devonne Woehl

Natural Resources Management

Carbon nanotubes have been the main focus in science and engineering fields lately for their extraordinary properties. But carbon nanotube fabrication process is very expensive, particularly for reinforcements and structural composite applications. Instead of working towards developing lower cost nanotubes, an alternate solution to resolve the problem is to formulate a cost effective reinforcement referred to as graphene nanoplatelets. These nanoplatelets have excellent mechanical as well as electronic properties opening up for several applications in various fields. Their structure with carboncarbon bonds make them stronger and stiffer. Single nanotubes can be used as reinforcements in one direction, while the graphite …

2010 North Dakota Field Crop Fungicide Guide

PP Series – Plant Pathology

No abstract provided.

I'M Seeing Red!Literally: The Effect Of Metaphoric Representation On Perception, Adam Kent Fetterman

Psychology

Metaphor is often used to represent abstract concepts using concrete domains (Lakoff & Johnson, 1980). One set of metaphors that has long been of interest, but seldom studied, is the set of those linking color and emotion. Specifically, red and anger are often linked in everyday language and popular media. There is a recent body of work on metaphoric representation processes, yet none of it has focused on color perception. The present studies investigate the effects of priming anger-related concepts and experiences on the visual perception of color. It was predicted that participants would perceive degraded color screens as red …

Literal Vs. Symbolic Immortality: Exploring The Relative Strengths Of Religious Paths To Death-Transcendence, Jacob Timothy Juhl

Psychology

According to terror management theory, religious worldviews provide protection from mortality concerns by providing feelings of literal immortality ( conscious life after death) and symbolic immortality (the essence of one's self or identity living after death). Although research has shown that both feelings of literal and symbolic immortality provide protection from mortality concerns, no studies have sufficiently compared the relative strength of these forms of immortality. To investigate their relative strengths as death anxiety buffers, three studies made mortality (MS) or a control topic salient and then made salient aspects of religion that provide symbolic or literal immortality ( or …

Perceptions Of Negative Attributes Of Never-Married Custodial Mothers And Fathers: A Comparison Study, Amanda Rae Haire

Human Development and Family Science

The present study examined the differences in the perceptions of the negative attributes of never-married custodial single mothers and fathers. The existing literature indicated that never-married single mothers and fathers were perceived differently; however, no previous study has examined perceptions of negative qualities that society assigns to never-married custodial single mothers and fathers. Thus, this study examined participants' perceptions of the negative attributes of never-married custodial single mothers and fathers and applied a feminist framework to determine what gender based differences existed in these perceptions. The results of the thematic analysis suggested that participants' perceptions of never-married single mothers and …

Kbb: A Knowledge-Bundle Builder For Research Studies, Deryle W. Lonsdale, David W. Embley, Stephen W. Liddle, Aaron Stewart, Cui Tao

Faculty Publications

Researchers struggle to manage vast amounts of data coming from hundreds of sources in online repositories. To successfully conduct research studies, researchers need to find, retrieve, filter, extract, integrate, organize, and share information in a timely and high-precision manner. Active conceptual modeling for learning can give researchers the tools they need to perform their tasks in a more efficient, user-friendly, and computer-supported way. The idea is to create “knowledge bundles” (KBs), which are conceptual-model representations of organized information superimposed over a collection of source documents. A “knowledgebundle builder” (KBB) helps researchers develop KBs in a synergistic and incremental manner and …

Shifting Perspectives: Desocialization And The Journey Toward Critical Consciousness, Angela Marie Mathers

Soil Science

The purpose of this study was to investigate how a service-learning course fosters students' development of a critical consciousness. Participants of this research study were students who participated in the 2009 International Service Seminar, a three-credit course that culminated with a service trip to Antigua, Guatemala. Interviews were conducted with participants that focused on students' experiences both during the class and in the year since the completion of the course. Utilizing critical pedagogy literature, I focused on the work of Jennifer Moon (1999) and Ira Shor (1992) to analyze the processes through which students gain critical consciousness. What became clear …

Japanese Elicited Imitation: Asr-Based Oral Proficiency Test And Optimal Item Creation, Hitokazu Matsushita, Deryle Londsdale, Dan Dewey

Faculty Publications

In this study we discuss the development of an optimal ASR-based grading system for an L2 oral proficiency test with a method called elicited imitation (EI). We also discuss EI test item creation from a linguistic point of view. Based on two issues found in a previous study (Matsushita & LeGare, 2010) we also investigate creation of improved language models for EI grading with speech corpus data. Finally, we examine the effectiveness of new EI items in our empirical study and suggest a method to retrieve authentic EI test items from corpus data.

Addressing And Improving Technology Integration Skills For Preservice Teachers Using The Teacher Work Sample, Charles R. Graham, Tonya Tripp, Nancy Wentworth

Faculty Publications

This study explores the efforts at Brigham Young University to improve preservice candidates’ technology integration using the Teacher Work Sample (TWS) as an assessment tool. Baseline data that was analyzed from 95 TWSs indicated that students were predominantly using technology for productivity and information presentation purposes even though they had been taught to use technology for active student learning. Researchers discovered that decisions made about technology integration were heavily influenced by field instructors and TWS rubrics. An intervention plan was developed to train field instructors and 99 TWSs were analyzed the following year. The TWSs showed noticeable improvements including increases …

Entrepreneurial Success: Differing Perceptions Of Entrepreneurs And Venture Capitalists, Ervin L. Black, F. Greg Burton, David A. Wood, Aaron F. Zimbelman

Faculty Publications

The recent credit crisis has made it more difficult for entrepreneurs to find funding. It is increasingly important for entrepreneurs to know what is important to venture capitalists (VCs) when they make their funding decisions. We interview entrepreneurs and VCs to determine traits these groups perceive as necessary for entrepreneurial success. We find that entrepreneurs cite traits inherent to their nature significantly more than VCs. Additionally, entrepreneurs who do not have previous VC funding experience differ significantly from VCs in identifying important factors for VC funding. In contrast, entrepreneurs with previous VC funding experience did not differ from VCs in …

Innovations And Barriers In Health Microinsurance, Sheila Leatherman, Lisa Jones Christensen, Jeanna Holtz

Faculty Publications

Health microinsurance (HMI) offers a promising way to mitigate the risks of disease and ill health, which are disproportionately borne by the world’s poorest citizens. Despite that HMI is a relatively new phenomenon, recent figures indicate that approximately 40 million people worldwide have some form of HMI coverage, principally in India.

The emergence of HMI programmes worldwide provides hope that the poor will receive, at a minimum, a reliable, adequate level of access to affordable healthcare. Research shows that access to HMI reduces out-of-pocket health expenses, especially for catastrophic health events, and improves access to quality health care for those …

Couple Relationship Education At Home: Does Skill Training Enhance Relationship Assessment And Feedback?, W. Kim Halford, Keithia Wilson, Bronwyn Watson, Tony Verner, Jeffry Larson, Dean M. Busby, Thomas Holman

Faculty Publications

To evaluate the effective components of couple relationship education, 59 newlywed couples were randomly assigned to one of two couple relationship programs (CRE): (1) RELATE, which involved receiving feedback mono their relationship based on the on-line RELATE assessment; or (2) RELATE + Couple CARE, which was RELATE plus completing the 6 unit Couple CARE relationship skill training program. Relative to RELATE, RELATE + Couple CARE produced more improvement in couple communication, and high relationship satisfaction across the next 12 months in women. Men sustained high and similar relationship satisfaction in either condition. Skill training CRE has additional benefits for couples …

Optimizing Incident Management Strategies Using Simulation, Anshuman Manori

Computer Science

Incidents, pre-programmed or random, are major sources of congestion on urban freeways. With many of urban freeways in the US operating close to capacity, the need to reduce the impact of incident-related congestion has become critical. Incident Management Strategies (IMS), when properly developed and deployed, have the potential to reduce such congestion on urban freeways. The purpose of this paper is to develop an analytic framework for the calibration and application of a -simulation model for testing the impact of alternate IMS on an urban transportation network. Initially a framework is presented in a conceptual form, and demonstrates the calibration …

Xgraphml-A Tool For Transforming Uml To Graphml, Sandeep Raavi

Computer Science

This paper proposes and implements XGraphML, a tool which transforms a file from a UML format to a GraphML using XSLT and JAXP technologies. The tool connects ArgoUML with VEGGIE through this transformation. ArgoUML is an open-source tool used to model software artifacts through UML diagrams and uses UML as a standard saving mechanism. On the other hand, VEGGIE (i.e., the Visual Environment for Graph Grammar Induction and Engineering) utilizes GraphML as a standard saving mechanism. XGraphML takes a UML file as input and produces a corresponding GraphML file. Based on XGraphML, software engineers use ArgoUML to model software artifacts …

Chemosensitization Of Cancer Cells By Sirna Using Targeted Nanogel Delivery, Erin B. Dickerson, William H. Blackburn, Michael H. Smith, Laura B. Kapa, L. Andrew Lyon, John F. Mcdonald

Biology, Chemistry, and Environmental Sciences Faculty Articles and Research

Background: Chemoresistance is a major obstacle in cancer treatment. Targeted therapies that enhance cancer cell sensitivity to chemotherapeutic agents have the potential to increase drug efficacy while reducing toxic effects on untargeted cells. Targeted cancer therapy by RNA interference (RNAi) is a relatively new approach that can be used to reversibly silence genes in vivo by selectively targeting genes such as the epidermal growth factor receptor (EGFR), which has been shown to increase the sensitivity of cancer cells to taxane chemotherapy. However, delivery represents the main hurdle for the broad development of RNAi therapeutics.

Methods: We report here …

Web-Based, Participant-Driven Studies Yield Novel Genetic Associations For Common Traits, Nicholas Eriksson, J. Michael Macpherson, Joyce Y. Tung, Lawrence S. Hon, Brian Naughton, Serge Saxonov, Linda Avey, Anne Wojcicki, Itsik Pe'er, Joanna Mountain

Biology, Chemistry, and Environmental Sciences Faculty Articles and Research

Despite the recent rapid growth in genome-wide data, much of human variation remains entirely unexplained. A significant challenge in the pursuit of the genetic basis for variation in common human traits is the efficient, coordinated collection of genotype and phenotype data. We have developed a novel research framework that facilitates the parallel study of a wide assortment of traits within a single cohort. The approach takes advantage of the interactivity of the Web both to gather data and to present genetic information to research participants, while taking care to correct for the population structure inherent to this study design. Here …