Digital Commons Network^™

Office Hour Scheduling Tool, Tyler Dunlap

Industrial Engineering Undergraduate Honors Theses

When an instructor (with or without student input) specifies her office hours for the semester, the informal process used often results in students experiencing conflicts with other lectures, labs, drills, or office hours. The result of this conflict is the student either scheduling individual meetings with teachers outside of their office hours or students missing the opportunity to get assistance from the instructor all together. Either outcome is undesirable, as it either takes additional faculty time from their other responsibilities or jeopardizes the performance of a student in their classes. One valid approach to solving this problem is through the …

Implementation Of Fix Engine And Order Management Systems Using Asp.Net C#, Shweta Swarnkar, John Jenq

Department of Computer Science Faculty Scholarship and Creative Works

Financial Information Exchange ("FIX") protocol, a public domain protocol, is a series of messaging specifications for the electronic communication of trade-related messages. FIX allows independently developed systems to communicate seamlessly and without licensing issues. It has been developed through the collaboration of banks, exchanges, broker-dealers, industry utilities and associations, institutional investors, and information technology providers from around the world. The vision of market participants is to standardize a common, global language for the automated trading of financial instruments. The objective of this project is to develop and implement a prototype FIX Engine and an Order Management System using Microsoft ASP.NET …

Forage News [2011-12], Department Of Plant And Soil Sciences, University Of Kentucky

Forage News

• Heart of America Grazing Conference
• UK Forage Variety Tests
• Forage Dynamics and Calf Behavior in Two Creep Grazing Systems
• Testing and Feeding Tobacco-Brown Hay and Silage
• World Population Hits Seven Billion
• Farmers Use of Broadband Internet
• High Cattle Prices to Continue, Analysts Say

The Life That Chose Us: Educators With Tourette Syndrome, Jennifer Kristen Stenger

Dissertations

The purpose of this phenomenological study was to explore how having Tourette syndrome has shaped educators’ relationships in their personal and professional experiences. I completed a series of three in-depth interviews with seven educators in K-12 public schools who self-identify as an educator with Tourette syndrome. I began with a background of the participants’ experiences related to having Tourette syndrome. From there, I discussed participants’ experiences in regard to attaining and retaining employment. My guiding research questions were how having Tourette syndrome shapes relationships with administrators, colleagues, and students and their parents. Also, I asked how Tourette syndrome has shaped …

Friends Of The Library Mcnair Scholarship Awards, The Mcnair Team

McNair Scholars Research Journal

No abstract provided.

Harvesting Seismic Energy For Emergent Use After Major Earthquakes, Crystal Jamaica

McNair Scholars Research Journal

No abstract provided.

Experimental Investigation Of Spring-In Behavior Of Composite Materials, John Black

McNair Scholars Research Journal

No abstract provided.

Acknowledgements, The Mcnair Team

McNair Scholars Research Journal

No abstract provided.

Buy, Build, Or Steal: China’S Quest For Advanced Military Aviation Technologies, Phillip C. Saunders, Joshua K. Wiseman

China Strategic Perspectives

Although China continues to lag approximately two decades behind the world’s most sophisticated air forces in terms of its ability to develop and produce fighter aircraft and other complex aerospace systems, it has moved over time from absolute reliance on other countries for military aviation technology to a position where a more diverse array of strategies can be pursued. Steps taken in the late 1990s to reform China’s military aviation sector demonstrated an understanding of the problems inherent in high-technology acquisition, and an effort to move forward. However, a decade later it remains unclear how effective these reforms have been. …

A Method For Representing Contextualized Information (Merci) To Improve Situational Awareness Among Electronic Message Brokering System Dashboard Users, Arunkumar Srinivasan

Dissertations and Theses (Open Access)

Electronic health information brokering systems are of interest to public health informatics because they emphasize how data can be effectively shared and utilized across healthcare institutions and among providers so as to improve the quality of care, increase efficiency, and reduce costs (Lumpkin, 2002). In the domain of public health (PH) specifically, where complete and timely reporting of data is critical for all epidemiological and disease surveillance activities (Langmuir, 1976), it is imperative to ensure proper functioning of the electronic information exchange infrastructure. Receiving multiple types of data, in various formats from numerous sources, and triaging them to the appropriate …

Efficacy Of Genetically Modified Bt Toxins Against Insects With Different Genetic Mechanisms Of Resistance, Bruce E. Tabashnik, Fangneng P. Huang, Mukti N. Ghimire, B. Rogers Leonard, Blair D. Siegfried, Murugesan Rangasamy, Yajun Yang, Yidong Wu, Linda J. Gahan, David G. Heckel, Alejandro Bravo, Mario Soberón

Department of Entomology: Faculty Publications

Transgenic crops that produce Bacillus thuringiensis (Bt) toxins are grown widely for pest control, but insect adaptation can reduce their efficacy. The genetically modified Bt toxins Cry1AbMod and Cry1AcMod were designed to counter insect resistance to native Bt toxins Cry1Ab and Cry1Ac. Previous results suggested that the modified toxins would be effective only if resistance was linked with mutations in genes encoding toxin-binding cadherin proteins. Here we report evidence from five major crop pests refuting this hypothesis. Relative to native toxins, the potency of modified toxins was > 350-fold higher against resistant strains of Plutella xylostella and Ostrinia nubilalis …

Comparison Of Fish Communities In Recently Constructed Side-Channel Chutes With The Main Stem Missouri River, Kasey Whiteman, Vincent H. Travnichek, Darrick L. Garner, Brandon Eder, Kirk Steffensen

The Prairie Naturalist

Two United States Army Corp of Engineers- (USACE) funded projects were conducted from 2006 to 2008 along the Missouri River to monitor fish communities in recently constructed side-channel chutes and to monitor pallid sturgeon (Scaphirhynchus albus) and the associated fish assemblage in the main stem Missouri River. Data from both monitoring projects were compared to evaluate fish assemblages among four mitigated habitats (e.g., constructed side-channel chutes) and the main-stem Missouri River. Chutes had a greater overall number of species (n = 59) and higher species richness (Margalef’s index = 5.81), but richness was not different (F1, 4 = …

Patterns Of Age-0 Gizzard Shad Abundance And Food Habits In A Nebraska Irrigation Reservoir, Christopher L. Sullivan, Casey W. Schoenebeck, Keith D. Koupal, W. Wyatt Hoback, Brian C. Peterson

The Prairie Naturalist

Gizzard shad (Dorosoma cepedianum) are prolific spawners that can influence reservoir communities. Larval gizzard shad may compete with larval recreational fish for zooplankton resources. Therefore, it is necessary to determine larval gizzard shad dynamics and food habits to better understand their potential for competition with larval recreational fish. Our study examined age-0 gizzard shad abundance in Harlan County Reservoir during late spring/summer from 2002–2010 and food habits and prey electivity of age-0 gizzard shad during late spring/summer 2008 and 2009. The annual peak age-0 gizzard shad density 3 from 2002–2010 ranged from 50 to 380/100 m , which …

Watch Your Spelling!, Kurt Hornik, Duncan Murdoch

The R Journal

We discuss the facilities in base R for spell checking via Aspell, Hunspell or Ispell, which are useful in particular for conveniently checking the spelling of natural language texts in package Rd files and vignettes. Spell checking performance is illustrated using the Rd files in package stats. This example clearly indicates the need for a domain-specific statistical dictionary. We analyze the results of spell checking all Rd files in all CRAN packages and show how these can be employed for building such a dictionary.

Creating And Deploying An Application With (R)Excel And R, Thomas Baier, Erich Neuwirth, Michele De Meo

The R Journal

We present some ways of using R in Excel and build an example application using the package rpart. Starting with simple interactive use of rpart in Excel, we eventually package the code into an Excel-based application, hiding all details (including R itself) from the end user. In the end, our application implements a service oriented architecture (SOA) with a clean separation of presentation and computation layer

Program Committee Report December 2011, Regenstrief Center For Healthcare Engineering

RCHE Reports

No abstract provided.

Management Theories In Manufacturing, James Nathan Webster

Graduate Research Papers

The principles and ideology of management have been around for thousands of years. "Before industrialization, organizations were primarily the household, the tribe, the church, the military, and government" (Wren, 1987, p. 13). It was very rare for people to gather and organize outside of these structures prior to the industrial revolution. As mankind and civilization have progressed, the power of organizations has shifted throughout time. In the time of Confucius, government positions were of the utmost respect, and Confucius taught that positions of power "should go to men of proven merit and ability" (Wren, 1987, p. 14). The ancient Egyptians …

On The Accuracy Of Classical And Long Wavelength Approximations For Phonon Transport In Graphene, Dhruv Singh, Jayathi Murthy, Timothy S. Fisher

Birck and NCN Publications

This paper presents a critical evaluation of the approximations usually made in thermal conductivity modeling applied to graphene. The baseline for comparison is thermal conductivity computations performed using a rigorous calculation of three-phonon scattering events and accounting for the anharmonicity of interatomic forces. Three central assumptions that underlie published theories are evaluated and shown to compromise the accuracy of thermal conductivity predictions. It is shown that the use of classical phonon occupation statistics in place of the Bose-Einstein distribution causes the overprediction of specific heat and the underprediction of phonon relaxation time; for ZA phonons, the classical approximation can underpredict …

City Of Industry: Los Efectos Concretos En El Condado De Los Angeles En La Economía, El Medio Ambiente Y La Salud Pública, Christina Andrea Hernandez

World Languages and Cultures

This project attempts to document the development of the City of Industry, located in eastern Los Angeles County, and to examine the environmental as well as socio-economic effects this industrial hub maintains on its surrounding neighborhoods. City of Industry, since its incorporation in 1957, has established an alarming precedent as a privatized city that has informed concrete changes in the local economy, the environment, and the public health of the surrounding communities that are predominantly Latina(o).

The research undertaken for this project represents an interdisciplinary intersection of a special topic in the study of Industrial Engineering: the global logistics industry, …

The Missouri Miner, December 1, 2011

The Missouri Miner Newspaper

No abstract provided.

Accelerating Innovation Via Industry-Scale Open Innovation Networks: A Case Study In The Us Automotive Industry, John Skardon

All Dissertations

Innovation is a key driving force of economic growth in the United States and other developed countries. A wide range of public policies seek to stimulate growth while curbing its excesses. As the rate of innovation continues to slow across many industry segments, state and federal policy makers continue to look for new ideas to stimulate growth. Between the extremes of antitrust and industrial policy lies a fertile and mostly unexplored area where government and industry may collaborate. Industry-government collaboration so far has had mixed success. Innovations in organizational form that utilize networks to link entrepreneurs, publically funded research, and …

Tracking Costs Of Alternatively Fueled Buses In Florida, Cutr

Research Reports

No abstract provided.

Development Of A Mode Choice Model For Bus Rapid Transit In Santa Clara County, California, Chun-Hung Peter Chen, George A. Naylor

Journal of Public Transportation

Bus Rapid Transit (BRT) is an enhanced bus service that offers many of the same service attributes as rail transit, such as specialized vehicles, large stations, real-time passenger information, and more frequent and reliable operations. The Santa Clara Valley Transportation Authority (VTA) intends to develop an integrated BRT network throughout Santa Clara County, California, to provide high quality service to areas not well served by the VTA Light Rail (LRT) system. Past research showed that many transit agencies in North America considered BRT the same as LRT in their demand models, and a few agencies treated BRT and local bus …

A New Architectural Design Of Elevated Small Group Automated Rapid Transit, Hugh Chapman, Mary Chapman, Avishai Ceder

Journal of Public Transportation

Due to increased motorcar popularity, public transport use has declined while congestion costs billions in wasted time, fuel, accidents, air and water pollution. Proposed passenger transport projects have been cancelled in major cities, and completed projects have not attracted the private motorist. This study investigates reasons for this. As cities grow vertically and horizontally, they form three-dimensional mazes requiring special transport design solutions that enhance the city. Congestion can be alleviated by transferring passenger transport onto elevated solutions such as the presented Elevated Small Group Automated Rapid Transit (ESGART) SkyCabs system, which straddles the gap between Group Rapid Transit (GRT) …

Assessment Of Surface Transportation Security Training Needs And Delivery Preferences, Karen W. Lowrie, Judy A. Shaw, Michael R. Greenberg

Journal of Public Transportation

America’s surface transportation system features long and inter-connected routes and open access to stations and vehicles, making the system vulnerable to terrorist attack. While a variety of security-related training products exist for the transportation sector, government and other reports have called for improvements in the transportation security training curriculum in terms of quality and consistency. At the same time, tight economic times have left few extra financial resources available for systems to deliver adequate training to employees. This study assessed the needs for additional security training through focus groups and interviews with representatives of major surface transportation stakeholders and agencies. …

Bus Passenger Origin-Destination Estimation And Related Analyses Using Automated Data Collection Systems, Wei Wang, John P. Attanucci, Nigel H.M. Wilson

Journal of Public Transportation

This research explores the application of archived data from Automated Data Collection Systems (ADCS) to transport planning with a focus on bus passenger travel behavior, including Origin-Destination (OD) inference, using London as a case study. It demonstrates the feasibility and ease of applying trip-chaining to infer bus passenger OD from smart card transactions and Automatic Vehicle Location (AVL) data and is the first known attempt to validate the results by comparing them with manual passenger survey data. With the inferred OD matrices, the variations of weekday and weekend bus route OD patterns are examined for planning purposes. Moreover, based on …

Full Issue 14(4)

Journal of Public Transportation

No abstract provided.

Dove Density In The Rio Grande Delta: 2007-2008, Michael F. Small, Margaret L. Collins, John T. Baccus, Jared B. Timmons

Bulletin of the Texas Ornithological Society

We used a grid sampling method to estimate Mourning Dove (Zenaida macroura) and White-winged Dove (Z. asiatica) densities in south Texas via distance sampling. We sampled over summers in 2007 and 2008 and calculated mean estimated density across years as well. Time (between years) did not affect density estimates for Mourning Doves but was significantly different for White-winged Doves. Species’ distribution and a separate banding study suggest a possible reason for the difference between years in White-winged Dove density estimates.

Colonial Waterbird Survey, Brent Ortego, Marc Ealy, Greg Creacy, Larry Lebeau

Bulletin of the Texas Ornithological Society

Texas Parks and Wildlife Department (TPWD) staff and volunteers conducted ground and air surveys of inland colonial waterbird nest sites at 584 locations in Texas from 1973 through 2004. There was an average of 472,466 nesting pairs sighted per year at all colonies. Cattle Egret (Bubulcus ibis), Little Blue Heron (Egretta caerulea), Snowy Egret (Egretta thula) and Great Egret (Ardea alba) were the most abundant species. The Oaks and Prairie Bird Conservation Region (BCR 21) had the most colonies with 171 and 269,210 nesting pairs. The total for the average densities for each colony from ground surveys from 1981-1990 in …

Habitat Use By Great-Tailed Grackles (Quiscalus Mexicanus) In Urban And Peri-Urban Habitats Of San Marcos, Hays County, Texas, Corey M. King, Thomas R. Simpson, John T. Baccus, M. Clay Green

Bulletin of the Texas Ornithological Society

Great-tailed Grackles (Quiscalus mexicanus) are habitat generalists occupying a wide variety of environments except dense forests and prairies lacking nearby water sources. Golf courses, campuses, lawns, parks, and avenue rights-of-way are inhabited in urban and suburban areas. However, examination of seasonal use of habitats in urban environments is limited. We documented seasonal use of urban and peri-urban habitats in San Marcos, Hays County, Texas. We compared habitat use by program Presence to apply the best fit model explaining occupancy within habitats. Principal components analysis suggested differences in woody vegetation among study sites. The best fit model incorporated occupancy, colonization, and …