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2011

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Business Intelligence Tools In A Developmental Environment: An Academic Module, Landon M. Hemsley Dec 2011

Business Intelligence Tools In A Developmental Environment: An Academic Module, Landon M. Hemsley

Undergraduate Honors Capstone Projects

Business Intelligence (BI), defined here as the creation and use of meaningful business information for management, has over the last 20 years shown over and over again its value to professional industry. The prevalence of BI has also demonstrated that a new brand of worker is needed to take advantage of the sophisticated tools available to modern industry. Evidence suggests modern universities have struggled to educate professionals on the tremendous impact BI can have on an organization if used properly. This work is a step in an endeavor to bridge that educational gap and generate an educational strategic advantage by …

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An Investigation Of The Application Of Phase Change Materials In Practical Thermal Management Systems, David Ewing Dec 2011

An Investigation Of The Application Of Phase Change Materials In Practical Thermal Management Systems, David Ewing

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This work investigates the application of alternative cooling techniques to thermal management. In the first section, this work presents models and extensive simulation studies on an alternative cooling strategy based upon phase change materials (PCMs) for the thermal management system of a LED headlight assembly. These studies have shown that properly chosen PCMs, when suspended in metal foam matrices, increased the thermal conductivity of the PCM. The increased thermal conductivity can enhance the cooling characteristics of a practical thermal management system for a LED headlight system. To further enhance the advantages of using PCMs, nanoparticle enhanced fluids (nanofluids) are desirable …

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Communication Crossroads: Assertiveness Pedagogy For College Writers With Attention-Deficit/Hyperactivity Disorder, Dev Bose Dec 2011

Communication Crossroads: Assertiveness Pedagogy For College Writers With Attention-Deficit/Hyperactivity Disorder, Dev Bose

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This study seeks to explore the phenomenon of why some adults with attention deficit/hyperactivity disorder (ADHD) have difficulties in communicating in groups at school and work, despite the integration of collaboration within the curricula of college oral and written communication courses. The purpose of this multiple case study was to explore a sample of college writers' with ADHD perceptions on difficulties with their writing, as well as to evaluate an intervention which utilized communication-based classroom scenarios. The research employed qualitative methods to investigate the phenomenon under study. Participants in the study consisted of a criterion-sampled group of 10 individuals from …

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Health Beliefs And Socio-Cultural Factors That Predict Cervical Cancer Screening Behaviors Among Hispanic Women In Seven Cities In The Upstate Of South Carolina, Arelis Moore De Peralta Dec 2011

Health Beliefs And Socio-Cultural Factors That Predict Cervical Cancer Screening Behaviors Among Hispanic Women In Seven Cities In The Upstate Of South Carolina, Arelis Moore De Peralta

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Cervical cancer is one of the most common reproductive cancers among women in the United States. The incidence and mortality rates of cervical cancer among Hispanic women in the U.S. are almost two times higher than non-Hispanic Whites. Cervical cancer screening is associated with early cervical cancer detection and, thus, with reductions in cancer morbidity and mortality. In Hispanic populations, where cancer rates are disproportionately high, it is important to conduct research that accounts for the influence of culture in health-seeking behaviors. The purpose of this study was to use the Health Belief Model (HBM) as a theoretical framework to …

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An Examination Of Variables Which Influence High School Students To Enroll In An Undergraduate Engineering Or Physical Science Major, Christopher Porter Dec 2011

An Examination Of Variables Which Influence High School Students To Enroll In An Undergraduate Engineering Or Physical Science Major, Christopher Porter

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The purpose of this study was to examine the variables which influence a high school student to enroll in an engineering discipline versus a physical science discipline. Data was collected utilizing the High School Activities, Characteristics, and Influences Survey, which was administered to students who were freshmen in an engineering or physical science major at an institution in the Southeastern United States. A total of 413 students participated in the survey.
Collected data were analyzed using descriptive statistics, two-sample Wilcoxon tests, and binomial logistic regression techniques. A total of 29 variables were deemed significant between the general engineering and physical …

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Radio Frequency Micro/Nano-Fluidic Devices For Microwave Dielectric Property Characterizations, Chunrong Song Dec 2011

Radio Frequency Micro/Nano-Fluidic Devices For Microwave Dielectric Property Characterizations, Chunrong Song

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In this dissertation, a number of different topics in microwave dielectric property measurements have been covered by a systematic approach to the goals of development of dielectric spectroscopy and study of its high electric field effects with integrated on-chip microwave microfluidic / nanofluidic devices.
A method of parasitic effects cancellation for dielectric property measurement is proposed, analyzed, and experimentally evaluated for microwave characterization of small devices and materials that yield low intensity signals. The method dramatically reduces parasitic effects to uncover the otherwise buried signals. A high-sensitive radio frequency (RF) device is then developed and fabricated to detect small dielectric …

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Quantitative Analysis And Structural Characterization Of Carbonaceous Pitches, Sourabh Kulkarni Dec 2011

Quantitative Analysis And Structural Characterization Of Carbonaceous Pitches, Sourabh Kulkarni

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Both petroleum pitches and pitches derived from pure polycyclic aromatic hydrocarbons (PAHs) are oligomeric materials that can serve as precursors for a wide variety of advanced carbon materials. The goal of this study was the structural characterization and quantitative analysis of the dominant constituent oligomers and species present in these pitches.
A key requirement for such work is the ability to fractionate these complex mixtures into samples of narrow molecular weight distribution (mol wt; MWD) that can be used as standards. To this end, semicontinuous (or semibatch) dense-gas/supercritical extraction (DGE/SCE) was used to produce monomer, dimer, and trimer fractions of …

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A Formal Representation Of Mechanical Functions To Support Physics-Based Computational Reasoning In Early Mechanical Design, Chiradeep Sen Dec 2011

A Formal Representation Of Mechanical Functions To Support Physics-Based Computational Reasoning In Early Mechanical Design, Chiradeep Sen

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The lack of computational support to the conceptual phase of mechanical engineering design is well recognized. Function-based modeling and thinking is widely recommended in design texts as useful means for describing design concepts and using them in tasks such as solution search, problem decomposition, and design archival. Graph-based function structure models that describe a product as a network of transformative actions of material, energy, and information, are discussed as a potential tool for this purpose, but in the current state of the art, function structures are not formalized as a computational representation. Consequently, no computer tool exists with which a …

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Modeling And Synthesis Of Functionalized Meta-Poly(Phenylene Ethynylene) Helical Structures, Ha Nguyen Dec 2011

Modeling And Synthesis Of Functionalized Meta-Poly(Phenylene Ethynylene) Helical Structures, Ha Nguyen

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The ability of meta-poly(phenylene ethynylene) (mPPE) materials to undergo random coil to helix conformational changes under select conditions affords many opportunities for their use in sensor, separation, catalysis, and bio-related applications. Thus, to advance the development of these materials, a modeling procedure based on replica exchange molecular dynamics (REMD) simulation was developed to reliably assess factors affecting the folding behaviors of functionalized mPPE variants in solution. A combinational modeling study of 20 functionalized mPPEs in five solvent conditions provided insight into how mPPE secondary structure is impacted by the complex relationship between mPPE functional groups and solvent moieties. Further, these …

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Restoring Longleaf Pine (Pinus Palustris) In Loblolly Pine (P. Taeda) Stands On The Coastal Plain Of North Carolina, Huifeng Hu Dec 2011

Restoring Longleaf Pine (Pinus Palustris) In Loblolly Pine (P. Taeda) Stands On The Coastal Plain Of North Carolina, Huifeng Hu

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To support the development of silvicultural protocols for restoring longleaf pine (LLP; Pinus palustris Mill.) and its characteristic herbaceous understory in loblolly pine (LBP; P. taeda L.) stands, a three-year study was conducted on moderately well- and well-drained soils in Onslow County, North Carolina. A replicated field experiment was conducted to test the effects of selected silvicultural treatments on planted LLP seedlings, understory vegetation, and plant resources. Seven canopy treatments included four uniform canopy density treatments defined by target residual basal area [Control, MedBA (9 m2/ha), LowBA (4.5 m2/ha), and Clearcut] and three circular gap treatments defined by area [LG …

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Composition And Ecophysiological Proficiency Of Tidal Freshwater Forested Wetlands: Investigating Basin, Landscape, And Microtopographic Scales, Jamie Duberstein Dec 2011

Composition And Ecophysiological Proficiency Of Tidal Freshwater Forested Wetlands: Investigating Basin, Landscape, And Microtopographic Scales, Jamie Duberstein

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A hierarchical approach to forest community assessment was conducted by first focusing on landscape associations to edaphic factors among major tidal freshwater forested wetland basins in the Southeast. Four general tree communities exist along coastal rivers in the southeastern United States, based on the most prominent species in each: Water Tupelo, Swamp Tupelo, Dwarf Palmetto, and Cabbage Palm. Microhabitat usage and preference by trees were then examined, both across all species and within species, as related to such factors as coast, presence on rivers with dams, tree community assemblage, relative distance from the river, specific river basin, and microsite availability. …

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Community College Faculty Job Satisfaction: A Network Approach, Bonnie Smith Dec 2011

Community College Faculty Job Satisfaction: A Network Approach, Bonnie Smith

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This study addresses the question, 'how do network dynamics and leadership behavior influence community college faculty job satisfaction?' Using ORA's dynamic network analysis (DNA) tools, this study investigates how network interactions relate to faculty job satisfaction, how beliefs about leader-member exchange (LMX) relationships relate to network interactions, and how beliefs about LMX relationships relate to job satisfaction. A faculty network is analyzed as a whole, then clusters are identified and analyzed using standard network measurements and a belief propagation algorithms.
Results indicate that job satisfaction and perceptions of relationship with leaders are co-created within networks. Cluster which have high network …

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Probabilistic Approaches To Stability And Deformation Problems In Braced Excavation, Zhe Luo Dec 2011

Probabilistic Approaches To Stability And Deformation Problems In Braced Excavation, Zhe Luo

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This dissertation is aimed at applying probabilistic approaches to evaluating the basal-heave stability and the excavation-induced wall and ground movements for serviceability assessment of excavation in clays. The focuses herein are the influence of spatial variability of soil parameters and small sample size on the results of the probabilistic analysis, and Bayesian updating of soil parameters using field observations in braced excavations.
Simplified approaches for reliability analysis of basal-heave in a braced excavation in clay considering the effect of spatial variability in random fields are presented. The proposed approaches employ the variance reduction technique (or more precisely, equivalent variance method) …

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Essays On Customer Training And Education In Service Design, Uzay Damali Dec 2011

Essays On Customer Training And Education In Service Design, Uzay Damali

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Customers who can effectively perform the tasks necessary in their service participation, and who are motivated to perform these tasks, experience improved satisfaction and service quality. In order to ensure customers have adequate skills and motivation, service designs incorporate practices which train and educate them. The goal of this research was to investigate how customers can effectively be trained and educated so that they can perform their service tasks. Based on various theories used in the field of management, we developed several research models to investigate this issue. These models were tested through survey data collected from adult patients with …

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Development Of A Design Method To Reduce Change Propagation Effects, Prabhu Shankar Dec 2011

Development Of A Design Method To Reduce Change Propagation Effects, Prabhu Shankar

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ABSTRACT
This dissertation presents a design method to reduce engineering changes caused due to change propagation effect. The method helps designers to systematically plan a verification, validation, and test (VV&T) plan. The rationale behind such a method is founded on a well-accepted principle that a robust validation plan can reduce design changes. However, such method has not yet been developed in mechanical engineering domain, so a method from software engineering has been adopted and extended to address the limitations in the existing design evaluation tools.
Tools extensively used in industry, such as FMEA, and in academia have been reviewed to …

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Computational Approaches To Understand Phenotypic Structure And Constitutive Mechanics Relationships Of Single Cells, Scott Wood Dec 2011

Computational Approaches To Understand Phenotypic Structure And Constitutive Mechanics Relationships Of Single Cells, Scott Wood

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The goal of this work is to better understand the relationship between the structure and function of biological cells by simulating their nonlinear mechanical behavior under static and dynamic loading using image structure-based finite element modeling (FEM). Vascular smooth muscle cells (VSMCs) are chosen for this study due to the strong correlation of the geometric arrangement of their structural components on their mechanical behavior and the implications of that behavior on diseases such as atherosclerosis.
VSMCs are modeled here using a linear elastic material model together with truss elements, which simulate the cytoskeletal fiber network that provides the cells with …

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Arsenic Represses Myogenesis And Neurogenesis Through Epigenetic Mechanisms, Repressed Transcription Factors, And Altered Wnt Signaling Pathway, Gia-Ming Hong Dec 2011

Arsenic Represses Myogenesis And Neurogenesis Through Epigenetic Mechanisms, Repressed Transcription Factors, And Altered Wnt Signaling Pathway, Gia-Ming Hong

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Arsenic is a toxicant commonly found in water systems around the world. Evidence from epidemiological studies indicates that chronic arsenic exposure can result in cancer, central nervous system and sensory deficits, effects on development, and neuromuscular deficits. However, the molecular mechanism of arsenic's toxicity remains largely unclear. In this study, both C2C12 mouse myoblast cells and mouse embryonic stem cells (mESCs) were used as models of arsenic mediated developmental toxicity in humans to investigate the effects of sodium arsenite on cellular differentiation.
Results from our first and second studies indicate that exposure of 20nM sodium arsenite to C2C12 mouse myocyte …

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Avoiding Engagement With 'Invisibles:' Religious Issues And The Field Of English Education, Robert Bruce Dec 2011

Avoiding Engagement With 'Invisibles:' Religious Issues And The Field Of English Education, Robert Bruce

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This study used content analysis of selected documents representing the three dimensions of the field of English Education (curriculum, teacher preparation and development, and research) to ascertain how the field was responding to the larger societal problem that religious intolerance and ignorance pose, especially given the growing religious diversity of American society. Data from the documents were classified into four categories derived from various proposals for the incorporation of religious issues into the public school curriculum: religious literacy, religious concerns related to personal development, religious aspects of multiculturalism, and religious issues related to improved civic engagement.
The documents related to …

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Fluid Mud Underflows In Coastal Dredge Disposal, Mijanur Chowdhury Dec 2011

Fluid Mud Underflows In Coastal Dredge Disposal, Mijanur Chowdhury

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This manuscript presents the results of a thorough theoretical and experimental investigation on fluid mud underflows generated in a typical coastal dredge disposal operation. The main goal of this investigation is to understand the propagation dynamics of fluid mud underflows that depends upon a number of factors, including: concentrations, rheological properties and released configurations of fluid mud. Laboratory experiments were conducted with different initial fluid mud concentrations in three different experimental set-ups: rectangular flume for constant volume release, rectangular flume for constant flux release, and a square pool for radial constant flux release of fluid mud. The experiments in the …

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ú`ÒIng: From Globalization To Glocalization---What The Impacts Of Globalization On Chinese Document Design Tell Us About International Professional Communication (Note: The First Two Chinese Characters Are Not Displayed Correctly. Please See The Actual Document.), Xiaoli Li Dec 2011

ú`ÒIng: From Globalization To Glocalization---What The Impacts Of Globalization On Chinese Document Design Tell Us About International Professional Communication (Note: The First Two Chinese Characters Are Not Displayed Correctly. Please See The Actual Document.), Xiaoli Li

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How people from different cultural backgrounds represent themselves and communicate with each other is an intriguing topic in the age of globalization. Using a grounded theory approach, this work investigates how Chinese individuals and companies introduce themselves to a global audience via resumes and annual reports.
To better understand the features of professional communication practices in China today, this work compares and contrasts current resume writing and annual report writing with those in the past, especially before Chinafs entry into the WTO, in order to understand the changes as well as the cultural contexts and cultural motives of these features. …

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Bases And Applications Of Riemann-Roch Spaces Of Function Fields With Many Rational Places, Justin Peachey Dec 2011

Bases And Applications Of Riemann-Roch Spaces Of Function Fields With Many Rational Places, Justin Peachey

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Algebraic geometry codes are generalizations of Reed-Solomon codes, which are implemented in nearly all digital communication devices. In ground-breaking work, Tsfasman, Vladut, and Zink showed the existence of a sequence of algebraic geometry codes that exceed the Gilbert-Varshamov bound, which was previously thought unbeatable. More recently, it has been shown that multipoint algebraic geometry codes can outperform comparable one-point algebraic geometry codes. In both cases, it is desirable that these function fields have many rational places. The prototypical example of such a function field is the Hermitian function field which is maximal. In 2003, Geil produced a new family of …

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Impacts Of Psychotropic Pharmaceuticals On Hybrid Striped Bass: Altered Predation Behavior As A Function Of Changes In Brain Chemistry, Joseph Bisesi Dec 2011

Impacts Of Psychotropic Pharmaceuticals On Hybrid Striped Bass: Altered Predation Behavior As A Function Of Changes In Brain Chemistry, Joseph Bisesi

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Advances in Analytical Chemistry have led to the detection of low concentrations of pharmaceuticals and personal care products (PPCPs) in wastewater treatment plant effluents as well as their receiving waters. Antidepressants are routinely found among these contaminants, but have been shown to be relatively non-toxic at environmentally measured concentrations using traditional toxicity testing techniques. The neurochemical mode of action of antidepressants warrants investigation of the effects these chemicals may have on fish behavior due to the highly conserved nature of neurotransmitter transporter targets. Using a predator prey bioassay designed in our laboratory, previous studies has shown that the antidepressant fluoxetine …

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Spectral Engineering Of Optical Fiber Through Active Nanoparticle Doping, Tiffany Lindstrom-James Dec 2011

Spectral Engineering Of Optical Fiber Through Active Nanoparticle Doping, Tiffany Lindstrom-James

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The spectral engineering of optical fiber is a method of intentional doping of the core region in order to absorb/emit specific wavelengths of light therby providing enhanced performance over current fibers. Efforts here focused on developing an understanding of optically active nanoparticles based on alkaline earth fluorides that could be easily and homogeneously incorporated into the core of a silica based optical fiber preform and result in efficient and tailorable spectral emissions.
Doped and undoped calcium, strontium and barium fluoride nanoparticles were successfully synthesized and characterized for their physical, chemical, and optical behavior. Distinct spectroscopic differences as a result of …

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Development Of Novel Organic Nitrogen Nutrient Solutions With Unique Bioreactors For Precision Nutrient Fertigation, Brian Ward Dec 2011

Development Of Novel Organic Nitrogen Nutrient Solutions With Unique Bioreactors For Precision Nutrient Fertigation, Brian Ward

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A fertility study conducted comparing organic nitrogen versus synthetic nitrogen on yield, quality, mineral and phyto-nutrient content of sweet corn under conventional cultural practices.

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Mechanical And Modular Verification Condition Generation For Object-Based Software, Heather Harton Dec 2011

Mechanical And Modular Verification Condition Generation For Object-Based Software, Heather Harton

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The foundational goal of this work is the development of mechanizable proof rules and a verification condition generator based on those rules for modern software. The verification system will be modular so that it is possible to verify the implementation of a component relying upon only the specifications of underlying components that are reused. The system must enable full behavioral verification. The proof rules used to generate verification conditions (VCs) of correctness must be amenable to automation. While automation requires software developers to annotate implementations with assertions, it should not require assistance in the proofs. This research has led to …

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Characterizing Mechanical Heterogeneity In Cardiovascular Cells, Sandra Deitch Dec 2011

Characterizing Mechanical Heterogeneity In Cardiovascular Cells, Sandra Deitch

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Most tissue-level mechanical models assume homogeneous mechanical properties within a single cell type. However, measurements of cellular mechanical properties show large variability in whole-cell mechanical properties between cells from a single population. This heterogeneity has been observed in many cell populations and with several measurement techniques but the sources are not yet fully understood. Cell mechanical properties are directly related to the composition and organization of the cytoskeleton, which is physically coupled to neighboring cells through adherens junctions and to underlying matrix scaffolds through focal adhesion complexes. As such, we believe that this high level of heterogeneity can be attributed …

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Modification And Characterization Of Fluorescent Conjugated Polymer Nanoparticles For Single Molecule Detection, Yueli Zheng Dec 2011

Modification And Characterization Of Fluorescent Conjugated Polymer Nanoparticles For Single Molecule Detection, Yueli Zheng

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Single molecule tracking using fluorescent dye or nanoparticle labels has emerged as a useful technique for probing biomolecular processes. Considerable interest arises in the development of nanoparticle labels with brighter fluorescence in order to improve the spatial and temporal resolution of single molecule detection and to facilitate the application of single molecule detection methods to a wider range of intracellular processes. The McNeill laboratory recently reported that conjugated polymer nanoparticles exhibit fluorescence cross-sections roughly 10-100 times higher than other luminescent nanoparticles of similar size, excellent photostability (2.2×108 photons emitted per nanoparticle prior to photobleaching), and saturated emission rates roughly 100 …

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The Political Economy Of Agriculture And Food Policies In Argentina During The Xxi Century: An Empirical Estimation Of The Electoral Response At The National, Provincial, And Local Level, And Its Conceptual Relationship With Lobbying, Advocacy, And Demons, Matias Nardi Dec 2011

The Political Economy Of Agriculture And Food Policies In Argentina During The Xxi Century: An Empirical Estimation Of The Electoral Response At The National, Provincial, And Local Level, And Its Conceptual Relationship With Lobbying, Advocacy, And Demons, Matias Nardi

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The political economy of Argentina in the XX and early XXI century has been characterized by the difficulty of establishing a sustainable path of balanced and integrated development due to the social, economic, and political conflict between rural and urban, agriculture and industry, high class versus low class, Radical or Justicialist party supporters which generated stop and go cycles. This dissertation analyzes the political economy of agriculture and food policies in Argentina during the first decade of the XXI century through a conceptual framework that takes into account politics, policies, economics and social responses through voting, lobbying, advocacy and demonstrations …

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Pitch-Based Activated Carbon Fibers: The Effect Of Precursor Composition On Pore Structure, Halil Tekinalp Dec 2011

Pitch-Based Activated Carbon Fibers: The Effect Of Precursor Composition On Pore Structure, Halil Tekinalp

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Although researchers have previously investigated the effect of precursor differences on the final properties of activated carbon fibers (ACFs), those precursors were not well-characterized. In particular, detailed information about their molecular composition and anisotropy was not available.
In this study, seven oligomeric fractions, each of well-defined composition and molecular weight (mol wt) distribution, were isolated from a commercially produced isotropic petroleum pitch (i.e., Marathon M–50) and used for the production of ACFs. Four of these precursors of varying oligomeric composition were fully isotropic and three contained different levels of mesophase, so that the effects of molecular composition and molecular order …

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Developing Strategies To Control Human Pathogens In Minimally-Maintained Dairy Manure-Based Compost Heaps, Marion Shepherd Dec 2011

Developing Strategies To Control Human Pathogens In Minimally-Maintained Dairy Manure-Based Compost Heaps, Marion Shepherd

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Composting has been proven to be an effective method used to inactivate pathogens in dairy manure. However, research has shown that if the compost heaps are unturned pathogens can persist, especially on the surface of the heaps for extended periods of time. As such, it is important to evaluate potential interventions that can be used to ensure that pathogens are inactivated at all locations of minimally maintained compost heaps under field conditions. The objectives of this study were to: 1) determine the impact of compost initial carbon-to-nitrogen (C:N) ratio on pathogen destruction when composting dairy manure in unturned heaps, 2) …

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