Digital Commons Network^™

Modeling Photosynthesis Of Spartina Alterniflora (Smooth Cordgrass) Impacted By The Deepwater Horizon Oil Spill Using Bayesian Inference, Wei Wu, Patrick D. Biber, Mark S. Peterson, Chongfeng Gong

Faculty Publications

To study the impact of the Deepwater Horizon oil spill on photosynthesis of coastal salt marsh plants in Mississippi, we developed a hierarchical Bayesian (HB) model based on field measurements collected from July 2010 to November 2011. We sampled three locations in Davis Bayou, Mississippi (30.375 degrees N, 88.790 degrees W) representative of a range of oil spill impacts. Measured photosynthesis was negative (respiration only) at the heavily oiled location in July 2010 only, and rates started to increase by August 2010. Photosynthesis at the medium oiling location was lower than at the control location in July 2010 and it …

Mother Is Supreme: A Memoir, Nneka M. Okona

Dissertations, Theses and Capstone Projects (Full IR Collection)

A memoir-style work of creative non-fiction.

Poverty Reduction In Burundi: A Case Study Of The Effectiveness Of Foreign Aid, Josiane Mapango

Dissertations, Theses and Capstone Projects (Full IR Collection)

The Millennium Development Goals (MDGs) are eight international development goals that were officially established by the United Nations in 2000 following the adoption of the United Nations’ Millennium Declaration. The aim of these goals is to free humanity from extreme poverty, hunger, illiteracy and disease by 2015. By signing the Millennium Declaration, Burundi has pledged to improve policies and governance, and increase accountability to its citizens. Burundi relies heavily on foreign aid and has experienced a significant increase in aid flow in recent years; however, the high external assistance has not yet translated into high and sustainable growth rates and …

Gender Pay Gap In Public Organizations: An Analysis Of Trends In Pay Gaps Between Men And Women In Federal Agencies, Aisha Coore

Dissertations, Theses and Capstone Projects (Full IR Collection)

The Equal Pay Act of 1963 prohibited gender-based wage discrimination in the workforce specifically between men and women that had an identical skill set and were performing the same job. The gender pay gap has been an issue in the American workforce and particularly public administration as early as the 1800s, but has continued through the 1940s, 1950s and up to 2012. There are many different forms of pay gap or other names for the same issue, such as; the glass ceiling, sex discrimination, and comparable worth. Although each term has a different meaning, the outcome remains that women are …

Clandestine Partnerships?: The Link Between Human Trafficking And Organized Crime In Metropolitan Atlanta, Tara M. Tripp

Dissertations, Theses and Capstone Projects (Full IR Collection)

Since the enactment of the Trafficking Victims Protection Act of 2000, which directly criminalized human trafficking, research on human trafficking has significantly increased. While recent studies have analyzed trafficking legislation, characteristics of offenders and victims, and types of human trafficking rings, little data has been collected on human trafficking ties to organized crime. Therefore, this research explores human trafficking and its relationship to organized crime through an analysis of public court records. Specifically, the study includes the 20 federal human trafficking cases in metropolitan Atlanta indicted between 2000 and 2012. It was found that 80% of the 20 human trafficking …

An Insight Into The Wrongly Convicted: Going Beyond The Perceptions And Beliefs Of The Causes, Chermaine Cribb

Dissertations, Theses and Capstone Projects (Full IR Collection)

This study examined the number of wrongful convictions that were exonerated from January 1, 2004 to September 1, 2012. Four hundred forty seven exoneration cases were examined to obtain the factors that contributed to wrongful convictions, the most common offenses related to wrongful convictions, the evidence that led to a new trial, and the outcome of the exoneration based on dismissal of charges, acquittal, or pardons. Interviews were conducted to obtain exoneration case representation criteria, challenges faced in handling exonerations, and the factors found that contributed to wrongful conviction cases worked on. This study revealed that the most common offenses …

Relationship Of A Healthy Work Environment To Retention Of Direct Care Nurses In A Hospital Setting, Ashlee P. Thomas

Dissertations, Theses and Capstone Projects (Full IR Collection)

Purpose: The anticipated nursing shortage supports the need for researchers to identify contributing factors that impact supply of direct care nurses. This study evaluated which elements of a healthy work environment were predictors of retention of direct care nurses in a hospital setting.

Design: A non-experimental descriptive predictive design was used.

Methods: Data were collected from a convenience sample of direct care nurses in an acute hospital in the southeastern United States using the Healthy Work Environment (HWE) instrument and the Anticipated Turnover Scale (ATS) in October and November 2012. Using multiple regression elements of the HWE …

How Caring Attitudes And Patient-Family Centered Care Beliefs Of Critical Care Registered Nurses Influence Family Members’ Perceptions Of Patient-Family Centered Care, Jennifer Shamloo

Dissertations, Theses and Capstone Projects (Full IR Collection)

Purpose: To examine the relationships between caring attitudes and PFCC beliefs of critical care nurses and family members’ perceptions of PFCC.

Design: A descriptive, cross-sectional research design was used.

Methods: One hundred and six critical care registered nurses and 76 critical care family members were recruited from a healthcare organization located in the southeastern United States. Data collection occurred from October 2012 to November 2012.

Results: Nurses reported a high level of caring efficacy and moderately high beliefs about PFCC principles. Family members reported a moderate level of PFCC needs being met. No statistically significant relationships …

The Effects Of Work Schedule Flexibility On Job Satisfaction Of Telephone Advice Nurses, Angela D. O'Neal

Dissertations, Theses and Capstone Projects (Full IR Collection)

Purpose: The purpose of this study was to explore the impact of work environment on job satisfaction of telephone advice nurses and describe any relationships that might exist among specific RN characteristics and overall job satisfaction.

Design: An exploratory, descriptive correlation design was selected to answer the research questions with the conceptual framework based on Herzberg’s Motivation-Hygiene Theory.

Methods: A convenience sample from77 telephone nurses at two call centers of a large metropolitan health care system in southeastern United States was utilized. Data collection took place in October 2012 using the McCloskey/Mueller Satisfaction Scale and specific demographic …

Challenging Hidden Assumptions: Colonial Ideologies As Determinants Of Aboriginal Mental Health, Sarah E. Nelson

Geography and Geology Faculty Publications

This report outlines how colonial practices such as the residential school system and government banning of ceremonies inflicted a “soul wound,” or intergenerational trauma caused by the experience of violence, oppression, and grief, on Aboriginal peoples.

Benefits And Barriers In Mining The Healthcare Industry Data, John Wang, Bin Zhou, Ruiliang Yan

Faculty Publications

The authors’ paper addresses the applications of data mining within the healthcare industry. Healthcare data are seen as one of the more rewarding and most difficult of all data to analyze. Proper data mining techniques provide the methodology and technology to transform the voluminous amounts of data into useful information for decision making. Data mining can be utilized to help find cures for existing diseases, uncovering patterns for genetic diseases and the causes of new diseases across the globe. By implementing data mining techniques the industry is finally gaining control over the inadequacy of readily available records. Data mining has …

Quantitative Analysis Of Methangenic Community In Anaerobic Digesters And Its Response To Freeze Drying And Exposure To Oxygen, Keerthi Cherukuri

Master's Theses (2009 -)

Methanogens are integral to carbon cycling, catalyzing the production of methane and carbon dioxide, both potent greenhouse gases. Methane is produced in a wide variety of highly reduced anaerobic environments, as well as by degradation of organic compounds in industrial and municipal wastewater. This process is carried out by the concerted activity of an interdependent microbial community, composed of Bacteria and Archaea, the later including methanogens which complete the final step and produce methane and carbon dioxide. Methanogenesis is often the rate limiting step and is sensitive to processing imbalances. Therefore, an understanding of the microbial community structure and dynamics …

Gastrophilanthropy: Utopian Aspiration And Aspirational Consumption As Political Retreat, Patricia Mooney Nickel, Angela M. Eikenberry

Reconstruction: Studies in Contemporary Culture

In this paper we inquire into the practice of gastrophilanthropy—the individualized consumption of food products under the aegis of philanthropic action. In particular, we examine the case of the philanthropic cupcake. By positioning gastrophilanthropy within the complex of consumption and social relations of power we attempt to shed light on why it has become so well accepted in society today and how the impulse to consume and the impulse to be philanthropic relate to each other and to the contemporary political moment. We question the transformative impact of gastrophilanthropy on those who practice it and on those for whom it …

Characterization Of Secretory Sphingomyelinase Activity, Lipoprotein Sphingolipid Content And Ldl Aggregation In Ldlr-/- Mice Fed On A High-Fat Diet, Gergana M. Deevska, Manjula Sunkara, Andrew J. Morris, Mariana N. Nikolova‑Karakashian

Physiology Faculty Publications

The propensity of LDLs (low-density lipoproteins) for aggregation and/or oxidation has been linked to their sphingolipid content, specifically the levels of SM (sphingomyelin) and ceramide. To investigate this association in vivo, ldlr (LDL receptor)-null mice (ldlr-/-) were fed on a modified (atherogenic) diet containing saturated fats and cholesterol. The diet led to significantly elevated SM content in all serum lipoproteins. In contrast, ceramide increased only in the LDL particles. MS-based analyses of the lipid acyl chain composition revealed a marked elevation in C16:0 fatty acid in SM and ceramide, consistent with the prevalence of palmitic acid in the modified diet. …

Toward A Concept Of Post-Postmodernism Or Lady Gaga’S Reconfigurations Of Madonna, Danuta Fjellestad, Maria Engberg

Reconstruction: Studies in Contemporary Culture

How can we describe the landscape of what is increasingly referred to as post-postmodernism? Is post-postmodernism but a revision (however significant) of postmodernism or is it a new, perhaps even original, episteme? As must be clear from the title, the article takes Ihab Hassan’s much discussed essay “Toward a Concept of Postmodernism” as its point of departure, but proposes a double revision of his chart. First, it supplements the chart with a set of concepts used to designate post-postmodernism. Second, it provides a re-vision of the very layout of the chart, arguing with Johanna Drucker that form is constitutive …

Review Of The Iconic Obama, 2007-2009: Essays On Media Representations Of The Candidate And New President, By Nicholas A. Yanes And Derrais Carter, Molly Brost

Reconstruction: Studies in Contemporary Culture

[First paragraph]

In the introduction to The Iconic Obama, 2007-2009: Essays on Media Representations of the Candidate and New President, co‐editor Derrais Carter notes that “popular culture warrants attention, for it depicts the superficial and subconscious aims of citizens throughout the globe” (1). Indeed, while the collection of essays is ostensibly about media representations of Barack Obama that appeared both during his campaign and in the early days of his presidency, the collection addresses issues that are relevant to virtually any media consumer: namely, how the media shapes our perceptions; how social media such as Facebook, Twitter, and YouTube …

Safe, Humane, Legal, Transparent': State Visions Of Guantánamo Bay, Rebecca A. Adelman

Reconstruction: Studies in Contemporary Culture

Over the course of its Global War on Terror, the U.S. government has become gradually less secretive about its detention practices and less restrictive in its management of the visual culture of this war, even drawing some kinds of attention toward itself. These displays, in which the state ostensibly opens itself up to public surveillance under the guise of greater transparency, are laudable in some ways, and preferable in many respects to their predecessors. But as the state makes its workings more visible, it also enmeshes spectators in relations of looking that are differently problematic, and in this paper, I …

Of Zombies, Aids, And 'Africa': Non‐Western Disease And The 'Raciocultural' Imagination, Richard Brock

Reconstruction: Studies in Contemporary Culture

This essay investigates the “raciocultural”—a term designating the slippage between, and mutual construction of, “race” and “culture” within discourses of quasi‐biological determinism—as a means of exploring Western representations of non‐Western disease as “foreign” threats to Europe and North America. It suggests that the raciocultural is at once a colonial‐era construction and a reflection of contemporary trends that have seen racist discourse become increasingly displaced onto the notion of the “cultural.” Investigating a range of texts including news media, literary texts, and interactive entertainment, the essay focuses on representations of “African” space as biologically and culturally “infected” in order to examine …

Reading Duhamel, Kocot, And Lease With Altieri's The Particulars Of Rapture, Thomas Fink

Reconstruction: Studies in Contemporary Culture

[First paragraph]

Since at least the early eighties, Charles Altieri has been a major scholar-critic of contemporary poetry, and Painterly Abstraction in Modernist American Poetry (1989) extended the scope of his reputation to Modernism and its intersection with visual art. Throughout his career, he has been engaged with literary theory; perhaps because he has articulated alternatives to prevailing trends in Poststructuralism, New Historicism, and Cultural Studies, the critical mainstream has not always granted Altieri’s subtle, dialogically complex work in this area a substantial hearing.

Good Knowledge About Hypertension Is Linked To Better Control Of Hypertension; A Multicentre Cross Sectional Study In Karachi, Pakistan, Aysha Almas, Saniya Siraj Godil, Saima Lalani, Zahra Aziz Samani, Aamir Hameed

Section of Internal Medicine

Back Ground: According to the National Health survey only 3% of the population has controlled hypertension. This study was designed to elucidate the knowledge about hypertension in hypertensive patients at three tertiary care centers in Karachi. Secondly we sought to compare the knowledge of those with uncontrolled hypertension and controlled hypertension.

Methods: It was a cross-sectional study conducted at The Aga Khan University hospital (AKUH), Ziauddin Hospital (ZH) and Civil hospital, Karachi (CHK. All diagnosed Hypertensive patients (both inpatients and outpatients) coming to a tertiary care hospital in Pakistan aged > 18 years were included. Patients were categorized into 2 groups: …

Competition Between Conjugation And M13 Phage Infection In Escherichia Coli In The Absence Of Selection Pressure: A Kinetic Study, Zhenmao Wan, Noel L. Goddard

Publications and Research

Inter- and intraspecies horizontal gene transfer enabled by bacterial secretion systems is a powerful mechanism for bacterial genome plasticity. The type IV secretion system of Escherichia coli, encoded by the F plasmid, enables cell-to-cell contact and subsequent DNA transfer known as conjugation. Conjugation is compromised by phage infection that specifically targets the secretion machinery. Hence, the use of phages to regulate the spread of genes, such as acquired antibiotic resistance or as general biosanitation agents, has gained interest. To predict the potential efficacy, the competition kinetics must first be understood. Using quantitative PCR to enumerate genomic loci in a resource-limited …

Bad Faith At Middle Age: Comments On “The Principle Without A Name (Yet),” Insurance Law, Contract Law, Specialness, Distinctiveness, And Difference, Robert H. Jerry Ii

UF Law Faculty Publications

In this article, Robert Jerry expounds on Professor Abraham's article on insurer liability for bad faith by pointing out that the concept of institutional bad faith is not a new phenomenon, but rather, one that is as old as the insurance industry itself. Jerry focuses on Abraham's depiction of the "specialness" and "distinctiveness" of insurance, while exploring additional instances of "rotten to the core" systemic bad faith dating as far back as the nineteenth century. Much like Abraham did in his article on bad faith, Jerry uses these examples of systemic bad faith to further his assertion that the insurance …

New Zealand's Litigation-Related Name Suppression Policies: A Workable Model For The United States, Candice Lazar

University of Miami International and Comparative Law Review

No abstract provided.

A Routine, A Life, Miriam Vega

First To Go Program

Parental sacrifice is a reality author Miriam Vega knows much about. In her personal narrative, Vega brings forth a concept very few acknowledge, i.e., the cost of responsibility and its future effect on children. At a young age, Vega was charged with taking care of very young siblings, while her parents worked most of the day. She feels guilty about wanting a better life for herself because she acknowledges and appreciates her parents’ sacrifices. Growing up in a family where the “importance of work…[became] more of a survival tool than an art of success,” by the end of the narrative …

Let's Take A Break, Seungyoun "Sally" Noh

Writing Programs

A political science major, Seungyoun “Sally” Noh was born and raised in South Korea. Her essay describes the mentally and physically grueling race to college to which Korean youths are subjected. Through the relentless pressure to study and compete with their friends, she argues Korean schools have stymied the dreams of a generation of students. In “Let’s Take a Break,” Sally calls for a more humane childhood, one in which students will have time to realize their passions.

The Update, October 2012, University Of Northern Iowa. College Of Humanities, Arts And Sciences.

Update

Inside this issue:

-- UNI Alum Receives Presidential Early Career Award
-- Department News
-- UNI Forensics News & Results
-- Featured Organization: Beta Beta Beta National Honor Society
-- Save the Date: Iowa Supreme Court Justices are Coming to UNI
-- Student Spotlight: Department of Earth Science: Alison Schell
-- Strayer-Wood Theatre Fall Productions: Lysistrata & November
-- Featured Organization: APO-TAP
-- School of Music Events
--Stay Connected

Dispatch From The Culture War: Virginia's Failed Hpv Vaccination Mandate, Rachel Reynolds

Law Student Publications

This paper will inquire into what makes Gardasil different from other vaccines, and how that impacts its administration. Part I will describe the specifics of the HPV vaccine: how it works and how Virginia decided to promote its usage. Part II will examine the ways in which jurisdictions have traditionally understood vaccination policy, and contrast it with the ways in which they have handled the HPV vaccine. Part III will examine the disadvantages of continuing the mandate’s ineffective political war of attrition, and suggest a coalition-building strategy to effect policy that honors communal values and meaningfully increases access to the …

Older Moms Deliver: How Increased Births To Older Mothers Are Impacting School Enrollment, Robert Lycan, Charles Rynerson

Publications, Reports and Presentations

A presentation that seeks to shed light on social processes in Portland, Oregon, and provide a look at how GIS and demographic tools can be used to dissect complicated issues.

Angry Judges, Terry A. Maroney

Vanderbilt Law School Faculty Publications

Judges get angry. Law, however, is of two minds as to whether they should; more importantly, it is of two minds as to whether judges’ anger should influence their behavior and decision making. On the one hand, anger is the quintessentially judicial emotion. It involves appraisal of wrongdoing, attribution of blame, and assignment of punishment — precisely what we ask of judges. On the other, anger is associated with aggression, impulsivity, and irrationality. Aristotle, through his concept of virtue, proposed reconciling this conflict by asking whether a person is angry at the right people, for the right reasons, and in …

Ipulse: October 2012, Lynn University

Student Newspapers

Issues:

• October 2, 2012
• October 3, 2012
• October 4, 2012
• October 5, 2012
• October 8, 2012
• October 9, 2012
• October 10, 2012
• October 11, 2012
• October 12, 2012
• October 15, 2012
• October 16, 2012
• October 19, 2012
• October 23, 2012
• October 24, 2012
• October 30, 2012