Digital Commons Network^™

Application And Characterization Of Self-Assembled Monolayers In Hybrid Electronic Systems, Michael Enoch Celesin

USF Tampa Graduate Theses and Dissertations

In this study, we explore ultra-thin insulators of organic and inorganic composition and their potential role as high-speed rectifiers. Typical applications for these structures include IR sensing, chemical detection, high speed logic circuits, and MEMS enhancements. While there are many elements in the functional group required to create a rectifying antenna (rectenna), the primary thrust of this work is on the rectifier element itself.

To achieve these research goals, a very good understanding of quantum tunneling was required to model the underlying phenomenon of charge conduction. The development of a multi-variable optimization routine for tunneling prediction was required. MATLAB was …

Asbestos Exposure In The Research Laboratory, Ediberto D. Garcia

USF Tampa Graduate Theses and Dissertations

Introduction: Asbestos has been employed in a myriad of industrial applications for more than a century. Of the 181 Mt of asbestos produced worldwide, over 31 Mt was consumed in the U.S. The production and consumption of this mineral eventually was found to cause asbestosis, lung cancer and mesothelioma. While the brunt of the human exposure to asbestos occurred in insulation work, many more workers in other jobs were expose to asbestos fibers. Very little is known about the potential exposure to asbestos in research labs.

Goal: In order to investigate potential research lab work exposures, we simulated lab work …

Immobilization And Characterization Of Physisorbed Antibody Films Using Pneumatic Spray As Deposition Technique, Jhon J. Figueroa

USF Tampa Graduate Theses and Dissertations

The immobilization of antibodies on silica surfaces has been a wide and common practice via cross-linking with the formation of covalent bonds between surface and antibody. The formation of antibody thin films on solid surfaces using pneumatic spray (PS) as the deposition technique and the analysis of the surface morphology of these films were investigated during this study. The pneumatic spray method was compared with the covalent bonding method Avidin-Biotin Bridge (ABB). The intensities and capture efficiency tests showed similar results for both techniques with a lower signal-to-noise ratio (SNR) for the PS deposited films. Specificity tests suggested that the …

Optical Investigations Of Neurohypophysial Excitability And Amyloid Fibril Formation, Joseph Leo Foley

USF Tampa Graduate Theses and Dissertations

This dissertation describes the work done on two distinct projects. In the first part I sought to unravel the mechanisms that underlie the activity-dependent modulation of response in the excitation-secretion coupling of the neurohypophysis. In the second part, I optically monitored and analyzed the secondary structure changes accompanying amyloid fibril formation along multiple pathways, under both denaturing and near-physiological conditions.

Neuronal plasticity plays an important role in regulating various biological systems by modulating release of hormones or neurotransmitters. The changing response to the same stimulus, depending on the context and previous stimulation events, is also the basis of learning and …

An(Other) Rhetoric: Rhetoric, Ethics, And The Rhetorical Tradition, Kathleen Sandell Hardesty

USF Tampa Graduate Theses and Dissertations

Rhetoric as a discipline is still touched by the shadow of ancient Greece. Rhetoric was defined famously by Aristotle as the "available means of persuasion," codified into five canons in classical Rome, and has since been a central part of Western education to train speakers and writers to effectively move their audiences. However, particularly beginning in the mid-20th Century, the discipline's understanding of rhetoric as a means of persuasion (or even manipulation) passed down from our ancient roots began to shift to a sense of rhetoric as matters of ethics and a concern for the other. It begs the question: …

Investigation Of Condition Effects On Batch Fecundity Of The Common Snook, Centropomus Undecimalis, In Tampa Bay, Florida, Catherine Michelle Bruger Hayslip

USF Tampa Graduate Theses and Dissertations

Common snook, Centropomus undecimalis, is a popular game fish species that occurs throughout central and southern Florida, yet many questions remain unanswered regarding their reproductive strategies, including estimates of fecundity with relation to size, age, and condition of the female. These relationships are critical to improving stock assessments and fundamental to estimating spawning potential ratio, the measure by which snook are managed. Spawning snook were collected from a known spawning site, Rattlesnake Key, Tampa Bay, Florida, during three consecutive spawning seasons (2009-2011) and batch fecundity for snook was reported for the first time. Of the 43 females suitable for fecundity …

Metabolism In Corals From Antarctica, The Deep-Sea, And The Shallow Subtropics: Contrasts In Temperature, Depth, And Light, Lara Henry

USF Tampa Graduate Theses and Dissertations

Coral habitats span the range from tropical to polar, extremely shallow to thousands of meters deep. The differences in light and temperature experienced in these varied habitats likely affect the metabolic rates of the corals residing there. The metabolism of three coral species from different habitats have been examined to elucidate the effects of these environmental parameters on metabolism, an under-studied aspect of coral biology. For all three species, measurements of oxygen uptake, ammonium excretion, and activity of the enzymes lactate dehydrogenase (LDH), malate dehydrogenase (MDH), and citrate synthase (CS) were used to characterize their metabolism. Off Florida's Gulf coast, …

World Heritage Status, Governance And Perception In The Pitons Management Area, St.Lucia, Vernice Camilla Hippolyte

USF Tampa Graduate Theses and Dissertations

There are currently 962 geographic sites in the world that have been classified as World Heritage. World Heritage is a unique concept, privy to and defined by UNESCO-- the United Nations, Educational, Scientific and Cultural organization, one of the specialized agencies and autonomous organizations established within the UN-United Nations system. World Heritage is governed by an international treaty called the Convention Concerning the Protection of the World Cultural and Natural Heritage, adopted by UNESCO in 1972 (The `Convention'). The inscription of a World Heritage Site or designation of World Heritage Status is highly coveted and considered in UNESCO parlance to …

Climate, Neo-Spinozism, And The Ecological Worldview, Nancy M. Kettle

USF Tampa Graduate Theses and Dissertations

The global community faces ecological problems with the natural environment and cultural impediments to solving them. Natural systems are constantly changing and so are cultural practices. Humans need to address both: the interaction between those dynamic systems, the natural and cultural, because what happens in one system changes things in the other. The changes to the ecosystems are rapid and sometimes irreversible while dealing with them has been inadequate. Environmental movements, including deep ecology, have been at the forefront of the efforts to engage the public, various groups, politicians, and world governments to address environmental problems on a coordinated large …

Variations Of Ghrelin, Growth Hormone, And Insulin-Like Growth Factor I In The West Indian Manatee (Trichechus Manatus), Rachel Lynn Cimino

UNF Graduate Theses and Dissertations

The metabolic hormones ghrelin, growth hormone, and insulin-like growth factor I are influenced by developmental age, sex, and nutritional status in domestic and free-ranging species. However the role these hormones play has not previously been explored in sub-tropical/ tropical mammals. Furthermore, the seasonality of species with less dynamic environmental cues, such as the West Indian manatee, have not been studied. The West Indian manatee is and endangered species distributed in the southeastern United States and throughout the Caribbean basin, and its nutritional physiology is influenced by environmental factors. Understanding the hormone response to nutritional status in this species and its …

Evolving: Using Science Fiction To Engage Students In Evolutionary Theory, Chad Rohrbacher

Publications

Evolutionary biology is not well-understood by a majority of the population. Many misperceptions and misconceptions exist as well as outright resistance to the theory. Various teaching and learning strategies have been tried in an attempt to involve students in exploring the theory, with mixed results. The use of science fiction to engage students in this area has been sparse, and virtually no quantitative assessment of learning with the method has been done. Using Origins, an anthology based on evolution, we created an interdisciplinary teacher’s resource manual that will be offered free to teachers. This paper examines some of the difficulties …

Article Navigation Wild-Type Measles Virus Infection Upregulates Poliovirus Receptor-Related 4 And Causes Apoptosis In Brain Endothelial Cells By Induction Of Tumor Necrosis Factor-Related Apoptosis-Lnducing Ligand, Haniah Abdullah, Brenda B. Brankin, Clare Brady, Sara Louise Cosby

Articles

Small numbers of brain endothelial cells (BECs) are infected in children with neurologic complications of measles virus (MV) infection. This may provide a mechanism for virus entry into the central nervous system, but the mechanisms are unclear. Both in vitro culture systems and animal models are required to elucidate events in the endothelium. We compared the ability of wild-type (WT), vaccine, and rodent-adapted MV strains to infect, replicate, and induce apoptosis in human and murine brain endothelial cells (HBECs and MBECs, respectively). Mice also were infected intracerebrally. All MV stains productively infected HBECs and induced the MV receptor PVRL4. Efficient …

The Epistemological Trend In The Evolution Of The Law Of Expert Testimony: A Scrutiny At Once Broader, Narrower, And Deeper, Edward J. Imwinkelried

Georgia Law Review

The thesis of this Article is that we are moving toward a
fundamentally epistemological approach to determining
the admissibility of expert testimony. The first part of the
Article notes that while many Frye jurisdictions exempted
soft science and nonscientific expertise, the Daubert line of
authority mandates that like an epistemologist, a trial
judge examine knowledge claims by any expert. The
second part addresses the question of the breadth of the
judge's analysis. The second part points out that under

the marketplace and general acceptance tests, courts
sometimes conducted a global analysis and inquired
generally whether the discipline itself was recognized …

Sundance Film Festival / Computer Generated Imagery / Video Game Industry / Battlestar Galactica / Pageants / Stereophonic Sound, J. Michael Hunter

Faculty Publications

Many people are unaware of how influential Mormons, members of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints (LDS Church), have been on American popular culture. Mormons and Popular Culture: The Global Influence of an American Phenomenon parts the curtain and looks behind the scenes at the little-known but important influence Mormons have had on popular culture in the United States and beyond. Included here are six sidebars that reveal some of the more fascinating contribution Mormons have made to American popular culture.

Profiles Of Selected Mormon Athletes In Professional Sports, J. Michael Hunter

Faculty Publications

“Profiles of Selected Mormon Athletes in Professional Sports” provides profiles with career highlights of over 200 Mormon athletes in professional sports, including baseball, basketball, bodybuilding, boxing, football, golf, hockey, racing, running, volleyball, and wrestling. This chapter appears in the second volume of Mormons and Popular Culture: The Global Influence of an American Phenomenon (Praeger 2013), a comprehensive treatment of Mormons and popular culture, providing an introduction and wide-ranging overview of the topic.

Spring/Summer 2013

University of Richmond Magazine

No abstract provided.

Dialect Leveling In Haloze, Slovenia, Grant H. Lundberg

Books

No abstract provided.

Gvsu Undergraduate And Graduate Catalog, 2013-2014, Grand Valley State University

Course Catalogs, 1963 - Current

Grand Valley State University 2013-2014 undergraduate and/or graduate course catalog published annually to provide students with information and guidance for enrollment.

Final Coastal Lakes Aquatic Plant Survey Report, Mary Pfauth, Mark Sytsma

Center for Lakes and Reservoirs Publications and Presentations

Invasive, non-indigenous plants can degrade water quality and fish habitat when they invade lakes, ponds, and streams. Changes in plant community architecture in lakes due to invasion by canopy-forming invasive aquatic plants can result in loss of native plant biodiversity and reduction of the structural complexity of the underwater habitat.

Whole-Nature: Integrating Science And Eco-Phenomenology, Bartholomew Patrick Walsh

Graduate Student Theses, Dissertations, & Professional Papers

A review of the literature in environmental philosophy reveals a certain tension between what we might call science-based and experience-based approaches to environmental ethics. The main trend of thought here follows seminal figures like Aldo Leopold and Holmes Rolston III by generally looking to the sciences for disclosing value in nature, particularly ecology and evolutionary biology. However others, such as David Abram and Jack Turner, worry that scientifically disclosed nature is in itself too distancing, objectifying, and abstract to engender any real care for nature and instead emphasize direct, embodied experience with actual wild places, hence the label “eco-phenomenology.” The …

Designing Islamic Constitutions: Past Trends And Options For A Democratic Future, Clark B. Lombardi

Articles

In recent years a growing number of countries have adopted constitutional provisions requiring that state law respect Islamic law (sharia). Muslims today are deeply divided, however, about what types of state action are consistent with sharia. Thus, the impact of a "Sharia Guarantee Clause" depends to a large degree on questions of constitutional design -- on who is given the power to interpret and apply the provision and on what procedures that they follow when making their decisions. This article explores the trends that gave rise to SGCs and provides a history of their incorporation into national constitutions. It then …

Consumer Subject Review Boards: A Thought Experiment, Ryan Calo

Articles

The adequacy of consumer privacy law in America is a constant topic of debate. The majority position is that United States privacy law is a “patchwork,” that the dominant model of notice and choice has broken down, and that decades of self-regulation have left the fox in charge of the henhouse. A minority position chronicles the sometimes surprising efficacy of our current legal infrastructure.

But the challenges posed by big data to consumer protection feel different. They seem to gesture beyond privacy’s foundations or buzzwords, beyond “fair information practice principles” or “privacy by design.” The challenges of big data may …

Eggshell Economics: A Revolutionary Approach To The Eggshell Plaintiff Rule, Steve Calandrillo, Dustin E. Buehler

Articles

For more than a century, courts have universally applied the eggshell plaintiff rule, which holds tortfeasors liable for the full extent of the harm inflicted on vulnerable “eggshell” victims. Liability attaches even when the victim’s condition and the scope of her injuries were completely unforeseeable ex ante.

This Article explores the implications of this rule by providing a pioneering economic analysis of eggshell liability. It argues that the eggshell plaintiff rule misaligns parties’ incentives in a socially undesirable way. The rule subjects injurers to unfair surprise, fails to incentivize socially optimal behavior when injurers have imperfect information about expected accident …

Swains Lake, Cooperative Extension

UNH Cooperative Extension

No abstract provided.

Extrahepatic 25-Hydroxylation Of Vitamin D3 In An Engineered Osteoblast Precursor Cell Line Exploring The Influence On Cellular Proliferation And Matrix Maturation During Bone Development, Shelley S. Mason, Sean S. Kohles, Shelley R. Winn, Randy D. Zelick

Biology Faculty Publications and Presentations

Osteoblastic precursors experience distinct stages during differentiation and bone development, which include proliferation, extracellular matrix (ECM) maturation, and ECM mineralization. It is well known that vitamin D plays a large role in the regulation of bone mineralization and homeostasis via the endocrine system. The activation of vitamin D requires two sequential hydroxylation steps, first in the kidney and then in the liver, in order to carry out its role in calcium homeostasis. Recent research has demonstrated that human-derived mesenchymal stem cells (MSCs) and osteoblasts can metabolize the immediate vitamin D precursor 25- dihydroxyvitamin D₃(25OH₂D₃) to the active steroid 1α,25-dihydroxyvitamin D₃ …

Effects Of Disturbance On Tree Community Dynamics In Whitebark Pine Ecosystems, Jeremy Travis Amberson

Graduate Student Theses, Dissertations, & Professional Papers

Whitebark pine (Pinus albicaulis), a keystone species of high-elevation ecosystems of western North America, is warranted for listing under the Endangered Species Act due to the combined threats of fire exclusion, white pine blister rust (Cronartium ribicola), and increased pressure from insects due to climate warming. Despite widespread knowledge of the potential causes of the tree’s decline, there is limited understanding of its ecology, including successional dynamics in forests disturbed by white pine blister rust and mountain pine beetle. Specifically, there is a need for more information on successional replacement by subalpine fir and whitebark seedling regeneration dynamics. I assessed …

A Reliance Approach To Precedent, Hillel Y. Levin

Georgia Law Review

Why and when should courts presumptively defer to their
own past precedents? The doctrine of precedent lies at the
core of American jurisprudence and legal practice, but the
source of its normative force remains unclear.
Consequently, its application is confused and contested.
In this Article, I argue that precedent matters because
and to the extent that it generates reliance interests on the
part of the public. Although I am not the first to suggest
that reliance is the foundational justification for deference
to precedent, this Article represents the first sustained effort
to defend the reliance approach in deontological terms and …

Air Circulation Under Reduced Atmospheric Pressures, Lendell E. Hillhouse

Theses and Dissertations

The control of heat exchange is vital for plant life in off-world, low pressure,

greenhouses. The ability to control this process was limited by methodology and

technology. Mathematical models, based on classical mechanics are created to enhance

our control capabilities. Data is collected using various sensors placed inside the Low

Pressure Test Bed (LPTB) Chamber at Kennedy Space Center. Data from those sensors

became non-linear at various pressures below 25 kPa. We introduced mathematical

calibration corrections and found that sensor data linearity could be extended to a greater

range of pressures. These calibration corrections allow for sensor calibration corrections

in …

An Investigation Of Gender's Role In Three- And Four-Year-Old Children's Musical Play, Kari Jo O'Keefe

Theses and Dissertations

Young children engage in many activities, with play being the most prominent. Musical play occurs when children freely investigate sound through vocal, instrumental, or other means. Identifying the extent of musical play - and the role that gender plays in musical play - may provide important information about children's natural tendencies.

The purpose of this study was to investigate gender's role in three- and four-year-old children's musical play, and to investigate further the general nature of musical play. A grounded theory methodology was used, and data was gathered from field and individual child observations, and parent and preschool teacher surveys. …

Pregnancy, Sexism, And The Greek System, Taylor Marie Walkky

Theses and Dissertations

Both hostile and benevolent sexism have been found to correlate with attitudes related to pregnancy (Terrell et al, in prep). Benevolent and hostile sexism have both been shown to correlate with attitudes towards sorority members as well (Walkky, unpublished). The goal of the present study was to expand on the knowledge of how sexism relates to pregnancy attitudes, especially how it relates to sorority membership. Participants read a scenario about a college woman, who was either in a sorority or not, who had just discovered that she was pregnant. In the scenario, she chose to either end the pregnancy, continue …