Digital Commons Network^™

Commencement Program 2013 December: College Of Engineering, The University Of Texas At Arlington

Commencement Programs, Photos, and Video

No abstract provided.

Commencement Program 2013 December: College Of Nursing, The University Of Texas At Arlington

Commencement Programs, Photos, and Video

No abstract provided.

Efficient Routing For Wireless Mesh Networks Using A Backup Path, Amir Esmailpour, Nidal Nasser, Jehad Al Dallal

Electrical & Computer Engineering and Computer Science Faculty Publications

Wireless Mesh Network (WMN) has a proven record in providing viable solutions for some of the fundamental issues in wireless networks such as capacity and range limitations. WMN infrastructure includes clusters of Mobile Ad-Hoc Networks (MANETs) connected through a fixed backbone of mesh routers. The mesh network can be constrained severely due to various reasons, which could result in performance degradation such as a drop in throughput or long delays. Solutions to this problem often focus on multipath or multichannel extensions to the existing ad- hoc routing protocols. In this paper, we propose a novel solution by introducing an alternative …

Front Matter And Faculty Notes

Transactions: The Tennessee Journal of Business Law

No abstract provided.

Legal Form, Style, And Etiquette For Email, George W. Kuney

Transactions: The Tennessee Journal of Business Law

No abstract provided.

Using An Interviewing, Counseling, Negotiating, And Drafting Simulation In The First Year Legal Writing Program, Kirsten A. Dauphinais

Transactions: The Tennessee Journal of Business Law

No abstract provided.

The Impact Of An Interdisciplinary Learning Community Course On Pseudoscientific Reasoning In First-Year Science Students, Timothy Franz, Kris H. Green

Psychology Faculty/Staff Publications

This case study examined the development and evaluation of an interdisciplinary first-year learning community designed to stimulate scientific reasoning and critical thinking. Designed to serve the needs of scholarship students majoring in mathematics and natural sciences, the six-credit learning community course was writing-intensive and emphasized general scientific reasoning and critical thinking skills. Success of the course was measured using a pre-test/post-test design that assessed students’ paranormal beliefs. Outcomes of the study indicated students’ paranormal beliefs were significantly lower at the end of the semester than at the beginning, which was used as a surrogate measure of scientific reasoning that was …

With 'Cheekbones And Noses Like Eagles And Hawks': Indigeneity And Mestizaje In Ana Castillo’S 'The Mixquiahuala Letters' And Leslie Marmon Silko’S 'Almanac Of The Dead', Tereza M. Szeghi

English Faculty Publications

This article argues that conceptions of indigeneity and mestizaje conveyed in Ana Castillo's The Mixquiahuala Letters and Leslie Marmon Silko's Almanac of the Dead are influenced (differentially) by the very colonialist assumptions the novels otherwise aim to dismantle. I compare how indigeneity and mestizaje are defined in Letters andAlmanac (with particular attention to their oppositional features), addressing relationships between these definitions, popular colonialist discourse, and anti-colonial articulations of identity that have developed in American Indian and Chicana/o communities. Significantly (and tragically), Letters' Chicana protagonist, Teresa, envisions her recovery of a cohesive cultural identity as a return to a …

Trauma Informed Care With Deaf Persons (With By Proxy Assistance From Supreme Court Justice Sotomayor), Michael A. Harvey

JADARA

None

Présence Francophone, Numéro 81 (2013)

Présence Francophone: Revue internationale de langue et de littérature

No abstract provided.

Parties Annexes

Présence Francophone: Revue internationale de langue et de littérature

No abstract provided.

Heroes - The Ismaili Africa, Nasrin Shamji-Dewany

Selected secondary sources and publications with substantial content about AKU

This issue of The Ismaili Africa highlights major institutional initiatives, community achievements, and humanitarian efforts across East and Central Africa. Featured stories include the inauguration of the Aga Khan Academy in Hyderabad by Mawlana Hazar Imam, the Aga Khan Award for Architecture, Serena Hotels’ recognition at the World Travel Awards, and the community's response to the 2013 Westgate Mall attack in Nairobi. The publication also includes profiles, interviews, regional news, and tributes, reflecting the values, resilience, and service ethos of the Ismaili community.

Examining The Ridership Attraction Potential Of Bus Rapid Transit: A Quantitative Analysis Of Image And Perception, Alasdair Cain, Jennifer Flynn

Journal of Public Transportation

If public transit is to attract discretionary riders, it must offer high-quality service and convey an attractive image. Although Bus Rapid Transit (BRT) is designed to emulate rail-based transit, there is little quantitative evidence of whether BRT can capture the ridership attraction benefits associated with rail. A combination of focus groups and an attitudinal survey were conducted to assess BRT’s ability to replicate the high-quality image and ridership attraction benefits associated with rail, and to quantify the tangible and intangible factors that drive perceptual differences between alternative transit modes. Research was fielded in Los Angeles due to the city’s range …

The Virtual Guru And Beyond: The Changing Role Of Teacher In North Indian Classical Music, Wallace Harvey

Dissertations, Masters Theses, Capstones, and Culminating Projects

This project, which encompasses both written and performed aspects, is an exploration of the North Indian classical music tradition as it is taught in twenty-first century California, and a de-exoticization of a musical style that most Americans are unacquainted with. A brief overview of the basic theory, history, and practice of North Indian classical music is followed by a comparison of oral and written musical traditions. A specific composition from the North Indian classical tradition is included as an example of the form and how that form is transmitted. Emerging modes of transmission include multimedia and network technologies; their use, …

All Four Knot, A Cover Story, Sean Adrian Smith

Dissertations, Masters Theses, Capstones, and Culminating Projects

No abstract provided.

Creating Safe Spaces: Bergson, Affirmation, And The Constitution Of Lgbtq Identity, Timothy Ross Johnston

Stony Brook Theses and Dissertations Collection, 2006-2020 (closed to submissions)

The central claim of this dissertation is that the ability to feel comfortable, both in terms of your identity and in your fluid movement through the world, is the result of what I call affirmative feedback loops. When your environment affirms and reflects your identity back to you, you become comfortable with yourself and in that environment. This affirmation can be as direct as someone explicitly affirming you (for example, when you come out) or it can be as subtle and quotidian as being able to display photos of loved ones in your workspace. I argue that caring for other …

Algorithms And Structures For Covariance Estimates With Application To Finance, Tengjie Jia

Stony Brook Theses and Dissertations Collection, 2006-2020 (closed to submissions)

Factor analysis is an important statistical tool used to describe variability among observed, correlated variables in terms of a potentially lower number of unobserved variables which are called factors. Maximum likelihood estimation (MLE) has been popular for fitting factor analysis. Among variety of iterative methods that can be used to perform MLE, the EM algorithm is probably one of the most stable in terms of monotonely increasing the likelihood and the easiest to implement. However, in the real world, the rate of convergence of EM could be painfully slow in factor model estimation. In this dissertation, we study two popular …

A Lifetime Of Magical Thinking, Victoria Johnston Boecherer

Stony Brook Theses and Dissertations Collection, 2006-2020 (closed to submissions)

This project examines how the narrative structure of Joan Didion's two most recent works, The Year of Magical Thinking and Blue Nights, may be used to gain a better understanding of the author herself. Didion's use of the term " magical thinking" is accepted as a reasonable response to the grief she experiences following the deaths of her husband and daughter. An examination of her larger body of work indicates that magical thinking is a tactic of literary invention Didion has relied upon since childhood to restore order to her life when it becomes chaotic and unmanageable. Using Wayne Booth's …

Error Reduction In Parameter Estimation With Case Studies In Risk Measurement And Portfolio Optimization, Xiaoping Zhou

Stony Brook Theses and Dissertations Collection, 2006-2020 (closed to submissions)

Parameter estimation is an important step in probabilistic and statistical modeling. Maximum likelihood estimators (MLE) are the classical parameter estimators. However, in the real world, for small samples or ill-posed problems maximum likelihood estimates may be difficult to find through direct numerical optimization, and are unstable and sensitive to outliers. In this dissertation, we study two popular problems in financial risk management and portfolio selection. The first problem is operational risk modeling. Data insufficiency and reporting threshold are two main difficulties in estimating the loss severity distributions in operational risk modeling. We investigate four methods including MLE, expectation-maximization (EM), penalized …

Accessible Web Automation, Yury Puzis

Stony Brook Theses and Dissertations Collection, 2006-2020 (closed to submissions)

The Web is far less usable and accessible for people with visual impairments than it is for sighted people. There are only a handful of screen-reader applications that improve web browsing accessibility by reading aloud the content of web pages. However, accessibility does not imply usability; blind people end up spending minutes on browsing tasks that take sighted people seconds. This lack of productivity using the Web poses a significant barrier for people with visual impairments in education, employment, healthcare, etc. Web automation, a process of automating browsing actions on behalf of the user, has the potential to bridge the …

Formal Analysis Of Dns Attacks And Their Countermeasures Using Probabilistic Model Checking, Tushar Suhas Deshpande

Stony Brook Theses and Dissertations Collection, 2006-2020 (closed to submissions)

The Domain Name System (DNS) is an internet-wide, hierarchical naming system used to translate domain names into physical IP addresses. Any disruption of the service DNS provides can have serious consequences. We present a formal analysis of two notable threats to DNS, namely cache poisoning and bandwidth amplification, and the countermeasures designed to prevent their occurrence. Our analysis of these attacks and their countermeasures is given in the form of a cost-benefit analysis, and is based on probabilistic model checking of Continuous-Time Markov Chains. We use CTMCs to model the race between legitimate and malicious traffic in a DNS server …

A Rssi Based Locating Algorithm For Multi-Robot System, Pan Wang

Stony Brook Theses and Dissertations Collection, 2006-2020 (closed to submissions)

An algorithm based on Received Signal Strength Indicator (RSSI) is designed for locating a wireless signal source in Multi-Robot System (MRS). Mobile robots are initially assigned to different locations. They are either sending or sensing wireless signals. The purpose of the algorithm is to establish communication among robots by locating the signal sources. Three main behavior modes of a robot are proposed for the algorithm skeleton through behavior-based analyzing. A log-distance path loss model is adopted for representing Received Signal Strength Indicator (RSSI) on a grid map. The locating process is a gradient-based motion control which refers to the RSSI …

Active Learning Using Model-Eliciting Activities And Inquiry-Based Learning Activities In Dynamics, Jeffrey Phillip Georgette

Master's Theses

This thesis focuses on a year-long project of implementing active learning in undergraduate dynamics courses at Cal Poly San Luis Obispo from 2012-2013. The purpose is to increase conceptual understanding of critical dynamics concepts and to repair misconceptions of the students. Conceptual understanding in Dynamics is vital to understanding the big picture, building upon previous knowledge, and better understanding the behavior of engineering systems. Through various hands-on activities, students make predictions, test their conceptions, and solve real world problems. These active learning methods allow students to improve their learning of Dynamics concepts. Education research on active learning is present in …

Design Of A Low Power Cargo Security Device Using A Micropower Ultra-Wideband Impulse Radar, Brian M. Wihl

Master's Theses

Each year, thousands of cargo containers are broken into during shipping, costing billions of dollars in lost and damaged goods. In addition to removing its contents, intruders can also add unwanted and dangerous materials to a container, posing a threat to National Security. The possibilities of cargo container break-ins require that the containers go through check points at which they are physically searched. These searches often require the opening of the container, unloading and inspecting all cargo, and then loading the container and resealing it. This is a long and costly process.

Because of the high costs of break-ins and …

Measuring The Counter/Assumption Model's Effect On Argumentation Quality, Evan D G Ovadia

Master's Theses

This thesis presents a new platform called See the Reason, built upon a tree- structured argumentation model called the Counter/Assumption model. In the Counter/Assumption model, a topic is posted first, then under that topic, reasons for and against, and for each reason, counterarguments, and for any counterargu- ment, more counterarguments. The model enables us to systematically determine whether a claim is “tentatively true” or “tentatively false,” in an effort to motivate people to make their side’s claims tentatively true and the opposing side’s claims tentatively false, thus encouraging conflict. Research suggests that debates with more conflict are better, so this …

Invisible Minority: People Incarcerated With Mental Illness, Developmental Disabilities, And Traumatic Brain Injury In Washington's Jails And Prisons, Bette Michelle Fleishman

Seattle Journal for Social Justice

No abstract provided.

The Money Or The Media? Lessons From Contrasting Developments In Us And Australian Whistleblowing Laws, Terry Morehead Dworkin, A.J. Brown

Seattle Journal for Social Justice

No abstract provided.

An Inconsistent Invitation: Am I Invited To Be A Party? How Not Affording Party Status To Youth In Washington Dependency Hearings Can Be A Violation Of Due Process, Laura Baird

Seattle Journal for Social Justice

No abstract provided.

Stymieing Controversy Over Generic Top-Level Domains (Gtlds) And Other Internet Governance Decisions With Content Neutrality, Nafees Uddin

Seattle Journal for Social Justice

No abstract provided.

The Future Of Transit In West Virginia, Diana Long, Benjamin L. Blandford, Peter J. Dailey, Sinaya Dayan, Justin Matthews, Kent Sowards

Reports with Contribution from KTC Researchers

No abstract provided.