Digital Commons Network^™

The Synthesis Of Benzyloxy Substituted Dp-Ppvs, Ryan Oostendorp

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The alkyne 1-(benzyloxy)-4-(propargyloxy)benzene was reacted with 2,5-di(carboethoxy)3,4-diphenylcyclopentadienone to yield diethyl 5-((4-(benzyloxy)phenoxy)methyl)-2,3-diphenylterephthalate. The terephthalate was reduced with lithium aluminum hydride to produce 5-((4-(benzyloxy)phenoxy)methyl)-1,4-di(hydroxymethyl)-2,3-diphenylbenzene. The diol was reacted with thionyl chloride to yield the monomer 5-((4-(benzyloxy)phenoxy)methyl)-1,4-di(chloromethyl)-2,3-diphenylbenzene that has a pendent protected phenol function. The new compounds were characterized by melting point, IR, 1H NMR, 13C NMR spectroscopy and elemental analysis. Polymerization of the dichloro monomer via a Gilch polymerization yielded poly[(2,3-diphenyl-(5-((4-(benzyloxy)phenoxy)methyl)-1,4-phenylene) vinylene]. The polymer was characterized by IR, 1H NMR spectroscopy, TGA and DSC. The polymer was insoluble in most solvents but partially soluble in chlorinated solvents. The solid polymer fluoresced a …

Semsos : An Architecture For Query, Insertion, And Discovery For Semantic Sensor Networks, Joshua Kenneth Pschorr

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With sensors, storage, and bandwidth becoming ever cheaper, there has been a drive recently to make sensor data accessible on the Web. However, because of the vast number of sensors collecting data about our environment, finding relevant sensors on the Web and then interpreting their observations is a non-trivial challenge. The Open Geospatial Consortium (OGC) defines a web service specification known as the Sensor Observation Service (SOS) that is designed to standardize the way sensors and sensor data are discovered and accessed on the Web. Though this standard goes a long way in providing interoperability between sensor data producers and …

Two Fundamental Building Blocks To Provide Quick Reaction Capabilities For The Department Of Defense, Daniel Alan Uppenkamp

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The Department of Defense (DoD) has a need for long-term development efforts in conjunction with short-term development efforts. Ideally, Quick Reaction Capabilities (QRC) would be able to make use of the same processes that are used for Acquisition Programs (AP) with a few modifications to accommodate the accelerated schedule. Unfortunately, APs have a more fundamental problem with both the development process and the development framework. In August of 2007, the agile development process and modular, open source framework discussed in this thesis were two key factors that enabled the Air Force Research Laboratory (AFRL) to successfully deploy AngelFire in support …

An Accuracy Improvement Method For Cricket Indoor Location System, Anall Vijaykumar Gandhi

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The effective deployment of Automated Guided Vehicles (AGV) in indoor hostile environment demands high precision localization for navigation purposes. The cricket system, based on Time Difference of Arrival (TDoA) approach, provides precise localization. It calculates TDoA between radio and ultrasonic signal to estimate distance between two cricket motes. The position, in the referenced coordinate system, is estimated by multilateration using estimated distances from multiple motes. Therefore, the position accuracy depends on the distance estimation which in turn depends on the TDoA calculation. Ultrasonic transducer, a component of cricket mote hardware, has highly directive radiation pattern which affects ultrasonic signal detection. …

Design And Improve Energy Efficiency And Functionalities Of Electrical Wheelchairs, Dewei Guan

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There are millions of people who have lost their abilities to walk and wheelchairs offer the ONLY opportunities for their interactions with people and environments outside their houses. These individuals are becoming more and more eager to adapt modern technologies on their wheelchairs to improve quality of social life and the life of freedom. However, most available electric wheelchairs, driven by traditional lead-acid batteries and gear motors, are heavy and bulky in design with low energy efficiency, limited travel radius, and scarce communication/navigation functionalities. This project is to design and prototype an electric wheelchair that is lighter, more flexible in …

Overview Of The Large-Scale Biosphere–Atmosphere Experiment In Amazonia Data Model Intercomparison Project (Lba-Dmip), Luis Gustavo Goncalves De Goncalves, Jordan Borak, Marcos Heil Costa, Scott R. Saleska, Ian Baker, Natalia Resprepo-Coupe, Michel Nobre Muza, Benjamin Poulter, Hans Verbeeck, Joshua B. Fisher, Altaf Arain, Phillip Arkin, Bruno P. Cestaro, Bradley Christoffersen, David Galbraith, Xiaodan Guan, Bart Van Den Hurk, Kazuhito Ichii, Hewlley Acioli Imbuzeiro, Atul Jain, Naomi Levine, Chaoqun Lu, Gonzalo Migues-Macho, Debora Roberti, Alok Sahoo, Koichi Sakaguchi, Kevin Shaefer, Mingjie Shi, James Shuttleworth, Hanqin Tian, Zong-Lian Yang, Xubin Zeng

United States National Aeronautics and Space Administration: Publications

A fundamental question connecting terrestrial ecology and global climate change is the sensitivity of key terrestrial biomes to climatic variability and change. The Amazon region is such a key biome: it contains unparalleled biological diversity, a globally significant store of organic carbon, and it is a potent engine driving global cycles of water and energy. The importance of understanding how land surface dynamics of the Amazon region respond to climatic variability and change is widely appreciated, but despite significant recent advances, large gaps in our understanding remain. Understanding of energy and carbon exchange between terrestrial ecosystems and the atmosphere can …

Spurious Behavior Of Shock-Capturing Methods By The Fractional Step Approach: Problems Containing Stiff Source Terms And Discontinuities, Helen C. Yee, D. V. Kotov, Wei Wang, Chi-Wang Shu

United States National Aeronautics and Space Administration: Publications

The goal of this paper is to relate numerical dissipations that are inherited in high order shock-capturing schemes with the onset of wrong propagation speed of discontinuities. For pointwise evaluation of the source term, previous studies indicated that the phenomenon of wrong propagation speed of discontinuities is connected with the smearing of the discontinuity caused by the discretization of the advection term. The present study focuses only on solving the reactive system by the fractional step method using the Strang splitting. Studies shows that the degree of wrong propagation speed of discontinuities is highly dependent on the accuracy of the …

Corrigendum To ‘‘Spurious Behavior Of Shock-Capturing Methods By The Fractional Step Approach: Problems Containing Stiff Source Terms And Discontinuities’’ [J. Comput. Phys. 241 (2013) 266–291], Helen C. Yee, Dmitry V. Kotov, Wei Wang, Chi-Wang Shu

United States National Aeronautics and Space Administration: Publications

This corrigendum contains a correction to some of the figures in the article ‘‘Spurious behavior of shock-capturing methods by the fractional step approach: Problems containing stiff source terms and discontinuities’’ [J. Comput. Phys. 241 (2013) 266–291]. There was a computer coding error in the computer code that generates the results. The coding error consists of failing to update the temperature from the final solution of the RK4 convection step time evolution before the reaction step using the Strang splitting in Eq. (29). In addition, if N_r > 1, the error includes no update to the temperature for each sub-iteration on …

Adaptive Semantic Annotation Of Entity And Concept Mentions In Text, Pablo N. Mendes

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The recent years have seen an increase in interest for knowledge repositories that are useful across applications, in contrast to the creation of ad hoc or application-specific databases.

These knowledge repositories figure as a central provider of unambiguous identifiers and semantic relationships between entities. As such, these shared entity descriptions serve as a common vocabulary to exchange and organize information in different formats and for different purposes. Therefore, there has been remarkable interest in systems that are able to automatically tag textual documents with identifiers from shared knowledge repositories so that the content in those documents is described in a …

Parental Beliefs And Attitudes On Enrollment In A Dual Language Program At An Elementary School, Leah Delorenzo

Electronic Theses and Dissertations

In the 2010-2011 school year, there were almost a quarter of a million English language learners (ELLs) enrolled in Florida public schools (Florida Department of Education, 2011), most of whom were placed in mainstream schools with segregated language remediation. Dual language education (DLE) programs offer developmental opportunities in two languages that mainstream schools cannot. The purpose of this research was to identify parental attitudes toward immersion programs and define the reasons that parents enroll their children in DLEs. Sixty participants completed a questionnaire sent home from their student's DLE. The study data included biographical information, statements depicting the reasons for …

Synthesis And Electrodeposition Of Mixed Metal Trinuclear Clusters Of Molybdenum And Chromium In Ionic Liquid Onto A Platinum Electrode, Lynn Renee Frock

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Electrochemical properties of [Mo3O2(O2CCH3)6(H2O)(CF3SO2H)2 and [Cr2Mo(u2-CH3COO)6(u3-O)(H2O)3][CF3SO3] in 1-ethyl-3-methylimidazolium bis(pentafluoroethanesulfonyl)-imide ionic liquid was investigated. Cyclic voltammograms using a Platinum electrode indicated deposition had occurred for the [Mo3O2(O2CCH3)6(H2O)(CF3SO2H)2 metal cluster but had not for the polynuclear complex [Cr2Mo(u2-CH3COO)6(u3-O)(H2O)3][CF3SO3]. Constant potential electrolysis of -1.23 V using a platinum foil electrode was performed. Scanning electron microscopy in combination with energy dispersion spectroscopy confirmed that deposition had occurred.

The Solvent-Free Synthesis Of And N-Methyl-N-Alkylpiperidinium Salts And Their Anion Exchange Reactions With Dilithium Phthalocyanine, Michael Joseph Krol Jr.

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A nucleophilic substitution reaction of N-methylpiperidine with bromopropane, bromobutane, bromopentane, bromohexane and bromoheptane was carried out in a Q-Tube with excess alkyl halide and yielded N-methyl-N-propylpiperidinium bromide, N-methyl-N-butylpiperidinium bromide, N-methyl-N-pentylpiperidinium bromide, N-methyl-N-hexylpiperidinium bromide and N-methyl-N-heptylpiperidinium bromide in yields from 85 to 92 %. The salts, which were solids at room temperature, were soluble in dichloromethane and were characterized by 1H and 13C NMR, elemental analysis and DSC. Two of the piperidinium bromides, N-methyl-N-propylpiperidinium bromide, N-methyl-N-butylpiperidinium bromide were used in an anion exchange reaction with dilithium phthlocyanine to yield N-methyl-N-propylpiperidinium lithium phthalocyanine and N-methyl-N-butylpiperidinium lithium phthalocyanine, respectively in 78 to 85% …

Fundamental Understanding Of Blisk Analytical Response, Joseph A. Beck

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This effort seeks to increase the reduced-order model fidelity for mistuned Integrally Bladed Rotor (IBR) and Dual Flow-path Integrally Bladed Rotor (DFIBR) response prediction by explicitly accounting for blade geometric and material property deviations. These methods are formulated in a component mode synthesis (CMS) framework utilizing secondary modal reductions in a cyclic symmetry format. The resulting reduced-order models (ROMs) capture perturbations to both blade natural frequencies and mode shapes resulting from geometric deviations. Furthermore, the secondary modal reductions and cyclic symmetry format offer significant computational savings over traditional component mode synthesis methods that give a further reduction in model size. …

Evaluating The E-Consult Process For Diabetes Care Delivery At An Outpatient Care Clinic, Brian M. Zoll

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The occurrence of one of the most common chronic conditions in the U.S., diabetes, is expected to rise 53% from 24 million cases in 2003 to 37 million cases in 2023. The U.S. Veterans Health Administration (VHA) is not immune to this. The VHA has experienced an $820 million increase spending on diabetes patients between 2000 and 2008. The VHA has tried to keep the growth of chronic care costs in check through improvements in patient access to care by expanding its network of community-based outpatient clinics. Other methods the VHA has used to curb chronic care spending costs are …

Effect Of A Graded Layer On The Plastic Dissipation During Mixed-Mode Fatigue Crack Growth On Ductile Bimaterial Interfaces, Craig M. Baudendistel

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An energy-based theory for predicting mode I fatigue crack growth rates in ductile metals based on the total plastic dissipation ahead of a crack tip was proposed in 2003. Since then, this theory has been extended to layered material systems that typically include mixed-mode loading and elastic/plastic mismatch. Previous research by the author first extended this theory to include a graded layer (i.e., no step change in material properties across the crack plane) with which to more accurately model a crack interface between two materials with a mismatch in plastic properties only. In the current research, the graded layer model …

Low Cost Open Source Modal Virtual Environment Interfaces Using Full Body Motion Tracking And Hand Gesture Recognition, Matthew J. Marangoni

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Virtual environments provide insightful and meaningful ways to explore data sets through immersive experiences. One of the ways immersion is achieved is through natural interaction methods instead of only a keyboard and mouse. Intuitive tracking systems for natural interfaces suitable for such environments are often expensive. Recently however, devices such as gesture tracking gloves and skeletal tracking systems have emerged in the consumer market. This project integrates gestural interfaces into an open source virtual reality toolkit using consumer grade input devices and generates a set of tools to enable multimodal gestural interface creation. The AnthroTronix AcceleGlove is used to augment …

Hpai H5n1: A Global Pandemic Concern, With Implications For Pandemic Preperation And Public Health Policy, Lauren M. Koontz

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Research on highly pathogenic avian influenza A (HPAI) H5N1 has gained much attention in recent years due to its devastating impact within the bird population. While transmission to humans is rare, infections are fatal in more than half of the cases. One of the main concerns among the scientific community is the ability for this virus to mutate in a way much like seasonal influeanza that would allow it to be transmitted efficiently among the human population. Two researchers were able to separately create mutant isolates of H5N1 influenza A virus that could be transmitted via the respiratory route between …

Software-Defined Radio Based Blind Hierarchical Modulation Detector Via Second-Order Cyclostationary And Fourth-Order Cumulant, Yang Qu

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Modulation detection is very important to many communication and electronic warfare applications. Recent developments in cognitive radio (CR) and dynamic spectrum access (DSA) network have also brought much attention to modulation detection of unknown radio frequency (RF) signals. It is well known that using second-order cyclostationary features, e.g., spectral correlation function (SCF) and spectral coherent function (SOF), BPSK modulation can be easily distinguished from higher order modulations such as QPSK and QAM modulations. However, QPSK and higher order modulations exhibit similar second-order cyclostationary features, thus these features cannot be employed to distinguish among higher order modulations. To classify higher order …

Quantitative Analysis Of The Polarity Reversal Pattern Of The Earth's Magnetic Field And Self-Reversing Dynamo Models, Patrick Shane Craig

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The geologic record documents that the Earth's magnetic field has reversed 284 times over the past 160 Myr. This study uses two methods to analyze the scaling properties of the pattern of geomagnetic reversals and to analyze the scaling properties of reversals output by two mathematical self-reversing dynamo models, the Rikitake (1958) two-disk dynamo and the magnetohydrodynamic (MHD) model of Driscoll and Olson (2011). The first analysis method plots the duration versus cumulative probability for geomagnetic polarity intervals ranging between 0.01 and 35 Myr. The Kolmogorov-Smirnov statistic is used to determine the optimal minimum value of xmin at which power …

Palaeoecological Analysis Of The Decline In Stromatolite Abundance During The Ordovician Period, Noran Mhm El-Sherif

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A stromatolite is a laminated benthic microbial deposit. Its uniqueness arises from being present since the Precambrian to the present. Stromatolites recorded a peak time during the Mesoproterozoic, subsequently they witnessed abrupt rises and falls in abundance with the steepest decline in the Ordovician period, from which it never recovered from. There is no consensus yet regarding the reasons behind the decline of stromatolites. Thus the decline of these microbial deposits remains an enigma. Additionally, a literature gap exists regarding the reasons that specifically led to the Ordovician decline. Accordingly, the focus of this literature-based MSc. thesis is to find …

Stability Of A Fuzzy Logic Based Piecewise Linear Hybrid System, Aaron W. Seyfried

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Complex cyber-physical systems are difficult to model and control. However, humans are capable of accomplishing these tasks by constantly adapting and redefining the rules to control these complex systems. Fuzzy logic provides a means of encoding human inference into a control methodology. However, the fuzzy logic controllers are nonlinear and their stability is difficult to verify. Therefore, the widespread usefulness of fuzzy logic controllers is limited. It has been proven that fuzzy logic controllers can be implemented as piecewise linear switched controllers. It has also been shown that the piecewise linear system can be implemented as a hybrid system. Piecewise …

Integrity Monitoring For Multiple Errors In Vision Navigation Systems, Nicholas Allen Baine

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In aviation applications, navigation integrity is paramount. Integrity of GPS systems is well established with set standards. Vision-based navigation systems have been found to be an adequate substitute for GPS when it is unavailable but are unlikely to be utilized until there is a measure for system integrity. Work has been done to detect the effect of a single measurement pair being corrupted with a bias; however, the measurement geometry varies greatly with the environment. The environment could be sparse in visual features to track, or the environment could be rich with features. With more features, there is a greater …

Bull's-Eye Structure With A Sub-Wavelength Circular Aperture, Masoud Zarepoor

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This research focuses on improving the spatial resolution of terahertz (THz) imaging. Using a sub-wavelength aperture in a metal ground plane is the most common way to improve the spatial resolution, but a sub-wavelength aperture has low radiation transmission. To increase the radiation transmission of a sub-wavelength aperture, periodic circular grooves were put in the metal around the aperture. The sub-wavelength circular aperture and the periodic circular grooves around it are known as the bull's-eye structure. The bull's-eye structure shows high radiation transmission at its design frequency, and it also has sub-wavelength spatial resolution. This research designed the bull's-eye structure …

Abiotic Degradation Of Chlorinated Hydrocarbons (Chcs) With Zero-Valent Magnesium (Zvm) And Zero-Valent Palladium/Magnesium Bimetallic (Pd/Mg)-Reductant, Fang Yu

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Chlorinated hydrocarbons (CHCs) in groundwater can be treated by monometallic and bimetallic metal reductants through abiotic degradation. The breakdown of CHC is achieved by gaining electrons from those reductants and removing chlorines from CHC molecules to transform the CHCs into less chlorinated compounds. As a proven technology in groundwater treatment, permeable reactive barriers (PRBs) have been used to passively treat contaminated groundwater, in which granular metals can be used as reactive materials. This study explored the abiotic degradation of CHCs by zero-valent magnesium (ZVM) and bimetallic palladium/magnesium (Pd/Mg) reductants. Different CHCs (carbon tetrachloride, chloroform, dichloromethane (DCM), 1,2-dichloroethane (1,2-DCA), 1,1,2-trichloroethane (1,1,2-TCA), …

Long-Term Effects Of Deer Browsing On Northern Wisconsin Forest Plant Communities, Danielle Rae Begley

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The effects of excessive white-tailed deer (Odocoileus virginianus) browsing on forest understory plant communities are well-documented. However, these studies are usually short-term, and fail to focus on phylogenetic diversity and additional variables that may explain species composition. This study examined ecological and phylogenetic diversity, vegetation structure, and light (% insolation) in short (7 year) and long-term (22 year) exclosures (and paired controls) to identify if competitive exclusion occurs in long-term exclosures. A deer browsing susceptibility index (DBS) was also developed to identify species reliant on exclosures for persistence. Statistical analysis using 2-way ANOVAs showed increased percent cover, vegetation height, and …

Structural-Acoustic Analysis And Optimization Of Embedded Exhaust-Washed Structures, Ryan N. Vogel

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The configurations for high speed, low observable aircraft expose many critical areas on the structure to extreme environments of intense acoustic pressure loadings. When combined with primary structural and thermal loads, this effect can cause high cycle fatigue to aircraft skins and embedded exhaust system components. In past aircraft design methods, these vibro-acoustic loads have often been neglected based on their relatively small size compared to other thermal and structural loads and the difficulty in capturing their dynamic and frequency dependent responses. This approach is insufficient for effective advanced designs of complex aerospace structures, such as internal ducted exhaust systems …

Dual-Stimuli Responsive Poly(Ethylenimine)S With A Tunable Lcst For Gene Delivery, Mary Abraham

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Hyperbranched poly(ethylenimine)s (HPEI) were modified with hydrophobic isobutyryl amide groups (HPEI-IBAm_0.60) to cause an LCST. These modified polymers were then further substituted with hydrophobic alkyl chains (HPEI-IBAm_0.60-R_0.40), a mixture of alkyl chains and hydroxyethyl groups (HPEI-IBAm_0.60-EtOH_0.20-R_0.20), and a mixture of alkyl chains and low molecular weight PEG (HPEI-IBAm_0.60-PEG_0.20-R_0.20) to determine the effect of different functional groups on solubility behavior. At pH 7.4, all but three LCSTs were below body temperature (37 °C), while at pH 5, all but three LCSTs were above …

Mining Diversified Decision Trees Across Multiple Datasets To Capture Similarities And Alignable Differences, Qian Han

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This dissertation studies the problem of mining shared and alignable difference knowledge structures across multiple datasets/applications. Shared and alignable difference knowledge structures are important for identifying analogies between application domains and for forming new hypothesis in challenging research applications, and for assessing the degree and types of knowledge-level similarities and differences between application domains for use in learning transfer. Generally speaking, shared knowledge structures characterize underlying datasets and highlight conceptual-level structural similarities among the datasets. This dissertation studies the mining of shared decision trees, which are a special type of shared knowledge structures. We first consider building one shared decision …

Hydroquinone-Based Poly(Arylene Ether)S With Pendent Benzothiazole Or Benzoxazole And 3-Sulfonated Phenyl Sulfonyl Groups For Use As Proton Exchange Membranes, Huong Hoang

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A series of hydroquinone-based poly(arylene ether) copolymers, with truly pendent sulfonated phenyl sulfonyl groups and either benzothiazole or benzoxazole groups was synthesized for use as proton exchange membranes (PEM). Two homopolymers series, benzothiazole and benzoxazole based, were prepared via meta activated nucleophilic aromatic substitution polycondensation reactions. Two copolymer series of N-heterocyclic and sulfonated phenyl sulfonyl groups were synthesized via a similar method. The ratio of 3,5-difluoro-3'-sulfonated diphenylsulfone to 2-[3,5-bis-(4-hydroxyphenoxy)]benzothiazole or 2-[3,5-bis-(4-hydroxyphenoxy)]benzoxaole was varied to afford ion-exchange capacities ranging from 0.60 to 1.39 meq and 0.62 to 1.42 meq, respectively. Polymers were characterized by gel permeation chromatography (GPC), ¹³C NMR …

2013-2014 Nursing Undergraduate Student Handbook, Morehead State University. Nursing Department.

Nursing Department Publications Archive

2013-2014 Undergraduate Student Handbook of the Department of Nursing at Morehead State University.