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Ua24 Mcicsl Newsletter - November 2015, Shannon R. Trimboli Education Coordinator

MCICSL Newsletter

This issue includes the following:

Partners Recognized for Water Quality Research at Mammoth Cave National Park and Increasing Diversity in the Geosciences

Texas A&M – Galveston Students Participate in Citizen Science at Mammoth Cave National Park

Northern Kentucky University and the Mammoth Cave International Center for Science and Learning to Host Partners in the Parks Program at Mammoth Cave National Park

as well as education and research highlights, and MCICSL symposium information

Scholarworks Statistics - November 2015, Scholarworks

ScholarWorks Reports

For the month of November 2015, ScholarWorks recorded a total of 28,071 full-text and additional file downloads and 13,410 page views.

Behavioral Finance: Its History And Its Future, Robert Christopher Hammond

Selected Honors Theses

The field of behavioral finance has attempted to explain a litany of biases, heuristics, and

inefficiencies present in financial markets since its creation in the 1980’s. This paper is structured as a comprehensive literature review of behavioral finance, and includes both the seminal works as well as more recent papers. The various subtopics of behavioral finance will also be analyzed, which include loss aversion, corporate finance, and momentum/contrarian investing. Finally, this paper will draw unique conclusions across behavioral finance and hypothesize about what topics within behavioral finance are likely to yield the most interesting research in the near future.

One Teacher’S Understandings And Practices For Real-World Connections In Mathematics, Kathleen Jablon Stoehr, Erin Turner, Amanda Tori Sugimoto

Teacher Education

Recent scholarship in mathematics education has increasingly supported the power of connecting mathematics lessons to students’ lived experiences. This case study, drawn from a larger multi-year study, traces the reflections and pedagogical practice of a middle school mathematics teacher who regularly connected her lessons to real-world contexts. We highlight how the teacher connected a fractions lesson to the context of making soup for her family to accomplish several goals including: (1) sharing stories to learn more about students, (2) moving beyond numbers to build understanding, (3) building students’ mathematical confidence, and (4) making space for students to connect mathematical ideas. …

Can I Teach Mathematics? A Study Of Preservice Teachers’ Self-Efficacy And Mathematics Anxiety, Kathleen Jablon Stoehr, Amy M. Olson

Teacher Education

This paper presents two studies (qualitative and quantitative) with the shared goal of exploring preservice teachers’ (PSTs’) experiences of mathematics anxiety and self-efficacy for mathematics teaching. Findings indicate that PSTs experience high levels of mathematics anxiety, impacting current learning and preference for teaching the content, as well as the development of self-efficacy for teaching mathematics and conceptions of ideal teaching. Findings regarding anxiety (fear) of evaluation and concern about being able to inspire students in their future classrooms converged across studies.

40ar/39ar Ages Of Lunar Impact Glasses: Relationships Among Ar Diffusivity, Chemical Composition, Shape, And Size, John W. Delano Phd, Nicolle Zellner

Atmospheric and Environmental Science Faculty Scholarship

Lunar impact glasses, which are quenched melts produced during cratering events on the Moon, have the potential to providenot only compositional information about both the local and regional geology of the Moon but also information about the impact flux over time. We present in this paper the results of 73 new 40Ar/39Ar analyses of well-characterized, inclusion-free lunar impact glasses and demonstrate that size, shape, chemical composition, fraction of radiogenic 40Ar retained, and cosmic ray exposure (CRE) ages are important for 40Ar/39Ar investigations of these samples. Specifically, analyses of lunar impact glasses from the Apollo 14, 16, and 17 landing sites …

Ring Theory Seminar | Row And Column Finite Matrices, Dec. 4, Ohio University College Of Arts & Sciences

All Forum Articles

No abstract provided.

2015: "Go With The Flow", Paul Nebres '16, Kushagra Gupta '16, Jason Chen '16, Noor Michael '16

Distinguished Student Work

In a famous incident in August 2010, a Chinese traffic jam stretched for over 100 kilometers and stranded drivers took over two weeks to get from one side to the other. Stemming from a routine lane closure for road maintenance, the traffic jam soon spiraled out of control, as cars piling up at the jam greatly outnumbered those leaving the other end. Sadly, in todays overpopulated world, these sorts of nightmare scenarios are only becoming more and more common, from chronic traffic jams in congested Chinese cities to Carmageddon in Los Angeles. For drivers, these extensive traffic jams can be …

2015: "No Safety, Know Pain : Know Safety, No Pain", Brice Wang '16, Joy Qiu '16, Daniel Sohn '16, Angad Garg '16

Distinguished Student Work

In the world we live in today, many people live in urban or suburban areas. For this reason, residents of these metropolitan areas should be aware of the safety of the city they live in so they can take necessary precautions and educate youth about what actions are safe. In addition, judging the safety of a city allows the government of the city to analyze what factors and laws make other cities safer, and how they can replicate these conditions to make their city a safer place as well.

The Founding Of The Robert B. Daugherty Water For Food Institute At The University Of Nebraska

Daugherty Water for Food Global Institute: Administrative Materials

University of Nebraska President J.B. Milliken drove to Omaha in to meet Robert Daugherty at his home. In the living room, the elder Daugherty was surrounded by Mogens Bay, his three sons and a covey of lawyers. Now 88 years old, the businessman had a reputation for being tough-minded and smart, a man who could intimidate, but also surprise with his ready sense of humor. In his long career, Daugherty had transformed agriculture and the rural landscape into the now familiar polka dot pattern, the signature of the center pivot irrigators Daugherty had popularized in the 1970s. He had started …

Algebra Seminar | Group Cohomology And The Extension Problem, Dec. 3, Ohio University College Of Arts & Sciences

All Forum Articles

No abstract provided.

Algebra Seminar | A Quick Introduction To The Hyperreals, Nov. 5, Ohio University College Of Arts & Sciences

All Forum Articles

No abstract provided.

Dynamics In Biology Timeseries From Ventilated Patients Dynamics Of Pulmonary Infection Immunity Process, Nov. 24, Ohio University College Of Arts & Sciences

All Forum Articles

No abstract provided.

Ring Theory Seminar | On Piecewise Prime Modules, Nov. 13, Ohio University College Of Arts & Sciences

All Forum Articles

No abstract provided.

Dynamics In Biology Global Stability Of Triatomine Reinfestation Models, Nov. 17, Ohio University College Of Arts & Sciences

All Forum Articles

No abstract provided.

Waning Influence Of History: Why?, Olga Kosheleva, Vladik Kreinovich

Departmental Technical Reports (CS)

In the past, history played an important role in education: students learned history of science, history of mathematics, etc. In the last decades, the influence of history has waned. In this paper, we provide a natural explanation for this waning.

Explaining Boris Pasternak's Observation That Complex Ideas Are Sometimes Easier To Understand, Olga Kosheleva, Vladik Kreinovich

Departmental Technical Reports (CS)

Probably the most cited lines from the poetry of the Nobel-prize winning Russian writer Boris Pasternak contain the observation that complex ideas are sometimes easier to understand than simpler ones. This is not just a paradoxical poetic statement: many teachers have observed the same seemingly counter-intuitive phenomenon. In this paper, we provide a possible explanation for this phenomenon, by showing that indeed, many easier-to-describe mathematical models lead to more-difficult-to-solve mathematical problems.

Why The Graph Isomorphism Problem Is Easier Than Propositional Satisfiability: A Possible Qualitative Explanation, Vladik Kreinovich, Olga Kosheleva

Departmental Technical Reports (CS)

A recent result has shown that the graph isomorphism problem can be solved in quasi-polynomial time, while the general belief is that only exponential time algorithms are possible for propositional satisfiability. This is somewhat counter-intuitive, since for propositional satisfiability, we need to look for one of 2ⁿ options, while in graph isomorphism, we need to look for one of n! options, and n! is much larger than 2ⁿ. Our qualitative explanation for this counter-intuitive fact comes from the fact that, in general, a graph isomorphism problem has a unique solution -- in contrast to propositional satisfiability which, …

Stem Stories, November 2015, #1, Daniel Vorwerk

STEM Stories

Program Spotlight - Louis Stokes Alliances for Minority Participation (LSAMP)

Population Of 13be In A Nucleon Exchange Reaction, B. R. Marks, P. A. Deyoung, J. K. Smith, T. Baumann, J. Brown, N. Frank, J. Hinnefeld, M. Hoffman, M. D. Jones, Z. Kohley, A. N. Kuchera, B. Luther, A. Spyrou, Sharon L. Stephenson, C. Sullivan, M. Thoennessen, N. Viscariello, S. J. Williams

Physics and Astronomy Faculty Publications

The neutron-unbound nucleus Be13 was populated with a nucleon exchange reaction from a 71 MeV/u secondary B13 beam. The decay-energy spectrum was reconstructed using invariant mass spectroscopy based on Be12 fragments in coincidence with neutrons. The data could be described with an s-wave resonance at Er=0.73(9)MeV with a width of Γr=1.98(34)MeVand a d-wave resonance at Er=2.56(13)MeV with a width of Γr=2.29(73)MeV. The observed spectral shape is consistent with previous one-proton removal reaction measurements from B14.

Two-Neutron Sequential Decay Of 24o, M. D. Jones, N. Frank, T. Baumann, J. Brett, J. Bullaro, P. A. Deyoung, J.E. Finck, K. Hammerton, J. Hinnefeld, Z. Kohley, A. N. Kuchera, J. Pereira, A. Rabeh, W. F. Rogers, J. K. Smith, A. Spyrou, Sharon L. Stephenson, K. Stiefel, M. Tuttle-Timm, R. G.T. Zegers, M. Thoennessen

Physics and Astronomy Faculty Publications

A two-neutron unbound excited state of 24O was populated through a (d,d ) reaction at 83.4 MeV/nucleon. A state at E = 715 ± 110 (stat) ± 45 (sys) keV with a width of < 2 MeV was observed above the two-neutron separation energy placing it at 7.65 ± 0.2 MeV with respect to the ground state. Three-body correlations for the decay of 24O → 22O + 2n show clear evidence of a sequential decay through an intermediate state in 23O. Neither a di-neutron nor phase-space model for the three-body breakup were able to describe these correlations.

X-Ray Emission From The Giant Magnetosphere Of The Magnetic O-Type Star Ngc 1624-2, V. Petit, David H. Cohen, G. A. Wade, Y. Nazé, S. P. Owocki, J. O. Sundqvist, A. Ud-Doula, A. Fullerton, M. Leutenegger, M. Gagné

Physics & Astronomy Faculty Works

We observed NGC 1624-2, the O-type star with the largest known magnetic field (Bp ∼ 20  kG), in X-rays with the Advanced CCD Imaging Spectrometer (ACIS-S) camera on-board the Chandra X-ray Observatory. Our two observations were obtained at the minimum and maximum of the periodic Hα emission cycle, corresponding to the rotational phases where the magnetic field is the closest to equator-on and pole-on, respectively. With these observations, we aim to characterize the star's magnetosphere via the X-ray emission produced by magnetically confined wind shocks. Our main findings are as follows. (i) The observed spectrum of NGC 1624-2 is hard, …

Seismic Surveys And Marine Turtles: An Underestimated Global Threat?, Sarah E. Nelms, Wendy Dow Piniak, Caroline R. Weir, Brendan J. Godley

Environmental Studies Faculty Publications

Seismic surveys are widely used in marine geophysical oil and gas exploration, employing airguns to produce sound-waves capable of penetrating the sea floor. In recent years, concerns have been raised over the biological impacts of this activity, particularly for marine mammals. While exploration occurs in the waters of at least fifty countries where marine turtles are present, the degree of threat posed by seismic surveys is almost entirely unknown. To investigate this issue, a mixed-methods approach involving a systematic review, policy comparison and stakeholder analysis was employed and recommendations for future research were identified. This study found that turtles have …

New Approach To Density Estimation And Application To Value-At-Risk, Kian Guan Lim, Hao Cheng, Nelson K. L. Yap

Research Collection Lee Kong Chian School Of Business

The key contribution in this paper is to provide a new approach in estimating the physical distribution of the underlying asset return by using a quadratic Radon-Nikodym derivative function. The latter function transforms a fitted Variance Gamma risk-neutral distribution that is obtained from traded option prices. The generality of the VG distribution helps to avoid unnecessary mis-specification bias. The estimated empirical distribution is then used to find the risk measure of VaR. We show that possible underestimation of VaR risk using existing methods is largely not due to VaR itself but perhaps due to mis-specification errors which we minimize in …

Skew Row-Strict Quasisymmetric Schur Functions, Sarah K. Mason, Elizabeth Niese

Mathematics Faculty Research

Mason and Remmel introduced a basis for quasisymmetric functions known as the row-strict quasisymmetric Schur functions. This basis is generated combinatorially by fillings of composition diagrams that are analogous to the row-strict tableaux that generate Schur functions. We introduce a modification known as Young row-strict quasisymmetric Schur functions, which are generated by row-strict Young composition fillings. After discussing basic combinatorial properties of these functions, we define a skew Young row-strict quasisymmetric Schur function using the Hopf algebra of quasisymmetric functions and then prove this is equivalent to a combinatorial description. We also provide a decomposition of the skew Young row-strict …

Volume 69 Issue 1 (Fall/Winter 2015)

Utah Science

2 Awareness, Appreciation, Conservation

The sage-grouse is an iconic bird that inhabits vast seas of sagebrush in western North America and has been the focus of extensive discussion and concern among wildlife managers, ranchers, mineral extraction and energy companies, land developers and others in the west and beyond. Why all the discussion about a 2-to 5-pound bird?

8 Recreation Ecology in National Parks and Protected Areas

People love national parks, but managing a growing numbers of visitors with a mandate to preserve natural conditions in perpetuity is a challenge. Recreation ecologists are providing park managers with good science to help …

Raisin' Contentions: A Farmer's Grapes Of Wrath And The Ninth Circuit's Questionable Takings Analysis In Horne V. U.S. Dept. Of Agriculture, Drew S. Mcgehrin

Villanova Environmental Law Journal (1991 - )

No abstract provided.

Exploration Of Factors That Contribute To Girls’ Performance In Mathematics-A Case Of A Public School In Taita-Taveta County, Kenya, Beatrice Wakio Mbogo

Master of Education

Mathematics as a science contributes to technological growth in the world. In the 21st century the role of mathematics has increased tremendously. It’s needed by individuals in their daily lives as well as in industry. If women are to participate in business and in the society of the global economy, then they must be represented in mathematics related courses. Kenyan girls have continued to perform poorly in this important subject as reflected in the Kenya Certificate of Secondary Education examinations. This study aimed at exploring the factors contributing to girls’ low performance in mathematics. The participants for the study were …

Exploring Teachers Roles On Students’ Learning: A Case In A Government Aided Secondary School In North Western District In Uganda, Osman Swalleh

Master of Education

Students’ learning is of great concern to the parents and to all stakeholders in a country. This is why Uganda government puts in a lot of resources to ensure that students are given education that will equip them with relevant skills that will make them productive citizens. However, students’ learning within the country has never been the same and within districts their learning varies from school to school leading to fluctuating academic performance of students. This study therefore explored teachers’ roles on students learning in one government aided secondary school in North Western district of Uganda. The main research question …

The Perceptions Of Elementary Stem Schools In Missouri, Kelli Michelle Alumbaugh

Dissertations

Science, technology, engineering, and mathematics education, or STEM, is an area that is currently growing in popularity with educators (Becker & Park, 2011). A qualitative study consisting of interviews was conducted and data were gathered from three leaders in professional STEM organizations, four principals from elementary STEM schools, and six teachers from elementary STEM schools to gain their perceptions of elementary STEM schools in Missouri. The perceptions of leaders in professional STEM organizations regarding STEM education were consistently all positive, and each leader was a proponent of STEM education at the elementary level. The perceptions of principals and teachers were …