Digital Commons Network^™

Online Diagnosis Of Diabetes With Twitter Data, Farheen Ali

Masters Theses

"Innovation in technology enables people to communicate, share information and look for their needs by just sitting in rooms and going through some clicks. While social media has played a very important role in connecting people worldwide, its potential has stretched beyond the innovative idea of connecting people through their social networks. While many thought there was no meeting point for the healthcare sector and social media, it was a surprise when research and innovations have shown that social media could lay a very significant role in the health care sector.

Research has been done in developing models that could …

Numerical Study Of Upstream And Downstream Regions Of One Dimensional Detonation Wave In A Dusty Gas Medium, Shubhadeep Banik

Masters Theses

"In detonative combustion very high temperatures are attained by the burned gases. As a result, a large amount of thermal energy is produced during the combustion process. This heat can affect the state of the unburned fuel through radiation of heat from the burned gases. In this study a one-dimensional model was deemed appropriate to gain insight into the fundamental structure of the detonation wave. In this model, the detonation wave divides the fluid stream into an upstream region, consisting of fuel and oxidant, and a downstream region, consisting of burned gases. A set of computer programs, some developed during …

Evaluation Of Preformed Particle Gel Treatment Using Homogeneous And Heterogeneous Models, Hilary Ogochukwu Elue

Masters Theses

"This research investigates the effects of preformed particle gel (PPG) in remedying the problems of excess water production and low oil recovery of heterogeneous reservoirs by placing the PPG in the high-permeability layer, thus diverting displacing brine to the unswept low permeability layer. This investigation was completed with three tasks.

The first task was to evaluate the PPG swelling kinetics and strength as a function of concentration of brine. The result of this task indicate that PPG prepared with low concentration of brine swells more, becomes weaker, more deformable than PPG prepared with high concentration of brine.

The second task …

Comprehensive Benefits Of Green Roofs, Madison R. Gibler

Masters Theses

"Green infrastructure uses vegetation, soils, and natural processes to manage water and create healthier urban environments, providing traditional roof services and alternative stormwater management technologies. Other benefits and impacts are not yet fully understood or valued. Research conducted assesses specific stormwater benefits of green roofs, providing information on nutrient leaching from media; and analyzes potential energy benefits through side-by-side comparisons of full-scale white, traditional black rubber, and green roofs in the mid-continent Missouri climate. Roofing media selection impacted leaching of nutrients, suspended solids, and organic carbon from the tested green roof media. Thermal properties were investigated at the building level, …

Characterizing The Influence Of Carbon On The Flowrate And Disinfection Efficacy Of Household Ceramic Water Filters, Jessie Yvonne Hahn

Masters Theses

"Drinking water contamination is a major cause of disease in developing countries. Point of Use (POU) water treatment technologies generally have low initial cost and allow rapid availability of improved water. Ceramic pot filters (CPFs) are a POU water source treatment technology which filter water by gravity through a porous ceramic media. Some filters in use contain carbon remnants left from the fugitive pore former as a dark carbon core. Using disk-shaped experimental ceramic filters produced in the lab to have varying levels of carbon, the percent carbon present was measured and a visual analysis method was developed to determine …

Spatial And Temporal Modulation Of Heat Source Using Light Modulator For Advanced Thermography, Arvindvivek Ravichandran

Masters Theses

"Thermography is a Non-Destructive Testing (NDT) method that has found increasing use in industry and research. It has the advantages of being non-contact and be able to interrogate a large surface simultaneously. Active thermography using flash lamps as heat source has been demonstrated for identifying blind holes and delamination in composites. Despite these advancements, active thermographic approach fails to defects like cracks. Under uniform illumination heat flow is predominantly 1D and can easily circumvent a narrow feature. This can be overcome by using a focused light/laser source onto the surface to impose a 3D heat flux. The disadvantage is that …

The Effects Of Physical Flash Hole Deviations On Factory-Grade Rifle Ammunition, Nicolaas Martin Schrier

Masters Theses

"The objective of this research is to determine the effect of dimensional and positional changes of the primer flash hole on the performance of factory-grade rifle ammunition. The studied variables were flash hole diameter, offset from center, and orientation of the offset in the primer pocket. Cartridge performance was quantified by measuring muzzle velocity, chamber pressure, and target grouping size (precision).

Five different flash hole diameters were tested for both the Remington .223 and Winchester .308 calibers: 1.4mm, 2.0mm (the Fiocchi standard), 2.4mm, 2.8mm, and 3.0mm. Each diameter was tested at three offsets: centered (no offset), 0.5mm from center, and …

Co₂ Miscible Flooding Application And Screening Criteria, Mingfei Yin

Masters Theses

"Field experience has shown that CO₂ miscible flooding is an effective method to improve oil recovery, but only with proper reservoir candidate selection and optimal project design. This paper discusses both CO₂ miscible and immiscible flooding mechanisms and offers some guidelines for flooding operations. New developments in MMP determination are also introduced.

This research is based on a summary of field data from 134 CO₂ projects in the U.S. Several numerical methods have been applied for data cleaning. After cleaning, data from 128 projects have been analyzed and correlated. Carbonate reservoirs and sandstone reservoirs are the two …

Optimum Acquisition And Processing Parameters For Multichannel Analysis Of Surface Waves Using 3d Electrical Resistivity Tomography As Control, Uchenna Chibuzo Nwafor

Masters Theses

"Multichannel Analysis of Surface Waves (MASW) and Electrical Resistivity Tomography (ERT) data were acquired in the Newburg, Missouri with the goal of determining optimum MASW acquisition parameters. Users of the MASW tool generally state that greater geophone intervals and greater shot-to-receiver offsets provide for more accurate results. The objective was to determine if this "rule of thumb" applies in karst terrain.

ERT data were acquired along four traverses with eighty-four (84) electrodes at five feet spacing with SuperSting R8 Resistivity System using dipole- dipole array. The data were processed using Earth Imager to generate 2-D resistivity inversion and thereafter, Voxler …

Design And Implementation Of Low Complexity Wake-Up Receiver For Underwater Acoustic Sensor Networks, Ming Yue

Masters Theses

"This thesis designs a low-complexity dual Pseudorandom Noise (PN) scheme for identity (ID) detection and coarse frame synchronization. The two PN sequences for a node are identical and are separated by a specified length of gap which serves as the ID of different sensor nodes. The dual PN sequences are short in length but are capable of combating severe underwater acoustic (UWA) multipath fading channels that exhibit time varying impulse responses up to 100 taps. The receiver ID detection is implemented on a microcontroller MSP430F5529 by calculating the correlation between the two segments of the PN sequence with the specified …

A Decision Support Simulation Model For Bed Management In Healthcare, Raja A. Baru

Masters Theses

"In order to provide access to care in a timely manner, it is necessary to effectively manage the allocation of limited resources such as beds. Bed management is key to the effective delivery of high-quality and low-cost healthcare. An efficient utilization of beds requires a detailed understanding of the hospital's operational behavior. It is necessary to understand the behavior of a hospital in order to make necessary adjustments to its resources, and policies, which can improve patient's access to care. The aim of this research was to develop a discrete event simulation to assist in planning and staff scheduling decisions. …

Substitute Arguments In Constitutional Law, Louis Michael Seidman

Georgetown Law Faculty Publications and Other Works

In this article, I argue that that substitution is crucial to our practice of constitutional law. Of course, if one wished, one could easily extend the domain of substitution beyond these boundaries. Substitute arguments are an important aspect of law more generally and, indeed, of life. I have nonetheless chosen to limit my discussion to constitutional substitution because, I believe, overt discussion of substitution in this particular area illuminates important aspects of our constitutional regime-–aspects that substitution itself regularly obscures. To put my central point directly, I hope to show that constitutional law amounts to one, giant substitute argument.

Understanding Impurities In Copper Electrometallurgy, Paul Laforest

Masters Theses

"This work involves examining two industrial reports of methods to handle impurities in copper electrowinning and electrorefining. The first part evaluates the addition of Hydrostar, Cyquest N-900, DXG-F7, and Guartec EW to copper electrowinning electrolyte to affect MnO₂ deposition on coated titanium anodes (CTAs). The second part examines the effects of anode chemistry and thiourea addition on the ductility of electrorefined copper starter sheet.

In part one, a laboratory cell was used to simulate a short cycle electrowinning cell via chronopotentiometric operation with an IrO₂-Ta₂O₅ CTA at 40⁰C. A cyclic voltammetric sweep was applied …

Damage Detection Through Acoustic Emission Of Fracture Processes In Concrete Masonry Units, John Alexander Cain

Masters Theses

"Masonry structures are vulnerable to earthquakes; their brittleness and discontinuous formation make them susceptible to collapse. In the event of an emergency, this could be detrimental and perhaps fatal. The area of Structural Health Monitoring (SHM) is focused on understanding the behavior of structures for the sake of safety and predicting their longevity. One applicable technique to monitor this behavior is Acoustic Emission (AE). Acoustic Emissions are transient elastic waves released as microcracks nucleate from stress intensities, coalesce into cracks and then accumulate as damage. AE monitoring is a favorable method because it is capable of detecting cracking from within …

Red-Teaming Nlw: A Top Ten List Of Criticisms About Non-Lethal Weapons, David A. Koplow

Georgetown Law Faculty Publications and Other Works

Critics of non-lethal weapons (NL W) have asserted numerous complaints about the concepts, the Department of Defense research and development efforts, and the pace of innovation in the field. These critiques challenge the cost of the programs, their consistency with international law, the adverse public reaction to some of the devices, and the dangers of proliferation, among other points. This article summarizes the various assessments, in form of a "top ten list" of criticisms, and evaluates their weight. The author concludes that some of these points of objection have merit, but overall, the NLW enterprise is worthy of continuation and …

Free To Be You And Me? Copyright And Constraint, Rebecca Tushnet

Georgetown Law Faculty Publications and Other Works

Joseph P. Fishman’s Creating Around Copyright advances a provocative thesis: some restrictions on creativity can spur the development of additional creative solutions, and (some level of) copyright might be one of those restrictions. If Picasso was right that “forcing yourself to use restricted means is the sort of restraint that liberates invention,” then being forced by law to use restricted means might do the same thing, ultimately leading to more varied and thus more valuable works.

At the outset, it’s important to know the baseline against which we ought to evaluate Fishman’s claims. Most copyright restrictionists, of whom I count …

Content, Purpose, Or Both?, Rebecca Tushnet

Georgetown Law Faculty Publications and Other Works

Most debates about the proper meaning of “transformativeness” in fair use are really about a larger shift towards more robust fair use. Part I of this short Article explores the copyright-restrictionist turn towards defending fair use, whereas in the past critics of copyright’s broad scope were more likely to argue that fair use was too fragile to protect free speech and creativity in the digital age. Part II looks at some of the major cases supporting that rhetorical and political shift. Although it hasn’t broken decisively with the past, current case law makes more salient the freedoms many types of …

2015 Library Section From Nast Self Study, Georgia Southern University, Zach S. Henderson

Program Accreditation Reports (2013-2023)

This document was prepared in 2015 as part of the NAST Self Study. The document includes the Preface/ Section I, G: Library and Learning Resources section of the study. The data in the document is based on the Fiscal Year 2014 report of Annual Library Statistics for the Zach S. Henderson Library's collections and services.

Recovering Household Preferences For Digital Entertainment, Jin Li, Zhiling Guo, Robert J. Kauffman

Research Collection School Of Computing and Information Systems

Cable TV return path data made possible by current generation set-top boxes present a new opportunity to analyze household viewing behavior and recover household viewing preferences from it. This research develops a model of household viewing preference that supports quantifying a household's valuation for different categories of digital content within the constraints of the programs to which it subscribes. This study uses a data set of more than 1 million observations on households from a digital entertainment firm that offers basic and premium services. Our estimation is via a Bayesian hierarchical model that employs the Gibbs sampler. The results show …

Diffusion Of Innovations Of Videoconference Technology: An Instrumental Case Study Concerning Undergraduate Degree-Seeking Nontraditional Learners, Bruce G. Campbell

Theses and Dissertations

This applied dissertation is an instrumental case study based on diffusion of innovations theory designed to gather student opinions regarding videoconference (VC) technology use in facilitating courses to undergraduate degree-seeking nursing students. The author of diffusion of innovations theory, Rogers (2003), recommended that more qualitative studies be conducted in education. Rogers and Jain (1968) recommended these studies should be conducted from the aspect of “receivers of innovation diffusion” (p.1) to provide feedback instrumental to implementation of technological innovations in academe. Further, Rogers stated that multiple data points should be used during the process of trialing an innovation. Therefore, a current …

Best Practices Of Actively Engaged Volunteers Within A Megachurch, John M. Chase

Theses and Dissertations

In the realm of churches, recruiting, engaging, and retaining volunteers is essential for

churches to thrive. This applied dissertation was designed to identify best practices for

recruiting, engaging, and retaining volunteers within a megachurch. Both quantitative and qualitative methods were used to identify those factors that draw people to volunteer, keep them volunteering, and lead to their work satisfaction while they volunteer in a megachurch. The effect of demographics on volunteer satisfaction and engagement were also identified. The final product of this study was a set of best practices for any church to use to improve its volunteer program.

The …

Developing Positive Working Relationships In A Large Urban School District, June Justa Chennault

Theses and Dissertations

This applied dissertation provides an overview of the working relationships among key leaders within a large urban school district in the Southeastern part of the United States. This study examined the communication methods and responsibilities of each key player within the decision-making process for the district at various levels of leadership. Results called for the exploration of (a) effective communication, (b) verbal and nonverbal techniques, (c) electronic means of communication, (d) informal styles of communication, (e) interpersonal communication, (f) communication styles, (g) leadership styles, and (h) conflict management, which delineated the theoretical framework and research questions for this study. This …

Analysis Of Attitudes, Gender, And Beliefs Of Adolescent Students Concerning Interactive Technology, Courtney L. Teague

Theses and Dissertations

This applied dissertation was designed to provide insight about the perceptions of middle school students attending a Title I school about technology use and careers. Using a mixed methods approach, the researcher explored the beliefs and circumstances that affect attitudes and behaviors in technology usage by eighth-grade boys and girls. The research questions for this study included: 1) female Title I middle school students' perceptions of interactive technology, 2) male Title I middle school students' perceptions of interactive technology, and 3) gender differences towards interactive technology. Data were collected from six focus group participants and 226 students who completed a …

Promises Of Power: A Political Autobiography, Carl B. Stokes

Cleveland Memory

For a brief time in Cleveland, I was the man of power. I had what no black man in this country has had before: direct control of the government of a predominantly white population. That power came to me because I seized a situation that had made me seem like a savior to men who ordinarily look on blacks as an alien and vaguely dangerous force. –Excerpt from chapter 1 “Big Man, Little Man.” Other chapters include “How to Get Elected by White People,” Carl Junior,” "The Media,” “The Police,” and “The Future of Black Politics.” Carl B. Stokes …

Does Animal Welfare Trump Religious Liberty? The Danish Ban On Kosher And Halal Butchering, R J. Delahunty

San Diego International Law Journal

Western European governments since the eighteenth century Enlightenment have frequently enacted laws and regulations that have adverse effects (sometimes intended) on traditional Jewish ritual practices, including Sabbath observance, dress, and dietary practices. Regulations of the latter kind have often been adopted in the name of sparing animals from the purportedly cruel and inhumane methods used in the Jewish ritual slaughtering of cattle. Last year, the Danish Ministry of Food and Agriculture issued regulations that require the stunning of cattle before they can be slaughtered. Defended on the grounds of animal welfare, the regulations had the foreseen effect of precluding the …

Electric Utilities And Distributed Energy Resources - Opportunities And Challenges, Jeff Winmill

San Diego Journal of Climate & Energy Law

This Article explores the key business and regulatory issues associated with utility investments in DERs, as well as important considerations for regulators seeking to strike the appropriate balance between DER services provided by third parties and DER services provided by utilities. Part I provides a brief overview of the electric utility industry, and the growth and impact of DERs in recent years. Part II analyzes two emergent distributed technologies––solar photovoltaics (PV) and distributed storage––as well as utility efforts to invest in these technologies. And Part III concludes with a discussion of two different regulatory models for addressing utility-ownership of DERs: …

"Green" Performance: The Future Of Performance-Based Executive Compensation?, Ben Schwefel

San Diego Journal of Climate & Energy Law

Although sustainability performance appears to be a logical extension of the traditional performance-based compensation model, the effect and result of such performance remains unclear and untested across the market. The adoption of broad-based sustainability performance measures may be dangerous because, often times, these measures are tailored to the corporation and may decrease total shareholder return in the short run. Regardless of whether or not the corporation decides to introduce these measures, their effect on total shareholder return and other corporate interests requires an individualized analysis.
Part II of this Comment discusses the current state of executive compensation, including the use …

Reclaiming Mediation’S Future: Re-Focusing On Party Self-Determination, Robert A. Baruch Bush

Hofstra Law Faculty Scholarship

No abstract provided.

Intellectual Property Infringement As Vandalism, Irina D. Manta, Robert E. Wagner

Hofstra Law Faculty Scholarship

Defenders of strong intellectual property rights often maintain that intellectual property infringement is theft and that the sanctions associated with it ought to be high. Others are skeptical of the property comparison and think that much lower sanctions are appropriate.

In this Article, we argue that a careful analysis demonstrates: 1) that intellectual property infringement can be analogized to a property crime, but 2) that the more analogous crime is vandalism or trespass rather than theft. This categorization takes the rhetorical punch out of the property comparison. In addition to analyzing the natures of the various offenses, this Article investigates …

A Statistical Analysis And Modeling Of Information Diffusion Across Online Social Networks, Michael Piserchia

Open Access Master's Theses

In recent years, online social networks have become a very popular and effective forum for information exchange. These large, highly interconnected networks span the globe and have the ability to disseminate information in a fraction of the time it would take other communication networks. Given the myriad ways in which online social networks can be used, creating accurate, predictive models for the spread of information across them is very valuable. With that, modeling processes on large networks is a difficult task. It is computationally expensive, and usually prohibitive, to model a process on the entirety of a very large network. …