Digital Commons Network^™

Re-Specifying The Sacred Values Scale, Adon Lee Neria

Open Access Theses & Dissertations

An object or value becomes sacred when a person feels compelled to protect and admire it. When a person holds a Sacred Value (SV) they are less likely to accept compromises, or "taboo tradeoffs," to that value and will behave less rationally to protect it from perceived slights. Though research on SV has replicated well, there has yet to be a popularized scale measuring it. A previous attempt at developing a multidimensional scale for measuring the degree to which a person holds any value as sacred was made that resulted in a 15-item measure. Though this version demonstrated good predictive …

The Nigerian Economy And The Dutch Disease., Kenechukwu Daryl Nweke

Open Access Theses & Dissertations

Dutch Disease explains the relationship between exploitation of natural resources and the decline in the agricultural and manufacturing sectors. The dependent variable of the model shows the contraction of either the manufacturing or agricultural sector. The theory asserts that increase in revenues from natural resources will de-industrialize a nationâ??s economy by appreciating the real exchange rate, and exports on the booming commodity, which in turn makes the tradable sector less competitive.

The government of Nigeria has neglected the agriculture sector, causing the sector to be less competitive in the trade market. As a result, when economic activities in Nigeria increase …

Keep Your Head Up: Building Life Skills In Youth For Social Reintegration And Success, Olga Lizbeth Ochoa

Open Access Theses & Dissertations

There are multiple factors that contribute to a juvenile's future incarceration when facing difficult environmental circumstances: adjudication (it is like an adult criminal conviction, but generally does not subject the youth to the same direct consequences), community characteristics, the age a young person is discharged, criminal history, and gender. This research is important because it applies social science research in community-based settings to address a social concern, moves beyond theoretical research while contributing to a new orientation of an applied project, and provides a model of university-community partnerships for finding innovative strategies to address issues of social concern for local …

Latina/O High School Students' Standpoint On Environmental Justice In A Border Community: A Phenomenological Study, Cynthia Christina Ontiveros

Open Access Theses & Dissertations

This qualitative research is a transcendental phenomenology seeking to understand Latin@ high school students’ perceptions and standpoints as they participated lessons that addressed border environmental justice issues in an underrepresented, marginalized community. Seven students from Borderland High School, enrolled in a senior level course, Environmental Science, participated in the study which focused on their experiences in an environmental justice air quality thematic unit built around the complex issues surrounding a local refinery, American Smelting and Refining Company (ASARCO). The study analyzed the meaning students made and their standpoints regarding the impact of the factory and its one-hundred year history polluting …

Receiver Function Analysis To Study Crustal Structure Of The Northern Nepal And Tibetan Plateau, Mohan Pant

Open Access Theses & Dissertations

The teleseismic P-waveform receiver function analysis is a commonly used technique in earthquake seismology to study the crustal structure beneath a broadband seismic station. To understand the structure of the Northern Nepal and Tibetan plateau different studies have used the receiver function method to estimate the Moho depth and Vp/Vs ratio. The value suggested was ~ 30 km in the south and the ~ 75 km in the north. Other studies have used teleseismic body wave data to perform the travel time residuals to model the lithosphere structure. In our study, we analyzed data from 261 seismic stations to establish …

Rare Pride Campaigns: Evaluating Participatory Communication In Conservation Efforts Throughout Indonesia, Lauren Elizabeth Perez

Open Access Theses & Dissertations

Communication scholars who study international development and social change have found that if facilitators of social change hope to find positive, lasting solutions to complex social and environmental issues, they must incorporate more participatory approaches. However, even the practitioners with the most noble intentions oftentimes fall short of facilitating truly participatory practices because their strategies are the product of linear processes for evaluating the change context. In this study, I apply Lennie and Tacchi's (2014) approach to evaluating communication for development in a case study of Pride Campaigns implemented by managers throughout Indonesia who partnered with the conservation non-governmental organization …

Ac-Susceptibility And Epr Investigations Of Superspin Dynamics In Magnetite Nanoparticles, Alex D. Price

Open Access Theses & Dissertations

In this investigation we use two complementary techniques to distinguish between superparamagnetic blocking (SPB) and superspin-glass (SSG) freezing phenomena in magnetite nanoparticles. While these manifestations of the superspin dynamics are fundamentally different, they have similar "signatures", especially in dc-magnetization experiments. Even if ac-susceptibility measurements are employed, careful use of mathematical models to analyze the data are needed to uncover which type of phenomena (SPB or SSG freezing) occurs within the material. Yet, by utilizing electron paramagnetic resonance (EPR) on a 10 nm Fe3O4 nano-powder as well as on a ferrofluid (based on the same nanoparticle ensemble) we found a very …

Fluid Flow Characterization Of High Turbulent Intensity Compressible Flow Using Particle Image Velocimetry, Marco Efrain Quiroz

Open Access Theses & Dissertations

A high turbulent intensity combustion chamber has been designed in order to operate with compressible (0.3 < M < 0.5) and preheated (T=500K) air-methane combustion. These conditions will allow the investigation of different flame regimes; most notably the proposed "Thickened Flame" regime. Initial design and flow validation has been completed in order to begin further experimentation. A 10 kHz Time Resolved Particle Image Velocimetry (TR-PIV) system and a 3 kHz Planer Laser Induced Fluorescence (PLIF) system have been integrated with the system in order to diagnose the flow field and the flame respectively. The exhaust and chamber cooling subsystems were designed to comply with safety regulations, and the control systems were set up in a way that allows automated (LabVIEW) and user controlled sequencing. This work's main purpose is to characterize and map the flow properties at maximum flow conditions (M > 0.3) in order to map the following; flow structures, kinetic energy at different length scales, velocity fluctuations and turbulent intensity. PIV measurements are carried out for three different volumetric flow rates (ð???Ì? = 25 scfm, 55 scfm, and 115 scfm) and three different grid geometries for each (BR= 67%, 61%, and 54%). Upon finding that the main flow structure consisted of jets caused by the grid at higher flowrates, experiments were done with a grid BR = 67% which was thinner (50% of original …

Studying Cellular And Molecular Interaction With Two-Photon Fluorescence Microscopy, Arifur Rahaman

Open Access Theses & Dissertations

Advances in microscopy and fluorescent probes provide new insight into studying cellular and molecular interactions. Two-photon fluorescence microscopy is one of the most important recent inventions in cellular and molecular study. This technology enables noninvasive study at cellular and molecular levels in three dimensions with submicrometer resolution. Two-photon excitation of fluorophores results from the simultaneous absorption of two photons. This excitation process has a number of unique advantages, such as reduced specimen photodamage and enhanced penetration depth. In this study, we used our two-photon microscope to observe predatorial behavior of fast moving bacterivorous marine organism Cafeteria roenbergensis and quantify Mycobacterium …

The Rock And The Hard Place: How The Prison Psychotherapist Balances Treatment Needs With Security Needs, Elijah Paige Ricks

Open Access Theses & Dissertations

Research on traditional psychotherapy suggests that the quality of the relationship between the therapist and client is the most important element of effective mental health work. In contrast, prison policies often require that staff maintain an emotional distance from offenders, and many elements of the prison environment and characteristics of the offenders may be counterproductive to the therapeutic relationship. Due to the competing demands of psychotherapy and prisons, it is important to understand how prison psychotherapists reconcile the aims of both in their work. This Dissertation examined the psychometric properties of a new measure of how prison therapists balance the …

Process Monitoring In Additive Manufacturing Aimed Toward Part Qualification, Shakerur Ridwan

Open Access Theses & Dissertations

Additive Manufacturing (AM), or layer-by-layer part fabrication, has played a tremendous role in the maker culture by allowing ideas to be materialized with limited resources or knowledge in manufacturing. Various cutting edge AM technologies exist today that are used to create end-use parts; however, these technologies are still new and the processes have not gone through the rigorous evaluation process that traditional manufacturing (i.e. milling, stamping, casting) methods have been through. As a result, several important questions arise when looking to adapt AM technology, including control of the manufacturing process, effect of manufacturing process on part properties, level of variance …

Processing Of Language Switches In Bilingual Individuals With Aphasia: An Event-Related Potential Comparison, Lizette Rodarte

Open Access Theses & Dissertations

Switching between languages, or code-switching, is a common phenomenon in bilingual individuals. In proficient bilinguals, these switches are done with ease and are used for many purposes. Contrary to popular belief, these switches are rule-governed and follow grammatical structure. Bilingual individuals diagnosed with aphasia present with difficulty processing languages and these language switches. With the increase in bilingual individuals, it is likely that the speech-language pathology community will see an increase of bilingual individuals with aphasia on their caseload. For this reason, the purpose of this study is to increase our understanding of the neural processes involved in processing of …

Carbon Based Nano-Composite Materials For Energy Storage Applications, Gerardo Rodriguez Melo

Open Access Theses & Dissertations

Energy storage systems and devices are an integral part of advanced electronic technology. Electronic technology is ever-advancing, but in order to do so, it must be supported by all its systems. The energy storage system is one key system that may dictate the performance and limitation of such electronics. Thus, research emphasis on energy storage devices has been on improving the performance of energy storage devices, such as: improved energy and power density, increased stability and cycle life, as well as reduced costs. Lithium-ion-batteries, and supercapacitors offer the potential to meet energy storage demands and to be improved further upon. …

Visual Arts Teacher Preparation, Lucina Rodriguez Zarate

Open Access Theses & Dissertations

Studies have found that visual arts education is an essential part of students' overall educational development. Students exposed to a robust visual arts education develop critical and analytical thinking skills, learn to evaluate their own work and the work of their peers, learn to interpret subject matter in various ways, and are encouraged to engage in their community, all of which help students develop a higher self-esteem and create a positive attitude towards learning. However, to achieve such positive results, visual arts educators need to acquire the proper training to learn how to develop and deliver well-rounded curricula with the …

Neighbor Discovery In Mobile Ad Hoc Networks, Esau Enrique Ruiz-Gaistardo

Open Access Theses & Dissertations

Neighbor Discovery (ND) is the process that initializes a reliable communication between one-hop neighbors in mobile ad hoc networks (MANETs). This process consists of scheduled exchanges of control messages, called â??Hello Messagesâ?? (HMs) between one-hop neighbors. HMs build bidirectional links that are used to announce the topology information. Each node uses ND and the topology information to populate its routing tables and to communicate with every other node in the network. In MANETs, ND process is a permanent process to discover one-hop neighbors. It is based on two parameters: 1) ND message interval (the period of time in between sending …

Microscopic And Spectroscopic Analysis Of Cadmium Telluride, Jessica Goretty Salazar

Open Access Theses & Dissertations

Cadmium telluride (CdTe) remains one of the materials of interest in the fabrication of photovoltaic cells and infrared devices, mainly because of its suitable crystal structure as well as of its small, direct bandgap of 1.5 eV. Since development of such devices requires a high quality and low defect material, the goal of this study is to microscopically and spectroscopically examine not only crystallinity, but also the induced stress in the material due to the effect of substrate orientation. This information is valuable if optimization of sample growth conditions is envisioned. Prior to CdTe deposition by close-spaced sublimation (CSS), Si …

Mobile Professional Development: Taxonomic Levels Of Learning On Teachers' Tpack Perceptions And Acquisition Of Technology Competencies, Raul Saldana Jr.

Open Access Theses & Dissertations

As it stands, the integration of technology can be advantageous for teachers, students, administrators, and parents, yet teachers are expected to teach and facilitate learning with new technologies in order to prepare students to succeed in a global economy. As the Part D of the Enhancing Education Through Technology Act of 2001 (Part D - Enhancing Education Through Technology, n.d) states, one of its purposes is to "enhance ongoing professional development of teachers, principals, and administrators by providing constant access to training and updated research in teaching and learning through electronic means," one of its goals is to "encourage effective …

Dating Across Difference: A Rhetorical Analysis Of Interracial Same-Sex Relationships In Targeted Media Outlets, Victor Santana-Melgoza

Open Access Theses & Dissertations

The purpose of this study is to examine how interracial same-sex relationships are constructed and communicated within gay themed media outlets, specifically magazine publications, and the possible effects such construction may have on various consumer populations through the frame of cultivation theory. I studied three major gay publications and surveyed 90 articles for both textual content and visual representation. Categories were then created and articles were grouped by relevance to each category. Through iterative processes, the number of useable articles fell to 68. Articles were mainly captured using online sources. Through this medium of online reading, other access points were …

A Geophysical Study Of The Castle Mountain Fault System And Matanuska-Susitna Valley Near Anchorage, Alaska, Shane Michael Schinagel

Open Access Theses & Dissertations

The Castle Mountain Fault (CMF) is the closest (~50 km) active fault to Anchorage, Alaska. Located within the Matanuska and Susitna (Matsu) Valleys, the CMF shows repeated, unmistakable evidence for Holocene motion. Recent geologic studies estimate that this fault is capable of producing earthquakes of magnitude 7.0 - 7.1. The Anchorage metropolitan area (which includes the Matsu Valley) contains most of Alaska's population as well as vital shipping and transportation facilities that serve much of inland Alaska. Expected magnitude >7 earthquakes pose seismic hazards to the expanding Anchorage area.

While several mapping and trenching studies have been conducted along the …

Heat Absorption Analysis By Falling Particles At High Temperatures For Concentrating Solar Power Systems, Arturo Sepulveda Fernandez

Open Access Theses & Dissertations

High temperature Heat Transfer Fluid (HTF) with Thermal Energy Storage (TES) for the Concentrated Solar Power (CSP) technology can provide a large and relatively cheaper storage option, as opposed to limited and expensive electrical battery storage with PV technology, and hence, it has potential to maintain a constant production when no sunlight is available. Research of material like aluminum, silicon, graphite could be potential candidates to work as thermal energy storage. Currently, nitrate and chloride molten salts are widely used as the TES medium for a CSP plant. However, molten salt, especially chlorides, must be handled carefully at high temperature …

A House All White And Empty Against The Night Sky, Jesus J. Silveyra

Open Access Theses & Dissertations

Not available.

High School Students' And Scientists' Perceptions Of A Student-Scientist Partnership, Karla Singh

Open Access Theses & Dissertations

The idea of getting high school students to work with scientists has become a hot topic. There have been many programs that get students involved with scientists to gain experience. Having students work with scientists allows students to practice authentic science. These programs also aim to get more students interested in science and hopefully inspire these students to go into a science career. Researchers have looked at several aspects during these interactions. These aspects include students' interest, students' ability, students' career choice and students' perceptions of the scientific community. However, few studies are known that include trying to understand students' …

Tiger Shell, Christopher Sinnett

Open Access Theses & Dissertations

Poetry is everything. A poem is a shell filled with a sliver of poetry. Life goes in, life comes out. These shells are filled with what we know, and deep inside, what we do not know. The ocean goes in and out. Art is in the shell. The poet enters, does not perform, does not act, does not do. The poet is.

A Bayes Approach In Step-Stress Accelerated Life Testings, Hao Yang Teng

Open Access Theses & Dissertations

A Bayesian analysis for the Weibull proportional hazard (PH) model is presented. A comparison between the Weibull PH model and the Weibull cumulative exposure (CE) model is made graphically and mathematically. The PH model is as flexible as the CE model in fitting step-stress data and the mathematical form of the PH model enables researchers to do Bayesian inferencemuch easier than the CE model. In addition, the PH model has the desirable proportional hazard property. A convex tent prior is used for Bayesian analysis. Markov chain Monte Carlo methods are used for posterior inferences. In this study, we adopt two …

"Es Que Nadie Me Quiere Ayudar," Affective Factors In The Schooling Experience Of Recent Immigrants And Dual Language Instruction, Maria Del Rosario Talamantes

Open Access Theses & Dissertations

This Dissertation is a critical ethnography of the schooling experiences of recent immigrants in dual language immersion classes in US schools where the separation of languages is a policy (Adelman Reyes, 2007; Collier & Thomas, 2004; Cummins, 2005; Lee et al., 2008). Under this program, language is said to be used as a resource to motivate learning among students working in cooperative groups (Gomez, Freeman & Freeman, 2005; Kagan, 1995; Ruiz, 1984). However, this study revealed that language was also used as a tool for oppression among recent immigrant students (Bakhtin, 1981; Giltrow, 2003; Heller, 1995). Focusing on recent immigrant …

Stochastic Differential Equation Applied To High Frequency Data Arising In Geophysics And Other Disciplines, Osei Kofi Tweneboah

Open Access Theses & Dissertations

Estimating future seismic hazards of a region constitutes an important study many scholars have shown a renewed interest in the past few decades. A good estimation of the seismic hazard in a region requires predicting the location and magnitude of future seismic events. As the knowledge of the geophysical mechanisms that drive seismic events have increased, so have the corresponding mathematical model representations.

This Thesis is devoted to the study of modeling geophysical data. We propose a stochastic differential equation arising on the superposition of independent Ornstein-Uhlenbeck processes driven by a Gamma process.

Superposition of independent Gamma Ornstein-Uhlenbeck processes offers …

Single And Multiple Objective Biomass-To-Biofuel Supply Chain Optimization Considering Environmental Impacts, Claudia Evangelina Valles Sosa

Open Access Theses & Dissertations

Bioenergy has become an important alternative source of energy to alleviate the reliance on petroleum energy. Bioenergy offers diminishing climate change by reducing Green House Gas Emissions, as well as providing energy security and enhancing rural development. The Energy Independence and Security Act mandate the use of 21 billion gallons of advanced biofuels including 16 billion gallons of cellulosic biofuels by the year 2022. It is clear that Biomass can make a substantial contribution to supply future energy demand in a sustainable way. However, the supply of sustainable energy is one of the main challenges that mankind will face over …

The Impact Of Accented English On Speech Comprehension, Benigno Valles

Open Access Theses & Dissertations

ABSTRACT

In the context of shifting demographics in the United States and with an increasing multicultural workforce, the verbal exchange of information is vital especially between health care providers and patients. Although English is the official language in the United States, many individuals from different national origins speak English with some degree of accent. Before we can address health care provider/patient communication, it is necessary to investigate the potential impact of accented English on speech comprehension and its implications on basic communicative interactions. The verbal exchange of information between health care providers and patients is important in diagnostics, treatment, patient …

Development Of A Novel Hybrid Unified Viscoplastic Constitutive Model, Luis Alejandro Varela Jimenez

Open Access Theses & Dissertations

Gas turbines are now days used in power plants for power generation and for propulsion in the aerospace industry. In these applications gas turbines are exposed to severe temperature and pressure variations during operating cycles. These severe operating conditions exposed the turbineâ??s components to multiple deformation mechanisms which degrade the material and eventually lead to failure of the components. Nickel based and austenitic super alloys are candidate material used for these applications due to its high strength and corrosion resistance at elevated temperatures. At such temperature levels, candidate materials exhibit a rate-dependent or viscoplastic behavior which difficult the prediction or …

No Longer Mourn, Riley Welcker

Open Access Theses & Dissertations

This novel is a coming-of-age story about a young woman named Eva who searches for the truth about her father's murder and in the process discovers more about herself than she could foresee. Intending to confront the man who murdered her father, she flies from her home in Norway to the State Correctional Institution in Idaho, but what she learns is totally unexpected. In an attempt to navigate her prejudice against him, the man tells a dual story that reveals his history with her parents and the dramas of a past she never knew. She then receives the shock of …