Digital Commons Network^™

Robust Capital Asset Pricing Model Estimation Through Cross-Validation, Kekoura Sakouvogui

Agribusiness and Applied Economics

Limitations of Capital Asset Pricing Model (CAPM) continue to present inconsistent empirical results despite its rm mathematical foundations provided in recent studies. In this thesis, we examine how estimation errors of the CAPM could be minimized using the cross-validation technique, a concept that is widely applied in machine learning (CV-CAPM). We apply our approach to test the assumption of CAPM as a well-diversified portfolio model with data from S&P500 and Dow Jones Industrial Average (DJIA). Our results from the CV-CAPM validate that both S&P500 and DJIA are well-diversified market indices with statistically insignificant variation in unsystematic risks during and after …

Does Collective Action Sequester Carbon? Evidence From The Nepal Community Forestry Program, Randall Bluffstone, Eswaran Somanathan, Prakash Jha, Harisharan Luintel, Rajesh Bista, Mike Toman, Naya Paudel, Bhim Adhikari

Economics Faculty Publications and Presentations

Highlights

• Presumed open access forests have as little as 34% of those under collective action.

• No evidence that Community Forestry Programme forests store more carbon

.• Carbon from collective action not conditional on Community Forestry Programme.

Accurate Lattice Parameters From 2d-Periodic Images For Subsequent Bravais Lattice Type Assignments, Peter Moeck, Paul R. Destefano

Physics Faculty Publications and Presentations

Three different algorithms, as implemented in three different computer programs, were put to the task of extracting direct space lattice parameters from four sets of synthetic images that were per design more or less periodic in two dimensions (2D). One of the test images in each set was per design free of noise and, therefore, genuinely 2D periodic so that it adhered perfectly to the constraints of a Bravais lattice type, Laue class, and plane symmetry group. Gaussian noise with a mean of zero and standard deviations of 10 and 50% of the maximal pixel intensity was added to the …

Transferring Sustainability Solutions Across Contexts Through City–University Partnerships, Lauren Withycombe Keeler, Fletcher Beaudoin, Amy M. Lerner, Beatrice John, Richard Beecroft, Kaidi Tamm, Arnim Wiek, Daniel J. Lang

Institute for Sustainable Solutions Publications and Presentations

The urgency of climate change and other sustainability challenges makes transferring and scaling solutions between cities a necessity. However, solutions are deeply contextual. To accelerate solution efforts, there is a need to understand how context shapes the development of solutions. Universities are well positioned to work with cities on transferring solutions from and to other cities. This paper analyses five case studies of city–university partnerships in three countries on transferring solutions. Our analysis suggests that understanding the interest, the action on sustainability, and the individual and collective sustainability competences on the part of the city administration and the university can …

A Cooperating Teacher, A Supervisor, And A Critical Confidant: The Journey Moving Toward A New Model Of Support For Student Teachers, Christina C. Pfister, Sophia Paljevic

Northwest Journal of Teacher Education

Extensive research has found that student teaching is a challenging experience for pre-service teachers (PSTs). This paper proposes a new model for the student teaching experience where PSTs have a cooperating teacher, supervisor, and also a special mentor called a Critical Confidant. We collected survey data over the course of three consecutive semesters to determine PST’s perceptions. Results indicate that PSTs found having a Critical Confidant to be an overwhelmingly positive experience. PSTs felt safe because of the non-evaluative Critical Confidant role. They appreciated support from someone who had more experience but who was not yet an expert teacher. Implications …

Effects Of Variable Density Thinning On Spatial Patterns Of Overstory Trees In Mt. Hood National Forest, Emma Huston

Environmental Science and Management Professional Master's Project Reports

Variable density thinning (VDT) is a method of restoration thinning that attempts to increase ecosystem resilience and spatial heterogeneity in forest stands to more closely resemble mosaic-like patterns characteristic of late-successional forests, which consist of clusters of multiple trees, individual trees, and gaps. This study examines the spatial patterning of overstory trees resulting from VDT of conifer forests in Mt. Hood National Forest in the western Cascade Mountains and compares these patterns with reference conditions. Stem maps were created from field surveys of study plots within one mature stand and six thinned stands designated as Late-Successional Reserve (LSR) with varying …

Monitoring And Evaluating Malawi Youth Conservation Engagement After Community-Based Environmental Education Workshops, Stefanie Kramer

Environmental Science and Management Professional Master's Project Reports

This project addressed Peace Corps Malawi’s need to redevelop and implement environmental education workshops using a community-based approach, monitored project outcomes from these workshops, and provided an evaluation of strengths and areas for improvement of the environmental education workshop program.

Long-Term Managed Flooding To Control Invasive Phalaris Arundinacea L. And Help Restore Native Vegetation In An Urban Palustrine Wetlands Ecosystem, Robert P. Lascheck

Environmental Science and Management Professional Master's Project Reports

We sought to determine the effects of 13 years of hydrologic management on the wetland plant community in Smith and Bybee Wetlands Natural Area (SBW), an 809 ha palustrine wetland complex in north Portland, Oregon. Previous management efforts resulted in an altered hydrologic regime; historically high water levels in spring and low water levels in fall were replaced by persistent water levels with minimal annual variations. A water control structure was installed in 2003 to better approximate historic seasonal hydrologic changes to reduce invasive Phalaris arundinacea (reed canarygrass) cover and promote native wetland vegetation growth. Vegetation monitoring has been carried …

Existing Ecological Conditions And Management Recommendations For A Portion Of The Chehalem Ridge Nature Park, Oregon, Amanda Pole

Environmental Science and Management Professional Master's Project Reports

Effective land management and habitat restoration work rely on the collection of baseline information regarding the existing conditions of the planning area. Existing conditions assessments can include such information as hydrologic conditions, botanical species assessment, land use issues, wildlife surveys, habitat distribution/quality assessments, etc. This project provides Oregon Metro’s Parks and Nature department with updated information regarding the existing conditions of a portion of the Chehalem Ridge Nature Park (CRNP) as well as recommendations and supplemental maps to aid in future management planning.

Within the ~61-acre project area exist several habitat types: a developing seasonal wetland, riparian forest, Douglas-fir forest, …

Development Of An Effective Shade Model For Water Quality Management In Oregon, Erin Costello

Environmental Science and Management Professional Master's Project Reports

Warming stream temperatures degrade water quality by stressing cold-water species, promoting harmful algal blooms, lowering dissolved oxygen, and increasing the toxicity of some compounds. The influence of stream temperature on the survival of native salmon is of particular concern in the Pacific Northwest. Effective shade, the fraction of solar radiation blocked from reaching a stream, is directly related to in-stream temperature and can be manipulated by riparian management actions. Mechanistic models of effective shade are prohibitively data and cost intensive. The objective of this research was to develop an empirical model (Simple Shade) for evaluating effective shade across the state …

Early Emerging Pathogen Detection, Mackenzie Wangenstein

Maseeh Summer Undergraduate Research Experience

A supervised learning technique was employed to identify emerging pathogen species. Portland State University has partnered with the University of New Mexico to take encodings of unknown pathogen molecular structures to determine emerging species.

How Do Stressed Workers Make Travel Mode Choices That Are Good For Their Health, Safety, And Productivity?, Liu-Qin Yang, Brad Wipfli, Lee Cyr, Kristina Marie Currans, Liming Wang

TREC Final Reports

It is well recognized in transportation and psychology research that commuting stress has consequences for commuters' travel safety, home environment, and work performance. Little research has addressed questions involving the possible interdependence between work stress, family stress, and commuting stress: Do workers having many demands from work and family life get more stressed out from a stressful commute? Or do stressed workers try to cope with work and non-work stress by choosing more relaxing travel modes?

This proposal integrates the perspectives from transportation, psychology, and health science by focusing on the relations between commuting stress, commuting mode choice, and consequences …

Exploratory Reconstructability Analysis Of Accident Tbi Data, Martin Zwick, Nancy Ann Carney, Rosemary Nettleton

Complex Systems Faculty Publications and Presentations

This paper describes the use of reconstructability analysis to perform a secondary study of traumatic brain injury data from automobile accidents. Neutral searches were done and their results displayed with a hypergraph. Directed searches, using both variable-based and state-based models, were applied to predict performance on two cognitive tests and one neurological test. Very simple state-based models gave large uncertainty reductions for all three DVs and sizeable improvements in percent correct for the two cognitive test DVs which were equally sampled. Conditional probability distributions for these models are easily visualized with simple decision trees. Confounding variables and counter-intuitive findings are …

Reflections On Teaching System Dynamics Modeling To Secondary School Students For Over 20 Years, Diana Fisher

Complex Systems Faculty Publications and Presentations

This paper contains the description of a successful system dynamics (SD) modeling approach used for almost a quarter-century in secondary schools, both in algebra classes and in a year-long SD modeling course. Secondary school students have demonstrated an ability to build original models from the news, write technical papers explaining their models, and present a newfound understanding of dynamic feedback behavior to an audience. The educational learning theory and instructional methods used for both the algebra and modeling courses are detailed, with examples. Successful student SD modeling experiences suggest the SD approach can expand the sophistication of topics that secondary …

Ideas And Graphs: The Tetrad Of Activity, Martin Zwick

Complex Systems Faculty Publications and Presentations

A graph can specify the skeletal structure of an idea, onto which meaning can be added by interpreting the structure. This paper considers several directed and undirected graphs consisting of four nodes, and suggests different meanings that can be associated with these different structures. Drawing on John G. Bennett’s “systematics,” specifically on the Tetrad that systematics offers as a model of “activity,” the analysis formalizes and augments the systematics account and shows that the Tetrad is a versatile model of problem-solving, regulation and control, and other processes. Discussion is extended to include hypergraphs, in which links can relate more than …

Introduction To Data Science: Executive Summary, Liming Wang

TREC Project Briefs

This education project created the curriculum for a new course: Introduction to Data Science for Planners, Engineers, and Scientists. The course helps students and professionals tackle the challenges of processing high volumes of data.

Intensity Inhomogeneity Correction Of Sd-Oct Data Using Macular Flatspace, Andrew Lang, Aaron Carass, Bruno M. Jedynak, Sharon D. Solomon, Peter A. Calabresi, Jerry L. Prince

Mathematics and Statistics Faculty Publications and Presentations

Images of the retina acquired using optical coherence tomography (OCT) often suffer from intensity inhomogeneity problems that degrade both the quality of the images and the performance of automated algorithms utilized to measure structural changes. This intensity variation has many causes, including off-axis acquisition, signal attenuation, multi-frame averaging, and vignetting, making it difficult to correct the data in a fundamental way. This paper presents a method for inhomogeneity correction by acting to reduce the variability of intensities within each layer. In particular, the N3 algorithm, which is popular in neuroimage analysis, is adapted to work for OCT data. N3 works …

On The Girth And Diameter Of Generalized Johnson Graphs, Louis Anthony Agong, Carmen Amarra, John Caughman, Ari J. Herman, Taiyo S. Terada

Mathematics and Statistics Faculty Publications and Presentations

Let v > k > i be non-negative integers. The generalized Johnson graph, J(v,k,i), is the graph whose vertices are the k-subsets of a v-set, where vertices A and B are adjacent whenever |A∩B|= i. In this article, we derive general formulas for the girth and diameter of J(v,k,i). Additionally, we provide a formula for the distance between any two vertices A and B in terms of the cardinality of their intersection.

High-Order Method For Evaluating Derivatives Of Harmonic Functions In Planar Domains, Jeffrey S. Ovall, Samuel E. Reynolds

Mathematics and Statistics Faculty Publications and Presentations

We propose a high-order integral equation based method for evaluating interior and boundary derivatives of harmonic functions in planar domains that are specified by their Dirichlet data.

Bootcmatch: A Software Package For Bootstrap Amg Based On Graphweighted Matching, Pasqua D'Ambra, Salvatore Filipone, Panayot S. Vassilevski

Mathematics and Statistics Faculty Publications and Presentations

This article has two main objectives: one is to describe some extensions of an adaptive Algebraic Multigrid (AMG) method of the form previously proposed by the first and third authors, and a second one is to present a new software framework, named BootCMatch, which implements all the components needed to build and apply the described adaptive AMG both as a stand-alone solver and as a preconditioner in a Krylov method. The adaptive AMG presented is meant to handle general symmetric and positive definite (SPD) sparse linear systems, without assuming any a priori information of the problem and its origin; the …

Clustering And Multifacility Location With Constraints Via Distance Function Penalty Methods And Dc Programming, Mau Nam Nguyen, Thai An Nguyen, Sam Reynolds, Tuyen Tran

Mathematics and Statistics Faculty Publications and Presentations

This paper is a continuation of our effort in using mathematical optimization involving DC programming in clustering and multifacility location. We study a penalty method based on distance functions and apply it particularly to a number of problems in clustering and multifacility location in which the centers to be found must lie in some given set constraints. We also provide different numerical examples to test our method.

Associative Learning In Biochemical Networks, Yasmin S. Sepulveda

REU Final Reports

Emerging evidence suggests that biochemical networks can be modeled by exploiting their ability to learn through associative learning. This type of learning in biomolecular structures gives it a the advantage to be able to be computationally model, and condition. Associative learning in biochemical networks is a developing area of study that once understood, can further develop diagnostic applications, and be used as tools for data analysis. Although it is a open ended project the motive of this research was to find the the best method of association learning being used in current work. After reading current work three associative learning …

Day Laborers & Extreme Heat: Recommendations For Reducing Heat Stress, Sandra Mena

REU Final Reports

The Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) has various Global Climate Models (GCM). One of them, models three greenhouse gases. The increasing amount of greenhouse gases are just a fraction of factors that fuel global climate change. According to the IPCC 2014, climate related extremes such as heatwaves are likely to occur more regularly and are likely to increase in duration. Since 1979, there has been over 9000 deaths that occurred from heat-related incidents in the United States (U.S. Environmental Protection Agency, 2016). Which brings attention to population groups who are exposed to hot temperatures on a frequent basis due …

Derivation Of The Hellinger-Reissner Variational Form Of The Linear Elasticity Equations, And A Finite Element Discretization, Bram Fouts

REU Final Reports

In this paper we are going to derive the linear elasticity equations in the Strong Form to the Hellinger Reissner Form. We find a suitable solution to solve our stress tensor. Then we will use finite element discretization from. We will run tests on a unit cube and multiple other shapes, which are described at the end. We view the different magnitudes of the displacement vector of each shape.

On Dust: Memory As Performance And Materiality, Natasha Lushetich

Contemporary Aesthetics (Journal Archive)

The world's "worldliness" is, to a large extent, perceptually constructed through touch, kinaesthetics, and proprioception. Gesture, too, is embedded in sedimentations of the body's prior sensory exchanges with the environment. Materiality is transitive; it triggers sensory landscapes through performance. Consisting of particles of pollen, human and animal skin, hairs, minerals, soil, and burnt meteorites, dust is usually seen as the antithesis of the performative-material nexus. In this paper, I propose a different view: that dust is and acts as a connective tissue. Borrowing from Hélène Cixous's écriture blanche, Quentin Smith's degree presentism, and theorizing nostalgia as a structuring absence, …

Agnostic Moralism, Mark Silcox

Contemporary Aesthetics (Journal Archive)

Many otherwise admired authors in the Western tradition (e.g. Plato, Augustine, and Tolstoy) have defended views about the radical dependence of aesthetic value upon morality that are nowadays regarded with deep skepticism. In more recent work on the connection between moral and aesthetic properties, Noël Carroll, Anne Eaton, Berys Gaut, and others have tried to defend relatively moderate varieties of moralism about art, according to which the aesthetic value of ethically significant artworks sometimes overlaps with but might also independently vary from their moral status. Here, I develop an immoderate species of moralism that treats the type of ethical knowledge …

Prospective Comparison Of Point-Of-Care Device And Standard Analyzer For Monitoring Of International Normalized Ratio In Outpatient Oral Anticoagulant Clinic, Bushra Moiz, Ahmed Raheem, Anila Rashid, Muhammad Hasan, Lena Jafri

Department of Pathology and Laboratory Medicine

Point-of-care testing (POCT) coagulometers are increasingly being used in the hospital setting and patients’ self-testing. We determined the agreement of prothrombin time international normalized ratio (INR) results by POCT coagulometer and laboratory instrument through a comparative analysis and investigated whether the results of POCT coagulometer can reliably be used without being confirmed by standard laboratory analyzer. A total of 200 INR measurements by POCT coagulometer (CoaguChek XS Pro) and laboratory analyzer (Sysmex CS2000i) were compared using Passing-Bablok regression analysis and Bland-Altman plot. Agreement of the INR measurement was further analyzed in relation to dosing decision. The correlation of INR measurements …

On Monetary And Non-Monetary Interventions To Combat Corruption, Ritwik Banerjee, Arnab Mitra

Economics Faculty Publications and Presentations

We study the relative effectiveness of extrinsic monetary disincentives and intrinsic non-monetary disincentives to corruption, using a harassment bribery game. In doing so, we also test the Beckerian prediction that at the same level of expected payoff, a low probability of detection with high fine is a stronger deterrent to corruption than a high probability of detection with low fine. In Experiment 1, two treatments are designed to study the effect of a low probability of detection with high fine and a high probability of detection with low fine, on bribe taking behavior. In Experiment 2, subjects participate in the …

Terahertz Imaging Of Thin Film Layers With Matched Field Processing, Scott Schecklman, Lisa M. Zurk

Electrical and Computer Engineering Faculty Publications and Presentations

Terahertz (THz) time of flight (TOF) tomography systems offer a new measurement modality for non-destructive evaluation (NDE) of the subsurface layers of protective coatings and/or laminated composite materials for industrial, security and biomedical applications. However, for thin film samples, the time-of-flight within a layer is less than the duration of the THz pulse and consequently there is insufficient range resolution for NDE of the sample under test. In this paper, matched field processing (MFP) techniques are applied to thickness estimation in THz TOF tomography applications, and these methods are demonstrated by using measured THz spectra to estimate the the thicknesses …

The New Writs Of Assistance, Ian Samuel

Articles by Maurer Faculty

The providers of network services (and the makers of network devices) know an enormous amount about our lives. Because they do, these network intermediaries are being asked with increasing frequency to assist the government in solving crimes or gathering intelligence. Given how much they know about us, if the government can secure the assistance of these intermediaries, it will enjoy a huge increase in its theoretical capacity for surveillance—the ability to learn, in principle, almost anything about anyone. That has the potential to create serious social harm, even assuming that the government continues to adhere to ordinary democratic norms and …