Digital Commons Network^™

A Novel Data-Driven Modeling Method For The Spatial-Temporal Correlated Complex Sea Clutter, Yanming Zhang, Lijun Jiang, Hong Tat Ewe

Electrical and Computer Engineering Faculty Research & Creative Works

The sea clutter, referred to as the time-varying radar backscatter from the ocean surface, plays a significant role in marine radar development. The ocean's complex hydrodynamics cause it to exhibit non-Gaussian and nonstationary characteristics, which brings challenges in the sea clutter modeling, especially for establishing its spatial-temporal correlated and coherent model. In this article, a data-driven method based on the Koopman mode decomposition (KMD) is proposed for modeling spatial-temporal correlated complex sea clutter. The method decomposes the coherent sea clutter dynamic behavior in terms of Koopman modes and corresponding temporal patterns. Then, these spatiotemporal patterns are used to construct the …

Proportional Fair Clustered Federated Learning, Mohamed Nafea, Eugine Shin, Aylin Yener

Electrical and Computer Engineering Faculty Research & Creative Works

This paper studies federated learning (FL) with non-identical data generating distributions and under the notion of proportional fairness. Users are partitioned into disjoint clusters based on their data distributions, and a distinct model is learnt for each cluster. Different than previous work that considered clustering to optimize personalized learning performance, here clustering is inspected under the disparate impact doctrine which requires that protected classes (e.g., those of certain race or gender) have representations in every cluster that are approximately equal to their representation in the overall set of users. A family of iterative algorithms that balance the learning performance and …

Simulation Study Of A Probabilistic Measurement Terminator For Cloud Radar Systems Using Cloudsat Data, Jakob Delong, Joel T. Johnson

Electrical and Computer Engineering Faculty Research & Creative Works

This paper presents a novel probabilistic method that is used to identify low-SNR measurements in a cloud profiling radar application and terminate them before completion to save resources. The method uses a statistical model to predict the final SNR level of a measurement in progress and terminate it if it falls below a specified threshold at a specified level of confidence. The method is applied in a simulation study in which radar backscattered power profiles are obtained from CloudSat radar data, and is shown to achieve favorable performance.

Religious Affiliation’S Association With Suicidality Across Sexual Orientations And Gender Identities, W. Justin Dyer, Michael A. Goodman

Faculty Publications

The objective was to replicate and extend earlier findings examining the intersection of sexual orientation and religious affiliation predicting suicidality. Current analyses used updated data and extended prior work by examining how affiliation relates to suicidality for transgender individuals. Data were collected in 2021 from 46,562 adolescents and were representative of Utah adolescents in grades 8, 10, and 12. In regressions, affiliation predicted suicidality and subsequent models added demographics, family functioning, drug use, feeling socially integrated, and interaction terms between sexual orientation, gender identity, and affiliation. In baseline models, affiliation was related to fewer mental health difficulties. When including drug …

Religiosity From Age 12 To 20: Stability, Change, And Bidirectional Effects Of Attendance, Prayer, And Salience, W. Justin Dyer, Sam A. Hardy, Michael Goodman

Faculty Publications

Religiosity is a protective factor for adolescents, though research has indicated religiosity declines across adolescence. However, little research has examined how various dimensions of religiosity may change across time. With yearly data from a sample of 489 participants, the current study examined rank-order and mean level changes in religiosity from early adolescence (12 years-old) into late adolescence/emerging adulthood (20 years-old). Three dimensions of religiosity were examined, public religious practices (religious service attendance), private religious practices (prayer), and religious salience. Using cross-lagged models, reciprocal relationships between these dimensions were examined. There was significant rank-order stability, though stability was highest for attendance. …

Cyber Security Curriculum In Western Australian Primary And Secondary Schools: Interim Report: Curriculum Mapping, Nicola Johnson, Ahmed Ibrahim, Leslie Sikos, Cheryl Glowrey

Research outputs 2022 to 2026

Cyber-crime poses a significant threat to Australians—think of, for example, how scams take advantage of vulnerable people and systems. There is a need to educate people from an early age to protect them from cyberthreats.

Consistent with the increasing prevalence of cyberthreats to individuals and organisations in Australia, the national Australian curriculum has been updated (version 9.0) to include specific content for cyber security for primary and secondary students up to Year 10. Endorsed by Education Ministers in April 2022, the Western Australian School Curriculum and Standards Authority (SCSA) completed a detailed audit of the endorsed Australian Curriculum version 9.0 …

“It Only Hurts When I Laugh”: Tolerating Bullying Humour In Order To Belong At Work, Barbara Plester, Tim Bentley, Emily Brewer

Research outputs 2022 to 2026

Our study examines the impacts on workers when organisational humour is repeated, sustained, dominating, and potentially harmful, and thus can be considered to be bullying. In an ethnographic study of an idiosyncratic New Zealand IT company, we observed humour that was sexualised, dominating, and perpetrated by the most powerful organizational members. We argue that the compelling need for belonging in this extreme organizational culture influenced workers to accept bullying humour as just a joke and therefore acceptable and harmless even when it contravened societal workplace norms. Our contribution is in identifying and extending the significant theoretical relationship between workplace humour …

Comparison Of Auditory Steady-State Responses With Conventional Audiometry In Older Adults, Hadeel Y. Tarawneh, Hamid R. Sohrabi, Wilhelmina H. A. M. Mulders, Ralph N. Martins, Dona M. P. Jayakody

Research outputs 2022 to 2026

Behavioral measures, such as pure-tone audiometry (PTA), are commonly used to determine hearing thresholds, however, PTA does not always provide reliable hearing information in difficult to test individuals. Therefore, objective measures of hearing sensitivity that require little-to-no active participation from an individual are needed to facilitate the detection and treatment of hearing loss in difficult to test people. Investigation of the reliability of the auditory steady-state response (ASSR) for measuring hearing thresholds in older adults is limited. This study aimed to investigate if ASSR can be a reliable, objective measure of frequency specific hearing thresholds in older adults. Hearing thresholds …

Comparison Of The Cardiometabolic Profiles Of Adolescents Conceived Through Art With Those Of A Non-Art Cohort, L. A. Wijs, D. A. Doherty, J. A. Keelan, P. Burton, J. L. Yovich, L. Beilin, T. A. Mori, R. C. Huang, L. A. Adams, John K. Olynyk, O. T. Ayonrinde, B. Penova-Veselinovic, R. J. Hart

Research outputs 2022 to 2026

STUDY QUESTION: Is the cardiometabolic health of adolescents conceived through ART worse than that of their counterparts conceived without ART? SUMMARY ANSWER: The majority of cardiometabolic and vascular health parameters of adolescents conceived through ART are similar or more favourable, than those of their counterparts of similar age and conceived without ART. WHAT IS KNOWN ALREADY: It has been proposed that the cardiometabolic health of offspring conceived with ART may be unfavourable compared to that of their counterparts conceived without ART. The literature pertaining to cardiometabolic health of offspring conceived after ART is contradictory, but generally suggests unfavourable cardiometabolic health …

Polygenic Resilience Scores Capture Protective Genetic Effects For Alzheimer’S Disease, Jiahui Hou, Jonathan L. Hess, Nicola Armstrong, Joshua C. Bis, Benjamin Grenier-Boley, Ida K. Karlsson, Ganna Leonenko, Katya Numbers, Eleanor K. O’Brien, Alexey Shadrin, Anbupalam Thalamuthu, Qiong Yang, Ole A. Andreassen, Henry Brodaty, Margaret Gatz, Nicole A. Kochan, Jean Charles Lambert, Simon M. Laws, Colin L. Masters, Karen A. Mather, Nancy L. Pedersen, Danielle Posthuma, Perminder S. Sachdev, Julie Williams, Alzheimer’S Disease Neuroimaging Initiative, Chun Chieh Fan, Stephen V. Faraone, Christine Fennema-Notestine, Shu-Ju Lin, Valentina Escott-Price, Peter Holmans, Sudha Seshadri, Ming T. Tsuang, William S. Kremen, Stephen J. Glatt

Research outputs 2022 to 2026

Polygenic risk scores (PRSs) can boost risk prediction in late-onset Alzheimer’s disease (LOAD) beyond apolipoprotein E (APOE) but have not been leveraged to identify genetic resilience factors. Here, we sought to identify resilience-conferring common genetic variants in (1) unaffected individuals having high PRSs for LOAD, and (2) unaffected APOE-ε4 carriers also having high PRSs for LOAD. We used genome-wide association study (GWAS) to contrast “resilient” unaffected individuals at the highest genetic risk for LOAD with LOAD cases at comparable risk. From GWAS results, we constructed polygenic resilience scores to aggregate the addictive contributions of risk-orthogonal common variants that promote resilience …

Stem Cell Therapy For Insulin-Dependent Diabetes: Are We Still On The Road?, Lu Yang, Zhu-Meng Hu, Fang-Xu Jiang, Wei Wang

Research outputs 2022 to 2026

In insulin-dependent diabetes, the islet β cells do not produce enough insulin and the patients must receive exogenous insulin to control blood sugar. However, there are still many deficiencies in exogenous insulin supplementation. Therefore, the replacement of destroyed functional β cells with insulin-secreting cells derived from functional stem cells is a good idea as a new therapeutic idea. This review introduces the development schedule of mouse and human embryonic islets. The differences between mouse and human pancreas embryo development were also listed. Accordingly to the different sources of stem cells, the important research achievements on the differentiation of insulin-secreting β …

Improving Virtual Synchronous Generator Control In Microgrids Using Fuzzy Logic Control, Oroghene Oboreh-Snapps, Rui Bo, Buxin She, Fangxing Fran Li, Hantao Cui

Electrical and Computer Engineering Faculty Research & Creative Works

Virtual synchronous generators (VSG) are designed to mimic the inertia and damping characteristics of synchronous generators (SG), which can improve the frequency response of a microgrid. Unlike synchronous generators whose inertia and damping are restricted by the physical characteristics of the SG, VSG parameters can be more flexibly controlled to adapt to different disturbances. This paper therefore proposes a fuzzy logic controller designed to adaptively set the parameters of the VSG during a frequency event to ensure an improved frequency nadir and rate of change of frequency (ROCOF) response. The proposed control method is implemented and tested on the power …

Practical Fixture Design For Passive Intermodulation Tests For Flexible Metallic Contacts, Shengxuan Xia, Yuchu He, Yansheng Wang, Hanfeng Wang, George Mankaruse, Danny Chan, Haicheng Zhou, Warren Lee, Nicholas Mcdonnell, Chulsoon Hwang

Electrical and Computer Engineering Faculty Research & Creative Works

Passive intermodulation (PIM) commonly exists in non-ideal metallic contacts. Since PIM typically represents an extremely low level of nonlinearity, it has not drawn enough attention over the years except for extremely high-power applications such as base stations. However, in recent years, the study on PIM has become essential in universally used consumer electronics design because of the higher requirement on the radio frequency (RF) sensitivity of wireless communications. The metal contacts caused PIM can create the sideband spectrum to interfere with the receiving band in the frequency divide duplex (FDD) mode. Therefore, the study on PIM for the frequently used …

3d Printed Multilayer Microwave Absorber, Wei Zhang, Rui Mi, Victor Khilkevich

Electrical and Computer Engineering Faculty Research & Creative Works

This paper explores the possibility to create 3D printed multilayer electromagnetic absorbers. The proposed design is similar to the thin-film filters used in optics and consists of interleaving high and low permittivity layers. Based on transmission line theory, the multilayer absorber can be designed in a circuit simulator. Analytical equations, circuit simulations, and measurements are used to analyze and validate the designed absorber. Multilayer absorbers based on 3D printed material can be an inexpensive option for engineering usage with great design flexibility and fast fabrication.

A New Discontinuous Conduction Mode In A Transformer Coupled High Gain Dc-Dc Converter, Kartikeya J.P. Veeramraju, Jacob Eisen, Joshua L. Rovey, Jonathan W. Kimball

Electrical and Computer Engineering Faculty Research & Creative Works

Electrospray space propulsion thrusters often employ transformer coupled high gain dc-dc converters. These thrusters have a unique load resistance profile that can vary dramatically during operation. Transformer coupled high gain dc-dc converters working in very low power modes can enter a unique discontinuous conduction mode (DCM) caused by a coupling effect between the boost and magnetization inductors in the converter. The transformer magnetization current prevents the boost inductors from discharging properly, which causes premature loss of boost action and higher than expected boost inductor voltages. This mechanism generates abnormally high voltages on the converter's output side, leading to converter and …

Two-Level Targeter Convergence Study For Collinear Libration Point Spacecraft Formations, Donna Jennings, Henry J. Pernicka

Mechanical and Aerospace Engineering Faculty Research & Creative Works

Spacecraft formation flying has attracted an increasing amount attention over the past several decades including a growing interest in relative motion at the collinear lib ration points. This current work builds on previous efforts by further developing and characterizing a two-level targeting (TLT) algorithm used to determine relative motion at lib ration points by performing a convergence study. A parametric study was conducted to identify the sensitivity of the algorithm to a variety of inputs and constraints. The parametric study revealed that the two-level targeting algorithm convergence properties significantly improve when using a higher order initialization estimate. The size of …

Use Of Technology And Its Impact On Higher Order Thinking In The Science Classroom, Mauree Angelina Haage

Dissertations and Theses @ UNI

This study focuses on examining the impact of technology on higher order thinking in the science classroom by first examining the impact of a teacher’s knowledge of Bloom’s Revised Taxonomy on the integration of higher order thinking activities and then by examining what levels of higher order thinking exist when technology was utilized. Previous research has found correlations between the levels of Bloom’s Taxonomy exhibited when using technology, particularly probeware, simulations/virtual labs, and special software like LoggerPro. In addition, previous research has shown a trend of teachers inaccurately categorizing their lessons and activities as having a higher order thinking level …

How Do We Use Creative And Personal Memories For Creative Communication?, Tyler Robert Montgomery

Dissertations and Theses @ UNI

Inspired by the author’s memories, KeyBoard Memories and You have the Right to Forget are two short stage plays exploring topics of identity, time, and justice. This thesis uses personal and creative memories to develop stories in the form of scripts. The thesis begins with an example of creative writing inspired by the author’s personal and creative memories and describes the purpose of the project before moving into a review of literature that explains what memories are, how they work, and the different types of memories. Then the method section describes the methods of journaling and scripting writing, and then …

Effects Of Perceived Reach On Ratings Of Media Bias, Quality, And Agreement, Matthew Sedlacek

Dissertations and Theses @ UNI

The hostile media effect refers to individuals’ tendencies to perceive seemingly neutral news coverage as biased against their stance (Vallone et al., 1985). Research has shown this effect in partisan politics, with liberals and conservatives perceiving bias in information presented from the opposing side. The current study examined the effects of liberal or conservative and small or large audience news source manipulations on liberals’ and conservatives’ perceptions of media bias and the relationship between partisan identity and perceptions of bias. Three hundred and sixty participants read a news article presented with either a Fox News, CNN, PatriotNewsDaily, or The Progressive …

Lexile Levels And Their Value To Public School Teachers, Kristin Schumacher

Dissertations and Theses @ UNI

This thesis examines how teachers perceive Lexile level and its value, and whether or not their beliefs inform their practice. To address questions regarding teachers’ beliefs about Lexile level, I designed and implemented an online survey for public school teachers. My research shows that teachers have a favorable view of Lexile level, that they believe both students and parents should be informed of students’ Lexile level, that books should be labeled with Lexile level, and that asking students to read within their Lexile level range is a good practice. This survey research reveals the need to further interrogate whether or …

Psychopathy And Emotion Regulation: The Mediating Role Of Motives And Goals, Morning S. Baker

Dissertations and Theses @ UNI

The purpose of this study was to examine the relation between psychopathy and emotion regulation as serially mediated by emotional motives and goals in an all-male sample. Six serial mediation models were proposed, three for each motive-type (i.e., hedonistic, instrumental), and two for each emotion (i.e., anger, fear, joy). Eight-hundred and seventy-eight participants were recruited via Amazon’s Mechanical Turk (MTurk). Results indicate that male MTurk workers with greater levels of psychopathy have poorer emotion regulation, emotion goals for experiencing anger and fear, hedonistic and instrumental motives for experiencing anger and fear, emotion goals for not experiencing joy, and hedonistic and …

Leading Early Childhood Education In Iowa Schools, Alaina T. Daters

Dissertations and Theses @ UNI

Over the last 15 years, Iowa’s Statewide Voluntary Preschool Programs (SWVPP) have undergone significant growth. By the end of the 2021-2022 school year, 323 out of 327 (99%) of Iowa public school districts offered preschool (Iowa Department of Education, 2022c). As a result, well over 450 Iowa administrators are potentially responsible for leading their district’s preschool program.

The purpose of this mixed methods research study was to gain an understanding of the experiences, knowledge, and pedagogical needs of licensed Iowa administrators that are responsible for their district’s SWVPP. Data was collected through a survey and analyzed using descriptive statistical analysis …

Monetization For Content Generation And User Engagement On Social Media Platforms: Evidence From Paid Q&A, Jonathan Hua Ye, Cecil Eng Huang Chua

Business and Information Technology Faculty Research & Creative Works

Social media platforms want to increase their valuation in terms of total content quantity and user engagement. Monetization is often used to induce user content generation. However, research documents that while monetization increases the quantity of specific kinds of content, it does not necessarily increase the total content quantity or user engagement (i.e., platform value). Furthermore, the impact of monetization may depend on the social status of content creators. This article investigates paid question and answer (paid Q&A). Based on expectancy theory and relevant research, this article hypothesizes the effects of introducing paid Q&A on both total content quantity and …

The Impact Of Perceived Manipulation, Motives, And Ethicality In Cause-Related Marketing: A Crm+ Model, Nathan W. Twyman, Sarah M. Stanley, Cassandra C. Elrod, Tamara M. Masters

Business and Information Technology Faculty Research & Creative Works

We Developed a CRM+ Model using Experimentation and Structural Equation Modeling Analysis. CRM+ Demonstrates Previously Unexplored Interrelationships among Consumer-Perceived Manipulation, Brand Motives, Perceived Ethicality of the Cause-Related Marketing, and Brand Attitude. CRM+ Reveals that Perceived Ethicality of the CRM Has a Significant Positive Effect on Brand Attitude, Though It is Not as Pronounced as the Effect of Perceived Altruistic Motives. Egoistic Motives Decrease Ethicality Perceptions But Has No Direct Effect on Brand Attitude. Altruistic Motive Perceptions Diminish Egoistic Motive Perceptions. CRM+ Suggests Marketing Managers Should Prioritize Emphasizing Altruistic Motives and Ethicality of the Partnership over Downplaying Egoistic Motives.

Information Systems Analysis And Design: Past Revolutions, Present Challenges, And Future Research Directions, Keng Siau, Carson Woo, Veda C. Storey, Roger H.L. Chiang, Cecil Eng Huang Chua, Jon W. Beard

Business and Information Technology Faculty Research & Creative Works

Systems Analysis and Design (SAND) is Undoubtedly a Pillar in the Field of Information Systems (IS). Some Researchers Have Even Claimed that SAND is the Field that Defines the Information Systems Discipline and is the Core of Information Systems. the Past Decades Have Seen the Development of Structured SAND Methodologies and Object-Oriented Methodologies. in the Early 1990s, Key Players in the Field Collaborated to Develop the Unified Modeling Language and the Unified Process. Agile Approaches Followed, as Did Other Dynamic Methods. These Approaches Remain Heavily Employed in the Development of Contemporary Information Systems. at the Same Time, New Approaches Such …

Noise Resilient Learning For Attack Detection In Smart Grid Pmu Infrastructure, Prithwiraj Roy, Shameek Bhattacharjee, Sahar Abedzadeh, Sajal K. Das

Computer Science Faculty Research & Creative Works

Falsified data from compromised Phasor Measurement Units (PMUs) in a smart grid induce Energy Management Systems (EMS) to have an inaccurate estimation of the state of the grid, disrupting various operations of the power grid. Moreover, the PMUs deployed at the distribution layer of a smart grid show dynamic fluctuations in their data streams, which make it extremely challenging to design effective learning frameworks for anomaly-based attack detection. In this paper, we propose a noise resilient learning framework for anomaly-based attack detection specifically for distribution layer PMU infrastructure, that show real time indicators of data falsifications attacks while offsetting the …

Cansafe: An Mtd Based Approach For Providing Resiliency Against Dos Attack Within In-Vehicle Networks, Ayan Roy, Sanjay Kumar Madria

Computer Science Faculty Research & Creative Works

Trending towards autonomous transportation systems, modern vehicles are equipped with hundreds of sensors and actuators that increase the intelligence of the vehicles with a higher level of autonomy, as well as facilitate increased communication with entities outside the in-vehicle network. However, increase in a contact point with the outside world has exposed the controller area network (CAN) of a vehicle to remote security vulnerabilities. In particular, an attacker can inject fake high priority messages within the CAN through the contact points, while preventing legitimate messages from controlling the CAN (Denial-of-Service (DoS) attack). In this paper, we propose a Moving Target …

Rssafe: Personalized Driver Behavior Prediction For Safe Driving, Bhumika, Debasis Das, Sajal K. Das

Computer Science Faculty Research & Creative Works

While the increased demand for taxi services like Uber, Lyft, Hailo, Ola, Grab, Cabify etc. provides livelihood to many drivers, the desire to raise income forces the drivers to work very hard without rest. However, continuous journeys not only affect their health, but also lead to abnormal driving behavior such as rash driving, swerving, sideslipping, sudden brakes, or weaving, leading to accidents in the worst cases. Motivated by the severity of rising accidents and health issues among drivers, this paper proposes a recommendation system, called RsSafe, for the safety of drivers. Aiming to improve the driving quality and the driver's …

Toward Feature-Preserving Vector Field Compression, Xin Liang, Sheng Di, Franck Cappello, Mukund Raj, Chunhui Liu, Kenji Ono, Zizhong Chen, Tom Peterka, Hanqi Guo

Computer Science Faculty Research & Creative Works

The objective of this work is to develop error-bounded lossy compression methods to preserve topological features in 2D and 3D vector fields. Specifically, we explore the preservation of critical points in piecewise linear and bilinear vector fields. We define the preservation of critical points as, without any false positive, false negative, or false type in the decompressed data, (1) keeping each critical point in its original cell and (2) retaining the type of each critical point (e.g., saddle and attracting node). The key to our method is to adapt a vertex-wise error bound for each grid point and to compress …

Delivery With Uavs: A Simulated Dataset Via Ats, Giulio Rigoni, Cristina M. Pinotti, Bhumika, Debasis Das, Sajal K. Das

Computer Science Faculty Research & Creative Works

We consider a delivery food service operated by Unmanned Aerial Vehicles (UAVs). Due to the absence of a dataset on UAVs deliveries in the literature, and since it is not possible to perform real tests, we create a dataset using an open-Air Traffic Simulator (ATS). Precisely, we converted a set of food deliveries operated by wheeled vehicles, proposed in the literature [1], into a set of simulated UAVs deliveries. For each delivery, we ran a UAV flight from the source to the destination. The results showed that, as expected, the UAV's course is shorter than the vehicle trajectory on the …