Digital Commons Network^™

Comparison Of 2018-2021 Tropical Cyclone Track Forecasts Before And After Noaa G-Iv Missions, Melissa Piper

Legacy Theses & Dissertations (2009 - 2024)

Tropical cyclone (TC) hazards are primarily dictated by the TC position; thus, it is important to produce accurate TC track forecasts. Many different features can influence a TC’s motion, yet these features are not always well sampled by in-situ observations over the open ocean, creating a need for supplemental observation collected via aircraft, including the deployment of dropsondes. In 1997, the National Hurricane Center (NHC) began operational synoptic surveillance missions in the near-storm environments of TCs using the Gulfstream IV-SP jet aircraft (G-IV), with the goal of reducing track forecast errors. In the first 10 years of operational missions, the …

Two Case Studies Examining How International Graduate Teaching Assistants Built Mathematical Literacy Knowledge Within The Affordances And Constraints Of A Calculus Instructional System, Patricia A. Rand

Legacy Theses & Dissertations (2009 - 2024)

As universities contend with high rates of student attrition from intended STEM majors, due to many students’ difficulty in passing entry-level mathematics courses, they must examine the systems they have in place and determine how best to support these students. Historically, graduate teaching assistants (GTAs) are assigned to introductory calculus classes, which serve as undergraduate-level gatekeeping courses. On one hand, this allows for additional instructors to assist mathematics faculty; however, many universities do not provide adequate training in pedagogy for their GTAs. Untrained GTAs may not have the requisite pedagogical content knowledge to teach and support struggling students. GTAs should …

Understanding Sense Of Belonging Of Students Of Color Attending A Liberal Arts College, Jessica Wenger

Legacy Theses & Dissertations (2009 - 2024)

College access programs have been created to provide students of color opportunities to attend college. The Posse Foundation selects promising urban high school students to attend highly selective colleges and universities across the country. College success is dependent on a variety of factors, two of which are successful social and academic integration into the campus community (Tinto, 1993). Related to integration, sense of belonging is the feeling that an individual belongs in their environment (McMillan & Chavis, 1986).

Organic Gunshot Residue : Detection, Identification, And Characterization For Forensic Purposes, Shelby R. Khandasammy

Legacy Theses & Dissertations (2009 - 2024)

The major focus of this thesis was to explore methods for the detection, identification, and characterization of organic gunshot residues (OGSRs) for forensic purposes using various spectroscopic techniques. There are four major projects detailed in this thesis. The first project details the development of a novel-two step method for the detection and identification of organic gunshot residues using fluorescence spectroscopy for detection and Raman spectroscopy as a confirmatory step. The second chapter builds upon the study conducted in the first chapter by applying the novel-two step method covered in the first chapter to OGSRs directly fired into cloth substrates. This …

Two Matrix-Weighted Norm Inequalities For Commutators With Fractional Integral Operators And Fractional Matrix-Weighted Dyadic Littlewood-Paley Theory, Roy Cardenas

Legacy Theses & Dissertations (2009 - 2024)

This thesis develops a fractional matrix-weighted John-Nirenberg type theorem, two matrix-weighted commutator bounds for the fractional integral operator, an Orlicz bumped two matrix-weighted commutator upper bound for the fractional integral operator, and a fractional matrix-weighted version of dyadic Littlewood-Paley theory.

Soil From Footwear Is A Newly Rediscovered Type Of Forensic Evidence Due To The Application Of Modern Analytical Techniques : A Review, Rhilynn Haley Ogilvie

Legacy Theses & Dissertations (2009 - 2024)

Traces of soil discovered on a footwear were historically among the first types of evidence used by crime scene investigators. This type of evidence has been rediscovered recently due to the application of powerful analytical techniques providing quantitative characteristics of the soil (bio)chemical composition. Advanced statistical analysis of the quantitative data further improves the probative value of the soil evidence. The article overview main aspects of the emerging techniques for the forensic soil analysis and the factors that challenge data interpretation including mixing, contamination, and composition complexity. Overcoming these issues is crucial for utilizing soil analysis for forensic purposes.

Development Of Nucleic Acid Diagnostics For Targeted And Non-Targeted Biosensing, Christopher William Smith

Legacy Theses & Dissertations (2009 - 2024)

The field of nucleic acid technology is rapidly expanding with new impactful discoveriesbeing made each year. Starting from the discovery of the double-helix structure, cloning, gene editing, polymerase chain reaction (PCR), CRISPR technology, and even the late mRNA vaccines; nucleic acid technology is at the forefront of improving medicine. Nucleic acid technology is extremely versatile due to its easy programmability, automated cheap synthesis, and even its catalog for numerous chemical modifications that can be used to alter structure stability. For example, the number of permutations that can be made with DNA just by altering the code for adenine (A), cytosine …

Domain Aware Deep Learning For Wireless Physical Layer, Shuvam Chakraborty

Legacy Theses & Dissertations (2009 - 2024)

Wireless receiver design for OFDM systems is well investigated with classical signal processing tools, which lack the capacity to extract intrinsic channel effects in received signal and lead to high decoding error in receiver. Current deep learning techniques have shown improvement in such cases. But these models are mostly being developed as black box without any anchor to the theory of wireless signal propagation, which leads to surface level information gain and lacks generalizability. We propose deep learning models where the hyperparameters and learning objectives are derived from domain knowledge of wireless signal propagation. These models not only increase the …

Addressing Human Error Through Effective Cyber Policy Design, Katherine Amoresano

Emergency Preparedness, Homeland Security, and Cybersecurity

Human error is a significant contributing factor to the rise in Cybersecurity attacks regardless of increased technical control implemented to safeguard Information systems. Adversaries can circumvent technical safeguards due to human errors which result from inadequate enforceable policies and training on Cybersecurity for the everyday user. Several studies and articles show that the majority of successful attacks are human enabled, proving the need for human-centric cybersecurity research and practices. This exploratory work reviews the human aspect of Cybersecurity by investigating the cybersecurity policies at SUNY Albany and other SUNY institutions. We used a survey of students and faculty members at …

Analyzing Academic Self-Regulation Improvement Via Proccoli Task And Time Management Application, Le Jie Bennett

Computer Science

In the academic context, success is dependent on the individual’s ability to keep track of what needs to be done in a timely manner. But, for most students, procrastination often stands in their way. The time management application, Proccoli, is a tool that the Sahebi/Feyzi lab has developed to study individual and group procrastination behavior and help improve students’ ability to track and manage their tasks and time. Drawing foundations from Human Computer Interaction literature, the application provided features and functionalities to help promote selfregulatory behaviors such as self-observation, self-judgement, and self-reflection. An evaluation survey was sent to previous Proccoli …

Metabolic Alterations And Cardiovascular Risk After Hepatitis C Cure In Subjects With Or At Risk For Hiv, Christophe Maxime Fokoua Dongmo

Legacy Theses & Dissertations (2009 - 2024)

Background. Hepatitis C virus (HCV) infection engenders substantial metabolic changes. These changes are altered when the virus is cleared after successful treatment. We measured these metabolic alterations that occur after HCV cure; further, we assessed whether these alterations differed in subgroups defined by patients’ characteristics.

Evaluating The Health Impacts Of Fruit And Vegetable Intake At The Individual Level And Food Pantry Level Among Food Pantry Users, Jiacheng Chen

Legacy Theses & Dissertations (2009 - 2024)

Background: Chronic diseases impose heavy burdens on individuals and the healthcare system in the US. Many factors were found to be associated with chronic diseases, including demographics, family history, social environmental factors, and individual behavioral factors such as diet and physical activity. Among those factors, fruit and vegetable intake can have substantial health impacts via a variety of causal pathways. Fruit and vegetable (F&V) consumption is generally lower among individuals living in households experiencing food insecurity and rely on food assistance programs. Decreased F&V intake among food pantry users may negatively impact health. However, conducting quantitative analysis on this population …

Regulation Of A Shared Focus In Open-Ended Collaborative Inquiry, Simona Pesaresi

Legacy Theses & Dissertations (2009 - 2024)

Essential to a flourishing society in a changing environment, knowledge creation has become pervasive across social sectors. Creative work with knowledge and ideas requires dynamic forms of collaboration in which individuals adapt goals as new advances and problems emerge. To prepare students for creative knowledge work, new classroom designs using knowledge building pedagogy engage learners in a process of open-ended inquiry as a community. This type of inquiry involves students taking the responsibility for identifying and pursuing ever-evolving knowledge goals that lead to deeper conceptual understanding through a path not known in advance. However, a major challenge is to understand …

Large-Scale Flow Patterns Conducive To Central American Extreme Precipitation Events During Autumn, Alexander Kyle Mitchell

Legacy Theses & Dissertations (2009 - 2024)

Extreme precipitation events (EPEs), characterized by daily widespread heavy rainfall exceeding the 95th percentile across Central America, can have large impacts on agriculture, life, and property during the rainy season. EPEs during the Northern Hemisphere (NH) autumn, however, have been observed to be influenced by both tropical and extratropical originating phenomena such as easterly waves and cold surges, respectively. Given the limited research in this area, the novelty of this work is to apply a systematic approach for identifying and better understanding EPEs, and investigating their associated synoptic-scale variability using daily high-resolution observations and reanalysis products over Central America. An …

Turning Density Functional Theory Calculations Into Molecular Mechanics Simulations : Establishing The Fluctuating Density Model For Rna Nucleobases, Christopher A. Myers

Legacy Theses & Dissertations (2009 - 2024)

Molecular mechanics (MD) simulations and density functional theory (DFT) have been the backbone of computational chemistry for decades. Due to its accuracy and computational feasibility, DFT has become the go-to method for theoretically predicting interaction energies, polarizability, and other electronic properties of small molecules at the quantum mechanical level. Although less fundamental than DFT, molecular mechanics (MM) algorithms have been just as influential in the fields of biology and chemistry, owing their success to the ability to compute measurable, macroscopic quantities for systems with tens of thousands to hundreds of thousands of atoms at a time. Nevertheless, MD simulations would …

A Composite Analysis Of Summer Afternoon Heavy Precipitation Events In The Taipei Basin Under Weak Synoptic Forcing And Pm2.5 Changes, Cidny Ramirez Martinez

Legacy Theses & Dissertations (2009 - 2024)

Taipei, Taiwan is a city affected by various types of precipitation. However, one of the most impactful short-term sources of precipitation is afternoon thunderstorms. Understanding the trends of these afternoon thunderstorms and the extent to which PM2.5 impacts precipitation totals is imperative for improving forecasting and developing urban infrastructure that can deal with said totals.

Probabilistic Forecasting Of Winter Mixed Precipitation Types In New York State Utilizing A Random Forest, Brian Chandler Filipiak

Legacy Theses & Dissertations (2009 - 2024)

Operational forecasters face a plethora of challenges when making a forecast; they must consider multiple data sources ranging from radar and satellites to surface and upper air observations, to numerical weather prediction output. Forecasts must be done in a limited window of time, which adds an additional layer of difficulty to the task. These challenges are exacerbated by winter mixed precipitation events where slight differences in thermodynamic profiles or changes in terrain create different precipitation types across small areas. In addition to being difficult to forecast, mixed precipitation events can have large-scale impacts on our society.

Essays On Career Progression Among The Underrepresented In Academic Biomedicine, Allison Nunez

Legacy Theses & Dissertations (2009 - 2024)

Representation of women and minorities in academia has historically lagged behind their white, male counterparts at all levels, from student to tenured professor. An important milestone in this progression in the biomedical sciences is the achievement of last authorship, which serves as a proxy for career independence. This work investigates gender gaps in last authorship using population-level data on biomedical publications, and further considers how these gaps may be a result of different rates of progression through the early career process. Additionally, the role a like-gender mentor can play in early career productivity and progress toward that important milestone is …

Impact Of Eocene-Oligocene Antarctic Glaciation On The Paleoceanography Of The Weddell Sea, Victoria Hojnacki, Allison Lepp, Josie Horowitz Castaldo, Abbey States, Xiaona Li, Sandra Passchier

Department of Earth and Environmental Studies Faculty Scholarship and Creative Works

The Eocene-Oligocene Transition (EOT) at ∼34 Ma marked a climatic shift from greenhouse to icehouse conditions, toward long-lasting lower global temperatures and a continental ice sheet in the Antarctic. We report on sedimentological and inorganic geochemical results across the EOT at Ocean Drilling Program (ODP) Site 696 in the Weddell Sea, within the Antarctic limb of the Atlantic circulation. The geochemical composition of detrital, authigenic and biogenic marine sediment components, and sortable silt proxies demonstrate the impact of ice growth on high latitude water masses. Sortable silt grain size and Zr/Rb ratios attest to a period of vigorous circulation at …

Bayesian Models For Spatially Explicit Interactions Between Neighbouring Plants, Cristina Barber, Andrii Zaiats, Cara Applestein, Lisa Rosenthal, T. Trevor Caughlin

Biology Faculty Publications and Presentations

1. Interactions between neighbouring plants drive population and community dynamics in terrestrial ecosystems. Understanding these interactions is critical for both fundamental and applied ecology. Spatial approaches to model neighbour interactions are necessary, as interaction strength depends on the distance between neighbouring plants. Recent Bayesian advancements, including the Hamiltonian Monte Carlo algorithm, offer the flexibility and speed to fit models of spatially explicit neighbour interactions. We present a guide for parameterizing these models in the Stan programming language and demonstrate how Bayesian computation can assist ecological inference on plant–plant interactions.

2. Modelling plant neighbour interactions presents several challenges for ecological modelling. First, nonlinear …

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Atomic Force Microscopy Cantilever-Based Nanoindentation: Mechanical Property Measurements At The Nanoscale In Air And Fluid, Ashton E. Enrriques, Sean Howard, Raju Timsina, Nawal K. Khadka, Amber N. Hoover, Allison E. Ray, Ling Ding, Chioma Onwumelu, Stephan Nordeng, Laxman Mainali, Gunes Uzer, Paul H. Davis

Physics Faculty Publications and Presentations

An atomic force microscope (AFM) fundamentally measures the interaction between a nanoscale AFM probe tip and the sample surface. If the force applied by the probe tip and its contact area with the sample can be quantified, it is possible to determine the nanoscale mechanical properties (e.g., elastic or Young's modulus) of the surface being probed. A detailed procedure for performing quantitative AFM cantilever-based nanoindentation experiments is provided here, with representative examples of how the technique can be applied to determine the elastic moduli of a wide variety of sample types, ranging from kPa to GPa. These include live mesenchymal …

¿Aviso O Alerta? Developing Effective, Inclusive, And Consistent Watch And Warning Translations For U.S. Spanish Speakers, Joseph E. Trujillo-Falcón, América R. Gaviria Pabón, Joseph T. Ripberger, Abby Bitterman, Jonathan B. Thornton, Mackenzie J. Krocak, Sean R. Ernst, Estilita Cassiani Obeso, John Lipski

National Oceanographic and Atmospheric Administration: Technical Reports and Related Materials

Spanish-speaking populations in the United States are more vulnerable in disaster contexts due to inequities, such as language barriers, that prevent them from receiving life-saving information. For the past couple of decades, governmental organizations have addressed these issues by translating weather watches, warnings, and advisories into Spanish. Previous studies suggest that these Spanish translations do not communicate the same level of urgency as their English counterparts. To identify whether these translated products result in inequities between English and Spanish speaker reception and comprehension of forecast information, we asked a representative sample of U.S. English (n = 1,550) and Spanish (n …

Eco-Dystopian Novels Written By Women: Second, Third, And Fourth Wave Feminism, Trystyn Cox

Department of Environmental Studies: Undergraduate Student Theses

The project is thematic; analysis of eco-dystopian novels written by American female authors in the 20th and 21st centuries in order to determine if the different waves of feminism experienced in the United States had any influence over the books. By doing an analysis of eco-dystopian novels the study identifies if there were any outside societal movements or issues going on at the time that may have influenced how the book was created or if a particular book was able to open innovative ideas to the society at the time it was published. I researched the second, third, and fourth …

A Leray Model For The Orlik–Solomon Algebra, Christin Bibby, Graham Denham, Eva Maria Feichtner

Faculty Publications

We construct a combinatorial generalization of the Leray models for hyperplane arrangement complements. Given a matroid and some combinatorial blow-up data, we give a presentation for a bigraded (commutative) differential graded algebra. If the matroid is realizable over C, this is the familiar Morgan model for a hyperplane arrangement complement, embedded in a blowup of projective space. In general, we obtain a CDGA that interpolates between the Chow ring of a matroid and the Orlik–Solomon algebra. Our construction can also be expressed in terms of sheaves on combinatorial blowups of geometric lattices. As a key technical device, we construct a …

Reference Database Of Teeth Images From The Family Bovidae, Juliet K. Brophy, Gregory J. Matthews

Faculty Publications

Researchers typically rely on fossils from the Family Bovidae to generate African paleoenvironmental reconstructions due to their strict ecological tendencies. Bovids have dominated the southern African fauna for the past four million years and, therefore, dominate the fossil faunal assemblages, especially isolated teeth. Traditionally, researchers reference modern and fossil comparative collections to identify teeth. However, researchers are limited by the specific type and number of bovids at each institution. B.O.V.I.D. (Bovidae Occlusal Visual IDentification) is a repository of images of the occlusal surface of bovid teeth. The dataset currently includes extant bovids from 7 tribes and 20 species (~3900). B.O.V.I.D. …

Building Structures From Mycelium, Noah M. Brown

Physics

The purpose of this project was to develop a method for creating bricks from mycelium and agricultural waste. The bulk of the research happened in two parts, the first part being a period in which different substrates, strains, and methods were used build the bricks. This research took place in San Luis Obispo and was aided by a group of students in PSC392 under Dr. Pete Schwartz in early 2022. After developing a method for constructing these bricks, the research was moved to St. Thomas, Jamaica, in collaboration with an ecovillage called The Source Farm from July to September. The …

Governing, Managing, And Leading During The Covid-19 Crisis: A Case Study Of How A Community College Senior-Level Administrative Team Adapted A Holistic Student Supports Initiative In Response To The Pandemic, Michel A. Hodge

Education Doctoral

For over 100 years, community colleges have provided access to a college education that helps citizens become fuller participants in democracy. In response to the recent crisis of low rates of student retention and graduation, community college leaders have instituted holistic student supports strategies to improve student success. In March 2020, COVID-19 presented an additional challenge to community college retention and graduation rates, creating a second crisis to which community colleges had to adapt and respond. This qualitative research case study on leadership and crisis management shed light on the impacts of the COVID-19 crisis on a community college and …

Effectiveness Of The Legal Rules That Protect Disabled People Through Neutrosophic Techniques, Santiago Fernando Fiallos Bonilla, Diego Xavier Chamorro Valencia, Diego Vladimir Garcés Mayorga, Eduardo Luciano Hernández Ramos

Neutrosophic Sets and Systems

No abstract provided.

Aha! Examining Insight In Exploratory Learning Versus Traditional Instruction., Olivia Kaiser

College of Arts & Sciences Senior Theses

In undergraduate classrooms, students are typically first taught the concepts and procedures for solving problems, then practice. With exploratory learning methods, students explore novel problems and generate original solutions before receiving instruction, which benefits conceptual understanding and future learning. The current study examined whether students who explore before instruction experience greater insight moments, and whether insight leads to better learning. Prior research demonstrates that individuals remember problem solutions better if they experience a sudden moment of solution clarity (Aha! Experience). Participants (N = 83) were randomly assigned to instruct-first or explore-first conditions and taught three types of magic tricks …

Molecular Dynamics Simulations Of The Adenylate Kinase Enzyme And Its Mutant States, Beata Izabella Dulko Smith

Chemistry & Biochemistry Dissertations - Archive

Adenylate kinase (AK) is a small, monomeric enzyme present across all domains of life. It is responsible for maintaining homeostasis of an intracellular adenylate pool and catalyzes a reversible transfer of the phosphoryl group from NTP (nucleoside triphosphate) to NMP producing two NDP molecules. While most known isoforms take ATP as phosphate donor, AK3 present in mitochondrial matrix employs GTP. Crystallographic investigations revealed that the basis for its selectivity for GTP over ATP came from an additional hydrogen bond between guanosine’s O6 and backbone nitrogen of threonine is responsible for recognition of GTP. Molecular dynamics (MD) simulations have demonstrated that …