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Catalytic Interfaces Of Earth-Abundant Metals Copper And Nickel Chalcogenides For Hydrogen Evolution Catalyst, Manuel Alejandro Ramirez Ubillus

Graduate Thesis and Dissertation post-2024

This dissertation establishes design principles for earth-abundant catalysts used in the hydrogen evolution reaction (HER), showing that electroactivity is primarily controlled by structural features such as surface facet exposure, dopant content, and dynamic phase transformations. These factors influence conductivity, active site density, and stability, as demonstrated through three model systems: Cu₂O, NiSe₂, and Cu₂S. Cu₂O particles with controlled shapes were synthesized to explore the relationship between facet exposure and catalytic activity. Octahedra dominated by the facet 111 performed better than cubes rich in the facet 100. Combining Cu₂O with reduced graphene oxide further improved conductivity, dispersion, and stability, leading to …

A Greener Way To Synthesize Biodiesel: Mechanochemistry With No Added Catalyst, Amanda S. Tanner

Graduate Thesis and Dissertation post-2024

Biodiesel production is currently energy-demanding and produces large volumes of waste despite being marketed as a greener approach to fuel. Here, we report the development and analysis of a more environmentally friendly way of producing biodiesel via mechanochemistry. In as little as one hour, biodiesel can be produced by ball milling intact oilseeds with methanol and no added catalyst. The catalyst for transesterification of oilseeds and methanol via mechanical milling comes from within the seed shells, rather than needing to be added from a separate source. The metals found in the milling media interact with lignin in the seed shells, …

Evaluating Health And Immune Proxies Within And Across Sea Turtle Life Stages, Tiffany M. Dawson

Graduate Thesis and Dissertation post-2024

Understanding variations in health and immune function across life stages or physiological states is important for population monitoring and for understanding species’ responses to anthropogenic disturbances. Sea turtles are a model species for evaluating these changes within and across life stages due to their long lifespans with ontogenetic habitat and diet shifts. In this dissertation, I tested whether health and immune hematological proxies (Packed Cell Volume [PCV], white blood cell counts, total protein [TP], biochemistry) differed: (1) across the reproductive season, (2) between species and (3) foraging groups, and (4) with reproductive output for adult female turtles (Chapter 2). In …

Trash To Textiles: The Journey Of Recycled Plastic In Fashion, Abigael Rasmussen

Honors Theses - Providence Campus

Plastic is all around us in modern America and in the world. Plastic is found in our vehicles, clothing, houses—it’s even made its way into our food, our septic systems, our oceans, and even our rain (Seferian). Plastic waste is a very pressing issue that brings up many environmental challenges: microplastics, landfill buildup, air pollution, soil contamination, water contamination etc. The textile industry is a major contributor to plastic pollution with the rise of fast fashion (Bandera). To combat this, textile and environmental scientists are exploring ways to transform plastic waste into usable textile materials through upcycling, “transforming mixed plastic …

The Global Thermophysical Properties Of (433) Eros, Mary L. Hinkle

Graduate Thesis and Dissertation post-2024

We present results from a shape-based, rotationally-resolved thermophysical model of near- Earth asteroid (433) Eros, using reflected and near-IR spectra collected at the NASA Infrared Telescope Facility (IRTF) over 18 nights (25 disk-integrated spectra in total) from 2009-2019. The data sample a variety of viewing geometries, illumination angles, and rotational phases and therefore allow us to characterize Eros's surface physical properties in detail, particularly at wavelengths in the thermal near- IR regime (λ > 3.5 microns) that were not measured by the NEAR Shoemaker mission. Eros's shape, spin state, density, albedo, and other physical properties measured by NEAR were incorporated into …

Terahertz Spin Pumping In Antiferromagnetic Crystals And Films, Gregory Fritjofson

Graduate Thesis and Dissertation post-2024

Antiferromagnetic spintronics is a budding field, promising applications for next generation computing and telecommunication, due to the inherent stability and terahertz frequency magnetic dynamics which antiferromagnets (AFMs) possess. However, due to the infancy and uniqueness of the field, AFM spin dynamics have yet to be studied to their full extent in the terahertz range. To this end, we describe a custom magnetometry system with continuous frequency operation from 60 GHz to 1.5 THz, complete quasi-optical polarization control, peak magnetic field of 9 T, temperature control from 5-300 K, and three-axis sample rotation. We provide initial results from uniaxial AFM MnF2 …

Sub-Cycle Nonlinear Optics In Solids, Dipendra Khatri

Graduate Thesis and Dissertation post-2024

The rapid advancement of digital electronics and telecommunication systems necessitates processing information at increasingly higher speeds. However, modern semiconductor technology faces fundamental physical limitations in transistor miniaturization and clock frequency due to quantum mechanical constraints. To overcome these barriers, ultrafast optoelectronics, leveraging light-matter interactions, offers a promising alternative. Light, as the fastest carrier of information, enables signal processing at frequencies far beyond conventional semiconductor technology. Advancements in laser technology have enabled stable and reliable ultrashort light pulse sources, lasting only a few femtoseconds at optical wavelengths. When utilized for signal processing, they could enable clock frequencies over 1000 times higher …

The Influence Of Regolith Properties And Environmental Conditions On Plume Surface Interactions, Brandon Dotson

Graduate Thesis and Dissertation post-2024

When landing or launching spacecraft, the impingement of rocket exhaust can cause significant surface erosion on planetary bodies, resulting in high-velocity ejecta, formation of dust and debris clouds, or even cratering. With humans returning to the Moon, and future missions to the surface of Mars, understanding and mitigating rocket plume effects is essential for the protection of personnel and equipment. To better understand the influence of surface properties and environmental conditions on plume induced erosion rates, this study leverages a series of geotechnical measurements and small-scale plume experiments in atmosphere, cold temperatures, and reduced ambient pressures using regolith simulants. This …

Investigations And Simulations: A Data-Driven Approach To Exoplanet Characterization, Kathleen J. Mcintyre

Graduate Thesis and Dissertation post-2024

High-precision infrared photometry is fundamental to the field of exoplanet science, enabling direct measurements of planetary thermal emission, atmospheric composition, and energy redistribution. The stability and sensitivity achieved by instruments aboard the Spitzer Space Telescope provides a catalog of hundreds of transiting exoplanets with measurements of flux variations to the level of tens of parts per million. This legacy contextualizes and complements recent and upcoming high-resolution spectroscopic observations. In this work I apply multiple analysis techniques to all available Spitzer observations of three hot Jupiters to determine how much we can still learn from archival data and what best practices …

Neural Network Accelerated Retrieval Of Clear Brown Dwarf Atmospheres, Peter T. Braunschweig

Graduate Thesis and Dissertation post-2024

In the era of the James Webb Space Telescope, there is a pressing need for atmospheric retrievals to be fast, accurate, and physically motivated. The computational cost of self-consistent atmosphere models has thus far made them unfeasible for use in retrieval. Machine learning techniques have greatly accelerated computational tasks in a variety of fields, and have been applied to retrieval before. However, previous application to brown dwarfs has focused on inferring parameters from spectra tailored to the resolution and wavelength range of a specific instrument.

We train a neural network on cloud-free model atmospheres computed self-consistently with PICASO, and use …

Optomechanical Interactions And Dynamics In Nanoparticle Systems, Sohila Abdelhafiz

Graduate Thesis and Dissertation post-2024

This dissertation investigates the coupling between optical forces and the dynamics of nanoparticle systems. Using theoretical models, simulations and experiments, we explore how light mediates interactions between nanoparticles leading to optical binding, nonreciprocal forces, and collective behavior in colloidal suspensions.

We first examine the dynamics and interactions of particles under illumination due to complex electromagnetic forces. Of particular interest are interparticle forces between particles with specific optical properties such as those satisfying the Kerker scattering conditions. We demonstrate the wavelength-dependent dynamics of such Kerker dimers and establish conditions required for their stable longitudinal binding. We also describe a one-way non-reciprocal …

The Nested Dirichlet Process And Applications To Nonparametric Bayesian Inference, Evan C. Donald

Graduate Thesis and Dissertation post-2024

This body of research focuses on Bayesian nonparametric inference, in regards to an array of S-valued random variables. These random variables are assumed to take values in a complete and separable metric space and further have a particular symmetry property, row exchangeability.

The Nested Dirichlet Process is a particularly apt model for inference in such circumstances. However, calculating posterior distributions in this framework is exceedingly difficult, and become exponentially more complicated as sample size increases.

This research explores the method of using sequential imputation to calculate posterior distributions, providing a rigorous proof of the method’s suitability that had been missing …

Numerical Solutions For Deterministic And Stochastic Partial Differential Equations And Effective Integral Evaluation, Guanqian Wang

Graduate Thesis and Dissertation post-2024

This thesis explores advancements in numerical methods, focusing on their applications to some classes of PDEs, Stochastic PDEs (SPDEs), and integral evaluations. The first part of this proposal provides algorithms for computing the mean curvature flow, including cases with topological changes. We propose energy-penalized and multilevel minimization algorithms. Benchmark problems with random initial conditions reveal that small changes in interaction length led to different solution patterns under topological changes. Our methods demonstrate robustness and efficiency, even with poor initial guesses, making them suitable for a wide range of scenarios.

The second part of this proposal introduces a new approach for …

How To Join Teams: Individual Factors That Influence An Incoming Team Member’S Understanding Of The Team’S Shared Mental Models, Madeline Filippi

Graduate Thesis and Dissertation post-2024

This study examined the effect of various individual differences on accuracy of incoming team members’ learning the team’s task and team shared mental models by leveraging literature on shared mental models and team member replacement. The four individual differences (openness to experience, perspective taking, social curiosity and trait negative affect) were hypothesized to positively impact the incoming team member’s ability to understand the team’s shared mental models through the theoretical mechanism of cue identification. Participants were asked to imagine they were entering a student organization executive team and based on characteristics (responsibilities, preferences, attitudes) of the team members in the …

The Benefit Of Benefits: The Role Of Fringe Job Benefits On The Recruitment Of Deskless Workers, Hannah A. Crandell

Graduate Thesis and Dissertation post-2024

Research indicates that the advertisement of fringe job benefits are related to positive job seeker perceptions of the organization and job pursuit intentions. Drawing from Conservation of Resources Theory, I investigate how different types of fringe benefits related to people’s motivations to obtain, enhance, or retain resources differentially attract them to an organization. The study also examines the role of financial well-being as a moderator of fringe benefits and anticipated organizational support. Further, I assess the relationship between fringe benefits and job pursuit intentions through the serial mechanisms of anticipated organizational support and organizational attractiveness. Findings suggest that fringe benefits …

Motion Extrapolation And Motion Dynamics: Are The Motion Dynamics Of Friction Utilized During Motion Extrapolation To Inform Time-To-Contact Estimations?, Genna Telschow

Graduate Thesis and Dissertation post-2024

Cognitive processing delays should cause us to respond too late when making time-to-contact estimations. According to the theory of constructivism, the brain accounts for these delays by supplementing sensory information with higher level cognitive information to create an accurate motion percept. Across the attention, memory, and motion extrapolation literatures there is evidence supporting the use of higher-level information, like motion dynamics, to supplement our visual input. Specifically, previous research suggests we may account for friction’s constraints on motion when interacting with dynamic stimuli. The current research utilizes features that represent friction as both a stopping agent and a motion catalyst …

Older Adult Centered Robot Assessment: Usability, Social Presence, And Acceptance. Building Towards A Better Robot., Jordan Sasser

Graduate Thesis and Dissertation post-2024

This dissertation investigated factors influencing older adults' perceptions of Misty, a voice-enabled social robot designed for caregiving interactions. Three sequential studies explored how voice characteristics (pitch and speech rate), robot persona (personable vs. robotic), and task guidance (Misty guiding through timed up and go and four stage balance task) influenced usability, social presence, acceptance, and perceptions of medical assistant competence. Study 1 employed thematic and quantitative usability analyses, identifying that lower-pitched, moderately paced voices optimized user satisfaction, while repetitive activation phrases ("Hey Misty") significantly reduced usability. Study 2 examined how persona framing (personable vs. robotic) influenced perceptions of social presence …

The Impact Of Virtual Backgrounds In Video-Mediated Selection And The Role Of Candidate Qualifications, Mira Gruber

Graduate Thesis and Dissertation post-2024

Videoconferencing allows users to manage their self-presentation through virtual backgrounds that mask their immediate physical environment. Prior research suggests that backgrounds depicting professional home spaces (e.g., bookshelves) elicit more favorable impressions than those that depict personal home spaces (e.g., bedrooms). Expectancy Violations Theory (EVT) provides a framework for understanding such effects. The present dissertation applied EVT to video-mediated selection interviews, that have become increasingly popular since the COVID-19 pandemic. Given the strict expectations for professionalism in interviews, virtual backgrounds that deviate from such expectations may negatively impact hiring decisions. Consequently, this work examined the impact of two virtual background types, …

The Relationship Between Adverse Childhood Experiences And Child Maltreatment Potential With Racial And Ethnic Considerations, Madison V. Verdone

Graduate Thesis and Dissertation post-2024

Referrals to Child Protective Services in the United States rise each year at a rate that is disproportionate to population growth (U.S. Department of Health and Human Services, 2022). The content of such reports includes instances of abuse, neglect, and/or suspicion of other types of violence against children. As such, it is clear that children are increasingly exposed to adverse experiences that impact their development. Understanding factors that may contribute to children’s exposure to adverse experiences may assist in breaking the cycle of intergenerational transmission. Thus, this study examined the relationships among parents’ adverse childhood experiences (ACEs), emotion dysregulation, and …

Parents’ Adverse Childhood Experiences And Young Children’S Behavior Problems: Examining Protective Moderating And Mediating Factors, Kaitlyn M. Daleandro

Graduate Thesis and Dissertation post-2024

Adverse childhood experiences (ACEs) are childhood exposures to abuse, neglect, and household dysfunction. ACEs have been linked to a cumulative negative impact on later adult physical and psychological well-being. Parents who carry ACEs often have difficulties in parenting, which have, in turn, been linked to young children’s internalizing and externalizing behavior problems. Nonetheless, some parents who carry ACEs develop positive parenting strategies. Very little is known about how such outcomes occur. A growing area of research concerns protective and compensatory experiences (PACEs) that buffer against the negative consequences of ACEs. PACEs may improve deficits in cognitive, emotional, and neurobiological systems …

Burnout In The Workplace- Organizational Influences On Counselor Burnout, Serene Hasan

Graduate Thesis and Dissertation post-2024

This study is a two-part manuscript dissertation that examined the impact of the six organizational influencers of burnout: Workload, Control, Reward, Community, Fairness, and Values on mental health counselors’ (MHCs) burnout, using Maslach’s three subscales of burnout: Emotional Exhaustion, Depersonalization, and Personal Accomplishment. Additionally, Work Setting and Age were assessed for their influence on MHC burnout, when the six organizational influencers were accounted for. The focus on this topic is crucial as burnout has a detrimental effect on counselors, clients, and organizations. The growing population in need of support surpasses the amount of MHCs that our nation has to offer. …

Quality Of Service Robots And Organizational Citizenship Behaviors: The Mediating Roles Of State Empathy And Perceived Organizational Support/Obstruction, Adam D. Jacobs

Graduate Thesis and Dissertation post-2024

Research on service robots is currently more conceptual than it is empirical. This thesis leverages resource allocation and social exchange theories to explain how employees choose to expend their resources depending on the functioning of the service robot. I propose that service robot quality (defined here as an employee’s perception of the usefulness and ease of use of a service robot) is an important consideration for organizations that adopt service robots, and hypothesize that employee state empathy and support (or obstruction) from their organization links service robot quality to employee organizational citizenship behaviors. The study consisted of 166 participants from …

An Involuntary Motive Of Voluntary Behavior: An Investigation Of The Causes And The Consequences Of Citizenship Pressure, Junyoung Hong

Graduate Thesis and Dissertation post-2024

This dissertation investigates citizenship pressure, defined as an individual’s perception of pressure to perform organizational citizenship behavior (OCB), by examining its conceptual boundaries, antecedents, behavioral outcomes, and underlying mechanisms. Study 1 used an item-sorting task with undergraduate participants to assess whether citizenship pressure is empirically distinct from related constructs such as OCB norms and workaholism. Substantial conceptual overlap prompted refinement of the construct and its measurement. Study 2 surveyed employees to examine how supervisor and coworker OCB demands, along with personality traits (conscientiousness and agreeableness), predict citizenship pressure at the between-person level. Although personality traits showed no direct effects, they …

Impacts Of Susceptibility To Peer Influence And Fomo On Viewing Alcohol-Related Content On Social Media, Alcohol Expectancies, And Alcohol Use, Callie L. Wang

Graduate Thesis and Dissertation post-2024

PURPOSE: Young adult (YA) alcohol use remains a significant public health problem, and may be influenced by alcohol expectancies developed through exposure to peers’ alcohol related content (ARC) on social media. This study examined the associations among ARC exposure, alcohol expectancies and alcohol use among YAs, and how susceptibility to peer influence and Fear of Missing Out (FoMO) may influence these relations. METHOD: YAs in the United States who endorsed consuming 1-2 standard drinks per month (N=371) completed surveys measuring ARC exposure, alcohol expectancies, susceptibility to peer influence, FoMO, and alcohol use at baseline and at 4- and 8-week follow …

Firefighter Syndrome: Improving The Identification And Classification Of Firefighters In Need, Michael A. Schlenk

Graduate Thesis and Dissertation post-2024

Firefighters (FFs) exhibit a multitude of behavioral and physical health concerns as well as fluctuating social support due to their occupation. Despite the fire service enacting preventative approaches to health and wellness, FFs still report increased prevalences of health concerns at the end of their career. Firefighter syndrome was created to identify FFs in need of medical care (e.g., behavioral and physical health services, Frueh et al., 2022b). The purpose of this study is to validate the construct of FF Syndrome by using statistical classification techniques to investigate whether there is a latent group of firefighters that have the symptoms …

Exploring Fake News Detection: Unpacking Polarization, Ambiguity, And Associated Neural Mechanisms, Shayna R. Soares

Graduate Thesis and Dissertation post-2024

A pertinent next step in investigating fake news, is exploring the inherent ambiguity of news headlines through the lens of uncertain decision-making theories. Few studies have done so while investigating the established neural correlates associated with uncertainty in the prefrontal cortex (PFC). A set of three studies was conducted examining the underlying neural mechanisms associated with ambiguity of news headlines, individuals’ polarization, and their decision behavior. Study 1 validated news headlines in terms of ambiguity (1-7 scale). Experiment 1 investigated choice behavior in an uncertain decision task with ambiguous news headlines, while recording activation in the prefrontal cortex using fNIRS. …

2025-2026 Graduate Catalog, Morehead State University. Registrar's Office.

Morehead State Catalog Archive

2025-2026 graduate catalog for Morehead State University.

2025-2026 Undergraduate Catalog, Morehead State University. Registrar's Office.

Morehead State Catalog Archive

2025-2026 undergraduate catalog for Morehead State University.

Temporary Marriage In Iraq: Views And Perceptions, Zena Al Safar

All Graduate Theses, Dissertations, and Other Capstone Projects

In July 2024, the Shia Muslim Parliament members proposed an amendment to the Personal Status Law. This amendment was passed on February 11, 2025. Per the amendment, the Shia Ja’afari School of Islamic jurisprudence has four months from the time the amendment was passed to submit a Personal Status Code for approval. It is speculated that this new Code will legalize mut’ah marriage, which is a type of temporary marriage. Temporary marriage within Islam is a heterosexual marriage that does not convey long-term commitment and usually has an end date. While scholarly written work in this field exists in other …

Laser Based Metal 3d Printer, Inura Goonawardena

All Graduate Theses, Dissertations, and Other Capstone Projects

The technology and applications of additive manufacturing (AM) have advanced significantly in recent years. Research from hobbyist to industrial scale has evolved and has seen advancements in materials that can be utilized for industrial manufacturing. The Institute for Machine Tools and Industrial Management at the Technical University of Munich (TUM) developed the reAM250, an open-source research platform for Powder Bed Fusion with a Laser (LPBF). It was made available to facilitate study into component-level innovation, control techniques, and process monitoring without the budgetary and intellectual property constraints of commercial machines. This paper delves into the concept and production of the …