Digital Commons Network^™

First Responders' Best Friends: A Mental Health And Trauma-Informed Care Program For First Responders, Jordan Postiglione

Entry Level Occupational Therapy Doctoral Capstone Projects Class of 2026

First responders experience consistent exposure to traumatic events in their day-to-day profession, placing them at increased risk for mental health challenges, including stress, burnout, anxiety, depression, and post-traumatic stress disorder.  The First Responder’s Best Friends doctoral capstone quality improvement project aimed to increase mental health and well-being in first responders as well as to bring awareness to the importance of mental health and the impact of trauma.  The capstone project consisted of three different areas of focus: program development and implementation, advocacy, and clinical practice skills.  Program development and implementation was a 12-week mental health program at the Kingston Fire …

Room To Breathe: The Surprising Capaciousness Of Osh Act Preemption, Michael C. Duff

All Faculty Scholarship

This essay is part of a Saint Louis University Law Journal seminar, conducted by the Wefel Center for Employment Law, titled "Shifting Workplace Law in an Era of Federal Vacuums: Business as Usual or Polycrisis?" The symposium presumed that the federal government would be scaling back workforce regulatory enforcement dramatically in the shadow of DOGE and several other developments. The essay focuses on OSHA and more narrowly questions the extent to which the OSH Act preempts state and local efforts to regulate workplace safety and health. The essay shows that unless OSHA promulgates a full-blown “standard” – a tedious form …

Overcoming Radiation Resistance: Ferroptosis Induction To Sensitize Solid Tumors To Radiation Therapy, Joseph Carmicheal, Caden M. Fritson, Alexandra Seas, Heidi M. Vieira, Surinder K. Batra

Journal Articles: Biochemistry & Molecular Biology

Radiation therapy (RT) is a mainstay of treatment for a myriad of cancers, often utilized for tumors that are unable to be resected, as well as an adjunct to surgery and chemotherapy. Unfortunately, many cancers are resistant to RT-induced damage and subsequent cell death. This has spurred the pursuit of novel radiation sensitizers that could potentiate the effects of this widely used and important treatment modality. Since its discovery as a regulated cell death mechanism in 2012, ferroptosis has been studied for its connection to cancer and other known oxidative pathways. With this, the interplay between RT and ferroptosis in …

Not On My Zoning Board: Achieving Mass Transit Development Despite Nimby Pushback, Brian J. Koluch

Pell Scholars and Senior Theses

Within the political discussion on local, state, and federal levels, all politicians seem to agree that U.S. Interstates are a crucial lifeline for many. Conjointly, city planners and scholars understand that we have a logistics issue in cities that can’t seem to handle highway congestion. When prompted with mass transit solutions, some community members protest them for altering the neighborhood in a presumably negative way, leading to the phrase; “Not in my back yard.” Thus, local governing bodies seem paralyzed to take the actions needed to move forward with these implementation strategies. Local governments, in order to circumvent the socially …

Deep Learning Framework For Sow Posture Classification From Depth Images: Comparison With Data Transformation Techniques, Models, And Cross-Validation, Md Towfiqur Rahman, Tami M. Brown-Brandl, Gary A. Rohrer, Sudhendu R. Sharma, Suzanne M. Leonard, Yeyin Shi

Department of Agricultural and Biological Systems Engineering: Faculty Publications

Piglet preweaning mortality (PWM) in the United States averages ≈14–15%, with sow overlaying causing about one third proportion of these losses. This research aimed to develop and evaluate deep learning models to classify six sow postures using depth images to monitor behaviors linked to overlaying risk. Top-down depth images were captured with Kinect V2^® cameras at 10 frames min^-1 for five consecutive days (2 days before to 2 days after farrowing), yielding 26,506 training images from 18 sows, 17,901 testing images from 12 sows, and 4,697 additional images from three sows in diagonal stalls for external validation. Three …

Green Hydrogen-Based Decarbonization Approach For Steel Industry With Hybrid Renewable Energy Sources, Raju Kumar Maurya, Dharmbir Prasad, Rudra Pratap Singh

Mansoura Engineering Journal

This work provides a micro-pilot techno-economic and environmental assessment of a green hydrogen-driven decarbonization scenario for low-carbon steel production at the capacity of 1 ton steel produced (i.e., requiring 50 kg of green hydrogen). In this work an integrated renewable energy (RE) scenario for the steel production site at Jamuria, West Bengal, India is planned to utilize solar photovoltaic (PV), wind turbines (WTs), battery storage and a diesel backup generator to meet the hydrogen production load from an electrolyzer using HOMER Pro software. The results show that the proposed micro-pilot system produces excess electricity with respect to the plant's operating …

Intelligent Audio‑To‑Indian Sign‑Language And Sign‑To‑Audio Translation System Using Mediapipe, Tensorflow, Whisper And Google Tts, N. Pothanna, T. Kusuma, S. Haindavi, T. Sreeja, Shaik Shaheem Taj

Mansoura Engineering Journal

Communication barriers between the Deaf community and the general public remain a persistent challenge, particularly in multilingual settings where Indian Sign Language (ISL) is the primary mode of interaction. We propose a real-time bidirectional translation framework integrating MediaPipe for hand landmark extraction, a Convolutional Neural Network (CNN) classifier built with TensorFlow/Keras for gesture recognition, OpenAI Whisper for robust multilingual speech-to-text transcription, and Google TTS for naturalistic speech synthesis. The system achieves 93% classification accuracy across 35 ISL classes (alphabets A–Z and numerals 1–9) on a dataset of 42,700 images, with macro and weighted F1-scores of 0.93. Deployed as a Flask …

Puppet Lab: Investigating Digital Technologies In Creative Learning, Harrison Lorenz-Daniel

Theses : Honours

This study interrogates the impact that digital technologies and digital mediation have on creative learning workshops run by arts organisations and delivered by teaching artists. It responds to a wave of new creative learning initiatives supported by arts organisations, state governments, and schools following the COVID-19 pandemic. Situating the research primarily in the investigation of Puppet Lab, a new digital workshop developed by Spare Parts Puppet Theatre in Walyalup (Fremantle), qualitative data was collected over a series of 5 semi-structured interviews with Western Australian teaching artists. The study found that digital technologies did not meaningfully impact the standard delivery of …

A Quantitative Analysis Of Burrowing And Subterranean Locomotion In The Sand Lance Using A Transparent Sediment, Issei Fujita, Makoto Tomiyasu, Jun Yamamoto, Yasuzumi Fujimori

Journal of Marine Science and Technology–Taiwan

Sand lances (Ammodytes spp.) rely on rapid burrowing into sediment for predator avoidance. Although their sediment grain-size preferences are well documented, the biomechanics underlying burrowing success remain unclear because natural substrates are opaque. Using a transparent-sediment system, we directly visualized and quantified burrowing kinematics to: (1) test the effect of body size (total length, TL) on burrowing success; (2) examine entry mechanisms (e.g., swimming speed, entry angle); and (3) describe locomotion within sediment. Logistic regression on the full dataset (N = 28 fish) identified TL as the primary determinant of success, with larger individuals exhibiting significantly higher success …

Enhancing Underwater Imagery And Organism Detection Using Reinforcement Learning, K. Arul Deepa, P. Ramya, Karpaga Vinodha, Dharmaraja C

Journal of Marine Science and Technology–Taiwan

Underwater environments pose significant challenges in assessing image quality and organism detection due to light scattering and absorption, which limits visibility and color fidelity. Existing solutions often fail to effectively address these challenges, resulting in suboptimal image quality and hindering organism identification. This paper examines the problem through a dual-focused approach: enhancing underwater images and detecting organisms using the Underwater Image Enhancement Benchmark (UIEB) dataset. The first step introduces a state-of-the-art method for image enhancement by applying reinforcement learning (RL) principles. By formulating the enhancement process as a Markov Decision Process (MDP)—where states are represented by image features and actions …

Improved Climate Services In Hawai‘I: The Collaborative Development Of Drought-Related Decision Support Tools, Ryan J. Longman, Derek Ford, Cherryle Heu, Jennifer Geis, Abby Frazier, Christian P. Giardina, James T. Potemra, Sean B. Cleveland, John J. Marra

Geography

Rising temperatures, prolonged droughts, and increasingly variable rainfall are negatively impacting natural and cultural resources and agricultural production systems in Hawai‘i. To effectively manage resources in the face of these changes, stewards and producers now require accurate, timely, and site-specific climate data and information. However, access to such data as well as the ability to interpret available data remain limited for many sectors. In response to various needs, a team of scientists working with the Pacific Drought Knowledge Exchange (PDKE) has developed two open-source decision-support tools (DSTs) through a collaborative, user-informed process aimed at closing longstanding gaps in local climate …

Crispr-Cas9 Unleashed: Gene-Slicing Adventures In The Cancer Battlefield, Shivakuma Sonnaila, Shilpi Agrawal

Chemistry & Biochemistry Faculty Publications and Presentations

Cancer, a global health menace, continues to pose significant challenges in terms of incidence and mortality, necessitating innovative therapeutic strategies. Despite existing treatments, the limitations persist, prompting a quest for novel approaches. The emergence of immunotherapy marked a transformative era in solid tumor treatments, yet its efficacy is constrained by adverse effects. Concurrently, the integration of advanced technologies into cancer treatment explores the vast potential residing at the molecular level through gene analysis and manipulation. This review articulates the role of state-of-the-art genome editing technology, notably clustered regularly interspaced short palindromic repeats (CRISPR-Cas9), in overcoming the constraints of immunotherapy for …

"The Queen's Grace Heartily Thanks You For The Quails:" Honor Lisle And The Role Of Gift-Giving In The Education And Preferment Of Her Children, Alexa Renee Gordon

Honors Program Theses

No abstract provided.

The Impact Of Artificial Intelligence In Advertising: An Experimental Evaluation Of Ai Video Generators, Josie Koenigs

Honors Program Theses

Artificial intelligence (AI) has rapidly transformed the landscape of modern advertising, reshaping how agencies conceptualize, create, and deliver campaigns (Gujar and Panyam 51). Today, advertising agencies and standalone advertisers increasingly integrate AI tools to automate tasks, generate creative content, and analyze consumer behavior with precision. These technologies have introduced significant strengths, including enhanced creativity, efficiency, and time-saving capabilities, that allow marketers to produce highly targeted and engaging campaigns. However, the growing use of AI also raises questions about critical weaknesses, including issues of authenticity, bias, and ethical safety concerns in AI-generated content. Existing research has explored the general applications of …

Development Of An Adhesive Emulsion Hydrogel For Soft Tissue Reconstruction, David J. Alpert

Dissertations and Theses

Soft tissue filling materials are most commonly associated with various aesthetic, cosmetic procedures, primarily using lightly cross-linked hyaluronic acid to fill wrinkles and give facial features a more youthful appearance. These natural materials are biocompatible but degrade over time while more persistent synthetic fillers may provoke a chronic inflammatory response. Migration from the injection site is also a key factor as this may not only render the implant non- functional but necessitate further procedures for removal of the foreign material. Such concerns are more pronounced for soft tissue reconstruction procedures (e.g., to treat congenital defects or traumatic injuries), which require …

Mad Or Uncontrollable? Reading Female Madness In Three Gothic Texts, Amy Marie Bueno

Dissertations and Theses

My thesis employs comparative close reading framed by disability studies to analyze representations of female madness in Charlotte Brontë’s Jane Eyre, Jean Rhys’ Wide Sargasso Sea, and Isabel Allende’s “If You Touched My Heart.” Drawing on theories of socially constructed disability, it argues that Bertha, Antoinette, and Hortensia are framed as “mad women” not through inherent pathology, but through patriarchal violence, colonial domination, and institutional power. By integrating the social model of disability with feminist theory, this thesis examines how women are rendered disabled within societies influenced by Social Darwinism and eugenic ideologies.

This thesis further incorporates Gothic theory and …

Disaster Risk Management During Climate Emergencies In The Dominican Republic And Puerto Rico, Rosleny Ubinas

Dissertations and Theses

This paper analyzes the DRM approach as an effective framework in addressing climate emergencies across the Dominican Republic and Puerto Rico. These two Caribbean regions, with high hurricane exposure and differing response structures, are deeply shaped by their governments and affiliated international organizations. Disaster Risk Management is the systematic process of using laws, plans, institutions, and community networks to reduce vulnerability to hazards and coordinate effective response when disasters occur. It covers the full cycle, from prevention to reconstruction and rebuilding more resiliently. The Dominican Republic’s law-based intervention led to greater local-level community participation during disasters with its embedded volunteer …

Dna Barcoding Complements Citizen Science Identifications In An Arthropod Survey At Governors Island, New York, Malky Gestetner

Dissertations and Theses

Arthropods are declining worldwide, threatened by habitat loss, climate change, and growing urbanization. Efforts to monitor arthropod biodiversity are crucial for conservation policies and for maintaining the ecosystem services provided by these animals in urban environments. Surveys of arthropods have been attempted in many New York neighborhoods, but no formal assessment has been conducted on Governors Island, which harbors 72-acres of parkland within a short boat ride away from Manhattan. This is a deficiency which this study helps to address. Following student-led collection efforts within four Governors Island sites, DNA barcoding was employed to complement specimen identification based on morphology …

Who Bears The Cost? A Module For Researching The Intersection Of Technology, The Individual, And Climate Change, Jonathan Auyer

Climate Change and the Individual, 2025-26

Who Bears the Cost? A Module for Researching the Intersection of Technology, the Individual, and Climate Change is a multi-day writing and research module designed for first-year composition courses. Using the ongoing controversy surrounding the Science, Technology & Advanced Manufacturing Park (STAMP) in Genesee County, New York as a central case study, students investigate the ethical, environmental, and social dimensions of artificial intelligence and climate change. The module guides students from initial inquiry, exploring the philosophical question of whether technology is value-neutral or value-laden, through source research, collaborative discussion, and persuasive writing. Drawing on the rhetorical framework of They Say …

Implementation Of Digital Interventions To Address Alcohol Use In Primary Care: A Scoping Review, Sean Becker

Public Health Theses

The development and implementation of digital interventions in the identification andmanagement of unhealthy alcohol use (i.e., the spectrum of consumption including at-risk alcohol use and alcohol use disorder) in the primary care setting has seen numerous advancements in recent years. Such rapid change makes it difficult to understand and assess the current state of the literature as it relates to these implementation topics. To better understand the broader research landscape, we (SB, Advised by EJE and BK and with collaboration from AG) conducted a scoping review to: 1) characterize the focus, components, and mode of digital interventions for targeting alcohol …

Black Carbon Exposure And Adult Mental Health And Cognitive Function: A Scoping Review, Zhihong Cai

Public Health Theses

Background: Black carbon (BC) is a particulate matter component that is closely linked to combustion and traffic sources, serving as both a short-lived climate pollutant and a potential risk factor for brain health. Despite a substantial burden of adult mental health disorders and cognitive decline, epidemiological evidence on BC exposure and brain health remains scattered.Objective: To systematically map study types, main findings, evidence gaps, and methodological limitations regarding BC exposure and its proxy indicators, such as PM₂.₅ absorbance and elemental carbon in relation to mental health and cognitive outcomes in adults. Methods: Following PRISMA-ScR guidelines, I searched PubMed, Web of …

Sex Differences In Metabolic Pathways Of Colorectal Cancer Liver Metastases, Yunhan Chen

Public Health Theses

Background: Colorectal cancer liver metastasis (CRLM) is a major cause of death in colorectal cancer, and growing evidence suggests that sex may influence tumor biology and metabolism. However, sex-specific metabolic changes in CRLM remain poorly understood.Method: This study performed sex-stratified metabolomics analysis of CRLM tissue samples using datasets generated from HILIC and RPLC LC-MS acquisition modes. Differential metabolites were identified using Wilcoxon tests with FDR correction, and pathway enrichment analysis was conducted using MetaboAnalyst to compare shared and sex-specific metabolic patterns between male and female samples. Results: Both male and female CRLM samples showed metabolic alterations in shared pathways, including …

Physiological Predictors Of Long-Term Diabetes Risk Among Asian Women With Gestational Diabetes: A Scoping Review, Haiyi Guo

Public Health Theses

Objective:To identify risk factors associated with the progression from gestational diabetes mellitus (GDM) to type 2 diabetes mellitus (T2DM) among women in East Asia. East Asian populations were selected as the focus because previous studies suggest that women in this region may experience a disproportionately high risk of progression after GDM, even at lower body mass index levels than those typically observed in Western populations. A clearer understanding of these risk factors may help inform more targeted postpartum prevention strategies. Methods: A scoping review was conducted using PubMed, Embase, the Cochrane Library, CNKI, VIP, and SinoMed databases, covering studies published …

Water Resource Governance And Health Equity In Angola, Mads Harner

Public Health Theses

AbstractBackground: Angola is confronting a set of intertwined challenges including water insecurity, increasing climate variability, and deep structural inequality that together intensify the burden of waterborne and water-related diseases (Lombana Cordoba et al., 2021; World Health Organization, 2025). Roughly half of the population does not have reliable access to safe drinking water, and gaps in sanitation and hygiene infrastructure, especially in peri-urban and rural areas, facilitate the spread of illnesses such as cholera, diarrheal diseases, and malaria (UNICEF Angola, 2025; Moreira et al., 2012). These issues are further exacerbated by drought and broader climate variability, and underlying them are historical …

Kinetics Of Antibody Responses To Hookworm Excretory/Secretory Products In A Hamster Model Of Infection And Cure, Jacquelyn Kauffman

Public Health Theses

Hookworms are a major global health burden in resource-limited settings despite ongoing control programs. This makes understanding host immune responses to infection and treatment critical to improve diagnostics and interventions. This study investigates the long-term kinetics of antibody responses following infection with Ancylostoma ceylanicum in a hamster model. Over a one-year study, groups of six hamsters were assigned to uninfected, infected, or infected then treated groups, with antibody responses measured using ELISAs. All infected animals had elevated IgG, IgM, and IgA responses by day 21 post infection. Mebendazole-treated hamsters had significantly reduced, but not eliminated, antibody levels, with IgM responses …

Climate, Land Use, And Lyme Disease Risk In The United States, Mohan Li

Public Health Theses

Lyme disease is the most common vector-borne bacterial infection in the United States. It remains an important public health concern due to its high disease burden, expanding geographic distribution, and complex transmission cycle. Climate change is frequently regarded as a driver of Lyme disease emergence, as many previous studies suggested. However, ongoing debate about the magnitude and mechanisms of climate effects complicates the interpretation of this relationship. This review synthesizes evidence on how climate influences Lyme disease through both direct and indirect pathways, with a focus on studies relevant to the United States and North America.Climate directly affects Lyme disease …

Maternal Sleep, Sleep Medication Use, And Birth Outcomes: A Pilot Study Of The Pregnancy, Environment, And Child Health (Peach) Cohort, Samantha Lydell

Public Health Theses

Pregnancy is often a period of poor sleep quality. Previous research has linked reduced sleep quality and difficulty sleeping during pregnancy to adverse maternal and fetal outcomes. However, little is known about how sleep medication use may influence these associations. This pilot study examines the relationships between poor sleep, sleep medication use, and birth outcomes in the Pregnancy, Environment, and Child Health (PEACH) cohort. This study included 136 participants from the PEACH cohort linked to Yale New Haven Health delivery records. Poor sleep and sleep medication use were self-reported. Outcomes were gestational age at birth (days) and birth weight (grams). …

Characterization Of Tick Exoproteins Interacting With Anaplasma Phagocytophilum, Yilei Qin

Public Health Theses

Anaplasma phagocytophilum (Ap) is an Ixodes-transmitted obligate intracellular bacterium thatinfects neutrophils and causes human granulocytic anaplasmosis. Ap alternates between an infectious dense-cored (DC) form and a replicative reticulate cell (RC) form, and successful transmission depends on coordinated interactions at the vector–pathogen interface. Tick extracellular and secreted proteins (the tick exoproteome) likely contribute to Ap survival and transmission, yet many proposed tick factors remain computationally annotated with limited experimental validation. In this thesis, I prioritize candidate tick exoproteins, identified from yeast- display screens using whole Ap organisms, and evaluate them using a two-step validation strategy. First, I quantify tissue-specific expression of …

Compromised Glutathione And Ascorbate Capacities Under Prenatal Alcohol Exposure, And Its Implications For Vulnerable Subpopulations, Reagan Strand

Public Health Theses

Prenatal alcohol exposure (PAE) remains the leading preventable cause of lifelong neurodevelopmental impairment, yet the biological mechanisms underlying differential susceptibility remain poorly understood. The populations most vulnerable to PAE overlap substantially with those bearing the greatest burden of antioxidant insufficiency, including individuals experiencing food insecurity, environmental pollutant exposures, and alcohol use disorder, yet this convergence and its developmental consequences remain poorly characterized. This thesis investigates how dual antioxidant deficiency in both the dam and offspring modulates vulnerability to PAE using a compound heterozygous mouse model (GclmHET/GuloHET) that recapitulates reductions in antioxidants glutathione (GSH) and ascorbic acid (AA, or Vitamin C) …

Assessment Of The Antimicrobial Properties And Skin Microbiota Of Unisexual (Ambystoma) Salamanders Within Defensive Toxins, Sydney Stanton

Senior Honors Theses and Projects

As antibiotic resistance continues to pose a significant threat to public health, discovery of novel antibiotics could provide tools to combat this threat. Amphibian skin exhibits complex pathogen defense physiology and diverse skin microbiota, which suggests that it could be a potential source of novel antibiotics. A critical feature of amphibian skin is mucus, which is secreted as a defense mechanism and contains many immune system components such as symbiotic microbiota and antimicrobial peptides. To test the antibacterial properties of amphibian mucus, this study assesses whether mucus secretions from unisexual Ambystoma salamanders are effective at inhibiting the growth of safe …