Digital Commons Network^™

How Does The Concentration Of Gibberellic Acid (Ga3) Impact The Growth Of Different Setaria Viridis Mutants?, Liz Ritenhour, Gracey Horn, Lawson Veit, Grant Juris, Rodrigo Suarez Almajano

2026 Student Academic Showcase

We tested the relationship between gibberlin and plant growth through the use of gibberellic acid and different dwarf millet variants. Subjects were split into two groups: group one with no gibberellic acid application, and group two with periodic gibberellic application. Each group consisted of 17 pots. Each row held one mutant variant, while the bottom left pot was removed to store water. The objective was to have significant data by the end of the semester to prove the relevant relationship of gibberellin and plant growth.

The Past, Present And Future Of The Dietary Guidelines Of America And The Impact On Community Nutrition, Jordyn Dearth

2026 Student Academic Showcase

The most recent addition of the Dietary Guidelines of America have been released to the public, and has caused many questions to the community. The guidelines serve not only as a resource for the general public and a resource for local and national policy regarding nutrition. Because community nutrition is directly shaped by these recommendations, exploring its past implementations, present implications and possible future actions can help in understanding how these guidelines influence public health at local and national levels. This project aims to explain the impact of the past Dietary Guidelines, show the newest Dietary Guidelines, and predict how …

Optimizing K-Nearest Neighbor Based On Dragonfly Algorithm For Diabetes Retinopathy Classification, Ahmed Subhi Abdalkafor, Alaa Abdalqahar Jihad, Esam Taha Yassen

Baghdad Science Journal

The K-Nearest Neighbors (KNN) has been proven to be an effective method for addressing classification problems. The performance of the KNN algorithm is heavily dependent on the value of parameter K, which represents the number of nearest neighbors. Choosing an inappropriate value for K can affect the classification accuracy because a smaller chosen K can lead to overfitting and vice versa. So, the appropriate selection of the K value has a significant impact on the performance of KNN. Manually, adjusting the value of K is a very difficult process because the appropriate choices for this value depend on the status …

Aggression And Fish Welfare: Challenges And Opportunities, Christine M. Soper, Peter D. Dijkstra

Animal Sentience

Oldfield & Bonano’s (2024) [O&B] target article discusses the wellbeing and sociality of bony fishes. Many fish species, such as cichlids, are not only social but territorial. Aggression is normal, but territorial aggression in a captive environment can have a negative impact on welfare. Aggression-related injuries and deaths are prevalent in pet stores as well as research settings. We discuss the need to develop effective methods to minimize the negative consequences of aggression.

My Right To Dominate You: The Populist Perversion Of Human Rights, James A. Gardner

Journal Articles

A constitutional “right” is a legal technology designed to protect the weak from the strong. In the twenty-first-century United States, however, constitutional rights have increasingly been interpreted and deployed, by both litigants and courts, to secure the ability of the strong to dominate the weak. It is quickly becoming standard practice among right-wing American populists to claim that the deployment of rights in ways that limit the ability of the strong to dominate those weaker than themselves is to make victims of the strong. Freedom, in the imagination of American populists, means the freedom to dominate disfavored others.

This paper …

Cross-Attention Mechanism For Medical Visual Question Answering, Nada Fadhil Mohammed, Israa H. Ali

Baghdad Science Journal

Visual Question Answering (VQA) is a machine learning task that aims to create systems capable of answering natural language questions based on given images. Medical VQA systems, a domain-specific application of VQA, assist in understanding clinically relevant information from medical images. These systems leverage deep neural techniques to generate accurate answers to questions, which can be closed-ended or open-ended. This paper proposes a Cross-Attention Mechanism-based Medical VQA system. The proposed Medical VQA system achieves good performance through the integration of three-key components, each addressing critical challenges in medical visual question answering: The biomedical domain-specific pretraining of BioBERT enables extracting powerful …

A Multi-Model Ensemble Framework For Assistive Image Captioning With Voice Interaction For The Visually Impaired Users, Alaa Noori Mazher, Ghadah K. Al-Khafaji

Baghdad Science Journal

Visual impairment greatly restricts an individual's ability for perception and interaction with the environment, making everyday activities challenging without the availability of appropriate assistive technologies. One major barrier is the inability to perceive visual scenes, which are essential for spatial awareness, wayfinding, and situational knowledge. This study aims to address this gap through the proposal of an intelligent assistive image captioning system specifically designed for visually impaired individuals. The system employs the best available computer vision and natural language processing techniques in generating context-oriented text captions for an image infused with interactive voice responses. Here, four models of Convolutional Neural …

Cupid And Psyche: How Stories Reflect Cultural Norms, Maia Porter

Honors Projects

Stories, as a whole, are retold time and time again, changing slightly with each retelling and interpretation. The story of Cupid and Psyche follows this pattern, changing as it is retold to fit the norms and values of the culture it is told within. This project examines three versions of the story: Apuleius’s “Cupid and Psyche” which is told within his larger novel Metamorphoses, Till We Have Faces (1956) written by C. S. Lewis, and Luna McNamara’s Psyche and Eros (2023). This project examines Psyche’s characterization and how much autonomy or agency she is given, how the inequality inherent in …

Montana Kaimin, April 23, 2026, Students Of The University Of Montana, Missoula

Montana Kaimin, 1898-present

Student newspaper of the University of Montana, Missoula.

The Effects Of Oleuropein In Olive Leaf Extract Alone Or Combined With Calcitriol On The Viability And Migration Of Human Endometrial Cells In Vitro, Katelyn Devereaux

Electronic Theses and Dissertations

Endometriosis is a chronic inflammatory disease affecting approximately 10% of reproductive-aged women worldwide and is commonly associated with pelvic pain, infertility, and reduced quality of life. Current management strategies, including hormonal therapies and surgical intervention, often provide only temporary relief and are associated with recurrence and adverse effects. These limitations highlight the need for alternative, non-hormonal therapeutic approaches that target underlying inflammatory and cellular mechanisms of disease progression.

This study evaluated the effects of oleuropein, contained within an olive leaf extract, and calcitriol, the active form of vitamin D, on cellular viability and migration in immortalized human endometriotic epithelial (12Z) …

Optimizing Quality Of Service In Cloud Computing: A Performance-Aware Task Classifier For Heterogeneous Big Data Workloads, Pawan Bhaker, Sophiya Sheikh, Rintu Nath, Ajay Nain

Baghdad Science Journal

The Big data originates from various heterogeneous sources worldwide. Due to the diverse origins of data generation, big data involves a variety of tasks. Some require storage resources, while others need computational resources. Additionally, cloud computing provides centralized storage and computational resources for executing these tasks. However, resource optimization and efficient task scheduling remain challenging. Moreover, accurately categorizing tasks and effectively allocating resources based on their nature pose challenges for cloud computing, especially when assigning tasks to heterogeneous resources to minimize task completion time. To address these issues, this paper proposes a Performance-Aware Task Classifier (PATC) algorithm that classifies tasks …

A New Reinforcement Learning Agent Framework For Digital Image Forgery Detection Using Prioritized Experience Replay, Muthana S. Mahdi, Saad N. Alsaad, Hasanen S. Abdullah

Baghdad Science Journal

Digital image forgery detection has become an urgent and complex problem in an age when powerful editing tools can easily alter photographs. The familiar maxim ``a picture is worth a thousand words'' can no longer be taken at face value, since even subtle manipulations may conceal or fabricate critical details. Conventional detection methods frequently suffer from highly imbalanced datasets and narrow feature representations that fail to capture the diverse artifacts introduced by modern editing techniques. In response, this work presents a novel framework that casts the forgery detection task as a reinforcement learning problem, enabling an agent to learn a …

An Informative Analysis Of Applying Feature Reduction Methods To Supervised Machine Learning Algorithms, Mustafa S. Abd

Baghdad Science Journal

Feature reduction techniques are fundamental to enhancing machine learning (ML) algorithms by reducing the number of features in a dataset. The study here explores the impact of Principle Component Analysis (PCA) on ML algorithms within an unbalanced classification framework, in partnership with feature selection techniques like Cluster Variation Attribute Evaluator (CVAE) and Correlation Attribute Evaluator (CAE). In addition, the research introspects a comparison analysis evaluating the effectiveness of several ML methods, including Multilayer Perceptron (MLP), Decision Tree J48, k-Nearest Neighbor (k-NN) and Sequential Minimal Optimization (SMO). The informative analysis of results signifies that the MLP technique with PCA minimized the …

Mandibular Landmark Determination Based On Statistical Features Of Panoramic Radiograph Images Using Multi-Output Neural Network, Nur Nafiiyah, Agus Harjoko, Kang-Hyun Jo, Rini Widyaningrum, Eha Renwi Astuti, Alhidayati Asymal

Baghdad Science Journal

The mandible is crucial in orthodontic treatment, forensic identification, and clinical diagnosis. However, manually identifying mandibular landmarks is time-consuming and highly dependent on expert skill, necessitating a more reliable automated prediction method. Previous research has used linear and nonlinear regression methods, in which each model predicts a single landmark point, resulting in inefficiency. In addition, these methods only use the centroid of the binary image of the mandible as input. This research proposes a multi-output neural network model that is able to predict multiple mandibular landmark points simultaneously. The proposed neural network architecture in predicting mandibular landmark points is 11 …

The San José De Laguna Mission: Christian Iconography Through The Lens Of Pueblo Oral Traditions, Natalie Sims Rasmussen

Theses and Dissertations

The San José de Laguna Mission was constructed in 1699 in modern New Mexico. Following on the heels of the second Pueblo revolt, it stands as a testament to the Pueblo adoption of Christian symbols in the portrayal of their own oral traditions. A central theme in the Laguna oral tradition is the complementary nature of masculine and feminine forces that make up the universe. The Christian figures of the altar screen, such as Saint Joseph, Saint John Nepomuck, Saint Barbara, and the Trinity, can be interpreted through the lens of the Pueblo oral tradition regarding a 19th century Laguna …

Differentiable Objectives For 3d Scene Relighting Via Gradient Descent On Olat Basis Coefficients, Anson Savage

Theses and Dissertations

Designing effective lighting is an iterative and often time-consuming process. This work contributes to automatic lighting design research by presenting a render-engine agnostic optimization routine: gradient descent on RGB multipliers of one-light-at-a-time (OLAT) basis images. We compare several objective functions to accomplish lighting tasks and show that our method is capable of quickly and effectively exploring different lighting styles using either text prompts or reference images. We also present several datasets specific to lighting tasks and show that fine-tuning on these datasets can improve performance.

Family-Based Gwas Of Cognitive Endophenotypes Reveals Genetic Architecture Of Memory And Executive Function In Alzheimer’S Disease, Kesheng Wang, Xueying Yang, Gayenell Magwood, Chun Xu, R. Osvaldo Navia, Jean Neils-Strunjas, Xiaoming Li

Health & Biomedical Sciences Faculty Publications

Alzheimer’s disease (AD), the most common cause of dementia, is characterized by progressive memory and cognitive decline. Conventional genome-wide association studies (GWAS) comparing AD cases and controls may miss genetic influences that act along a continuum of cognitive function. Using data from 3007 participants in the National Institute on Aging Late-Onset Alzheimer’s Disease Family Study (NIA-LOAD GWAS), we conducted a family-based GWAS of eight quantitative cognitive phenotypes encompassing episodic memory (Logical Memory IA and IIA), working memory (Digit Span Forward, Backward, and Ordering), and semantic fluency (Animal, Fruit and Vegetable, and Vegetable Fluency). Family-based association testing in PLINK v1.9 identified …

Currents Of Culture: Exchange And Interaction In Early Cycladic Greece, Megan Garrett

Honors Theses

In this paper, trade networks and cultural exchange during the Greek Late Neolithic, Final Neolithic, and the Early Bronze Age will be tracked to better understand cultural interaction, seen through material parallels and synchronicities. Dating between the 5th and 3rd millennia BC, cultural practices will be traced geographically and through material cultures around the Cycladic islands, mainland Greece, and into the Aegean, specifically the exchange networks that include Euboea across each of these periods. Euboea is the second largest island in the Cyclades and is directly east of mainland Attica. Based on previous research, the Early Bronze Age material in …

What Happens After Oil And Gas Decommissioning? A Global Systematic Review Of Marine Environmental Effects, Anaelle Lemasson Lemasson, Antony M. Knights

School of Biological and Marine Sciences

The thousands of oil and gas (OG) platforms placed at sea for fossil fuel extraction have introduced new hard substrate to the marine environment. Over time, these structures can become colonized by a diversity of marine life, fostering novel ecosystems. However, an increasing number of OG platforms are reaching decommissioning age and decisions regarding their fate must be made. Some view these artificial structures as litter that ought to be removed; others view them as valuable contributors to marine biodiversity worth preserving. Evidence of the environmental effects of these structures following different decommissioning strategies is needed to identify the potential …

Dual Membrane-Spanning Anti-Sigma 2 Controls Omv Biogenesis And Colonization Fitness In Bacteroides Thetaiotaomicron, Evan J Pardue, Tengfei Zhong, Nichollas E Scott, Biswanath Jana, Wandy Beatty, Juan C Ortiz-Marquez, Mohammed Kaplan, Clay Jackson-Litteken, Mario F Feldman

2020-Current year OA Pubs

UNLABELLED:

IMPORTANCE: Dual membrane-spanning anti-sigma factors (Dma) are a novel class of regulatory proteins found solely among Bacteroidota. Previous studies demonstrated the importance of Dma1 in vesiculation, but the overall role of the Dma family in Bacteroides physiology remains poorly understood. Here, we show that Dma2 modulates vesiculation and the expression of select polysaccharide utilization loci (PULs) that target host-associated glycans

Persian To British Mandate-Period Settlement At Qedumim Square, Yafo (Jaffa): An Umayyad Fortress And Ottoman Street, Avraham S. Tendler

'Atiqot

An excavation at Qedumim Square, Yafo, uncovered settlement remains of the tell, dating from Iron II, the Persian, Hellenistic–Early Roman, Byzantine, Early Islamic, Crusader and late Ottoman–British Mandate periods. Two segments of a fortification wall were probably part of an Umayyad-period fortress dating from the seventh century CE. A late Ottoman-period stone-paved street with a drainage and sewage channel below it contribute important data concerning the urban infrastructure of that time. Several coins and large quantities of pottery retrieved from the excavation, including a few ceramic items inscribed with short Hebrew, Greek and Latin inscriptions, shed light on the settlements …

Faunal Remains From The Byzantine Street (Area S2), Jerusalem, Lee Perry Gal

'Atiqot

The faunal assemblage from the Byzantine Street (Area S2) in the City of David derives from domestic refuse accumulated on a street surface and from redeposited construction fill associated with episodes of street repair during the late Byzantine–Early Islamic periods. The assemblage is well-preserved but highly fragmented, indicating rapid burial followed by post-depositional disturbance. Taxonomic composition is dominated by sheep and goats, with lower frequencies of pigs and cattle, alongside chicken, fish and molluscs, reflecting patterns of everyday urban consumption. Caprine age-at-death profiles are skewed toward adults, suggesting herd management strategies that emphasized secondary products and herd maintenance rather than …

The Pottery From The Byzantine Street (Area S2), Jerusalem, Itamar Taxel

'Atiqot

The Byzantine street segment exposed in Area S2 revealed pottery dated primarily to the Byzantine and the beginning of Early Islamic period, including from well-stratified contexts; these finds are accompanied by a handful of Early and Late Roman period pottery types which should be treated as residuals of pre-Byzantine activity in the area. The Byzantine- and Early Islamic-period pottery illuminate the chronology of the street and some later nearby features, providing important new data on the development of the Byzantine building projects west and southwest of the Temple Mount. Based on the ceramic analysis, the Byzantine street was built somewhat …

Aspects Of Urban Planning In Bet She’An-Scythopolis: A View From Rhometalkes’ Alleys, Benjamin Y. Arubas, Leah Di Segni

'Atiqot

Intercity roads, colonnaded and drained streets, agoras and forums of the Roman and Late-Antiquity city of Bet She’an-Scythopolis—all have been widely studied, producing an ample bibliography. Not so are alleys, although they must have served various functions as thoroughfares for foot traffic or in relation to the buildings that overlooked them. These buildings could have been domestic, commercial or public, causing the function of the alley to surely change accordingly. This paper is dedicated to the study of two such alleys, which existed solely amidst public buildings, and whose story can be told based on the results of excavations and …

Roads To The Holy City: An Integrated Archaeological And Spatial Analysis Of Access Routes Leading To Jerusalemin The Second Century Bce–Seventh Century Ce, Yosef Spiezer, Boaz Zissu, Yehiel Zelinger

'Atiqot

This study presents a comprehensive analysis of Jerusalem’s transportation network by integrating archaeological evidence from rescue excavations with Geographic Information Systems (GIS)-based spatial analysis and literary sources. Three distinct development phases were observed. In the Hasmonean and Early Roman periods (63 BCE–70 CE), roads primarily served Jewish pilgrimage and were accompanied by religious infrastructure such as miqwa’ot (ritual baths), water reservoirs and elaborate tombs reflecting Jerusalem’s sacred status. In the Middle and Late Roman periods (70–324 CE) systematic road construction followed the Jewish revolts, emphasizing military and administrative functions through straight, paved routes marked with milestones, including forts, watchtowers, water …

Global Trends In Dietary Exposure To Polychlorinated Naphthalenes (Pcns): A Review Of Contamination Levels And Health Implications, Vhodaho Nevondo, Okechukwu Jonathan Okonkwo

Engineering and Technology Journal

Polychlorinated naphthalenes (PCNs) belong to a class of persistent organic pollutants that are structurally related to chlorinated dibenzo-p-dioxins, dibenzofurans, and other chlorinated biphenyls as a result of the presence of benzene rings in their respective structures. Additionally, they display high levels of persistence in the environment, bioaccumulative, and dioxin-like toxicities characteristics. Although the production and use of PCNs is either banned or greatly regulated in several countries around the globe, unintentional production in industrial thermal processes and legacy usage have resulted in the ubiquity of these compounds in the environment and the food chain. Several studies have shown various exposure …

Uc-135-129 Fishgame: Mobile Hyper-Casual Fishing Game, Lauren Rousell, Lisbeth Martinez, Jacob Portillo, Jacob Miller

C-Day Computing Showcase

fishGame is a strategy-driven hyper-casual mobile game that combines the accessibility of traditional mobile gameplay with the progression depth of a roguelike. The project was developed over a three-month period using Unity 6.3 and related production tools. Following the completion of an alpha build, testing was conducted through gameplay sessions and a detailed follow-up survey to gather feedback on player experience, clarity, and engagement. Results indicated that fishGame was well received, with players reporting low levels of confusion and strong replayability. These findings suggest a clear interest in mobile games that offer greater depth while preserving the immediacy and simplicity …

Uc-137-237 The House Watches, Lisbeth Martinez, Lauren Rousell, Jaime Mcbride, Karizma Quiroz, Aidan Kleine

C-Day Computing Showcase

The House Watches is a horror-puzzle game about a boy and a dog trying to reunite after mysterious supernatural creatures, called duendes, invade their home. The game consists of two levels, each with a different mode of gameplay; level one is a more traditional item-collection horror experience, and level 2 is based around puzzles that must be completed in a limited time frame. The House Watches includes original art, music, and models, as well as a dynamic gameplay system that increases the difficulty of each level over time.

Uc-115-161 Wayward Stray: Selix, Arly Tinoco, Tyler Ercole, Ivy Stansel, Austin Lothman, Jeremi Charland-Martin

C-Day Computing Showcase

Wayward Stray:Selix is a 3rd person platformer which places importance on exploration and discovery. Players will take the role of Selix as they explore an arid desert, fighting off enemies and discovering items hidden around the map, which reveal more about the game world and its characters. Selix, a young dragon, is exiled from the only home he’s known, forced into a strange land in search of a new place to call his own. Along the way, he finds a companion, a small dove that aids and guides his way. Exploring these uncharted areas, Selix discovers there’s more to the …

Grm-157-180 Precision Engineering: Using Ai To Design Nanoparticles That Target Malignant Cells, Rakshak Gurung, Nino Tkabladze

C-Day Computing Showcase

The challenge of predicting nanoparticle distribution remain a significant hurdle in nanomedicine. This research presents a computational framework for the inverse design of nanoparticles, utilizing ML models to optimize drug delivery systems for tumor targeting. By analyzing the relationship between nanoparticle compositions and biological accumulation, the model identifies optimal configurations to maximize therapeutic efficacy. The results demonstrate that AI-driven inverse design can significantly streamline the development of precision nanocarriers, reducing the need for exhaustive experimental trials.