Digital Commons Network^™

Applying Transfer Learning For Street-Scale Nuisance Flood Forecasting In Coastal-Urban Environments, Binata Roy, Jonathan L. Goodall, Diana Mcspadden, Chetan Kumar, Steven Goldenberg, Yidi Wang, Malachi Schram

Data Science Faculty Publications

An important challenge with Machine Learning (ML) is its transferability; that is, whether an ML model trained on one set of data can be applied to a second set of data without requiring full retraining of the model. Transfer Learning (TL) addresses this challenge by transferring knowledge learned in the source domain (the data it was trained on) to the target domain (a second set of data that is statistically different but related, which the model was not trained on). This study investigates the use of TL for street-scale nuisance flood forecasting by exploring whether an ML model trained for …

Fda After Loper Bright, Erika Lietzan

SMU Law Review

Loper Bright Enterprises v. Raimondo, which overruled the Chevron, U.S.A. v. Natural Resources Defense Council decision from 1984, tells us that a court should determine the meaning of all statutory provisions for itself, rather than deferring to the views of the federal agencies that implement those provisions. But the overruling of Chevron may have less of an impact on the U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA) than conventional wisdom supposes. Most challenges to FDA action do not concern its statutory interpretations. And the agency prevailed in most cases involving statutory interpretation before the Chevron doctrine took hold. After 1984, …

The Effects Of A Teacher-Led Coaching Intervention On Paraprofessionals’ Rates Of Behavior-Specific Praise In Secondary Special Education Classrooms, Melanie Urmilla Singh

PCOM Psychology Dissertations

The role of paraprofessionals in education is essential as they work alongside teachers to provide additional support to students within classrooms. Their responsibilities may differ based on the needs of the school, classroom, and student, paraprofessionals often play an important role in supporting students’ behavioral needs. While their roles being prevalent in education, paraprofessionals could benefit from additional training in evidence-based strategies, specifically when working with students with behavioral needs and the application of behavior-specific praise. Considering that teachers typically receive more formal training and work closely with paraprofessionals in the classroom, they are well positioned to provide training support …

Social Drivers Of Healthcare Access In Pediatric Autoimmune Disease: A U.S. Analysis (2022–2023), Kevin Okifo

Yale Medicine Thesis Digital Library

Background: Prior studies in adults have demonstrated that social drivers of health contribute to disparities in disease burden, management, and healthcare access among individuals with autoimmune disease (AD). There is emerging pediatric evidence suggesting similar patterns, but national-level data describing how social and structural factors shape healthcare access for children with AD remain limited. The aim of this study is to identify the sociodemographic and structural factors associated with healthcare access among children and adolescents with AD in the United States. Understanding these factors can support meaningful advances that will optimize patient-centered care and wraparound services for pediatric AD.Study Design: …

Health Communication Challenges In The Digital Era: Two Empirical Investigations, Neeraj Gautam Patel

Yale Medicine Thesis Digital Library

Background: The quality and availability of health information consumed by the general public have undergone dramatic changes in the 21st century with the rise of digitization and the internet. These include the growth of direct-to-consumer (DTC) advertising of prescription drugs on television and online media, changes in health content on traditional news media platforms, and the propagation of health misinformation and disinformation on social media and other websites. Understanding the nature and sources of these changes can inform efforts and interventions aimed at improving the general public’s understanding of health information. One area of interest within regulated health communication is …

Preoperative Patient Sentiment Is Associated With Postoperative Outcomes In Adult Spinal Deformity Surgery, Ross J. Gore, David Mazur-Hart, Mohan K. Sunkara, Aaqib Ali, Qizar Ali, Christopher J. Lynch, Christopher Ames

Center for Secure and Intelligent Critical Systems (CSICS) Publications

Study Design: Prospective observational pilot study of adult spinal deformity surgery patients.

Objective: To determine whether preoperative patient sentiment, quantified using a 21-class valence scale extending the CARP paradigm implemented through an offline Large Language Model, predicts postoperative outcomes.

Summary of Background Data: Predicting adult spinal deformity surgery outcomes remains challenging with traditional clinical and radiographic parameters alone. Although patient psychological factors and expectations significantly influence postoperative satisfaction and quality of life, systematic approaches to capture these factors are underdeveloped. Offline Large Language Models offer scalable, privacy-preserving psychological risk stratification.

Materials and Methods: We prospectively enrolled 18 patients undergoing adult …

Promoting The Use Of Smoke Evacuation Systems In The Operating Room: A Quality Improvement Initiative, Andrea Leigh Drayer

Graduate Theses, Dissertations, and Problem Reports (ETD)

Background: Surgical smoke produced during procedures poses serious health risks to operating

room (OR) staff and patients, yet many hospitals, including an academic medical center in

northern West Virginia, have underutilized smoke evacuation systems. The imminent

enforcement of West Virginia House Bill 4376, mandating smoke evacuation use, provided both

urgency and opportunity for an intervention.

Purpose: The purpose of this Doctor of Nursing Practice (DNP) quality improvement project

was to increase timely compliance with the use of smoke evacuation systems during all smoke-

producing procedures, ensuring alignment with safety standards and legislative requirements.

Methods: A systematic evidence review of academic …

Out-Group And In-Group Relational Trust In Group Coaching With First-Grade Teachers: A Single Case Study, Jentry S. Barrett, Rachel E. Schachter, Jungwon Eum, Gwen Nugent, Kathleen M. Rudasill

Department of Child, Youth, and Family Studies: Faculty Publications

Coaching has become a prominent professional learning tool for helping early childhood teachers (birth–8) implement curriculum and research-based practices in their classrooms. One coaching strategy that supports positive changes in teacher practice and child outcomes is building trust between the coach and teacher(s). However, there is limited understanding of the nature of trust-building in coaching, particularly in group coaching configurations. There are two types of trust to consider in the context of group coaching: out-group trust between an outside coach and the teachers, and in-group trust between the teachers experiencing coaching who already have a relationship. This case study aimed …

Towards Developing A Career Technology Fit Framework And Analyzing Its Influence On Work-Related Outcomes Among It Professionals, Gunjan Tomer

Journal of International Technology and Information Management

With growing attrition rate and significant demand for skilled IT professionals, the importance of studying their behaviour has become important for both academia and industry. Despite ample amount of research, there is still a gap between theory and practice. Based on our qualitative study conducted on Indian IT professionals we propose that technology allocation might contribute in understanding the behaviour of IT professionals. We found that IT professionals evaluate the technology allocated to them based on their individual career motives. This evaluation, either positive or negative, influences their job outcomes. Further, we explored the factors that make a technology preferable …

High Technology And The Developing State: The Arrival Of Supercomputers In India, Ramesh Subramanian

Journal of International Technology and Information Management

While India has made vast strides in information technology in the last few decades, its success is mainly attributed to its software, rather than its hardware sector. In fact, India’s attempts at developing computer hardware that can match international standards have largely been unsuccessful. A notable exception is its development of a series of supercomputers that match and exceed many international standards. This paper looks at an interesting period in India’s computing history – namely the 1980s and 1990s – focusing on its development of an indigenous supercomputer. During that period, supercomputers were thought to be the sole privy of …

Responsible People Analytics For Remote-Work Decisions: A Machine-Learning Benchmark For Classifying Perceived Productivity, Ruth Menjivar, Nima Molavi, Narges Mashhadi Nejad

Journal of International Technology and Information Management

This study examines whether employee-perception survey data can support responsible people-analytics decisions about remote-work productivity. Using the public New South Wales (NSW) Remote Working Survey 2021 (N=1,512), the study benchmarks statistical and machine-learning classifiers for self-reported perceived productivity classes (same, less, or more productive when working remotely relative to onsite work), not objective output, under default, class-weighted, and resampling protocols. Main evidence comes from 5×5 repeated stratified cross-validation using macro F1 and balanced accuracy with fixed model specifications. Class-balanced separability is modest. Random Forest, CatBoost, and LightGBM form a leading cluster with overlapping confidence intervals (macro F1 ≈0.51–0.52). Affective/well-being items, …

The Value Of Personal Data Ecosystems: A Flemish Media Sector Case Study, Maarten De Mildt, Melanie Verstraete, Sofie Verbrugge, Didier Colle

Journal of International Technology and Information Management

Personal Data Stores (PDSs) have been proposed as a privacy-preserving approach to data sharing that increases individual control over personal data while enabling new forms of cross-organizational collaboration. This collaboration leads to the emergence of Personal Data Ecosystems (PDEs). Despite growing interest in PDEs, limited research has examined how the organizational and economic barriers identified in prior studies manifest in practice. This paper investigates these challenges through a case study of the Flemish media sector within the Solid4Media project, which explores the use of PDSs to support data sharing and personalization across media organizations. Using a qualitative research design, data …

Slm With Swarm Intelligence For Efficient Representation Of Medical Claims, Mohamed Ahmed Abo El-Enen, Ravi S. Sharma, Mustafa Abdulrazek, Amril Nazir, Reem Muhammad, Ahmed Talat Sahlol

All Works

Healthcare industry faces significant challenges due to fraudulent medical insurance claims, which result in substantial financial losses. We propose an automated system using domain-specific Small Language Models (SLMs) with a narrower scope and smaller parameter count than general-purpose Large Language Models (LLMs), combined with optimization algorithms to improve fraud detection. Our approach integrates numerical features, such as age and claim amount, with textual descriptions, including diagnoses and procedures, into a unified textual representation for each medical activity. This representation captures complex patterns, enhancing the model’s predictive ability. SLMs fine-tuned on medical corpora transform these textual inputs into fixed-dimensional numerical embeddings, …

Optimized Hybrid Beamforming For Ris-Assisted Multi-User Mimo In 6g Mmwave Networks: A Low-Complexity Approach To Spectral Efficiency And Interference Mitigation, Safiya Nasser Al-Jaradi, Mohammad Kamrul Hasan, Nabeel Al-Qirim, Shayla Islam, Thippa Reddy Gadekallu, Hana Mujlid, Hashim Elshafie, Rashid A. Saeed

All Works

The joint optimization of hybrid beamforming and reconfigurable intelligent surface (RIS) phase shifts in multi-user millimeter-wave (mmWave) MIMO systems is a challenging problem, mainly due to high computational complexity and the lack of adaptive interference management. Existing approaches typically rely on fixed Zero-Forcing (ZF) or Maximum-Ratio Transmission (MRT) designs or require iterative optimization with high overhead, limiting their practical use in dense 6G environments. To overcome these challenges, this research proposes a RIS-Aided Adaptive Zero-Forcing and Maximum-Ratio Transmission Hybrid Precoding (RA-ZMHP) framework for 6G mmWave multi-user MIMO systems. The main novelty of the method lies in an adaptive ZF–MRT mixing …

Edge-Aware Ris-Assisted Dynamic Channel Allocation With Lightweight Llm Decision Agent For Interference Mitigation In Low-Altitude Remote Sensing Networks, Safiya Nasser Al-Jaradi, Mohammad Kamrul Hasan, Nabeel Al-Qirim, Shayla Islam, Muhammad Attique Khan, Rashid A. Saeed, Hashim Elshafie, Bishwajeet Kumar Pandey, Khairul Akram Zainol Ariffin

All Works

Low-altitude remote sensing networks are increasingly important for applications, such as environmental monitoring, disaster response, infrastructure inspection, and real-time sensing services. However, when many sensing nodes share limited spectrum resources, severe cochannel interference can degrade communication reliability and delay sensing-data delivery. This challenge becomes more critical in edge-enabled deployments, where control decisions must be made under strict latency, memory, and computational constraints. To address this issue, this article proposes a large language model (LLM)-enhanced edge-aware lightweight reconfigurable intelligent surface (RIS)-assisted dynamic channel allocation (EL-RIS-DCA) framework for interference mitigation in dense low-altitude remote sensing networks. The novelty of the proposed framework …

Lightweight Tinyml-Enhanced Task Offloading In Vanets For Next-Generation Intelligent Transportation Systems, Muhammad Ali, Tariq Qayyum, Asadullah Tariq, Zouheir Trabelsi, Irfan Ud Din, Shabir Ahmed

All Works

Vehicular Ad Hoc Networks (VANETs) face resource constraints, high node mobility, and stringent latency requirements, especially in safety-critical applications such as collision avoidance, path planning, and emergency braking. Task offloading to nearby vehicles or Roadside Units (RSUs) mitigates local computational limits, but dynamic conditions, unreliable nodes, and rapid topology changes complicate dependable node selection. This paper proposes a Tiny Machine Learning (TinyML)-enhanced, credibility-based task offloading framework for real-time decision-making in vehicular networks. RSUs evaluate vehicle reliability through a three-component Credibility Assessment Module: a Task Assignment Component that distributes lightweight test tasks and filters unreliable nodes via TinyML inference; a Verification …

Aoi-Aware Agentic Federated Mixture-Of-Digital-Twin Experts For 6g Vehicular Edge Intelligence, Asadullah Tariq, Mohamed Adel Serhani, Ikbal Taleb, Shayma Alkobaisi, Tariq Qayyum, Irfan Ud Din

All Works

Digital twin-enabled vehicular edge intelligence is expected to become a fundamental service paradigm for sixth-generation (6G) intelligent transportation systems. However, the performance of such systems depends not only on model accuracy, but also on the freshness of digital twin states, timeliness of inference, privacy-preserving model training, and efficient use of heterogeneous edge resources. Existing DT-assisted federated learning and edge mixture-of-experts solutions optimize digital twin synchronization, distributed learning, and sparse inference largely independently, without allowing digital twin states to actively govern expert specialization, expert refreshing, and distributed orchestration. Nevertheless, the joint problem of how digital twins should guide federated expert specialization, …

Kidney Dysfunction, Biochemical Changes, Dna Alteration, And Mapks Regulation Following Chronic Exposure To Regular And Occasional Hookah Smoke In Mice, Naserddine Hamadi, Anas Nemmar, Sumaya Beegam, Nur Elena Zaaba, Ozaz Elzaki, Abderrahim Nemmar

All Works

Regular hookah smoking (Reg-HS) has become a major global public health issue, linked to significant health risks, including kidney damage. A less frequent pattern of use, known as occasional hookah smoking (Occ-HS), is also common; however, there has been little progress in understanding the direct impact of Occ-HS on kidneys. To investigate how varying frequencies of HS inhalation affect the kidney, we exposed mice to nose-only HS under two regimens, occasional (30 min once weekly) and regular (30 min five times per week) for a duration of 6 months. This study explored the impact on renal damage, inflammatory responses, oxidative …

Integrative Machine Learning Of Genetic And Lifestyle Factors For Personalized Skin Health, Yassine Benachour, Lina Maloukh, Barbara Geusens

All Works

Objective: To develop an AI framework that combines genetic, phenotypic, and lifestyle data for profiling skin-health patterns and generating hypothesis-supporting summaries for potential decision support. Methods and procedures: A dataset of 5,254 individuals integrates six genes (FLG, AQP3, MMP-1, MMP-3, SOD2, GPX), six phenotype severities, and 20+ lifestyle factors. Mutation burden and interactions are tested by ANOVA. K-modes clustering identifies four interpretable dermatological profiles within the cohort and is embedded in leakage-free nested cross-validation (train-only selection; test labels from training centroids). Subtypes are predicted from genetics plus lifestyle using an XGBoost (XGB) classifier; explainability uses gain, permutation importance, and SHAP …

Cyber Behaviors And Well-Being In Emerging Adults: Patterns, Determinants, And Gender Differences, Areej Elsayary, Juan Calmaestra, Mercedes Gómez-López

All Works

Technological advances have reshaped the ways in which young people interact, giving rise to a complex digital landscape with implications for their well-being. Despite the growing body of research on cyber behaviors, their potential for both positive and negative well-being outcomes is not yet fully understood, nor is the role of gender in shaping these relationships. The present study aimed to explore the relationship between online moral disengagement, problematic internet use, online disinhibition, and cyberbullying dimensions and emotional, social, and psychological well-being among 671 emerging adults, as well as to examine the potential moderator role of gender. The results revealed …

Human Factors In Visual Attention: Gender Differences In Engagement With Male-Oriented Ads, Mohamed Basel Almourad, Emad Bataineh, Zelal Wattar, Mohammed Hussain

All Works

In today's competitive market, it is increasingly important to understand how visual design shapes customer behaviour. This study examines the decision drivers influencing female customers' purchase choices when buying male-oriented products as gifts, identifying the visual components of advertisements that attract them by analysing the relationship between purchase intention and visual attention. Results show that participants with higher purchase intent focused more on product imagery and branding, indicating that visual appeal, perceived quality, and brand familiarity significantly guide their decisions, with brand awareness speeding up decision-making by reducing the need for repeated visual checks. Conversely, those with low purchase intent …

Mapping Multiclass-Targeted Hate Speech In Online Discourse: An Open Dataset, Sanaa Kaddoura, Sumaia Al-Kohlani

All Works

Online social networks have become central spaces for public discourse, where hostile and discriminatory language toward social groups can cause psychological and social consequences for marginalized communities. Although multiple public hate speech datasets are available, many rely on binary categorization practices that obscure linguistic, cultural, and contextual variation across targeted groups. As a result, minority and less visible forms of hate speech remain insufficiently documented and analyzed. This discussion paper examines methodological limitations in existing hate speech annotation schemes and presents a re-annotation framework applied to the HatEval2019 dataset. The proposed framework introduces target-specific multiclass labels that distinguish subcategories of …

Epistemic Edge: Subjective Logic Guardrails For Llm-Driven Iot Actuation, Muntaser Syed, Marius Silaghi

Electrical Engineering and Computer Science Student Publications

Deploying large language models (LLMs) as decision-making agents in safety-critical Internet of Things (IoT) systems introduces risks that purely behavioral guardrails, such as action whitelists, cannot fully address. This paper presents Epistemic Edge, a four-tier neuro-symbolic pipeline that augments LLM-driven actuation with subjective logic (SL) uncertainty quantification, temporal decay, and dual guardrails combining epistemic threshold checks with behavioral whitelists. We evaluate seven locally-deployed models: three PrismML Bonsai 1-bit models (1.7B, 4B, 8B), three 4-bit quantized models (Qwen3-8B, Llama 3.2-3B, Phi-3.5-mini), and the DeepSeek-R18B reasoning model, across eight ablation conditions and five IoT actuation scenarios (2,800 controlled trials). We further validate …

Real-Time Neck Posture Classification Using A Lightweight Wearable Imu Pendant, Muntaser Syed, Alfred Sjöqvist, Noah Sedlik, Tsing Liu

Electrical Engineering and Computer Science Student Publications

Poor neck posture during prolonged device use contributes to musculoskeletal disorders affecting millions worldwide. Existing posture monitoring solutions rely on camera-based systems or complex multi-sensor arrays, limiting their practicality for continuous daily use. We present a lightweight, chest-worn pendant using a single 6-axis IMU (accelerometer and gyroscope) for real-time classification of seven neck posture states: neutral, mild flexion, moderate flexion, severe flexion, extension, lateral tilt, and lying. Our approach employs an ensemble architecture combining bidirectional LSTM, Transformer encoder, and 1D-CNN models with learnable fusion weights. To address limited training data, we apply aggressive data augmentation (30x multiplication) including noise injection, …

Does My Job Love Me? - A Story Of Transforming While Investigating Newly Qualified Teachers’ Knowledge Of And Practices In Early Reading., Ali Beaman

School of Law, Humanities and Social Sciences Theses

For nearly 50 years, a vast amount of evidence shows that a Phonological Awareness (PA) deficit is a primary risk factor for reading difficulties (Wagner and Torgesen, 1978 and Kilpatrick, 2012, 2016, 2019). The initial aim of my research in early 2019 was to investigate, over a period of a year, Newly Qualified Teachers’ (NQTs’) knowledge of and practices in early reading, with a specific focus on NQTs' knowledge and understanding of PA. Policy for Education in England requires all teachers to show effective early reading education (Rose, 2009 and Department for Education and Employment, 1998a). According to the Teachers’ …

Improving Primary Initial Teacher Training (Itt) Trainees’ Confidence In Mathematics Teaching, Pinar Gumus

School of Law, Humanities and Social Sciences Theses

This research aimed to investigate how primary ITT trainees’ confidence in teaching mathematics could be improved through the curriculum coherence approach. A convergent mixed-method case study design was employed, collecting both quantitative and qualitative data from undergraduate trainees over three years via questionnaires. University mathematics tutors and selected school-based mentors were also interviewed using a semi-structured format.Following the analysis of the first year’s questionnaires, a new mathematics curriculum was designed for the second year of the study. As required by DfE and Ofsted, teaching plans and resources incorporated conceptual mathematics techniques, theory-practice links, and the Core Content Framework (CCF). The …

Legal Semiotics, Political Ontology, & Merging Chronotopes Of Identity Through The Federation Of Aboriginal Nations Of The Americas, Kevin T. Inglesby

Graduate Student Theses, Dissertations, & Professional Papers

This dissertation studies the concept of self-determination related to a confederation known as the Federation of Aboriginal Nations of the Americas. It addresses three main questions: How does FANA represent an institution of legal cooperation? In what ways does cultural capital become reproduced? And what are key principles for the Federations’ code of unity? Self-determination is a core principle of international law and may be identified through treaties and social conventions like Wunnandry. The study explores an interdisciplinary approach to American Indian selfdetermination through a focus on applied anthropology, cultural heritage, and Peircean legal semiotics to problematize some historical approaches …

Archaeology Of Yellowstone's Cascade Corner: Findings And Diet Breadth Modeling, William Brent Powell

Graduate Student Theses, Dissertations, & Professional Papers

In the summer of 2025, archaeologists from the University of Montana conducted a pedestrian survey through the southwest corner of Yellowstone National Park to take inventory of cultural resources. Over nearly 50 miles of trail survey, the team identified and recorded 17 new archaeological sites, mostly consisting of sparse lithic scatters on the surface. The findings indicate recurrent use of the Bechler area since the Paleoindian period. This thesis aims to provide a comprehensive and detailed report on those findings, followed by an interpretation of the data through the lens of optimal foraging theory and diet breadth modeling. The first …

What Really Matters In Behavioral Cough Suppression Therapy? A Retrospective Look At Targeted Treatment Components, Mary B. Walsh, Laurie Slovarp, Kassidi Heinle, John Quindry, Jane Salois

Graduate Student Theses, Dissertations, & Professional Papers

Background: 
Refractory chronic cough (RCC) is a prevalent condition that substantially impairs quality of life and is associated with significant physical, psychological, and social burden. Behavioral cough suppression therapy (BCST), delivered by speech-language pathologists, is an evidence-based nonpharmacologic intervention shown to improve cough-related quality of life. However, variability exists in how BCST is implemented, and the relative contribution of specific treatment components remains unclear.

Objective: 
To evaluate the effectiveness of a BCST program implemented in a community otolaryngology clinic that emphasizes consistent suppression at the urge-to-cough and neuroplasticity-informed behavioral principles.

Methods: 
This observational retrospective case series examined clinical records of …

The Birth Of Afghanistan: From Ancient Persia To A Modern-Day Multiethnic And Linguistic Country, Tyler A. Worm

Graduate Student Theses, Dissertations, & Professional Papers

This thesis offers a comprehensive historical analysis of the formation and evolution of Afghan identity from antiquity through the early medieval period, emphasizing the region’s role as a dynamic crossroads of civilizations. It traces the origins of Afghan populations to Indo-Iranian pastoralist migrations and examines the successive influence of major imperial formations, including the Median and Achaemenid Persian empires, the conquests of Alexander and the Seleucid period, and the rise of the Kushan, Parthian, and Sasanian states. Through this longue durée approach, the study demonstrates how Afghanistan’s geographic position facilitated continuous cultural interaction, economic exchange, and political contestation, producing a …