Digital Commons Network^™

Univariate And Bivariate Binary Spatial Regression Models With Application To Plant Abundance Data, Amir Hamza Akash

Graduate Theses and Dissertations

Analyzing species distributions is of prime interest in ecological research. Prevalence of a species usually depends on several environmental and topographic features not all of which can be quantified or measured. Spatial random effects play an important role as a surrogate for missing features that can explain similarity in species prevalence patterns between neighboring locations. In this thesis, we focus on a dataset on abundance of plants in the southern part of South Africa. First, we build a hierarchical Bayesian model for binary regression, using the probit link, on presence/ absence of a species based on available covariates. Since the …

Physics-Informed Machine Learning For Predictive Digital Twins In Greenhouses, Hoang Kim Tran

Graduate Theses and Dissertations

Greenhouses are widely used to create controlled environments for crop production, where indoor climate variables such as air temperature, relative humidity, CO2 concentration, radiation, and soil or substrate conditions directly affect plant growth, yield, energy consumption, and resource use. However, greenhouse climates are highly dynamic because they are influenced by complex interactions among outdoor weather, greenhouse structure, crop transpiration, heating systems, ventilation, screens, fans, irrigation, and other actuators. Building digital twins for greenhouses provides a powerful way to represent, monitor, and predict these climate dynamics. A predictive digital twin can simulate future indoor climate states based on current greenhouse conditions, …

Localizing And Repairing Backdoor-Sensitive Layers In Pre-Trained Language Models For Secure Fine-Tuning, Sunanda Das

Graduate Theses and Dissertations

Task-agnostic backdoor attacks can contaminate pre-trained language models (PLMs) in a way that survives downstream adaptation, even under full fine-tuning, making it difficult for practitioners to trust third-party checkpoints. Existing defenses often rely on privileged assumptions (e.g., access to poisoned data or trigger/target knowledge), thereby limiting their applicability in realistic settings. We present DiSec (Disentanglement of potentially adversarial weights for Secure fine-tuning), a robust and label-efficient purification framework that uses only clean auxiliary text and does not rely on downstream supervision or attack signatures. DiSec elicits model-internal signals from this clean data to separate suspicious parameter components that are inconsistent …

There Is No Free Benchmark: An Institutional View Of Legal Ai Benchmarking, Neel Guha, Andy K. Zhang, Christine Tsang, Christopher D. Manning, Julian Nyarko, Daniel E. Ho

Faculty Scholarship

Despite substantial excitement around the use of AI in law, little information exists on the performance and associated risks of the domain’s widely marketed tools. Recent work, for instance, has demonstrated the significant potential for “hallucinations” — wherein models make up facts, law, and precedent — leading Chief Justice Roberts to spotlight this risk in his annual report on the judiciary. We argue that there is a need for public AI benchmarking in law. First, relative to other AI application domains, the legal AI ecosystem lacks legibility — there is little information about the design and performance of many commercial …

From Learner To Leader: Exploring Principals' Perspectives On Professional Learning, Development, And Mentoring, Eric William Kausch

Graduate Theses and Dissertations

This purpose of this qualitative study was to examine veteran secondary school principals’ engagement in professional learning, development, and mentoring for the improvement of their leadership skills. While previous literature provides insight into administrative preparation programs, mentoring of novice leaders, and succession planning for those advancing their careers, there are fewer studies that discuss enhancing experienced principals’ leadership development. The study was guided by three research questions: (1) How do principals describe their experiences participating in professional learning and development? (2) What types of leadership experiences do principals engage in to improve their leadership skills? and (3) How does engaging …

Investigating And Comparing Special Education Teachers’ Perceptions Of Workload Manageability And The Relationship With Attrition, Kasey Sanders

Graduate Theses and Dissertations

This study investigated special education teachers’ (SETs) perceptions of workload manageability and the relationship between these perceptions and intentions to quit. State-wide data from the Kansas State Department of Education showed a significant increase in the number of special education vacancies from a total of 161, or .03% in the 2019-2020 school year to 557, or 11%, in the 2024-2025 school year. Over the past four years, the number of special education teachers with a non-traditional license has increased from 312, or 6%, in the 2021-2022 school year to 427, or 8%, in the 2024-2025 school year (KSDE, 2025). Using …

Sigesn-Based Lasers On Silicon For Mid-Infrared Optoelectronics, Sudip Acharya

Graduate Theses and Dissertations

Germanium-tin (GeSn) alloys represent a significant advancement in semiconductor technology, particularly for applications in the short-wave and mid-infrared (SWIR and MIR) spectral ranges. As a group IV material system, these alloys offer a unique combination of tunable optoelectronic properties and full compatibility with established silicon-based manufacturing processes. The controlled incorporation of tin into germanium enables the engineering of a fundamental direct bandgap, a critical feature that distinguishes GeSn from its indirect bandgap materials, silicon and germanium. This direct bandgap behavior which was demonstrated in high-quality single crystalline GeSn alloys around the year 2015 is the foundation for efficient light emission …

The Role Of Speculators In The Agricultural Futures Market And Their Impact On Prices, Clement Asamoah

Graduate Theses and Dissertations

The study evaluates the impact of speculative activity on agricultural commodity returns, specifically in the corn, soybeans, rice, and oats markets. The study also analyzed the influence commodity returns have on speculative positions. Weekly data from the Commodity Futures Trading Commission were used as a proxy for speculative activity, and futures data were also retrieved from Barchart. Vector Autoregressive models and the Granger Causality tests were estimated to identify the relationships between returns and speculation. The paper found that speculative positions do not Granger-cause returns over the course of a week except for rice Tuesday results, which recorded a statistically …

Investigation Of Early To Late Cretaceous North American Ecosystems And Paleoclimate Using Geochemical Proxies, Clayton William Forster

Graduate Theses and Dissertations

The relationships between the environment and an organism can be traced through stable isotope and trace element geochemistry. This thesis explores the stable oxygen and carbon isotopic composition of fossil vertebrate assemblages in pursuit of revealing the relationships between dinosaurs and their archosaur relatives with the environment in which they lived during the Cretaceous. The Cretaceous Period of North America experienced some of the hottest intervals in the Phanerozoic Eon and the continental vertebrate taxa that existed during this time recorded these periods within the stable isotopic composition of their skeletal bioapatite. Oxygen isotopes in the bioapatite of vertebrates reflect …

Advancing Social Media Analytics And Personalized Generation Via Transfer Learning, Discourse-Aware Modeling, And Collaborative Modeling, Gibson Nkhata

Graduate Theses and Dissertations

Social media platforms have become central to information exchange, shaping public opinion across social, political, and economic domains. However, the massive volume of user-generated content, combined with its informal, nuanced, and often noisy nature, presents significant challenges for automated analysis and generation. Tasks such as stance detection, rumor verification, and personalized content generation are further complicated by sarcasm, evolving discourse structures, and diverse user preferences. Addressing these challenges requires models that can effectively leverage linguistic nuance, conversational dynamics, and collaborative user signals. Transfer learning has emerged as a powerful paradigm for improving performance in low-resource and complex language understanding tasks. …

Integrated Sensing And Communication For Uavs With Oddm Waveforms, Mohammad Abdul Mobin

Graduate Theses and Dissertations

A new delay-Doppler (DD) integrated sensing and communications (ISAC) framework is proposed for unmanned aerial vehicle (UAV) systems. In the DD-ISAC framework, both sensing and communications are performed by using the orthogonal delay Doppler division multiplexing (ODDM) waveforms, which unify sensing and communication designs through their unique properties, such as local bi-orthogonality and dual-resolution in the DD domain. Specifically, the dual-resolution property enables the generation of delay-Doppler map for accurate and low complexity sensing, and the bi-orthogonality minimizes interference for both sensing and communications. The ODDM waveforms are used in combination with the phase comparison monopulse technique and a scaled …

Towards Audio-Driven Photorealistic Avatars For Teleconsultation: A Development And Evaluation Framework Under Constrained Bandwidth Environments, Fnu Himanshu

Graduate Theses and Dissertations

Telehealth can improve access to healthcare services, especially for patients in rural and underserved areas. Many telehealth services use video communication to provide real-time interaction and a visible connection between patients and healthcare providers. However, video communication requires continuous transmission of audio and video data. When network conditions are limited or unreliable, audio and video interruptions can reduce communication quality. This thesis explores an audio-driven photorealistic avatar as a possible visual communication layer for teleconsultation without requiring continuous webcam video transmission. It develops two connected frameworks: the Audio-Driven Photorealistic Avatar Communication Framework and the Evaluation Framework. The Audio-Driven Photorealistic Avatar …

Draft Final 2023 Unreclaimed Sites Sampling: Ur-42 Site Evaluation Summary Report, Pioneer Technical Services, Inc.

Silver Bow Creek/Butte Area Superfund Site

No abstract provided.

Necessary Digital Competencies Of Preschool Teachers In Austria, Walter Fikisz

Journal of Global Education and Research

The aim of this paper is to identify specific digital competencies that preschool teachers require, compared with schoolteachers, to extend the Austrian digital competence model for teachers, digi.kompP. Methodologically, the study is based on interviews with Austrian experts in early childhood education, media pedagogy, computer science, and preschool teacher education. The expert interviews addressed the digital competencies required by preschool teachers, differences compared with schoolteachers, the timing and nature of competence development, and the institutions involved. As a result of this study, sixteen new can-do statements were developed for the expansion of the existing digi.kompP model, which maps the specific …

The Razorback Educator, Carole Shook Dr., Lynn Meade, Sheri Deaton, Faith Lessner, Karl Schubert, Gretchen Scroggins, Rachel Glade, Treisha Peterson, Flint Harris, Tamara Snyder, Kim Mccomas, Austin Jones, Eric Button

TFSC Publications and Presentations

The Razorback Educator is a joint publication of the University of Arkansas Teaching Academy and the Wally Cordes Teaching and Faculty Support Center.  It is designed to share teaching innovations related to the Scholarship of Teaching and Learning.  Faculty from multiple disciplines author the publication.

On The Side And Angle Mixtures Expressed By Triangles: Phase Diagrams Based On Intensive State Properties, Daniel Graham

Chemistry: Faculty Publications and Other Works

This is a lecture packet focused on the side and angle mixtures of structures at the center of the planar geometry universe. The intensive states of triangles are charted with the help of phase diagrams—long-standing tools in chemical thermodynamics and materials science. The intended audience consists of students and teachers—college and high school—seeking fresh perspectives, projects, and discussion topics surrounding age-old systems.

Improving Urban Search And Rescue Team Coordination Through Adaptive Context Awareness, Daniel Reyes Duran

Doctoral Dissertations and Master's Theses

Modern multi-agent Urban Search and Rescue (USAR) operations heavily rely on mobile geospatial Common Operating Pictures (COPs) to maintain team coordination and Situational Awareness (SA). However, the proliferation of high-frequency sensor telemetry at the tactical edge has introduced a data saturation paradox challenge: while information theoretically drives informed decision-making, unmanaged data surges induce increased operator cognitive overload and alert fatigue on mobile End-User Devices (EUDs), while downstream data-broadcasting models inherently strain edge processing and viewport environments.

To resolve these constraints, this dissertation presents a context-aware Value of Information (VoI) data-management framework integrated directly with a custom, event-driven Android Team Awareness …

Polarized Truth Decay & The Role Of Education In A Democracy, Sonja Varbelow, William Yaworsky

Anthropology Faculty Publications

The purpose of this paper is to delineate the causes and dangers of truth decay for a democracy, the role education has played in the process, and how education can present a resistance to this dangerous trend. Truth decay has been characterized as an increase in quantity of opinion over fact, divergent views on what constitutes a fact, and decreased confidence of traditional sources of information. We agree that truth decay is a serious problem but would characterize it somewhat differently. Opinions, divergent views, and decreased confidence in traditional sources of information are not detrimental by themselves. Instead, we see …

Highly Confident But Slightly Uncertain: A Long Overdue Reinvention Of The School Scientific Method, Uncertainty And Error - Volume 3, Stephen Demeo

Publications and Research

Volume 3 explores the essential roles of uncertainty and error in scientific experimentation. It distinguishes between scientific error and scientific uncertainty: Scientific error refers to the difference between an experimental value and an accepted literature value, as well as the difference between data points in an x-y scatter plot and a predicted trendline. Scientific uncertainty, on the other hand, is associated with doubt arising from instrument limitations, variability within a data set, and psychological factors. Human error is set apart as mistakes or blunders, not to be conflated with scientific error.

Of utmost importance to the scientific investigator is the …

Highly Confident But Slightly Uncertain: A Long Overdue Reinvention Of The School Scientific Method, The X - Volume 1, Stephen Demeo

Publications and Research

In Volume 1, I critique the traditional School Scientific Method—an oversimplified, underdeveloped, and short, stepwise process—and argue for a more authentic, detailed, and rigorous approach to experiment-based scientific inquiry in education. I briefly explain the historical roots of the School Scientific Method, its benefits in increasing the exposure of experimental science to the masses, and its limitations in fostering more authentic scientific thinking and experimental practice.

In place of this traditional and problematic method, I introduce a graphic organizer called sciXpsy to foster both big-picture and detailed scientific thinking. The heuristic combines scientific concepts and methodology with the psychology of …

Highly Confident But Slightly Uncertain: A Long Overdue Reinvention Of The School Scientific Method, Confidence - Volume 2, Stephen Demeo

Publications and Research

Focusing on the psychology of empirical science, Volume 2 is an in-depth exploration of how students can build confidence in scientific data. Central to the text are twelve Confidence Indicators, a comprehensive set of approachable strategies and methodologies that help investigators produce, evaluate, and argue for reliable and valid empirical data. They include:

Good (and Ethical) Laboratory Practices

Repetition

Peer Replication/Review

Secondary Tests

Comparisons with Standards

Plots and Patterns

Conceptual Support

External Data Sources

Precision

Accuracy

Checking Calculations

Redesign/What-If Ideas

This volume includes numerous school science experiments that demonstrate how these indicators are applied across a wide range of educational …

Book Review: Atlas Of Minerals And Igneous And Metamorphic Rocks In Thin-Section (2025) By Alessandro Da Mommio And Victoria Pease., Kenneth L. Brown

Geology and Environmental Geoscience Faculty Publications

"Optical mineralogy and petrography not only equip us with the skills necessary to address society’s growing need for rock and mineral resources but also awaken a deeper curiosity—inviting us into moments of discovery that change the way we understand these resources. From observing the vibrant and mesmerizing interference colors of a dunite thin section to examining the uniaxial interference figure of calcite, many of us can still recall the first time we peered through the oculars of a polarizing microscope. Atlas of Minerals and Igneous and Metamorphic Rocks in Thin-Section is an exceptional reference textbook, which nurtures that curiosity and …

A Systems Analysis Of Autonomous Uav Swarm Spraying For Precision Agriculture, Ryker Davis

Graduate Theses and Dissertations

The application of Unmanned Aerial Vehicles (UAVs) in civilian sectors, particularly for precision agriculture and targeted aerial spraying, has rapidly evolved from passive monitoring to advanced, autonomous, multi-agent coordination. While deploying UAV swarms offers a promising solution to the payload and battery endurance limitations of single drone operations, realizing field-scale coverage introduces significant logistical and safety challenges. To evaluate the trajectory and viability of swarms, this study synthesizes bibliometric trends, operational simulation, and safety reporting analysis. First, because physical testing of complex swarms poses financial and safety risks, we developed an agent-based and discrete event simulation to evaluate autonomous spraying …

Design And Modeling Of A Robotic Manipulator For Agricultural Explorations, Trent Thomas Powell

Graduate Theses and Dissertations

This thesis focuses on the modeling, design, and early testing of a spherical revolute revolute prismatic (RRP) robotic manipulator for probe based applications. The system is motivated by agricultural grain probing, where a probe is positioned over a truck bed and inserted into the grain to collect samples as trucks enter storage facilities, ports, hubs, or transfer points. A spherical RRP configuration is useful for this type of task because it provides a large accessible workspace while maintaining a relatively simple mechanical structure. A model based design approach is used to develop the system, beginning with forward and inverse kinematics …

Improved Pbs Algorithm For Multi-Agent Path Planning Based On Conflict Guidance And Punishment Mechanism, Jinbao Zhang, Jianlin Mao, Chengze Qian, Guimi Sun, Kaixin Tong

Journal of System Simulation

Abstract: To address the bottleneck in which the priority-based search (priority-based search, PBS) algorithm for multi-agent path planning easily falls into conflict loops and generates invalid node expansions in complex scenarios, an improved algorithm based on conflict guidance and a punishment mechanism (improved PBS multi-agent path finding algorithm based on conflict guidance and punishment mechanism, CGP-PBS) was proposed. A conflict-guided node expansion mechanism was constructed; in high-level search, it comprehensively evaluated path cost and the number of conflicts, preferentially expanded child nodes with high potential for conflict resolution, and delayed the expansion of high-conflict nodes, thereby effectively compressing the search …

A Proposed Typology Of Nos Empirical Research: Trends And Implications, Maryam Saberi, Noushin Nouri, William F. Mccomas

Teaching and Learning Faculty Publications

Nature of Science (NOS) is a vital school subject with extensive publication record including results from many empirical investigations. This project examined the range, nature, and trends in empirical NOS studies from six major science education research journals over a recent 25-year period with additional recent data. Using systematic literature review techniques (SLR) and subsequent qualitative methods, we developed a comprehensive typology of empirical NOS articles. Ten categories emerged: Teaching NOS to students; Teaching NOS to teachers; Teachers’ NOS classroom practices and knowledge transfer; NOS assessment development and application; Analyses of textbooks and science curricula; Relationships between NOS knowledge and …

Impartial Intelligence? Evidence Of Country-Label Sensitivity In Ai Financial Analysis, Fabio Motoki, Jedson Pinto

School of Accountancy Faculty Publications

This study examines whether large language models exhibit systematic country-contingent differential treatment in financial fraud detection. Analyzing 30,000 synthetic transactions with identical statistical properties across three country attributions (United States, Great Britain, and China), we find LLMs assign significantly higher fraud probabilities to Chinese-attributed transactions (36.2%) compared to Western countries (≈30–31%), resulting in accuracy disparities of 67% versus 74%. The gap remains stable across five independent experimental replications and persists when using Chinese language prompts, ruling out linguistic effects. Bias mitigation strategies, such as requiring explanations or explicit country neutrality instructions, reduce but fail to eliminate these disparities. Testing across …

Forecast: An Exhibition Inviting Slow Feeling Through Participation In Unstable Weather States, Jo Pollitt, Helena Grehan, Lilly Blue, Peggy Attkinson, Justine Dandy, Naomi Joy Godden, Leanda Mason, Renee Esther Newman, Alexa Taylor, Danielle Gilson

Research outputs 2022 to 2026

This paper presents a series of responses from Western Australian based artists and scholars from a range of disciplines including: meteorology, science, education, social work, psychology, art and performance studies, to a year-long exhibition titled Forecast in Gallery 09 at The Art Gallery of Western Australia (AGWA). Forecast is a collaboration between AGWA's Head of Learning and Creativity Research, Lilly Blue, Edith Cowan University's Centre for People, Place and Planet artist-scholar, Jo Pollitt, together with artists Dianne Jones and Eva Fernández. The exhibition invites audiences to contribute to two participatory works: Weather Patterns, a daily changing installation that makes room …

Why Are Western Australian Girls Less Motivated Than Boys To Study Senior Secondary Higher-Level Mathematics Courses? Relationships Between Gender, Prior Achievement, And Mathematics Course Aspirations, Jane Kirkham, Elaine Chapman

Research outputs 2022 to 2026

Secondary school students, and particularly girls, may avoid enrolling in higher-level mathematics courses despite having the competence to succeed in these courses. Understanding the reasons behind these choices is essential to addressing this concern. In this study, the teachers of Western Australian Year 10 students (n=886) nominated the mathematics course in which they believed each participating student could succeed in Year 11 with participants grouped into four achievement cohorts on this basis. Then each teacher course nomination was compared to participants’ own course selection with participants classified as either aspiring below or at/above their judged potential achievement level. We then …

Analysis Of Inhibitor Supply Control Systems To Prevent Hydrate Formation In A Low-Temperature Gas Separation Unit And A Method For Solving The Problem, Shakhzod Nurmuhammadovich Amirov Mr, Erkin Xxx Uljayev

Technical science and innovation

The article examines and analyzs patents, published scientific works, and currently used scientific and practical methods and devices for regulating the parameters of the low-temperature separation process in production. However, the conducted analysis showed that one of the main causes of hydrate formation in the device is the lack of continuous comprehensive control over parameters such as the pressure of the inhibitors supplied to the injectors at each stage and the moisture content of the total gas, i.e., the moisture content of the total gas at the system inlet, the gas temperature at the device outlet, and the pressure and …