Digital Commons Network^™

Invasion Dynamics Of The European Collared-Dove In North America Are Explained By Combined Effects Of Habitat And Climate, Yiran Shao, Danielle Ethier, Simon Bonner

Statistical and Actuarial Sciences Publications

Global biodiversity is increasingly threatened by the spread of invasive species. Understanding the mechanisms influencing the initial colonization and persistence of invaders is therefore needed if conservation actions are to prevent new invasions or strive to slow their spread. The Eurasian Collared-Dove (Streptopelia decaocto, EUCO) is one of the most successful avian invasive species in North America; however, to our knowledge, no study has simultaneously examined the role that climate-matching, human activity, directional propagation, and local density have in this invasion process. Our research expands upon a cellular-automata-based hierarchical model developed to assess directional invasion dynamics to further quantify the …

Solar Cells, Lambert W And The Logwright Functions, Prabhat Lankireddy, Sibibalan Jeevanandam, Aditya Chaudhary, P. C. Deshmukh, Ken Roberts, S. R. Valluri

Physics and Astronomy Publications

Algorithms that calculate the current-voltage (I-V) characteristics of a solar cell play an important role in processes that aim to improve the efficiency of a solar cell. I-V characteristics can be obtained from different models used to represent the solar cell, and the single diode model is a simple yet accurate model for common field implementations. However, the I-V characteristics are obtained by solving implicit equations, which involve repeated iterations and inherent errors associated with numerical methods used. Some methods use the Lambert W function to get an exact explicit formula, but often causes numerical overflow problems. The present work …

Modelling Of Covid-19 Using Fractional Differential Equations, Rishi Patel, P. Sainani, M. Brar, R. Patel, X. Li, J. Drozd, F. A. Chishtie, A. Benterki, T. C. Scott, S. R. Valluri

Physics and Astronomy Publications

In this work, we have described the mathematical modeling of COVID-19 transmission using fractional differential equations. The mathematical modeling of infectious disease goes back to the 1760s when the famous mathematician Daniel Bernoulli used an elementary version of compartmental modeling to find the effectiveness of deliberate smallpox inoculation on life expectancy. We have used the well-known SIR (Susceptible, Infected and Recovered) model of Kermack & McKendrick to extend the analysis further by including exposure, quarantining, insusceptibility and deaths in a SEIQRDP model. Further, we have generalized this model by using the solutions of Fractional Differential Equations to test the accuracy …

The Role Of R-Modes In Pulsar Spindown, Pulsar Timing And Gravitational Waves, Varenya Upadhyaya, Xiyuan Li, Xiyang Zhang, S. R. Valluri

Physics and Astronomy Publications

Pulsars are fast spinning neutron stars that lose their rotational energy via various processes such as gravitational and magnetic radiation, particle acceleration and mass loss processes. This dissipation can be quantified by a spin-down equation that measures the rate of change of the frequency as a function of the rotational frequency itself. We explore the pulsar spin-down and consider the spin-down equation upto the seventh order in frequency. This seventh order term accounts for energy loss due to the gravitational radiation caused by a current type quadrupole in the pulsar due to r-modes. We derive the rotational frequency due to …

Suitup: Addressing Employee Retention, Satisfaction, And Scaling, Melia Furst, Lauren Jones, Ananya Pagadala

Miller Center Fellowship

This research paper delves into the complex dynamics of employee retention and company growth within the context of SuitUp, a social enterprise (SE) focused on innovative virtual and in-person business competitions, providing coaching and mentorship. Utilizing a mixed-method approach, including surveys, interviews, and participant observation, our study addresses key questions related to employee retention, opportunities for support, and the broader implications for work-life balance in remote settings. The study identifies the critical role of passion among SuitUp employees, emphasizing the need for clear growth opportunities and a well-established work-life balance for sustained engagement. Drawing on the organization's mission and context, …

Future Of Great Salt Lake Survey, Lisa W. Welsh, Joanna Endter-Wada, Karin M. Kettenring, Anna Mcentire

Reports

The Future of Great Salt Lake Survey was conducted in fall 2022 when state and global attention on Great Salt Lake was ramping up, following record lows of the elevation of lake water levels. In the survey, we asked Utahns their opinions on securing water for Great Salt Lake and focused on strategies that individuals, local communities, and the state of Utah could pursue. When it comes to how water is used and managed in Utah, there are multiple actors and institutions who all make decisions and have authority or ability to take different actions. While the state of …

Approximations Of Practice And Equity: Surveying The Spaces, Bima Sapkota, Carrie Lee, Liza Bondurant, Heather Howell

CoE Publications

No abstract provided.

The Artificially Intelligent Trolley Problem: Understanding Our Criminal Law Gaps In A Robot Driven World, Jake Feiler

UC Law Science and Technology Journal

Not only is Artificial Intelligence (AI) present everywhere in people’s lives, but the technology is also now capable of making unpredictable decisions in novel situations. AI poses issues for the United States’ traditional criminal law system because this system emphasizes mens rea’s importance in determining criminal liability. When AI makes unpredictable decisions that lead to crimes, it will be impractical to determine what mens rea to ascribe to the human agents associated with the technology, such as AI’s creators, owners, and users. To solve this issue, the United States’ legal system must hold AI’s creators, owners, and users strictly liable …

I3@Usd Fall 2023, University Of San Diego

I3@USD: Magazine for Shiley-Marcos School of Engineering

02 | Not Your Average Engineer

04 | Beyond Ones and Zeros

05 | Advancing Mutual Interests

06 | Darkness Turns to Light

07 | Honoring Sam Burt

08 | Memories. Milestones. Marvels.

14 | A Long Way From Home

15 | News Briefs

16 | Faculty Achievements

18 | Alumni Notes

22 | Showcase Innovators

23 | Career Outcomes

24 | Class of 2023

Utilizing The Classical Christian Study Of Latin To Promote Intentionality, Erin Lamont

Master of Arts in Classical Studies

It is well known that the study of Latin increases English vocabulary, helps one understand grammar, raises standardized test scores, and helps one learn other languages. As modern education sees itself as an agent for change and social reform set on reconstructing society, fewer schools are offering Latin to students. Of those that do offer it, many are veering away from the traditional approach which has a goal of being able to read and connect with the writing of the great thinkers of the past while utilizing a methodology that focuses on grammar and syntax. This paper looks at three …

Math And The Moon Activity Plan, Admin Stem For Success

STEM for Success Showcase

No abstract provided.

Basic Math Terms And Properties, Admin Stem For Success

STEM for Success Showcase

Basic Math Terms

In a math equation or sentence, the operator identifies the action taken. The equal sign shows the relationship that the expressions on the two sides are equal in value.

Arithmetic And Geometric Series, Admin Stem For Success

STEM for Success Showcase

Math:

-Introducing the concept of arithmetic and geometric series/discussing the differences

-Multiplying, adding, dividing, subtracting, exponents

Monty Hall, Admin Stem For Success

STEM for Success Showcase

No abstract provided.

Chemistry And Public Policy: Equipping Advocates, Herbert R. Fynewever, I. Bos, C. Demlow, G. Fulkerson

Summer Research

No abstract provided.

Impact Of The Flexibility Of A Hydroxy Group Of Coumarins To Its Quantum Yield, Yejin Chung, Mark Muyskens

Summer Research

Coumarin is an organic, bioactive (anti-tumor, antioxidant) molecule that has a structure of a bicyclic benzene and pyrone ring. The monohydroxy-substituted coumarins only differ in the location of hydroxy group location but carry radically different photophysical properties such as wavelength of absorption, excitation, emission, and quantum yield.

The hydroxy groups in coumarins have different flexibility in rotating based on their locations. Ranked by quantum yield: 7-hydroxycoumarin (7HC) > 6HC> 5HC > 8HC. The flexibility of coumarins were studied in relation to the quantum yield.

Towards Full Authorship With Ai: An Interactive User Interface For Supporting Revision, Kenneth C. Arnold, Edom Maru, Jiho Kim, Noelle Haviland, Ray Flanagan, Saron Melesse, Souad Yakubu, Zeai Sun

Summer Research

Recent breakthroughs in large language models (LLMs) have led to the development of tools like ChatGPT and Bing Chat, which can produce texts comparable to those written by competent writers. The affordances of these tools encourage users to offload large parts of their thinking and writing onto the LLM. But in doing so, users surrender autonomy and authorship over their writing. Could LLMs instead encourage writers to reflect on texts that they wrote themselves? Could these reflections lead them to make meaningful revisions to their texts? Our goal is to provide writers with a tool that promotes reflection and encourages …

Finutyper: Design And Validation Of An Automated Deep Learning-Based Platform For Simultaneous Fiber And Nucleus Type Analysis In Human Skeletal Muscle, August Lundquist, Enikő Lázár, Nan S. Han, Eric B. Emanuelsson, Stefan M. Reitzner, Mark A. Chapman, Vera Shirkova, Kanar Alkass, Henrik Druid, Susanne Petri, Carl J. Sundberg, Olaf Bergmann

School of Engineering: Faculty Scholarship

Aim While manual quantification is still considered the gold standard for skeletal muscle histological analysis, it is time-consuming and prone to investigator bias. To address this challenge, we assembled an automated image analysis pipeline, FiNuTyper (Fiber and Nucleus Typer). Methods We integrated recently developed deep learning-based image segmentation methods, optimized for unbiased evaluation of fresh and postmortem human skeletal muscle, and utilized SERCA1 and SERCA2 as type-specific myonucleus and myofiber markers after validating them against the traditional use of MyHC isoforms. Results Parameters including cross-sectional area, myonuclei per fiber, myonuclear domain, central myonuclei per fiber, and grouped myofiber ratio were …

What’S The Purpose?: A Mixed-Methods Exploration Of Purposes For Reading In Secondary Classrooms, Dianna Townsend, Hannah Carter, Rachel Knecht

Literacy, Language and Culture Faculty Publications and Presentations

Supporting the wide range of readers in secondary disciplinary classrooms can involve a number of helpful scaffolds and instructional routines, and the role of reading purpose may be particularly important. Research suggests that reading purposes impact reading processes and outcomes, and also that disciplinary experts have discipline-specific purposes for reading. In this qualitative-dominant, mixed-methods study, five high school classrooms were studied to explore what kind of purposes teachers establish for reading in the disciplines and how students perceive those reading purposes. Teachers’ (n = 7) reading purposes and related instruction were explored via observations and interviews, and high school …

The Effect Of A Self-Regulated Intervention On Vocabulary Knowledge And Self-Regulated Learning Skills For English Language Learners, Qizhen Deng, Guy Trainin

Literacy, Language and Culture Faculty Publications and Presentations

English language learners (ELLs) lack academic vocabulary knowledge, an essential component that explains much of the persistent achievement gap between students who start schools as ELLs and their monolingual peers. This single-subject experimental design study addressed this issue by focusing on self-regulated vocabulary learning that helps ELLs become effective and independent word learners. Nine upper elementary ELLs participated in an intervention for 16 sessions, with about 35 minutes per session. The intervention included the instruction of task-specific cognitive strategies (i.e., morphological and contextual analyses) and metacognitive strategies (i.e., goal-setting and monitoring) in authentic reading texts in social studies. Results indicated …

Rural Education In Peru: A Study Of Its Performance, Physical And Digital Infrastructure, Gender, Linguistic, And Social And Cultural Development, Mohammed Forero Bucheli

Master of Liberal Studies Theses

Rural and indigenous education in Peru significantly differs from its urban counterparts. The physical and digital infrastructure, gender-based education, linguistic neglect, and sociocultural discrimination that rural and indigenous communities’ education receive profoundly affect performance. This thesis aims to showcase these characteristics through case studies, comparing different government and community projects to understand their development in these areas. These cases explore different aspects of the educational situation of the Huallatiri, San Antonio de Cusicancha, and Quispicanchi communities in the Southern Peruvian Andes. Through these analyses, this study portrays the intersectional characteristics of educational development in rural and indigenous communities and how …

Historical And Future Projections Of Supercell Precipitation Contributions To The Hydroclimate Of The United States, Aaron Zeeb

Graduate Research Theses & Dissertations

Rotating storms, or supercells, are frequent producers of significant tornadoes, hail, and nontornadic winds and an underappreciated genitor of extreme precipitation rates and flash floods. Little research has examined the precipitation contributions from supercells to the overall hydroclimate of the CONUS and, provided that these storms and their precipitation rates may shift in the future due to climate change, it is important to understand their characteristics from both historical and future perspectives. This research seeks to understand supercell precipitation characteristics across the CONUS using high-resolution, convection-permitting, dynamical-downscaled simulations for three, 15-year epochs. Epochs include a historical end-of-20th-century period (1990–2005) and …

Correlation And Balance Functions Of Identified Hadron Pairs In Au+Au Collisions At Rhic, Launa Di Carlo

Wayne State University Dissertations

Heavy-ion collisions are used to study the properties of the Quark Gluon Plasma (QGP), a hot and dense strongly-interacting system of deconfined quarks and gluons. Such systems can be formed in collisions of 197Au nuclei at the RHIC facility. Correlation and balance functions will be used to study these collisions. The correlation functions provide information on reaction mechanisms and the balance functions indicate the conditional probability that a pair of particle species was locally produced together during the collision. The correlation and balance functions of the full 3×3 matrix of (π, K, p)x(π, K, p) species pairs versus the relative …

A Theoretical Framework For 3+1d Dynamics Of Relativistic Heavy-Ion Collisions, Sahr Alzhrani

Wayne State University Dissertations

The primary goal is to enhance a theoretical tool for studying 3D dynamics in relativistic heavy-ion collisions. We aim to explore the effects of stochastic fluctuations within these systems as part of the Beam Energy Scan program at the Relativistic Heavy-Ion Collider. Our approach involves constructing 3D initial conditions using minimal model parameters based on Glauber collision geometry, energy, and momentum conservation principles. We validate the model by comparing its predictions on particle rapidity distributions and anisotropic flow coefficients in specific collision scenarios. Model parameters are calibrated by comparing predictions to observed data from central Au+Au collisions. Additionally, we extend …

Optimal Spatial Design Of Groundwater Level Monitoring Networks Using Machine Learning Methods, Sadaf Teimoori

Wayne State University Dissertations

Groundwater plays a crucial role in sustaining ecosystems, providing drinking water, and supporting various industrial activities. As water scarcity becomes an increasingly pressing global issue, accurate groundwater level monitoring is essential for effective resource management and environmental protection. The study introduces a comprehensive methodology that integrates groundwater flow modeling, stochastic simulations, and ML algorithms to design efficient Groundwater Level Monitoring Networks (GLMNs) in regions with limited groundwater observation data. Two primary ML algorithms, K-means clustering and Relevance Vector Machine (RVM), are used to select and position observation wells strategically. The research addresses the challenge of minimizing data uncertainties and determining …

Building A Mathematics Intervention Program: One District’S Journey, Karise Mace, Karen Austin, Jodi Kirstein

Education Faculty Research

No abstract provided.

Does Genre Matter When Reading To Your Child?, Charles Baldwin

NERA Conference Proceedings 2023

This review asks if research from 2014 and afterwards indicates that narratives dominate early childhood libraries and shared book reading. It further asks if varied genres positively impact children's (1) content area knowledge and vocabulary, (2) language skills, (3) knowledge about informational text structures and text features, and (4) reading interest and engagement. The review used ERIC and APA PsycINFO in a combined search. The search terms were “Informational Text*” or “Text Structure*” or “Literary Genre*” or “Disciplinary Literac*” or “Genre”. The author identified 135 peer-reviewed studies from 2014 and later which were reduced after the author read titles, abstracts …

Investigating The Extent To Which Chatgpt’S Output Reflects And Reproduces Gender Stereotypes About Math Ability, Miles Baldwin, Nina Braum-Bharti, Peter Baldwin

NERA Conference Proceedings 2023

One concern with AI systems is their potential for perpetuating harmful stereotypes. In this paper, we task ChatGPT with estimating student age based on math test performances. Despite attributing identical test performances to girls and boys, ChatGPT’s age estimates for girls are 5.8 months older than for boys on average.

Advantages And Implications Of Incorporating Qualitative Data In Education Research: Across Contexts, Hannah Smith, Elena Silla, Paul Pacheco, Andrew Mc Reynolds, Itay Kohen, Maddy Berube, Gabriella Morra, Christina Areizaga Barbieri, Paul Reimer

NERA Conference Proceedings 2023

Quantitative and qualitative methods are used in education research and each have their own unique affordances and limitations, partially dependent on contexts, participants and methodologies. This symposium argues for the broader use of qualitative and mixed methods approaches within education research to uncover deeper details of participant perspectives and experiences.

An Exploratory Constructivist Grounded Theory Study: How Secondary School Science Teachers Interpret Students’ Scientific Models That Are Comprised Of Drawing Activities, Alecia M. Redway

Selected Full Text Dissertations, 2011-

Extant literature lacks an explanation of the thought processes used by secondary school science teachers to interpret students’ scientific models that are comprised of drawing activities. In this exploratory study, a constructivist grounded theory (CGT) was developed to generate an interpretive understanding. The CGT was generated from observations, interviews, and document analyses of five research participants consisting of secondary school science teachers from lower New York State. To generate a CGT, concepts, terms, assumptions, and definitions from selected theories—decolonizing methodologies theory (DMT), visual semiotic theory (VST), and cultural studies theory (CST)—collectively provided a fresh onto-epistemological lens for initially examining and …