Digital Commons Network^™

Visual Analytics For Interpretable Quantum Computing, Shaolun Ruan

Dissertations and Theses Collection (Open Access)

Quantum computing has entered a stage of increasing practicality. Many quantum hardware vendors such as IBM, Rigetti, Honeywell, and IonQ now enable experiments on real devices in the Noisy Intermediate-Scale Quantum (NISQ) era. These platforms show computational advantages in domains such as optimization, machine learning, and materials science. However, they remain limited by hardware noise and the absence of human-interpretable information. Existing visual metaphors, such as the Bloch Sphere for single-qubit states or circuit schematics for algorithm design, struggle to convey multi-qubit entanglement or measurement probabilities in ways accessible to human reasoning. Likewise, the rise of variational quantum circuits and …

The Impact Of Corporate Mergers And Acquisitions On Performance From The Perspective Of Growth Pressure, Jiandong Wang

Dissertations and Theses Collection (Open Access)

Against the backdrop of economic volatility and intensified industry competition, firms generally face multidimensional growth pressures, including historical growth pressure, social growth pressure, and market competition pressure. Growth pressure is not only related to firms’ operational stability, but also profoundly influences their strategic choices, particularly merger and acquisition (M&A) behaviour.Grounded in performance feedback theory, this study constructs an integrated analytical framework encompassing growth pressure, M&A strategic decisions, and M&A performance, and systematically examines how different types of growth pressure affect firms’ M&A decisions, as well as how M&A performance varies across different firm characteristics and different types of M&A.

The …

A Case Of Median Raphe Cysts In 8-Year-Old Male, Christina Guo, Marshall Hall, Garrett Furth, Henry Lim, Olivia Gruver, Dustin Wilkes, Stephen E. Weis

North Texas GME Research Forum 2026

Background: The median raphe cyst is a rare, benign, congenital condition characterized by small, fluid-filled cysts that develop along the ventral midline of male external genitalia. These cysts are usually asymptomatic during infancy and childhood but tend to grow in size as the patient grows. These can become cosmetically concerning or symptomatic due to swelling, irritation, and discomfort. They may also present social and psychological stress to patients and families. We present a case of median raphe cysts in an 8-year-old male.

Case Presentation: An 8-year-old male without a prior medical history who presented to dermatology for penile lesions. He …

Evaluating The Alt-70 Model For Cellulitis Management In The Emergency Department, Marshall Hall, Paige Loux, Henry Lim, Jeffrey Durbin, Garrett Furth, Olivia Gruver, Christina Guo, Dustin Wilkes, Michael Carletti, Stephen E. Weis

North Texas GME Research Forum 2026

Background: Cellulitis is a common skin infection that classically presents with unilateral lower extremity erythema, swelling, and pain. The diagnosis is made clinically. Many conditions may mimic cellulitis that are collectively referred to as “pseudocellulitis.” These include stasis dermatitis, deep vein thrombosis, atopic dermatitis, psoriasis, and gout. The Alt-70 model is a validated clinical prediction tool for differentiating cellulitis from pseudocellulitis. It is unclear if it is utilized or if it has changed clinical practice in the emergency department setting.

Methods: This was a retrospective chart review study utilizing the HCA Healthcare Data Warehouse. The Alt-70 model was applied using …

Excision Followed By Standing Cone Deformity Repair Is Tissue Conservative, Henry Lim, Christian Scheufele, Marshall Hall, Stephen Weis, Dustin Wilkes

North Texas GME Research Forum 2026

Introduction Elliptical excisions are the most common method to treat benign and malignant tumors in dermatologic surgery. This standardized design is traditionally 3 to 4.5 times longer than the excisional width to prevent unsightly protrusions of skin after primary closure, known as “standing cone,” “Burow’s triangles” or “dog ear” deformities. This results in a scar significantly longer than the original tumor that may be less easily concealed.

Objective To compare the final repair length of a tissue conservative method to remove skin tumors and close resultant defects against predicted repair length of traditional elliptical excision.

Methods Eighteen cases are presented …

Inpatient Dermatology: Dermatology Consults At Medical City Fort Worth, Olivia Gruver, Marshall Hall, Henry Lim, Christina Guo, Garrett Furth, Stephen E. Weis, Dustin Wilkes, Michael Carletti

North Texas GME Research Forum 2026

Background: Inpatient dermatology is an important yet evolving field. There has been a linear decrease in the number of dermatologists providing inpatient care and in the number of medical centers with an inpatient dermatology service. Medical centers with inpatient dermatology services are unevenly distributed geographically, with most in larger metropolitan areas. There is still a great need for dermatologic expertise in the inpatient setting. We aim to examine the utility of the dermatologic consult service, including the most common chief complaints and conditions that prompted consultation over four months at Medical City Fort Worth.

Methods: This was a retrospective chart …

The Effects Of Attending Prediabetes Prevention Workshops On Improving Students' Awareness, Knowledge, And Interest, Madelene Hamann

DNP Research Projects

Abstract

Objective:This DNP project evaluated the effectiveness of a five-week educational intervention on adolescents’ knowledge of prediabetes, awareness, and intentions to adopt healthy lifestyle behaviors. Method and Intervention:Youth aged 13 to 18 years participated in five 40-minute school-based workshops. Outcomes were measured using the Adolescent Diabetes Awareness Test (ADAT), Health Belief Model (HBM), and Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) workshop evaluation. Effect sizes and 95% confidence intervals (CIs) were used to determine clinical relevance. Results:The intervention had a large, clinically relevant effect on prediabetes knowledge and awareness measured by the ADAT (Hedges’ g = 1.10) …

Empowering Dietary Change: A Culturally Competent Nutrition Intervention For Hispanic Patients At The Agape Clinic, Ariana N. Smith

DNP Research Projects

Abstract 

Type 2 diabetes disproportionately affects Hispanic adults and may be more difficult to manage among uninsured and underserved populations experiencing barriers to healthcare, nutrition education, and culturally appropriate resources. The purpose of this Doctor of Nursing Practice quality improvement project was to implement and evaluate a brief, culturally tailored nutrition education intervention for Hispanic adults with elevated A1C receiving care at The Agape Clinic in Dallas, Texas. A quantitative, quasi-experimental, within-subject design was used. The intervention provided bilingual, low-literacy education focused on A1C, portion control, added sugars, and culturally familiar foods. Thirty-eight participants enrolled in the project, and 11 …

Utilizing Youth Mental Health First Aid: A Community-Based Prevention Strategy To Increase Teh Confidence Levels Of Seventh-Day Adventist Adults In Assisting Youth With Mental Health Distress, Sarah Hillebert

DNP Research Projects

Abstract 

Objective: Youth Mental Health First Aid (YMHFA) is an initiative from the National Council for Mental Wellness that trains adults in identifying and responding to adolescents exhibiting mental health distress. This DNP project evaluated the effectiveness of YMHFA in increasing the mental health literacy and confidence scores of Seventh-day Adventist (SDA) adults. Method: quality improvement, pretest-posttest quasi-experimental design was used. Participants were SDA adults aged 22 to 74 who work with youth in school, church, or camp settings (n=19; Mean age = 48.5 years, SD = 10.5). The quantitative MHFA 2.1 measured mental health literacy and confidence to intervene, …

Implementing A Mental Health Workshop To Mitigate Burnout And Improve Job Satisfaction Among Psychiatric Technicians: A Mixed-Methods Case Study, John P. Smith

DNP Research Projects

Abstract 

Burnout among psychiatric technicians contributes to emotional exhaustion, decreased job satisfaction, workforce instability, and reduced quality of patient care. Despite increasing recognition of healthcare worker well-being as a priority, limited evidence exists regarding interventions specifically designed for psychiatric technicians. The purpose of this Doctor of Nursing Practice project was to implement and evaluate a structured mental health workshop designed to reduce burnout and improve job satisfaction among psychiatric technicians employed in inpatient, outpatient, and group home mental health settings. A mixed-methods case study utilizing a quasi-experimental pretest-posttest design was conducted with a convenience sample of 41 participants. Quantitative data …

The Impact Of A Social Wellness Intervention On The Perception Of Social Support Among Working Adults, Jannysse Gray

DNP Research Projects

Abstract 

Objective: Social isolation and loneliness have detrimental effects on physical and mental health. For working adults, these experiences may impact work attendance, performance, satisfaction, and retention, leading to burnout, fatigue, grief, and disengagement. Barriers to developing and nurturing healthy relationships, such as competing work and family responsibilities, or a lack of resources or energy, can contribute to this problem; therefore, this group was chosen for the intervention. This project aimed to raise awareness of the importance of social connections and to analyze whether an online educational intervention was associated with improved perceptions of social support among working adults. Methods: …

Redefining Educational Technology: A Critical Collaborative Inquiry, Aras Bozkurt, Helen Crompton, Robert Farrow, Agnes Kukulska-Hulme, Jon Dron, Richard West, Agnieszka (Aga) Palalas, Matth Bower, Junhong Xiao, Ahmed Tlili, Danah Henriksen, Angelica Pazurek, Henk Huijser, Thomas K. F. Chiu, Petar Jandrić, Katy Jordan, John Curry, Royce Kimmons, Mutlu Cukurova, Thomas Reeves, Gwo-Jen Hwang, Peter Shea, Jason Lodge, Martin Weller, Davy Ng, Tutaleni Iita Asino

STEMPS Faculty Publications

Educational technologists have not settled on a fixed definition of the field and likely never will. However, attempting to define the field helps to understand the epistemological meanings that shape what the field sees, values, and considers worth pursuing. Through a critical historical review spanning over a century, alongside theoretical engagement with the concepts of entanglement and distributed agency, this paper identifies three key insufficiencies in current educational technology frameworks. These are the persistence of an instrumental-facilitative paradigm that treats technology as a resource deployed by human agents; the theoretical dissolution of the pedagogy-technology dichotomy that existing definitions have not …

Co-Curricular Science Experiences Support Undergraduate Students' Science Gpa, Degree Completion, Workforce Entry, And Motivation, Lisa Linnenbrink-Garcia, Tony Perez, Stacy J. Priniski, Sharlyn Ferguson-Johnson, John Keane, Alexandra Lee, Kristy A. Robinson, You-Kyung Lee, Goun Choi, Matthew J. Schell, Danielle N. Berry, Rochelle Schwatz-Bloom

STEMPS Faculty Publications

Science co-curricular experiences (SciXP)-such as research experiences and internships-are a common, yet understudied, strategy to enhance undergraduates' science career pursuit. Using a doubly robust method to account for initial differences in science motivation, academic readiness, and career intentions, we investigated whether SciXP participation across four years of college predicted undergraduates' (N = 1984) science achievement, career persistence, and motivation at the end of college and after graduation. Participation in science co-curricular experiences was positively associated with science GPA, earning a science degree, being in a more science-intensive career one to two years post-graduation, and viewing science as important and useful …

Reduced Threat-Related Neural Efficiency: A Possible Biomarker For Pediatric Anxiety Disorders, Julia O. Linke, Reut Naim, Simona P. Haller, Parmis Khosravi, Beck Scheinberg, Meghan E. Byrne, Anita Harrewijn, Ellen Leibenluft, Melissa A. Brotman, Anderson M. Winkler, Daniel Samuel Pine

School of Medicine Publications

Objective: Pediatric anxiety disorders are common and predict adult psychopathology, yet current treatments, such as cognitive-behavioral therapy (CBT), produce lasting remission in less than 50% of affected youths. To support the search for improved, mechanistically grounded interventions, this study evaluated neural efficiency, defined as similarity in functional connectivity between a threat task and rest, as a potential biomarker. The study evaluated neural efficiency in relation to anxiety diagnosis and treatment response.

Methods: The authors compared 103 youths with an anxiety disorder diagnosis (mean age, 12.5 years [SD=2.91], 62% female) to 103 youths with no psychiatric diagnosis (mean age, 13.4 years …

The End Of Territoriality?, Reuven S. Avi-Yonah

Articles

The One Big Beautiful Big Act (OBBBA) of 2025 is generally consideredto be a continuation of the Tax Cuts and Jobs Act (TCJA) of 2017.1Thatis definitely true as far as the individual tax provisions are concerned, be-cause the OBBBA merely made permanent the TCJA provisions with minorchanges, such as increasing the cap on the state and local tax deduction from$10,000 to $40,000. For the corporate tax, the OBBBA continued some of thechanges in the TCJA (such as expensing) while relaxing others (such as amorti-zation of research and experimentation (R&E) expenditures and a stricter limiton interest deductions) without changing the overall …

Liability For Non-Disclosure In Ipos, Albert H. Choi, Kathryn E. Spier

Articles

A privately-informed entrepreneur may withhold material information from prospective investors who may sue the firm ex post for (alleged) non-disclosure. Absent liability, the entrepreneur has an excessive incentive to withhold bad news and pursue socially-wasteful projects. Liability deters inefficient non- disclosure and prevents capital misallocation. Any damage award received by investors is partially offset by a reduction in equity value. Depending on the likelihood of court error and litigation cost, the socially-optimal damage award may be either zero or the minimum necessary for full deterrence. The private incentive to waive liability may be socially excessive or insufficient. Positive and normative …

States As Gatekeepers In Global Governance, Kristina Daugirdas

Articles

Over the last several decades, private actors—corporations, philanthropic foundations, and non-governmental organizations—have increasingly contributed to the development and implementation of public international law. In some cases, private actors are developing standards that serve as substitutes for public regulation. In other cases, private actors have been “invited in” to public international organizations as funders, accredited observers and consultants, and even representatives of member states. According to one estimate, 56 percent of international organizations offered some form of access to private actors in 1990; two decades later, more than 90 percent did.

What we are witnessing, in other words, is the growing …

State Climate Superfunds, Rachel Rothschild

Articles

The harmful effects of climate change have already arrived in cities and states across America, with disasters increasing markedly in recent years along with more gradual environmental changes like sea-level rise and drought. To protect populations and natural resources, significant funding will be necessary for preventative measures as well as disaster response.

At present, it is states and ordinary taxpayers who must shoulder the enormous costs and planning for climate adaptation. A number of state legislators, however, have recently proposed enacting new laws that would require the companies who have most profited from fossil fuel usage to assist in funding …

Ai-Powered Lawyering: Ai Reasoning Models, Retrieval Augmented Generation, And The Future Of Legal Practice, Daniel Schwarcz, Sam Manning, J. J. Prescott, Patrick Barry, David R. Cleveland, Beverly Rich

Articles

Generative AI is set to transform the legal profession, though its most promising uses and ultimate effects are still unclear. While AI models like GPT-4 improve efficiency, they can also “hallucinate” and may undermine legal judgment, particularly in complex tasks typically handled by skilled lawyers. This article examines two emerging AI innovations that may mitigate these concerns: Retrieval Augmented Generation (RAG), which grounds AI-powered analysis in legal sources, and AI reasoning models, which structure complex reasoning before generating output. We conduct the first randomized controlled trial assessing these technologies, assigning upper-level law students to complete legal tasks using a RAG-powered …

Authorship Nonsense, Jessica Litman

Articles

Copyright law’s primary device for promoting progress is to bestow rights on the authors of works. Rights vest automatically and last for a very long time. Authors’ choices to retain, license, or transfer those rights fuel opportunities to communicate the works to their audiences. The copyright system’s mechanisms for determining who authored works (and therefore automatically obtained copyright rights) should be both accurate and reliable, since misidentifications will undermine the law’s working as intended.

This article examines authors’ creation of works and copyright law’s handling of authorship disputes. Many works result from creative collaboration. Although the copyright statute incorporates mechanisms …

Monitoring, Oversight, And Learning In Medical Ai, W. Nicholson Price Ii

Articles

When medical AI errs, it often goes unnoticed. If there’s a specific patient injury, and the link to AI is obvious, that problem might be reported to the Food and Drug Administration (FDA), but not always. And many other types of problems, like worse performance on specific groups or ineffective integration into health system workflows, simply don’t fall within the contours of regularized reporting. Even if they are noticed by the health system—far from a given—there’s no obvious way to share that information more broadly. Against this backdrop, there are justified calls for better oversight and reporting. But there’s the …

The Basis Of The Labor Exemption Reconsidered, Sanjukta Paul

Articles

Broadly speaking, this symposium queries the question of expanding some actors’ coordination rights under antitrust law as a way of effectuating legal goals relating to “power relations.” I commend the organizers of the symposium for opening this conversation, for asking about the use of “collective bargaining” beyond the traditional labor domain, and for taking on the question in a creative way. These broader questions are essential, and yet my own article will (paradoxically, perhaps) try to contribute to this effort by going back to the core domain of the labor exemption itself—where, it turns

How The U.S. Constitution Shapes International Tax Law: Instrument Choice In Tax Agreements, Noam Noked, Young Ran (Christine) Kim, Reuven Avi-Yonah

Articles

The U.S. Constitution’s Treaty Clause, which requires Senate approval by a two-thirds vote for treaties, has significantly influenced the development of international tax law. This Article examines the implications of Senate supermajority requirements on bilateral and multilateral tax treaties and agreements, alternative instruments, relevant international tax standards, and global tax governance.

Historically, tax treaties have been approved exclusively as Article II treaties requiring Senate approval. The difficulty of entering into treaties with the United States has influenced the instrument choice and design of U.S. and international tax standards. To address this challenge, several U.S. and international tax reforms have employed …

Covid And The Great Retrenchment, Samuel R. Bagenstos

Articles

The past six years have seen two dramatic shifts in federal health and benefits policy. First, during the COVID pandemic, the government dramatically expanded public benefits. These expansions had incredibly positive effects, and recipients were largely satisfied with them. But after a relatively short time, Congress rolled back nearly all of the expansion. Worse, the immediate pullback set the stage for even more significant retrenchments in the second Trump Administration. Where in 2023 the United States came closest to universal health care in its history—with a record low uninsured rate of 7.7%—the Trump Administration’s Medicaid cuts and failure to extend …

Useful Noise: Understanding Dicta And Knowing What To Do With It, Len Niehoff, Tucker Gribble

Articles

Sometimes we approach the idea of obiter dictum as if it were Latin for “Here the court says something I wish it didn’t.” When a judicial opinion includes a statement that hurts our case, we labor to cast it as dicta and we give it the first name “mere.” If the opposing party quotes the statement, we huff about its irrelevance and dismissively proclaim that it can, indeed must, be ignored. We treat dicta as background noise, and we encourage the court to plug its ears and hum.

Noneconomic Tort Damages And Biased Beliefs About Vulnerability To Harm, Roseanna Sommers

Articles

The American tort system aspires to provide fair compensation to injured plaintiffs, regardless of socioeconomic status, race, religion, or gender. Recent experimental evidence from psychology suggests, however, that factfinders consistently judge identical harms as less severe when experienced by individuals of lower socioeconomic status (SES). People presume, for instance, that a paper cut hurts a wealthy person more than a less well-off person, that domestic violence inflicts greater suffering on a high-SES woman than a lower-SES woman, and that bullying harms a fiveyear- old from a high-SES family more severely than one from a low- SES family. This Essay examines …

Junior Public Health Service Officer Mentor Program: Developing New Leaders In The United States Public Health Service Commissioned Corps For Workforce Retention, Felecia Annetta Bailey

Yale School of Nursing Digital Theses

Junior Public Health Service Officer Mentor Program: Developing New Leaders in the United States Public Health Service Commissioned Corps for Workforce Retention

Mentorship is a critical tool for preparing junior personnel for senior roles, professional development and retention within organizations; however, formal mentorship is often lacking or insufficiently tailored to the needs of diverse workforces, particularly in organizations comprising uniformed service members and civilian employees. This project was designed to provide targeted mentorship for Public Health Service (PHS) Commissioned Corps junior officers and to modify an existing mentoring program that primarily served civilian personnel.

The project aimed to modify the …

Optimization Of Social Determinants Of Health Data With Z Code Utilization In Inpatient Care, Felicia Cordia Alleyne

Yale School of Nursing Digital Theses

The U.S. healthcare system is characterized as being costly, wasteful, and fraught with inequity, due to historical disparities and contemporary challenges such as the aftermath of the COVID 19 pandemic and recent international policy changes that raise the costs of materials and imports. There is evidence to support that with the use of social determinants of health screening tools that are associated with a standardized data capture approach can contribute to value-added clinical and financial changes, resulting in improve care, reduce healthcare disparities, and reduce healthcare costs. This DNP project piloted the implementation of a training protocol for a social …

Nursing Primary Care To Better Health, Kristen Dulling

Yale School of Nursing Digital Theses

The national nursing shortage and the rising cost of nursing is threatening sustainability of

the RN role on the care team in ambulatory care settings. There is a critical need to develop a

care model that defines the value of RNs on the primary care team by improving access and

effectively reducing cost by mitigating turnover and role dissatisfaction. This DNP project

developed and implemented a care model across four primary care settings that shifted

workflows for vaccine administration, prior authorizations, and emergency department follow up

calls from RNs to other roles on the care team. Capacity created allowed the …

Addressing Social Determinants Of Health To Reduce Missed Appointments In Primary Care Setting., Omolara Goyea

Yale School of Nursing Digital Theses

Background: Missed appointments impose a significant financial burden on the U.S. healthcaresystem, costing over $150 billion annually, with individual physicians losing an average of $200 per unused time slot (Gier, 2017). Unmet Social Determinants of Health (SDOH), such as transportation barriers, negatively impact primary care services and contribute to missed appointments (Brown et al., 2020; Fiori et al). The missed appointment rate in the United States ranges from 12% to 50% of scheduled appointments (Boone et al., 2023). Objective: This quality improvement project aimed to develop, implement, and evaluate a telehealth protocol specifically tailored for patients who identified transportation as …