Digital Commons Network^™

Cooperation Or Competition With China: Interest Groups And Us Policy On Climate Change, Lucia G. Green-Weiskel

Dissertations, Theses, and Capstone Projects

This dissertation analyzes the existence of two constellations of political forces, emphasizing their relationship to each other and the link between their interests related to China and climate change. It argues that two China-related alignments on climate issues are driven by their opposing approaches to US China relations in general in such a way that the latter predicts the former. These broad but opposing coalitions of political forces—one favoring and one opposing cooperation with China—are made up of think tanks, NGOs and industry groups, which have demonstrated a convergence in policy preferences over the course of two presidential administrations, democrat …

An Argument Against Unbounded Arrest Power: The Expressive Fourth Amendment And Protesting While Black, Karen Pita Loor

Faculty Scholarship

Protesting is supposed to be revered in our democracy, considered “as American as apple pie” in our nation’s mythology. But the actual experiences of the 2020 racial justice protesters showed that this supposed reverence for political dissent and protest is more akin to American folklore than reality on the streets. The images from those streets depicted police officers clad in riot gear and armed with shields, batons, and “less than” lethal weapons aggressively arresting protesters, often en masse. In the first week of the George Floyd protests, police arrested roughly 10,000 people, and approximately 78 percent of those arrests were …

Managerial Trustworthiness And Buybacks, Sterling Huang, Kaisa Snellman, Theo Vermaelen

Research Collection School Of Accountancy

CEO trustworthiness is positively related to long-term excess returns after buyback announcements. When the CEO is trustworthy, statements that the stock is undervalued are more credible. CEO trustworthiness is initially measured by the extent to which people in the county where the company headquarters is located trust each other. Further, the positive impact of trustworthiness on excess returns is higher when the CEO has been a long-term resident of a high-trust county, and correspondingly, trustworthy CEOs are less likely to be accused of financial misreporting. Our conclusions are confirmed when we use alternative measures of trustworthiness such as employee trust …

Analysing Urban Energy Transition In Light Of The Energy Conservation Act, 2001, Madhubanti Sadhya

Articles

The interplay of legislative division and inter-ministerial convergence in India impacts energy conservation efforts across states, reflecting socio-economic disparities. Urban areas, central to energy efficiency initiatives, face challenges due to varying state-level political and economic contexts. Effective implementation of the Energy Conservation Act, 2001, and urban development policies necessitates tailored approaches and robust data tools for mapping and tracking energy use. Bridging central and state policies is crucial for achieving uniform energy efficiency and meeting national energy transition targets.

Optimization Of Palmitic Acid Production In Chloroidium Sp. Utex 3007 As A Sustainable Source Of Palm Oil Alternative, Amnah Salem Alzahmi

Theses

The increase in palm oil consumption and production has resulted in removing up to 90% of trees in some tropical forests. The green microalgae Chloroidium sp. UTEX 3007 can be an alternative sustainable source of palm oil due to its high palmitic acid content. The objective of this study was to generate a mutant Chloroidium population that is capable of producing and accumulating elevated levels of palmitic acid and to characterize the obtained populations’ lipid contents. The palmitic acid production optimization in Chloroidium sp. UTEX 3007 was conducted via a workflow of ultraviolet (UV) mutagenesis and sorting of high-lipid producing …

Numerical Modelling Of Externally-Bonded Fiber Reinforced Polymer Shear-Strengthened Reinforced Concrete Beams Subjected To Fatigue Loading, Nagwa Ibrahim Fares

Theses

An extensive number of existing structures persistently exposed to fatigue loading such as bridges, offshore structures, pavements, and highways, are in urgent need of repairing and strengthening. This may be attributed to the continuous increase in the load requirements, change of the structure’s function, and meeting current load standards. Among the potential methods of rehabilitation and strengthening of existing reinforced concrete structures, the externally bonding fiber reinforced polymers (FRP) composites are gaining massive popularity and becoming a viable and cost-effective method. Shear failure of reinforced concrete (RC) beams is known to be brittle, which occurs without prior sufficient warnings; therefore, …

Physicochemical, Techno-Functional And Bioactive Properties Of Camel Whey Protein Concentrate As Affected By Spray-Drying And Ultrasonication Treatment, Alanoud Muhsen Al Thaibani

Theses

Whey protein concentrates (WPCs) are gaining importance as a functional ingredient due to their nutritional, techno-functional and bioactive properties. In this study, WPCs were prepared from skimmed camel milk, then either spray-dried (SD) at 170, 185 and 200°C, or treated by ultrasonication (US) (20 kHz) for 5, 10 and 15 min followed by freeze-drying to obtain powders. The characterization of WPC powders was carried out by Sodium dodecyl sulfate-polyacrylamide gel electrophoresis (SDS-PAGE) and Reverse-Phase Ultra Performance Liquid Chromatography (RP-UPLC) which showed that the US treatment degraded the proteins more than SD. The morphology, particle size, and surface charge of WPC …

حمایة الخصوصیة الرقمیة في ظل تطبیقات الذكاء الاصطناعي (دراسة تحلیلیة مقارنة), ریم غریب الشامسي

Theses

مع بزوغ عصر الثورة الصناعیة الرابعة (4IR)، تزامن ذلك مع وجود حقبة جدیدة في التطور التقني والتحول الرقمي والتي أصبحت فیھا التكنولوجیا جزءاً لا یتجزأ من المجتمعات، مما أدى إلى ازدیاد ظھور تطبیقات الذكاء الاصطناعي بشكل كبیر والتي دخلت في مجالات كثیرة في حیاتنا الیومیة، فأصبح الاستغناء عنھا ضرباً من الخیال، فنرى استخدامات الطائرات بدون طیار في مجال التجارة الإلكترونیة في إیصال السلع و الخدمات، والروبوتات الجراحیة في العملیات الدقیقة، و الاستشارات المھنیة والقانونیة عن بعد، و الحكومة الذكیة في استخدام التطبیقات الحكومیة المؤتمتة - من بینھا حكومة الإمارات بوضع استراتیجیة الحكومة الرقمیة لدولة الإمارات 2025 واستراتیجیة الإمارات للذكاء الاصطناعي-، …

The Coming Causation Revolution In Employment Discrimination Litigation, D’Andra Millsap Shu

Cardozo Law Review

For more than a decade, employment discrimination causation law has been a confusing, often overly restrictive quagmire that has contributed substantially to the paltry success rate of plaintiffs in employment discrimination cases. Most of these cases are dismissed pretrial, all too often based on a failure of causation. A key reason traces back to loose and misleading language—centered on a single word—in a 2009 Supreme Court opinion involving the but-for causation standard that applies in most discrimination cases. The Court said that the discriminatory motive must be “the” but-for cause of the employer’s action when it should have said “a” …

Civil Rights Catch-22s, Jonathan P. Feingold

Cardozo Law Review

Civil rights advocates have long viewed litigation as a vital path to social change. In many ways, it is. But in key respects that remain underexplored in legal scholarship, even successful litigation can hinder remedial projects. This perverse effect stems from civil rights doctrines that incentivize litigants (or their attorneys) to foreground community plight—such as academic underachievement or overincarceration. Rational plaintiffs, responding in kind, deploy legal narratives that tend to track racial stereotypes and regressive theories of inequality. When this occurs, even successful lawsuits can harden the structural and behavioral forces that produce and perpetuate racial inequality.

I refer to …

Patent Law’S Externality Asymmetry, Peter Lee

Cardozo Law Review

Technologies such as social media, autonomous vehicles, and “big data” analytics generate enormous benefits for society, but they also create substantial harms. Many of these effects take the form of externalities—external benefits and harms that a decisionmaker (such as an inventor) imposes on third parties without charge or compensation. Considering negative externalities, for example, social media networks spread misinformation throughout the electorate, autonomous vehicles threaten the jobs of millions of professional drivers, and predictive policing based on big data can lead to unreasonable searches and seizures. Externalities can cause inefficient resource allocation, and the classic remedy is to “internalize” externalities …

Driving The National Labor Relations Act Forward: Analyzing Abusive Conduct That Occurs In The Course Of Protected Activity After General Motors Llc, Kurt Stumpo

Cardozo Law Review

No abstract provided.

Will The Border Water Quality Restoration And Protection Act Of 2020 Be Enough To Flush The Tijuana River Valley Water Pollution Crisis Down The Drain?, Kyle A. Rudolph

San Diego Journal of Climate & Energy Law

This Article reviews the complex and decades-long wastewater pollution crisis occurring in the Tijuana River Valley, its legislative history, and whether the Water Quality Restoration and Protection Act of 2020 would flush the Tijuana River Valley water pollution crisis down the drain in light of the promulgation of the USMCA.

Nevada's Energy Choice Initiative: A Case Study Of Deregulation, The Dormant Commerce Clause, And Energy Federalism, Joel A. Kaufmann

San Diego Journal of Climate & Energy Law

The fight over “Energy Choice” or “retail electricity market deregulation” in Nevada demonstrated a disagreement about how to structure electricity markets, economic consequences in the billions of dollars, and thorny legal doctrines like the Dormant Commerce Clause and dual sovereignty. The Energy Choice Initiative was the first attempt to deregulate a state’s retail electricity market by ballot initiative and the first include a right to “Energy Choice.” The Energy Choice Initiative is one example of the growing interest in retail customer choice or “Energy Choice” across the country. In the past two years, Virginia and Arizona considered retail customer choice …

Behind The Concrete Curtain: Acknowledging And Curbing Greenhouse Gas Emissions From Hydroelectric Facilities And River Impoundments, Joseph A. Welsh

San Diego Journal of Climate & Energy Law

From its early use as kinetic power to kick start the industrial revolution, a consensus emerged that hydroelectric power is clean, renewable, and reliable. In contemporary parlance it is universally classified as either “carbon free” or “low-carbon.” The history of hydropower in the United States supports this belief, and its use has rarely been scrutinized. However, an emerging consensus indicates scrutiny is necessary (for hydroelectric power and other energy sources avoiding acute assessment) given the challenges foisted upon us by anthropogenic climate change.

This Article will put the standard hydropower consensus to task and analyze whether it holds water as …

Effects Of Positive Reappraisal And Self-Distancing On Meaning-Making In Negative Experiences, Yong Hao Clement Lau

Dissertations and Theses Collection (Open Access)

Scant research has investigated the impact of common daily adversities on one’s sense of meaning, and how one can cope and find meaning in these distressing events. Drawing on the meaning-making model and tripartite model of meaning, this study sought to examine how using a combination of coping strategies (i.e., positive reappraisal and self-distancing) can help individuals to derive greater situational meaning (i.e., meaning from the experience), greater global meaning (i.e., meaning in life)—across three facets (i.e., coherence, significance, and purpose). Specifically, it is proposed that the effects of positive reappraisal on promoting meaning would be enhanced by adopting a …

Building A Supply Chain For Emergency: A Case Study Of Kingfa's Mask Supply Chain, Nanjing Li

Dissertations and Theses Collection (Open Access)

In case of emergency such as pandemic or earthquake, there are usually surge demands for some necessary products, which are usually far more than available production capacities thus it is necessary to quickly build more production capacities. However, building production capacities is not just building production lines but to constructing whole supply chains, from raw materials and equipment sourcing, manufacturing flow lines to demand management.

To quickly construct a supply chain for fulfilling such emergency demands is very challenging both theoretically and practically. This thesis aims to develop a model of supply chain construction for emergency demand and identify the …

Essays On Financial Materiality Of Corporate Social Responsibility And Corporate Strategies, Yang Lan

Dissertations and Theses Collection (Open Access)

This dissertation investigates how the endorsement of certain social activities by CSR standards impacts stakeholders’ interpretation on firms’ motivation of doing CSR and how managers make decisions on which specific CSR activities they would like to participate in. The first essay examines how the standards release of CSR by Sustainability and Accounting Standards Board (SASB) affects the relationship between material CSR and firm performance outcomes in terms of stock returns (for investors) and sales growth (for customers), through shaping investor and customer perceptions on the motivation underlying a firm’s material CSR activities. I further argue that a sharp increase in …

Differential Gene Expression In Tall Fescue Tissues In Response To Water Deficit, Manohar Chakrabarti, Padmaja Nagabhyru, Christopher L. Schardl, Randy D. Dinkins

School of Integrative Biological & Chemical Sciences Faculty Publications

Tall fescue (Festuca arundinacea Schreb.) is a popular pasture and turf grass particularly known for drought resistance, allowing for its persistence in locations that are unfavorable for other cool-season grasses. Also, its seed-borne fungal symbiont (endophyte) Epichloë coenophiala, which resides in the crown and pseudostem, can be a contributing factor in its drought tolerance. Because it contains the apical meristems, crown survival under drought stress is critical to plant survival as well as the endophyte. In this study, we subjected tall fescue plants with their endophyte to water-deficit stress or, as controls with normal watering, then compared plant …

The Ephemerality Of The Living And The Persistence Of The Inanimate, Erin Johnston

MFA in Visual Art

I create fragile, sculptural works with paper. Either cast from pre-existing objects or constructed forms, my three-dimensional works ultimately become pure paper objects. I use the visual language of absence, memory, ruin and ephemerality to present modern artifacts and address the now. I am interested in how the manufactured crumbs we leave behind as a species reveal our collective desires, and our relationship to the body and mortality. I am fascinated with, and even enchanted by, the proliferation of material objects and their tendency to surpass the lifespan of any single human. Perhaps this behavior of producing lasting creations is …

Skip The Grid: Solar Powered Refrigeration In The Navajo Nation, Sydney Jo Sitton

Construction Management

The Skip the Grid project was a combined effort of California Polytechnic State University, San Luis Obispo (Cal Poly) students, and company sponsors SOLV Energy, Dometic, and Goal Zero, facilitated through the non-profit, Heart of America. The interdisciplinary project team successfully installed photovoltaic energy systems with refrigerators and lights for families within the Navajo Nation. Skip the Grid’s mission focuses on improving quality of life and providing access to clean, affordable off-grid energy. In the Navajo Nation, access to electricity and running water is not necessarily a given, with large disparities from family to family. This issue was exacerbated during …

Field-Evolved Δg210-Ppo2 From Palmer Amaranth Confers Pre-Emergence Tolerance To Ppo-Inhibitors In Rice And Arabidopsis, Pamela Carvalho-Moore, Gulab Rangani, Ana Claudia Langaro, Vibha Srivastava, Aimone Porri, Steven J. Bowe, Jens Lerchl, Nilda R. Burgos

Crop, Soil and Environmental Sciences Faculty Publications and Presentations

Resistance to protoporphyrinogen IX oxidase (PPO)-inhibitors in Amaranthus palmeri and Amaranthus tuberculatus is mainly contributed by mutations in the PPO enzyme, which renders herbicide molecules ineffective. The deletion of glycine210 (ΔG210) is the most predominant PPO mutation. ΔG210-ppo2 is overexpressed in rice (Oryza sativa c. ‘Nipponbare’) and Arabidopsis thaliana (Col-0). A foliar assay was conducted on transgenic T1 rice plants with 2× dose of fomesafen (780 g ha−1), showing less injury than the non-transgenic (WT) plants. A soil-based assay conducted with T2 rice seeds confirmed tolerance to fomesafen applied pre-emergence. In agar medium, root growth of WT …

Reducing Administrative Burdens To Protect Taxpayer Rights, Leslie Book, T. Keith Fogg, Nina E. Olson

Faculty Publications

The tax system designed by Congress imposes significant administrative burdens on taxpayers. IRS decisions regarding how it administers tax laws can add to congressionally imposed burdens. The administrative burdens are consequential and hurt some people, especially lower- or moderate- income individual taxpayers, more than others. While the IRS strives to measure and reduce the time and money taxpayers spend to comply with their tax obligations, it does not consider the effect administrative burdens have on taxpayer rights, including the right to be informed, the right to pay no more than the correct amount of tax, and the right to a …

Optimizing Stable Isotope Sampling Design In Terrestrial Movement Ecology Research, Andrea Contina, Sarah Magozzi, Hannah B. Vander Zanden, Gabriel J. Bowen, Michael B. Wunder

School of Integrative Biological & Chemical Sciences Faculty Publications

1. The recognition of adequate sampling designs is an interdisciplinary topic that has gained popularity over the last decades. In ecology, many research questions involve sampling across extensive and complex environmental gradients. This is the case for stable isotope analyses, which are widely used to characterize large-scale movement patterns and dietary preferences of organisms across taxa. Because natural-abundance stable isotope variation in the environment is incorporated into inert animal tissues, such as feathers or hair, it is possible to draw inferences about the type of food and water resources that individuals consumed and the locations where tissues were synthesized. However, modern …

Scenario Acceleration Through Automated Modelling: A Method And System For Creating Traceable Quantitative Future Scenarios Based On Fcm System Modeling And Natural Language Processing, Christopher W.H. Davis

Dissertations and Theses

Scenario planning is used extensively in strategic planning because it helps leaders broaden their perspectives and make better decisions by presenting possible futures in story form. Some of the benefits of using scenarios include breaking away from groupthink, creating better products, acceleration of organization learning and reducing bias. Product development teams, particularly for digital products, are gaining more autonomy in organizations and tend to manage risk by undergoing very short development iterations on their products while leaning on their consumers for feedback -- a process known as agile development. This method tends to limit the perspective of the team and …

Masthead & Table Of Contents

Dalhousie Law Journal

No abstract provided.

Kinetic, Isotherm And Thermodynamic Studies On The Ciprofloxacin Adsorption From Aqueous Solution Using Aleppo Bentonite, Hicham Abazli, Hussein Jneidi, Siba Hatem

Baghdad Science Journal

Aleppo bentonite was investigated to remove ciprofloxacin hydrochloride from aqueous solution. Batch adsorption experiments were conducted to study the several factors affecting the removal process, including contact time, pH of solution, bentonite dosage, ion strength, and temperature. The optimum contact time, pH of solution and bentonite dosage were determined to be 60 minutes, 6 and 0.15 g/50 ml, respectively. The bentonite efficiency in removing CIP decreased from 89.9% to 53.21% with increasing Ionic strength from 0 to 500mM, and it increased from 89% to 96.9% when the temperature increased from 298 to 318 K. Kinetic studies showed that the pseudo …

Reconciliation, Restoration And Reconstruction Of A Conflict Ridden Country, Muhammad S. Riaz

Theses and Dissertations

Conflict has sadly been a constant part of history. Winning a conflict and making a lasting peace are often not the same thing. While a peace treaty ends a conflict and often dictates terms from the winners’ perspective, it may not create a lasting peace. Short of unconditional surrender, modern conflict ends with a negotiated cessation of hostilities. Such accords may have some initial reconstruction agreements, but Reconciliation, Restoration and Reconstruction (RRR) is a long term process. This study maintains that to achieve a lasting peace: 1) The culture and beliefs of the conflict nation must be continuously considered and …

Diagnostics Of Dementia From Structural And Functional Markers Of Brain Atrophy With Machine Learning, Tetiana Habuza

Dissertations

Dementia is a condition in which higher mental functions are disrupted. It currently affects an estimated 57 million people throughout the world. A dementia diagnosis is difficult since neither anatomical indicators nor functional testing is currently sufficiently sensitive or specific. There remains a long list of outstanding issues that must be addressed. First, multimodal diagnosis has yet to be introduced into the early stages of dementia screening. Second, there is no accurate instrument for predicting the progression of pre-dementia. Third, non-invasive testing cannot be used to provide differential diagnoses. By creating ML models of normal and accelerated brain aging, we …

Aesthetic Implications Of Using The Computer Medium In Music, Rodrigo Valente Pascale

Masters Theses

In this thesis, I reflect on the relationship between the materiality of computers and computer music. Marshall McLuhan and Friedrich Kittler had a fundamental role in unraveling how media shape discourse and influence their conveyed message and history. These were important discoveries that built the foundation for the field of Media Studies. Throughout this thesis, I will revisit reflections of researchers who contributed to this field and point out how the medium molds computer music’s history and aesthetics. After reviewing the role of the materiality of computers, I will indicate some aesthetically compelling directions of computer music, which consider features …