Sediment And Debris Flows Resulting From The 2020 El Dorado Wildfire, San Bernardino Mountains, California, Andrew Suarez

Electronic Theses, Projects, and Dissertations

The Yucaipa Ridge is a section of the San Bernardino Mountains within the Transverse Ranges of Southern California. During the summer and early fall of 2020, Yucaipa Ridge experienced severe vegetation damage from both the Apple and El Dorado wildfires. Burned slopes exhibit a higher susceptibility to geomorphic change within several years of burning from the introduction of meteoric water onto the slope. Yucaipa, Oak Glen, and other nearby communities are currently at risk of damage by hyperconcentrated flows and debris flows during the seasonal rainy season.

Debris flows and hyperconcentrated flows (a.k.a. mudflows; are grouped and referred to in …

Personalized Retention Strategy Optimization Of Auto Insurance Customers Using Churn Prediction Analysis, Sai Charan Kurakula

Electronic Theses, Projects, and Dissertations

Addressing customer churn remains one of the greatest difficulties in the auto insurance sector, frequently caused by unmanaged complaints, service inaction, and insufficient communication regarding the customer’s needs. The goal of this research is to create a framework based on machine learning algorithms that predict whether a customer complaint will be confirmed by the regulatory authority and use this as a proxy to estimate customer churn in the absence of direct cancellation data. Through predicting complaint confirmation, which acts as an indicator of genuine service failure, the model helps in detecting customers with greater risk and aids in formulating individualized …

Forced Sterilizations And Reproductive Control: A Legacy Of Eugenics And White Supremacy In The United States, Bshara Alsheikh

Electronic Theses, Projects, and Dissertations

Women of color have suffered racial reproductive abuse by the hands of government-funded white supremacist institutions. From federal government agencies to the highest court of the land, they have all played a crucial role in the reproductive oppression of women of color and have failed to protect their bodily autonomy. This thesis examines legal cases like Buck v. Bell, Madrigal v. Quilligan, and Relf v. Weinberger to showcase how the bodies and reproductive capacities of women of color have been targeted and controlled under the guise of public health, to advance supposed economic stability, and through a racially charged eugenics …

The Educational Imperative Of Inspect: A Trauma-Informed, Neurodivergent-Affirming Classroom Culture Framework, David A. Palmer

Electronic Theses, Projects, and Dissertations

This project introduces the INSPECT Framework, a trauma-informed and neurodivergent-affirming classroom culture model that challenges traditional, compliance-based behavior systems in inclusive educational settings. INSPECT—an acronym for “I first, Nurturing environment, Structure, Planning, Engagement, Consistency, and Time”—provides educators with a sequential, research-informed framework for cultivating emotional safety, engagement, and regulation among students, particularly those with ADHD, Autism spectrum disorders, sensory processing differences, and trauma histories.

The issue being addressed is the widespread use of punitive behavior management strategies that intensify student distress and misinterpret neurologically based behaviors as defiance. Drawing from recent literature in neuroscience, trauma theory, Universal Design for Learning …

Challenges The Sporting Industry Faced During Covid-19 On Fan Attendance: The Case Of The National Basketball Association, Marlon Long

Electronic Theses, Projects, and Dissertations

This culminating experience project investigates the challenges the sporting industry faced during the COVID-19 pandemic, with a focused look at the National Basketball Association. The research questions are: (Q1) How did the NBA arena shutdowns impact fan attendance for each team during the COVID-19 pandemic? (Q2) What factors influenced NBA arena attendance before the COVID-19 shutdowns? (Q3) What factors influenced NBA arena attendance after the COVID-19 shutdown? The data collected includes all 30 NBA teams from 2019 through the 2024 seasons. The research questions were analyzed using multilinear regression analysis and comparison of attendance data over 6 seasons including the …

Burnout Prediction In Pediatric Urgent Care Providers Using Wearable Data: A Pilot Study, George E. Quaye, Addison Leabo, J Steven Leeder, Brooke L. Fridley, Tiffany Addington

Research at Children's Mercy Month 2025

Burnout is a critical issue among healthcare providers, especially in high-stress environments such as pediatric urgent care (PUC). Existing tools, like the Maslach Burnout Inventory (MBI), tend to identify burnout after it has occurred. This study aims to leverage wearable technology to predict burnout before its onset, using biometric data to facilitate timely interventions. This observational study will explore the application of several machine learning (ML) models to biometric data collected from Garmin Venu 3 smartwatches, with the goal of determining the best predictive approach for burnout. Up to 50 medical providers from three PUC sites will wear Garmin Venu …

Assessing The Relationship Between The Incidence Of Campylobacteriosis And Ecological Risk Factors In Tennessee, Emmanuel Angmorteh Mensah

Electronic Theses and Dissertations

Background: Campylobacteriosis although is the leading causes of bacterial diarrheal illnesses, have not gained prominent awareness and there are gaps in the understanding of transmission routes for sporadic, non-outbreak cases and their risk factors at the communal level to humans. This study, therefore, aimed to identify the campylobacteriosis risk factors and risk perception from the existing literature in the United States, determine the incidence and ecological risk factors for campylobacteriosis zip code level in Tennessee, and to perform spatiotemporal analysis of campylobacteriosis incidence cases in Tennessee.

Method: To achieve the first aim, a scoping review was conducted to synthesize …

Normative Variability In Retinal Nerve Fiber Layer Thickness: Does It Matter Where The Peaks Are?, Sowjanya Gowrisankaran, Ashkan Abbasi, Xubo Song, Joel Schuman, Gadi Wollstein, Bhavna Antony, Hiroshi Ishikawa

Wills Eye Hospital Papers

PURPOSE: Retinal nerve fiber layer thickness (RNFLT), a glaucoma biomarker, has a wide normative range affecting its sensitivity and specificity for abnormality detection. The interindividual RNFLT peak location variability contribution to this wide normative range has not been directly evaluated. The purpose of this study is to assess the effect of RNFLT peak normalization (PN) on normative variability.

METHODS: Circumpapillary RNFLT profiles at 1.7 mm radius from the optic nerve head (ONH) were re-sampled from optical coherence tomography (OCT) volumes (Cirrus HD-OCT, 200 × 200) obtained from one eye of 83 healthy individuals. Fovea-ONH axis (FOA) was calculated from corresponding …

Rewriting The Rules: Impact Of Covid-19 On Norms In Science, The International Order, And China, Jacob Kissling '25

Honor Scholar Theses

The Covid-19 pandemic exposed both strengths and vulnerabilities in global responses, many of which were shaped by underlying norms and behavioral expectations within key institutions. Understanding how these norms influenced decision-making, collaboration, and communication—and how they were themselves challenged or reshaped by the crisis—can provide valuable insights for improving future responses. While some norms adapted in response to the evolving crisis, others remained stagnant or were inconsistently enforced, contributing to fragmented and, at times, ineffective responses. This paper investigates the role of norms in three critical sectors: the scientific community, the international order, and China. Within the scientific community, norms …

Virtual Reality And Nursing Education: A Randomized Control Trial Of The Effectiveness Of Virtual Reality As A Simulation Modality, David R. Haigh

Dissertations

Virtual Reality (VR) is an emerging technology being utilized in educational and professional training in fields such as engineering, heavy industry, and the military. VR also has the potential to be utilized in pre-licensing nursing education; however, nursing programs have been slow to adopt VR as a simulation modality to train pre-licensed nurses in clinical skills. As such, there is a lack of research on the effectiveness of VR training in critical skills that nurses will utilize in clinical settings. This research is vital because utilizing VR as a training tool can reduce the time and cost of preparing nurses …

Multistage Random Key Genetic Algortihm Optimization For Scheduling Flexible Flow Lines With Sequence Depenedent Setup Times, Aadithan Anbuvanan

All Theses

This thesis proposes a new variation to the Random Key Genetic Algorithm (RKGA) for scheduling optimization in flexible flow line manufacturing with sequence dependent setup times. The proposed RKGA representation decodes scheduling information independently at each stage, unlike the traditional RKGA, which is only sequenced based on the first stage, limiting flexibility. The proposed method's performance is compared to the traditional method with varying numbers of jobs and stages. It is compared regarding performance ratio and statistical significance of differences through the Wilcoxon Signed Rank Test. Results show that the proposed RKGA outperformed traditional RKGA in high complexity (8 Stage …

A Dutch Approach To Charleston’S Water Management, Noor Hooijmaijers

All Theses

Coastal cities across the world face increasing threats from climate change impacts such as flooding, drought, and sea level rise. The East Coast of the United States, including Charleston, South Carolina is among the most vulnerable cities due to its low elevation and exposure to extreme weather events. The Netherlands, with a big part of its country below sea level, have become accustomed generating solutions to mitigate climate change impacts.

This thesis examines how elements of Dutch water management, which is known for its multi-layered, proactive, and integrated governance system, can be adapted to improve Charleston’s resilience against climate change …

Impact Of Shear Flow On Marine Biofilms Using Hyperspectral Imaging, Shantanu Mahesh Kore

All Theses

Various microbial communities in marine biofilms cause biofouling on submerged surfaces, posing challenges to marine industries. Despite their ecological and economic importance, biofilms' biomechanical and biochemical responses to hydrodynamic shear stress are insufficiently understood, particularly in dynamic flow conditions. To fill this gap, our study uses an innovative fiber-optic hyperspectral imaging (HSI) system and a supercontinuum laser source to examine marine biofilms' structure, composition, and detachment behavior at different shear stress levels.

To detect spectral and spatial heterogeneity in live biofilms without labeling, we created a custom imaging pipeline that captures reflectance spectra in the 600-850 nm range, targeting microbial …

Berm-Leveling Machine For Peach Orchards: Incorporation Of Tree-Sensing Feature And Profitability Study, Shubham Singh

All Theses

Root collar excavation extends the productive life of peach trees in Armillaria root rot-infested soil, but the process requires trees to be planted on berms. Berm-planted peach orchards restrict the mobility of workers and machinery and can lead to increased erosion in furrows on either side of the berms. The current inter-tree berm-leveling machine depends on the driver's command to dodge the peach trees. The objectives of this thesis were to (1) integrate the feeler, infrared, and LiDAR-based tree sensing systems in the berm-leveling machine to make the soil excavating head's movement independent, (2) measure the impact of finger weeder-based …

Understanding Writing Center’S Motivations For Creating And Providing Online Writing Resources: A Qualitative Study, Mackenzie K. Croley

All Theses

This research-based thesis documents the process of creating online writing resources. The data was collected from an IRB-approved study where I interviewed writing center directors about how their centers have created and maintained online writing resources to support students. After conducting interviews, I share the results of the study about each center’s creation and maintenance practices. I discuss the labor that this type of project takes and how those centers have supported this process by using staff from all roles within the center. I explore how the online resources build ethos for the center. Finally, I explain how these online …

Performance Of Inline Compression With Software Caching For Reducing The Memory Footprint In Pysdc, Emily Lattanzio

All Theses

The volume of data required for High Performance Computing (HPC) applications is growing faster than the memory storage available to store the required data, leading to performance bottlenecks in transferring data. Whether sending data from main memory to computation nodes or between parallel processes during runtime, the more data there is to send, the longer it will take to for that data to be sent from one location to the next. Hence the need for inline data compression, which reduces the amount of allocated memory needed by storing the largest data structures in a compressed format and decompressing/recompressing single variables …

Sacred Grounds: A Risk Assessment Framework Developed For Historic African American Cemeteries Threatened By Sea Level Rise In Georgetown, Sc, Jocelyn Patterson

All Theses

ABSTRACT

This study acknowledges historic African American cemeteries as vital cultural and historical landmarks that preserve the stories and traditions of often overlooked communities. However, coastal cemeteries, particularly in Georgetown, South Carolina, face increasing environmental threats. These burial sites risk severe damage or complete loss as climate change accelerates from sea level rise, flooding, storm surges, neglect, development pressure, and land development.

This research develops and considers a risk assessment framework to address the risks of cemeteries proximity to water, elevation, flood risk, and cultural significance. The research employs Geographic Information Systems (GIS) mapping, historical records, and site analysis to …

Tradespace Exploration With Statistical Modeling Techniques And Immersive Visual Representation In Virtual Environments, Nikhil Raj

All Theses

Statistical modeling techniques combined with virtual reality (VR) visualization offer powerful new approaches to tradespace exploration in engineering design. The research presented addresses the challenge of analyzing and communicating insights from complex multidimensional datasets, particularly for autonomous ground vehicle systems.

Beginning with a review of statistical methods—including Principal Component Analysis (PCA), Analysis of Variance (ANOVA), and correlation analysis—the study examines their applications in tradespace exploration. Building on this foundation, three distinct visualization pathways connecting MATLAB data to virtual environments are developed and evaluated: VRML representation, STL conversion, and Blender integration. Each approach is assessed for its ability to maintain data …

Biodegradable Active Packaging: Exploring The Antimicrobial Efficacy And Compostability Of Chitosan-Based Films, Rachel Mchugh

All Theses

The overarching purpose of this experiment is to create an active packaging component that has both antimicrobial and biodegradable properties specifically designed for poultry food products. For the scope of this study, the packaging component created would theoretically be used in conjunction with another material, such as a poultry tray which are commonly used for fresh poultry products. Based on the scope and purpose of this experiment, biopolymer films and coatings were considered after the initial literature review. Due to the goals of the packaging component, chitosan, a polysaccharide shown to have antimicrobial properties and an inherent ability to biodegrade, …

Anaerobic Soil Disinfestation As A Non-Chemical Management Option Against Fungi And Heterotrophic Bacteria In Organic Sweetpotato Production, Meredith Tucker

All Theses

North Carolina is the largest producer of sweetpotatoes in the United States, with South Carolina increasing farming acreage to 2,501 in 2022 compared to 1,300 in 2017. Growers producing conventional and organic sweetpotatoes are equally challenged with managing fungal pathogens due to fungicide resistance or fungicides being unavailable due to environmental regulations, leading many to shift to growing organic crops. Anaerobic soil disinfestation (ASD) is a non-chemical pre-plant management option that uses a carbon amendment, irrigation, and plasticulture to establish an anaerobic environment in soils, killing soil microbes. A greenhouse study was conducted to assess ASD on fungal pathogens and …

Investigation Of Plm Utilities And Concepts In Engineering Curriculum: Challenges And Opportunities, Frederick Rowell

All Theses

The implementation of Product Lifecycle Management (PLM) tools and concepts in engineering education has gained increasing significance as manufacturing and engineering industry shifts towards digital engineering workflows to enhance collaboration, efficiency, and innovation. Despite its typical application in engineering industries, many mechanical engineering programs have not integrated PLM software into their curriculums. The Product Lifecycle Management Center (PLMC) at Clemson University offers PLM workshops and research opportunities to students. Despite these initiatives, PLM education remains largely extracurricular and is not fully incorporated into required coursework within the mechanical engineering curriculum. The objective of this thesis is to explore the role …

Blockchain-Integrated Version Control For Secure And Transparent Software Supply Chains, Iwinosa W. Aideyan

All Theses

The software supply chain encompasses all stages of software development and delivery from initial coding and version control to integration and deployment. As development environments become increasingly distributed and reliant on external dependencies, ensuring the integrity, auditability, and consistency of code changes has become a pressing challenge. Traditional version control systems like Git, while effective for collaboration and tracking revisions, do not inherently provide tamper-evident commit histories. Features such as history rewriting (e.g., git rebase, git push --force) can be exploited to manipulate commit logs without detection, posing risks in security-sensitive domains. This thesis proposes a blockchain-integrated version control framework …

Bim-Based Automated System For Carbon Emissions And Construction Costs Estimation (Bas-Cc) In Modular Design And Production, Roshan Bandiwadekar

All Theses

Modular construction adopts a manufacturing-like construction process, enhancing the management of embodied carbon emissions in production and construction phases. However, estimating these emissions presents challenges due to the involvement of diverse stakeholders across various lifecycle stages. Additionally, cost considerations often influence design choices and material selections in modular constructions, neglecting the impact of embodied carbon emissions. To address these challenges, we present a proof-of-concept for an automated Building Information Modeling (BIM)-based system to estimate both carbon emissions and construction costs. This system automates the calculation of embodied carbon and cost implications of different modular designs and materials, enabling informed decision-making. …

Cloud-Native Mucad For Design Reviews, Emily C. Petty

All Theses

This research explores the potential of a cloud-native multi-user computer-aided design (MUCAD) system to improve communication and efficiency during engineering design reviews and shorten the design timeline for military tools. First, a literature review is used to generate a list of thirty-five collaboration-oriented requirements that aim to ensure concurrency, annotations, heterogeneity, security, IP protection, version control, and viewing within a MUCAD system. A comparative evaluation of existing collaborative CAD system architectures, including cloud-native, cloud-enabled, and a single-user system with external file sharing, is conducted to determine how well each system architecture fulfills the generated collaboration-oriented requirements. Following this, a survey …

Algebraic Properties Of Boolean Models, Harrison Fisher

All Theses

Boolean models are n-tuples of polynomial functions in n variables over the finite field of order 2. These models define finite dynamical systems which are used for modeling many different biological systems such as gene regulatory networks. These systems can be defined by updating every function synchronously, or by updating one function at a time asynchronously. In this project, we discuss a method for reverse engineering the model space of all Boolean models which fit a set of partial asynchronous data. This method is a generalization of a known method for synchronous data. In addition, we show that given the …

Novel Methods For Assessing And Prioritizing Road-Stream Crossings For Aquatic Organism Passage, Lesley E. Twiner

All Theses

Anthropogenic barriers such as dams and culverts have led to riverine habitat fragmentation and decreased fish diversity worldwide. Low-head structures such as culverts are far more abundant than large dams and may have a larger cumulative impact on river connectivity. Many efforts to inventory road crossing barriers and prioritize removal and restoration efforts do not consider temporal variation in flow. We used cameras to gain continuous water level monitoring data to quantify the relationship between precipitation events and outlet drop height. In the spring of 2024, we selected 25 culvert sites in upstate South Carolina and set up cameras to …

Gene Editing Combined With Apap Diet-Mediated Selection In A Ldlr-/- Mouse Model Of Familial Hypercholesterolemia, Pramita Suresh

All Theses

Cell-based gene therapy has garnered significant interest in treating familial hypercholesterolemia (FH), an autosomal co-dominant disorder characterized by elevated low-density lipoprotein cholesterol (LDL-C) levels. However, achieving a therapeutic threshold level of engraftment of gene-modified cells is a significant hurdle. In FH, as in most liver diseases, the transplantation of healthy gene-modified hepatocytes does not result in a selective advantage for the healthy hepatocytes over native hepatocytes for clonal expansion in the liver. In FH, as in most liver diseases, the transplantation of healthy gene-modified hepatocytes does not provide a selective advantage for the healthy hepatocytes over native hepatocytes regarding clonal …

Defining Fidelity For Tradespace Application, Aditya Agrawal

All Theses

This research proposes a definition of tradespace fidelity and presents a study on its effectiveness in the tradespace. Tradespace exploration helps evaluate various design options, allowing engineers to make informed decisions in early design stages. Fidelity generally refers to how closely a model approximates reality. However, the definition of fidelity has been inconsistently defined and interpreted in various contexts concerning particular problems. In some cases, it is a measure of accuracy; in others, information; in another, uncertainty; and in others, computational complexity. Fidelity is poorly and inconsistently defined in the literature. In general, higher fidelity models tend to be more …

A Parametric Study Of Compact Wind Borne Debris In Tornadoes, Akash Yadav

All Theses

Debris lofted and transported by tornadoes is a significant source of damage during these storms. Several approaches have been taken to model such debris flight, ranging in complexity from fine-scale CFD simulations to coupling the compact debris flight equations with simplified analytic models for the tornado vortex. Both approaches have their merits, though the latter comes with significantly lower computational costs. Despite the simplifications, this second approach has successfully captured details of debris flight events established in post-tornado forensic surveys. Herein, we take advantage of the low computational cost of the latter approach to undertake a detailed parametric study of …

Divergence-Free Smoothed Particle Hydrodynamics In A Stream Digital Twin, Austin Hartley

All Theses

Digital Twins (DT) are being explored by the South Carolina (SC) water community to simulate how SC streams will flow at various water levels. Currently, a DT called Gilligan simulates these streams utilizing weakly-incompressible Smoothed Particle Hydrodynamics (SPH). This method does not strictly enforce incompressibility, which leads to unrealistic water flows and unwanted visual artifacts that require post-processing effects to hide. To address these problems and simulate more realistic water flows, the Gilligan stream logic is updated and a state-of-the-art SPH method that enforces incompressibility—Divergence-Free SPH (DFSPH)—is implemented within the Gilligan framework. DFSPH is able to make use of two …