Digital Commons Network^™

Who Owns Land, Who Owns Language? Challenging The Commercialization Of Indigenous Language Data, Matthew Riemland

Maya America: Journal of Essays, Commentary, and Analysis

As Indigenous scholars and activists have pointed out, the commercialization of Indigenous language data resembles the historical and ongoing dispossession of Indigenous land. Using Mayan languages as a case study, this article illustrates the process by which digital advertising platforms – Google and Meta – appropriate and benefit commercially from Indigenous language data, drawing parallels with the dispossession of Indigenous land. It identifies the significant costs of this commercialization to Indigenous communities, including the lack of compensation for the Indigenous language data’s commercial value, the distortion of Indigenous communities’ linguistic and cultural representation online, and the reinforcement of extractive relationships …

La Violencia: Family Stories Of Labor, War, And Migration, Gabriela Merida

Maya America: Journal of Essays, Commentary, and Analysis

Gabriela Merida, a doctoral student at the University of Albany and a child of Guatemalan Maya refugees, interviews her grandmother and father about their lives in Guatemala and their subsequent experiences as migrants in the United States. Through life history interviews with each of them, Merida examines how foreign intervention shaped the economic and political realities that compelled them to migrate. She employs Giovanni Batz’s (2024) concept of the four invasions as an analytic frame to demonstrate how the historical arc of colonization, the plantation economy, the Guatemalan Civil War, and capitalism produce compounding forms of structural and quotidian violence …

Rethinking Teacher Education Programs: (Mis)Understanding Of Culturally Responsive Teaching Among Teacher Candidates, Shirley M. Sommers

Northwest Journal of Teacher Education

This article draws from a study conducted on pre-service teachers enrolled in a teacher education program. The study examines students’ understanding and misunderstanding of what constitutes culturally responsive teaching. This is a mixed methods study. A Likert-type survey and qualitative questionnaires were used to collect data. Descriptive statistics were used to analyze survey data, and a thematic coding method was used for analysis of qualitative data. The results of the study show that pre-service teachers are aware and knowledgeable of the term culturally responsive teaching as the term is widely used in the teacher education program in which they were …

Assessing The Impact Dynamics Of Less Lethal Ammunition, Steven Bermejo

Student Theses

Less-lethal ammunition is widely used by law enforcement as an alternative to lethal force during crowd control, on-street confrontations, and other situations requiring force. Although these projectiles are intended to reduce risk of fatal injury, serious injuries and fatalities have been reported, highlighting the need to better understand the factors that influence their impact behavior. This study evaluated the impact dynamics of four types of 12-gauge less-lethal ammunition, including rubber buckshot, single rubber ball, double rubber ball, and Byrna kinetic projectile, using kinetic energy calculations derived from projectile mass and velocity measurements. In addition, Attenuated Total Reflectance Fourier Transform Infrared …

The Effect Of Background Music On Cognitive Performance In The Stroop Task, Jakob A. Clegg

McNair Scholars Research

This experimental study aims to explore the effects of background music on cognitive performance and attention using the Stroop task. The Stroop task was first introduced by psychologist John Ridley Stroop, demonstrating how automatic processes, like reading, can interfere with controlled tasks, such as naming ink colors. Participants were tasked with correctly associating ink colors and color words. These words would differentiate between incongruent, color words different from the ink color, and congruent, color words matching the ink color. Using PsyToolKit to administer the Stroop task and Google Forms for participant intake, participants (n = 36) listened to a vocal …

Physical Activity, Trauma, And Posttraumatic Stress: The Indirect Role Of Exercise Addiction, Anastasiia Rozumna

Theses and Dissertations

Exercise is often conceptualized as a protective factor for mental health, including for individuals exposed to trauma. However, less is known about whether exercise may relate to posttraumatic stress symptoms differently when it is accompanied by compulsive or addictive features. The present study examined whether volume and intensity of physical activity were associated with posttraumatic stress symptom severity indirectly through exercise addiction symptoms. This secondary cross-sectional analysis included 557 adults living in the United States who reported regular participation in sport or physical activity. Participants completed self-report measures of physical activity behavior, exercise addiction symptoms, trauma exposure, and posttraumatic stress …

A Systematic Review Of Posttraumatic Stress Disorder Among Hispanic Immigrants In The United States, Rashel Acireale

Theses and Dissertations

This study systematically reviews the literature on posttraumatic stress disorder (PTSD) among Hispanic immigrants in the United States, a population exposed to cumulative trauma across the migration process. Stressors may occur before, during, and after migration and include violence, family separation, dangerous travel conditions, discrimination, and fear of deportation. Despite these risks, findings on PTSD prevalence remain mixed, and Hispanic immigrants are underrepresented in clinical research and culturally informed interventions. This review examines sample representation, types and timing of trauma, PTSD measurement approaches, and the inclusion of cultural and contextual factors such as acculturation and immigration-related stress. It also evaluates …

Dry After-Ripening Increases Germination Of Critically Imperilled Physaria Thamnophila (Zapata Bladderpod), Christopher A. Gabler, Jerald T. Garrett

School of Earth, Environmental, & Marine Sciences Faculty Publications

Effective endangered plant conservation and recovery require empirical knowledge of seed dormancy release and responses to post-collection handling, yet such information is lacking for many rare taxa. Physaria thamnophila (Zapata bladderpod; Brassicaceae), a critically imperilled (G1) species endemic to southern Texas, USA, is poorly studied, and basic questions regarding seed storage and germination remain unresolved. We evaluated the effects of short-term cool-storage duration (14–180 d), storage temperature (refrigeration vs. freezing), dry after-ripening and maternal plant identity on germination probability and timing in P. thamnophila. Dry after-ripening and increased cool-storage duration consistently increased germination and shortened germination time, whereas storage temperature …

Evaluating Gender Equity In The Berenstain Bears Picture Books, Christy Tisnawijaya, Geni Kurniati

Bahasa dan Seni: Jurnal Bahasa, Sastra, Seni, dan Pengajarannya

Picture books serve as a foundational medium in early childhood education, utilizing interrelated visual and verbal elements to foster linguistic, cognitive, and social development. Despite their pedagogical utility, certain literary works inadvertently perpetuate traditional gender roles, constraining children's conceptualizations of identity. This study evaluates gender representation within eleven selected titles of The Berenstain Bears series. Employing a qualitative multimodal content analysis, the study integrates Butler's gender performativity framework (1990), Callow's multimodal narrative approach (2020), and Adam and Harper's evaluative criteria (2021) to examine how domestic, social, and recreational roles are constructed. This study offers novelty by establishing a dual-lens multimodal …

Real Bullets, Plastic Guns: Evaluating The Strength Of 3-D Printed Gun Parts, Maria Latenia Mayol

Student Theses

Privately made firearms (PMFs), often referred to as “ghost guns,” are firearms manufactured or assembled by individuals rather than federally licensed manufacturers. Although the terms are frequently used interchangeably, “ghost gun” more specifically describes an unserialized firearm, whereas PMFs include a broader range of firearms produced through nontraditional manufacturing methods. PMFs may be entirely 3-D printed, assembled from partially completed firearm kits, or constructed by integrating additively manufactured components with commercially manufactured firearm parts. The increasing accessibility of additive manufacturing and widespread dissemination of computer-aided design files have raised concerns about concealment, regulation, and forensic evasion, particularly when factory-manufactured components …

Spatial Abilities In Down Syndrome: A Comparison Of Mental Rotation And Perspective Taking, Edward C. Merrill, Yingying Jennifer Yang, Frances Conners, Beverly Roskos, Stephanie Grinshpun, Samantha Zakrzewski, Matthew Baker

Department of Psychology Faculty Scholarship and Creative Works

Introduction: Mental rotation and spatial perspective taking are two key spatial abilities and are integral to one's everyday life. This study compared performance on these two abilities between adolescents and young adults with Down syndrome (DS) and typically developing (TD) children.

Methods: Twenty-three participants with DS and twenty-three TD children were matched using Raven's progressive matrices ability scores. Two experimental tasks measured each spatial ability, and combined scores were calculated for mental rotation and perspective-taking, respectively.

Results: Participants with DS did not differ significantly from their TD counterparts in perspective-taking. However, the groups differed significantly in mental rotation, with participants …

The Computed Microwave Spectrum Of The Protonated Fullerene C60H+, Laszlo Nemes, Jos Oomens, Vincent J. Esposito, Vincent Boudon, Alexander G. G. M. Tielens

Biology, Chemistry, and Environmental Sciences Faculty Articles and Research

The largest known molecule in the interstellar medium of galaxies, C₆₀, has been detected in its neutral and cationic form through its vibrational, UV-driven fluorescence emission spectrum and its electronic absorption spectrum, respectively. The detection of several polycyclic aromatic hydrocarbon molecules through their pure rotation spectrum in cold, dense, molecular cloud cores suggests that C₆₀ might be present in these environments as well. The low flux of UV pumping photons in molecular cloud cores and the absence of suitably bright background stars, make detection of C₆₀ and its cation through the commonly used methods impractical. As …

Automated Flim-Fret Segmentation Within Rnp Condensates, Noah D Powell, Joshua M Marcus, Leyla E Fahim, Jason E Lee

Faculty, Staff and Students Publications

Ribonucleoprotein (RNP) condensates are membraneless organelles that exist alongside many RNA-driven processes, such as transcription and splicing. Despite their ubiquity, the biological necessity of forming a condensed phase remains unclear, particularly because the same RNP components exist both within these organelles and in the surrounding dilute phase. Most current methods for studying biochemical interaction dynamics within condensates rely on in vitro reconstitution of minimal factors or low-throughput single-molecule studies. However, RNP condensates are complex organelles containing tens to hundreds of proteins and hundreds to thousands of different RNAs. Here, we describe a scalable, high-throughput fluorescence microscopy–based approach to analyze protein–protein …

The 2025 Measles Outbreak In Texas, Tamer Oraby, Martial L. Ndeffo-Mbah

School of Mathematical & Statistical Sciences Faculty Publications

Background: In 2025, Texas experienced its largest measles outbreak in decades, reporting 762 cases by mid-August. Measles is a highly contagious but vaccine-preventable infection transmitted mainly among unvaccinated individuals and capable of causing severe outcomes.

Methods: We investigate counterfactual measles control scenarios based on daycare and school closures and reactive vaccination of infants and children, including mixed interventions. We analyze the 2025 Texas outbreak using an age-structured multi-stage SEIR model formulated as a system of ordinary differential equations. The model is fit to case data using Bayesian inference to estimate the effective reproduction number and generate posterior predictive trajectories under …

Childhood Cancer Predisposition Study: A Prospective Registry And Biorepository Protocol, Melissa R Perrino, Suzanne P Macfarland, Luke Maese, Jennie Vagher, Junne Kamihara, Surya Rednam, Philip J Lupo, Garrett M Brodeur, Joshua Schiffman, Lisa Diller, Lauren Desrosiers-Battu, Sharon E Plon, Kim E Nichols, Samuel L Volchenboum, David Malkin, Anita Villani, Christopher C Porter

Faculty, Staff and Students Publications

Introduction: Cancer is the most common cause of disease-related mortality in children, highlighting the urgent need for improved care in this population. It is estimated that >15% of children diagnosed with cancer harbour a germline pathogenic variant in a cancer predisposition gene which confers an increased risk to develop cancer. There are over 100 genes associated with cancer predisposition syndromes (CPSs) and greater availability and acceptability of genetic testing in the last decade has facilitated their recognition in childhood. However, individually, each of these CPSs is rare, impeding robust research and advancement of clinical care. Once a specific CPS is …

Prescription Opioid Misuse Among High School Athletes During The Opioid Prescribing Limit Law Era: Yrbss 2017-2023, Francine R Vega, Andrea J Yatsco, Audrey Sarah Cohen, James R Langabeer, Tiffany Champagne-Langabeer, Rakshitha Vijendra, Christine Bakos-Block

Faculty, Staff and Student Publications

Background/Objectives: School-age athletes occupy a paradoxical position in the adolescent opioid crisis, combining health-oriented activity with elevated risk of sports-related injury and prescription opioid exposure. In response to the opioid epidemic, states enacted opioid prescribing limit laws (OPLLs) beginning in 2016-2017, yet whether these supply-side policies reached high-risk youth subgroups remains unclear. This study evaluated national temporal trends in prescription opioid misuse among U.S. high school students during the period of OPLL implementation and examined differences across athletic participation, concussion history, sex, grade, race/ethnicity, and substance-use profiles.

Methods: Using four biennial waves of the Youth Risk Behavior Surveillance System with …

Characterizing Candidate Blazar Counterparts Of The Ultra-High-Energy Event Km3-230213a, O. Adriani, S. Aiello, A. Albert, A. R. Alhebsi, M. Alshamsi, S. Alves Garre, S. Rani, Et Al.

Michigan Tech Publications

High-energy astrophysical neutrinos serve as crucial messengers for understanding hadronic acceleration processes and identifying the origins of cosmic rays, with blazars among the most promising neutrino sources. The KM3NeT experiment reported the detection of an ultrahigh-energy neutrino with an energy estimate of ∼220 PeV, the most energetic yet observed. The neutrino arrival direction has a 99% confidence region of 3° radius centered at R.A. 94 (Formula presented) .° 3, decl. −7 (Formula presented) .° 8 (J2000). In this work, 17 candidate blazars located within this region are identified. Comprehensive new observations and archival data analysis for these sources are presented. …

Teleportation Game: Quantum Teleportation In Multi-Agent Systems For Interactive Music, Eduardo Miranda

School of Art, Design and Architecture

This paper introduces an interactive music system with quantum musical agents that communicate by teleporting quantum states to one another. Human performers interact in real time with agents whose melodic and rhythmic behaviours are encoded as quantum states using Single Qubit Probability Amplitude Modulation (SQPAM) and structured through Quantum Phase Estimation (QPE). Up to three agents are combined within a single quantum circuit, with directed communication via quantum teleportation. We are interested in supporting ambiguous, transformative interactions reminiscent of free Jazz improvisation. Therefore, rather than treating noise and decoherence as limitations, the system embraces NISQ-era constraints as creative affordances, framing …

The Buildings Of Muslim Al-Majdal Asqalān (Ashqelon) In Their Historical-Geographic And Economic Context, Avraham Sasson

'Atiqot

In the course of the Mamluk and Ottoman periods, six villages were established in the al-Majdal Asqalān area in the southern coastal plain of Palestine, the status of this area enhancing in the 1830s when its geographic and economic advantages were appreciated. The small villages were built on the kurkar ridge slopes with minimal planning, traversed by two or three main arteries adjoined by narrow lanes. The houses were mostly built of mud bricks. Only the central village, al-Majdal Asqalān, developed on flat ground, where there was ample land for construction: most of its buildings were built of kurkar stones. …

The Importance Of An ‘Unimportant’ Toy: Children In The Ancient Domestic Sphere, Rona S. Avissar Lewis

'Atiqot

This paper examines an often-overlooked sector of households: children. The paper first presents the importance of children within the framework of the household and society, pointing out significant references from textual sources and imagery, such as orthostats. Then, a set of artifacts identified in the archaeological record is presented, which may be defined as spinning toys, comprising two components: a string and a perforated object. The conclusions discuss the way these toys reflect on the importance of children in society.

There’S No Place Like Home: Identifying Women In Iron Age Houses, Deborah Cassuto

'Atiqot

From rural farmsteads to urban environments, the excavation of domestic contexts in the Southern Levant provides a rich dataset for investigating how households structured quotidian activities, social interactions, and meanings through spatial organization. This article examines how the material culture of Iron Age dwellings can aid in reconstructing patterns of behavior, social organization and ideologies pertaining to women. Comparing the contextual distribution of archaeological finds with ethnographic, ethnoarchaeological and textual data, can shed light on the use of space in Iron Age households and how this reflects on gender-associated activities and economic behaviors of the individuals who lived there. This …

Editorial, Débora Sandhaus

'Atiqot

No abstract provided.

From Global Principles To National Implementation: The 9th Un Conference And Its Product Safety Resolution, Suruchi ., Kumar Jyotish

International Journal on Consumer Law and Practice

The 9th United Nations Conference on Competition and Consumer Protection of 2025 advanced international consumer protection law by extending its scope. The Product Safety Resolution adopted at the Geneva-based conference is the first binding global resolution on product safety. Addressing the wide scope of problems associated with the emergence of more complex global and online markets, the Resolution presents a set of legal criteria to ensure the safety of goods, liability of defaulting manufacturers, rights of consumers, and the laying out of appropriate procedures. This paper presents a critical evaluation of the normative context of the Resolution and its variation …

The Palestinian Arendtian Condition: Worldlessness In Kanafani’S Men In The Sun, Kareem Alsawalha

Discussions

No abstract provided.

The Palestinian Arendtian Condition: Worldlessness In Kanafani’S Men In The Sun

Discussions

No abstract provided.

Navigating Digital Transformation: Students’ And Lecturers’ Perceptions And Experiences Of Online Teaching In South African Higher Education, Precious Dube, Yolisa Madolo

Jurnal Pendidikan: Teori, Penelitian, dan Pengembangan

The digital transformation of higher education has reshaped teaching and learning practices, but experiences in South African universities remain diverse because of differences in technological access, digital readiness and institutional support. This systematic literature review aimed to examine students' and lecturers’ perceptions and experiences of online teaching and learning in South African tertiary institutions. The review employed studies retrieved from Google Scholar, ERIC, Scopus, and Web of Science. A total of 1253 studies from across the globe were identified and screened using Covidence, resulting in 21 South African studies meeting the inclusion criteria. The selected studies were analysed thematically to …

Td Spec: Topological Helical Embedding Constraints For Hyperbolic Slingshot Manifolds, Christopher L. Eckes

Defensive Publications Series

This specification formalizes a non-perturbative, effective field theory (EFT) governing the topological transformation of a two-dimensional quantum information substrate into macroscopic three-dimensional volumetric space-time metrics. While standard holographic frameworks, such as the Anti-de Sitter/Conformal Field Theory (AdS/CFT) correspondence, establish that boundary data can mathematically define a bulk volume, they often rely on unverified high-dimensional compactifications or free parameters to model local mass-energy tensors.

This paper introduces a coordinate-free, macroscopic dual mechanism: physical matter and spatial geometry emerge natively when a parameter-agnostic 2D viscoelastic fluid membrane experiences localized coordinate compression (The Fold) and asymmetric rotational torque (The Twist). By restricting the …

Genai-Driven Detection Of Infrastructure Role Mutation Using Behavioral Embeddings, Dinesh Verma

Defensive Publications Series

A system and method detect infrastructure role mutation by learning a semantic operational identity for each monitored infrastructure entity from multi-layer runtime telemetry.  The system maintains an adaptive temporal trajectory of each entity's role and detects when that role diverges from its established purpose using semantic distance metrics, without requiring predefined rules, static baselines, or known threat signatures. By incorporating cross-entity graph context, the system distinguishes legitimate orchestrated changes from unauthorized infrastructure repurposing, enabling early detection of role mutation that is invisible to conventional monitoring and security tools.

Malt-Nsom Ground Truth: Integrated Electromagnetic, Thermodynamic, And Acoustic Tensor Dataset For Biophysical Modeling, Daniel Schramm

Defensive Publications Series

Title: MALT-NSOM: A Multi-Physics 3D Tensor Dataset for AI-Driven Oncological Biosensing and Targeted Therapeutics

Abstract:

This dataset provides a high-fidelity, multi-physics ground-truth benchmark for the MALT-NSOM (Metal-Assisted Lossless-Dielectric Nanophotonic Sub-diffraction Optical Microscopy) platform. Unlike noisy clinical datasets, this archive contains 3D tensor fields derived from first-principles Maxwell, Poisson, and Acoustic wave equations. It is designed for researchers developing machine learning models for predictive biomarker detection, sub-cellular diagnostic imaging, and non-invasive therapeutic targeting.

Data Generation & Methodology:

The dataset was constructed using three primary high-performance physics engines:

1. Optics (MEEP/FDTD): 3D Maxwell tensor simulations of a bi-spherical Hafnium Oxide (HfO2) dimer cavity …

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Motion-Driven Audio Instrument With Same-Signal Cadence Lock And Beat-Aligned Handoff To Tempo-Matched Media, Using The User's Own Measured Motion Cycle As A Variable-Length Rhythmic Bridge, Harnek Gulati

Defensive Publications Series

A mobile device continuously synthesizes an audio voice modulated in real time by its own inertial motion, so that a user physically swinging or carrying the device hears themselves as sound. The same inertial signal that drives the synthesis is simultaneously used as the detection carrier for a periodicity estimator, which locks onto the user's repetitive-motion period (gait cadence, arm swing) by folding N recent cycles per candidate period and scoring inter-cycle coherence. Octave ambiguity — the classic step-versus-stride error — is resolved by folding at twice the candidate period and testing the two resulting half-cycles for asymmetry, exploiting the …