Digital Commons Network^™

Experimental And Simulation Of Compression After Impact (Cai) Tests For Thermoplastic Composite Materials, M. M. Shahzamanian, Sydney Houck, Li Ai, Md Mushfiqur Rahman Fahim, Sourav Banerjee, Wout De Backer, Paul Ziehl

Civil Engineering Faculty Publications

Damage caused by low velocity impacts in composite materials may go undetected, resulting in significant damage being unnoticeable. This phenomenon has been studied using experiments and simulations on a typical composite material, Toray T1225 LM-PAEK UD Tape, following impacts with varying energy levels. To the authors’ knowledge, there is a lack of information on thermoplastics and compression after impact (CAI) in the publicly available literature, and there have been insufficient results and discussions regarding CAI tests on thermoplastic composite materials at the relatively high levels of impact used, especially with the rise in the use of thermoplastic materials for the …

“Take Eight Bits And Call Me In The Morning” Video Games, Well-Being, And The Psychology Of Nostalgia, Nicholas Bowman

Media Studies - All Scholarship

For nearly 60 years, video games have arrested the attention of players, inviting us to interact and interface with on-screen content. More than just short-term entertainment experiences, video games are part of a broader cultural milieu—they are the most profitable media entertainment sector (global revenues nearly $400 billion USD in 2023) with more than 3.5 billion players globally (Clement, 2023). Similar to other entertainment media, some video game intellectual properties have transcended generations and, in many cases, grown beyond the medium itself: common cultural touchstones include Super Mario Bros. and Sonic the Hedgehog, along with seemingly endless subcultures of devoted …

J.A.C. Redford’S Variations On The Incarnation: Looking Back And Forward With Piano Theme And Variations, Nathaniel Brown

Honors Program: Senior Projects (Public)

This senior thesis consists of a lecture recital and research regarding the development of the theme and variations form in piano literature. It will trace the way the types of pieces that use theme and variations have developed from era to era and composer to composer. The culminating lecture recital will present my research on the topic and will end with a performance of J.A.C. Redford’s Variations on the Incarnation, one of the most recently published theme and variations pieces for solo piano. Redford’s piece was commissioned by Dr. Paul Barnes.

The composers and pieces featured in this project …

What Lawyers Could Learn From The Corporate Practice Of Medicine, Melissa D. Mortazavi

Faculty Articles

Proponents of the United States’ domestic experiments in non-lawyer ownership (NLO) of legal practice justify them in terms of increasing “access to justice.” But what if opening ownership of legal practice to investment capital only exacerbates market failures (leading to further consolidation and increased costs to clients), while also compromising professional autonomy and fiduciary duty? The legal profession must be clear-eyed about who are the real winners and losers of such a shift and avoid being blinded by wishful thinking. Prominent legal scholars have repeatedly touted NLO as a solution to the access to justice crisis. However, there is scant …

Artificial Intelligence And The Hipaa Privacy Rule: A Primer, Stacey A. Tovino

Faculty Articles

No abstract provided.

Homelands Not Graveyards, M. Alexander Pearl

Faculty Articles

Within the last five years, the U.S. Supreme Court has taken up several transformative cases affecting Native nations and federal Indian law jurisprudence. The Supreme Court’s decision in Arizona v. Navajo Nation is no different. This Article examines that decision and situates it within that legal history as well as the realities of present-day water resource availability. While recent decisions have shown the Court’s willingness to confirm fundamental components of federal Indian law, such as the legal tests for determining the persistence of reservation and the authority of Congress to enact the Indian Child Welfare Act, the Court’s examination of …

An Unreliable Reporter, Jon J. Lee

Faculty Articles

As part of the legal profession’s tradition of self-regulation, attorneys have an ethical obligation to ensure that those within it are fit to practice. Given the gravity associated with accusing another lawyer of misconduct, it is not surprising that many are reticent to speak up. But what would happen if attorneys were pressured to vigorously pursue sanctions against their opponents, even if those sanctions may be unwarranted? President Trump’s recently-issued memorandum arguably does just that, mandating the Attorney General to seek court and disciplinary sanctions for lawyers and law firms that appear to violate ethics rules. This Essay explains how …

The First Amendment, Global Corporate Responsibility Standards, & The Quest For Online "Speech Nirvana", Evelyn Aswad

Faculty Articles

With large and powerful social media companies operating as worldwide speech regulators, it is unsurprising that governments have attempted to not only regulate how these companies address platform speech but also pressure them to deliver preferred speech outcomes. In 2024, the Supreme Court decided two cases addressing both themes in the U.S. context. In Moody v. NetChoice, the Court explained how legislation regulating private platform curation of usergenerated content runs afoul of First Amendment protections. And, in Murthy v. Missouri, the Court appeared to erect significant hurdles to challenging alleged governmental coercion of such platforms. These cases have left many …

Increasing Congressional Oversight Of Fisa Section 702 After Risaa, Noah C. Chauvin

Faculty Articles

In April of 2024, Congress passed the Reforming Intelligence and Securing America Act ("RISAA"). This bill reauthorized Section 702 of the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act ("FISA'), an important counterterrorism authority that was intended to make it easier for the government to spy on foreign terrorists but which has been repeatedly abused to spy on Americans. While RISAA enacted modest surveillance reforms, it also included substantial expansions of the government's spying powers. Moreover, it largely left intact the existing oversight regime for Section 702, which is deficient as a matter of law, policy, and fact.

This article assesses the extent to …

Insider Trading & Unconstitutionally Complelled Speech, Steven J. Cleveland

Faculty Articles

The Supreme Court has recently weaponized the First Amendment to invalidate economic regulations. Consequently, the Court’s current analytical framework risks invalidating as unconstitutional certain speech compelled by Congress and the SEC to combat insider trading.

The government may compel speech to combat fraud, and many courts and commentators view insider trading as a fraud against the counterparty to the insider’s trade. Today, the government primarily resorts to Section 10(b) of the Securities Exchange Act of 1934 and its implementing regulations, including Rule 10b-5, to combat insider trading. Those regulations prohibit deceptive conduct and do not directly compel speech. Interestingly, in …

An Empirical Exploration Of A Jury Veto, Stephen E. Henderson, Vanessa A. Edkins, Matthew L. Jensen

Faculty Articles

Among the many contemporary dissatisfactions with American criminal justice are longstanding concerns relating to the scarcity of jury trials and the resulting lack of democratic oversight and control in the adjudicative process. A novel solution has recently been proposed in the form of a ‘jury veto’: perhaps a jury could be empaneled, prototypically if not exclusively by defense request, that would be empowered to select between the judicially-imposed sentence and a prosecutorial and defense alternative. We conduct the first empirical exploration of such a structure and find reason to believe it could lessen the disconnect between the American framing vision …

Confessions Of A National Security Lawyer, Noah C. Chauvin

Faculty Articles

In part one of this paper, an unidentified national security lawyer tells all. In part two, I explain why the overclassification issues part one satirizes have important implications for the democratic accountability of intelligence agencies, using examples of classification abuses related to Section 702 of the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act.

Zorro: Everyperson's Moral Vigilante, Stephen E. Henderson

Faculty Articles

Zorro (Amazon 2024) is hundreds of years in the making—from medieval ballads of Robin Hood; to the fiction of Alexandre Dumas, Baroness Orczy, and the legend of Mexican bandits; to the Johnston McCulley 1919 original; to comics like Daredevil and Batman; to scores of Zorro derivatives from the minds of McCulley, Walt Disney, and many others. At this point, it would be impossible to identify and duly credit the countless inspirations that together form this early-California vigilante. But such rich heritage might provide something more than literature and entertainment: if there is an everyperson’s conception of a moral vigilante, Zorro …

The Economic Cost Of Exclusion: How Trump's Second-Term Immigration Policies Threaten California's Economy, Kit Johnson

Faculty Articles

The second Trump administration has pursued an array of immigration enforcement initiatives—from denaturalization and visa scrutiny to termination of humanitarian programs and aggressive workplace raids. Legal scholars have sharply debated these measures, but almost entirely through constitutional, statutory, and rights-based frames. This Article exposes a critical omission in immigration law scholarship: the economics of large-scale noncitizen removal. Drawing on major empirical studies of historic enforcement episodes—including Mexican repatriation between 1929-1934, Japanese internment during World War II, Arizona’s immigration restrictionism from 2007-2012, and federal immigration enforcement efforts of 2008-2015—this Article demonstrates that broad noncitizen removals may reduce the employment and wages …

Can States Force Ice To Take Off The Masks?, Noah C. Chauvin

Faculty Articles

No. But that does not mean they are entirely powerless to combat the practice.

In Defense Of Pardons, Stephen E. Henderson

Faculty Articles

Pardons by the past two U.S. presidents—one Democratic and one Republican—have caused some to question the wisdom of executive clemency. American criminal justice is imperfect, such critics of course recognize, but here the cure might be worse than the disease. If pardons have become the playthings of would-be monarchs and tyrants, perhaps it is time to let them go. As a strong proponent of role-reversible criminal justice, I am sympathetic to this view—even in mercy, why is the decision of the single elite supplanting the will of the people? Still, I write in pardons’ defense. Not only are pardons an …

Undocumented Eldercare, Llc, Kit Johnson

Faculty Articles

Americans are aging. Within five years, 20% of the U.S. population will be over the age of 65. In the next 25 years, the number ofcitizens over the age of 80 is expected to triple.

Many older Americans, particularly the oldest, need help with daily lifeeverything from dressing and showering to cooking and cleaning. Assistance, however, is hard to come by. At-home caregivers are expensive. Institutional settings, also expensive, are routinely understaffed.

Thousands of noncitizens provide eldercare in home and institutional settings. Many of these noncitizens have work authorization pursuant to Temporary Protected Status (TPS), an immigration program that President …

The Difference A Year Makes: The Admissibility Of Expert Opinion Testimony Under The 2023 Amendment To Federal Rule Of Evidence 702, Daniel J. Capra, Liesa L. Richter

Other Faculty Publications

No abstract provided.

Contested Sovereignty And Jurisdictional Flux In Oklahoma Indian Country 2025, Darla Jackson

Other Faculty Publications

No abstract provided.

Space Resource Development And Property - Clarifying Usufruct, Jeremy A. Kent

Journal of Air Law and Commerce

This article examines competing legal frameworks for governing property rights in outer-space resources through a comparative analysis of two distinct approaches: the rule of capture and the concept of usufruct. The increasing interest in commercial space activities, such as mining the Moon and asteroids, has raised questions about the legal frameworks governing property rights in space resources. The growing challenge is that while the Outer Space Treaty (OST) serves as the foundation for space law, it does not explicitly address property rights in the resources humankind increasingly can extract from the space domain.

The rule of capture is a legal …

Dangers From Regulatory Vacuums In Outer, Inner, And Near Space, Rob Frieden

Journal of Air Law and Commerce

Space, “the final frontier,” has become an attractive but increasingly risky market for both public and private investments. Gold rush enthusiasm anticipates solutions to the digital divide via small low earth orbiting satellites, extraction of valuable minerals from asteroids, a vibrant space launch and tourism industry, and expanding earth observation opportunities. Such entrepreneurial boldness juxtaposes with a severe lag in government oversight, consumer safeguards, and essential operational guardrails. The ambitious plans of Elon Musk and other space entrepreneurs could fail—despite recent market success—as SpaceX’s plans for 148 rocket launches in 2024.

Without substantial refinement of global space treaties and effective …

Roaring Skies: The Law Of Supersonic Commercial Flight And Arguments For Its Return, Caleb S. Dorris

Journal of Air Law and Commerce

The prospect of supersonic commercial flight is no longer confined to history; it is reemerging as a viable transportation model in the 21st century. With major airlines placing orders for next-generation supersonic aircraft and regulatory agencies, including the Federal Aviation Administration (FAA) and the International Civil Aviation Organization (ICAO), reconsidering longstanding restrictions, the return of supersonic flight is imminent. This article examines the legal, regulatory, and policy considerations that have shaped supersonic aviation’s trajectory and explores the challenges that remain for its full reintroduction into global airspace.

First, this article surveys the historical rise and fall of supersonic passenger aviation, …

Airplane!: Does The Federal Aviation Act Preempt State Law Design Defect Claims?, Max Birmingham

Journal of Air Law and Commerce

Which level of government—state or federal—has jurisdiction to set safety standards for aviation defect design is a nuanced issue. Generally speaking, federal law preempts state law in this context by occupying the field through a regulatory scheme that permeates aviation safety. The Federal Aviation Act of 1958 (FAAct) confers its namesake agency—the Federal Aviation Administration (FAA)—the powers to prescribe the “minimum standards required in the interest of safety.” The word “minimum” has been seized upon by those on the state side of the debate to advocate that it means the floor. And they contend that those in the Union have …

Flight Path To Accountability: A Legal Comparison Of Boeing’S Shortcomings, Airbus’S Successes, And International Aviation Safety Regulations, Riley M. Wagstaff

Journal of Air Law and Commerce

Investigations following two separate and deadly crashes of Boeing 737 8 Max aircraft revealed that America’s most trusted manufacturer had failed to notify pilots and airliners alike of a new Maneuvering Characteristics Augmentation System, commonly known as MCAS. What had first seemed like an accident unfortunately had a deeper and traceable history. Through relatively new United States legislation, Boeing was essentially permitted to oversee their own operations and grant airworthiness certifications for their own aircrafts. This practice is wholly unlike the detailed certification process of the European manufacturing giant, AirBus, by the European Aviation Safety Administration (EASA). This comment sheds …

High Crimes In Low Airspace: The Rise Of Drones In Cross-Border Drug Trafficking, Hannah Haight

Journal of Air Law and Commerce

Can the United States effectively regulate its airspace when criminal actors exploit it without entering traditional territorial channels? Mexican drug trafficking organizations increasingly deploy drones to deliver narcotics across the U.S.–Mexico border. These flights often occur at low altitudes, at night, and in remote areas, which renders them nearly undetectable by conventional enforcement methods. Yet, no statute squarely addresses the use of drones in cross-border drug trafficking. The Federal Aviation Administration (FAA) regulates drones under the FAA Modernization and Reform Act of 2012, but its mandate is safety, not interdiction. The result? A growing technological asymmetry: criminal cartels innovate, while …

Let’S Jettison Some Executive Perks: Exploring The Sec And Irs Approaches To Personal Use Of Corporate Aircraft, Christine Lane

Journal of Air Law and Commerce

In 2023, 46% of the S&P 500 companies provided personal use of corporate aircraft to their chief executive officers, and 31% provided this perk to other named executive officers. This type of executive compensation has notoriously garnered much attention from the media, given the large amount of investor money spent on personal travel and the environmental impacts of flying private. In addition, the line between personal travel and business travel is often blurred, and the media has tracked flight paths of corporate aircraft to speculate that some flights may be incorrectly categorized as business trips when the jets land and …

Air Strikes In Myanmar - An Analysis Under International Law, Jacob Davis

Journal of Air Law and Commerce

Since the Russian invasion of Ukraine in 2022, and the reignited Israel-Palestine conflict in 2023, international law regulating the use of air power has been put to the test. The use of air strikes in civilian areas has put this shortcoming at the forefront of conversation about the use of force, and what constitutes a war crime in modern conflict.

This conversation has centered around the two aforementioned conflicts but has left other international disputes out of the discussion. In particular the civil war in Myanmar, a bloody conflict which follows decades of ethnic violence, political stratification, and a successful …

Learning From Mistakes: A Quantitative Comparative Study Of Court Decisions Involving The Excuse Of Contractual Mistake, Brian Mccall

Faculty Articles

In almost two decades of teaching Contracts law to first year law students, I have found one of the hardest doctrines to teach to be the excuse of mistake, both mutual and unilateral Students typically express the frustration that they cannot articulate a clear standard to determine when a party’s claim of an excusing mistake will succeed or fail. This frustration with the doctrine seems to be thousands of years old. After years of struggling to teach this topic, I resolved to dig deeper into the caselaw to see if any trends could be observed that would help dispel some …

Acc 362: Cryptoassets & Accounting Implications, Sean Stein Smith

Open Educational Resources

AI Policy and course materials (case studies) for course ACC 362: Cryptoassets & Accounting Implications.

Arh 167 Tradition And Innovation In The Art Of The West (Introductory Art History Course), Sharon L. Jordan

Open Educational Resources

In this OER section of the course Tradition and Innovation in the Arts of the West, students will be introduced to arts of different styles and time periods spanning the ancient world to the beginning of the modern era focusing mainly on the development of Western art within a global context.