Physical Sciences and Mathematics Commons^™

High-Throughput Assessment Of A Novel, Thiol-Acrylate Hydrogel For Tumor Spheroid Synthesis In A Microfluidic Device, Nathan Daniel Kersker

LSU Master's Theses

The extracellular environment plays an important role in regulating cell behavior. The mechanical, structural, and compositional properties of the extracellular matrix can determine the fate of the growing cells. Standard two-dimensional culturing in a flask fails to represent a native cellular environment. To create the native environment suitable for cells, hydrogels were previously studied. One of the most extensively studied synthetic hydrogels was a poly(ethylene glycol diacrylate) (PEGDA) hydrogel. However, the need for UV polymerization may introduce unwanted changes in cell morphology and viability. The hydrogel being proposed was a form of a thiol-acrylate hydrogel that can eliminate this problem …

Numerical Study Of Liquid Atomization And Breakup Using The Volume Of Fluid Method In Ansys Fluent, Sai Saran Kandati

LSU Master's Theses

The spherical metal particles produced from the centrifugal atomization process have been the topic of numerous theoretical, experimental and numerical studies from the past few years. This atomization process uses centrifugal force to break-up molten material into spherical droplets, which are quenched into solidified granules by the flow of cold air on the spherical droplets. In the present work, a transient three-dimensional multiphase CFD model is applied to three different materials: Molten slag, aqueous glycerol solution, and molten Ni-Nb to study the influence of the dimensionless parameters on the centrifugal atomization outcome.

Results from numerical experiments indicated that the droplet …

Bipartite Quantum Interactions: Entangling And Information Processing Abilities, Siddhartha Das

LSU Doctoral Dissertations

The aim of this thesis is to advance the theory behind quantum information processing tasks, by deriving fundamental limits on bipartite quantum interactions and dynamics. A bipartite quantum interaction corresponds to an underlying Hamiltonian that governs the physical transformation of a two-body open quantum system. Under such an interaction, the physical transformation of a bipartite quantum system is considered in the presence of a bath, which may be inaccessible to an observer. The goal is to determine entangling abilities of such arbitrary bipartite quantum interactions. Doing so provides fundamental limitations on information processing tasks, including entanglement distillation and secret key …

Identifying Key Factors Associated With High Risk Asthma Patients To Reduce The Cost Of Health Resources Utilization, Amani Ahmad

LSU Master's Theses

Asthma is associated with frequent use of primary health services and places a burden on the United States economy. Identifying key factors associated with increased cost of asthma is an essential step to improve practices of asthma management.

The aim of this study was to identify factors associated with over utilization of primary health services and increased cost via claims data and to explore the effectiveness of case management program in reducing overall asthma related cost.

Claims data analysis for Medicaid insured asthma patients in Louisiana was conducted. Asthma patients were identified using their ICD-9 and ICD-10 codes, forward variable …

Predicting River Stage Using Recurrent Neural Networks, Eric Rohli

LSU Master's Theses

River stage prediction is an important problem in the water transportation industry. Accurate river stage predictions provide crucial information to barge and tow boat operators, port terminal captains, and lock management officials. Shallow river levels caused by prolonged drought impact the loading capacity of barges and tow boats. High river levels caused by excessive rainfall or snowmelt allow for greater tow capacities but make downstream transportation and lock management risky. Current academic river height prediction systems utilize either time series statistical analysis or machine learning algorithms to forecast future river heights, but systems that combine these two areas often limit …

Distributed Iterative Graph Processing Using Nosql With Data Locality, Ayam Pokhrel

LSU Master's Theses

A tremendous amount of data is generated every day from a wide range of sources such as social networks, sensors, and application logs. Among them, graph data is one type that represents valuable relationships between various entities. Analytics of large graphs has become an essential part of business processes and scientific studies because it leads to deep and meaningful insights into the related domain based on the connections between various entities. However, the optimal processing of large-scale iterative graph computations is very challenging due to the issues like fault tolerance, high memory requirement, parallelization, and scalability. Most of the contemporary …

Waste Management By Waste: Removal Of Acid Dyes From Wastewaters Of Textile Coloration Using Fish Scales, S M Fijul Kabir

LSU Master's Theses

Removal of hazardous acid dyes by economical process using low-cost bio-sorbents from wool industry wastewaters is of a pressing need, since it causes skin and respiratory diseases and disrupts other environmental components. Fish scales (FS), a by-product of fish industry, a type of solid waste, are usually discarded carelessly resulting in pungent odor and environmental burden. In this research, the FS of black drum (Pogonias cromis) were used for the removal of acid dyes (acid red 1 (AR1), acid blue 45 (AB45) and acid yellow 127 (AY126)) from wool industry wastewaters by absorption process with a view to …

The Tensile Root Strength Of Emergent Coastal Macrophytes, Lauris Olivia Hollis

LSU Doctoral Dissertations

Spartina patens is a dominant emergent macrophyte in fresh, intermediate, and brackish marshes along the Atlantic and Gulf coasts of United States where its biomechanical properties are a key component of wetland health and resilience. Its root biomass and tensile root strength are essential for anchorage, erosion protection, and are important determinants of soil strength. Nutrients and the herbicide atrazine are suspected of negatively impacting this wetland plant and others. The objectives of this study were to: 1) ascertain the tensile root strength of five emergent coastal macrophytes in coastal estuaries, and 2) test the effects of nutrient addition, atrazine …