Physical Sciences and Mathematics Commons^™

How Wildlife Information, Recreation Involvement And Demographic Characteristics Influence Public Acceptability Of Development, Jessica Espenshade

Graduate College Dissertations and Theses

Increasing development like roads and houses will alter the future landscape of Vermont. Development provides important resources for people and society, but also results in consequences for wildlife and opportunities for recreation. Managing development requires information on the public's acceptability of development and how acceptability is shaped by information on various consequences. In this study, I examined three questions: 1) What is the public's acceptability of development? 2) Does wildlife information influence public acceptability of development and 3) Is the maximum amount of acceptable development influenced by views about wildlife, involvement in recreation, and demographic factors? I surveyed 9,000 households …

An Evaluation Of Vermicompost As A Fast-Acting Nitrogen Amendment To Mitigate Nitrogen Deficiencies In Organic Vegetable Production, Peter Dalton Austin

Graduate College Dissertations and Theses

For sustained production, organic agriculture depends on plant needs being synchronized with the release of nutrients from organic amendments during decomposition within the soil. Because decomposition is strongly dependent on soil moisture and temperature, nutrient needs may not always be met as planned or synchronous with plant need. Unlike conventional agriculture, fast acting amendments are not readily available. Much of the evidence that vermicompost benefits crop production comes from studies on seed germination and production of starts in greenhouses. Yet, there is a dearth of information derived from field studies. Soil, soil and water nitrogen, plant development, and marketable yield …

Numerical Simulations Of Reacting Flow In An Inductively Coupled Plasma Torch, Maximilian Dougherty

Graduate College Dissertations and Theses

In the design of a thermal protection system for atmospheric entry, aerothermal heating presents a major impediment to efficient heat shield design. Recombination of atomic species in the boundary layer results in highly exothermic surface-catalyzed recombination reactions and an increase in the heat flux experienced at the surface. The degree to which these reactions increase the surface heat flux is partly a function of the heat shield material. Characterization of the catalytic behavior of these materials takes place in experimental facilities, however there is a dearth of detailed computational models for the fluid dynamic and chemical behavior of such facilities. …

Effects Of Pcb Contamination On The Environment And The Cultural Integrity Of The St. Regis Mohawk Tribe In The Mohawk Nation Of Akwesasne, Kim Ellen Mcrae

Graduate College Dissertations and Theses

The following research project examines the effects of polychlorinated biphenyls (PCBs) on the environment and the cultural integrity of the St. Regis Mohawk tribe in the Mohawk Nation of Akwesasne. This indigenous community has been subjected to widespread long-term industrial pollution from nearby toxic hazardous waste facilities and Superfund sites.

The Mohawk Nation of Akwesasne has the distinction of being the only tribe whose officially recognized territory straddles the border between the United States and Canada. Using qualitative methodologies, coupled with an interdisciplinary framework, this study successfully engages with Akwesasne community members to explore such issues as bottom-up approaches to …

Exploring The Google Books Corpus: An Information-Theoretic Approach To Linguistic Evolution, Eitan Pechenick

Graduate College Dissertations and Theses

The Google Books corpus contains millions of books in a variety of languages. Due to this incredible volume and its free availability, it is a treasure trove that has inspired a plethora of linguistic research.

It is tempting to treat frequency trends from Google Books data sets as indicators for the true popularity of various words and phrases. Doing so allows us to draw novel conclusions about the evolution of public perception of a given topic. However, sampling published works by availability and ease of digitization leads to several important effects, which have typically been overlooked in previous studies. One …

Spatiotemporally Periodic Driven System With Long-Range Interactions, Owen Dale Myers

Graduate College Dissertations and Theses

It is well known that some driven systems undergo transitions when a system parameter is changed adiabatically around a critical value. This transition can be the result of a fundamental change in the structure of the phase space, called a bifurcation. Most of these transitions are well classified in the theory of bifurcations. Among the driven systems, spatiotemporally periodic (STP) potentials are noteworthy due to the intimate coupling between their time and spatial components. A paradigmatic example of such a system is the Kapitza pendulum, which is a pendulum with an oscillating suspension point. The Kapitza pendulum has the strange …

Early Adoption Dynamics Of Private Sustainability Governance Initiatives: A Case Study Of The Marine Cultured-Pearl Industry, Julie Nash

Graduate College Dissertations and Theses

We are witnessing a time of unprecedented human impact on the natural environment. Coral reefs, one of the most biologically diverse and productive ecosystems, are at the forefront of enduring these human impacts. Despite widespread recognition of coral reef degradation, counter measures have not reached a scale to offset the threat. The magnitude of this and other environmental issues call for a deeper understanding of the role the private sector can play in sustainable development.

In response to environmental pressures and the shortcomings of global-scale governance, private sustainability governance initiatives have developed. In the last decade, these initiatives have flourished, …

Using Stable Isotope Analysis To Estimate Black Bear (Ursus Americanus) Diet In Vermont, Eliese Antona Dykstra

Graduate College Dissertations and Theses

The black bear (Ursus americanus) is an iconic species with cultural, economic and ecological importance in Vermont, USA. Bears exhibit a highly variable diet, and few studies have described bear diet in the state. Information on diet may provide insight into foraging behavior, thus allowing managers to better assess patterns of human-bear conflict. My objectives were to estimate the relative contribution of food items to bear diet and how factors including sex, habitat, food availability, and nuisance status describe patterns of consumption. I collected samples from bears and major food groups including C3 plants, white-tailed deer (Odocoileus virginianus), corn (Zea …

Collaboration And Conflict In The Adirondack Park: An Analysis Of Conservation Discourses Over Time, Jeffrey Michael O'Donnell

Graduate College Dissertations and Theses

The role of collaboration within conservation is of increasing interest to scholars, managers and forest communities. Collaboration can take many forms, but one under-studied topic is the form and content of public discourses across conservation project timelines. To understand the discursive processes that influence conservation decision-making, this research evaluates the use of collaborative rhetoric and claims about place within discourses of conservation in the Adirondacks. Local newspaper articles and editorials published from January 1996 to December 2013 and concerning six major conservation projects were studied using content analysis. Results show that collaborative rhetoric increased during the study period, and conflict …

Pedagogical Praxis Models In Sustainability Education: A Focus On Food Systems And Environment, Karen Lynn Nordstrom

Graduate College Dissertations and Theses

As societies embrace notions of sustainability, there is an increasing interest in how to best educate students about these concepts. The field of sustainability education (SE) is an approach that has been developed to address this concern. SE frameworks seek to integrate into curricular contents and formats within campus learning environments, in order to systematically improve upon approaches and services developed to support student learning and development. My research offers insight into the relationships between the philosophical principles and praxes of sustainability education, with the aim to inform educators on how best to prepare students to address complex sustainability issues. …

Habitat Use By Early Successional Bird Species Along Powerline Rights Of Way: Making Connections Across Private Lands, Christine Rose Peterson

Graduate College Dissertations and Theses

Wildlife species that rely on early successional habitat are showing long-term region-wide declines, including songbirds such as Eastern Towhee (Pipilo erythrophthalmus), Field Sparrow (Spizella pusilla), Blue-winged Warbler (Vermivora cyanoptera), Golden-winged Warbler (Vermivora chrysoptera), Prairie Warbler (Setophaga discolor), and Brown Thrasher (Toxostoma rufum). All six species are listed as Species of Greatest Conservation Need on a majority of the New England state's Wildlife Action Plans and in 2011, the Golden-winged Warbler was placed under review for federal listing. In areas where vegetation structure is actively maintained in early successional stages, such as powerline rights-of-way (ROWs), there is an opportunity to provide …

Analytical And Decision Tools For Wildlife Population And Habitat Management, Kurt Rinehart

Graduate College Dissertations and Theses

The long-term success of wildlife conservation depends on maximizing the benefits of limited funds and data in pursuit of population and habitat objectives. The ultimate currency for wildlife management is progress toward long-term preservation of ample, wild, free wildlife populations and to this end, funds must be wisely spent and maximal use made from limited data.

Through simulation-based analyses, I evaluated the efficacy of various models for estimating population abundance from harvest data. Because managers have different estimators to choose from and can also elect to collect additional data, I compared the statistical performance of different estimation strategies (estimator + …

Get Real: An Examination Of The Real Food Challenge At The University Of Vermont, Jennifer Porter

Graduate College Dissertations and Theses

The Real Food Challenge (RFC) is a national student movement that is trying to harness student power to shift $1 billion'roughly 20% of college and university food budgets across the country towards local, ecologically sound, fair, and humane food sources, what they call "real" food, by 2020. The University of Vermont (UVM) was the fifth university in the country to sign the Real Food Campus Commitment, pledging to shift at least 20% of its own food budget towards "real" food by 2020. The purpose of this thesis is to evaluate the implementation of the Real Food Campus Commitment at UVM. …

The Impact Of Ecosystem Services Knowledge On Decisions, Stephen Mark Posner

Graduate College Dissertations and Theses

The need to protect diverse biological resources from ongoing development pressures is one of today's most pressing environmental challenges. In response, "ecosystem services" has emerged as a conservation framework that links human economies and natural systems through the benefits that people receive from nature. In this dissertation, I investigate the science-policy interface of ecosystem services in order to understand the use of ecosystem service decision support tools and evaluate the pathways through which ecosystem services knowledge impacts decisions. In the first paper, I track an ecosystem service valuation project in California to evaluate how the project changes the social capacity …

Multi-Satellite Formation Trajectory Design With Topological Constraints Over A Region Of Interest Using Differential Evolution, David William Hinckley

Graduate College Dissertations and Theses

Satellite formation missions allow for scientific measurement opportunities that are only otherwise possible with the use of unrealistically large satellites. This work applies the Evolutionary Algorithm (EA), Differential Evolution (DE), to a 4-satellite mission design that borrows heavily from the mission specifications for Phase 1 of NASA's Magnetospheric Multi-Scale Mission (MMS). This mission specifies goals for formation "quality" and size over the arc when scientific measurements are to be taken known as the Region of Interest (ROI). To apply DE to this problem a novel definition of fitness is developed and tailored to trajectory problems of the parameter scales of …

An Embodied Approach To Evolving Robust Visual Classifiers, Karol Zieba

Graduate College Dissertations and Theses

From the very creation of the term by Czech writer Karel Capek in 1921, a "robot" has been synonymous with an artificial agent possessing a powerful body and cogitating mind. While the fields of Artificial Intelligence (AI) and Robotics have made progress into the creation of such an android, the goal of a cogitating robot remains firmly outside the reach of our technological capabilities. Cognition has proved to be far more complex than early AI practitioners envisioned. Current methods in Machine Learning have achieved remarkable successes in image categorization through the use of deep learning. However, when presented with novel …

I. A New Route To Azomethine Ylides: Shifting The Reliance On Amino Ester Precursors Ii. Applications In Total Synthesis, Natalie Kay Machamer

Graduate College Dissertations and Theses

Nitrogen-containing heterocycles have great utility in the biomedical and medicinal fields and one such heterocycle is the 5-membered pyrrolidine ring. The synthesis of pyrrolidine rings has been studied extensively with the routes relying on anodic oxidation, transition metals and dipolar cycloadditions with azomethine ylides. Previous work in the Waters group has been focused on new routes to azomethine ylides through a domino sequence. Through a thermal aza-Cope rearrangement followed by [3+2] dipolar cycloaddition the synthesis of a library of 2-allyl pyrrolidines was accomplished. It was discovered that by using allylic amines and glyoxals at room temperature a cycloadduct was isolated …

Investigation Of A Ring Fragmentation Reaction For The Synthesis Of Tethered Aldehyde Ynones And Medium Sized Cyclic Ynones And Ynolides, Ali Bayir

Graduate College Dissertations and Theses

The fragmentation of γ-silyloxy-β-hydroxy-α-diazoesters to provide tethered aldehyde ynoates was discovered and developed in Prof. Brewer's laboratory. This reaction is a Lewis acid mediated heterolytic cleavage of the Cβ-γ bond of a γ-silyloxy-β-hydroxy-α-diazocarbonyl functional group array contained in a ring compound.

This dissertation describes a further study of this ring fragmentation reaction and application of this fragmentation to the preparation of synthetically useful organic molecules. The purpose of this dissertation work was three fold. The first objective was to extend this ring fragmentation reaction to the synthesis of tethered aldehyde ynones by fragmenting various γ-silyloxy-β-hydroxy-α-diazo ketone compounds. The second objective …

A Comparative Examination Of The Safety Programs At Ucla, Umn, And Uvm In Response To Recent Chemistry Laboratory Incidents, Victoria Carhart

Graduate College Dissertations and Theses

Laboratory safety has recently become more of an imperative in research laboratories than it has ever been in the past. Recent accidents at several universities have escalated the awareness of safety concerns in laboratory workspaces among the general public and created a greater need for a stronger culture of safety in chemistry research overall. Historically, results and publications have been the top priority of most researchers, not laboratory safety.

This thesis discusses a number of laboratory accidents. The first happened in December of 2008 at the University of California, Los Angeles (UCLA) and resulted in the death of a graduate …

Sustainable Agriculture In Vermont: Economics Of Climate Change Best Management Practices And The Complexity Of Consumer Perceptions Of Raw Milk, Alexander Paul Helling

Graduate College Dissertations and Theses

Changing weather patterns, the declining social fabric of rural communities, and economic uncertainty increasingly pose challenges to Vermont communities. The socially and environmentally embedded production practices within sustainable agriculture present a potential solution to these problems. In order to make the most of the potential benefits of these practices society must maximize their adoption. This requires an understanding of both farmer adoption of these practices and consumer perceptions of the resulting food products. This thesis contributes two original articles on sustainable agriculture through the analysis of factors driving both farmer adoption and consumer perceptions of products and practices often thought …

The Supply Chain Of Fair Trade Coffee: Challenges, Opportunities & The Future Inside A Troubled Industry, Katharine D. Lukas

Graduate College Dissertations and Theses

What started as a grassroots effort to aid tradespeople in developing nations, Fair Trade and similar certification models have, over the last sixty years, successfully established themselves as a viable alternative to conventional international trade; the ongoing growth of their market share and volume emphasize the increasing market demand for these alternatives. For coffee, Fair Trade's oldest and most established commodity, over two billion pounds was sold as certified in 2012 alone and the percentage of certified coffee continues to grow in share each year (Volcafe, 2012, Fair Trade USA 2012). As Fair Trade continues to grow, so does the …

Using Mutli Criteria Decision Analysis To Develop Sustainability Assessment Tools: Biomass Supply Chains, Deandra Marie Perruccio

Graduate College Dissertations and Theses

Energy access remains a significant challenge in nations lacking access to resources and strong infrastructure systems, creating barriers to economic development and to increased standards of living. Small scale biomass gasification energy (BGE) systems have been developed to meet energy needs in rural areas, creating synergies between agricultural and agro-forestry systems through utilization of biomass feedstock for energy generation. The sustainability of such systems requires sophisticated planning and coordination of the biomass supply chain.

The goal of this thesis is to investigate and improve structural and process related characteristics of sustainability assessments for small scale bio-energy systems, specifically focusing on …

Burst Pressure Properties And Ex Vivo Analysis Of Alginate-Based Hydrogels For Tissue Sealant Applications, Patrick Nelson Charron

Graduate College Dissertations and Theses

Lung diseases, cancers, and trauma can result in injury to the connective tissue lining the lung, i.e., the pleura. Pleural injuries lead to pneumothoraxes or pleural effusions, i.e., air or fluid leaking out of the lung respectively, and potential lung collapse - an immediately life threatening condition. While several bioengineered soft tissue sealants exist on the market, there is only one sealant FDA-approved for use in pulmonary surgery. In addition, very limited techniques are presented in the literature for characterizing the burst properties of hydrogel tissue sealants. For my thesis, I proposed to develop a protocol for characterizing the burst …

The Interaction Mechanisms Of A Screw Dislocation With A Defective Coherent Twin Boundary In Copper, Qiongjiali Fang

Graduate College Dissertations and Theses

Σ3{111} coherent twin boundary (CTB) in face-centered-cubic (FCC) metals and alloys have been regarded as an efficient way to simultaneously increase strength and ductility at the nanoscale. Extensive study of dislocation-CTB interaction has been carried out by a combination of computer simulations, experiments and continuum theory. Most of them, however, are based on the perfect CTB assumption. A recent study [Wang YM, Sansoz F, LaGrange T, et al. Defective twin boundaries in nanotwinned metals. Nat Mater. 2013;12(8):697-702.] has revealed the existence of intrinsic kink-like defects in CTBs of nanotwinned copper through nanodiffraction mapping technique, and has confirmed the effect of …

Biological Indicators Of Compost-Mediated Disease Suppression Against The Soilborne Plant Pathogen Rhizoctonia Solani, Lynn Fang

Graduate College Dissertations and Theses

Compost can suppress soilborne plant pathogens that cause significant damage on globally important food crops. However, reports of plant pathogen suppression are inconsistent likely because there are no established standards for feedstock material, application rate, and maturity age upon application. Excellent results can be achieved in greenhouse trials, but field applications are much less reliable. Disease suppression occurs through the activity of biocontrol organisms (direct antagonism), and general microbial competition. Biocontrol species are hypothesized to colonize the pile during the curing phase, but single species may not be as important as microbial consortia. Substrate composition during maturation may give rise …

Catalytic Main Group Element Bond Formation Reactions Toward The Preparation Of Conjugated Materials, Neil Mucha

Graduate College Dissertations and Theses

Polymers incorporating main group elements offer different and interesting properties compared to their all carbon analogues. For example, π-conjugated polymers incorporating phosphorus in the main chain of the polymer have generated interest due to their unique thermal and electronic properties, which primarily result from delocalization of the phosphorous lone pair within aromatic units. Similarly, interest in polysilanes stems from conductivity resulting from σ electron delocalization, though current methods of preparation for both of these types of materials are lacking. In this dissertation, both early and late transition-metal compounds were used to dehydrocouple phosphine and silane substrates. The use of dehydrocoupling …

Exchange Mechanisms In Macroscopic Ordered Organic Magnetic Semiconductors, Naveen Rawat

Graduate College Dissertations and Theses

Small molecule organic semiconductors such as phthalocyanines and their derivatives represent a very interesting alternative to inorganic semiconductor materials for the development of flexible electronic devices such as organic thin field effect transistors, organic Light Emitting Diodes and photo-voltaic cells. Phthalocyanine molecules can easily accommodate a variety of metal atoms as well in the central core of the molecule, resulting in wide range of magnetic properties. Exploration of optical properties of organic crystalline semiconductors thin films is challenging due to sub-micron grain sizes and the presence of numerous structural defects, disorder and grain boundaries. However, this can be overcome by …

Grass-Based Dairy In Vermont: Benefits, Barriers, And Effective Public Policies, Serge William Wiltshire

Graduate College Dissertations and Theses

A comprehensive literature review was undertaken in order to define and assess the sustainability and resiliency characteristics associated with grass-based and confinement dairy farming. Primarily as a result of reduced input costs, grass-based dairy farming often enhances profitability over confinement systems, especially on small farms. Further, conversion of tilled soil to permanent pasture has been shown to significantly reduce harmful sediment and nutrient transport into waterways. Perennial forage also acts as a carbon sink, curtailing or even negating a grass-based farm's carbon footprint. Finally, social benefits derived from enhanced nutrition and higher quality of life are also associated with grass-based …

The Molecular Evolution Of Non-Coding Dna And Population Ecology Of The Spiny Softshell Turtle (Apalone Spinifera) In Lake Champlain, Lucas Edward Bernacki

Graduate College Dissertations and Theses

ABSTRACT

Spiny softshell turtles (Apalone spinifera) occur at the northwest limit of their range in Lake Champlain. This species, although widespread across North America, is listed as threatened in Vermont due to habitat destruction and disturbances of anthropogenic origin. The population of spiny softshell turtles in Lake Champlain is isolated from other North American populations and is considered as an independent management unit. Efforts to obtain information on the biology of spiny softshell turtles in Lake Champlain precede 1936 with conservation measures being initiated in 1987.

Methods of studying spiny softshell turtles in Lake Champlain have included direct …

Management By Crisis: Land Trust Conservation Engagement And Methods In Vermont, Louise Sopher Lintilhac

Graduate College Dissertations and Theses

Planning a future for the landscapes we live in can be a daunting challenge for many communities in Vermont. Conservation initiatives affect the quality of life for all community members and can be difficult if not impossible to change in the event of poor planning. Through examining stakeholder relationships with land trusts I have explored the complexities of planning processes used by land trusts in Vermont for conservation initiatives

The study involved one statewide land trust, the Vermont Land Trust, and two community land trusts, the Stowe Land Trust and the Duxbury Land Trust. I used qualitative methods including document …