Physical Sciences and Mathematics Commons^™

Myrothecium Verrucaria : A Potential Biological Control Agent For The Invasive 'Old World Climbing Fern' Lygodium Microphyllum, Tainya Cathia Clarke

FIU Electronic Theses and Dissertations

Non native plants are a threat to ecosystems across the globe, some delicate ecosystems like those in South Florida are in greater danger because of the large number of endemics at risk. Old World Climbing Fern (Lygodium microphyllum) has become one of the most invasive and destructive weeds in southern Florida. To date different efforts have been made to control its growth and spread but have not been successful. In light of the highly delicate ecosystem affected by L. microphyllum, a biological paradigm may be a more ecologically sound approach to the containment of this obnoxious weed. …

Synthesis Of Multisubstituted Halo-Olefins Via Pd-Catalyzed Cross-Coupling Reactions : Applications In Nucleoside Chemistry, Daniela Andrei

FIU Electronic Theses and Dissertations

The enzyme S-adenosyl-L-homocysteine (AdoHey) hydrolase effects hydrolytic cleavage of AdoHcy to adenosine (Ado) and L-homocysteine (Hcy). The cellular levels of AdoHcy and Hcy are critical because AdoHcy is a potent feedback inhibitor of crucial transmethylation enzymes. Also, elevated plasma levels of Hcy in humans have been shown to be a risk factor in coronary artery disease.

On the basis of the previous finding that AdoHcy hydrolase is able to add the enzyme-sequestered water molecule across the 5',6'-double bond of (halo or dihalohomovinyl)-adenosines causing covalent binding inhibition, we designed and synthesized AdoHcy analogues with the 5',6'-olefin motif incorporated in place of …

South Florida Coastal Water Quality Monitoring Network - 7-9/06 Quarterly Report (C-14397), Joseph N. Boyer, Henry O. Briceño

SERC Research Reports

No abstract provided.

Phylogenetic Analysis Of Within-Host Serially-Sampled Viral Data, Patricia Buendia

FIU Electronic Theses and Dissertations

The primary goal of this dissertation is the study of patterns of viral evolution inferred from serially-sampled sequence data, i.e., sequence data obtained from strains isolated at consecutive time points from a single patient or host. RNA viral populations have an extremely high genetic variability, largely due to their astronomical population sizes within host systems, high replication rate, and short generation time. It is this aspect of their evolution that demands special attention and a different approach when studying the evolutionary relationships of serially-sampled sequence data. New methods that analyze serially-sampled data were developed shortly after a groundbreaking HIV-1 study …

Little Venice Water Quality Monitoring Project, Joseph N. Boyer, Henry O. Briceño

SERC Research Reports

No abstract provided.

South Florida Coastal Water Quality Monitoring Network 4 6/06 Quarterly Report (C-15397), Joseph N. Boyer, Henry O. Briceño

SERC Research Reports

No abstract provided.

Syntheses Of Aza Analogs Of Kainoids, Mingping Di

FIU Electronic Theses and Dissertations

The kainoids are a class of non-proteinogenic pyrrolidine dicarboxylates that exhibit both excitatory and excitotoxic activities. These activities are a result of the ability of the kainoids to act as glutamate receptor agonists by activating ionotropic glutamate receptors. The parent of this group of compounds is x-kainic acid. Kainic acid is isolated from the seaweed Diginea simplex and has been used in Asian countries as a treatment for intestinal worms in children. In addition it is used extensively by neuropharmacologists for the study of glutamate receptors. Several years ago, the world's sole supplier of kainic acid discontinued this product. Since …

A Framework For Transforming, Analyzing, And Realizing Software Designs In Unified Modeling Language, Zhijiang Dong

FIU Electronic Theses and Dissertations

Unified Modeling Language (UML) is the most comprehensive and widely accepted object-oriented modeling language due to its multi-paradigm modeling capabilities and easy to use graphical notations, with strong international organizational support and industrial production quality tool support. However, there is a lack of precise definition of the semantics of individual UML notations as well as the relationships among multiple UML models, which often introduces incomplete and inconsistent problems for software designs in UML, especially for complex systems. Furthermore, there is a lack of methodologies to ensure a correct implementation from a given UML design. The purpose of this investigation is …

Natural Organic Matter And Colloid-Facilitated Arsenic Transport And Transformation In Porous Soil Media, Zhangrong Chen

FIU Electronic Theses and Dissertations

Prediction of arsenic transport and transformation in soil environment requires understanding the transport mechanisms and proper estimation of arsenic partitioning among all three phases in soil/aquifer systems: mobile colloids, mobile soil solution, and immobile soil solids. The primary purpose of this research is to study natural dissolved organic matter (DOM)/colloid-facilitated transport of arsenic and understand the role of soil derived carriers in the transport and transformation of both inorganic and organoarsenicals in soils.

DOM/colloid facilitated arsenic transport and transformation in porous soil media were investigated using a set of experimental approaches including batch experiment, equilibrium membrane dialysis experiment and column …

South Florida Coastal Water Quality Monitoring Network -1-3/06 Quarterly Report (C-15379), Joseph N. Boyer

SERC Research Reports

No abstract provided.

On Optimizing Compatible Security Policies In Wireless Networks, Scott C-H Huang, Kia Makki, Nikki Pissinou

Telecommunications and Information Technology Institute

This paper deals with finding the maximum number of security policies without conflicts. By doing so we can remove security loophole that causes security violation. We present the problem of maximum compatible security policy and its relationship to the problem of maximum acyclic subgraph, which is proved to be NP-hard. Then we present a polynomial-time approximation algorithm and show that our result has approximation ratio for any integer with complexity .

Reactions Of 1,1-Disubstituted-Ethylenes And 1,4-Diphenyl-1,3-Butadienes With Singlet Oxygen And 4-Alkyl-1,2,4-Triazoline-3,5-Dione (Rtad), Baishakhi Das

FIU Electronic Theses and Dissertations

A study of the reaction pathways of 1,1-diphenylethylene; methyleneindan; fluorenene; trans,trans-1,4-diphenyl-1,3-butadiene; cis,trans-1,4-diphenyl-1,3- butadiene and cis,cis-1,4-diphenyl-1,3-butadiene with singlet oxygen and the singlet oxygen mimic, 4-alkyl-1,2,4-triazoline-3,5-dione (RTAD) has been undertaken. Comparisons of the reactivity and reaction mechanisms among the isomers and electrophiles have been conducted. Singlet oxygen exhibits significantly lower reactivity compared to RTAD. RTAD reacts with 1,1- diphenylethylene to produce 4+2/ene and 4+2/4+2 (2:1) adducts but with methyleneindan to give a complex mixture including the ene adduct. Reactions of isomeric 1,4-diphenyl-1,3-butadienes with RTAD produce 4+2 adducts. The results of the studies provide …

Effect Of Hydrologic Restoration On The Habitat Of The Cape Sable Seaside Sparrow, Annual Report Of 2004-2005, Michael S. Ross, Jay P. Sah, Pablo L. Ruiz, David T. Jones, Hillary Cooley, Rafael Travieso, Franco Tobias, James R. Snyder, David Hagyari

SERC Research Reports

The major activities in Year 3 on ‘Effect of hydrologic restoration on the habitat of the Cape Sable seaside sparrow (CSSS)’ included presentations, field work, data analysis, and report preparation. During this period, we made 4 presentations, two at the CSSS – fire planning workshops at Everglades National Park (ENP), one at the Society of Wetland Scientists’ meeting in Charleston, SC, and a fourth at the Marl Prairie/CSSS performance measure workshop at ENP. We started field work in the third week of January and continued till June 3, 2005. Early in the field season, we completed vegetation surveys along two …

South Florida Coastal Water Quality Monitoring Network - 10-12/05 Quarterly Report (C-15397), Joseph N. Boyer

SERC Research Reports

No abstract provided.

Exotic Meson Decay Widths Using Lattice Quantum Chromodynamics, Merritt S. Cook

FIU Electronic Theses and Dissertations

Most experiments in particle physics are scattering experiments, the analysis of which leads to masses, scattering phases, decay widths and other properties of one or multi-particle systems. Until the advent of Lattice Quantum Chromodynamics (LQCD) it was difficult to compare experimental results on low energy hadron- hadron scattering processes to the predictions of QCD, the current theory of strong interactions. The reason being, at low energies the QCD coupling constant becomes large and the perturbation expansion for scattering amplitudes does not converge. To overcome this, one puts the theory onto a lattice, imposes a momentum cutoff, and computes the integral …

Social Sustainability Of Hybrid Electricity Generation Systems In Mexico, Pablo Federico Blackmore

FIU Electronic Theses and Dissertations

This thesis tried to determine the socioeconomic contributions of a renewable-hybrid energy system in San Juanico, Mexico. It also tried to analyze if the hybrid system was designed based on sustainable development principles. A survey of 91 electrified homes was conducted in San Juanico to gather information on consumer satisfaction and data analyzed using simple means and group mean comparisons, with suitable tests as needed. A binomial probit model for two dependent variables was applied to survey data. An energy price-comparison exercise was conducted as well. Findings showed the hybrid system had suffered from weak institutional frameworks, low community participation …

Origin Of The Grande Ronde Formation Flows, Columbia River Flood Basalt Group, Sedelia Rodriguez Durand

FIU Electronic Theses and Dissertations

Lavas belonging to the Grande Ronde Formation (GRB) constitute about 63% of the Columbia River Basalt Group (CRBG), a flood basalt province in the NW United States. A puzzling feature is the lack of phenocrysts (< 5%) in these chemically evolved lavas. Based mainly on this observation it has been hypothesized that GRB lavas were nearly primary melts generated by large-scale melting of eclogite. Another recent hypothesis holds that GRB magmas were extremely hydrous and rose rapidly from the mantle such that the dissolved water kept the magmas close to their liquidi. I present new textural and chemical evidence to show that GRB lavas were neither primary nor hydrous melts but were derived from other melts via efficient fractional crystallization and mixing in shallow intrusive systems. Texture and chemical features further suggest that the melt mixing process may have been exothermic, which forced variable melting of some of the existing phenocrysts.

Finally, reported here are the results of efforts to simulate the higher pressure histories of GRB using COMAGMAT and MELTS softwares. The intent was to evaluate (1) whether such melts could be derived from primary melts formed by partial melting of a peridotite source as an alternative to the eclogite model, or if bulk melting of eclogite is required; and (2) at what pressure …

South Florida Coastal Water Quality Monitoring Network Fy2006 Cumulative Report To The South Florida Water Management District (Contract No. C-15397 And 4600000352), Joseph N. Boyer, Henry O. Briceño

SERC Research Reports

No abstract provided.

2006 Annual Report Of The Water Quality Monitoring Project For The Water Quality Protection Program Of The Florida Keys National Marine Sanctuary, Joseph N. Boyer, Henry O. Briceño

SERC Research Reports

No abstract provided.

Flux Of Organic Carbon In A Riverine Mangrove Wetland In The Florida Coastal Everglades, Melissa M. Romigh, Stephen E. Davis Iii, Victor H. Rivera-Monroy, Robert R. Twilley

FCE LTER Journal Articles

Short-term (daily) and seasonal variations in concentration and flux of dissolved organic carbon (DOC) were examined over 15 tidal cycles in a riverine mangrove wetland along Shark River, Florida in 2003. Due to the influence of seasonal rainfall and wind patterns on Shark River’s hydrology, samplings were made to include wet, dry and transitional (Norte) seasons. We used a flume extending from a tidal creek to a basin forest to measure vertical (vegetated soil/water column) and horizontal (mangrove forest/tidal creek) flux of DOC. We found significant (p < 0.05) variations in surface water temperature, salinity, conductivity, pH and mean concentration of DOC with season. Water temperature and salinity followed seasonal patterns of air temperature and rainfall, while mean DOC concentration was highest during the dry season (May), followed by the wet (October) and ‘Norte’ (December) seasons. This pattern of DOC concentration may be due to a combination of litter production and inundation pattern of the wetland. In contrast to daily (between tides) variation in DOC flux between the mangrove forest and tidal creek, daily variations of mean water quality were not significant. However, within-tide variation of DOC flux, dissolved oxygen content and salinity was observed. This indicated that the length of inundation and water source (freshwater vs. saltwater) variation across tidal cycles influenced water quality and DOC flux in the water column. Net DOC export was measured in October and December, suggesting the mangrove forest was a source of DOC to the adjacent tidal creek during these periods. Net annual export of DOC from the fringe mangrove to both the tidal creek and basin mangrove forest was 56 g C m⁻² year⁻¹. The seasonal pattern in our flux results indicates …