Physical Sciences and Mathematics Commons^™

Harmful Algal Blooms In Caesar Creek Lake And Their Relationship To Riparian Cover, Morgan C. Grunden

Browse all Theses and Dissertations

Caesar Creek Lake (CCL) in Warren County, OH has recently been experiencing harmful algal blooms (HABs) which are most likely attributed to an excess of phosphorus (P) from fertilizers and manures applied to surrounding fields. Sediments act as a sink for P later supplying a source of P in lakes for HABs when waters become thermally stratified and anoxic. This study seeks to determine the relationship between HABs in CCL and riparian cover at the main tributaries, Anderson Fork and Caesar Creek. In order to do this, sediment samples were collected from four sample sites along Anderson Fork and three …

Mercury Methylation In Oxic Sub-Polar Marine Regions Linked With Nitrification, Marissa Collins Despins

Browse all Theses and Dissertations

Methylmercury (MeHg) is a neurotoxin that bioaccumulates to potentially harmful concentrations in Arctic marine wildlife and in those that consume them. Monitoring and modeling MeHg bioaccumulation and biogeochemical cycling in the ocean requires understanding of the mechanisms behind net mercury (Hg) methylation. The key functional gene for Hg methylation, hgcAB, is widely distributed throughout ocean basins and spans multiple microbial phyla. While multiple microbially-mediated anaerobic pathways for Hg methylation are known, in the ocean, the majority of hgcA homologs have been found in oxic subsurface waters, in contrast to other ecosystems. In particular, microaerophilic Nitrospina, a genera of nitrite-oxidizing bacteria …

A Solder-Defined Computer Architecture For Backdoor And Malware Resistance, Marc W. Abel

Browse all Theses and Dissertations

This research is about securing control of those devices we most depend on for integrity and confidentiality. An emerging concern is that complex integrated circuits may be subject to exploitable defects or backdoors, and measures for inspection and audit of these chips are neither supported nor scalable. One approach for providing a “supply chain firewall” may be to forgo such components, and instead to build central processing units (CPUs) and other complex logic from simple, generic parts. This work investigates the capability and speed ceiling when open-source hardware methodologies are fused with maker-scale assembly tools and visible-scale final inspection.

The …

Has Winter Weather In Southwest Ohio Been Affected By The El Niño Southern Oscillation, The North Atlantic Oscillation, The Pacific Decadal Oscillation, And The Atlantic Multidecadal Oscillation?, John A. Blue

Browse all Theses and Dissertations

Winter temperature and precipitation in Southwest Ohio over the last century were examined for anomalies attributable to teleconnections with large-scale atmospheric perturbations caused by the El Niño Southern Oscillation (ENSO), the North Atlantic Oscillation (NAO), the Pacific Decadal Oscillation (PDO), and the Atlantic Multidecadal Oscillation (AMO). The record of temperature gives evidence of a teleconnection with the NAO, ENSO, and PDO, with the strongest link being for phases of the NAO. Most winters during positive NAO phases had mean monthly temperature warmer than the century long mean, and the majority of negative NAO phase winters had colder temperatures. The difference …

Gene Vectors With Fluorescence Tracking Capabilities, Sophia Despina Angelopoulos

Browse all Theses and Dissertations

This project focuses on the optimization of benzothiazole-based chromophores to utilize them as fluorescent tags functionalized onto stimuli-responsive, or “smart,” polymers as non-viral gene delivery vectors for gene therapy applications. Blue-fluorescent emissive chromophores will allow tracking capabilities for the transfection pathway of the vector to be monitored as it delivers the DNA payload within intercellular space. The most appropriate chromophore must be covalently bound to a free amine within the vector, which is accomplished through NAS chemistry from fluorophenyl-benzothiazoles (F-BTZ-CBz) derivatives to amidated hyperbranched poly(ethyleneimine)(HPEI-IBAm0.61). HPEI is considered to be a synthetic polycation, which promotes tunable solubility through characteristics of …

Automatically Generating Searchable Fingerprints For Wordpress Plugins Using Static Program Analysis, Chuang Li

Browse all Theses and Dissertations

This thesis introduces a novel method to automatically generate fingerprints for WordPress plugins. Our method performs static program analysis using Abstract Syntax Trees (ASTs) of WordPress plugins. The generated fingerprints can be used for identifying these plugins using search engines, which have support critical applications such as proactively identifying web servers with vulnerable WordPress plugins. We have used our method to generate fingerprints for over 10,000 WordPress plugins and analyze the resulted fingerprints. Our fingerprints have also revealed 453 websites that are potentially vulnerable. We have also compared fingerprints for vulnerable plugins and those for vulnerability-free plugins.

Novel Natural Language Processing Models For Medical Terms And Symptoms Detection In Twitter, Farahnaz Golrooy Motlagh

Browse all Theses and Dissertations

This dissertation focuses on disambiguation of language use on Twitter about drug use, consumption types of drugs, drug legalization, ontology-enhanced approaches, and prediction analysis of data-driven by developing novel NLP models. Three technical aims comprise this work: (a) leveraging pattern recognition techniques to improve the quality and quantity of crawled Twitter posts related to drug abuse; (b) using an expert-curated, domain-specific DsOn ontology model that improve knowledge extraction in the form of drug-to-symptom and drug-to-side effect relations; and (c) modeling the prediction of public perception of the drug’s legalization and the sentiment analysis of drug consumption on Twitter. We collected …

Establishing A Machine Learning Framework For Discovering Novel Phononic Crystal Designs, Drew Feltner

Browse all Theses and Dissertations

A phonon is a discrete unit of vibrational motion that occurs in a crystal lattice. Phonons and the frequency at which they propagate play a significant role in the thermal, optical, and electronic properties of a material. A phononic material/device is similar to a photonic material/device, except that it is fabricated to manipulate certain bands of acoustic waves instead of electromagnetic waves. Phononic materials and devices have been studied much less than their photonic analogues and as such current materials exhibit control over a smaller range of frequencies. This study aims to test the viability of machine learning, specifically neural …

A Cloud Computing-Based Dashboard For The Visualization Of Motivational Interviewing Metrics, E Jinq Heng

Browse all Theses and Dissertations

Motivational Interviewing (MI) is an evidence-based brief interventional technique that has been demonstrated to be effective in triggering behavior change in patients. To facilitate behavior change, healthcare practitioners adopt a nonconfrontational, empathetic dialogic style, a core component of MI. Despite its advantages, MI has been severely underutilized mainly due to the cognitive overload on the part of the MI dialogue evaluator, who has to assess MI dialogue in real-time and calculate MI characteristic metrics (number of open-ended questions, close-ended questions, reflection, and scale-based sentences) for immediate post-session evaluation both in MI training and clinical settings. To automate dialogue assessment and …

Deep Understanding Of Technical Documents : Automated Generation Of Pseudocode From Digital Diagrams & Analysis/Synthesis Of Mathematical Formulas, Nikolaos Gkorgkolis

Browse all Theses and Dissertations

The technical document is an entity that consists of several essential and interconnected parts, often referred to as modalities. Despite the extensive attention that certain parts have already received, per say the textual information, there are several aspects that severely under researched. Two such modalities are the utility of diagram images and the deep automated understanding of mathematical formulas. Inspired by existing holistic approaches to the deep understanding of technical documents, we develop a novel formal scheme for the modelling of digital diagram images. This extends to a generative framework that allows for the creation of artificial images and their …

Fabrication And Characterization Of Novel Agnps Functionalized With Chlorothymol (C@Agnps), Lirim Sopaj

Browse all Theses and Dissertations

In this study, novel silver nanoparticles (AgNPs) were successfully synthesized and functionalized with an antibacterial agent, namely chlorothymol (denoted C@AgNPs). The resulting colloid (C@AgNPs) was purified by two comparative methods: ultrafiltration and ultracentrifugation. Ultrafiltration proved to be more efficient in purifying and size selecting (10 kD filter) and concentrating the C@AgNPs than ultracentrifugation. The physicochemical properties of the filtered C@AgNPs were then characterized by UV-Vis absorption spectroscopy, inductively coupled plasma optical emission spectroscopy (ICP-OES), Raman spectroscopy, Cytoviva hyperspectral imaging, and Scanning electron microscopy. These measurements confirmed the functionalization of the core AgNPs with chlorothymol and suggest the proposed mechanism of …

Synthetic Aperture Ladar Automatic Target Recognizer Design And Performance Prediction Via Geometric Properties Of Targets, Jacob W. Ross

Browse all Theses and Dissertations

Synthetic Aperture LADAR (SAL) has several phenomenology differences from Synthetic Aperture RADAR (SAR) making it a promising candidate for automatic target recognition (ATR) purposes. The diffuse nature of SAL results in more pixels on target. Optical wavelengths offers centimeter class resolution with an aperture baseline that is 10,000 times smaller than an SAR baseline. While diffuse scattering and optical wavelengths have several advantages, there are also a number of challenges. The diffuse nature of SAL leads to a more pronounced speckle effect than in the SAR case. Optical wavelengths are more susceptible to atmospheric noise, leading to distortions in formed …

Evaluating Similarity Of Cross-Architecture Basic Blocks, Elijah L. Meyer

Browse all Theses and Dissertations

Vulnerabilities in source code can be compiled for multiple processor architectures and make their way into several different devices. Security researchers frequently have no way to obtain this source code to analyze for vulnerabilities. Therefore, the ability to effectively analyze binary code is essential. Similarity detection is one facet of binary code analysis. Because source code can be compiled for different architectures, the need can arise for detecting code similarity across architectures. This need is especially apparent when analyzing firmware from embedded computing environments such as Internet of Things devices, where the processor architecture is dependent on the product and …

Covalent Attachment Of Tadf Chromophores To Thermally Stable Poly(Arylene Ether)S, Samuel Farrar

Browse all Theses and Dissertations

The covalent attachment of a blue emitting, benzothiazole based TADF chromophore into poly(arylene ether) backbone polymers was explored. A benzothiazole derivative, 2-(2,4-difluorophenyl)-benzothiazole (2,4-diF-BTZ), was synthesized to form the electrophilic component of the host polymer. Two polymers were synthesized to have chromophore incorporated, using 2,4-diFBTZ and 4,4-dihydroxydiphenyl ether (DPE) or 4,4’-biphenol (BP). The chromophore was covalently incorporated at a 10% molar ratio into the polymer backbone by copolymerization with 2,4-diF-BTZ and BP, utilizing nucleophilic aromatic substitution (NAS). Structural characterization was provided via NMR spectroscopy and GC/MS analysis. The polymer syntheses provided high molecular weight materials that were able to be cast …

Validating Software States Using Reverse Execution, Nathaniel Christian Boland

Browse all Theses and Dissertations

A key feature of software analysis is determining whether it is possible for a program to reach a certain state. Various methods have been devised to accomplish this including directed fuzzing and dynamic execution. In this thesis we present a reverse execution engine to validate states, the Complex Emulator. The Complex Emulator seeks to validate a program state by emulating it in reverse to discover if a contradiction exists. When unknown variables are found during execution, the emulator is designed to use constraint solving to compute their values. The Complex Emulator has been tested on small assembly programs and is …

Topological Hierarchies And Decomposition: From Clustering To Persistence, Kyle A. Brown

Browse all Theses and Dissertations

Hierarchical clustering is a class of algorithms commonly used in exploratory data analysis (EDA) and supervised learning. However, they suffer from some drawbacks, including the difficulty of interpreting the resulting dendrogram, arbitrariness in the choice of cut to obtain a flat clustering, and the lack of an obvious way of comparing individual clusters. In this dissertation, we develop the notion of a topological hierarchy on recursively-defined subsets of a metric space. We look to the field of topological data analysis (TDA) for the mathematical background to associate topological structures such as simplicial complexes and maps of covers to clusters in …

Automatically Inferring Image Bases Of Arm32 Binaries, Daniel T. Chong

Browse all Theses and Dissertations

Reverse engineering tools rely on the critical image base value for tasks such as correctly mapping code into virtual memory for an emulator or accurately determining branch destinations for a disassembler. However, binaries are often stripped and therefore, do not explicitly state this value. Currently available solutions for calculating this essential value generally require user input in the form of parameter configurations or manual binary analysis, thus these methods are limited by the experience and knowledge of the user. In this thesis, we propose a user-independent solution for determining the image base of ARM32 binaries and describe our implementation. Our …

Secure Authenticated Key Exchange For Enhancing The Security Of Routing Protocol For Low-Power And Lossy Networks, Sarah Mohammed Alzahrani

Browse all Theses and Dissertations

The current Routing Protocol for Low Power and Lossy Networks (RPL) standard provides three security modes Unsecured Mode (UM), Preinstalled Secure Mode (PSM), and Authenticated Secure Mode (ASM). The PSM and ASM are designed to prevent external routing attacks and specific replay attacks through an optional replay protection mechanism. RPL's PSM mode does not support key replacement when a malicious party obtains the key via differential cryptanalysis since it considers the key to be provided to nodes during the configuration of the network. This thesis presents an approach to implementing a secure authenticated key exchange mechanism for RPL, which ensures …

Bedrock Anisotropy At Sycamore Farms: An Investigation Using Azimuthal Resistivity And Electromagnetic Induction, Cody M. Kessler

Browse all Theses and Dissertations

Azimuthal resistivity surveys coupled with an electromagnetic survey were completed at Sycamore Farms with the goal of investigating bedrock fracturing at the site. Previous work on this subject matter was completed at the site using similar geophysical tools, however, this study utilizes a unique method of azimuthal resistivity and higher resolution electromagnetic data. 72 azimuthal surveys were completed, and the electromagnetic survey covered all fields in which azimuthal surveys were completed. The results from the two methods were compared to identify zones of bedrock fracturing. Although correlation between the two data sets was limited it was found that the electromagnetic …

Locality Analysis Of Patched Php Vulnerabilities, Luke N. Holt

Browse all Theses and Dissertations

The size and complexity of modern software programs is constantly growing making it increasingly difficult to diligently find and diagnose security exploits. The ability to quickly and effectively release patches to prevent existing vulnerabilities significantly limits the exploitation of users and/or the company itself. Due to this it has become crucial to provide the capability of not only releasing a patched version, but also to do so quickly to mitigate the potential damage. In this thesis, we propose metrics for evaluating the locality between exploitable code and its corresponding sanitation API such that we can statistically determine the proximity of …

Data Analytics And Visualization For Virtual Simulation, Sri Lekha Koppaka

Browse all Theses and Dissertations

Healthcare organizations attract a diversity of caregivers and patients by providing essential care. While interacting with people of various races, ethnicity, and economical background, caregivers need to be empathetic and compassionate. Proper training and exposure are needed to understand the patient’s background and handle different situations and provide the best care for the patient. With social determinants of health (SDOH) as the basis, the thesis focuses on providing exposure through “Wright LIFE (Lifelike Immersion for Equity) - A simulation-based training tool” to two such scenarios covering patients from the LGBTQIA+ community & autism spectrum disorder (ASD). This interactive tool helps …

Realistic Virtual Human Character Design Strategy And Experience For Supporting Serious Role-Playing Simulations On Mobile Devices, Sindhu Kumari

Browse all Theses and Dissertations

Promoting awareness of social determinants of health (SDoH) among healthcare providers is important to improve the patient care experience and outcome as it helps providers understand their patients in a better way which can facilitate more efficient and effective communication about health conditions. Healthcare professionals are typically educated about SDoH through lectures, questionaries, or role-play-based approaches; but in today’s world, it is becoming increasingly possible to leverage modern technology to create more impactful and accessible tools for SDoH education. Wright LIFE (Lifelike Immersion for Equity) is a simulation-based training tool especially created for this purpose. It is a mobile app …

The Effects Of An Ultrafast Pulsed Laser On Ybco Thin Film Circuit Transients, Matthew L. Rustad

Browse all Theses and Dissertations

Terahertz (THz) frequency light has shown promise for a wide variety of applications due to its material characterization and imaging capabilities. Its nondestructive nature coupled with its submillimeter spatial resolution provides the most value for terahertz light as an imaging tool. The application of terahertz technology has been limited by a lack of novel and powerful sources. It has been shown that that Yttrium Barium Copper Oxide (YBCO), a type II superconductor, has certain properties that would allow YBCO to be an effective source for THz light. Recent microwave work has shown that when a persistent supercurrent is placed on …

Detection And Identification Of Prevalent Cutting Agents In 'Street' Samples Utilizing Handheld And Benchtop Raman Spectroscopy And Surface-Enhanced Raman Spectroscopy (Sers), Nicole Kenny

Browse all Theses and Dissertations

Illicit and licit drugs continue to have a negative impact on the public’s health even with new regulations and laws. At local, state, and federal levels, crime laboratories analyze samples in a variety of mixtures and concentrations. Raman spectroscopy is a molecular fingerprinting, multiplex technique, which is considered a category A forensic characterization tool by the Scientific Working Group for the Analysis of Seized Drugs (SWGDRUG). The sensitivity of the Raman technique can be further enhanced down to the single-molecule detection level when analytes of interest are located at the interstitial sites of aggregated silver nanoparticles (i.e., the “hot spots” …

Design, Analysis, And Optimization Of Traffic Engineering For Software Defined Networks, Mohammed Ibrahim Salman

Browse all Theses and Dissertations

Network traffic has been growing exponentially due to the rapid development of applications and communications technologies. Conventional routing protocols, such as Open-Shortest Path First (OSPF), do not provide optimal routing and result in weak network resources. Optimal traffic engineering (TE) is not applicable in practice due to operational constraints such as limited memory on the forwarding devices and routes oscillation. Recently, a new way of centralized management of networks enabled by Software-Defined Networking (SDN) made it easy to apply most traffic engineering ideas in practice. \par Toward creating an applicable traffic engineering system, we created a TE simulator for experimenting …

Mercury Concentrations And Mercury Methylation Along The Freshwater To Marine Continuum, Lindsay D. Starr

Browse all Theses and Dissertations

Mercury (Hg) is a neurotoxin that can have detrimental impacts on the human nervous system and on brain development in infants. Methylmercury (MeHg) is the most toxic form of Hg and can concentrate to potentially harmful levels in higher levels of marine food webs. Production of MeHg in oxic water columns is poorly understood due to lack of knowledge of the mechanisms of formation and distribution. Recent work has reported widespread, putative Hg methylation genes in nitrite oxidizers, but any relationship with nitrifiers is unknown. This work focuses on Hg water column distribution, speciation, and methylation. The aims of this …

Detection Of Benzotriazole And Related Analogues In Surface Samples Collected Near An Ohio Airpark, Clara Leedy

Browse all Theses and Dissertations

Benzotriazoles are a class of contaminant of emerging concern which are commonly used as anticorrosive agents in aircraft deicer and anti-icing fluids (ADAFs). The analogues 1H-benzotriazole (BTZ), 4-methyl-1H-benzotrizole (4m-BTZ), and 5-methyl-1H-benzotriazole (5m-BTZ) are commonly found in environmental occurrence together. The two methylated isomers, collectively known as tolytriazole (TTZ), have different toxicity and stability. These contaminants are highly water soluble and resistant to biodegradation, making them persistent through water treatment. Benzotriazoles have been detected worldwide; this investigation focuses on monitoring three sites near a small airpark in Wilmington, Ohio. Two sites that receive runoff from the airpark, Lytle Creek and Indian …

Evaluating Energy-Based Trait Shifts And Population Level Impacts Of Big Brown Bats (Eptesicus Fuscus) With Long-Term Exposure To Pseudogymnoascus Destructans, Molly C. Simonis

Browse all Theses and Dissertations

Disturbances in environment can lead to a wide range of host physiological responses. These responses can either allow hosts to adjust to new conditions in their environment or can reduce their survival, and can subsequently cause host traits to shift. Small mammals are particularly vulnerable to stochastic disturbances, like a pathogen introduction, because of their high energy demands. Studies examining host responses to pathogens often focus on species highly susceptible to infection that typically have high mortality rates, leading to a gap in understanding the responses of less susceptible species. My dissertation evaluates the energy balance of Eptesicus fuscus (big …

Development Of Enhanced User Interaction And User Experience For Supporting Serious Role-Playing Games In A Healthcare Setting, Mark Lee Alow

Browse all Theses and Dissertations

Education about implicit bias in clinical settings is essential for improving the quality of healthcare for underrepresented groups. Such a learning experience can be delivered in the form of a serious game simulation. WrightLIFE (Lifelike Immersion for Equity) is a project that combines two serious game simulations, with each addressing the group that faces implicit bias. These groups are individuals that identify as LGBTQIA+ and people with autism spectrum disorder (ASD). The project presents healthcare providers with a training tool that puts them in the roles of the patient and a medical specialist and immerses them in social and clinical …

Few-Shot Malware Detection Using A Novel Adversarial Reprogramming Model, Ekula Praveen Kumar

Browse all Theses and Dissertations

The increasing sophistication of malware has made detecting and defending against new strains a major challenge for cybersecurity. One promising approach to this problem is using machine learning techniques that extract representative features and train classification models to detect malware in an early stage. However, training such machine learning-based malware detection models represents a significant challenge that requires a large number of high-quality labeled data samples while it is very costly to obtain them in real-world scenarios. In other words, training machine learning models for malware detection requires the capability to learn from only a few labeled examples. To address …