Physical Sciences and Mathematics Commons^™

Differential Elliptic Flow Analysis Of Hadrons With Different Wuark Content In Simulated Pp Collisions, Elhussein Osama

Theses and Dissertations

According to current physics theories, it is assumed that in the first microsecond after the big bang, the universe was in a state of matter called Quark-Gluon Plasma (QGP), where the fundamental consistent of matters (quarks and leptons), were highly energetic, and floating around freely. Searching for such phase of matter; as the possible earliest signatures after the big bang, and among many other interesting experimental measurements, the jet quenching and elliptic flow are the most important ones, in the heavy ion collisions at the Relativistic Heavy Ion Collider (RHIC) and the Large Hadron Collider (LHC) experiments.

The azimuthal anisotropy …

Feasibility Of Oil Palm Agroforestry System: Evaluating The Application Of Oil Palm Ash For Enhancing Cherry Tomato (Solanum Lycopersicum. Var. Nancy Rz) Production Using Brackish Water., Ime Joseph Bassey

Theses and Dissertations

Monoculture systems of oil palm production are ravaging the world’s tropical forests, causing deforestation and biodiversity loss, which contribute to climate change at an uncontrollable pace. Oil palm agroforestry systems (AFSs), one of the strategies of regenerative agriculture, have proven to reverse the unfavorable effects of the oil palm monoculture systems. A sustainable means of soil fertilization and irrigation must be explored to improve the feasibility of oil palm AFSs. This study evaluates the impact of the application of oil palm ash and brackish irrigation on cherry tomato production. The experiment was conducted in a hydroponic system using a 2*4 …

Towards Carbon Dioxide Reduction: Synthesis And Characterization Of Ccc-Nhc Pincer Iron Complexes., Joshua Mensah

Theses and Dissertations

The industrial revolution came with its downside of emission of greenhouse gases into the atmosphere. The NOAA reported in 2019 that, of the greenhouse gases emitted into the atmosphere, CO2 contributed to about 80% of the increased greenhouse gases hence the need for CO2 Sequestering and Storage (CSS) and ultimately leading to Carbon Capture and Recycling (CCR) as a viable option to convert CO2 into useful forms. The race to find the best catalyst for CCR has led to the synthesis of many organometallic compounds. Pincer complexes catalyzed CO2 reduction has gained notoriety recently because of the tunability and robustness …

Predictability Of The Overland Reintensification Of North Atlantic Tropical Cyclone Erin (2007), Ariel Tickner-Ernst

Theses and Dissertations

Tropical cyclones (TC) typically decrease in intensity upon interacting with land because of increased surface roughness and decreased surface evaporation. However, several studies have documented cases in which TCs maintain their intensity or even intensify over land within non- or weakly baroclinic environments. Yet, our understanding of the precise physical processes that support maintenance or intensification over land in non- or weakly baroclinic environments remains limited, and the predictive skill for these outcomes has yet to be quantified.

We begin this process by quantifying the predictive skill and forecast uncertainty of the overland intensification of North Atlantic Tropical Storm Erin …

Investigating The Impact Of Human-Centered Interface Design On The User Experience Of Mobile Device Users, Ruchir Gupta

Theses and Dissertations

In order to investigate the intricate interaction between interface design, user technological proficiency, and other components of the user experience, this research study used a mixed-method approach. The beginner user group—those with little experience or expertise with technology - were the main target audience. The important discovery emphasizes the substantial influence that careful design can have on improving the effectiveness and usability of interfaces for non-tech-savvy individuals. When using the suggested Interface B instead of the current Interface A, beginner participants' task completion times significantly improved, according to the user study. This underlines the significance of creating with the needs …

A Statistical Fetch Model For Water Wave Glint Correction Using Worldview-3 Imagery, Amanda Jade Quintanilla

Theses and Dissertations

Sun glint in satellite imagery of the water surface contaminates the upwelling signal received by a detector. Many models exist that attempt to correct for this wave facet effect and phenomena. In this work a model for sun glint correction is created using the comparison of image transects between two nearly simultaneously collected images of the same area, although with differing sensor geometry. One image utilized in this research is almost entirely glint free while the other is contaminated by water wave facet glint. Although many models for removing sun glint exist based on various techniques, none are completely accurate, …

Deep Learning In Indus Valley Script Digitization, Deva Munikanta Reddy Atturu

Theses and Dissertations

This research introduces ASR-net(Ancient Script Recognition), a groundbreaking system that automatically digitizes ancient Indus seals by converting them into coded text, similar to Optical Character Recognition for modern languages. ASR-net, with an 95% success rate in identifying individual symbols, aims to address the crucial need for automated techniques in deciphering the enigmatic Indus script. Initially Yolov3 is utilized to create the bounding boxes around each graphemes present in the Indus Valley Seal. In addition to that we created M-net(Mahadevan) model to encode the graphemes. Beyond digitization, the paper proposes a new research challenge called the Motif Identification Problem (MIP) related …

Modelling Terrestrial And Potential Extraterrestrial Photopigments Via Density Functional Theory, Dorothea Illner

Theses and Dissertations

In the search for extraterrestrial life, biosignatures play a crucial role in identifying its putative traces. A commonly known and robust biosignature is the Vegetation Red Edge (VRE), which can be described as a sharp increase of reflectance observed from a planet and stems from the light absorption of photopigments in specific regions in the electromagnetic spectrum. For Earth, this VRE is known to occur around 700 nm, however, if the photopigments absorb light in different regions and have different structures the VRE could experience a wavelenght shift.

In this work, Chlorophyll a and a potential photopigment precursor called Phot0 …

Space Transformation For Open Set Recognition, Atefeh Mahdavi

Theses and Dissertations

Open Set Recognition (OSR) is about dealing with unknown situations that were not learned by the models during training. In OSR, only a limited number of known classes are available at the time of training the model and the possibility of unknown classes never seen at training time emerges in the test environment. In such a setting, the unknown classes and their risk should be considered in the algorithm. Such systems require not only to identify and discriminate instances that belong to the source domain (i.e., the seen known classes contained in the training dataset) but also to reject unknown …

Unraveling The Physics Of Quasar Jets Using Hst Polarimetry, Devon Clautice

Theses and Dissertations

We present a multiwavelength study of three high-power FR II (quasar) jets -- 3C 273, PKS 0637-752, and 1150+497 -- with an emphasis on new high-quality Hubble Space Telescope (HST) optical polarimetry and Chandra X-ray Observatory imaging. Relativistic jets from active galactic nuclei transport energy and mass from the supermassive black hole’s accretion region out to Megaparsec-scale lobes, with effects that feedback into galaxy formation and cluster energetics. We build on recent work which has called into question our fundamental understanding of FR II jet physics, and suggest that highly-efficient particle acceleration must be taking place in situ …

Development Of Chiral Lewis Base Catalysts For Chlorosilane-Mediated Asymmetric C-C Bond Formations, Changgong Xu

Theses and Dissertations

The chiral hydrazine is a crucial structural motif that serves as pivotal structural elements in numerous natural products and biologically significant molecules. We are particularly interested in the catalytic asymmetric reduction of hydrazones, as well as the catalytic asymmetric propargylation and allenylation of hydrazones, because they provide direct pathways to these enantio-enriched chiral building blocks. In this work, we will explore the potential of two different categories of chiral Lewis base catalysts in the said transformations.

Developed by another student in our group, axial-chiral 3,3’-triazolyl biisoquinoline N,N’-dioxides derived catalysts are tested and demonstrated its capability in activating various hydrazone …

An Investigation Of The Interactions Of Gradient Coherence And Network Pruning In Neural Networks, Zachary Yauney

Theses and Dissertations

We investigate the coherent gradient hypothesis and show that the coherence measurements are different on real and random data regardless of the network's initialization. We introduce "diffs," an attempt at an element-wise approximation at coherence, and investigate their properties. We study how coherence is affected by increasing the width of simple fully-connected networks. We then prune those fully-connected networks and find that sparse networks outperform dense networks with the same number of nonzero parameters. In addition, we show that it is possible to increase the performance of a sparse network by scaling the size of the dense parent network it …

Trip - Transformer Interatomic Potential Predicts Realistic Energy Surface Using Physical Bias, Bryce Eric Hedelius

Theses and Dissertations

Accurate interatomic energies and forces enable high-quality molecular dynamics simulations, torsion scans, potential energy surface mapping, and geometry optimization. Machine learning algorithms have enabled rapid estimates of energies and forces with high accuracy. Further development of machine learning algorithms holds promise for producing general potentials that support dozens of atomic species. I present my own Transformer Interatomic Potential (TrIP): a chemically sound potential based on the SE(3)-Transformer. TrIP's species-agnostic architecture--using continuous atomic representation and homogenous graph convolutions--encourages parameter sharing between atomic species for more general representations of chemical environments, keeps a reasonable number of parameters, serves as a form of …

Towards A Practical Method For Monitoring Kinetic Processes In Polymers With Low-Frequency Raman Spectroscopy, Robert Vito Chimenti

Theses and Dissertations

Unlike liquids and crystalline solids, glassy materials exist in a constant state of structural nonequilibrium. Therefore, a comprehensive understanding of material kinetics is critical for understanding the structure-property-processing relationships of polymeric materials. Amorphous materials universally display low-frequency Raman features related to the phonon density of states resulting in a broad disorder band for Raman shifts below 100 cm-1, which is related to the conformational entropy and the modulus. This disorder band is dominated by the Boson peak, a feature due to phonon scattering because of disorder and can be related to the transverse sound velocity of the material, and a …

Head Tail Open: Open Tailed Classification Of Imbalanced Document Data, Chetan Joshi

Theses and Dissertations

Deep learning models for scanned document image classification and form understand- ing have made significant progress in the last few years. High accuracy can be achieved by a model with the help of copious amounts of labelled training data for closed-world classification. However, very little work has been done in the domain of fine-grained and head-tailed(class imbalance with some classes having high numbers of data points and some having a low number of data points) open-world classification for documents. Our proposed method achieves a better classification results than the baseline of the head-tail-novel/open dataset. Our techniques include separating the head-tail …

Unique K3 Surfaces With Purely Non-Symplectic Automorphism: Insights From Weighted Projective Spaceunique K3 Surfaces With Purely Non-Symplectic Automorphism:\\Insights From Weighted Projective Space, Elizabeth Melville

Theses and Dissertations

K3 surfaces have garnered attention across various fields, from optics and dynamics to high energy physics, making them a subject of extensive study for many decades. Recent work by mathematicians, including Brandhorst [1], has focused on non-symplectic automorphisms, aiming to categorize K3 surfaces that admit such automorphisms. Brandhorst made a list of unique K3 surfaces with purely non-symplectic automorphisms and established specific criteria for a K3 surface to be isomorphic to one on his list. This thesis aims to provide an alternative representation of select K3 surfaces from Brandhorst's list. While Brandhorst predominantly characterizes these surfaces as elliptic K3 surfaces, …

The Generation Of Terahertz Light And Its Applications In The Study Of Vibrational Motion, Aldair Alejandro

Theses and Dissertations

Terahertz (THz) spectroscopy is a powerful tool that uses ultrashort pulses of light to study the properties of materials on picosecond time scales. THz light can be generated through a variety of methods. In our lab, we generate THz through the process of optical rectification in nonlinear optical (NLO) organic crystals. THz light can be used to study several phenomena in materials, such as spin precession, electron acceleration, vibrational and rotational motion. The work presented in this dissertation is divided into two parts: (1) the generation of THz light and (2) applications of THz light. The first portion of this …

Multifunctional And Moisture Tolerant Zinc-Based Mono- And Bi-Metallic Metal-Organic Framework (Mof) Thin Films, Emmanuel Agbata

Theses and Dissertations

Many applications of metal-organic frameworks (MOFs) are highly dependent on their structures. The type and consistency of structure inform their properties. Zinc-based MOFs are applicable in different fields because of the low toxicity of zinc materials and are therefore also useful for catalysis. While MOF-5, a zinc-based MOF with carboxylate linkers is moisture intolerant, a variant of this is moisture tolerant. The introduction of a nitrogen-based linker in the zinc MOF which renders the structure moisture-tolerant. This material has not been explored as much, despite its multifunctional properties. Furthermore, the growth of Zn-based bimetallics of this MOF has not yet …

Applying Mathematical Modeling To The Study Of Family Systems, Dahlia Maxwell

Theses and Dissertations

Mathematical modeling provides a powerful framework for insight into current scientific theories as well as hypothesis generation for further research. Despite its undeniable potential to enrich scientific advancement, the application of mathematical modeling remains conspicuously scarce in the field of family science. The complexity inherent in family dynamics, coupled with the intricate interplay of emotions in the individual, underscores the necessity of a robust analytical approach. Addressing this critical gap in the literature, this thesis introduces a sophisticated mathematical model of family dynamics integrating essential elements from family systems theory, emotion dynamics, and appraisal theory. The model is implemented as …

Advancing Single-Cell Proteomics Through Innovations In Liquid Chromatography And Mass Spectrometry, Kei Grant Isaac Webber

Theses and Dissertations

Traditional proteomics studies can measure many protein biomarkers simultaneously from a single patient-derived sample, promising the possibility of syndromic diagnoses of multiple diseases sharing common symptoms. However, precious cellular-level information is lost in conventional bulk-scale studies that measure tissues comprising many types of cells. As single cells are the building blocks of organisms and are easier to biopsy than traditional bulk samples, performing proteomics on a single-cell level would benefit clinicians and patients. Single-cell proteomics, combined with mass spectrometry imaging, can be used to analyze cells in their microenvironment, preserving spatial information. We have previously used laser-capture microdissection to isolate …

Robot Proficiency Self-Assessment Using Assumption-Alignment Tracking, Xuan Cao

Theses and Dissertations

A robot is proficient if its performance for its task(s) satisfies a specific standard. While the design of autonomous robots often emphasizes such proficiency, another important attribute of autonomous robot systems is their ability to evaluate their own proficiency. A robot should be able to conduct proficiency self-assessment (PSA), i.e. assess how well it can perform a task before, during, and after it has attempted the task. We propose the assumption-alignment tracking (AAT) method, which provides time-indexed assessments of the veracity of robot generators' assumptions, for designing autonomous robots that can effectively evaluate their own performance. AAT can be considered …

N-H Nhc Palladium Catalysts Derived From Unique 2-Phosphinoimidazole Precursors For C-C Cross Coupling Reactions And Application Of Slow Releasing Polymers Impregnated With Gibberellic Acid To Overcome Seed Dormancy For Land Reclamation, Alexandra Jean Setelin Larson

Theses and Dissertations

Organometallic chemistry is highly dependent upon the ligands which are employed on a metal's surface. These ligands control steric bulk and electronics of the metal center which can change the reactivity of the organometallic complex. Ligands that are standard in organometallic chemistry include phosphine ligands. These phosphine ligands have been utilized in the field since the 1960's and have shaped the development of many key organometallic catalysts. Phosphine ligands are easily functionalized and highly reactive. This increased reactivity, however, causes severe limitations as phosphine ligands are often unstable under standard benchtop conditions and must be handled both air and moisture …

Gt-Ches And Dycon: Improved Classification For Human Evolutionary Systems, Joseph S. Johnson

Theses and Dissertations

The purpose of this work is to rethink the process of learning in human evolutionary systems. We take a sober look at how game theory, network theory, and chaos theory pertain specifically to the modeling, data, and training components of generalization in human systems. The value of our research is three-fold. First, our work is a direct approach to align machine learning generalization with core behavioral theories. We made our best effort to directly reconcile the axioms of these heretofore incompatible disciplines -- rather than moving from AI/ML towards the behavioral theories while building exclusively on AI/ML intuition. Second, this …

Development Of Bifunctional Peptides As Scaffolds For Bifunctional Catalysis And A Novel Method Of Peptide Stapling Using Squaric Esters, Adam X. Wayment

Theses and Dissertations

Enzymes are some of nature's most powerful tools in chemical processes. However, their molecular complexity makes them difficult to synthesize and complicates their application in traditional organic synthesis. Peptides, a building block of enzymes, can be rapidly synthesized and have been used as a possible alternative in achieving enzyme-like catalysis. However, most peptide-based catalysts are limited in reaction-scope and are unable to incorporate traditional organic catalysts. We have designed a helical peptide scaffold capable of being functionalized with a wide variety of organocatalysts as well as transition-metal based catalysts. In order to understand how the peptide structure effects reactivity and …

Development Of Salinomycin Derivatives As Potential Anticancer Agents, Viren Soni

Theses and Dissertations

Salinomycin is a poly-ionophore antibiotic that was originally isolated from Streptomyces albus by Miyazaki and colleagues from Kaken Chemicals Co., Ltd., Tokyo, Japan. Salinomycin exhibits antimicrobial activity against Gram-positive bacteria including Bacillus subtilis, Staphylococcus aureus, Micrococcus flavus, Sarcina lutea, Mycobacterium spp. Some filamentous fungi, Plasmodium falciparum, and Eimeria spp. as well as protozoan parasites responsible for the poultry disease coccidiosis. Hence, it is used in veterinary medicine. In 2009 Gupta et al demonstrated that salinomycin selectively killed human breast cancer stem cells (CSCs) with great efficacy, and the mechanism of action of this novel CSCs molecule was explored. To name …

Mri Image Regression Cnn For Bone Marrow Lesion Volume Prediction, Kevin Yanagisawa

Theses and Dissertations

Bone marrow lesions (BMLs), occurs from fluid build up in the soft tissues inside your bone. This can be seen on magnetic resonance imaging (MRI) scans and is characterized by excess water signals in the bone marrow space. This disease is commonly caused by osteoarthritis (OA), a degenerative join disease where tissues within the joint breakdown over time [1]. These BMLs are an emerging target for OA, as they are commonly related to pain and worsening of the diseased area until surgical intervention is required [2]–[4]. In order to assess the BMLs, MRIs were utilized as input into a regression …

New Mathematics Teachers' Goals, Orientations, And Resources That Influence Implementation Of Principles Learned In Brigham Young University's Teacher Preparation Program, Caroline S. Gneiting

Theses and Dissertations

Research in mathematics education shows that new mathematics teachers struggle to implement reform teaching practices that they learned in their teacher preparation programs. In this study, the researcher observed and interviewed three new mathematics teachers (within five years of graduation) to further explore the question of why new teachers use or do not use what they learned in their teacher preparation program. The study uses an expanded version of Schoenfeld's decision-making theory of Orientations, Goals, and Resources. This theory proved useful in the analysis of the research data, providing a framework to incorporate and organize the numerous reasons suggested by …

Usability-Driven Security Enhancements In Person-To-Person Communication, Tarun Kumar Yadav

Theses and Dissertations

In the contemporary digital landscape, ensuring secure communication amid widespread data exchange is imperative. This dissertation focuses on enhancing the security and privacy of end-to-end encryption (E2EE) applications while maintaining or improving usability. The dissertation first investigates and proposes improvements in two areas of existing E2EE applications: countering man-in-the-middle and impersonation attacks through automated key verification and studying user perceptions of cryptographic deniability. Insights from privacy-conscious users reveal concerns about the lack of E2EE support, app siloing, and data accessibility by client apps. To address these issues, we propose an innovative user-controlled encryption system, enabling encryption before data reaches the …

Analyzing Novel Metal Alloys For Glucose Sensing And Electrocatalysis, Anna Grace Boddy

Theses and Dissertations

In pharmaceutical and medicinal chemistry, metals and metal alloys often receive less attention compared to biological or organic compounds due to many factors including toxicity in the body for drug development or the cost of these metals. However, metals can play an important role in pharmaceuticals, having an impact on original cancer drugs, such as platinum used for head and neck tumors. Electrocatalysis is also another topic that receives less attention over topics such as chromatography in pharmaceuticals due to its potential toxic catalysts and voltages that could be harmful to the body. Electrocatalytic sensors can play an important role …

Open System Neural Networks, Bradley Hatch

Theses and Dissertations

Recent advances in self-supervised learning have made it possible to reuse information-rich models that have been generally pre-trained on massive amounts of data for other downstream tasks. But the pre-training process can be drastically different from the fine-tuning training process, which can lead to inefficient learning. We address this disconnect in training dynamics by structuring the learning process like an open system in thermodynamics. Open systems can achieve a steady state when low-entropy inputs are converted to high-entropy outputs. We modify the the model and the learning process to mimic this behavior, and attend more to elements of the input …