Physical Sciences and Mathematics Commons^™

Enriched Continental Flood Basalts From Depleted Mantle Melts: Modeling The Lithospheric Contamination Of Karoo Lavas From Antarctica, Jussi S. Heinonen, Arto V. Luttinen, Wendy A. Bohrson

All Faculty Scholarship for the College of the Sciences

Continental flood basalts (CFBs) represent large-scale melting events in the Earth’s upper mantle and show considerable geochemical heterogeneity that is typically linked to substantial contribution from underlying continental lithosphere. Large-scale partial melting of the cold subcontinental lithospheric mantle and the large amounts of crustal contamination suggested by traditional binary mixing or assimilation-fractional crystallization models are difficult to reconcile with the thermal and compositional characteristics of continental lithosphere, however. The well-exposed CFBs of Vestfjella, western Dronning Maud Land, Antarctica, belong to the Jurassic Karoo large igneous province and provide a prime locality to quantify mass contributions of lithospheric and sublithospheric sources …

Evaluating And Predicting Agricultural Management Effects Under Tile Drainage Using Modified Apsim, Robert W. Malone, N. Huth, P. S. Carberry, Liwang Ma, Thomas C. Kaspar, Douglas L. Karlen, T. Meade, Ramesh S. Kanwar, Philip Heilman

Douglas L Karlen

An accurate and management sensitive simulation model for tile-drained Midwestern soils is needed to optimize the use of agricultural management practices (e.g., winter cover crops) to reduce nitrate leaching without adversely affecting corn yield. Our objectives were to enhance the Agricultural Production Systems Simulator (APSIM) for tile drainage, test the modified model for several management scenarios, and then predict nitrate leaching with and without winter wheat cover crop. Twelve years of data (1990–2001) from northeast Iowa were used for model testing. Management scenarios included continuous corn and corn–soybean rotations with single or split N applications. For 38 of 44 observations, …

Prediction Of Laser Ablation In Brain: Sensitivity, Calibration, And Validation, Samuel J. Fahrenholtz

Dissertations & Theses (Open Access)

The surgical planning of MR-guided laser induced thermal therapy (MRgLITT) stands to benefit from predictive computational modeling. The dearth of physical model parameter data leads to modeling uncertainty. This work implements a well-accepted framework with three key steps for model-building: model-parameter sensitivity analysis, model calibration, and model validation.

The sensitivity study is via generalized polynomial chaos (gPC) paired with a transient finite element (FEM) model. Uniform probability distribution functions (PDFs) capture the plausible range of values suggested by the literature for five model parameters. The five PDFs are input separately into the FEM model to gain a probabilistic sensitivity response …

Estimating The Water Quality Condition Of River And Lake Water In The Midwestern United States From Its Spectral Characteristics, Jing Tan

Open Access Dissertations

This study focuses on developing/calibrating remote sensing algorithms for water quality retrieval in Midwestern rivers and lakes. In the first part of this study, the spectral measurements collected using a hand-held spectrometer as well as water quality observations for the Wabash River and its tributary the Tippecanoe River in Indiana were used to develop empirical models for the retrieval of chlorophyll (chl) and total suspended solids (TSS). A method for removing sky and sun glint from field spectra for turbid inland waters was developed and tested. Empirical models were then developed using a subset of the field measurements with the …

Monitoring And Modeling The Hydrological Performance Of Extensive Green Roof Systems, Joseph Seidl

Theses and Dissertations

Urban stormwater runoff causes many problems for watersheds located within large metropolitan areas, including such detrimental effects as flooding, erosion, pollution, and the increased risk of combined sewerage overflows. Increased amounts of impervious areas resulting from urban sprawl have also been shown to escalate stormwater flows, which exacerbates water management issues in these metropolitan areas. Water resource engineers have progressively turned toward green infrastructure to solve stormwater problems, and green roof systems represent one type of this green infrastructure. As of current, however, green roof systems are largely underused in as an effective stormwater management tool.

The major factor limiting …

Using Digital Elevation Models Derived From Airborne Lidar And Other Remote Sensing Data To Model Channel Networks And Estimate Fluvial Geomorphological Metrics, Noah Slovin

Masters Theses

Recent advances in remote-sensing technologies and analysis methods, specifically airborne-LiDAR elevation data and corresponding geographical information system (GIS) tools, present new opportunities for automated and rapid fluvial geomorphic (FGM) assessments that can cover entire watersheds. In this thesis, semi-automated GIS tools are used to extract channel centerlines and bankfull width values from digital elevation models (DEM) for five New England watersheds. For each study site, four centerlines are mapped. LiDAR and NED lines are delineated using ArcGIS spatial analyst tools with high-resolution (1-m to 2-m) LiDAR DEMs or USGS National Elevation Dataset (NED) DEMs, respectively. Resampled LiDAR decreases LiDAR DEM …

Niche-Based Modeling Of Japanese Stiltgrass (Microstegium Vimineum) Using Presence-Only Information, Nathan Bush

Masters Theses

The Connecticut River watershed is experiencing a rapid invasion of aggressive non-native plant species, which threaten watershed function and structure. Volunteer-based monitoring programs such as the University of Massachusetts’ OutSmart Invasives Species Project, Early Detection Distribution Mapping System (EDDMapS) and the Invasive Plant Atlas of New England (IPANE) have gathered valuable invasive plant data. These programs provide a unique opportunity for researchers to model invasive plant species utilizing citizen-sourced data. This study took advantage of these large data sources to model invasive plant distribution and to determine environmental and biophysical predictors that are most influential in dispersion, and to identify …

Robust Modeling And Predictions Of Greenhouse Gas Fluxes From Forest And Wetland Ecosystems, Khandker S. Ishtiaq

FIU Electronic Theses and Dissertations

The land-atmospheric exchanges of carbon dioxide (CO₂) and methane (CH₄) are major drivers of global warming and climatic changes. The greenhouse gas (GHG) fluxes indicate the dynamics and potential storage of carbon in terrestrial and wetland ecosystems. Appropriate modeling and prediction tools can provide a quantitative understanding and valuable insights into the ecosystem carbon dynamics, while aiding the development of engineering and management strategies to limit emissions of GHGs and enhance carbon sequestration. This dissertation focuses on the development of data-analytics tools and engineering models by employing a range of empirical and semi-mechanistic approaches to robustly …

Geophysical Evidence For Mid-Crustal Magma Reservoirs In The Lassen Volcanic Region, California, Samantha Catherine Tavarez

USF Tampa Graduate Theses and Dissertations

Regional-scale complete Bouguer gravity anomalies underlying the Lassen and Shasta -Medicine Lake regions in northern California and southern Oregon are associated with subduction of the Gorda plate beneath North America. These generally negative anomalies reflect where underplating has deepened to form the mantle wedge, and where subduction has given rise to a series of Quaternary volcanoes comprising the southernmost end of the Cascade range. Multiple conductive bodies were identified by Park and Ostos (2013) in their magnetotelluric (MT) study of the broader Lassen volcanic region. Their broadband and long period measurements were conducted along a 250 km profile spanning from …

Prediction Of 1‑Octanol Solubilities Using Data From The Open Notebook Science Challenge, Andrew Lang, Michael A. Buonaiuto

College of Science and Engineering Faculty Research and Scholarship

Background: 1-Octanol solubility is important in a variety of applications involving pharmacology and environmental chemistry. Current models are linear in nature and often require foreknowledge of either melting point or aqueous solubility. Here we extend the range of applicability of 1-octanol solubility models by creating a random forest model that can predict 1-octanol solubilities directly from structure. Results: We created a random forest model using CDK descriptors that has an out-of-bag (OOB) R2 value of 0.66 and an OOB mean squared error of 0.34. The model has been deployed for general use as a Shiny application. Conclusion: The 1-octanol solubility …

In Need Of A Domain-Specific Language Modeling Notation For Smartphone Applications With Portable Capability, Hamza Ghandorh, Luiz Fernando Capretz Dr., Ali Bou Nassif Dr.

Electrical and Computer Engineering Publications

The rapid growth of the smartphone market and its increasing revenue has motivated developers to target multiple platforms. Market leaders, such as Apple, Google, and Microsoft, develop their smartphone applications complying with their platform specifications. The specification of each platform makes a platform-dedicated application incompatible with other platforms due to the diversity of operating systems, programming languages, and design patterns. Conventional development methodologies are applied to smartphone applications, yet they perform less well. Smartphone applications have unique hardware and software requirements. All previous factors push smartphone developers to build less sophisticated and low-quality products when targeting multiple smartphone platforms. Model-driven …

Maintaining Consistency Between A Design Model And Its Implementation, Hector M. Chavez

Dissertations

Software design models are increasingly being used as part of the software development process as analysis and design artifacts and to automatically generate code that developers can further modify or extend, greatly expediting the software development process. This, however, has introduced the challenge of maintaining consistency between the design models and their implementation as they evolve during the development process. Traditional software testing and verification techniques have been well studied in the past, and they are an integral part of many software development projects, however, they are not well suited for consistency checking between a design model and its implementation. …

Modeling Gross Primary Production Of Maize And Soybean Croplands Using Light Quality, Temperature, Water Stress, And Phenology, Anthony L. Nguy-Robertson, Andrew E. Suyker, Xiangming Xiao

School of Natural Resources: Faculty Publications

Vegetation productivity metrics, such as gross primary production (GPP) may be determined from the efficiency with which light is converted into photosynthates, or light use efficiency (ϵ). Therefore, accurate measurements and modeling of ϵ is important for estimating GPP in each ecosystem. Previous studies have quantified the impacts of biophysical parameters on light use efficiency based GPP models. Here we enhance previous models utilizing four scalars for light quality (i.e., cloudiness), temperature, water stress, and phenology for data collected from both maize and soybean crops at three Nebraska AmeriFlux sites between 2001 and 2012 (maize: 26 field-years; soybean: …

Interdisciplinary Modeling For Water-Related Issues Graduate Course, Laurel Saito, Alexander Fernald, Timothy Link

All ECSTATIC Materials

The science and management of aquatic ecosystems is inherently interdisciplinary, with issues associated with hydrology, atmospheric science, water quality, geochemistry, sociology, economics, environmental science, and ecology. Addressing water resources issues in any one discipline invariably involves effects that concern other disciplines, and attempts to address one issue often have consequences that exacerbate existing issues or concerns, or create new ones (Jørgensen et al. 1992; Lackey et al. 1975; Straskraba 1994) due to the strongly interactive nature of key processes (Christensen et al. 1996). Thus, research and management of aquatic ecosystems must be interdisciplinary to be most effective, but such truly …

Detecting, Modeling, And Predicting User Temporal Intention, Hany M. Salaheldeen

Computer Science Theses & Dissertations

The content of social media has grown exponentially in the recent years and its role has evolved from narrating life events to actually shaping them. Unfortunately, content posted and shared in social networks is vulnerable and prone to loss or change, rendering the context associated with it (a tweet, post, status, or others) meaningless. There is an inherent value in maintaining the consistency of such social records as in some cases they take over the task of being the first draft of history as collections of these social posts narrate the pulse of the street during historic events, protest, riots, …

Toward “Optimal” Integration Of Terrestrial Biosphere Models, Christopher R. Schwalm, Deborah N. Huntzinger, Joshua B. Fisher, Anna M. Michalak, Kevin Bowman, Philippe Ciais, Robert Cook, Bassil El-Masri, Daniel Hayes, Maoyi Huang, Akihiko Ito, Atul Jain, Anthony W. King, Hiumin Lei, Junjie Liu, Chaoqun (Crystal) Lu, Jaifu Mao, Shushi Peng, Benjamin Poulter, Daniel Ricciuto, Kevin Schaefer, Xiaoying Shi, Bo Tao, Hanqin Tian, Weile Wang, Yaxing Wei, Jia Yang, Ning Zeng

Chaoqun (Crystal) Lu

Multimodel ensembles (MME) are commonplace in Earth system modeling. Here we perform MME integration using a 10-member ensemble of terrestrial biosphere models (TBMs) from the Multiscale synthesis and Terrestrial Model Intercomparison Project (MsTMIP). We contrast optimal (skill based for present-day carbon cycling) versus naïve (“one model-one vote”) integration. MsTMIP optimal and naïve mean land sink strength estimates (−1.16 versus −1.15 Pg C per annum respectively) are statistically indistinguishable. This holds also for grid cell values and extends to gross uptake, biomass, and net ecosystem productivity. TBM skill is similarly indistinguishable. The added complexity of skill-based integration does not materially change …

Kinematic Modeling Of The Determinants Of Diastolic Function, Leonid Shmuylovich

Arts & Sciences Electronic Theses and Dissertations

Multiple modalities are routinely used in clinical cardiology to determine cardiovascular function, and many of the indexes derived from these modalities are causally interconnected. A correlative approach to cardiovascular function however, where indexes are correlated to disease presence and progression, fails to fully capitalize on the information content of the indexes.

Causal quantitative modeling of cardiovascular physiology on the other hand offers a predictive rather than accommodative approach to cardiovascular function determination. In this work we apply a kinematic modeling approach to understanding diastolic function. We discuss novel insights related to the physiological determinants of diastolic function, and define novel …

Time Series Modeling Of Baseball Performance​, Kyle Andelin, Sam Kaplan

Scholars Week

The 162 game long Major League Baseball season provides ample time for a player’s performance to vary and trend in different directions. Managers must set daily rosters for their teams, using past performance to help make decisions. But which prior performance periods tell us the most about upcoming performance? To answer this, it's helpful to view a player’s future performance, for any given statistic, as a function of his performance in previous playing periods (e.g. previous game, previous week, previous year, etc.). In this on-going research project, we consider two approaches to predicting future performance from the past. In the …

Assessing The Probability That A Finding Is Genuine For Large-Scale Genetic Association Studies, Chia-Ling Kuo, Olga A. Vsevolozhskaya, Dmitri V. Zaykin

Olga A. Vsevolozhskaya

Genetic association studies routinely involve massive numbers of statistical tests accompanied by P-values. Whole genome sequencing technologies increased the potential number of tested variants to tens of millions. The more tests are performed, the smaller P-value is required to be deemed significant. However, a small P-value is not equivalent to small chances of a spurious finding and significance thresholds may fail to serve as efficient filters against false results. While the Bayesian approach can provide a direct assessment of the probability that a finding is spurious, its adoption in association studies has been slow, due in part to the ubiquity …

Using Capture-Mark-Recapture Techniques To Estimate Detection Probabilities & Fidelity Of Expression For The Critically Endangered James Spinymussel (Pleurobema Collina)., Alaina C. Esposito

Masters Theses, 2010-2019

The critically endangered James Spinymussel (Pleurobema collina) is a species of freshwater mussel endemic to Virginia’s James and Dan River basins. In the last 20 years, P. collina has experienced a substantial decline in numbers and currently occupies approximately 10% of its original habitat; however, little information is known about this species to assist in conservation. A 230-meter reach of transitional habitat in Swift Run was selected for repeat observations to estimate detection probabilities using a Capture-Mark-Recapture framework. In June 2014, visual scouting began to locate and tag P. collina (including other mussels in the community) with PIT …

Data-Driven Modeling And Analysis Of Household Travel Mode Choice, Nagesh Shukla, Jun Ma, Rohan Wickramasuriya Denagamage, Nam N. Huynh

Nagesh Shukla

One of the important problems studied in the area of travel behavior analysis is travel mode choice which is one of the four crucial steps in transportation demand estimation for urban planning. State of the art models in travel demand modelling can be classified as trip based; tour based; and activity based. In trip based approach, each individual trips is modelled as independent and isolated trips i.e. no connections between different trips. In tour based approach, trips that start and end from the same location (home, work, etc) and trips within a tour are dependent on each other. In past …

Mathematical Modeling And Optimal Control Of Alternative Pest Management For Alfalfa Agroecosystems, Cara Sulyok

Mathematics Honors Papers

This project develops mathematical models and computer simulations for cost-effective and environmentally-safe strategies to minimize plant damage from pests with optimal biodiversity levels. The desired goals are to identify tradeoffs between costs, impacts, and outcomes using the enemies hypothesis and polyculture in farming. A mathematical model including twelve size- and time-dependent parameters was created using a system of non-linear differential equations. It was shown to accurately fit results from open-field experiments and thus predict outcomes for scenarios not covered by these experiments.

The focus is on the application to alfalfa agroecosystems where field experiments and data were conducted and provided …

Stellar Spectroscopy: New Methods And Insights, Sanaz S. Golriz

Electronic Thesis and Dissertation Repository

The study of the chemical evolution of stars is of crucial importance since they play a major role in the enrichment of the chemistry of the universe. Throughout their lifetime, stars undergo several processes that can alter their chemistry. Gradually, the nucleosynthesis products from the interior of the star are radiatively and convectively levitated and mixed with the upper layers of the atmosphere. In the later stages of their evolution, low to intermediate mass stars (0.8-8.0~M☉) eject a significant fraction of these nucleosynthesis products, resulting in a circumstellar envelope of gas and dust around the central star with a very …

Toward A Theory Of Multi-Method Modeling And Simulation Approach, Mariusz A. Balaban

Computational Modeling & Simulation Engineering Theses & Dissertations

The representation via simulation models can easily lead to simulation models too simple for their intended purpose, or with too much detail, making them hard to understand. This problem is related to limitations of the modeling and simulation methods. A multi-method Modeling and Simulation (M&S) approach has the potential for improved representation by taking advantage of methods' strengths and mitigating their weaknesses. Despite a high appeal for using multiple M&S methods, several related problems should be addressed first. The current level of theoretical, methodological, and pragmatic knowledge related to a multi-method M&S approach is limited. It is problematic that there …

An Individual-Based Model Of Chaparral Vegetation Response To Frequent Wildfire, Timothy Lucas, Dayna Mann, Reanna Dona

Seaver College Research And Scholarly Achievement Symposium

In recent years, the Santa Monica Mountains (SMM) have been plagued by frequent wildfires which threaten the native chaparral species. Nonsprouting chaparral species are completely killed by a fire, but their seeds germinate in response to fire cues. Facultative sprouters both resprout after a wildfire and release seeds that germinate post-fire. This project is based on data collected since 1986 at a biological preserve adjacent to the Malibu campus of Pepperdine University with an average fire return interval of 7.5 years. We present a spatial model that simulates the growth, seed dispersal and resprouting behavior of individual shrubs that compete …

Modeling And Simulation Of Evacuation Plan For Hancock Stadium, Nirmal Neranjan Weerasekara

Theses and Dissertations

The goal of this study is to use Modeling and Simulation of Evacuation Plan (MSEP) to support management to execute proper evacuation plan in case of emergency at Hancock Stadium in Illinois State University. Analyses of the research literature and evacuation scenarios are used to build a simulation system that will connect a description of emergency and evacuation situation with its context. It shows how an evacuation plan actually functions. The results of the study will help safety managers to understand the current situations of evacuation according to the specific simulation scenarios. The evacuation simulation is categorized according to the …

Computer Modeling The Incursion Patterns Of Marine Invasive Species, Matthew W. Johnston

HCNSO Student Theses and Dissertations

Abstract Not Available.

Panel - Real World Applications: Overview Of Virginia Beach Center For Gis' Geoprocessing Of Storm Surge Models, Dave Arnold

January 23, 2015: Storm Surge Modeling Tools for Planning and Response

No abstract provided.

Applications Of The Adcirc Storm Surge, Tide, And Wind-Wave Model, Rick Luettich, Brian Blanton

January 23, 2015: Storm Surge Modeling Tools for Planning and Response

No abstract provided.

Storm Surge And Street-Level Inundation Modeling In New York City During Hurricane Sandy, Harry V. Wang, Derek Loftis, Zhou Liu, Jay Titlow, David Forrest, Joseph Zhang

January 23, 2015: Storm Surge Modeling Tools for Planning and Response

No abstract provided.