Physical Sciences and Mathematics Commons^™

A Functioning Code May Not Be A Secure Code : A Preliminary Study On The Students' Complacency With Secure Coding, Jeremiah Niiquaye Kotey

Theses, Dissertations and Culminating Projects

Eleanor Roosevelt once said: "Learn from the mistakes of others. You can’t live long enough to make them all yourself". Mistakes are almost inevitable while coding or designing a system. Therefore, patches are created to fix the issues in the code either by a manual review, or through a static analysis tool. Oftentimes, mistakes in programming emanate from lack of skills thus, competence with a particular programming language but negligence also plays a role in other instances. A functioning code that solves a particular problem does not guarantee that the code is secure, hence the code should be structured to …

A Computational Study Of The Copper-Catalyzed Trifluoromethylation Of Boronic Acids, Kevin Nyhuis

Theses, Dissertations and Culminating Projects

This work is a computational study of a reaction mechanism for the trifluoromethylation of boronic acids. Three steps of the proposed reaction mechanism are studied, •CF₃ addition to a copper catalyst center, base promoted transmetalation between copper and aryl boronic acid, and bond forming reductive elimination in which the CF₃ and aryl substituent form a bond. Limited information is known about this mechanism. This study uses computational methods to attempt to elucidate the mechanism and provide the groundwork for potential improvement. Quantum chemical methods in conjunction with tight-binding based conformational sampling methods are used to investigate the possible …

Investigating The Roles Of Active Site Residues K59, K119 And E168 In M. Tuberculosis Indole-3-Glycerol Phosphate Synthase, Maryum M. Bhatti

Theses, Dissertations and Culminating Projects

Tuberculosis (TB) is a disease that is caused by a bacteria called Mycobacterium tuberculosis and primarily attacks the lungs but can spread to other areas of the body as well. TB can develop resistance to drugs that may be used to cure the disease. Multidrug resistant TB is especially a growing issue as it does not respond to the two most powerful anti-TB drugs, isoniazid and rifampicin. For this reason, finding new ways to target TB are critically needed. One possible way to do this is to target the enzymes in the tryptophan biosynthetic pathway of M. tuberculosis. Studies have …

Facial Expression Recognition Using Lightweight Deep Learning Modeling, Mubashir Ahmad, Saira, Omar Alfandi, Asad Masood Khattak, Syed Furqan Qadri, Iftikhar Ahmed Saeed, Salabat Khan, Bashir Hayat, Arshad Ahmad

All Works

Facial expression is a type of communication and is useful in many areas of computer vision, including intelligent visual surveillance, human-robot interaction and human behavior analysis. A deep learning approach is presented to classify happy, sad, angry, fearful, contemptuous, surprised and disgusted expressions. Accurate detection and classification of human facial expression is a critical task in image processing due to the inconsistencies amid the complexity, including change in illumination, occlusion, noise and the over-fitting problem. A stacked sparse auto-encoder for facial expression recognition (SSAE-FER) is used for unsupervised pre-training and supervised fine-tuning. SSAE-FER automatically extracts features from input images, and …

An Experiment On The Effects Of Using Color To Visualize Requirements Analysis Tasks: Supplemental Material, Yesugen Baatartogtokh, Irene Foster, Alicia M. Grubb

Computer Science: Faculty Publications

Supplemental material for the paper: "An Experiment on the Effects of using Color to Visualize Requirements Analysis Tasks".
This paper is a scientific evaluation of the effectiveness and usability of EVO. We conduct an experiment to measure any effect of using colors to represent evidence pairs.

Is Disclosure And Certification Of The Use Of Generative Ai Really Necessary?, Maura R. Grossman, Paul W. Grimm, Daniel G. Brown

Faculty Scholarship

No abstract provided.

Coming Out While Going Fast: Queer Conviviality In Speedrunning Live Streams, Johanna Brewer

Computer Science: Faculty Publications

Drawing on ethnographic research of LGBTQIA+ live streaming speedrunners, this article demonstrates how by centering queer perspectives, we can catalyze meaningful social changes for all. Though for most people, beating the original Super Mario Bros. in under five minutes would seem unfathomably difficult, LGBTQIA+ speedrunning live streamers regularly accomplish this superhuman feat, while coming out to an audience of thousands at the same time. For queer and trans folks, broadcasting such a transgressive, transformational form of play is defiant demonstration of vulnerability; one that creates a comfortable space for a community to thrive, by cultivating a culture of queer conviviality. …

More Human Than Human: Llm-Generated Narratives Outperform Human-Llm Interleaved Narratives, Zoie Zhao, Sophie Song, Bridget Duah, Jamie C. Macbeth, Scott Carter, Monica Van, Nayeli Bravo, Matthew Klenk, Katherine Sieck, Alexandre Filipowicz

Computer Science: Faculty Publications

Narrative story generation has gained emerging interest in the field of large language models. The present paper aims to compare stories generated by an LLM only (non-interleaved) with those generated by interleaving human-generated and LLM-generated text (interleaved). The study’s hypothesis is that interleaved stories would perform better than non-interleaved stories. To verify this hypothesis, we conducted two tests with roughly 500 participants each. Participants were asked to rate stories of each type, including an overall score or preference and four facets—logical soundness, plausibility, understandability, and novelty. Our findings indicate that interleaved stories were in fact less preferred than non-interleaved stories. …

Image Schema Decompositions Of The Conceptual Dependency Ingest Primitive: A Study Of Paraphrases, Jamie C. Macbeth, Alexis Kilayko, Zoie Zhao, Sophie Song, Winniw X. Zheng

Computer Science: Faculty Publications

One of the hallmarks of the Schank-Minsky Conceptual Dependency Trans-Frames meaning representation system is that it attempts to express complex meanings by building large and complex conceptual structures using a relatively small number of primitives. Recently comparisons of image schemas with Conceptual Dependency primitives revealed ways of possibly reducing the number of primitives while maintaining the expressiveness of the set—an important research goal because it increases the flexibility and richness of the primitive-decomposed structures in a way that better approximates human cognition. Inspired by this prior work, we employ a paraphrase generation system to explore the replacement of the Conceptual …

Role Of Chatgpt In Computer Programming., Som Biswas

Mesopotamian Journal of Computer Science

Purpose: The purpose of this abstract is to outline the role and capabilities of ChatGPT, a language model developed by OpenAI for computer programming. Methodology: ChatGPT is a large language model that has been trained on a diverse range of texts and can perform a variety of programming-related tasks. These tasks include code completion and correction, code snippet prediction and suggestion, automatic syntax error fixing, code optimization and refactoring suggestions, missing code generation, document generation, chatbot development, text-to-code generation, and answering technical queries. Results: ChatGPT can provide users with explanations, examples, and guidance to help them understand complex concepts and …

Infusing K-Means For Securing Iot Services In Edge Computing, Tam Sakirin, Iqra Asif

Mesopotamian Journal of Computer Science

Accurate, timely, and safe administration of data from IoT devices is made possible by intelligent computing. As the number of IoT devices proliferates, more and more data will be collected, adding depth and breadth to the existing range of IoT services. Technology that incorporates entire systems on a single integrated circuit has improved to the point where more and more consumer electronics can support full-fledged operating systems. It is impractical to use a single computing model for the entire planet since doing so would cause severe network congestion and security holes. In order to solve this problem, we present a …

Predicting Carbon Dioxide Emissions With The Orange Application: An Empirical Analysis, Israa Ezzat, Alaa Wagih Abdulqader

Mesopotamian Journal of Computer Science

The effects of climate change, such as droughts, storms, and extreme weather, are increasingly being felt around the world. Greenhouse gases are the primary contributors to climate change, with carbon dioxide (CO2) being the most significant. In fact, CO2 accounts for a significant percentage of all greenhouse gas emissions. As a result, reducing CO2 emissions has become a critical priority for mitigating the impacts of climate change and preserving our planet for future generations. Based on simulation and data mining technologies that use historical data, CO2 is expected to continue to rise. Around the world, 80% of CO2 emissions come …

Unlocking The Full Potential Of Spectrum: A Comprehensive Review Of Cognitive Radio Technology, Indu Bala, Maad M. Mijwil

Mesopotamian Journal of Computer Science

Wireless networks are confronted with enormous challenge because of the limited availability of radio spectrum, which has culminated in spectrum congestion and ineffective utilization of the spectrum's resources. This has led to a great deal of innovation in both communication and mobile devices that enable the delivery of high-quality multimedia content from various sources. However, despite these advances, there is still a need to find new ways to utilize existing frequency bands. Recent years have witnessed an awful research on cognitive radio (CR) based networks development. This review paper provides a comprehensive overview of CR technology, its capabilities, and its …

The Evolving Role Of Artificial Intelligence In The Future Of Distance Learning: Exploring The Next Frontier, Maad M. Mijwil, Guma Ali, Emre Sadıkoğlu

Mesopotamian Journal of Computer Science

In recent years, education has become especially related to the applications provided by artificial intelligence technology through a digital environment that includes a set of tools that assist in processing and storing information. Artificial intelligence techniques contribute to the development of students' skills by providing them with advanced scientific content and building their mental capabilities faster. Moreover, these techniques support analysing student data and suggest suitable educational materials and activities for them. Artificial intelligence is a noteworthy tool for the growth of distance education, especially after the development of expert systems that have become a human advisor in many domains, …

Study And Analysis Of Ofdm Under Rayleigh Fading Channel Using Various Modulation Methods, Sowmya Kalakoti, Uday Kiran Vashapaka, Mokshith Reddy Gujjula, Harika Surasi, Siddartha Kusuma

Mesopotamian Journal of Computer Science

Orthogonal Frequency Division Multiplexing (OFDM) is well recognized as a very efficient multicarrier technology. OFDM has witnessed a significant increase in its utilization within contemporary wideband digital communication systems. The technology possesses several notable benefits, including its capacity to effectively manage challenging channel circumstances, optimize spectrum utilization, mitigate inter symbol interference (ISI), and support high data transmission rates. Hence, it has been employed in several forthcoming wired and wireless communication systems, such as 4G LTE mobile communications. This work primarily concentrates on the performance assessment and investigation of the OFDM system in the presence of Rayleigh fading channels. By analyzing …

Exploring The Evolution Of Ai Integration In English As A Foreign Language Education: A Scopus-Based Bibliometric Analysis (1997-2023), Mohanad G. Yaseen, Sara S. Alnakeeb

Mesopotamian Journal of Computer Science

Significant scholarly interest has been focused on the use of AI in English as a Foreign Language (EFL) instruction because it presents novel opportunities for improving language learning contexts and pedagogical approaches. This study provides an in-depth investigation into how AI is revolutionizing English as a foreign language (EFL) instruction, with special focus on the ways in which this technology can help students acquire a language in a fun, engaging, and one-on-one setting. This research examines the ethical and sociological implications of the broad integration of AI technology into language learning environments, highlighting major trends and identifying critical gaps through …

Understanding Influencers Of College Major Decision: The Uae Case, Mohammad Amin Kuhail, Joao Negreiros, Haseena Al Katheeri, Sana Khan, Shurooq Almutairi

All Works

This study aims to understand and analyze what influences female students to choose a college major in the United Arab Emirates (UAE). To accomplish our target, we conducted a survey with mostly female first-year undergraduate students (N = 496) at Zayed University to understand the personal, social, and financial factors influencing students’ major choices. Further, this study also asked students to specify their actions before deciding on their major and assessed the information that could be helpful for future students to decide on their majors. Last, the study investigated how Science, Technology, Engineering, and Mathematics (STEM) students differ from other …

Forecasting Networks Links With Laplace Characteristic And Geographical Information In Complex Networks, Muhammad Wasim, Feras Al-Obeidat, Fernando Moreira, Haji Gul, Adnan Amin

All Works

Forecasting links in a network is a crucial task in various applications such as social networks, internet traffic management, and data mining. Many studies on forecasting links in social networks and on other networks have been conducted over the last decade. In this paper, we propose a novel method based on graph Laplacian eigenmaps for predicting the geographic location of nodes in complex networks. Our method utilizes the adjacency matrix of the network and generates a scoring matrix that captures the similarity between nodes in terms of their geographic location. By transforming the distance matrices into score matrices using exponential …

New Advances In Long-Term Monitoring Of Storm-Deposited Boulder Ridges Along Rocky Shorelines Of San Salvador Island, Bahamas, Bosiljka Glumac, Ursula Miquel, H. Allen Curran

Geosciences: Faculty Publications

Beginning in January 2012, we have monitored two boulder ridges on San Salvador: Singer Bar Point (SBP, length ~790 m) along the reef- and lagoon-protected northern coast and The Gulf (TG, length ~460 m) on the island’s high-energy southern coast. This long-term monitoring aims at documenting changes in ridge morphology and distribution, and the direction and amount of movement of individual boulders to gain insights into the intensity and effects of storms on these coastal areas.

In the initial stage of our investigations, the largest boulders from each site were photographed, GPS-located, measured, and characterized by composition and morphology. Boulders …

Evaluating The Use Of Environmental Tracers To Reduce Conceptual Model Uncertainty Of Hydrogeologic Models, Andrew Nordberg, Jon Graham, W. Payton Gardner

Graduate Student Theses, Dissertations, & Professional Papers

Environmental tracer concentrations for CFC12, SF6, and tritium are used in groundwater simulations to assess the ability of these tracers to reduce conceptual model uncertainty due to uncertainty of a site’s geologic and recharge characterization. The resulting groundwater simulations are characterized by site-specific hydrologic and geologic data, and with coordination from a field team with years of knowledge about the site. First-order (conceptual) uncertainty is directly addressed by using a stochastic modeling approach for spatial variability of the proposed subsurface configurations. Simulations of environmental tracer concentrations and water levels are used to assess six alternate conceptual models that are based …

Synthetic Aperture Radar Observations At Salar De Pajonales, Chile, Michael A. A. Mcinenly

Graduate Student Theses, Dissertations, & Professional Papers

Remotely sensed microwave radars provide the spatial and temporal coverage needed to improve our understanding of the relationship between moisture content and salt pan mineralogy and, ultimately, climate variability. Moisture content in the surface and near-surface crusts found in salt pan environments, such as salt pan, has a significant impact on the backscatter values recorded by synthetic aperture radar (SAR) systems. This is because moisture affects the dielectric constant and surface roughness of the saline surface, which in turn influences the amount of electromagnetic energy reflected back to the SAR sensor. Changes in backscatter values are attributed to seasonal and …

Meta-Analysis Of Scent Detection Canines And Potential Factors Influencing Their Success Rates, Molly Marie Jaskinia

Graduate Student Theses, Dissertations, & Professional Papers

Objective: This is a meta-analysis focused on the success rates of scent detection canines and potential factors that could influence their accuracy. A series of statistical analyses were conducted to determine if certain demographic factors, such as the dog’s gender, age, and breed, have an effect on a scent dog’s accuracy during a search. Or if more circumstantial factors, like the dog’s level of experience in scent work, the type of target scent, and their handler’s awareness of the target’s location, affect the outcome of the search.

Materials and Methods: A dataset was created from 37 different articles consisting of …

2-Aminopyridyl Functionalized Scaffold As A Tool For Systematic Investigation Of B-Glucan Binding And Dectin-1 Activation, Jasper Alinea Aquino

Graduate Student Theses, Dissertations, & Professional Papers

Tuberculosis (TB) – an infectious disease caused by Mycobacterium tuberculosis (Mtb) – remains an epidemic worldwide contributing to millions of deaths each year. Vaccination is possibly the best means of addressing this global threat. In recent years, synergistic Th1 and Th17 immune responses have emerged as the key players for a vaccine-induced protection against TB. There is currently no vaccine approved for humans that elicits a Th17-mediated immune response. C-Type Lectin Receptors (CLR), specifically Dectin-1, a pattern recognition receptor (PRR) of β-1,3-glucans (β-glucans) primarily from fungi cell walls, is known to induce a Th17-mediated response. The Th17 response upon binding …

Applications Of Transfer Learning From Malicious To Vulnerable Binaries, Sean Patrick Mcnulty

Graduate Student Theses, Dissertations, & Professional Papers

Malware detection and vulnerability detection are important cybersecurity tasks. Previous research has successfully applied a variety of machine learning methods to both. However, despite their potential synergies, previous research has yet to unite these two tasks. Given the recent success of transfer learning in many domains, such as language modeling and image recognition, this thesis investigated the use of transfer learning to improve vulnerability detection. Specifically, we pre-trained a series of models to detect malicious binaries and used the weights from those models to kickstart the detection of vulnerable binaries. In our study, we also investigated five different data representations …

Displacement, Place Attachment, And Other Characteristics Of Anglers On The Yellowstone River, Zachary L. Jones

Graduate Student Theses, Dissertations, & Professional Papers

Yellowstone River has seen increasing recreational use as Montana has grown and out of state visitation has increased, leading to some locals voicing concerns of crowding. River recreation, as with many outdoor recreational activities, has participants that may be considered to be sensitive to crowded conditions and place a high value on solitude. Considering these perceptions, there is reason to believe that these participants may change their river use patterns if or when the perceived level of crowding exceeds their tolerance thresholds. Further, monitoring efforts conducted at river access sites often do not fully capture users that are already displaced …

Assessing The Impact Of Parallel Burnout Fires On Flank Rate Of Spread, Erik Borke

Graduate Student Theses, Dissertations, & Professional Papers

The effects of flank-parallel suppression fires on the local rate of spread (ROS) of freely burning headfires through fully cured homogeneous grass fuels are assessed. Data sets include: one thermal image stack of a prescribed burn recorded by drone, and a suite of simulation experiments carried out in Wildland Urban Interface Fire Dynamics Simulator (WFDS). A new approach to computing ROS, curvature proxy driven normals to convex polylines, was developed to carry out this analysis. ROS time series depicting flank acceleration of the prescribed burn and simulation experiments, observable under coarse and fine directional classification schemes respectively, are the primary …

Beaver Dam Analogs (Bdas) Alter Carbon Pools, Fluxes, And Concentrations Of Intermountain Headwater Streams, Hilary Schultz

Graduate Student Theses, Dissertations, & Professional Papers

Beaver dam analogs (BDAs) have emerged as a climate adaptation and restoration strategy for water resource management in the drought-prone Western U.S., yet the focus has been on their influence on water quantity, overlooking effects on broader ecological components. By increasing water residence time and facilitating sediment retention, BDAs have the potential to influence carbon pools, fluxes, and concentrations. To examine the influence of BDAs on instream and riparian organic C and trace gases, we studied three intermountain headwater streams restored with BDAs two years after restoration during the summer of 2021. We found that there were subtle differences in …

Climatological, Hydrological, And Economic Analysis Of Agriculture In Montana And The Western U.S.A., Zachary H. Lauffenburger

Graduate Student Theses, Dissertations, & Professional Papers

Many studies have addressed the impact of climate on agriculture; however, fewer studies addressed how farmers adapt to climate change, to what extent implementation of adaptation strategies mitigates economic losses or alters the hydrologic system. Analyses of how historical climate affected not only farmer decision making, but also the economic and hydrological consequences of farmers’ adaptations to climate variations, and projections of the spatiotemporal climatic regimes at finer regional scales are critical for aiding in actionable climate change adaptations. This dissertation helps fill knowledge gaps on the impacts of climate change in rural regions of the agricultural western U.S.A. and …

Evaluating The Sensitivity Of Crustal Deformation To Bedrock Hydrology In A Mountain Watershed, Brett J. Oliver

Graduate Student Theses, Dissertations, & Professional Papers

We evaluate the sensitivity of Earth's elastic deformation to groundwater hydraulic diffusivity using coupled groundwater and elastic deformation models. Seasonal changes in terrestrial water storage cause deformation to the Earth’s crust and deeper interior that is within the observational capacity of GPS instruments. We couple finite difference groundwater simulations with geodetic forward models of crustal displacement to investigate the ability of geodetic deformation to constrain bedrock hydrologic properties. We use MODFLOW-2005 to simulate seasonal changes in groundwater flow and storage, and then use the LoadDef elastic deformation model to forward model surface displacement caused by the change in terrestrial water …

Modeling Current And Future Saltmarsh Distribution In Arcata Marsh, Madeline Kay Mcnerthney

Cal Poly Humboldt theses and projects

Saltmarsh habitat is vulnerable to Sea Level Rise (SLR) and requires long-term management plans for communities to continue to benefit from their ecosystem services. This study analyzed the variation of above-ground vegetation biomass throughout I Street Marsh, using multiple variables, including classified vegetative community types, elevation and remote sensing indexes comprised of both visual (Red, Green, Blue) and non-visual (Red Edge, Near Infrared) bands. Plant community types were classified using a cluster analysis, and distinguished three communities, based on dominant species: Salicornia, Spartina, and a mixed type (diverse floristic makeup, with no dominant species). Above-ground biomass was significantly higher in …