Physical Sciences and Mathematics Commons^™

The Effectiveness Of Using Near-Peer Role Models And Mentoring: A Phenomenological Reflection On Stem For Success, Bruce G. Bukiet, Cristo Leon, James Lipuma

STEM for Success Resources

The proper study of communication from existing models opens the doors to scientific research that allows exploring language and coding as an integral part of effective communication to generate new models that include Trans-Disciplinary Collaboration. The authors analyze the communication factors to describe the application of Trans-Disciplinary Communication. This paper aims to define communication processes and their relationship with language, considering their impact on trans-disciplinary collaboration and innovation. After conducting a systematic literature review, the article explored the concepts of communication, functions, language, and Trans-Disciplinary Communication. This led to its application in the convergence research approach presented in the Collaborative …

Variable Drought Impacts On Stream Habitat Across The Northwestern Us, Sophia Withers

Student Research Symposium

The United States has been in a continuous drought since 2002. Stream quality, specifically in the context of fish habitat, depends on many variables, including vegetation quality. Drought conditions affect vegetation conditions, however it is unclear how drought conditions impact stream habitat quality for fish. Objectives for my project include:

• How does stream habitat quality relate to drought across National Forests of the Northwestern US?
• Has drought increased impacts on riparian vegetation over the past 20 years?

Simulating Ice Nuclei Under Atmospheric Electric Fields, Joseph Cooney

Student Research Symposium

Orographic clouds generally form over mountains when valleys are sunny. The unstable atmosphere can trigger clouds over the mountains, which can be convective. When this happens, the cloud particles (water droplets and ice particles) become charged, ultimately creating ice crystals. In this study, we want to evaluate the impact of electricity on the formation of ice crystals and used a simulation to do so.

Chemtrails: Deadly Skies Or Dangerous Misinformation?, Abigail Foust

Undergraduate Research Symposium

A common sight on a clear day is a thin strip of white across the otherwise blue sky: A contrail. Most people do not think anything of these contrails, and assume they have little to no impact on the world at large. Suppose for a moment, however, that they are not as harmless as some believe. Suppose these cloud trails are actually composed of dangerous chemicals, and are being used by sinister forces in a conspiracy to kill off the weak, mind-control the population, or simply dull our minds in preparation for a government takeover. As far-fetched as this may …

Assessing The Promise And Pitfalls Of Chatgpt For Automated Cs1-Driven Code Generation, Fawad Khan, Max Ramsdell

Student Research Symposium

Definition and Overview of Large Language Models:

• Large Language Models (LLMs) are advanced AI algorithms designed to understand, generate, and interact with human language at a vast scale.

The Evolution of LLMs:

• The development of LLMs has progressed
• 1960 - Basic LLM - basic predictive text functions
• 2017- Transformers - Core model powering ChatGPT introduced
• 2022 - ChatGPT context-aware systems

Assessing Chatgpt As A Programming Exercise Generator, Maxwell Ramsdell, Fawad Khan

Student Research Symposium

Motivation

• Proximal Zone of Development
• Teaching Efficiency
• Cross-Discipline Applications

For these to work, we need to evaluate the effectiveness with which chatGPT writes coding exercises

Teaching A Computer To Do Mechanics, Andrew Watson

Student Research Symposium

Classical Mechanics

- Used for determining motion of objects

- Three Main Formulations of Classical Mechanics

• Newtonian Mechanics: Revolves around Newton’s 2nd Law (F = ma)
• Lagrangian Mechanics: Revolves around the Lagrangian
• Hamiltonian Mechanics: Revolves around the Hamiltonian

- Hamiltonian Mechanics provides the most powerful view of mechanics – but it’s complicated!

• My goal is to get the computer to do Hamiltonian Mechanics.

Application Of T Gates For Anti-Concentration In Clifford Circuits, Matthew Dominicis, Mason Toombs, Gabriel Riddle, Parineeta Puja Saha, Himanth Bobba

Undergraduate Research Conference at Missouri S&T

Our study examines the integration of non-Clifford T gates into randomly generated Clifford circuits to enhance their universal unitary capacity. We investigate the impact of T gates on circuit output randomness, focusing on generating random Clifford circuits and analyzing the effects of T gates. Through simulations and analysis, we assess the effectiveness of this modification in achieving outputs consistent with Anti concentration properties while minimizing the required number of Clifford gates. Our findings provide valuable insights into quantum circuits, with implications for quantum computing applications.

The History Of The Billboard Hot 100 And Its Process, Brileigh Cates

Undergraduate Research Conference at Missouri S&T

The Billboard Hot 100 has been around for decades, and it is believed without much accreditation. What really is Billboard, and why is it so popular? Why have other charting companies not taken up as much popularity? How does Billboard determine the popularity of artists? How has this changed with the introduction of the internet? This research project addresses all of these question, allowing the validity of the data collection to be addressed.

Numerical Studies On Bose–Einstein Condensates, Megan Benkendorf

Undergraduate Research Conference at Missouri S&T

Bose-Einstein condensate (BEC) is a state of matter near absolute zero temperature for which all atoms lose their individual properties and condense into a macroscopic coherent "super-wave". The superfluidity of BEC has been the focus of active research since the first experimental realization of BEC in 1995. The recent launch of the Cold Atom Laboratory to the space station on May 21, 2018, has once again drawn spotlights to these fascinating properties of BEC. In this project, we will carry out numerical studies to understand the behavior of exciton-polariton BECs. A modified Gross-Pitaevskii equation is used to model the dynamics …

A Fisher Information-Based Approach To Improve Labeling Efficiency Of Neural Network Models In Image Classification, Joshua Caruso

Undergraduate Research Conference at Missouri S&T

Active learning is a framework for training machine learning models where the goal is to reduce the number of labels used during training. Neural network models used for image classification require a large training dataset to achieve good accuracy. This project will use active learning to reduce the number of labels needed for training neural network models. We propose to use the Fisher information of the neural network parameters to actively select which images are labelled and included in the training data. A key challenge is the large number of parameters in commonly used neural network models, which significantly increases …

The Search For The Akwamu People In The Americas, 1729-1733, Ben Brown, Justin Pope

Undergraduate Research Conference at Missouri S&T

This Poster presentation attempts to trace the journey of one nation of Africans into the Americas. In 1729, the Akwamu Empire, in modern day Ghana, West Africa, suffered a terrible collapse. Rival African armies enslaved thousands of Akwamu subjects and sold them to European slavers on the Gold Coast. This nation later led the biggest island wide slave revolt prior to the age of revolution in the Americas. Using primary and secondary resources such as the "Transatlantic Slave Trade Database," we will attempt to identify the European slave ships that purchased enslaved Akwamu people and trace their journey into the …

Gender And The Billboard Top 40 Charts Between 1958 And 2023, Brileigh Cates, Justin W. Pope

Undergraduate Research Conference at Missouri S&T

Is there an inherent bias towards male artists in the music industry? Evidence has been shown in previous studies, the most recent being from 2017, that there may be bias towards male artists appearing in Billboard Magazine s Hot 100 list. This study not only updates previous data to include 2017 through 2023, but also looks at the top 40 charts on a week-by-week bias as opposed to the year-end charts that other studies used for their data. We coded each song so as to indicate the gender of the artist(s) as well as whether or not the artists appeared …

Ta Theoretical Framework For Comparing Rlhf Method, Matthew Dominicis

Undergraduate Research Conference at Missouri S&T

Reinforcement Learning from Human Feedback (RLHF) can be used as a means to align Al agents and Large Language Models (LLM) to better represent human expectations. There is a myriad of RLHF methods that exist, however it is difficult to benchmark and compare such methods in terms of alignment, training cost, data collection cost, and other metrics. This project aims to create a robust classification for different RLHF methods from a theoretical point of view. Additionally, this project will attempt to propose bounds for the degree of influence on LLMs that stems from human feedback. Open source LLMs will be …

Heat's Effect On Asphalt Binders Using Nmr, Kaitlin Miles

Undergraduate Research Conference at Missouri S&T

Nuclear Magnetic Resonance (NMR) spectroscopy is a well-known analytical technique that uses the excitation of nuclear spins for solving chemical structures and conformations. Relaxometry is a special field of NMR spectroscopy where information is gained about interactions of 100 nuclear spins with their molecular surroundings. The deterioration of asphalt is a major infrastructure problem, and its rejuvenation back toward its original virgin state is an important field of research and development. The current asphalt industry relies on visual inspection on site and invasive or destructive physical methods to assess emerging asphalt failures. This study examines the chemical changes environmental factors …

Amorphous Transparent Oxide P-Type Semiconductors, Joshua Santy

Undergraduate Research Conference at Missouri S&T

For decades, n-type transparent conducting oxides (TCOs) have been extensively studied and applied in various energy and optoelectronic devices. However, the search for high-performance p-type TCOs, crucial for transparent p-n junctions and next-generation microelectronics - remains uncertain. The most studied p-type TCOs (e.g ., Cu2O-based delafossite family) exhibit the carrier mobilities (<1 cm2Ns) that are much smaller than those in typical n-type TCOs (10-100 cm2Ns). In contrast to the Cu-based layered materials with a relatively flat Cu d10 valence band (resulting in the hole effective mass of 2.5me), Sn2+ in SnO has s2 electronic configuration giving rise to a significantly more dispersed valence band (the hole effective mass is 0.5me) and, hence, to higher hole mobility. Currently, the practical use of SnO is limited due to (i) stability issues of SnO associated with tin preference for valence 4 (as in SnO2, a well-known n-type TCO); (ii) small band gap ~0.7 eV; and (iii) anisotropic hole effective mass in the crystalline phase. Further search for p-type TCOs should involve amorphous phases of SnO-based multi-cation materials where metal composition helps stabilize Sn2+ and open the band gap, whereas the disordered structure is expected to result in uniform isotropic electronic properties and low scattering due to absence of grain boundaries.

Enhancing Galaxy Surveys With Machine Learning, Steven Karst

Undergraduate Research Conference at Missouri S&T

Applications of machine learning (ML) or artificial intelligence (Al) to problems in astrophysics and cosmology have recently entered a golden era. In response, we have updated two of our recent ML/Al efforts that contribute to galaxy surveys whose main scientific target is to reveal the nature of the Comsic Acceleration or Dark Energy. We first revised our effort to infer cosmological information beyond the survey geometry using Graph Neural Networks (GNNs) to take advantage of supercomputing resources on campus. We then updated our methods for galaxy target selection in the Subaru Prime Focus Spectrograph (PFS) survey with modern reinforcement learning …

Quantifying Asphalt Binder Uv Effects With Relaxometry, Rosalee Brown

Undergraduate Research Conference at Missouri S&T

Asphalt deterioration involves many physical and chemical changes caused by environmental factors such as automotive strain, extreme heat, and UV exposure. Asphalt binder assessment in the industry is currently based on structurally destructive testing methods and tests of physical performance without accounting for chemical structure. An emerging evaluation of asphalt binder uses relaxometry, a field of nuclear magnetic resonance (NMR) spectroscopy, to directly observe how asphalt binder is changed by causes of deterioration such as UV exposure. NMR relaxometry explores nuclear spins' interactions with their environment. This noninvasive method can provide a detailed view into the chemical environment of virgin …

Enhancing Galaxy Surveys With Machine Learning, Steven Karst

Undergraduate Research Conference at Missouri S&T

Applications of machine learning (ML) or artificial intelligence (AI) to problems in astrophysics and cosmology have recently entered a golden era. In response, we have updated two of our recent ML/ AI efforts that contribute to galaxy surveys whose main scientific target is to reveal the nature of the Cosmic Acceleration or Dark Energy. We first revised our effort to infer cosmological information beyond the survey geometry using Graph Neural Networks (GNN) to take advantage of supercomputing resources on campus. We then updated our reinforcement learning methods for galaxy target selection in the Subaru Prime Focus Spectrograph (PFS) survey with …

Visualization Of Ultracold Atomic Samples, Samuel Schrader

Undergraduate Research Conference at Missouri S&T

Laser cooling techniques have evolved into a powerful experimental tool to perform precision spectroscopy (for instance, atomic clocks), study fundamental few-body dynamics, and create well-controlled systems for quantum information applications. When the atoms are captured, it is critical to analyze the laser-cooled atomic samples carefully and characterize their properties, such as density, temperature, population distribution, etc., in order to perform these advanced tasks. A straightforward way to measure these properties is detecting the visible optical photons emitted from the sample with a camera. Throughout this project, I have written and developed a computer application that controls a camera and extracts …

Effects Of Reproduction On Senescence In Local Species, Nathan Smith

Undergraduate Research Conference at Missouri S&T

Understanding the impact of reproduction on the aging process within species populations remains an ongoing challenge in ecological and evolutionary research. In this study, we aim to clarify the relationship between reproduction and senescence using agent-based modeling using wild species data sets. Our objectives include investigating how variations in reproductive rates influence the lifespan and aging trajectories of individuals within populations, as well as identifying potential mechanisms underlying these effects. We will employ agent-based modeling to simulate populations and explore the dynamics of reproduction and senescence using publicly available datasets of local wild species. By manipulating parameters related to reproductive …

Numerical Studies On Bose-Einstein Condensates, Megan Benkendorf

Undergraduate Research Conference at Missouri S&T

Bose-Einstein condensate (BEC) is a state of matter near absolute zero temperature for which all atoms lose their individual properties and condense into a macroscopic coherent "super-wave". The superfluidity of BEC has been the focus of active research since the first experimental realization of BEC in 1995. The recent launch of the Cold Atom Laboratory to the space station on May 21, 2018, has once again drawn spotlights to these fascinating properties of BEC. In this project, we will carry out numerical studies to understand the behavior of exciton-polariton BECs. A modified Gross-Pitaevskii equation is used to model the dynamics …

Effect Of Heat On Virgin And Uv-Aged Asphalt Binders Determined By Nuclear Magnetic Resonance Relaxometry, Kaitlin Miles

Undergraduate Research Conference at Missouri S&T

Nuclear Magnetic Resonance (NMR) spectroscopy is a well-known analytical technique that uses the excitation of nuclear spins for solving chemical structures and conformations. Relaxometry is a special field of NMR spectroscopy where information is gained about interactions of nuclear spins with their molecular surroundings. The deterioration of asphalt is a major infrastructure problem, and its rejuvenation back toward its original virgin state is an important field of research and development. The current asphalt industry relies on visual inspection on site and invasive or destructive physical methods to assess emerging asphalt failures. This study examines the chemical changes environmental factors have …

Investigating Geomorphic Controls On The Luminescence Properties Of Quartz Sand In A River System, Jenna Mills

Student Research Symposium

Optically Stimulated Luminescence (OSL) dating of quartz sand grains is used to date young deposits across disciplines in geology and archaeology. OSL dating requires that the quartz mineral is sensitized, or pre-conditioned to produce a luminescence signal following exposure to ionizing radiation. The geological processes that enhance the OSL sensitivity (photons released per given radiation dose and sediment mass) remain uncertain. Our Research Objectives are to investigate the geomorphic controls (bedrock source, fluvial transport, and hillslope processes) on OSL sensitivity using sediment collected along the Pagliara River in NE Sicily.

The Pagliara catchment (13km²) is tectonically active and …

The 2022 Hunga Tonga Volcanic Eruption's Impact On Radio Communications, Spencer Brothers

Student Research Symposium

On January 15^th 2022, the Hunga Tonga volcanic eruption, Figure 1, ejected unprecedented amounts of water into the stratosphere. The resulting plume may present temporary opportunities for long distance radio communication.

Wave Properties Of 2019 Southern Ssw Event, Gabriel Decker

Student Research Symposium

Sudden Stratospheric Warming (SSW) events are extreme increases in polar stratospheric temperatures (10s of Kelvins) over several days. They happen nearly yearly in the Northern Hemisphere, but they’re rare in the Southern.

Planetary Waves (PWs) are large-scale perturbations of the atmospheric dynamical structure that extend coherently around a full longitude circle. (A. K. Smith, 2003)

The exact relationship between SSWs and PWs is not known, but in September 2019, there was a Southern Hemispheric SSW (2^nd ever recorded) which coincided with a strong PW activity. In this investigation, we examined the PW to better understand whether this PW activity …

Towards Fast, Realistic Gas Plume Simulation For Lwir Hyperspectral Images To Improve Deep Learning Identification Models, Scout Jarman

Student Research Symposium

• Longwave infrared (LWIR) hyperspectral images (HSI) are taken from airborne platforms and can be used to find gas plumes.
• Detection and identification of gas plumes has applications in environmental monitoring, disaster response, and national security
• Deep learning can be used to identify gases from a large library of materials,  but can be difficult to apply in practice

Neural Machine Translation Vs. Computer Assisted Technology: Machine Translation Post Editing Human Quality Assurance, Sarah Aland, Sarah Kane, Kenya Merida Millan

Student Research Symposium

What is neural machine Translation (NMT) and Computer Assisted Technology (CAT)?

Stripe Order, Impurities, And Symmetry Breaking In A 3-Dimensional Model Of A Diluted Frustrated Magnet, James Elverson, Thomas Vojta

Undergraduate Research Conference at Missouri S&T

Many quantum materials feature low-temperature phases that break realspace symmetries in addition to spin or charge symmetries. Examples include stripe phases in cuprate superconductors, nematic phases in iron pnictides, and spin-density waves in magnetic materials. Realistic materials always contain some quenched disorder or randomness. To understand the effect of disorder on phases that break real-space symmetries, we investigate the influence of spinless impurities on a frustrated 3-dimensional J 1-J2 Ising model through Monte Carlo simulations. Spin less impurities generate random field type disorder for the spin-density wave (stripe) phase in this system. Whereas the long-range stripe order is destroyed by …

Simulating Inter-Species Competition In C. Elegans, Kevin Lai

Undergraduate Research Conference at Missouri S&T

In biological research, understanding the life cycles of Caenorhabditis elegans (C. elegans) is pivotal for insights into developmental biology, genetics, and population dynamics. Our project builds on Worm-Pop, a Python-based multi-agent simulation of Caenorhabditis elegans (C. elegans) , to enhance its capabilities in simulating survival strategies, reproductive success, and genetic drift. The current model simulates a uniform population without inter-agent interactions. I plan to introduce multiple species of worms into the simulation to study competitive dynamics and determine which variants are most successful under various conditions. Pheromones significantly influence C. elegans behavior, affecting mating, foraging, and social interactions. To address …