Physical Sciences and Mathematics Commons^™

The First Variational Formula, The Phase Space Of Solutions, And The Ostrogradsky Formalism, Matthew Pontius, Drew Watson

Physics Capstone Projects

We consider Lagrangians for classical mechanics which depend upon an arbitrary number of time derivatives of the configuration variables. From the boundary term in the first variation of the Lagrangian we derive the Ostrogradsky formulas which define the Hamiltonian formulation of mechanical systems.

Assessing The Usability And Feasibility Of Digital Assistant Tools For Direct Support Professionals: Participatory Design And Pilot-Testing, Patrice Dolhonde Tremoulet, Andrea Lobo, Christina A. Simmons, Ganesh Baliga, Matthew Brady

College of Science & Mathematics Departmental Research

Background: The United States is experiencing a direct support professional (DSP) crisis, with demand far exceeding supply. Although generating documentation is a critical responsibility, it is one of the most wearisome aspects of DSPs’ jobs. Technology that enables DSPs to log informal time-stamped notes throughout their shift could help reduce the burden of end-of-shift documentation and increase job satisfaction, which in turn could improve the quality of life of the individuals with intellectual and developmental disabilities (IDDs) whom DSPs support. However, DSPs, with varied ages, levels of education, and comfort using technology, are not likely to adopt tools that detract …

Somewhat Surprisingly, (Subjective) Fuzzy Technique Can Help To Better Combine Measurement Results And Expert Estimates Into A Model With Guaranteed Accuracy: Digital Twins And Beyond, Niklas Winnewisser, Michael Beer, Olga Kosheleva, Vladik Kreinovich

Departmental Technical Reports (CS)

To understand how different factors and different control strategies will affect a system -- be it a plant, an airplane, etc. -- it is desirable to form an accurate digital model of this system. Such models are known as digital twins. To make a digital twin as accurate as possible, it is desirable to incorporate all available knowledge of the system into this model. In many cases, a significant part of this knowledge comes in terms of expert statements, statements that are often formulated by using imprecise ("fuzzy") words from natural language such as "small", "very possible", etc. To translate …

Climate Change And Voluntary Private Land Conservation: A Case Study Of Working Lands For Wildlife, Abigail Thompson

School of Professional Studies

This case study examines the role, impact, and future of voluntary private land conservation (VPLC) programs, with a particular focus on the U.S. Department of Agriculture’s Working Lands for Wildlife (WLFW) initiative. Climate change and population growth pose a significant threat to public land conservation, making alternative methods like WLFW increasingly important. WLFW is a relatively successful and well-received program, but it is still young and comparatively smaller than other VPLC programs operated by the government. Publications by the U.S. Department of Agriculture, WLFW partner organizations, and relevant scholarly articles were utilized in order to assess WLFW’s success independently and …

White-Fronted Capuchins (Cebus Albifrons Aequatorialis) In La Hesperia Cloud Forest Reserve: A Study Of Aggressive Behaviors In Response To Human Presence, Marin Lynch

Independent Study Project (ISP) Collection

The Ecuadorian white-fronted capuchin, Cebus albifrons aequatorialis, is a critically endangered primate species native to Ecuador and northern Peru. Their population consists of only a handful of surviving troops spread out across this region. One surviving population exists in La Hesperia Cloud Forest Reserve in Ecuador. This reserve serves as an education and volunteer site for dozens of international travelers every year. I studied the effect of the presence of humans and the lodging they have constructed. Specifically, I investigated the effect on behavior of the proximity of the troops alpha male to manmade structures in the reserve. I …

Analyzing Deaths From Extreme Weather Events And Their Relevance To The Life Insurance Industry, Erika Roof

Honors Projects in Biological and Biomedical Sciences

This study aims to discover the effect of extreme weather events on the life insurance industry. As climate change progresses and global temperatures increase, extreme weather events, which are separated into drought, freeze, severe storms, tropical cyclones, wildfires, and winter storms are expected to occur more often. Extreme weather events not only impact the local economies but increase local death rates as well. Using data from the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration’s National Centers for Environmental Information (NOAA NCEI), this study uses regression analysis to examine the correlation between extreme weather and mortality data. Time series regression analysis suggests that …

The Impacts Of Covid-19 On The U.S. Life Insurance Industry: A Study Of Pandemic Mortality Rates, Allison Wheaton

Honors Projects in Mathematics and Economics

The COVID-19 pandemic has had substantial and widespread impacts around the world that are not yet completely understood but will likely be experienced for years to come. This research seeks to analyzed and quantify the pandemic’s effects on the life insurance industry in the United States through the use of mortality models. Because the life insurance industry relies on the ability to accurately predict an individual’s mortality, it is necessary to investigate the impacts of the pandemic on mortality predictions and accuracy. Impairment factors were developed using pandemic mortality data and applied to existing mortality tables to compare expected and …

Smu Libraries – An Enabling Partner In Ai Information Literacy, Samantha Seah, Zhe Benedict Yeo, Lukas Tschopp

Research Collection Library

SMU Libraries plays a pivotal role in advancing AI information literacy within the larger need for digital literacy skills in the SMU community. In this presentation, participants will get an overview of SMU Libraries' engagement and partnerships with the academic community and will showcase initiatives and resources supporting AI literacy. This includes a discussion of insights from the scholarly literature, research findings and critical perspectives to inform teaching and learning practices related to AI. Speakers will share SMU Libraries’ contributions towards awareness and adoption of AI through a portfolio of successful collaborations and initiatives with partners and stakeholders within and …

Group Iv Topological Quantum Alloy And The Role Of Short-Range Order: The Case Of Ge-Rich Ge1–XPbX, Yunfan Liang, Shunda Chen, Xiaochen Jin, Damien West, Shui-Qing Yu, Tianshu Li, Shengbai Zhang

Electrical Engineering and Computer Science Faculty Publications and Presentations

Despite the explosion of interest in topological materials over the last decades, their applications remain limited due to challenges in growth and incorporation with today’s microelectronics. As a potential bridge to close this gap, we investigate the group-IV alloy Ge_1–xPb_x, in the Ge-rich condition using density functional theory and show that relatively low concentrations of Pb (~9.4%) can lead to a topological phase transition. Furthermore, the calculation of the Z₂ invariant for both the random alloy and the alloy with short-range order (SRO) indicate that the topological phase of the material can be directly modified …

Ct Image Segmentation Using Optimization Techniques Under Neutrosophic Domain, Doaa El-Shahat, Nourhan Talal, Jun Ye, Wen-Hua Cui

Neutrosophic Systems with Applications

In this paper, we introduce a hybrid technique between optimization algorithms and neutrosophic theory. This new hybridization can deal with uncertainties in brain computed tomography (CT) images in three different memberships very effectively. To prove the real-time application of this theory, a new segmentation method for brain CT medical images is presented. The grayscale medical image suffers from uncertainties and inconsistencies in the gray levels due to their bad luminance. The proposed technique addressed this problem by performing neutrosophic operations on gray levels based on the S membership function.

Statistics Pedagogy: Modernizing Introductory College Statistics Courses For Students With Non-Stem Majors, Samantha Hazan

Honors Projects in Mathematics and Economics

With the growing role of technology in society, statistics and statistical literacy have become ever more important. In reaction to this, many colleges now require students, regardless of major, to take an introductory statistics course. The intention behind this is to create a workforce of people who are capable of reasoning about statistics. While good intentioned, preliminary research suggests that current statistics curriculum is not effective in instilling the necessary skills to achieve statistical literacy, particularly for students not majoring in a STEM field. For this reason, this thesis looks to empirically evaluate how the disjuncture between teaching statistics and …

A Green New England? Regional Implementation Of Grant-Based Provisions Of The Inflation Reduction Act In The Northeastern U.S., Samuel Cooper

Sustainability and Social Justice

The Inflation Reduction Act of 2022 has been described as “the most significant action Congress has taken on clean energy and climate change in the nation’s history,” totaling some $370 billion in tax credits and federal grants for everything from residential solar panels to urban forestry. As the first of its size in U.S. climate policy, the IRA has been a subject of study and debate since its introduction, but it is only in this past year that funding reporting data has become available. This thesis utilizes this federal data to produce a novel analysis of IRA implementation at the …

Utah Lake Paleoecology Study Report To Deq, April 2024, J. Brahney, L. King, M. Devey, M. Carter, G. Carling, S. Brothers, A. Provard, B. Young, R. West

Watershed Sciences Faculty Publications

Utah Lake is a large shallow eutrophic lake located in north central Utah. In recent years, the occurrence of frequent and sometimes toxic algal blooms has brought new urgency in understanding the cause and effects of eutrophication in Utah Lake. The drainage basin of Utah Lake is dominated by carbonate sedimentary materials and small pockets of phosphate rock occur. Given the bedrock geology and shallow nature of the lake, there has been uncertainty as to the natural trophic status and ecology of the lake prior to the settlement of Utah Valley. Thus, defining historical nutrient concentrations and sources in the …

How Difficult Is It To Comprehend A Program That Has Significant Repetitions: Fuzzy-Related Explanations Of Empirical Results, Christian Servin, Olga Kosheleva, Vladik Kreinovich

Departmental Technical Reports (CS)

In teaching computing and in gauging the programmers' productivity, it is important to property estimate how much time it will take to comprehend a program. There are techniques for estimating this time, but these techniques do not take into account that some program segments are similar, and this similarity decreases the time needed to comprehend the second segment. Recently, experiments were performed to describe this decrease. These experiments found an empirical formula for the corresponding decrease. In this paper, we use fuzzy-related ideas to provide commonsense-based theoretical explanation for this empirical formula.

“Making The Bed”: Challenging Ideologies Of Ownership, Nonlocality, And Romanticism In The Age Of The Anthropocene, Ainsley P. Foster

[Archive] Belmont University Research Symposium (BURS)

The current Age of the Anthropocene marks a recent and rapid transition into a period in climate history that is notably defined by human impact. Modern Western sentiments of grief, frustration, and romanticism as a result of the interplay between domestic and corporate spaces seem to culminate in an overall attitude of apathy and acceptance of the Age of the Anthropocene. Various art forms collaborate to create the current conversation of the causatory and reactionary relationship that humans have with the Anthropocene, offering interpretations of how individuals and corporations view ownership of and responsibilities to the environment. There is a …

Health And Healthcare: Designing For The Social Determinants Of Health And Blue Zones In North Nashville, Rebecca Tonguis, Honor Thomas, Olivia Hobbs

[Archive] Belmont University Research Symposium (BURS)

Owned by North Nashville’s First Community Church, a now empty site in the Osage-North Fisk neighborhood of North Nashville has been identified as a potential site for a new location of The Store, in addition to a community-centric architectural development based on the social determinants of health and informed by the principles behind Blue Zones, the locations with the highest lifespans in the world. Opened by Brad Paisley and Kimberly Williams-Paisley, The Store is a free grocery store that “allow[s] people to shop for their basic needs in a way that protects dignity and fosters hope”, for which North Nashville …

Mean Flow And Dispersion In The Western Mediterranean Sea From Drifter Observations, Helga Huntley, James Turbett, A.D. Kirwan, Jr., Pierre-Marie Poulain

College of Science & Mathematics Departmental Research

Currents in the ocean distribute water masses and everything floating in them. To understand how fast the water (and its flotsam) travels and how effectively it mixes, we need to study the flow statistics. There are two types of measurements of ocean currents: Eulerian measurements that look at how the ocean velocities change at a stationary point on the Earth; and Lagrangian measurements that follow a water mass. Dispersion and mixing is generally best captured by Lagrangian measurements. At the submesoscale (~10-1 – 10 km), the observational tool of choice are drifters, or floating buoys, tethered to a drogue that …

Enhancing Rotating Machinery Fault Diagnosis: A Dual-Head Attention Mechanism In Deep Learning Neural Networks, Qing Snyder

Dissertations

Rotating machinery is crucial to production efficiency and safety in manufacturing industries for an extended time. Ensuring machinery reliability necessitates effective diagnostic systems, particularly for rotating bearings, the key components of such equipment. Fault diagnosis in rotating machinery is essential to prevent failures and minimize downtime, thereby playing an important role in industrial operations. The application of advanced neural network techniques in industry has risen recently. Among these, attention-based neural networks, especially the Transformer models, are originally noteworthy for their sequential data handling capability. This research delves into attention-based algorithms for rotating machinery fault diagnosis, signifying a substantial advancement in …

Santa Clara Magazine, Volume 65 Number 1, Spring 2024, Santa Clara University

Santa Clara Magazine

14 - A CAMPUS ON THE RISE Six new buildings on campus aren’t the only changes brought by a successful $1 billion fundraising campaign. Lauren Loftus & Leslie Griffy

20 - HUMAN AT HEART How Santa Clara University is distinguishing itself as a leader in human-focused health care innovation. Lauren Loftus

26 - SHEPHERDING INNOVATION How wonder, and God, can make us better scientists. Brother Guy Consolmagno, S.J.

30 - THE CO-OP Santa Clara University has long been a bastion of interdisciplinary learning. A new fund is taking cross-collaboration to new heights. SCM Staff

34 - MAKE AI THE BEST …

2024- The Twenty-Eighth Annual Symposium Of Student Scholars

Symposium of Student Scholars Program Books

The full program book from the 28th Annual Symposium of Student Scholars, held on April 17-19, 2024. Includes abstracts from the presentations and posters.

Phys 401/801

Department of Physics and Astronomy: Syllabi

No abstract provided.

Why Bernstein Polynomials: Yet Another Explanation, Olga Kosheleva, Vladik Kreinovich

Departmental Technical Reports (CS)

In many computational situations -- in particular, in computations under interval or fuzzy uncertainty -- it is convenient to approximate a function by a polynomial. Usually, a polynomial is represented by coefficients at its monomials. However, in many cases, it turns out more efficient to represent a general polynomial by using a different basis -- of so-called Bernstein polynomials. In this paper, we provide a new explanation for the computational efficiency of this basis.

How To Make A Decision Under Interval Uncertainty If We Do Not Know The Utility Function, Jeffrey Escamilla, Vladik Kreinovich

Departmental Technical Reports (CS)

Decision theory describes how to make decisions, in particular, how to make decisions under interval uncertainty. However, this theory's recommendations assume that we know the utility function -- a function that describes the decision maker's preferences. Sometimes, we can make a recommendation even when we do not know the utility function. In this paper, we provide a complete description of all such cases.

Shall We Place More Advanced Students In A Separate Class?, Shahnaz Shahbazova, Olga Kosheleva, Vladik Kreinovich

Departmental Technical Reports (CS)

In every class, we have students who are more advanced and students who are more behind. From this viewpoint, it seems reasonable to place more advanced students in a separate class. This should help advanced students progress faster, and it should help other students as well, since the teachers in the remaining class can better attend to their needs. However, empirically, this does not work: when we form a separate class, the overall amount of gained knowledge decreases. In this paper, we provide a possible explanation for this seemingly counterintuitive phenomenon.

Towards An Optimal Design: What Can We Recommend To Elon Musk?, Martine Ceberio, Olga Kosheleva, Vladik Kreinovich, Hung T. Nguyen

Departmental Technical Reports (CS)

Elon Musk's successful "move fast and break things" strategy is based on the fact that in many cases, we do not need to satisfy all usual constraints to be successful. By sequentially trying smaller number of constraints, he finds the smallest number of constraints that are still needed to succeed -- and using this smaller number of constrains leads to a much cheaper (and thus, more practical) design. In this strategy, Musk relies on his intuition -- which, as all intuitions, sometimes works and sometimes doesn't. To replace this intuition, we propose an algorithm that minimizes the worst-case cost of …

Exploring Tokenization Techniques To Optimize Patch-Based Time-Series Transformers, Gabriel L. Asher

Computer Science Senior Theses

Transformer architectures have revolutionized deep learning, impacting natural language processing and computer vision. Recently, PatchTST has advanced long-term time-series forecasting by embedding patches of time-steps to use as tokens for transformers. This study examines and seeks to enhance PatchTST's embedding techniques. Using eight benchmark datasets, we explore explore novel token embedding techniques. To this end, we introduce several PatchTST variants, which alter the embedding methods of the original paper. These variants consist of the following architectural changes: using CNNs to embed inputs to tokens, embedding an aggregate measure like the mean, max, or sum of a patch, adding the exponential …

Engr 691: Trustworthy Machine Learning, University Of Mississippi. School Of Engineering

GMAS Course Syllabi

No abstract provided.

Phys 727: Advanced Thermodynamics/Statistical Mechanics, Kevin Beach

GMAS Course Syllabi

No abstract provided.

Soc 501: Statistics, Savannah L. Kelly Ph.D.

GMAS Course Syllabi

No abstract provided.

Activated Carbon Derived From Cucumber Peel For Use As A Supercapacitor Electrode Material, Meruyert Nazhipkyzy, Gulim Kurmanbayeva, Aigerim Seitkazinova, Esin Apaydın Varol, Wanlu Li, Balaussa Dinistanova, Almagul Issanbekova, Togzhan Mashan

Department of Chemistry and Biochemistry Faculty Scholarship and Creative Works

Biowaste conversion into activated carbon is a sustainable and inexpensive approach that relieves the pressure on its disposal. Here, we prepared micro-mesoporous activated carbons (ACs) from cucumber peels through carbonization at 600 °C followed by thermal activation at different temperatures. The ACs were tested as supercapacitors for the first time. The carbon activated at 800 °C (ACP-800) showed a high specific capacitance value of 300 F/g at a scan rate of 5 mV/s in the cyclic voltammetry and 331 F/g at the current density of 0.1 A/g in the galvanostatic charge–discharge analysis. At the current density of 1 A/g, the …