Social and Behavioral Sciences Commons^™

High-Precision Lead Isotope Analysis On Modern Populations To Determine Geolocation Reliability, Gennifer M. Goad

USF Tampa Graduate Theses and Dissertations

Forensic anthropologists increasingly use chemical isotope analysis in the investigation of unidentified human remains, as biochemical georeferencing continually improves with the development of modern reference data of known origins. Isotope variations in trace elements such as strontium (Sr) and lead (Pb) in human teeth are some of the most useful indicators of past domicile in archaeological research and thus have high potential for modern, forensic applications. In this study, high-precision lead isotope analysis was conducted on 63 modern human teeth, which were previously analyzed for strontium isotopes. The results present new lead isotope data for the following countries: United States …

Pursuing Resilience Of Coastal Communities Through Sustainable And Integrated Urban Water Management, Pacia Díaz

USF Tampa Graduate Theses and Dissertations

Reliability of water supply in the urban setting has become essential for communities to function and thrive. It is needed for more than mere human consumption and well-being. Although modern cities have water treatment and distribution systems, pressures from urbanization, population growth and the anticipated pressures of climate change are affecting the quality of water supply and the reliability of treatment and distribution systems. There is therefore an urgent need to take appropriate measures to improve the resilience of water supply systems before the impacts are irreversible.

Improving the resilience of water supply systems can be a challenge. In the …

Assessing The Cooling Effects Of Urban Vegetation On Urban Heat Mitigation In Selected U.S. Cities, Qiuyan Yu

USF Tampa Graduate Theses and Dissertations

Urban Heat Island (UHI) is a growing problem worldwide. Mitigation of UHI is necessary for cities to adapt to climate change and enhance sustainable development at a city scale. Cooling cities with urban vegetation management is a sustainable solution for urban heat mitigation. Urban vegetation influences urban microclimate through the shading effect, surface roughness, and evapotranspiration. The differences in horizontal and vertical structures of urban vegetation determine the shading effect, surface roughness, and evapotranspiration. Enhancing the cooling effect of urban vegetation requires a comprehensive understanding of how vegetation structure affects UHI. The effects of horizontal structure on land surface temperature …

A Cost Benefit Analysis Of Using A Battery Energy Storage System (Bess) Represented By A Unit Commitment Model, Nemanja Mihailovic

USF Tampa Graduate Theses and Dissertations

This thesis aims to provide a general overview of a cost and benefit analysis of incorporating a battery energy storage system within unit commitment model.

The deregulation of the electricity market in the U.S. has only been around for the last two decades. With renewable energy and energy storage systems becoming less expensive, a decentralized market scheme is becoming more popular and plausible. The scope of this work is to provide a fundamental understanding of unit commitment and a cost analysis of applying a battery energy storage system to an already established power system.

A battery energy storage system (BESS) …

An Investigation Of Habitat Suitability Factors And Their Interactions For Predicting Gopher Tortoise Habitat, Abigail V. Lavallin

USF Tampa Graduate Theses and Dissertations

This thesis evaluates the interaction between four habitat factors vital to the gopher tortoise in Florida. Federally and state listed as threatened throughout its entire range, the gopher tortoise is vital to protect, not only for itself individually but its burrows provide an essential habitat to over 300 species making it a key stone species within its environment. Historic habitat modeling methods are reviewed for the gopher tortoise to highlight the gap on this topic. This research expanded on the methods utilized by Baskaran et al. (2006) evaluating the soil, landcover, percentage of canopy cover and the depth to water …

Access To Safe Water Supply: Management Of Catchment For The Protection Of Source Water In Ghana, Michael K. Eduful

USF Tampa Graduate Theses and Dissertations

This study investigates provisions made within institutional and regulatory frameworks of water resources management to enhance multi-stakeholder relationships and the challenges of maintaining those relationships, and implications of water resources management for rural communities in the Densu River basin, Ghana. The primary objectives of this study were four fold, these are to: i) review the existing regulatory framework and how it promotes or hinders multi-stakeholder relationships within the catchment area; ii) examine multi-stakeholder relationships to identify challenges in promoting effective collaboration in water resources management; iii) explore the impacts of catchment management on the livelihoods of rural communities; and iv) …

Emotion Recognition Using Deep Convolutional Neural Network With Large Scale Physiological Data, Astha Sharma

USF Tampa Graduate Theses and Dissertations

Classification of emotions plays a very important role in affective computing and has real-world applications in fields as diverse as entertainment, medical, defense, retail, and education. These applications include video games, virtual reality, pain recognition, lie detection, classification of Autistic Spectrum Disorder (ASD), analysis of stress levels, and determining attention levels. This vast range of applications motivated us to study automatic emotion recognition which can be done by using facial expression, speech, and physiological data.

A person’s physiological signals such are heart rate, and blood pressure are deeply linked with their emotional states and can be used to identify a …

Assessing The Impacts Of Ghana’S Oil And Gas Industry On Ecosystem Services And Smallholder Livelihoods, Michael Acheampong

USF Tampa Graduate Theses and Dissertations

Ghana discovered oil and gas within its shores in commercial quantities in the year, 2007. This discovery was hailed as a potential turn around for the country’s economic destiny. While this optimism may have been well-founded, there has been a relative lack of appreciation of the potential adverse implications of the industry on traditional smallholder livelihoods, and the critical ecosystems that form their basis. In many countries, discovery of natural resources results in negative environmental and social outcomes, due to the loss of local livelihoods and environmental degradation. Deterioration of local livelihoods occurs through several biophysical pathways, both simple and …

A Comparative Study On Coastal Zone Changes And Anthropogenic Impacts Between Tampa Bay, Usa, And Xiangshan Harbor, China, During The Last 30 Years, Qiandong Guo

USF Tampa Graduate Theses and Dissertations

Currently, the U.S. and China are the two largest national economic entities in the world. However, it is noticeable that the two countries have considerably different strategies for economic development, environmental protection and land supply in coastal zones. In order to understand the coastline dynamics, land use land cover (LULC) changes and land management policies in the U.S. and China, a case study of the Tampa Bay (TB) watershed, Florida, U.S., and Xiangshan Harbor (XH), Zhejiang Province, China was conducted. The two areas possess similar humid subtropical climate and dense population, but experienced different anthropogenic impacts. TB sat at a …

Remote Sensing And Spatial Metrics For Quantifying Seagrass Landscape Changes: A Study On The 2011 Indian River Lagoon Florida Seagrass Die-Off Event, René Dieter Baumstark

USF Tampa Graduate Theses and Dissertations

Florida’s seagrasses are ecologically important marine environments which have suffered major degradation caused by increasing anthropogenic pressures. A 2011 seagrass die-off event caused by an algal bloom in the Florida Indian River Lagoon (IRL) was particularly severe with a majority of seagrass lost in areas such as the Banana River. An understanding of how this coastal marine environment changed is an important step toward better managing resources for conservation. Modern tools and methods provide new opportunities to study these changes at the landscape scale, a scale that informs on the larger more comprehensive state of a system. Classified satellite imagery …

Assessment Of Drinking Water Quality Management And A Treatment Feasibility Study For Brick By Brick Water Storage Tanks In Rakai Uganda, James V. Murduca

USF Tampa Graduate Theses and Dissertations

Reliable access to safe drinking water is one necessity for humans to live without concern for major health risks. The overall goal of this research is to improve the public health, through improved drinking water, for communities in the Rakai District in Uganda, directly, and other communities in the world, indirectly, via dissemination of knowledge. This study specifically assessed the knowledge of drinking water quality in regards to public health, their sanitation measures, and water treatment methods for users of Brick by Brick rainwater harvesting tanks in the Rakai District (N = 28) by using a knowledge, attitudes, and practice …

Reconstructing Historical Hurricane Tracks In The Atlantic Basin: Three Case Studies From The 1840s, Emily L. Cerrito

USF Tampa Graduate Theses and Dissertations

Analyzing past tropical cyclone activity enables researchers to recognize patterns of hurricane variability, estimate hurricane return periods, and assess local risk to future storms. This paleotempestology study used original primary data to make the historical record as comprehensive and accurate as possible for three major hurricanes: October 1844, October 1846, and September 1848. This thesis presents the reconstructed storm tracks, assesses the societal impacts, and evaluates the storm intensity of these three major hurricanes for the eastern U.S. and Cuba. The data utilized in this study include ship logbooks, newspapers, diaries, and instrumental meteorological records. A geographic information system (GIS) …