Physical Sciences and Mathematics Commons^™

Accelerated Oxidation Of Epinephrine By Silica Nanoparticles, Zhimin Tao, Gang Wang, Jerry Goodisman, Tewodros Asefa

Chemistry - All Scholarship

We have measured the influence of mesoporous silica (MCM-41 and SBA-15) nanoparticles and dense silica nanoparticles on epinephrine oxidation, a pH-dependent reaction, whose rate is small in acidic or neutral solutions but much greater at higher pH. The reaction was measured by monitoring adrenochrome at 480 nm, the product of epinephrine oxidation. In distilled water (dH ₂O) with no particles present, the oxidation of epinephrine occurs slowly but more rapidly at higher pH. The presence of MCM-41 or silica spheres does not accelerate the oxidation, but SBA-15 does, showing that the difference in the structures of nanomaterials leads to …

2009 Sonia Kovalevsky Math For Girls Day Flyer, Association For Women In Mathematics, Lincoln University Of Missouri

Math for Girls Day Documents

4th Annual Lincoln University Sonia Kovalevsky Math for Girls Day program flyer on April 24, 2009.

Noisy Signal Recovery Via Iterative Reweighted L1-Minimization, Deanna Needell

CMC Faculty Publications and Research

Compressed sensing has shown that it is possible to reconstruct sparse high dimensional signals from few linear measurements. In many cases, the solution can be obtained by solving an L1-minimization problem, and this method is accurate even in the presence of noise. Recent a modified version of this method, reweighted L1-minimization, has been suggested. Although no provable results have yet been attained, empirical studies have suggested the reweighted version outperforms the standard method. Here we analyze the reweighted L1-minimization method in the noisy case, and provide provable results showing an improvement in the error bound over the standard bounds.

An Analysis Of The Environmental And Hormonal Effects On The Growth And Development Of The Moss Ceratodon Purpureus, Megan Knight

Undergraduate Honors Thesis Collection

Ceratodon has not been documented in scientific literature as thoroughly as other species of moss such as Funaria or Tortula. Commonly known as fire moss or purple horned moss, Ceratodon is often reddish or yellow-brown and the spore capsules are usually purple (Crum, 1983). A picture of the species growing in its natural habitat is shown in Figure 4. Ceratodon often grows in tufts and is considered a weed, often thriving in polluted or disturbed areas and frequently invading after a fire (Crum 1983). Ceratodon belongs to the class Bryopsida, which also contains the previously mentioned Funaria and Tortula species. …

Software Simulation And Emergency Response Training: A Case Study, Heather Burke

Regis University Student Publications (comprehensive collection)

Emergency response training has several shortcomings that affect its effectiveness. Full-scale exercises are effective, but expensive, cumbersome and time consuming to plan and conduct. Discussion based trainings are much more cost effective and easy to plan, but the retention rate is lower on covered material. It is important to get the most out of limited training budgets by finding a way to be both efficient and effective with time and money. In this case study, the problems of the 2002 New Mexico Public Health ICS training are analyzed. This training provides good examples of how traditional training tools, style and …

Mountain Building Across A Lithospheric Boundary During Arc Construction: The Cretaceous Peninsular Ranges Batholith In The Sierra San Pedro Martir Of Baja California, Mexico, K Schmidt, S Paterson, Ann Blythe, C Kopf

Ann Blythe

The Jura-Cretaceous Peninsular Ranges batholith (PRB) of Southern and Baja California contains a remarkable example of variation in crustal composition and structure across a batholith-parallel lithospheric-scale discontinuity. This lithospheric boundary between western oceanic-floored and eastern continental-floored crust influenced contractional deformation, arc magmatism, and differential exhumation of western and eastern zones in the batholith during its evolution. In the Sierra San Pedro Martir of Baja California, Mexico, a ca. 20 km wide, doubly vergent fan structure occurs across the PRB basement transition that consists of inward-dipping mylonite thrust sheets on the sides of the fan that gradually transition to a steeply-dipping …

Hyperspectral Reflectance For Rapid Viability Assessment Of Bacillus Endospores, Jarrod Edwards

Theses and Dissertations

A study was conducted to optically determine the viability of the Gram +, endospore-forming bacterial genera Bacillus using a hyperspectral reflectance spectrometer. Endospores are a dormant, differentiated cellular capsule form taken by select bacteria to ensure survival when environmental conditions become unfavorable. Two species of Bacillus were used for this study, Bacillus megaterium and Bacillus subtilis. These endospores were killed using a chemical treatment of sodium hypochlorite or a physical treatment of heat and pressure in an autoclave. The treated samples along with viable samples were lyophilized to form a powder. A reflectance spectrometer measuring 350 nm to 2500 nm …

Liquid Carbon Dioxide Extraction Of Various Food Flavors: Evaluation And Analysis, Deven Lee Shinholt

Undergraduate Honors Thesis Collection

Sub- and supercritical carbon dioxide has been utilized as an extraction solvent for a variety of natural compounds. This requires the use of specialized high-pressure vessels. It was reported recently that common laboratory apparatus (centrifuge tubes) could be utilized in liquid carbon dioxide extractions obviating the need for specialized equipment. Various herbs and spices (including orange, lemon, lime, and grapefruit zest, oregano, rosemary, sage, spearmint, nutmeg, black peppercorns, cloves, caraway seeds, and vanilla beans) were used as substrates for liquid carbon dioxide extractions by this straightforward technique. The extracted oils, containing terpenes and terpenoids, were then analyzed through GC/MS. Liquid …

Simulating Realistic Social And Individual Behavior In Agent Societies, Jason Leezer

Computer Science Honors Theses

While the value of simulations as a tool in the natural sciences has been realized for quite some time, its

potential in the social sciences is only beginning to be explored. A class of simulations used to study social behavior

and phenomena is known as social simulations. One particular type of social simulation is known as agent based

social simulation. Here agents are used to model social entities such as people, groups and towns. A purpose of

these models is to reproduce realistic behavior in the simulation which is then used to draw conclusions about the

corresponding real world entities. …

Agent Communication In Multi-Agent Models Of Information Cascades, Jennifer West

Computer Science Honors Theses

Understanding how information is transmitted and how an information cascade is formed has many applications both in understanding political and economic behavior and how to best implement economic and public policies. Many papers have shown that information cascades do occur, but they always describe a very basic situation that does not occur often in the real world. To further understand information cascades in more complex conditions, I extended a multi agent simulation model that set out to investigate information cascades in the motion picture industry. I extended the model by allowing agents to speak to other agents before making a …

Constraints On The Utility Of Mno2 Cartridge Method For The Extraction Of Radionuclides: A Case Study Using 234Th, M. Baskaran, P. W. Swarzenski, B. A. Biddanda

Environmental Science and Geology Faculty Research Publications

Large volume (10²–10³ L) seawater samples are routinely processed to investigate the partitioning of particle reactive radionuclides and Ra between solution and size-fractionated suspended particulate matter. One of the most frequently used methods to preconcentrate these nuclides from such large volumes involves extraction onto three filter cartridges (a prefilter for particulate species and two MnO₂-coated filters for dissolved species) connected in series. This method assumes that the extraction efficiency is uniform for both MnO₂-coated cartridges, that no dissolved species are removed by the prefilter, and that any adsorbed radionuclides are not desorbed from …

Capacitive Conductivity Logging And Electrical Stratigraphy In A High-Resistivity Aquifer, Boise Hydrogeophysical Research Site, C. Jonathan Mwenifumbo, Warren Barrash, Michael D. Knoll

CGISS Publications and Presentations

We tested a prototype capacitive-conductivity borehole tool in a shallow, unconfined aquifer with coarse, unconsolidated sediments and very-low-conductivity water at the Boise Hydrogeophysical Research Site (BHRS). Examining such a high-resistivity system provides a good test for the capacitive- conductivity tool because the conventional induction- conductivity tool (known to have limited effectiveness in high-resistivity systems) did not generate expressive well logs at the BHRS. The capacitive-conductivity tool demonstrated highly repeatable, low-noise behavior but poor correlation with the induction tool in the lower-conductivity portions of the stratigraphy where the induction tool was relatively unresponsive. Singular spectrum analysis of capacitive- conductivity logs reveals …

Mutation Invariance Of Khovanov Homology Over F_2, Stephan M. Wehrli

Mathematics - All Scholarship

We prove that Khovanov homology and Lee homology with coefficients in F₂=Z/2Zare invariant under component-preserving link mutations.

Uav Intelligent Path Planning For Wilderness Search And Rescue, Rongbin Lin

Theses and Dissertations

In Wilderness Search and Rescue (WiSAR), the incident commander (IC) creates a probability distribution map of the likely location of the missing person. This map is important because it guides the IC in allocating search resources and coordinating efforts, but it often depends almost exclusively on prior experience and subjective judgment. We propose a Bayesian model that utilizes publicly available terrain features data to help model lost-person behaviors. This approach enables domain experts to encode uncertainty in their prior estimations and also make it possible to incorporate human-behavior data collected in the form of posterior distributions, which are used to …

Elemental Composition And Nutrient Effect On The Uptake And Metabolism Of Dissolved Organic Carbon By Bacteria From A Temperate Region River, Anne Stuart

Theses and Dissertations

Rivers are arteries that connect land and sea, and provide a conduit and reactor for allochthonous and autochthonous organic carbon sources (OC) delivered to the coastal ocean. In comparison to marine waters, inland waters quantitatively represent only a fraction of the marine system; however, their importance to global C cycling maybe disproportional to its actual size. Inland systems are subject to multiple sources of OC (autochthonous and allochthonous) that vary individually in space and time with respect to their concentration and potential bacterial bioavailability. This study investigates the impact of high and ambient inorganic nutrient concentrations on the bacterial bioavailability …

Band Bending In Gan, Michael Foussekis

Theses and Dissertations

Steady-state and transient surface photovoltages in undoped GaN are studied in various environments (air, nitrogen, oxygen, vacuum) at room temperature and 400 K with a Kelvin probe attached to an optical cryostat. The results are explained within a phenomenological model accounting for the accumulation of photo-generated holes at the surface, capture of free electrons from the bulk over the near-surface potential barrier, and emission of electrons from surface states into the bulk. Mechanisms of surface photovoltage are discussed in detail. Photoadsorption and photodesorption of negatively charged species will either increase or decrease the surface potential and thus band bending. Oxygen …

A Survey Of Stellar Families: Multiplicity Of Solar-Type Stars, Deepak Raghavan

Physics and Astronomy Dissertations

I present the results of a comprehensive assessment of companions to 454 solar-type stars within 25 pc. New observational aspects of this work include surveys for (1) very close companions with long-baseline interferometry at the Center for High Angular Resolution Astronomy (CHARA) Array, (2) close companions with speckle interferometry, and (3) wide proper motion companions identified by blinking multi-epoch archival images. I have also obtained and included unpublished results from extensive radial velocity monitoring programs. The many sources utilized enable a thorough evaluation of stellar and brown dwarf companions. The results presented here include eight new companion discoveries, four of …

Subdividing Hexagon-Clustered Wireless Sensor Networks For Power-Efficiency, Dajin Wang, Li Xu, Jing Peng, Stefan Robila

Department of Computer Science Faculty Scholarship and Creative Works

Hexagons are an ideal shape for clustering sensor networks, because clustered areas can be seamlessly divided by the hexagons. In addition, hexagons are the largest regular polygon (in terms of the number of sides) that has this property. In this paper, we propose a novel scheme for subdividing a hexagonal cluster where sensors are densely populated and distributed uniformly throughout the cluster. We provide an analytical estimate of power saving resulting from the subdivision, and show that our proposal gives rise to a substantial reduction in power consumption. We also perform subdivisions at various scales, and analyze the corresponding power …

Exchange Coupling At Cobalt/ Nickel Oxide Interfaces, Andrew G. Baruth

Department of Physics and Astronomy: Dissertations, Theses, and Student Research

Spin arrangement at interfaces in layered magnetic materials is of vital importance to the emerging field of spintronics. Knowledge of how and why the interfacial spins behave in a certain way will aid in the development of future magnetic-based memories.

Much exploration has taken place in the interlayer exchange coupling (IEC) of ferromagnetic heterostructures with in-plane anisotropy. Only recently has it become apparent that to achieve the goals of increased areal density in magnetic memory a push for exploring magnetic materials with perpendicular magnetic anisotropy (PMA) must occur. An interesting and promising candidate for such a magnetic system is [Co/Pt]/NiO/[Co/Pt], …

Quantum Multiplexers, Parrondo Games, And Proper Quantization, Faisal Shah Khan

Dissertations and Theses

A quantum logic gate of particular interest to both electrical engineers and game theorists is the quantum multiplexer. This shared interest is due to the facts that an arbitrary quantum logic gate may be expressed, up to arbitrary accuracy, via a circuit consisting entirely of variations of the quantum multiplexer, and that certain one player games, the history dependent Parrondo games, can be quantized as games via a particular variation of the quantum multiplexer. However, to date all such quantizations have lacked a certain fundamental game theoretic property.

The main result in this dissertation is the development of quantizations of …

A New Parallel Algorithm For Planarity Testing, Rebecca Ingram

Computer Science Honors Theses

Determining whether a graph is planar is both theoretically and practically interesting. Although several sequential algorithms have been introduced which accomplish planarity testing in O(V ) time for graphs with V vertices, very few of these have been parallelized. In a recent comparison of sequential planarity testing algorithms, the newest algorithms were found to be fastest; however, these are the ones which have not been parallelized. The goal of this thesis is to introduce a method for parallelizing one of the newest planarity testing algorithms.

Observation Of Double-Charge Discrete Vortex Solitons In Hexagonal Photonic Lattices, B Terhalle, T Richter, Kjh Law, D Gories, P Rose, Tj Alexander, Pg Kevrekidis, As Desyatnikov, W Krolikowski, F Kaiser, C Denz, Ys Kivshar

Panos Kevrekidis

We report on the experimental observation of stable double-charge discrete vortex solitons generated in hexagonal photonic lattices created optically in self-focusing nonlinear media and show that single-charge vortex solitons are unstable in analogous conditions. Subsequently, we study, both theoretically and experimentally, the existence and stability of spatial vortex solitons in two-dimensional hexagonal photonic lattices. We demonstrate that the stability of the double-charge vortices is a consequence of the intersite power exchange in the vortex soliton, and we provide a simple stability criterion on the basis of the analysis of the corresponding discrete nonlinear model. We extend our analysis to the …

Primary Decomposition And Secondary Representation Of Modules Over A Commutative Ring, Muslim Baig

Mathematics Theses

This paper presents the theory of Secondary Representation of modules over a commutative ring and their Attached Primes; introduced in 1973 by I. MacDonald as a dual to the important theory of associated primes and primary decomposition in commutative algebra. The paper explores many of the basic aspects of the theory of primary decomposition and associated primes of modules in the hopes to delineate and motivate the construction of a secondary representation, when possible. The thesis discusses the results of the uniqueness of representable modules and their attached primes, and, in particular, the existence of a secondary representation for Artinian …

Primary Decomposition In Non Finitely Generated Modules, Somaya Muiny

Mathematics Theses

In this paper, we study primary decomposition of any proper submodule N of a module M over a noetherian ring R. We start by briefly discussing basic facts about the very well known case where M is a finitely generated module over a Noetherian ring R, then we proceed to discuss the general case where M is any module over a Noetherian ring R. We put a lot of focus on the associated primes that occur with the primary decomposition, essentially studying their uniqueness and their relation to the associated primes of M/N.

Temporal Variations In Spring Water Chemistry And Comparison Of Variable Paleozoic Aquifer Discharges In The Ridge And Valley Province Of Northwestern Georgia, Oliver Wood Costello

Geosciences Theses

The fluctuations in solute concentrations from eight springs in the Ridge and Valley Province in northwestern Georgia were used to determine flow types and to measure each aquifer’s ability to remove contamination. The target springs are located along a northeast trending line in the Ridge and Valley Province of northwest Georgia. This study determined and interpreted the fluctuations in chemistry of each of the sampled spring’s water based upon temporal variations of precipitation in the area and variations in the chemistries measured at each weekly sampling event. Analysis determined that carbonate springs that showed characteristics of diffuse flow, including stable …

The Responses Of Blue Crabs (Callinectes Sapidus) To Hypoxia/Hypercapnia In Freshwater, James Martin

Theses and Dissertations

The present research examined respiratory responses of blue crabs to long term (4, 13, and 21 days) hypercapnic hypoxia in freshwater at 23 C. Hypoxic conditions (50-60 & 75-85 mmHg O2) were induced by allowing the crabs to consume their oxygen supply, resulting in a hypercapnic induced decrease in pH that remained through the exposure. Postbranchial hemolymph responses to hypoxia/hypercapnia in freshwater demonstrate decreases in PO2, increases in PCO2, and decreases in pH. Lactate levels decreased over time, but hemocyanin concentration was highly variable with no trends. PH, lactate, and hemocyanin observations also demonstrated high variability and a variety of …

A Browser-Based Collaborative Multimedia Messaging System, Susan Gayle Gentner

Computer Science Theses

Making a communication tool easier for people to operate can have profound and positive effects on its popularity and on the users themselves. This thesis is about making it easier for people to publish web-based documents that have sound, video and text. Readily available software and hardware are employed in an attempt to achieve the goal of providing a software service that enables users to compose audio-video documents with text.

Synthesis, Structure And Function Studies Of Selenium And Tellurium Derivatized Nucleic Acids, Jia Sheng

Chemistry Dissertations

Nucleic acids play important roles in living systems by storing and transferring genetic information and directing protein synthesis. Recently, it was found that nucleic acids can catalyze chemical and biochemical reactions similar to protein enzymes. In addition, they can also serve as drug targets for the treatment of deadly diseases such as AIDS and cancers. As a result, the 3D structure study of nucleic acids and proteinnucleic acids complexes by X-ray crystallography has become one of the most active research areas. However, the two intrinsic bottlenecks of macromolecule X-ray crystallography, including crystallization and phase determination, have significantly limited its application …

Development Of An Adaptive Equalization Algorithm Using Acoustic Energy Density, Panu Tapani Puikkonen

Theses and Dissertations

Sound pressure equalization of audio signals using digital signal processors has been a subject of ongoing study for many years. The traditional approach is to equalize sound at a point in a listening environment, but because of its specific dependence on the room frequency response between a source and receiver position, this equalization generally causes the spectral response to worsen significantly at other locations in the room. This work presents both a time-invariant and a time-varying implementation of an adaptive acoustic energy density equalization filter for a one-dimensional sound field. Energy density equalization addresses the aforementioned challenge and others that …

Bilinear Immersed Finite Elements For Interface Problems, Xiaoming He

Mathematics and Statistics Faculty Research & Creative Works

In this dissertation we discuss bilinear immersed finite elements (IFE) for solving interface problems. The related research works can be categorized into three aspects: (1) the construction of the bilinear immersed finite element spaces; (2) numerical methods based on these IFE spaces for solving interface problems; and (3) the corresponding error analysis. All of these together form a solid foundation for the bilinear IFEs.

The research on immersed finite elements is motivated by many real world applications, in which a simulation domain is often formed by several materials separated from each other by curves or surfaces while a mesh independent …