Physical Sciences and Mathematics Commons^™

Experimental Inoculation Of Coyotes With Mycobacterium Bovis Susceptibility And Shedding, Shylo R. Johnson, Mike R. Dunbar, Lorene Martinez, Robert L. Jones, Richard Bowen, Paul Gordy

United States Department of Agriculture Wildlife Services: Staff Publications

Several wildlife species have tested positive for bovine tuberculosis in Michigan and may potentially transmit the disease to other animals. Coyotes have the highest known prevalence in the endemic area and thus, our objective was to investigate the shedding of Mycobacterium bovis by coyotes. Four coyotes were orally inoculated with 1 ml of 1 x 10⁵ CFU/ml of M. bovis. Oral and nasal swabs, and feces were collected regularly and tested by culture. Fecal samples were also tested by exposing guinea pigs to the coyotes' feces. All animals were necropsied to determine if infection occurred. All swabs, feces …

Bird Damage To Corn And Sunflower In North Dakota, George M. Linz, Anthony A. Slowik, Linda B. Penry, H. Jeffrey Homan

United States Department of Agriculture Wildlife Services: Staff Publications

The last comprehensive field surveys of bird damage to sunflower in North Dakota were conducted in 1979 and 1980. Average economic damage across years was slightly over US $5.0 million. Sunflower prices have appreciably increased since these monetary losses were calculated.

As corn acreages in North Dakota have increased, so have complaints from growers about blackbird damage to corn. Quantitative surveys of blackbird damage to corn, however, have never been conducted in North Dakota.

The goal of our multi-year study is to quantify blackbird damage to sunflower and corn crops in the Prairie Pothole Region, the principal corn and sunflower …

Silica Removal From Brine By Using Ion Exchange, Carlos R. Acevedo

Open Access Theses & Dissertations

Local governments have been forced to look for additional water sources to satisfy the ever increasing demand for fresh water. Very often, the new water sources such as the underground water in continental territories have high salt content. Currently, reverse osmosis technology (RO) is one of the most common processes for water desalination. However, this process is limited by high silica and salt concentrations in water. At high concentrations silica clogs the membranes used in the RO process, reducing their life and increasing operational costs. In this study, quaternary ammonium resins and sulfonic acid resins were used to remove silica …

Microwave Assisted Solid-Supported Organic Synthesis: A Novel Methodology To Obtain 2,3-Disubstituted-1,4-Naphthoquinones, Israel Garcia-Martinez

Open Access Theses & Dissertations

This research focuses on the combinatorial solid phase organic synthesis (SPOS) of different bioactive compounds utilizing transition metal mediated reactions via microwave assisted organic synthesis (MAOS).

A microwave-assisted solid-supported Dötz benzannulation of chromium Fischer carbene complexes with various alkynes has been reported. The oxidative cleavage of the resulting resin-bound 1,4-naphthols affords 2,3-disubstituted-1,4-naphthoquinone derivatives in good to moderate yields with high purities. We demonstrated that solid phase organic synthesis of naphthoquinones via conventional heating is limited due to their long reaction times and high temperatures. The products decompose leading to low yields and purities.2 Microwave assisted synthesis of these naphthoquinones will …

Improving Throughput Of Simultaneous Multithreaded (Smt) Processors Using Shareable Resource Signatures And Hardware Thread Priorities, Mitesh Ramesh Meswani

Open Access Theses & Dissertations

Simultaneous multithreading (SMT) allows multiple hardware threads to execute concurrently on a processor core, potentially increasing the utilization and throughput of the processor core by a factor of the degree of multithreading. However, such performance gains may not be achieved due to contention for resources shared by the threads. Hardware thread priorities can be used to control the ratio of decode cycles allocated to the hardware threads of a processor core and, therefore, the degree of resource contention among the threads. The IBM POWER5, which has two hardware threads associated with each of its two cores, supports hardware thread priorities. …

Real-Time Image-Based Motion Detection Using Color And Structure, Manali Chakraborty

Open Access Theses & Dissertations

Motion detection is an important problem in computer vision and has multiple applications in the real world, including surveillance-related activities, gaming, and human-robot interactions. These systems need to be robust enough to handle fluctuations in light intensity and other external factors like noise and compression artifacts. In this thesis a method is proposed for detecting the regions of motion from a video sequence in real time. The main idea of this work is to detect motion based on both structure and color. Structure-based detection is carried out using information from the Census Transform computed on gradient images obtained with Sobel …

Toxicity Of Zinc Oxide And Cerium Oxide Nanoparticles To Mesquite, Jose Angel Hernandez Viezcas

Open Access Theses & Dissertations

The impact of metal nanoparticles (NPs) in biological systems is still not well understood. Little is known about the response of plants, the first trophic level, to NP exposure; consequently, their possible role on the fate and transport of NPs in ecosystems is unknown. The aim of this research was to determine the response of mesquite (Prosopis juliflora-velutina), a native desert plant, to ZnO and CeO2 (nanoceria) NPs. Mesquite seedlings were grown for 15 days in hydroponics with of ZnO (10 nm) and CeO2 NPs (10 nm) at concentrations varying from 500 to 4000 mg L-1. In the present study, …

Characterizing The Deformation Of Reservoirs Using Interferometry, Gravity, And Seismic Analyses, Cara Schiek

Open Access Theses & Dissertations

In this Dissertation, I characterize how reservoirs deform using surface and subsurface techniques. The surface technique I employ is radar interferometry, also known as InSAR (Interferometric Synthetic Aperture Radar). The subsurface analyses I explore include gravity modeling and seismic techniques consisting of determining earthquake locations from a small-temporary seismic network of six seismometers. These techniques were used in two different projects to determine how reservoirs deform in the subsurface and how this deformation relates to its remotely sensed surface deformation.

The first project uses InSAR to determine land subsidence in the Mimbres basin near Deming, NM. The land subsidence measurements …

Multiplicative Riesz Decomposition On The Ring Of Matrices Over A Totally Ordered Field, Julio Cesar Urenda

Open Access Theses & Dissertations

The Riesz Decomposition Theorem for lattice ordered groups asserts that when G is an l-group and when a nonnegative element a is bounded by a product of nonnegative elements b1,...,bn, then a can be decomposed into a product of nonnegative elements b'1,...,b'n, i.e., a = b'1·...·b' n, with the property that b'i ≤ bi for any i = 1,...,n. In this work we characterize all nonnegative matrices for which this decomposition is possible with respect to matrix multiplication. In addition, we show that this result can be applied to ordered semigroups.

Toric Surface Codes And Minkowski Length Of Polygons, Ivan Soprunov, Jenya Soprunova

Mathematics and Statistics Faculty Publications

In this paper we prove new lower bounds for the minimum distance of a toric surface code CP defined by a convex lattice polygon P⊂R2. The bounds involve a geometric invariant L(P), called the full Minkowski length of P. We also show how to compute L(P) in polynomial time in the number of lattice points in P.

The Maximum Of The Maximum Rectilinear Crossing Numbers Of D-Regular Graphs Of Order N, Matthew Alpert, Elie Feder, Heiko Harborth

Publications and Research

We extend known results regarding the maximum rectilinear crossing number of the cycle graph (Cn) and the complete graph (Kn ) to the class of general d-regular graphs Rn,d. We present the generalized star drawings of the d-regular graphs Sn,d of order n where n + d ≡ 1 (mod 2) and prove that they maximize the maximum rectilinear crossing numbers. A star-like drawing of Sn,d for n ≡ d ≡ 0 (mod 2) is introduced and we conjecture that this drawing maximizes the maximum rectilinear crossing numbers, too. We offer a simpler proof of two results initially proved by …

The Orchard Crossing Number Of An Abstract Graph, Elie Feder, David Garber

Publications and Research

.We introduce the Orchard crossing number, which is defined in a similar way to the well-known rectilinear crossing number. We compute the Orchard crossing number for some simple families of graphs. We also prove some properties of this crossing number.

Moreover, we define a variant of this crossing number which is tightly connected to the rectilinear crossing number, and compute it for some simple families of graphs.

Information Flow Properties For Cyber-Physical Systems, Rav Akella

Masters Theses

"In cyber-physical systems, which are the integrations of computational and physical processes, security properties are difficult to enforce. Fundamentally, physically observable behavior leads to violations of confidentiality. This work analyzes certain noninterference based security properties to ensure that interactions between the cyber and physical processes preserve confidentiality. A considerable barrier to this analysis is the representation of physical system interactions at the cyber-level. This thesis presents encoding of these physical system properties into a discrete event system and represents the cyber-physical system using Security Process Algebra (SPA). The model checker, Checker of Persistent Security (CoPS) shows Bisimulation based NonDeducibility on …

Tree Die-Off In Response To Global Change-Type Drought: Mortality Insights From A Decade Of Plant Water Potential Measurements, David D. Breshears, Orrin B. Meyers, Clifton W. Meyer, Fairley J. Barnes, Chris B. Zou, Craig D. Allen, Nathan G. Mcdowell, William Pockman

United States Geological Survey: Staff Publications

Global climate change is projected to produce warmer, longer, and more frequent droughts, referred to here as “global change-type droughts”, which have the potential to trigger widespread tree die-off. However, drought-induced tree mortality cannot be predicted with confidence, because long-term field observations of plant water stress prior to, and culminating in, mortality are rare, precluding the development and testing of mechanisms. Here, we document plant water stress in two widely distributed, co-occurring species, piñon pine (Pinus edulis) and juniper (Juniperus monosperma), over more than a decade, leading up to regional-scale die-off of piñon pine trees in …

A System For Estimating Bowen Ratio And Evaporation From Waste Lagoons, Arturo I. Quintanar, Rezaul Mahmood, John H. Loughrin, Nanh Lovanh, Monica V. Motley

High Plains Regional Climate Center: Personnel Publications

A low‐cost system was deployed above a swine waste lagoon to obtain estimates of Bowen ratios and characterize lagoon temperatures. The system consisted of humidity and temperature sensors and anemometers deployed above the lagoon, water temperature sensors, and a meteorological station located by the lagoon. To evaluate the system, data was analyzed from the 25th through 28th June 2007. Bowen ratios showed diurnal behavior near the lagoon surface characterized by negative values during day and positive ones at night. Latent (evaporation) and sensible heat fluxes were towards the atmosphere and the lagoon, respectively for most of the day. A diurnal …

Ecosystem Jenga!, Natalie Umphlett, Tierney Brosius, Ramesh Laungani, Diandra L. Leslie-Pelecky

High Plains Regional Climate Center: Personnel Publications

Students are often taught that ecosystems are "delicately balanced," But what. exactly, does this mean? How do we help students relate what they learn in the classroom about ecosystems to the world immediately around them?

As scientists who work closely with middle school students as part of a National Science Foundation-funded Graduate Fellows in K-12 Education program called Project Fulcrum. we have learned that abstract concepts, such as "delicately balanced ecosystem," are often not truly understood. We addressed this concern in a seventh-grade science classroom in Lincoln. Nebraska. by introducing students to locally threatened saline wetlands and the endangered Salt …

Proceedings Of The Third Annual Meeting Of The Georgia Association Of Mathematics Teacher Educators Front Matter

Proceedings of the Annual Meeting of the Georgia Association of Mathematics Teacher Educators

Contents of 3rd Annual GAMTE Proceedings Front Matter:

• Proceedings Committee
• Officers of GAMTE
• Purposes and Goals of GAMTE
• Table of Contents
• Letter from President

Complete Identification Of Permissible Sampling Rates For First-Order Sampling Of Multi-Band Bandpass Signals, Yan Wu, Daniel F. Linder

Biostatistics Faculty Publications

The first-order sampling of multi-band bandpass signals with arbitrary band positions is considered in this paper. Gaps between the spectral sub-bands are utilized to achieve lower sampling rates than the Nyquist. The lowest possible sampling rate along with other permissible sampling rates is identified via a unique partition of the frequency axis. With the complete identification of all the permissible sampling rates, a necessary and sufficient sampling theorem for multi-band bandpass signals is presented in terms of a series of csinc-interpolators.

A Plotless Density Estimator Based On The Asymptotic Limit Of Ordered Distance Estimation Values, Barry J. Kronenfeld

Faculty Research and Creative Activity

Estimation of tree density from point-tree distances is an attractive option for quick inventory of new sites, but estimators that are unbiased in clustered and dispersed situations have not been found. Noting that bias of an estimator derived from distances to the kth nearest neighbor from a random point tends to decrease with increasing k, a method is proposed for estimating the limit of an asymptotic function through a set of ordered distance estimators. A standard asymptotic model is derived from the limiting case of a clustered distribution. The proposed estimator is evaluated against 13 types of simulated generating processes, …

Relative Rates Of B Meson Decays Into Ψ(2S) And J/Ψ Mesons, V. M. Abazov, Kenneth A. Bloom, Gregory Snow, D0 Collaboration

Kenneth Bloom Publications

We report on a study of the relative rates of B meson decays into ψ(2S) and J/ψ mesons using 1.3 fb^-1 of pp collisions at √s = 1.96 TeV recorded by the D0 detector operating at the Fermilab Tevatron Collider. We observe the channels B⁰_s → ψ(2S)φ, B⁰_s → J/ψφ, B^± → ψ(2S)K^±, and B^± → i>J/ψK^± and we measure the relative branching fractions for these channels to be (B(B_s⁰ → ψ(2 …

Search For Charged Higgs Bosons Decaying Into Top And Bottom Quarks In Pp Collisions, V. M. Abazov, Kenneth A. Bloom, Gregory Snow, D0 Collaboration

Kenneth Bloom Publications

We describe a search for production of a charged Higgs boson, qq’ → H⁺, reconstructed in the tb final state in the mass range 180 ≤ M_H⁺ ≤ 300 GeV. The search was undertaken at the Fermilab Tevatron collider with a center-of-mass energy √s =1.96 TeV and uses 0.9 fb^-1 of data collected with the D0 detector. We find no evidence for charged Higgs boson production and set upper limits on the production cross section in the types I, II, and III two-Higgs-doublet models (2HDMs). An excluded region in the (M_{H^{+ …}}

Measurement Of Γ + B + X And Γ + C +X Production Cross Sections In Pp Collisions At √S = 1.96tev, V. M. Abazov, Kenneth A. Bloom, Gregory Snow, D0 Collaboration

Kenneth Bloom Publications

First measurements of the differential cross sections d³σ/(d p_T^γ dy^γ dy^jet) for the inclusive production of a photon in association with a heavy quark (b, c) jet are presented, covering photon transverse momenta 30 < p_T^γ < 150 GeV, photon rapidities |y^γ| < 1.0, jet rapidities |y^jet| < 0.8, and jet transverse momenta p_T^jet > 15 GeV. The results are based on an integrated luminosity of 1 fb^-1 in pp collisions at √s = 1.96 TeV recorded with the D0 detector at the Fermilab Tevatron Collider. The results are compared with next-to-leading order perturbative QCD predictions.

Search For Dark Photons From Supersymmetric Hidden Valleys, V. M. Abazov, Kenneth A. Bloom, Gregory Snow, D0 Collaboration

Kenneth Bloom Publications

We search for a new light gauge boson, a dark photon, with the D0 experiment. In the model we consider, supersymmetric partners are pair produced and cascade to the lightest neutralinos that can decay into the hidden sector state plus either a photon or a dark photon. The dark photon decays through its mixing with a photon into fermion pairs. We therefore investigate a previously unexplored final state that contains a photon, two spatially close leptons, and large missing transverse energy.We do not observe any evidence for dark photons and set a limit on their production.

Measurement Of The ZΓ → Ννγ Production Cross Section And Limits On Anomalous ZzΓ And ZΓγ Couplings In Pp Collisions At √S= 1.96 Tev, V. M. Abazov, Kenneth A. Bloom, Gregory Snow, D0 Collaboration

Kenneth Bloom Publications

We present the first observation of the Zγ → ννγ process at the Fermilab Tevatron at 5.1 standard deviations significance, based on 3.6 fb^-1 of integrated luminosity collected with the D0 detector at the Fermilab Tevatron pp Collider at √s = 1.96 TeV. The measured Zγ production cross section multiplied by the branching fraction of Z → νν is 32 ± 9(stat + syst) ± 2(lumi) fb for the photon E_T > 90 GeV. It is in agreement with the standard model prediction of 39 ± 4 fb. We set limits on anomalous trilinear Zγγ …

Search For The Standard Model Higgs Boson In Tau Final States, V. M. Abazov, Kenneth A. Bloom, Gregory Snow, D0 Collaboration

Kenneth Bloom Publications

We present a search for the standard model Higgs boson using hadronically decaying tau leptons, in 1 fb^-1 of data collected with the D0 detector at the Fermilab Tevatron pp collider. We select two final states: τ^± plus missing transverse energy and b jets, and τ⁺τ^- plus jets. These final states are sensitive to a combination of associated W/Z boson plus Higgs boson, vector boson fusion, and gluon-gluon fusion production processes. The observed ratio of the combined limit on the Higgs production cross section at the 95% C.L. to the standard model expectation is 29 …

Synthesis, Characterization And Use Of Nb2 O5 Based Catalysts In Producing Biofuels By Transesterification, Esterification And Pyrolysis, Rodrigo F. Brandão, Rafael L. Quirino, Vinicius M. Mello, André P. Tavares, Antônio C. Peres, Flávia Guinhos, Joel C. Rubim, Paulo A. Z. Suarez

Department of Chemistry and Biochemistry Faculty Publications

Nb2O5/HX (X = HSO4-, H2PO4-, NO3-) compounds were obtained from the treatment of niobium acid (Nb2O5·xH2O) with sulfuric, phosphoric, and nitric acids as well as Nb2O5 and Nb2O5·xH2O have been investigated as catalysts for the transesterification, esterification and pyrolysis of vegetable oils. The compounds were characterized by thermal analysis (DTA-TGA), spectroscopy (DRX, FT-IR and FT-Raman), surface area (BET) and the acidity (Ho) determined by n-butylamine titration using the Hammet´s indicator method. It was observed that after the acid treatment both the surface area and the acidity decreased as compared to the starting Nb2O5·xH2O. The only exception was a higher acidity …

Fabrication And Superconducting Properties Of Highly Dense Mgb2 Bulk Using A Two-Step Sintering Method, Minoru Maeda, Yue Zhao, Yoshifumi Watanabe, Hiroaki Matsuoka, Y Kubota

Australian Institute for Innovative Materials - Papers

We investigated on microstructure and superconducting properties of high-density MgB₂superconductors synthesized by a heat-treatment method combining a short period of sintering at 1100^°C with a following annealing at a low temperature. The two-step sintering method was found to achieve a coexistence of a high density and broadened XRD full width at half maximum (FWHM) of MgB₂ peak in the samples. The onset of diamagnetism at 5 T was approximately 2 K higher than those of the samples heat-treated by single-step sintering at high or low temperatures. Different second-step annealing temperatures were examined in this work. …

Crystal Structure And Electronic And Thermal Properties Of Tbfeaso0.85, N Kaurav, Y.T Chung, Y.K Kuo, R S Liu, T S Chan, J.M Chen, J.F Lee, H.S Sheu, Xiaolin Wang, S X. Dou, Sung-Ik Lee, Y.G Shi, A.A Belik, K Yamaura, E Takayama-Muromachi

Australian Institute for Innovative Materials - Papers

The crystal structure and the electronic and thermal properties of a high-quality polycrystalline TbFeAsO_0.85 sample made by a high-pressure technique are investigated. The crystal structure, as determined by synchrotron X-ray powder diffraction, possesses a tetragonal unit cell (space group: P4/nmm) with lattice parameters of a=b=3.8851 Å and c =8.3630 Å. In order to elucidate the electronic structure and oxidation states of corresponding elements, X-ray absorption near-edge structure (XANES) spectra are presented. The XANES spectra confirm that the oxidation states of Fe, As, and Tb in the TbFeAsO_0.85 sample are ~Fe²⁺, …

A Superconducting Transistorlike Device Having Good Input-Output Isolation, Ivan Nevirkovets

Australian Institute for Innovative Materials - Papers

A multiterminal superconducting device with the S₁IS₂FIS₃ structure (where S, I, and F denote a superconductor, an insulator, and a ferromagnetic material) is fabricated and characterized. Introducing a thin ferromagnetic layer into the middle electrode dramatically reduces parasitic back action of the acceptor junction (S₁IS₂) bias current on the injector junction (S₂FIS₃)current-voltage characteristic as compared with that for the formerly reported quiteron, a device exploiting similar operation principle.

Dehydrogenation/Rehydrogenation Mechanism In Aluminum Destabilized Lithium Borohydride, Xuebin Yu, Guanglin Xia, Zaiping Guo, Hua-Kun Liu

Australian Institute for Innovative Materials - Papers

LiBH₄/Al mixtures with various mol ratios were prepared by ball milling. The hydrogen storage properties of the mixtures were evaluated by differential scanning calorimetry/ thermogravimetry analyses coupled with mass spectrometry measurements. The phase compositions and chemical state of elements for the LiBH₄/Al mixtures before and after hydrogen desorption and absorption reactions were assessed via powder x-ray diffraction, infrared spectroscopy, and x-ray photoelectron spectroscopy. Dehydrogenation results revealed that LiBH₄ could react with Al to form AlB₂and AlLi compounds with a two-step decomposition, resulting in improved dehydrogenation. The rehydrogenation experiments were investigated at 600^{° …}