Physical Sciences and Mathematics Commons^™

The Role Of Larval Dispersal In Metapopulation Gene Flow: Local Population Dynamics Matter, Daphne M. Munroe, John M. Klinck, Eileen E. Hofmann, Eric N. Powell

OES Faculty Publications

The degree of genetic connectivity among populations in a metapopulation has direct consequences for species evolution, development of disease resistance, and capacity of a metapopulation to adapt to climate change. This study used a metapopulation model that integrates population dynamics, dispersal, and genetics within an individual-based model framework to examine the mechanisms and dynamics of genetic connectivity within a metapopulation. The model was parameterized to simulate four populations of oysters (Crassostrea virginica) from Delaware Bay on the mid-Atlantic coast of the United States. Differences among the four populations include a strong spatial gradient in mortality, a spatial gradient …

An Introduction To Ecology Of Infectious Diseases - Oysters And Estuaries, Eileen E. Hofmann, Susan E. Ford

OES Faculty Publications

Infectious diseases are recognized as an important factor regulating marine ecosystems (Harvell et al., 1999, 2002, 2004; Porter et al., 2001; McCallum et al., 2004; Ward and Lafferty, 2004; Stewart et al., 2008; Bienfang et al., 2011). Many of the organisms affected by marine diseases have important ecological roles in estuarine and coastal environments and some are also commercially important. Outbreaks of infectious diseases in these environments, referred to as epizootics, can produce significant population declines and extinctions, both of which threaten biodiversity, food web interactions, and ecosystem productivity (Harvell et al., 2002, 2004).

Database Of Diazotrophs In Global Ocean: Abundance, Biomass, And Nitrogen Fixation Rates, Y. W. Luo, S. C. Doney, L. A. Anderson, M. Benavides, I. Berman-Frank, A. Bode, S. Bonnet, K. H. Boström, D. Böttjer, D. G. Capone, M. R. Mulholland

OES Faculty Publications

Marine N₂ fixing microorganisms, termed di-azotrophs, are a key functional group in marine pelagic ecosystems. The biological fixation of dinitrogen (N₂) to bioavailable nitrogen provides an important new source of nitrogen for pelagic marine ecosystems and influences primary productivity and organic matter export to the deep ocean. As one of a series of efforts to collect biomass and rates specific to different phytoplankton functional groups, we have constructed a database on diazotrophic organisms in the global pelagic upper ocean by compiling about 12 000 direct field measurements of cyanobacterial diazotroph abundances (based on microscopic cell counts or …

Impact Of Abrupt Deglacial Climate Change On Tropical Atlantic Subsurface Temperatures, Matthew W. Schmidt, Ping Chang, Jennifer E. Hertzberg, Theodore R. Them Ii, Link Li, Bette L. Otto-Bliesner

OES Faculty Publications

Both instrumental data analyses and coupled ocean-atmosphere models indicate that Atlantic meridional overturning circulation (AMOC) variability is tightly linked to abrupt tropical North Atlantic (TNA) climate change through both atmospheric and oceanic processes. Although a slowdown of AMOC results in an atmospheric-induced surface cooling in the entire TNA, the subsurface experiences an even larger warming because of rapid reorganizations of ocean circulation patterns at intermediate water depths. Here, we reconstruct high-resolution temperature records using oxygen isotope values and Mg/Ca ratios in both surface- and sub-thermocline-dwelling planktonic foraminifera from a sediment core located in the TNA over the last 22 ky. …

Solar Forcing Of Florida Straits Surface Salinity During The Early Holocene, Matthew W. Schmidt, William A. Weinlein, Franco Marcantonio, Jean Lynch-Stieglitz

OES Faculty Publications

Previous studies showed that sea surface salinity (SSS) in the Florida Straits as well as Florida Current transport covaried with changes in North Atlantic climate over the past two millennia. However, little is known about earlier Holocene hydrographic variability in the Florida Straits. Here, we combine Mg/Ca-paleothermometry and stable oxygen isotope measurements on the planktonic foraminifera Globigerinoides ruber (white variety) from Florida Straits sediment core KNR166-2 JPC 51 (24° 24.70' N, 83° 13.14' W, 198 m deep) to reconstruct a high-resolution (~25 yr/sample) early to mid Holocene record of sea surface temperature and δ¹⁸O_SW)(a …

Identifying And Tracking Proteins Through The Marine Water Column: Insights Into The Inputs And Preservation Mechanisms Of Protein In Sediments, Eli K. Moore, Brook L. Nunn, David R. Goodlett, H. Rodger Harvey

OES Faculty Publications

Proteins generated during primary production represent an important fraction of marine organic nitrogen and carbon, and have the potential to provide organism-specific information in the environment. The Bering Sea is a highly productive system dominated by seasonal blooms and was used as a model system for algal proteins to be tracked through the water column and incorporated into detrital sedimentary material. Samples of suspended and sinking particles were collected at multiple depths along with surface sediments on the continental shelf and deeper basin of the Bering Sea. Modified standard proteomic preparations were used in conjunction with high pressure liquid chromatography-tandem …

Introduction To Special Section On Recent Advances In The Study Of Optical Variability In The Near-Surface And Upper Ocean, T. Dickey, M. L. Banner, P. Bhandari, T. Boyd, L. Carvalho, O. Wurl

OES Faculty Publications

Optical variability occurs in the near-surface and upper ocean on very short time and space scales (e.g., milliseconds and millimeters and less) as well as greater scales. This variability is caused by solar, meteorological, and other physical forcing as well as biological and chemical processes that affect optical properties and their distributions, which in turn control the propagation of light across the air-sea interface and within the upper ocean. Recent developments in several technologies and modeling capabilities have enabled the investigation of a variety of fundamental and applied problems related to upper ocean physics, chemistry, and light propagation and utilization …

Diversity, Distribution, And Expression Of Diazotroph Nifh Genes In Oxygen-Deficient Waters Of The Arabian Sea, Amal Jayakumar, Mamoon M. D. Al-Rshadat, Bess B. Ward, Margaret R. Mulholland

OES Faculty Publications

The Arabian Sea oxygen minimum zone (OMZ), the largest suboxic region in the world's oceans, is responsible for up to half of the global mesopelagic fixed nitrogen ( N ) loss from the ocean via denitrification and anammox. Dinitrogen (N₂) fixation is usually attributed to cyanobacteria in the surface ocean. Model prediction and physiological inhibition of N₂ fixation by oxygen, however, suggest that N₂ fixation should be enhanced near the oxygen-deficient zone (ODZ) of the Arabian Sea. N₂ fixation and cyanobacterial nifH genes (the gene encoding dinitrogenase reductase) have been reported in surface waters overlying …

Warcreate: Create Wayback-Consumable Warc Files From Any Webpage, Mat Kelly, Michele C. Weigle

Computer Science Faculty Publications

The Internet Archive's Wayback Machine is the most common way that typical users interact with web archives. The Internet Archive uses the Heritrix web crawler to transform pages on the publicly available web into Web ARChive (WARC) files, which can then be accessed using the Wayback Machine. Because Heritrix can only access the publicly available web, many personal pages (e.g. password-protected pages, social media pages) cannot be easily archived into the standard WARC format. We have created a Google Chrome extension, WARCreate, that allows a user to create a WARC file from any webpage. Using this tool, content that might …

Warcreate - Create Wayback-Consumable Warc Files From Any Webpage, Mat Kelly, Michele C. Weigle, Michael L. Nelson

Computer Science Faculty Publications

[First Slide]

What is WARCreate?

• Google Chrome extension
• Creates WARC files
• Enables preservation by users from their browser
• First steps in bringing Institutional Archiving facilities to the PC

Integrating Ensemble Species Distribution Modeling And Statistical Phylogeography To Inform Projections Of Climate Change Impacts On Species Distributions, Brenna R. Forester

WWU Graduate School Collection

Species distribution models (SDMs) are commonly used to forecast climate change impacts on species and ecosystems. These models, however, are subject to important assumptions and limitations. By integrating two independent but complementary methods, ensemble SDMs and statistical phylogeography, I was able to address key assumptions and create robust assessments of climate change impacts on species' distributions while improving the conservation value of these projections. This approach was demonstrated using Rhodiola integrifolia, an alpine-arctic plant distributed at high elevations and latitudes throughout the North American cordillera. SDMs for R. integrifolia were fit to current and past climates using eight model algorithms, …

The Use Of A Bayesian Network To Calculate The Risks Of Mercury Contamination To Fish And Birds Of The South River, Virginia, Heather M. Summers

WWU Graduate School Collection

The South River watershed in western Virginia has a history of mercury contamination from past industrial practices. My study demonstrates how Bayesian networks can be used to conduct an environmental risk assessment of aquatic and riparian environments to assess the overall effects of mercury contamination to target species in the South River. The risk assessment focused on two species of fish, one game-fish, smallmouth bass and one non-game fish, white sucker and two species of birds, one piscivorous, Belted Kingfisher and one insectivorous, Carolina Wren. By examining the exposure pathways through various habitats in the study area, I created a …

Seasonal And Age-Based Aspects Of Diet Of The Introduced Redside Shiner (Richardsonius Balteatus) In Ross Lake, Washington, Carmen A. (Carmen Ann) Welch

WWU Graduate School Collection

This study investigates the introduced population of the Redside Shiner (Richardsonius balteatus) in Ross Lake, Washington. The Redside Shiner was introduced to Ross Lake around 2000 and in the summer months, can be found in densities of hundreds per cubic meter in the shallow areas of Ross Lake. Ross Lake is a protected thirty-five and a half kilometer long reservoir in North Cascades National Park with cold, clear water of exceptional quality. Fish native to Ross Lake include: Bull Trout, Dolly Varden and Rainbow Trout. It is a commonly held belief that the introduced Redside Shiner have no negative effect …

Relocation And Analysis Of The 2007 Nechako, B.C., Seismic Swarm: Evidence For Magmatic Intrusion In The Lower Crust, Jesse A. Hutchinson

WWU Graduate School Collection

On October 9th, 2007, a seismic swarm, known as the Nechako swarm, began in south-central British Columbia, approximately 20 kilometers west of the Nazko polygenetic cinder cone. After lasting for well over a month, seismic activity tapered off by November 21st, 2007. This study analyzes data from several temporary broadband seismometers deployed by the Geological Survey of Canada near the epicentral locations of initial events from the swarm. Over 4400 events were observed during this period, from which 1048 absolute locations were calculated, with depths ranging from 26-35 kilometers. All of the events recorded by the temporary seismometers were high …

Performance Of Oriented Fluorophore Luminescent Solar Concentrators, Tristan Butler

WWU Graduate School Collection

Solar power is likely to play a significant role in the future of fossil fuel alternatives. In order to maximize its impact, the cost of solar power must be competitive with fossil fuels on the global energy market. Luminescent Solar Concentrators are an attractive technology that can potentially reduce the cost of solar power. LSCs utilize cheap materials and no moving parts to concentrate light, however the amount of solar concentration is limited by loss mechanisms inherent in LSCs. One potential method to improve the efficiency of LSCs is through the use of oriented fluorophores. Based on theory presented in …

Documenting Magma Evolution Of The Fossa Delle Felci (Salina Island, South Tyrrhenian Sea) By Integrating In Situ Plagioclase Data With Quantitative Modeling, Aaron Mayfield

All Master's Theses

Compositional diversity occurs via processes dominated by recharge, assimilation and fractional crystallization (RAFC), quantification of which can provide insights into eruption catalysts, and therefore assist in hazard mitigation. This study evaluates the relative roles of RAFC processes in Fossa delle Felci (Salina Island, Italy) magmas, which span the basalt to dacite range (52-65 wt% SiO2). Integration of petrographic, whole rock, and in situ plagioclase data with quantitative magma chamber models suggests differentiation dominated by fractional crystallization and magma recharge/mixing in reservoirs located at different crustal levels. At ~12 km depth, magma evolved through crystallization of a pyroxene dominated assemblage; plagioclase …

Documenting Magnatic Processes At Filicudi Island, Aeolian Arc, Italy: Integrating Quantitative Modeling And Plagioclase Textural And In Situ Compositional Data, Michelle Harris

All Master's Theses

Documenting the physiochemical processes that influence magma composition is critical for forecasting eruption styles and managing volcanic hazards. Compositional diversity of magmas develops through recharge, assimilation, and fractional crystallization (RAFC) within subvolcanic magma reservoirs. Integration of MELTS modeling, whole rock, plagioclase textural and in situ elemental and isotopic data from Filicudi Island, Italy allow documentation of the roles and relative chronology that RAFC played in the magmatic evolution and elucidates aspects of the magma plumbing system structure.

Results indicate a polybaric magma plumbing system with deeper (3.5-4 kilobars) and shallower (0.5-1.2 kilobars) storage regions. Within the deeper system, FC acted …

Under Pressure: A Psychophysiological Analysis Of The Effect Of Temporal Constraints On Information Processing And Decision Making, Nagaratna Krishna Sneha Pochinapeddi

Masters Theses

"In recent times, decision making under time pressure has become more common than ever and hence, it has become a hot topic for behavioral researchers. This research studies the effects of temporal constraints on users' decision quality and decision strategy. The paper primarily addresses two research questions: (i) Does time pressure affect decision quality? (ii) Does time pressure affect decision strategy? The decision accuracy and decision strategy of the participants were measured for three time-pressure conditions namely, No time pressure, Reasonable time pressure and Extreme time pressure. Research results from the past revealed that, Cognitive style is also observed to …

Physiochemical Characteristics Contributing To The Cytotoxicity Of Transition Metal Oxides, Chi-Heng Wu

Masters Theses

"In the past ten years nanotechnology has not only evolved to play a prominent role in our economy but also increased the concern over potential adverse effects caused by nanomaterials to human health and the environment. Nanotoxicity is to understand the nature and origin of the toxicity imposed by nanomaterials. Studies from our laboratory have shown that nanoparticle induces oxidative stress, perturbs calcium homeostasis, alter gene expression, and produces pro-inflammatory responses. We also identified a trend of toxicity: TiO₂ < Cr₂O₃ < Fe₂O₃ < Mn₂O₃ < NiO < ZnO < CuO. We then asked a question: what are physiochemical factors of transition metal nanoparticles that contributed to this increasing cytotoxicity. In this thesis I investigated the correlation between physicochemical properties and toxicity of the transition metal oxides in the 4th Period of the Periodic Table of Elements. Particle size, BET surface area, point of zero charge, metal dissolution, and degree of surface adsorption of transition metal oxide nanoparticles were measured. There were no increasing trends in both particle size and specific surface area. The point of zero charge showed an increasing trend as TiO₂ < Cr₂O₃ < Fe₂O₃ < NiO < CuO = ZnO < Mn₂O₃. The number of available binding sites of nanoparticle showed an increasing trend as Cr₂O₃ > ZnO > CuO > NiO > Fe₂O₃ > Mn₂O₃ > TiO₂. The degree of adsorption on the surface of nanoparticles showed an increasing trend with atomic …

Demographic Prediction Of Mobile User From Phone Usage, Shahram Mohrehkesh, Shuiwang Ji, Tamer Nadeem, Michele C. Weigle

Computer Science Faculty Publications

In this paper, we describe how we use the mobile phone usage of users to predict their demographic attributes. Using call log, visited GSM cells information, visited Bluetooth devices, visited Wireless LAN devices, accelerometer data, and so on, we predict the gender, age, marital status, job and number of people in household of users. The accuracy of developed classifiers for these classification problems ranges from 45-87% depending upon the particular classification problem.

Which Accelerates Faster – A Falling Ball Or A Porsche?, James D. Rall, Wathiq Abdul-Razzaq

Faculty & Staff Scholarship

An introductory physics experiment has been developed to address the issues seen in conventional physics lab classes including assumption verification, technological dependencies, and real world motivation for the experiment. The experiment has little technology dependence and compares the acceleration due to gravity by using position versus time graphs and the kinematic equation. The students are then asked to compare the acceleration they found to the one of a Porsche car which they seem surprised when they learn about it. This experiment may contribute significantly to the understanding of the concept of acceleration and the appreciation for the force of gravity.

Which Accelerates Faster A Falling Ball Or A Porsche?, James D. Rall, Wathiq Abdul-Razzaq

Faculty & Staff Scholarship

An introductory physics experiment has been developed to address the issues seen in conventional physics lab classes including assumption verification, technological dependencies, and real world motivation for the experiment. The experiment has little technology dependence and compares the acceleration due to gravity by using position versus time graphs and the kinematic equation. The students are then asked to compare the acceleration they found to the one of a Porsche car which they seem surprised when they learn about it. This experiment may contribute significantly to the understanding of the concept of acceleration and the appreciation for the force of gravity.

A Survey On Privacy Frameworks For Rfid Authentication, Chunhua Su, Yingjiu Li, Yunlei Zhao, Robert H. Deng, Yiming Zhao, Jianying Zhou

Research Collection School Of Computing and Information Systems

Due to rapid growth of RFID system applications, the security and privacy problems become more and more important to guarantee the validity of RFID systems. Without introducing proper privacy protection mechanisms, widespread deployment of RFID could raise privacy concerns to both companies and individuals. As a fundamental issue for the design and analysis of secure RFID systems, some formal RFID privacy frameworks were proposed in recent years to give the principles for evaluating the security and privacy in RFID system. However, readers can be confused with so many proposed frameworks. In this paper, we make a comparative and survey study …

Road: A New Spatial Object Search Framework For Road Networks, Ken C. K. Lee, Wang-Chien Lee, Baihua Zheng, Yuan Tian

Research Collection School Of Computing and Information Systems

In this paper, we present a new system framework called ROAD for spatial object search on road networks. ROAD is extensible to diverse object types and efficient for processing various location-dependent spatial queries (LDSQs), as it maintains objects separately from a given network and adopts an effective search space pruning technique. Based on our analysis on the two essential operations for LDSQ processing, namely, network traversal and object lookup, ROAD organizes a large road network as a hierarchy of interconnected regional subnetworks (called Rnets). Each Rnet is augmented with 1) shortcuts and 2) object abstracts to accelerate network traversals and …

The Geometry Of Homological Triangles, Florentin Smarandache, Ion Patrascu

Branch Mathematics and Statistics Faculty and Staff Publications

This book is addressed to students, professors and researchers of geometry, who will find herein many interesting and original results. The originality of the book The Geometry of Homological Triangles consists in using the homology of triangles as a “filter” through which remarkable notions and theorems from the geometry of the triangle are unitarily passed. Our research is structured in seven chapters, the first four are dedicated to the homology of the triangles while the last ones to their applications. In the first chapter one proves the theorem of homological triangles (Desargues, 1636), one survey the remarkable pairs of homological …

Real-Time Anomaly Detection In Full Motion Video, Glenn Konowicz,, Jiang Li, Donnie Self (Ed.)

Electrical & Computer Engineering Faculty Publications

Improvement in sensor technology such as charge-coupled devices (CCD) as well as constant incremental improvements in storage space has enabled the recording and storage of video more prevalent and lower cost than ever before. However, the improvements in the ability to capture and store a wide array of video have required additional manpower to translate these raw data sources into useful information. We propose an algorithm for automatically detecting anomalous movement patterns within full motion video thus reducing the amount of human intervention required to make use of these new data sources. The proposed algorithm tracks all of the objects …

Cooperation As A Service In Vanet: Implementation And Simulation Results, Hajar Mousannif, Ismail Khalil, Stephan Olariu

Computer Science Faculty Publications

The past decade has witnessed the emergence of Vehicular Ad-hoc Networks (VANET), specializing from the well-known Mobile Ad Hoc Networks (MANET) to Vehicle-to-Vehicle (V2V) and Vehicle-to-Infrastructure (V2I) wireless communications. While the original motivation for Vehicular Networks was to promote traffic safety, recently it has become increasingly obvious that Vehicular Networks open new vistas for Internet access, providing weather or road condition, parking availability, distributed gaming, and advertisement. In previous papers [27,28], we introduced Cooperation as a Service (CaaS); a new service-oriented solution which enables improved and new services for the road users and an optimized use of the road network …

Learning Sparse Representations For Fruit Fly Gene Expression Pattern Image Annotation And Retreival, Lei Yuan, Alexander Woodard, Shuiwang Ji, Yuan Jiang, Zhi-Hua Zhou, Sudhir Kumar, Jieping Ye

Computer Science Faculty Publications

Background: Fruit fly embryogenesis is one of the best understood animal development systems, and the spatiotemporal gene expression dynamics in this process are captured by digital images. Analysis of these high-throughput images will provide novel insights into the functions, interactions, and networks of animal genes governing development. To facilitate comparative analysis, web-based interfaces have been developed to conduct image retrieval based on body part keywords and images. Currently, the keyword annotation of spatiotemporal gene expression patterns is conducted manually. However, this manual practice does not scale with the continuously expanding collection of images. In addition, existing image retrieval systems based …

On A Versatile Stochastic Growth Model, Samiur Arif, Ismail Khalil, Stephan Olariu

Computer Science Faculty Publications

Growth phenomena are ubiquitous and pervasive not only in biology and the medical sciences, but also in economics, marketing and the computer and social sciences. We introduce a three-parameter version of the classic pure-birth process growth model when suitably instantiated, can be used to model growth phenomena in many seemingly unrelated application domains. We point out that the model is computationally attractive since it admits of conceptually simple, closed form solutions for the time-dependent probabilities.

Momcmc: An Efficient Monte Carlo Method For Multi-Objective Sampling Over Real Parameter Space, Yaohang Li

Computer Science Faculty Publications

In this paper, we present a new population-based Monte Carlo method, so-called MOMCMC (Multi-Objective Markov Chain Monte Carlo). for sampling in the presence of multiple objective functions in real parameter space. The MOMCMC method is designed to address the "multi-objective sampling" problem, which is not only of interest in exploring diversified solutions at the Pareto optimal front in the function space of multiple objective functions, but also those near the front. MOMCMC integrates Differential Evolution (DE) style crossover into Markov Chain Monte Carlo (MCMC) to adaptively propose new solutions from the current population. The significance of dominance is taken into …