Physical Sciences and Mathematics Commons^™

Learn To Intervene: An Adaptive Learning Policy For Restless Bandits In Application To Preventive Healthcare, Arpita Biswas, Gaurav Aggarwal, Pradeep Varakantham, Milind Tambe

Research Collection School Of Computing and Information Systems

In many public health settings, it is important for patients to adhere to health programs, such as taking medications and periodic health checks. Unfortunately, beneficiaries may gradually disengage from such programs, which is detrimental to their health. A concrete example of gradual disengagement has been observed by an organization that carries out a free automated call-based program for spreading preventive care information among pregnant women. Many women stop picking up calls after being enrolled for a few months. To avoid such disengagements, it is important to provide timely interventions. Such interventions are often expensive and can be provided to only …

Code2que: A Tool For Improving Question Titles From Mined Code Snippets In Stack Overflow, Zhipeng Gao, Xin Xia, David Lo, John C. Grundy, Yuan-Fang Li

Research Collection School Of Computing and Information Systems

Stack Overflow is one of the most popular technical Q&A sites used by software developers. Seeking help from Stack Overflow has become an essential part of software developers' daily work for solving programming-related questions. Although the Stack Overflow community has provided quality assurance guidelines to help users write better questions, we observed that a significant number of questions submitted to Stack Overflow are of low quality. In this paper, we introduce a new web-based tool, Code2Que, which can help developers in writing higher quality questions for a given code snippet. Code2Que consists of two main stages: offline learning and online …

Automating The Removal Of Obsolete Todo Comments, Zhipeng Gao, Xin Xia, David Lo, John C. Grundy, Thomas Zimmermann

Research Collection School Of Computing and Information Systems

TODO comments are very widely used by software developers to describe their pending tasks during software development. However, after performing the task developers sometimes neglect or simply forget to remove the TODO comment, resulting in obsolete TODO comments. These obsolete TODO comments can confuse development teams and may cause the introduction of bugs in the future, decreasing the software’s quality and maintainability. Manually identifying obsolete TODO comments is time-consuming and expensive. It is thus necessary to detect obsolete TODO comments and remove them automatically before they cause any unwanted side effects. In this work, we propose a novel model, named …

Void Hunting: Ambient Noise Tomography For Spatio-Temporal Subsurface Imaging And Monitoring In Karst Environments, John B. Paustian

Boise State University Theses and Dissertations

Karst environments are characterized by voids, i.e. sinkholes and conduits of varying size that arise from the active dissolution of carbonate rock by acidic groundwater. These voids, whether air-, water-, or soil-filled, can be difficult to image using near-surface geophysical methods due to the limited investigation depths of most active-source methods. In addition, due to the significant effort it takes to collect active-source data, investigators are often unable to monitor spatio-temporal variations in the subsurface. The ability to detect, image, and monitor subsurface voids improves the understanding of processes that create and transform voids, a vitally important insight across a …

Fundamental Resonant Frequencies Derived From Shallow Sediment Properties For The Charleston, South Carolina Area, William Dale Schermerhorn

Boise State University Theses and Dissertations

Large historic earthquakes, low velocity near surface sediments, a poor understanding of earthquake sources, and a growing population base for the Charleston, South Carolina area suggest robust site response and active fault maps are needed. A Boise State University team acquired 14 km of new surface-based seismic data to obtain surface wave dispersion curves and reflection images for the southern isoseismal region of the 1886 earthquake. From these data, I generate shear wave velocity (Vs)-depth profiles through a grid search approach. I integrate my results with other published data to develop a soil thickness and high frequency fundamental resonance maps …

Assessing Controls On Ice Dynamics At Crane Glacier, Antarctic Peninsula Using A Numerical Ice Flow Model, Rainey Aberle

Boise State University Theses and Dissertations

The widespread retreat of glaciers and the collapse of ice shelves along the Antarctic Peninsula has been attributed to atmospheric and oceanic warming, which promotes mass loss. However, several glaciers on the eastern peninsula that were buttressed by the Larsen A and B ice shelves prior to collapse in 1995 and 2002, respectively, have been advancing in recent years. This asymmetric pattern of rapid retreat and long-term re-advance is similar to the tidewater glacier cycle, which can occur largely independent of climate forcing. Here, I use a width- and depth-integrated numerical ice flow model to investigate glacier response to ice …

Translating Risk Information To Protective Action: Examining Household Response To Information About Earthquake Hazards And Risk, Carson C. Macpherson-Krutsky

Boise State University Theses and Dissertations

Natural hazards have been a part of the landscape since its existence, but they are becoming more devastating as they intersect with growing populations and as climate change increases their frequency and intensity. As these changes occur, the need to understand how to reduce disaster impacts becomes paramount. Despite growing concern and increasing costs of disasters over the past decade, household preparedness, which is at the foundation of disaster readiness, has seen little to no improvement. Using two research experiments, we adopt the Protective Action Decision Model (PADM; Lindell & Perry, 2004; 2012) as a framework to investigate what motivates …

Re-Evaluation Of The First Metamorphic P-T Path Using Quig Barometry And Equilibrium Thermodynamics, Sam Couch

Boise State University Theses and Dissertations

Quartz in garnet (“QuiG”) barometry is a relatively new technique that uses physical properties of minerals to estimate the pressure of garnet nucleation and growth history independent of chemical equilibrium. QuiG barometry was used to determine pressures of garnet growth and compared to thermodynamically calculated P-T conditions for two samples (FH-1M and Z3H) from the Lower Shieferhülle (Formation), Tauern Window, Austria. FH-1M was the first sample for which a P-T path was calculated through inversion of chemical zoning in garnet (Selverstone et al., 1984). Mineral Assemblage Diagrams (MADs) and geothermobarometric techniques were used to determine P-T conditions for garnet nucleation …

Laboratory Measurement Of Electrical And Hydraulic Properties Of Regolith Over Granitic Bedrock, Taylor James Bienvenue

Boise State University Theses and Dissertations

Characterizing water flux within the critical zone (CZ) is essential for a multitude of studies and applications related to irrigation, drainage, water management, and contaminant transport. Trying to measure water flux in the critical zone, specifically in the subsurface, is difficult due to the associated structural heterogeneity and complex interactions taking place between biological, chemical, and physical processes. Current methods (i.e., inferred from soil suction and soil moisture measurements) to characterize water flux within the critical zone can be time consuming and are not directly related to water flux. Recent literature has provided evidence that self-potential (SP) is a promising …

Dynamic Mass Loss From Greenland's Peripheral Glaciers, Katherine E. Bollen

Boise State University Theses and Dissertations

While global glacier mass balance has decreased rapidly over the last two decades, mass loss has been greatest in regions with marine-terminating glaciers. In Greenland, peripheral glaciers and ice caps (GICs) cover only ~5% of Greenland’s area but contributed ~14-20% of the island’s ice mass loss between 2003-2008. Although Greenland GIC’s mass loss due to surface meltwater runoff have been estimated using atmospheric models, mass loss due to changes in ice discharge into surrounding ocean basins (i.e., dynamic mass loss) remains unquantified. Here, we use the flux gate method to estimate discharge from Greenland’s 594 marine-terminating peripheral glaciers between 1985 …

Seismic Imaging Of Active And Ancient Co2 Pathways In The Little Grand Wash Fault, Jonathan Yelton

Boise State University Theses and Dissertations

Understanding the migration behavior of carbon dioxide (CO2) during long-term geological storage is crucial to the success of carbon capture and sequestration technology. I explore p-wave and s-wave seismic properties across the Little Grand Wash fault in east-central Utah, a natural CO2 seep and analogue for a long-failed sequestration site. Travertines dated to at least 113,000 k.y. and geochemical surveys confirm both modern and ancient CO2 leakage along the fault. Outgassing is currently focused in damage zones where the total fluid pressure may reduce the minimum horizontal effective stress. Regional stress changes may be responsible for decadal- to millennial-scale changes …

Tukey Morphisms Between Finite Binary Relations, Rhett Barton

Boise State University Theses and Dissertations

Let A = (A₋, A₊, A) and B = (B₋, B₊, B) be relations. A morphism is a pair of maps φ₋ : B₋ → A₋ and φ₊ : A₊ → B₊ such that for all b ∈ B₋ and a ∈ A₊, φ₋(b)Aa ⟹ bBφ₊(a). We study the existence of morphisms between finite relations. The ultimate goal is to identify the conditions under which morphisms exist. In this thesis …

An Integrative Approach For Environmental Assessment And Water Resources Management Using Direct Current Resistivity (Dc), Geographic Information System (Gis), Remote Sensing, And Gain And Loss Method, Dina Ragab Desouki Abdelmoneim

Boise State University Theses and Dissertations

Sustainable water resource management is a crucial national and global issue (Currell et al., 2012). In arid areas, groundwater is often the major source of water or at least a crucial supplement to other freshwater resources for agriculture, industry and domestic consumption (Vrba and Renaud, 2016). The complexity associated with groundwater-surface water interactions creates uncertainty about water resource sustainability in semi-arid environments, especially with urbanization and population growth. Flood irrigation in the early 1900s increased the shallow groundwater table in the Treasure Valley (TV), but with increasing irrigation efficiencies, they have been declining since the 1960s with a mean decline …

Exploring Electron-Sink Behaviors Of Molecular Assemblies, Yume Mai

Boise State University Theses and Dissertations

Metal carbonyl clusters, such as the [Ni₃₂C₆(CO)₃₆]^6- anion, have been documented to display electron-sink phenomena. However, such large clusters suffer from inefficient yields due to their demanding and unreliable synthesis routes. To approach this obstacle, we investigated the electrochemical properties of Fe₂(μ-PPh₂)₂(CO)₆, an organometallic complex known to experience a reversible two-electron transfer process. In this work, we report a modular synthetic strategy for expanding the electron-sink capacity of molecular assemblies by installing Fe₂(μ-PPh₂)₂(CO)₆ redox mediators to arylisocyanide ligands. …

Mafic Explosive Volcanism At Llaima Volcano: 3d X-Ray Microtomography Reconstruction Of Pyroclasts To Constrain Shallow Conduit Processes, Pedro Antonio Valdivia-Munoz

Boise State University Theses and Dissertations

Mafic eruptions, which are typically effusive to mildly explosive, can produce much stronger explosive eruptions. Eruption style is determined by the ability of gas to escape through the permeable network. If the permeability is sufficiently high to reduce vesicle overpressure during ascent, the volatiles may escape from the magma, inhibiting violent explosive activity. In contrast, if the permeability is sufficiently low to retain the gas phase within the magma during ascent, bubble overpressure may drive magma fragmentation. Rapid ascent rates may induce disequilibrium crystallization, increasing viscosity and explosivity, and have consequences for the geometry of the vesicle network. Quantitative vesicle …

3-D Ambient Noise Tomography Of Llaima Volcano, Chile, Claudia Kristina Rossavik

Boise State University Theses and Dissertations

Llaima is a glaciated, basaltic-andesitic stratocone in the South-Central Andean Volcanic Zone. It is one of the largest and most active volcanoes in Chile. However, uncertainty remains regarding the depths and geometry of where magma is stored and the routes which it takes towards the Earth's surface. To provide a structural framework for the interpretation of petrological and geochemical data, I apply ambient noise tomography (ANT) to produce a 3-D shear wave velocity (v_s) model of Llaima's magmatic plumbing. The results of this project show slow shear wave velocity anomalies within the upper 8 km of the …

The Importance Of Dna Repair Capacity To (And A Model To Predict) Cell Radiosensitivity To Ions, David B. Flint, David B. Flint

Dissertations & Theses (Open Access)

Radiation therapy with ions has a number of advantages over conventional radiation therapy with photons, including favorable depth-dose distributions, greater relative biological effectiveness (RBE) and a lesser dependence on a number of biological factors known to affect radiosensitivity to photons, including DNA repair capacity. Thus, it is expected that an additional benefit of using ions is that they mitigate the great heterogeneities in treatment responses commonly observed in photon therapies.

However, by analyzing the cell survival of human cancer cell lines exposed to clinically relevant photon, proton, and carbon ion beams, we show there is not significantly less relative variability …

Towards Machine Learning-Based Demand Response Forecasting Using Smart Grid Data, Matthew S. Johnson

Theses, Dissertations and Culminating Projects

Demand response is a valuable tool for improving the reliability, stability, and financial efficiency of smart grids. With the intention of altering customer power consumption patterns, utility companies often implement strategies such as time-of-use (TOU) programs. Although effective in some situations, TOU programs struggle to perform in highly developed countries due to the complexity of human behavior. In this study, we analyze power consumption readings from smart meters from 5567 households in London, UK from November 2011 to February 2014 to measure the success of the TOU program. We additionally consider the variability of weather conditions and customer demographics when …

Understanding Combined Sewer Overflow (Cso) And Green Infrastructure Interaction In New Jersey : An Economic Analysis, Taylor J. Wieczerak

Theses, Dissertations and Culminating Projects

New Jersey, as a coastal area, has historically struggled with a variety of problems stemming from stormwater runoff, which have only grown more prevalent and harmful as urbanization and climate change have taken their toll. One such issue that has emerged in recent years is the prevalence of combined sewer overflows (CSOs). These sewer systems are common in urban areas in the United States and abroad, and increased urbanization has them not only obsolete but a persistent danger, as their discharges can contaminate waterways and affect human health. While municipalities across the United States are beginning to move towards mitigating …

A Geo-Economic Framework For Dune Construction And Long-Term Coastal Resiliency In New Jersey, Jesse Charles Kolodin

Theses, Dissertations and Culminating Projects

Following the extensive coastal impacts (i.e., storm surges) caused by Hurricane Sandy in 2012, the State of New Jersey chose to install large-scale engineered berm-dune structures as their main coastal resiliency strategy. Initially, the project was entirely funded with federal emergency relief funds, but will require state and local beachfront communities to pay a percentage costshare for future renourishment projects. The thesis specifically focuses on three adjacent beachfront communities within the barrier island stretch of Long Beach Island, NJ (i.e., Beach Haven, Long Beach Township, and Ship Bottom), all of which had been provided engineered dunes in 2016. Following installation, …

Cyclic Sulfones From Double Conjugate Addition Of Rongalite, Hao Zong

Theses, Dissertations and Culminating Projects

We report a cyclic sulfone synthesis method from the addition of sodium hydroxymethanesulfinate to doubly electrophilic dienone substrates. The novel synthesis of the cyclic sulfone thus avoided the using the toxic and odorous sulfides, and also oxidizing reagents. We prepared both the symmetrical and unsymmetrical substrates, and then used the substrate for the synthesis of cyclic sulfone.

Silver Bow Creek/Butte Area Npl Site Butte Priority Soils Operable Unit, Pioneer Technical Services, Inc.

Silver Bow Creek/Butte Area Superfund Site

No abstract provided.

The Role Of Trust In Advice Acceptance From Non-Human Actors, Rahul Banerjee

Dissertations and Theses Collection (Open Access)

Advancements in technology are now allowing non-human actors in the form of robot-advisors, driverless cars, medical assistants to perform increasingly complex tasks. While technological change is as old as civilization, these non-human actors can do novel tasks. One such task is that they provide advice which is a credence service (Dulleck, & Kerschbamer, 2006). Using a financial services context this thesis studies the role trust plays in advice acceptance.

Robo-advisors are rapidly replacing human financial advisors as the agent-provider for portfolio investment services. For centuries, it was the banker (human financial advisor) who was responsible for providing his investors with …

Credit Assignment In Multiagent Reinforcement Learning For Large Agent Population, Arambam James Singh

Dissertations and Theses Collection (Open Access)

In the current age, rapid growth in sectors like finance, transportation etc., involve fast digitization of industrial processes. This creates a huge opportunity for next-generation artificial intelligence system with multiple agents operating at scale. Multiagent reinforcement learning (MARL) is the field of study that addresses problems in the multiagent systems. In this thesis, we develop and evaluate novel MARL methodologies that address the challenges in large scale multiagent system with cooperative setting. One of the key challenge in cooperative MARL is the problem of credit assignment. Many of the previous approaches to the problem relies on agent's individual trajectory which …

Learning To Interpret Knowledge From Software Q&A Sites, Bowen Xu

Dissertations and Theses Collection (Open Access)

Nowadays, software question and answer (SQA) data has become a treasure for software engineering as it contains a huge volume of programming knowledge. That knowledge can be interpreted in many different ways to support various software activities, such as code recommendation, program repair, and so on. In this dissertation, we interpret SQA data by addressing three novel research problems.

The first research problem is about linkable knowledge unit prediction. In this problem, a question and its answers within a post in Stack Overflow are considered as a knowledge unit (KU). KUs often contain semantically relevant knowledge, and thus linkable for …

Acoustic Parameters As Discriminators Of Wall Events In Pico Dark Matter Search Data, Lucia Volkova

University Honors Program Senior Projects

Bubble chambers are one of several detector types that particle physicists use to search for the as-yet-undetected dark matter. The PICO collaboration – formed from the merger of the similar PICASSO and COUPP experiments – runs such a bubble detector using superheated fluorocarbons (with and without iodine). Bubbles that form along chamber walls exhibit different behavior than those which nucleate in the bulk of the target liquid due to shape distortions from the wall boundary; in previous analyses when searching for dark matter, these wall events have been cut from the data to control for the differing behavior using information …

Invasives In Our National Parks: How Tourists Can Help Stop The Spread Of Invasive Species, Alexandria Elivira Marci

Masters Theses

Invasive species are a major issue around the world and more specifically in our U.S. National Parks. Ranging from plants to insects to animals, invasive species are a greater threat than many may imagine. The impact that invasive species have on an ecosystem encompasses more than taking over a native species’ environment; it includes competing for food, water, and other resources, as well as having an adverse effect on our economy and threatening us with deadly diseases. Many factors lead to the cause of spread of invasive species, but all point back to human interference, from purposely spreading invasive species …

Study Of Nonlinear Optical Properties Of Gold Nanoparticles Dispersed In Nematic Liquid Crystals, Changshuo Fu

Graduate Masters Theses

Gold nanoparticles come in various sizes and shapes. Their optical properties arise from surface plasmon resonance, collective excitation/oscillation of conduction electrons. The study of the nonlinear optical properties of these materials is essential for photonic and biomedical applications. In this thesis, nonlinear optical properties of gold nanoparticles dispersed in the nematic liquid crystal were studied using optical and photoacoustic Z-scan techniques. Results show enhanced nonlinearity when gold is dispersed in planar-oriented 5CB liquid crystals compared to when liquid crystals were not oriented (degenerate). Also, sample with low gold concentration, by weight percentage, shows the better nonlinearity. Reasons behind the influence …

Preconditioned Nesterov’S Accelerated Gradient Descent Method And Its Applications To Nonlinear Pde, Jea Hyun Park

Doctoral Dissertations

We develop a theoretical foundation for the application of Nesterov’s accelerated gradient descent method (AGD) to the approximation of solutions of a wide class of partial differential equations (PDEs). This is achieved by proving the existence of an invariant set and exponential convergence rates when its preconditioned version (PAGD) is applied to minimize locally Lipschitz smooth, strongly convex objective functionals. We introduce a second-order ordinary differential equation (ODE) with a preconditioner built-in and show that PAGD is an explicit time-discretization of this ODE, which requires a natural time step restriction for energy stability. At the continuous time level, we show …

Partial Representations For Ternary Matroids, Ebony Perez

Electronic Theses, Projects, and Dissertations

In combinatorics, a matroid is a discrete object that generalizes various notions of dependence that arise throughout mathematics. All of the information about some matroids can be encoded (or represented) by a matrix whose entries come from a particular field, while other matroids cannot be represented in this way. However, for any matroid, there exists a matrix, called a partial representation of the matroid, that encodes some of the information about the matroid. In fact, a given matroid usually has many different partial representations, each providing different pieces of information about the matroid. In this thesis, we investigate when a …