http://hdl.handle.net/1957/89 2013-06-19T00:10:21Z http://hdl.handle.net/1957/39564 Humans and other animals Basinger, Jeffrey D. In this thesis, I explore the relationship between animals and humans in various forms, through fursuit fandom to fish-watching, to space exploration, Buddhism, and separation anxiety (among other concepts.) These relationships attempt to illuminate what it means to be human, what it means to be animal, and ultimately how, while our culture at times separates humans and animals into two distinct categories, we are really the same. In this thesis I look at the ways other people find empathy with animals, and by the end of this thesis, I look at the ways in which I find empathy. This is a nonfiction collection of essays. Nonfiction is an amorphous genre of prose that still, as of 2013, has not found a concrete definition. In my explorations of animal and human relationships, I look through the nonfiction eye of "truthiness"--a journalistic approach at its foundation, but with a clear consideration for the more important truth, a truth of experience, reality, memory, and meaning. Graduation date: 2013; Access permanently restricted to the OSU Community at author's request 2013-04-30T00:00:00Z http://hdl.handle.net/1957/39562 The four-chambered heart Christie, Jennifer L. The Four-Chambered Heart is a collection of four short stories centering around themes and motifs most popular in the genre of magical realism. Important to this work is its emphasis of repurposed fairy tales and uncanny tropes. These have purposefully been embedded within realistic, domestic settings for aesthetic purposes. The first story, "Immaculate Flora," begins in the home of Elizabeth and Anchor Mason. They decide to raise a child grown from a Petri dish on their windowsill. The next story, "Breaking In," follows Mary Townsend as she addresses her absent lover, Ambrose, in epistolary form, meanwhile breaking into Johnny and Herman Galahads' Victorian house so that she can retrieve Ambrose's vacation address. In "Matriarchs," Agatha Dale decides to raise a small flock of chickens in her Chicago graystone apartment so that she might win the affection of the new family next door. In the final, most baroque and ornamental story, "In The Winter Palace," a young Russian guard is invited into the Queen's chambers within a St. Petersburg-inspired Winter Palace. All four stories challenge the expectations of the traditional domestic space and the way characters' psychologies shape these spaces into something new for the reader. Graduation date: 2013; Access permanently restricted to the OSU Community at author's request 2013-04-26T00:00:00Z http://hdl.handle.net/1957/39559 Finite volume method modeling of corona discharge microreactor oxidization of dibenzothiophene Fan, Xiangru The growing need for cleaner fuels requires the development of better deep fuel desulfurization methods. The current study presents a reaction model for the mechanism of dibenzothiophene oxidization by dissolved oxygen occurring in a corona discharge microreactor. In the present work, a Finite Volume Method model of the reactor is created and several possible reaction pathways investigated. The finite volume method model is first implemented in MATLAB and optimized to compute data efficiently. Without significant loss of precision, the FVM model implemented is between 50 and 400 times faster than COMSOL. Following model implementation, transport and reaction mechanism studies of 5 alternatives based on Reactions 1 through 6 below were investigated and results compared with existing experimental data for the reactor.; Reaction 1 O₂ + e- ------k1------> 2O. + e-; Reaction 2 2O. + e- ------k2------> O₂ + e-; Reaction 3 DBT + O. ------K4------> DBTO; Reaction 4 DBTO ------K4------> DBT + O.; Reaction 5 DBTO + O. ------K5------> DBTO₂; Reaction 6 DBTO₂ + DBTO₂ ------K6------> 2DBTO + 2O; The results indicate that: 1 - Transport in the microreactor is not the limiting factor, and 2 - The corona discharge reaction most likely involves a second order reverse reaction that converts DBTO₂ to DBTO and a first order reverse reaction that converts DBTO to DBT. The performance of the reactor is therefore restricted by a high rate of reverse reaction(s) when high concentrations of DBTO and DBTO2 are present. Graduation date: 2013 2013-05-20T00:00:00Z http://hdl.handle.net/1957/39548 Systematics and host associations of Ormyrus species (Hymenoptera: Chalcidoidea) Hanson, Paul E. The genus Ormyrus has a worldwide distribution and comprises about sixty recognized species. The higher taxonomic relationships of the genus are uncertain, as evidenced by its placement in the families Ormyridae, Pteromalidae, or Torymidae. Here, the genus is described in detail and a preliminary catalog of the world species is provided. The Nearctic species of Ormyrus have never been revised and the original descriptions are inadequate for separating species. Fifteen species have been described from the Nearctic, but two were previously synonymized. After examining all type material and over 8000 additional specimens, I consider nine species to be valid and relegate five to junior synonymy. The nine recognized species are redescribed. With the description of seven new species, the genus now comprises sixteen Nearctic species; a key is provided for separating these species. Certain characters such as color and size were found to be quite variable in some species. Surface sculpture, as documented through the use of SEM, proved especially useful in separating species. Thirteen of the sixteen Nearctic species may be associated exclusively with cynipid galls on oaks. Host records from specimen labels are summarized in tables, one of which includes an updated list of all Nearctic oak cynipids. Twig galls harbor several oligophagous species of Ormyrus, many leaf galls just a single polyphagous species, and "apple" galls usually none. Other hosts of Nearctic species include cynipid galls on Rosaceae and a pteromalid gall on blueberry. In other parts of the world, dipteran and chalcidoid galls may be important hosts. Distributional patterns of Nearctic Ormyrus species are compared with those of host cynipids and oaks. Graduation date: 1987 1987-01-14T00:00:00Z