From 3 April – 23 September 2009 we monitored the distribution, abundance and productivity of the federally Threatened Western Snowy Plover (Charadrius alexandrinus nivosus) along the Oregon coast. From north to south, we surveyed and monitored plover activity at Sutton Beach, Siltcoos River estuary, the Dunes Overlook, North Tahkenitch Creek,...
The effect of cosputtered catalyst on growth and alignment of carbon nanotubes (CNTs) grown by plasma enhanced chemical vapor deposition (PECVD) was investigated. Aligned CNTs were observed using a cosputtered catalytic metal deposited directly on boro-aluminosilicate glass. Catalytic metal alloys were sputtered directly onto the substrate using magnetron sputtering. Deposition...
This thesis will look at Paul Jensen while he was an education professor at Western Oregon State College in Monmouth, Oregon, and his role in Alaska Native education while working with the Bureau of Indian Affairs. Dr. Jensen's work coincided with the last twenty-five years of Bureau of Indian Affairs...
This is a redacted version of a two-week investigation of academic libraries offering "24/7" services within the Greater Western Library Alliance (GWLA). It was undertaken to better inform Oregon State University Libraries (OSUL) administration of the staffing, security and costs associated with providing such a service. OSUL undertook a pilot...
This thesis investigates the reported communication experiences of married women transitioning to motherhood. The study involves a series of focus groups in which new mothers share their communicative experiences, explaining how they are navigating their new roles as mothers while also performing roles as wives, daughters, and workers. Informed primarily...
Colonization of N. densiflorus tissues by P. ramorum is not well understood. The pathogen is able to colonize nearly all tissues of this host but it is unclear how a tree is ultimately killed. Because this is such a destructive invasive pathogen, it is important to investigate its pathogenic strategy....
My thesis explored the effects of environmental variability on population
dynamics and community composition of aquatic insects. Environmental variability in
the form of flow regime in streams can limit the distribution and life-history traits of
aquatic insects. I used tributaries to the McKenzie River in Oregon with dramatically
different flow...
The lingcod (Ophiodon elongatus) is an important groundfish species in both recreational and commercial fisheries of the Northeastern Pacific. It is a large, fast-growing, generalist predator of invertebrates and fishes. In response to concerns that lingcod may limit populations of rockfishes (Sebastes spp.), I compared the diets of 375 adult...
There are typically two responses to the complex environmental problems of our time: 1) doom and gloom and 2) optimism. There is a lot of doom and gloom in the environmental literature. This literature warns that the future portends danger for humans and their life support systems. But when one...
Electronic structure calculations for free and immersed atoms are performed in the context of unrestricted Hartree-Fock Theory. Spherical symmetry is broken, lifting de-generacies in electronic configurations involving the magnetic quantum number m. Basis sets, produced from density functional theory, are then explored for completeness. Com-parison to spectroscopic data is done...
Pesticides are among the most pervasive environmental contaminants and they are an important potential risk for human health. Agricultural workers are constantly exposed to pesticide spray, drift and residues in the soil and foliage. Many agricultural pesticides are readily absorbed by the body, through contact with the skin, the respiratory...
Salmon survival and eventual recruitment success have long been thought to be determined within the first summer following ocean migration. Juvenile growth during this period is largely influenced by ocean conditions such as temperature, prey availability, abundance, and quality. Shifts in these conditions due to climatic perturbations are particularly prevalent...
Managing rangelands with livestock grazing is a tool that can be applied to obtain vegetation management objectives. Animals utilize available resources, which vary in quantity and quality, across the landscape. Their movements are adjusted to the spatial and temporal heterogeneity of resource distribution. Controlling livestock distribution is fundamental to economically...
We studied the feasibility of using end-grain characteristics to match individual boards and cants back to their parent Douglas-fir (Pseudotsuga menziesii) logs. After reviewing marking/reading and biometric automated identification systems, we focused on end-grain biometrics because they appear to have the most promise for sawmills. Biometric identification requires that every...
As the demand for real-time information in engineering and health care systems keeps increasing, the need for wireless sensor nodes is also continuously increasing. As a result, the cost and effort involved in installing and maintaining batteries to power the numerous sensor nodes is growing exponentially. Providing a cost effective...
Endothelial activation with increased expression of cellular adhesion molecules, chemokines and pro-inflammatory cytokines critically contributes to vascular inflammation and the initiation and progression of atherosclerosis. By affecting redox-sensitive cell signaling pathways and transcription factors, redox-active transition metal ions, such as copper and iron, may play an important role in these...
Nest counts from the largest subpopulation of the loggerhead sea turtle (Caretta caretta) in the Atlantic, peninsular Florida, have been declining since 1998. Analyzing trends of nests and adult females is insufficient to determine the overall status of a sea turtle population, due to variation in nesting frequency and a...
Grapes (e.g. Vitis vinifera L.) are one of the more important fruit crops from an economic standpoint with world market values over 550 million US dollars in 2007 and 2008, second to apples (United States Department of Agriculture). While a satisfactory level of ripeness is of primary concern, the quality...
There are seven commercially important species of salmon and trout (genera Oncorhynchus and Salmo) in North America, many of which are closely related but command markedly different prices. The purpose of this research was to provide improved and novel methods for the detection of salmon species substitution on the commercial...
Virtual environments and simulations are being used increasingly to both visualize and understand data as well as to create scenarios for training and analysis purposes. In this paper, we are interested in the use of simulation and visualization of interactive virtual agents to create realistic motions for training scenarios. We...