Sedimentary records from the North Atlantic, instrumental in the development of modern paleo-geomagnetic concepts, show a highly variable field even during times of constant polarity. Yet, our understanding of how the magnetization is acquired in the sediments is poorly understood. Primary magnetizations preserved in deep-sea sediments are known to be...
Fungi are capable of growth on a wide variety of carbon sources, both living and dead. They can produce an arsenal of enzymes and transporters for harvesting sugars, polysaccharides, amino acids, lipids and micronutrients from their environments [1]. Within the nucleus of a cell, transcription factors (TF) control whether genes...
Sulfur is one of the six elements required during the early stages of the evolution of life, and enzymes involved in sulfur transfer and oxidation are increasingly being recognized as potential drug targets for antimicrobials as well as for therapies for cancer, neurodegenerative and inflammatory diseases. Bacteria are able to...
Microscale reactors operate in sub millimeter space dimensions. Their small length scale enables process intensification of mass, heat and momentum transport that influence reaction rates. Hence it's possible to observe the true intrinsic reaction kinetics occurring for a set of reactions. In this work a novel microscale reactor for producing...
Passage of blood through a sorbent device for removal of bacteria and endotoxin by specific binding with immobilized, membrane-active, bactericidal peptides holds promise for treating severe blood infections. Peptide insertion in the target membrane and stable binding is desirable, while membrane disruption and release of degradation products to the circulating...
Biodiversity losses in terrestrial, freshwater, and marine systems are accelerating at a global scale and the most threatened vertebrate taxa are those associated with freshwater habitats. The causes of biodiversity losses are often complex and include synergistic effects of natural and human-induced stressors, such as habitat loss and fragmentation, urbanization,...
The concept of ecosystem services broadens perspectives on nature to include not only intrinsic value but also the utilitarian value it provides to society. Viewing nature through this lens informs our understanding of how particular ecological processes benefit different actors. In this research, I examine how water utilities in the...
Central Oregon's landscape is rich in dry forests prone to frequent wildfires. Climate change studies and improved modeling indicate this region could experience conditions that result in an increase in number and severity of wildfires. With the potential for increased environmental hazards, the nearby communities face potential risks and vulnerabilities...
Environmental sustainability and economic growth is at the forefront of international policy discussions. There is no question that climate change is happening, but also that countries all around the world aspire to continued economic growth. When it comes to climate change, scientists agree that increased carbon dioxide (CO₂) emissions in...
Methods for obtaining accurate, spatially explicit estimates of biomass density in tropical forests are required to reduce uncertainties in the global carbon cycle, and to support international climate agreements and emerging carbon markets. Three-dimensional (3-D) remote sensing techniques sensitive to the vertical structure of vegetation provide a unique opportunity for...
Over the past few decades, a primary focus has been on the negative health effects of not participating in regular moderate-to-vigorous physical activity (MPVA). Only recently has sedentary behavior been studied as a distinct and independent risk factor for adverse health outcomes. This dissertation sought to provide new insights into...
Forest management is rapidly undergoing a transformation from a discipline based on efficient commodity production to one for multiple uses, especially on federally managed land in the United States. This new management paradigm has challenged silviculturists to develop and adapt forest management techniques that can deal with increased demands. Using...
Doctoral training programs in counselor education require a dissertation, a capstone project in the academic training and development of graduate students seeking a PhD or an EdD. The dissertation is expected to contribute new knowledge to the profession through the researcher reporting the results of research. The counselor education literature...
Improving the understanding the relations of sustainability behaviors in manufacturing systems and actively engaging with manufacturers (especially SMEs) in sustainability efforts is key to the long-term success of U.S. industry and the natural environment. This study addresses this urgent need by establishing a systemic approach for the design of costing...
Community and technical colleges in the United States are experiencing an expansion of racial and ethnic diversity in students, faculty, and administrators. From 1996 to 2006, the number of Asian female college students increased 55.3%, from 13,184 to 20,477. The number of Asian male students increased 48.9%, from 9,731 to...
Quantification of macroscale transport phenomenon in microfluidic systems is important to many science and engineering disciplines. In part, this is because fully resolved solutions to microscale balance laws over large domains are out of reach with current computational technology. Additionally, engineers are most often interested in some upscaled quantity and...
Over the past twenty years, the national three-year graduation rate for community college students has ranged from 44% to roughly 31% in 2013 (NCES, 2013). As a way to address such low graduation rates, colleges have implemented a myriad of services and programs (i.e., tutoring, mentoring, etc.). Another intervention is...
Several dolphin species have global distributions. The extent of their radiation and limits to gene flow are presumably a product of oceanographic features both recent and historical, behavioral specializations and social organization. Rough-toothed dolphins (Steno bredanensis) are globally distributed in tropical and subtropical waters and are generally found in depths...
A Right-hook (RH) crash is a common type of bicycle-motor vehicle crash that occurs between a right-turning vehicle and through-moving bicycle at an intersection. At signalized intersections, RH crashes can occur at the onset of the green or during the latter portion of the green phase. In spite of the...
Two-phase flows in microtechnology based devices are purposefully present in multiphase reactors, phase separators, analytical devices and others. Two-phase flows can also be an undesirable side effect occurring during operation due to phase transitions or, more commonly, introduction of surrounding air through equipment gaps and with process feed. In both...
Geologic CO₂ sequestration is a climate change mitigation strategy that prevents CO₂ emissions to the atmosphere by capturing CO₂ gasses from large point source emissions streams and then pressurizing and pumping the supercritical-state CO₂ into underground geologic storage reservoirs. Once underground, CO₂ is prevented from buoyant migration to the surface...
The purpose of this qualitative phenomenological study was to explore the successes of first generation, community college transfer students served by a TRiO/Student Support Services (TRiO/SSS) program. This study addresses a specific problem in higher education – there are a limited number of first generation transfer students who successfully matriculate...
Pacific Northwest and California freshwater resources are key elements in the life history and ecology of Pacific salmon and steelhead listed as threatened or endangered under the Endangered Species Act. Risk to listed Pacific salmonid species can be assessed by evaluating the spatial and temporal co-occurrence of salmonid species at...
Emerging infectious diseases impact both human and wildlife populations. Infectious agents, in particular the aquatic fungus Batrachochytrium dendrobatidis (chytrid), have an influential role in driving global amphibian population declines. The emergence of the chytrid fungus has aspects of both geographic spread as well as climate shifts altering environmental conditions and...
Mycobacterium avium subspecies paratuberculosis (MAP) is the causative agent of Johne's disease, a chronic inflammatory bowel disease that affects ruminant populations worldwide. The characteristic stages of the disease make diagnosis difficult, resulting in silent transmission among animals in a herd for years before proper detection of the infection. The extensive...
Bipedal locomotion is a complex phenomenon to understand and control, making it difficult for legged robots to achieve the speed, agility, efficiency, and robustness of their animal counterparts. This thesis argues for the use of numerical optimization to investigate and implement bipedal control as it applies to biology, dynamical models,...
Fluid-structure interaction (FSI) is a very interesting and challenging multi-disciplinary field involving interaction of a movable or deformable structure with an internal or surrounding fluid flow. FSI has several practical engineering applications such as the determination of the hydrodynamic forces on a structure or the dynamics of motion of bodies...
The objective of this study is to propose control strategies for legged robots to walk and run naturally like humans and animals. To achieve this goal, we use the spring-mass model for the legged robots to be able to create the same dynamics in the leg as humans and animals....
Spatially explicit maps of habitat relationships have proven to be valuable tools for conservation and management applications including evaluating how and which species may be impacted by large scale climate change, ongoing fragmentation of habitat, and local land-use practices. Studies have turned to remote sensing datasets as a way to...
Nanomaterials are expected to enable significant advances in several technological fields in coming years. Among them, electronics has emerged as one of the most likely benefactors from the ability to control matter on the nanometer-scale. For many electronic devices synthesized nanomaterials must be integrated into thin film structures. Vapor-based deposition...
This dissertation has focused on the charateristics of bubbles generated by breaking waves and the feedback of wave-current interaction on the forcing mechanism of low frequency wave especially basin seiching wave. For the first study, Optical image capture observations of breaking waves in a laboratory surf zone are presented. The...
There is growing evidence that children develop science-related interests in early childhood, before they enter school, and that these interests may have long-term implications for science participation and achievement. Although researchers have made headway in describing interest development in the preschool years, little is currently known about the proximal processes...
Population trends and patterns in species distributions are the major currencies used to examine responses by biodiversity to changing environments. Effective conservation recommendations require that models of both distribution dynamics and population trends accurately reflect reality. However, identification of the appropriate temporal and spatial scales of animal response, and then...
Professional development is a critical part of education, especially in career and technical education (CTE). CTE programs have rapidly changing technological foundations, and while the CTE teachers' primary focus is to prepare students for entry-level positions in their occupational areas, CTE teachers are also required to embed academics into their...
Lead zirconate titanate (PZT) is the dominant ferroelectric material in the market due to its excellent piezoelectric properties, relatively high Curie transition temperature (T[subscript C]), low cost, etc. However, because of emerging applications with requirements for high temperature (T[subscript C] > 400 °C) ferroelectrics, researchers are increasingly looking at alternative...
Cyprinid herpesvirus 3 (CyHV-3), commonly known as koi herpesvirus (KHV), is a member of the Alloherpesviridae and is a deadly pathogen for koi and common carp, Cyprinus carpio. It causes severe gill necrosis and nephritis, dermal ulceration and hemorrhage, and mass mortality of up to 100% of affected fish. Fish...
The purpose of this dissertation is twofold; to review existing literature regarding the process of international student transition to the United States and to specifically increase the understanding of the experiences of a defined international student population through an original grounded theory study. Specifically, the study describes experiences of South...
Recent climatic warming trends and increases in the frequency and extent of wildfires have prompted much concern regarding the potential for rapid change in the structure and function of forested ecosystems around the world. Episodes of mortality in wildfires and insect outbreaks associated with drought have affected large areas and...
Reintroduction programs are increasingly being used to save animals from extinction and aid in their recovery. The California Condor (Gymnogyps californianus), one of the most endangered birds in the world, is a remarkable example of how reintroduction programs can help rapidly increase a species' population numbers and range following a...
Releasing hatchery reared salmon and steelhead to supplement threatened and endangered populations is a widely used conservation tool. One issue with this strategy is hatchery fish have lower reproductive fitness than wild fish when spawning in the wild. One of the drivers of fitness loss in steelhead is adaptation to...
Although fish are a nutritious food source, they also are the main source of methylmercury exposure in U.S. populations. This research examined the risks from methylmercury and benefits from omega-3 fatty acids and selenium from fish consumption. The first study provided the first region-specific quantitative risk/benefit analysis for nine commonly...
The purpose of the dissertation was to gain an understanding of counselor professional identity and identity development, as well as an understanding of the experiences of doctoral students as they develop their professional identity within a nontraditional (hybrid) counselor education (CE) program. This was accomplished through systematic literature review of...
Organizational trust refers to the tendency of individuals or groups within an organization to trust each other. Tschannen-Moran (2004) describes trust as one's "willingness to be vulnerable to another based on the confidence that the other is benevolent, honest, open, reliable, and competent" (p. 17). The purpose of this study...
Many important policy problems entail linkages among multiple economic sectors, and require the use of a general equilibrium economic modeling framework. This economic approach is appropriate when the market for any one good or service is linked to numerous other goods and services, and back to fundamental inputs such as...
While properties are extremely important from an application point of view, it is crucial to have a detailed understanding of the underlying structural influence. Once a concrete correlation between the structure and the observed property is established, rational design of novel materials with optimized properties can be realized. These optimized...
The application of lean to new product development (NPD) processes has been claimed to generate positive impact on NPD performance. There are very few empirical studies, however, on how organizations should apply lean practices or on the exact nature of the impact of lean on NPD performance. To further understand...
Substantial scientific investment has been directed towards understanding factors that influence distribution patterns and animals' remarkable ability for precise orientation and navigation, yet fundamental gaps in our knowledge remain. In my dissertation, I applied emerging genetic technologies to conduct a top-down and bottom-up investigation of animal movement and cue perception....
Analytical chemistry is an essential qualitative and quantitative tool to describe foods and biomaterials and their changes during production, processing and distribution. In this work, rapid analytical procedures for the extraction and quantification of components in fluid milk and diatom fermentation broth were developed. Analytical methods to measure the concentration...
Organic compounds which contain one or more nitrogen atoms are especially important as they are disproportionately represented among biologically active molecules. As a result, significant effort has been focused on the development of methods for the synthesis of nitrogenous molecules. We identified the aminal as an under-explored functional group. Despite...
Drosophila suzukii Matsumura (Diptera: Drosophilidae) are small invasive flies that in the past five years (2009-2014) invaded berry and stone fruit production regions in Europe and the Americas. Evolutionary adaptations, biological traits, and anthropogenic factors have contributed to its current status as a global pest. Females oviposit eggs into ripe...