It is uncertain how predicted changes in climate will impact vegetation responses and plant species’ distributions because the physiological mechanisms underlying thresholds for damage are not well understood, and responses to stress vary by functional type and developmental stage. Thus, it is crucial to investigate physiological responses to heat and...
Optimization of reservoir operation is involves various competing objectives for a scarce resource (water). To find the optimal operation of reservoirs, it is essential to consider multiple objectives simultaneously. There are various sources of uncertainty associated with the reservoir operation problem that should be considered as well.
The overarching goal...
This research investigates shape optimization process, using b-spline models and panel methods, to achieve a high lift to drag ratio for an aerodynamic structure. This research is a proof of concept for further research in aerodynamic shape optimization. The coupled process, involving the design and optimization of a random shape,...
The Pacific Northwest is an internationally important region for the production of Brassica seed and other seed crops including grass seed. Oregon lawmakers mandated research into the co-existence of canola (Brassica napus) with other Brassica production in the Willamette Valley and House Bill 2427 was signed into law in 2013,...
Water samples from the Arctic Ocean were analyzed in order to assess the present nature of particulate organic matter and investigate the effect of climate-driven changes on the ecology of the region. 661 individual surface water samples and 216 samples from CTD casts were collected from the Bering, Chukchi, and...
Prior to World War One, plastic surgery, as in its present form, was yet unfounded and not recognized as a genuine medical specialty. The carnage of the war prompted Britain to establish a specialized treatment center for plastic surgery, first at Aldershot and then at Sidcup, under the leadership of...
Few remote health monitoring (RHM) studies have included Mexican-origin Latinos, and even fewer have explored RHM acceptance and utility, reasons for RHM uptake success or failure, or how cultural values influence RHM use among this population. The primary purpose of this study was to determine the remote health monitoring (RHM)...
Delimiting species boundaries among closely related lineages often requires a range of independent data sets and analytical approaches. Similar to other organismal groups, robust species circumscriptions in fungi are increasingly investigated within an empirical framework. Here we attempt to delimit species boundaries in a closely related Glade of lichen-forming fungi...
Software testing is a very important task during software development and it can be used to improve the quality and reliability of the software system. One potential way to reduce the cost and increase the efficiency of software testing is to generate test data automatically. Search-based approaches successfully generate unit...
The marine environment is under increasing pressure from human activities worldwide, particularly in coastal waters, creating a need to better understand fine-scale distributions of highly mobile species that occur in the area, as they are frequently most threatened. Harbor porpoise (Phocoena phocoena) occur frequently in Oregon’s nearshore habitat, but due...
Potato (Solanum tuberosum L.) is the fourth largest food crop in the world following rice (Oryza sativa L.), wheat (Triticum spp.), and maize (Zea mays subs. mays). Potatoes arrived in the United States in the early 1600s and over the following centuries, the crop was subsequently cultivated across the country...
INTRODUCTION: Academic libraries have experimented with a variety of services to encourage article deposit to institutional repositories, with varying degrees of success. Universities now face the challenge of meeting federal agency public access requirements. Following the White House Office of Science Technology and Policy public access directive in 2013, Oregon...
The corrosion behaviors of carbon and stainless steels were investigated in supercritical CO₂ (sCO₂ ) containing H₂O and O₂ simulating conditions that exist in direct sCO₂ power cycle heat exchangers. Thermodynamic properties of CO₂-H₂O-O₂ systems related to the corrosion phenomena were determined using NIST software. The exposure tests of the...
Chainsaws, an indispensable tool for modern forestry operations, rely on bar lubricant to prevent rapid wear of the chain and bar. Choice of bar lubricant must balance performance, cost, and biological impact. Many bar lubricants are available, but little published work exists that conclusively ranks the performance of these choices....
The overall concept of reducing laboratory operations to a scale that fits on a single microfluidic chip has been an attractive area of research over the last several decades. Despite a surge in research, few commercial success stories have been written. Lab-on-a-chip technologies have the capability to be cost effective...
The emergence of altmetrics has drawn the attention of academic libraries as a new and effective approach for capturing the types of impact often ignored by traditional citation-based metrics. At Oregon State University Libraries, before investing in a full-scale implementation of altmetrics services, we conducted an assessment survey of faculty...
We monitored the distribution, abundance and productivity of the federally threatened Western SnowyPlover (Charadrius nivosus nivosus) along the Oregon coast from 5 April – 31 August 2016. From north to south, we surveyed and monitored plover activity at Sutton Beach, Siltcoos River estuary, the Dunes Overlook, North and South Tahkenitch...
Liquid transportation fuels require costly and time-consuming tests to characterize metrics, such as Research Octane Number (RON) for gasoline. If fuel sale restrictions requiring use of standard Cooperative Fuel Research (CFR) testing procedures do not apply, these tests may be avoided by using multivariate statistical models to predict RON and...
Polyoxometalates are a rapidly growing class of discrete metal oxide clusters with a wide range of applications including functional materials. These anionic clusters of the group V and VI transition metals are inexpensive and non-toxic. Within group V polyoxometalates, niobium and tantalum chemistry has been underdeveloped owing to their unique...
High purity niobium metal is used in the construction of superconducting radio frequency (SRF) cavities in superconducting particle accelerators, such as the Large Hadron Collider (LHC) at CERN or the Spallation Neutron Source (SNS) at Oak Ridge National Laboratory. The usual method for characterizing the impurities in this niobium, the...
The purpose of this thesis is to understand the experiences that Nahua children, in rural Mexico, have as they attend schools that are primarily influenced by formal Western education in relation to their own ways of learning and knowing. This research took place over the course of three months within...
The metal-organic–framework MOF-5 is used as an adsorbent in advanced systems for vehicular hydrogen storage that are currently under development. Presently, these systems are limited by poor thermal conductivity of the adsorption bed, and thus our research addresses how the interfaces between grains of MOF-5 can be engineered to improve...
Piezoelectric materials convert mechanical strain into a dielectric displacement, as well as the converse, allowing these materials to be used as sensors, actuators, and transducers. Currently, lead zirconate titanate (PZT) is the primary material used in these applications. Due to environmental toxicity and safety concerns associated with Pb, development of...
Wheat stripe rust (WSR), also called yellow rust of wheat (Tricitum spp.), causal agent Puccinia striiformis f.sp. tritici (Pst), is a foliar disease of major economic importance on wheat, especially grown in temperate locations. WSR causes major losses of wheat yield, estimated at nearly $ 1 billion per year, and...
Roughstalk bluegrass (Poa trivialis L.) (RB) is a weed species that increased very quickly in grass seed production fields of the Willamette Valley. The invasion of RB in grass seed crops often occurs in waterlogged soils. In waterlogged areas, RB exhibited better competitiveness and had greater population densities than other...
CR-39 foils were irradiated as part of nuclear accident dosimetry experiments using the Godiva reactor at the Nevada National Security Site and the Caliban and Prospero reactors at the Valduc Centre for Nuclear Studies in France. The irradiated foils were chemically etched using the standard Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory process...
Current research on the topic of advanced reactor fuel types include the use of ultrahigh density Uranium-Molybdenum fuels, towards their use in high-performance research reactors. These reactors operate with high power densities, and the increased cooling requirements therefore place high relevance on the fluid-structure interaction with these fuel elements; therefore...
Users interested in customizing their Primo installation are required to configure specific settings, files, and code during the View setup process. A consequence of this is that unique customizations are not easily sharable between institutions. With the release of the new Primo User Interface, Ex Libris has enabled institutions to...
Increasing complexity and demand of healthcare has not been matched with policy changes and improvements in healthcare training. In Linn, Benton, and Lincoln Counties (LBL), a few challenges that prevent the efficient training of healthcare providers are (1) limited training capacity due to clinical placements and availability of qualified faculty...
Understanding connectivity among exploited populations is critical to their sustainable management and long-term viability. In the marine environment, estimates of connectivity often rely on the use of genetic markers, as dispersal primarily occurs during a planktonic larval phase which is difficult to track using direct methods. In this thesis, we...
Liberalization of electricity markets has become a dominant energy sector reform for most of the European Union (EU) countries since 1990s. Despite initial expectations that liberalization will reduce electricity prices and strengthen overall energy security, outcomes of the deregulation reforms proved to be unclear and even contradictory. This study seeks...
Koi herpesvirus (KHV) is highly pathogenic to Cyprinus carpio. KHV can also become latent in recovered fish and reactivate from latency under stressful conditions. Understanding KHV latency is important for development of strategies against herpesvirus latent infection. Our previous studies found KHV ORF6 mRNA is detectable during latent infection. In...
Incremental ADCs (IADCs) have found wide applications in sensor interface circuitry since, compared to ∆Σ ADCs, they provide low-latency high-accuracy conversion and easy multiplexing among multiple channels. On the other hand, continuous-time ∆Σ ADCs (CTDSM) have been receiving more and more attention as a power-efficient solution in targeting medium to...
Bullying cultivates insecurity and fear while generating attention for the perpetrator and degrading the student-victim in front of others. The act erodes the self-efficacy and identity of minority students more specifically and produces a hostile climate that undermines the learning and social development to all affected. Despite the pervasive negative...
Juvenile Chinook Salmon (Oncorhynchus tshawytscha) have a finite amount of energy that they can use to move from their riverine habitat to their oceanic habitat. Fish in the Willamette River Basin are prevented from moving to the ocean easily by dams which create reservoirs, where they reside for up to...
The Endangered Species Act of 1973 (ESA) is considered by many to be among the most powerful and most contentious environmental laws in the United States. Persistent challenges to the Act’s implementation make reaching conservation goals problematic. Most notably, the very nature of the law—providing protections for species already at...
Nepal’s community forestry has been internationally recognized as an example of successful case of collective action. However, many scholars argue that although it has been successful in protecting forests from degradation, it has not been able to create an inclusive platform for political decision-making process. Using historical analysis, comparative case...
Sixty-four percent of Oregon's farmland is expected to change hands in the next 20 years, yet many Oregon farmers are unprepared for succession. Simultaneously, beginning farmers are finding it harder to start farmers because of dramatically increasing land prices.
These distinct but interwined challenges are addressed in a new research...
Reed Canarygrass (RCG) is an aggressive invader in aquatic ecosystems that swiftly modifies the environment and decreases biodiversity. A physical model was used to investigate the mechanisms by which RCG spreads. Experimental trials were implemented to examine feedbacks between a mid-channel patch of the flexible RCG, hydraulics, and bedform evolution...
As a result of warming temperatures and subsequently declining snowpacks, forest fires are increasing in frequency, intensity and extent across the western USA. In turn, forest fire disturbance affects patterns of snow accumulation and ablation by reducing canopy interception and modifying the snowpack energy balance. Following a 2011, high severity...
Throughout most of the developed world, surgical sterilization via gonadectomy has become a common tool for combating the overpopulation of unwanted dogs as well as to eliminate the risk of reproductive diseases in pet dogs. In the dog as in other normal adult mammal, the hypothalamus secretes gonadotropin-releasing hormone (GnRH),...
Cutaneous melanoma remains the deadliest form of skin cancer arising from malignant transformation of pigment-producing melanocytes, with a diagnosis of metastasis indicating a median survival rate of less than a year. Solar ultraviolet (UV) radiation, especially childhood sun exposure, is an important etiological risk factor of melanoma. This DNA damage...
During the 2016 greater sage-grouse breeding season, 1,908 aerial and ground lek surveys were conducted at 768 individual lek sites comprising 501 lek complexes. Surveys were conducted at 66.0% of known lek sites in the state, which was the greatest proportion of leks ever surveyed in Oregon. Survey effort during...
Forest policymakers and managers have long sought ways to evaluate the capability of forest landscapes to jointly produce timber, habitat, and other ecosystem services in response to forest management. Currently, carbon is of particular interest as policies for increasing carbon storage on federal lands are being proposed. However, a challenge...
Periodic weighing of seabird chicks is labour-intensive and repeated handling can cause high levels of disturbance to chicks. Although automatic weighing systems using a fibreglass nest have been designed for albatross species with a pedestal nest made of mud, this approach is inappropriate for great albatross species (genus Diomedea) whose...
Composites often are able to carry more load after damage due to the structure of laminates. In addition, damage can be difficult to detect in composites compared to homogeneous materials. Understanding the behavior of composite material after damage is vital for composite structural design. Currently, experimental methods exist for classifying...
The sexually transmitted disease gonorrhea, caused by the Gram-negative bacterium and obligate human pathogen Neisseria gonorrhoeae, remains a significant health and economic burden worldwide. In the absence of a protective vaccine, antimicrobial agents are the only pharmacological intervention for patients with gonorrhea. However, due to the remarkable ability of gonococcus...