Large equine facilities are comprised of many different departments (areas) that are necessary for the proper care and maintenance of horses. The placement of departments is often inefficient due to the slow growth of equine facilities. As a result, facility layout becomes a crucial aspect requiring explicit consideration because mandatory...
As of February 2012, approximately 46% of American adults own a smartphone. The graphics quality of these devices gets better each year. However, they still have many more limitations in graphics processing and storage space than desktop computers. This means that applications on these devices should focus on optimizing their...
Earthquake rupture scenarios are important tools for understanding the nature of plate movement and patterns in seismic activity. The creation and assessment of these rupture scenarios rely heavily on geologic reasoning and principles applied to earthquake event data. This reliance introduces a certain amount of subjectivity to the rupture scenario...
Blueberry stem galls in Pacific Northwest are often attributed to Agrobacterium tumefaciens. The disease also is associated with indole-3-acetic-acid (IAA) producing bacteria, as described on cranberry stem gall. Lack of studies makes it difficult to conclude whether these two types of bacteria could be the causal agent of stem gall...
Amyotrophic Lateral Sclerosis (ALS) is a relatively rare neurodegenerative disorder that is fatal 2-4 years after the onset of the disease. Population studies are being done in order to help reveal candidates for further studies of disease etiology, disease progression, as well as to further understand racial and ethnic variations....
Postpartum uterine inflammation (endometritis) is not uncommon in beef cattle, resulting in infertility and culling. Prolonged calving may contribute to the increased incidence of endometritis in heifers. Commonly used methods to treat endometritis in beef cattle include intrauterine antibiotics and/or hormone injections, which can result in meat residues. Platelet rich...
Variability in the depth and duration of anesthesia in individuals within a species is
frequently observed, yet few studies have investigated its causes in reptiles. To evaluate
the potential causes of variability in reptile anesthesia, I conducted experiments to test for
effects of body temperature, body composition and time post-feeding...
In the continuing effort to reduce time spent in the product development cycle many industries
have realized the benefits of rapid prototyping. Within a few hours a design engineer can turn a
computer model into an actual three-dimensional object allowing customers, engineers and
marketing agents to evaluate a product early...
Polycyclic aromatic hydrocarbons (PAHs) are a known class of chemicals that are linked to a multitude of adverse health outcomes. There are over 1,500 of these chemicals across various families and subgroups. 16 of these PAHs, known as parent PAHs, are identified by the EPA for focused risk assessment within...
A project to restore and increase the native riparian habitat on a 1½ acre site along Oak Creek will begin in spring 2013. In order to carry out long-term monitoring and evaluation of the efficacy of the restoration effort, it is necessary to know what is growing there now. To...
Dynamic bipedal locomotion is among the most difficult and yet relevant problems in modern robotics. While a multitude of classical control methods for bipedal locomotion exist, they are often brittle or limited in capability. In recent years, work in applying reinforcement learning to robotics has lead to superior performance across...
Particleboard is a commodity composite panel made from the residual materials of other wood products manufacturing companies. The industry operates on low profit margins and thus produces high volumes of differing panel grades. Slight inefficiencies over the course of a year can mean a significant loss in profit. Previous calculations...
Over the past decade, it has come to light that many published scientific findings cannot be reproduced. This has led to the replication crisis in science. Many researchers feel that they can no longer trust much of what they read in scientific journals, and the public is becoming ever more...
Offshore renewable energy, an untapped energy resource in the United States, has the potential to stimulate job creation and diversify the world’s energy portfolio. Transmission cables are used to transfer electrical power to the mainland. These cables carry a harmonic time-dependent current. This current in turn generates both an electric...
St. Augustine was an influential member of the early Christian Church, establishing many doctrines of the Christian faith. One of his most significant contributions to Christianity was a Christian philosophy of history. Augustine defined the purpose of history as God providing salvation to humanity after the fall of Adam. This...
This study explores the influence that the sustainability of hotels has on the choice of hotels. Because of recent concern about global warming and reducing energy consumption, many designers are planning sustainable buildings. But often attractiveness is sacrificed for the goal of making a building sustain in its environment. The...
Treatment of extrahepatic portosystemic shunts provides many options, including cellophane banding. These cellophane bands are secured with a ligation clip. Weck® offers two forms of these: the stainless steel Hemoclip, and the polymer Hem-o-lok. This in vitro study compares the mechanical strength of these two of types of clips by...
Epidemiological research on HIV/AIDS seeks to determine at-risk populations not reached by current care. In the forty years since the AIDS epidemic began, transgender people were only recently deemed “at-risk” by the CDC and more action was taken to study them. Most current research centers on transgender women, with transgender...
Interest in organizational culture has grown enormously over the last twenty years and much
effort has gone into investigating the relationship between organizational culture and
performance. Because most research to date has focused on large organizations, we chose to
investigate the culture in a community bank undergoing a cultural transformation....
This project focuses on building a test stand in order to measure novel scintillator
materials’ decay times. A proof of concept prototype confirms the manufacturer decay
time of EJ-204 and LYSO scintillators with good statistics and confirmation of results
after calibrations. With the prototype functional, the test stand is commissioned...
Although Latino students make up more than a quarter of the U.S. public school system, only three percent of children’s literature either features a Latino protagonist or is written by a Latino author (Machado et al.). Latinos are therefore severely underrepresented in children’s books. Additionally, studies have revealed that Latino...
This investigation examines The Jetsons’ vision of the future and tracks to what extent the content of the show is relevant to the modern era, both technologically and socially. Much of the dazzling technology in the show feels familiar, and most of it is either already available or is in...
Social discourse presents teenage childbearing as a “serious problem” that results in significant harm and expense to teenage mothers, their children, and society. Although the discourse of teenage childbearing has been multiple, overlapping, and contested, it has resulted in negative stereotyping and stigmatization of teenage mothers. Much of these stereotypes...
This thesis examines whether and how interest groups concerned with capital punishment change how they frame the issue when advocating before the Supreme Court via amicus curiae briefs over time. I measured the frequency of frames used throughout amicus briefs submitted in cases pertaining to how the death penalty could...
Old-growth dry-mixed conifer forests are valued as habitats for late seral forest species, for the
ecosystem services and landscape diversity they provide, and for their aesthetic appeal. The
structure of these forests has been heavily altered by historic logging of overstory ponderosa
pine and Douglas-fir. Additionally, changes in fire regime...
Mental health is a hot topic of concern for many college students, educators, and mental health professionals. Three-quarters of serious mental illnesses present in individuals before the age of 24 (American College Health Association, 2012). This age bracket also encompasses many college students, and the stressors and transitions associated with...
Starting in 2001, just five years after its formation, Fox News had the largest nightly cable television news audience and has become an important participant in American news media. Despite outside claims of Fox’s conservative-leaning news coverage, Fox News claims status as an objective news source presenting “fair and balanced”...
Empowering pedagogy (also know as “transgressive,” “emancipatory,” or “democratic” forms of education) seeks to challenge the historically oppressive tendencies of traditional education. As a student of Social Justice and International Studies, I approach the topic of empowering pedagogy through a case study. My research explored this non-traditional educational philosophy and...