Long-term, large-scale studies of meta-ecosystems provide critical information about how global change influences communities. In my dissertation, I analyzed data from studies encompassing 18 years (2006 – 2023) and over 1,000 km of coastline to investigate drivers of rocky intertidal community structure and dynamics. Specifically, I explored the roles of...
Student conduct has become increasingly significant in higher education as demands to address campus safety, student behaviors, and classroom management are increasingly prominent. Existing research focuses on the efficacy of student conduct policies and practices, but has not established how individuals understand student conduct as a myth, or a concept...
Machine learning applied to computer architecture has rapidly transitioned from a theoretical novelty to being a driving force behind design, control, and simulation in practically all components. These machine-learning-based methodologies are further notable for their scalability to increasingly complex design challenges, which has allowed these methodologies to surpass the prior...
The group of scientists that make up the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change found in 2007 that the warming of Earth’s climate is unequivocal and largely due to human activity. Earth’s climate has changed in the past, though the recent magnitude and pace of changes are unprecedented in human existence....
Uncertainties in general circulation model (GCM) representations of marine boundary layer (MBL) shallow cloud cover contribute substantially to the spread in model predictions of future climate. Further uncertainties in GCM output arise from an incomplete understanding of cloud-aerosol interactions. For example, the Fifth Assessment Report from the Intergovernmental Panel on...
Metal-oxo clusters can be described as soluble pieces of metal-oxide frameworks. Metal-oxo clusters are also the building blocks for the Metal-Organic Frameworks (MOFs) and coordination polymers. A better knowledge of metal-oxo clusters helps fundamentally understand geosciences, molecular engineering, catalysis, single-molecule magnetism, and MOFs for synthesis, design, and modification of these...
Most marine fishes experience high rates of mortality during their early life history stages with far reaching consequences for adult population dynamics. Within a few weeks of hatching, relatively small changes in larval growth and mortality rates can lead to orders of magnitude variability in year-class strength. Growth and survival...
Deeply weathered soils in tropical rainforests and savannas are classified as Ferralsols according to the World References Bases for Soil Resources (WRB). Ferralsols are most nearly akin to the Oxisols order defined in the US Soil Taxonomy. The acidity, low cation exchange capacity, and strong phosphorus retention by the oxidic...
The climate of the Pacific Northwest is in flux, and existing forest ecosystems are stressed and poised to shift in fundamental ways, with or without human intervention. This dissertation probes the nature of forest responses to environmental change through investigations of morphology and genetics of three species of alder co-occurring...
Developers frequently change the type of a program element and update all its references for performance, security, concurrency, library migration, or better maintainability. Despite type changes being a common program transformation, it is the least automated and the least studied. Manually performing type changes is tedious since the programmers have...