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- Title
- PROTESTANT'S GUIDE TO CATHOLIC "NUNSENSE"A PERFORMANCE STUDY AND ANALYSIS OF "SISTER MARY HUBERT".
- Creator
-
Endsley, Anita, Chicurel, Steven, University of Central Florida
- Abstract / Description
-
Anita Endsley will portray the role of Sister Mary Hubert in the musical Nunsense at Seaside Music Theatre in Daytona Beach, Florida from October 28 through November 14, 2005. This parody of convent life in crisis written by Dan Goggin provides a breadth of material for analysis of the genre as well as character analysis. Dissecting the comedy will be the foundation for characteer development. The popularity of this musical among Catholic and non-Catholic audiences have created a market that...
Show moreAnita Endsley will portray the role of Sister Mary Hubert in the musical Nunsense at Seaside Music Theatre in Daytona Beach, Florida from October 28 through November 14, 2005. This parody of convent life in crisis written by Dan Goggin provides a breadth of material for analysis of the genre as well as character analysis. Dissecting the comedy will be the foundation for characteer development. The popularity of this musical among Catholic and non-Catholic audiences have created a market that inspired the writer to extend this theme through five sequels. The commercial success of these musicals suggest a strong connection between the demands of the Catholic doctrine and the foundation for comic relief. A vast amount of research can be incorporated to assist in the analysis of comedy written into Nunsense.
Show less - Date Issued
- 2005
- Identifier
- CFE0000531, ucf:46420
- Format
- Document (PDF)
- PURL
- http://purl.flvc.org/ucf/fd/CFE0000531
- Title
- THE EFFECTS OF ADOPTION ON IDENTITY FORMATION: A QUALITATIVE ANALYSIS.
- Creator
-
Heath , Lisa, Berman , Steven, University of Central Florida
- Abstract / Description
-
While evidence suggests that adoptees do not differ from non-adoptees in their ability to achieve a stable sense of identity, much is still unknown about how specifically the fact of being adopted affects one's identity. The purpose of this research is to take a deeper look at the significance and meaning of being adopted to one's sense of identity through qualitative analyses of in depth interviews with adoptees. Participants were recruited from Psychology classes via the SONA system. The...
Show moreWhile evidence suggests that adoptees do not differ from non-adoptees in their ability to achieve a stable sense of identity, much is still unknown about how specifically the fact of being adopted affects one's identity. The purpose of this research is to take a deeper look at the significance and meaning of being adopted to one's sense of identity through qualitative analyses of in depth interviews with adoptees. Participants were recruited from Psychology classes via the SONA system. The participants (N = 16) took part in an in-depth structured interview and completed a survey battery which included a demographic questionnaire, the Ego Identity Process Questionnaire, the Identity Distress Survey, and the Brief Symptom Index-18. Interviews were transcribed, analyzed, and coded for emerging themes using thematic analysis. The themes and their effect on adopted individuals' identity is discussed with multiple case examples.
Show less - Date Issued
- 2012
- Identifier
- CFH0004298, ucf:44923
- Format
- Document (PDF)
- PURL
- http://purl.flvc.org/ucf/fd/CFH0004298
- Title
- THE DEVELOPMENT OF A "GENETIC EYEWITNESS" PROFILING SYSTEM FOR LOW TEMPLATE FORENSIC SPECIMENS: IDENTIFICATION OF NOVEL PROTEIN, RNA, DNA BIOMARKERS.
- Creator
-
Hanson, Erin, Ballantyne, Jack, University of Central Florida
- Abstract / Description
-
In many criminal investigations, valuable information regarding the physical appearance of suspected perpetrators or the time and order of events that transpired are provided by eyewitness accounts. However, the information obtained from eyewitnesses is often constrained by human recollection or subjective accounts and provides a biased description of the perpetrator's appearance or an inaccurate time line of events. Additionally, in numerous situations eyewitness accounts may not be...
Show moreIn many criminal investigations, valuable information regarding the physical appearance of suspected perpetrators or the time and order of events that transpired are provided by eyewitness accounts. However, the information obtained from eyewitnesses is often constrained by human recollection or subjective accounts and provides a biased description of the perpetrator's appearance or an inaccurate time line of events. Additionally, in numerous situations eyewitness accounts may not be available. An increasing reliance therefore is placed on the biological evidence recovered during criminal investigations to act as a silent witness, providing unbiased and scientific information that may aid in the resolution of criminal investigations. While the current capabilities of operational forensic crime laboratories include analytical methods to allow for a determination of the origin of a biological stain and for the recovery of a genetic profile of the donor, the sensitivity of such methods is not always sufficient to accommodate the limited amounts of biological material often recovered in forensic casework, Therefore, it is critical that continual advancements in the analysis of low template samples be made. In this report, we have sought to identify novel protein, RNA and DNA biomarkers that, in combination with enhanced profiling strategies, would allow for a determination of the time since deposition, the body fluid of origin and the genetic profile of the donor ("genetic eyewitness") of forensic low template specimens. First, we have developed a novel strategy for the determination of the time since deposition of dried bloodstains using spectrophotometric analysis of hemoglobin. An examination of the Soret band (lambda max = 414nm) in aged bloodstains has revealed a previously unidentified hypsochromic shift as the age of the stain increases. The extent of this shift permits a distinction to be made between stains that differ in age by only minutes, hours, days and months thus providing the highest resolution of any previously developed method. We also demonstrate that it may be possible to utilize a decline in enzyme activity to determine the age of a forensic biological stain. Second, we demonstrate that the differential expression of a panel of nine miRNAs allows for the identification of the body fluid origin of forensic biological stains using as little as 50pg of total RNA. This is the highest reported sensitivity of any RNA-based approach and this assay has demonstrated a high degree of specificity for each body fluid tested. The final task of this work was to identify novel DNA biomarkers and to develop enhanced profiling strategies to allow for greater sensitivity and reliability in the genetic profiling of low template samples. We demonstrate that the use of laser capture micro-dissection and enhanced amplification strategies resulted in the ability to obtain genetic profiles from as few as 2-5 epithelial cells and 5-10 sperm cells with greater reproducibility than previously reported studies. The use of a novel whole genome amplification method provided the ability to not only increase the quantity of genetic material obtained from micro-dissected cells but also the ability to recover additional genetic information from individual samples using novel DNA biomarkers. The novel biomarkers and profiling strategies described in this report provide the basis for the establishment of a molecular "genetic eyewitness" from low template forensic samples and demonstrate the future potential for routine and reliable analysis of trace amounts of genetic material recovered from low template biological evidence.
Show less - Date Issued
- 2008
- Identifier
- CFE0002373, ucf:47785
- Format
- Document (PDF)
- PURL
- http://purl.flvc.org/ucf/fd/CFE0002373
- Title
- Design and Structural Analysis of Morphing Wings.
- Creator
-
Fernandez, Nicholas, Bhattacharya, Samik, Kauffman, Jeffrey L., Orlovskaya, Nina, University of Central Florida
- Abstract / Description
-
Many natural flyers and marine swimmers can morph their wings during a number of unsteady maneuverings. With such wing morphing they are able to control the unsteady aerodynamic forces. A number of man-made flyers, such as unmanned aerial vehicles and micro air vehicles, fly in comparable Reynolds number range, but they are yet to acquire similar morphing capabilities as natural flyers or swimmers. Moreover, the knowledge of fluid structural interaction (FSI) of such morphing wings is not...
Show moreMany natural flyers and marine swimmers can morph their wings during a number of unsteady maneuverings. With such wing morphing they are able to control the unsteady aerodynamic forces. A number of man-made flyers, such as unmanned aerial vehicles and micro air vehicles, fly in comparable Reynolds number range, but they are yet to acquire similar morphing capabilities as natural flyers or swimmers. Moreover, the knowledge of fluid structural interaction (FSI) of such morphing wings is not well developed. Hence there is a need to investigate the FSI of morphing wings. In this thesis, a morphing wing was designed and its FSI was investigated. The wing was designed with the help of advanced 3D printing and the morphing capabilities utilized servo driven actuators. The design enabled the wing to execute spanwise bending, twisting and combined bending and twisting during a number of unsteady maneuverings. In the present work, the effect of gradual acceleration on the resultant unsteady forcing was investigated. FEA simulations were performed in order to gauge the response of the wing in different scenarios. A flat plate wing was towed in a 6-m-long towing tank and force data was collected using a 6-dof force sensor. With this method of morphing, future experiments can be performed for different unsteady cases. The analysis performed in this thesis will also be helpful in understanding more complex FSI problems applicable to morphing wings.
Show less - Date Issued
- 2019
- Identifier
- CFE0007802, ucf:52338
- Format
- Document (PDF)
- PURL
- http://purl.flvc.org/ucf/fd/CFE0007802
- Title
- TWITTER IMPLEMENTATION WITHIN MEGACHURCHES: AN EXAMINATION OF THE SOCIAL MEDIA'S EFFECTIVENESS.
- Creator
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Thompson, Andrea, Malala, John, Dodd, Melissa, Flammia, Madelyn, University of Central Florida
- Abstract / Description
-
This study identified what Twitter followers were discussing in reference to the top five megachurches in size. The methods utilized within this study involved an examination of all tweets hashtagging the top five megachurches over a sixteen day timeframe. The first research question was answered by categorizing tweets into predetermined content categories. This study also addressed the second research question by determining if Twitter implementation was beneficial in executing the missions...
Show moreThis study identified what Twitter followers were discussing in reference to the top five megachurches in size. The methods utilized within this study involved an examination of all tweets hashtagging the top five megachurches over a sixteen day timeframe. The first research question was answered by categorizing tweets into predetermined content categories. This study also addressed the second research question by determining if Twitter implementation was beneficial in executing the missions of the top five megachurches. This question was answered by analyzing tweets using a five point Likert scale measuring how reflective each tweet was to the mission statement of each of the Top five megachurches. Ultimately, this study revealed that hashtagged tweets did reflect topics that are beneficial to each individual church's growth, however, tweets hashtagging the top three megachurches did not reflect the mission statements of each church. Therefore, this study concluded that Twitter implementation is beneficial to church growth because followers discuss topics relevant to the success of the church, however, Twitter may not be the most suitable social media platform for megachurches in their attempts to
Show less - Date Issued
- 2014
- Identifier
- CFE0005427, ucf:50417
- Format
- Document (PDF)
- PURL
- http://purl.flvc.org/ucf/fd/CFE0005427
- Title
- Integral Representations of Positive Linear Functionals.
- Creator
-
Siple, Angela, Mikusinski, Piotr, Atanasiu, Dragu, Dutkay, Dorin, Han, Deguang, Lee, Junho, Brennan, Joseph, Huo, Qun, University of Central Florida
- Abstract / Description
-
In this dissertation we obtain integral representations for positive linear functionals on commutative algebras with involution and semigroups with involution. We prove Bochner and Plancherel type theorems for representations of positive functionals and show that, under some conditions, the Bochner and Plancherel representations are equivalent. We also consider the extension of positive linear functionals on a Banach algebra into a space of pseudoquotients and give under conditions in which...
Show moreIn this dissertation we obtain integral representations for positive linear functionals on commutative algebras with involution and semigroups with involution. We prove Bochner and Plancherel type theorems for representations of positive functionals and show that, under some conditions, the Bochner and Plancherel representations are equivalent. We also consider the extension of positive linear functionals on a Banach algebra into a space of pseudoquotients and give under conditions in which the space of pseudoquotients can be identified with all Radon measures on the structure space. In the final chapter we consider a system of integrated Cauchy functional equations on a semigroup, which generalizes a result of Ressel and offers a different approach to the proof.
Show less - Date Issued
- 2015
- Identifier
- CFE0005713, ucf:50144
- Format
- Document (PDF)
- PURL
- http://purl.flvc.org/ucf/fd/CFE0005713
- Title
- Tiling properties of spectra of measures.
- Creator
-
Haussermann, John, Dutkay, Dorin, Han, Deguang, Sun, Qiyu, Dogariu, Aristide, University of Central Florida
- Abstract / Description
-
We investigate tiling properties of spectra of measures, i.e., sets ? in R with an orthogonal basis in L2 with respect to some finite Borel measure on R. Such measures include Lebesgue measure on bounded Borel subsets, finite atomic measures and some fractal Hausdorff measures. We show that various classes of such spectra of measures have translational tiling properties. This lead to some surprising tiling properties for spectra of fractal measures, the existence of complementing sets and...
Show moreWe investigate tiling properties of spectra of measures, i.e., sets ? in R with an orthogonal basis in L2 with respect to some finite Borel measure on R. Such measures include Lebesgue measure on bounded Borel subsets, finite atomic measures and some fractal Hausdorff measures. We show that various classes of such spectra of measures have translational tiling properties. This lead to some surprising tiling properties for spectra of fractal measures, the existence of complementing sets and spectra for finite sets with the Coven-Meyerowitz property, the existence of complementing Hadamard pairs in the case ofHadamard pairs of size 2,3,4 or 5. In the context of the Fuglede conjecture, we prove that any spectral set is a tile, if the period of the spectrum is 2,3,4 or 5.
Show less - Date Issued
- 2014
- Identifier
- CFE0005182, ucf:50656
- Format
- Document (PDF)
- PURL
- http://purl.flvc.org/ucf/fd/CFE0005182
- Title
- CONTENT AND CITATION ANALYSIS OF INTERDISCIPLINARY HUMANITIES TEXTBOOKS WITHIN A FRAMEWORK OF CURRICULUM THEORY.
- Creator
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Guidera, Julie, Boote, David, University of Central Florida
- Abstract / Description
-
The purpose of this dissertation was to analyze the content of textbooks used in undergraduate survey courses in interdisciplinary humanities to understand the content of the curriculum and how an author's viewpoint shapes the product. By enumerating the texts and images authors and their publishers used to illustrate 20th century culture and the transition into the 21st century, the analysis generated a description of the range of perspectives from traditional to postmodern found in six...
Show moreThe purpose of this dissertation was to analyze the content of textbooks used in undergraduate survey courses in interdisciplinary humanities to understand the content of the curriculum and how an author's viewpoint shapes the product. By enumerating the texts and images authors and their publishers used to illustrate 20th century culture and the transition into the 21st century, the analysis generated a description of the range of perspectives from traditional to postmodern found in six sampled textbooks. Textbook content provided chronological data, while authors' source citations established identity properties of the works' contributors. Through a ranking system of authors' treatment of content and citations, the most traditional perspectives were compared to the most postmodern. Classifying cultural contributors by identity properties gave a quantitative rate of inclusion of traditionally excluded groups. A trend of increase in "diversity-infusion" was observed among all authors when the content of the textbooks was compared in chronological sequence. The qualitative differences, as constructed for this dissertation, indicate that each textbook constitutes a varied and unique representation of author perspective. The project's contribution to future research is the development of a database of art works and literary sources from the years 1900-2006 that can be used for quantification and for further study.
Show less - Date Issued
- 2009
- Identifier
- CFE0002851, ucf:48075
- Format
- Document (PDF)
- PURL
- http://purl.flvc.org/ucf/fd/CFE0002851
- Title
- Point Cloud Technology for Analysis of Existing Structures.
- Creator
-
Cano, Jacob, Catbas, Necati, Apostolakis, Georgios, Zaurin, Ricardo, Walters, Lori, University of Central Florida
- Abstract / Description
-
For this thesis, a study was completed on two different structures on the UCF Orlando campus through the use of both structural plans and point cloud technology. The results sought to understand the viability of point cloud technology as an accurate tool for the static and dynamic modal analysis of existing structures. For static analysis, a portion of the framing of Spectrum Stadium was rendered, modeled, analyzed and compared to a previous case study. The results emphasized how different...
Show moreFor this thesis, a study was completed on two different structures on the UCF Orlando campus through the use of both structural plans and point cloud technology. The results sought to understand the viability of point cloud technology as an accurate tool for the static and dynamic modal analysis of existing structures. For static analysis, a portion of the framing of Spectrum Stadium was rendered, modeled, analyzed and compared to a previous case study. The results emphasized how different users can render dissimilar member sizes and lengths due to human judgment on point cloud visuals. The study also found that structural plans cannot always be relied upon as the most accurate source for analysis as the new point cloud produced more accurate results than the structural plans when compared to the control model. For the pedestrian bridge, the structure was scanned, rendered and modeled for both static and dynamic modal analysis. The point cloud produced from scanning the bridge was modified twice in order to have three distinct point clouds with varying densities: fine, medium and coarse. These three cases were compared to structural plans in a static analysis. The fine point cloud produced the most accurate displacement results with an accuracy above 96%. The data sources were also compared to experimental data under dynamic modal analysis to discover how lessening the density of point clouds affect the accuracy of results. The analysis showed that point cloud technology can give you an accuracy of 88% and above for frequency while also producing MAC values exceeding 0.9 consistently. Also, changes in density were found to change the accuracy of results but the numeric values stayed within close proximity by not differing more than 10%. This thesis shines a light on the accuracy point cloud technology can ascertain and the potential it has within engineering.
Show less - Date Issued
- 2019
- Identifier
- CFE0007438, ucf:52724
- Format
- Document (PDF)
- PURL
- http://purl.flvc.org/ucf/fd/CFE0007438
- Title
- Methods to Calculate Cut Volumes for Fault Trees with Dependencies Induced by Spatial Locations.
- Creator
-
Hanes, Phillip, Wiegand, Rudolf, Wu, Annie, DeMara, Ronald, Song, Zixia, University of Central Florida
- Abstract / Description
-
Fault tree analysis (FTA) is used to find and mitigate vulnerabilities in systems based on their constituent components. Methods exist to efficiently find minimal cut sets (MCS), which are combinations of components whose failure causes the overall system to fail. However, traditional FTA ignores the physical location of the components. Components in close proximity to each other could be defeated by a single event with a radius of effect, such as an explosion or fire. Events such as the...
Show moreFault tree analysis (FTA) is used to find and mitigate vulnerabilities in systems based on their constituent components. Methods exist to efficiently find minimal cut sets (MCS), which are combinations of components whose failure causes the overall system to fail. However, traditional FTA ignores the physical location of the components. Components in close proximity to each other could be defeated by a single event with a radius of effect, such as an explosion or fire. Events such as the Deepwater Horizon explosion and subsequent oil spill demonstrate the potentially devastating risk posed by such spatial dependencies. This motivates the search for techniques to identify this type of vulnerability. Adding physical locations to the fault tree structure can help identify possible points of failure in the overall system caused by localized disasters. Since existing FTA methods cannot address these concerns, using this information requires extending existing solution methods or developing entirely new ones.A problem complicating research in FTA is the lack of benchmark problems for evaluating methods, especially for fault trees over one hundred components. This research presents a method of using Lindenmeyer systems (L-systems) to generate fault trees that are reproducible, capable of producing fault trees with similar properties to real-world designs, and scalable while maintaining predictable structural properties. This approach will be useful for testing and analyzing different methodologies for FTA tasks at different scales and under different conditions.Using a set of benchmark fault trees derived from L-systems, three approaches to finding these vulnerabilities were explored in this research. These approaches were compared by defining a metric called (")minimal cut volumes(") (MCV) for describing volumes of effect that defeat the system. Since no existing methods are known for solving this problem, the methods are compared to each other to evaluate performance.1) The control method executes traditional FTA software to find minimal cut sets (MCS), then extends this approach by searching for clusters in the resulting MCS to find MCV.2) The next method starts by searching for clusters of components in the three dimensional space, then evaluates combinations of clusters to find MCV that defeat the system.3) The last method uses an evolutionary algorithm to search the space directly by selecting center points, then using the radius of the smallest sphere(s) as the fitness value for identifying MCV.Results generated using each method are presented. The performance of the methods are compared to the control method and their utilities evaluated accordingly.
Show less - Date Issued
- 2018
- Identifier
- CFE0007403, ucf:52075
- Format
- Document (PDF)
- PURL
- http://purl.flvc.org/ucf/fd/CFE0007403
- Title
- Macroscopic Crash Analysis and Its Implications for Transportation Safety Planning.
- Creator
-
Siddiqui, Chowdhury, Abdel-Aty, Mohamed, Abdel-Aty, Mohamed, Uddin, Nizam, Huang, Helai, University of Central Florida
- Abstract / Description
-
Incorporating safety into the transportation planning stage, which is often termed as transportation safety planning (TSP), relies on the vital interplay between zone characteristics and zonal traffic crashes. Although a few safety studies had made some effort towards integrating safety and planning, several unresolved problems and a complete framework of TSP are still absent in the literature. This research aims at examining the suitability of the current traffic-related zoning planning...
Show moreIncorporating safety into the transportation planning stage, which is often termed as transportation safety planning (TSP), relies on the vital interplay between zone characteristics and zonal traffic crashes. Although a few safety studies had made some effort towards integrating safety and planning, several unresolved problems and a complete framework of TSP are still absent in the literature. This research aims at examining the suitability of the current traffic-related zoning planning process in a new suggested planning method which incorporates safety measures. In order to accomplish this broader research goal, the study defined its research objectives in the following directions towards establishing a framework of TSP- i) exploring the existing key determinants in traditional transportation planning (e.g., trip generation/distribution data, land use types, demographics, etc.) in order to develop an effective and efficient TSP framework, ii) investigation of the Modifiable Aerial Unit Problem (MAUP) in the context of macro-level crash modeling to investigate the effect of the zone's size and boundary, iii) understanding neighborhood influence of the crashes at or near zonal boundaries, and iv) development of crash-specific safety measure in the four-step transportation planning process.This research was conducted using spatial data from the counties of West Central Florida. Analysis of different crash data per spatial unit was performed using nonparametric approaches (e.g., data mining and random forest), classical statistical methods (e.g., negative binomial models), and Bayesian statistical techniques. In addition, a comprehensive Geographic Information System (GIS) based application tools were utilized for spatial data analysis and representation.Exploring the significant variables related to specific types of crashes is vital in the planning stages of a transportation network. This study identified and examined important variables associated with total crashes and severe crashes per traffic analysis zone (TAZ) by applying nonparametric statistical techniques using different trip related variables and road-traffic related factors. Since a macro-level analysis, by definition, will necessarily involve aggregating crashes per spatial unit, a spatial dependence or autocorrelation may arise if a particular variable of a geographic region is affected by the same variable of the neighboring regions. So far, few safety studies were performed to examine crashes at TAZs and none of them explicitly considered spatial effect of crashes occurring in them. In order to understand the clear picture of spatial autocorrelation of crashes, this study investigated the effect of spatial autocorrelation in modeling pedestrian and bicycle crashes in TAZs. Additionally, this study examined pedestrian crashes at Environmental Justice (EJ) TAZs which were identified in compliance with the various ongoing practices undertaken by Metropolitan Planning Organizations (MPOs) and previous research. Minority population and the low-income group are two important criteria based on which EJ areas are being identified. These unique areal characteristics have been of particular interest to the traffic safety analysts in order to investigate the contributing factors of pedestrian crashes in these deprived areas. Pedestrian and bicycle crashes were estimated as a function of variables related to roadway characteristics, and various demographic and socio-economic factors. It was found that significant differences are present between the predictor sets for pedestrian and bicycle crashes. In all cases the models with spatial correlation performed better than the models that did not account for spatial correlation among TAZs. This finding implied that spatial correlation should be considered while modeling pedestrian and bicycle crashes at the aggregate or macro-level. Also, the significance of spatial autocorrelation was later found in the total and severe crash analyses and accounted for in their respective modeling techniques.Since the study found affirmative evidence about the inclusion of spatial autocorrelation in the safety performance functions, this research considered identifying appropriate spatial entity based on which TSP framework would be developed. A wide array of spatial units has been explored in macro-level crash modeling in previous safety research. With the advancement of GIS, safety analysts are able to analyze crashes for various geographical units. However, a clear guideline on which geographic entity should a modeler choose is not present so far. This preference of spatial unit can vary with the dependent variable of the model. Or, for a specific dependent variable, models may be invariant to multiple spatial units by producing a similar goodness-of-fits. This problem is closely related to the Modifiable Areal Unit Problem which is a common issue in spatial data analysis. The study investigated three different crash (total, severe, and pedestrian) models developed for TAZs, block groups (BGs) and census tracts (CTs) using various roadway characteristics and census variables (e.g., land use, socio-economic, etc.); and compared them based on multiple goodness-of-fit measures.Based on MAD and MSPE it was evident that the total, severe and pedestrian crash models for TAZs and BGs had similar fits, and better than the ones developed for CTs. This indicated that the total, severe and pedestrian crash models are being affected by the size of the spatial units rather than their zoning configurations. So far, TAZs have been the base spatial units of analyses for developing travel demand models. Metropolitan planning organizations widely use TAZs in developing their long range transportation plans (LRTPs). Therefore, considering the practical application it was concluded that as a geographical unit, TAZs had a relative ascendancy over block group and census tract.Once TAZs were selected as the base spatial unit of the TSP framework, careful inspections on the TAZ delineations were performed. Traffic analysis zones are often delineated by the existing street network. This may result in considerable number of crashes on or near zonal boundaries. While the traditional macro-level crash modeling approach assigns zonal attributes to all crashes that occur within the zonal boundary, this research acknowledged the inaccuracy resulting from relating crashes on or near the boundary of the zone to merely the attributes of that zone. A novel approach was proposed to account for the spatial influence of the neighboring zones on crashes which specifically occur on or near the zonal boundaries. Predictive model for pedestrian crashes per zone were developed using a hierarchical Bayesian framework and utilized separate predictor sets for boundary and interior (non-boundary) crashes. It was found that these models (that account for boundary and interior crashes separately) had better goodness-of-fit measures compared to the models which had no specific consideration for crashes located at/near the zone boundaries. Additionally, the models were able to capture some unique predictors associated explicitly with interior and boundary-related crashes. For example, the variables- 'total roadway length with 35mph posted speed limit' and 'long term parking cost' were statistically not significantly different from zero in the interior crash model but they were significantly different from zero at the 95% level in the boundary crash model.Although an adjacent traffic analysis zones (a single layer) were defined for pedestrian crashes and boundary pedestrian crashes were modeled based on the characteristic factors of these adjacent zones, this was not considered reasonable for bicycle-related crashes as the average roaming area of bicyclists are usually greater than that of pedestrians. For smaller TAZs sometimes it is possible for a bicyclist to cross the entire TAZ. To account for this greater area of coverage, boundary bicycle crashes were modeled based on two layers of adjacent zones. As observed from the goodness-of-fit measures, performances of model considering single layer variables and model considering two layer variables were superior from the models that did not consider layering at all; but these models were comparable. Motor vehicle crashes (total and severe crashes) were classified as 'on-system' and 'off-system' crashes and two sub-models were fitted in order to calibrate the safety performance function for these crashes. On-system and off-system roads refer to two different roadway hierarchies. On-system or state maintained roads typically possess higher speed limit and carries traffic from distant TAZs. Off-system roads are, however, mostly local roads with relatively low speed limits. Due to these distinct characteristics, on-system crashes were modeled with only population and total employment variables of a zone in addition to the roadway and traffic variables; and all other zonal variables were disregarded. For off-system crashes, on contrary, all zonal variables was considered. It was evident by comparing this on- and off-system sub-model-framework to the other candidate models that it provided superior goodness-of-fit for both total and severe crashes.Based on the safety performance functions developed for pedestrian, bicycle, total and severe crashes, the study proposed a novel and complete framework for assessing safety (of these crash types) simultaneously in parallel with the four-step transportation planning process with no need of any additional data requirements from the practitioners' side.
Show less - Date Issued
- 2012
- Identifier
- CFE0004191, ucf:49009
- Format
- Document (PDF)
- PURL
- http://purl.flvc.org/ucf/fd/CFE0004191
- Title
- Wrong-Way Driving: A Regional Approach To A Regional Problem.
- Creator
-
Faruk, Md. Omar, Al-Deek, Haitham, Uddin, Nizam, Hasan, Samiul, University of Central Florida
- Abstract / Description
-
Wrong-way driving (WWD) has been problematic on United States highways for decades despite its rare occurrence. Since WWD crashes are rare, recent researchers have studied WWD non-crash events such as WWD 911 calls and WWD citations to understand the overall nature and trend of WWD. This paper demonstrates the regional nature of the WWD problem and proposes regional transportation systems management and operations (Regional TSM(&)O) solutions to combat this problem. Specifically, it was found...
Show moreWrong-way driving (WWD) has been problematic on United States highways for decades despite its rare occurrence. Since WWD crashes are rare, recent researchers have studied WWD non-crash events such as WWD 911 calls and WWD citations to understand the overall nature and trend of WWD. This paper demonstrates the regional nature of the WWD problem and proposes regional transportation systems management and operations (Regional TSM(&)O) solutions to combat this problem. Specifically, it was found that 11% of all WWD multi-data events (e.g., multiple 911 calls for the same WWD event) traveled from one county to another. Additionally, 30% of all WWD single-data and multi-data events occurred at or near interchanges between two limited access highways in counties with multiple operating agencies. This indicates that a significant proportion of WWD events could potentially travel from one limited access facility to another. Moreover, 28% of WWD events occurred on limited access facilities shared by multiple agencies. To emphasize the regional nature of WWD, this paper determined the vulnerable demographic groups in different regions of Florida by developing WWD crash and citation prediction models. The models' findings indicate that certain demographic groups (such as elderly or Hispanic) increase WWD risk. The models' results can be used to improve driver education and increase law enforcement presence in high risk WWD locations. Regional TSM(&)O solutions, such as coordination and communication among agencies and regional traffic management centers (RTMCs), law enforcement co-location with RTMCs, and strengthening statewide TSM(&)O programs to manage WWD events are also proposed.
Show less - Date Issued
- 2017
- Identifier
- CFE0006874, ucf:51736
- Format
- Document (PDF)
- PURL
- http://purl.flvc.org/ucf/fd/CFE0006874
- Title
- Non-Destructive Analysis of Trace Textile Fiber Evidence via Room-Temperature Fluorescence Spectrocopy.
- Creator
-
Appalaneni, Krishnaveni, Campiglia, Andres, Belfield, Kevin, Sigman, Michael, Yestrebsky, Cherie, Schulte, Alfons, University of Central Florida
- Abstract / Description
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Forensic fiber evidence plays an important role in many criminal investigations. Non-destructive techniques that preserve the physical integrity of the fibers for further court examination are highly valuable in forensic science. Non-destructive techniques that can either discriminate between similar fibers or match a known to a questioned fiber - and still preserve the physical integrity of the fibers for further court examination - are highly valuable in forensic science. When fibers cannot...
Show moreForensic fiber evidence plays an important role in many criminal investigations. Non-destructive techniques that preserve the physical integrity of the fibers for further court examination are highly valuable in forensic science. Non-destructive techniques that can either discriminate between similar fibers or match a known to a questioned fiber - and still preserve the physical integrity of the fibers for further court examination - are highly valuable in forensic science. When fibers cannot be discriminated by non-destructive tests, the next reasonable step is to extract the questioned and known fibers for dye analysis with a more selective technique such as high-performance liquid chromatography (HPLC) and/or gas chromatography-mass spectrometry (GC-MS). The common denominator among chromatographic techniques is to primarily focus on the dyes used to color the fibers and do not investigate other potential discriminating components present on the fiber. Differentiating among commercial dyes with very similar chromatographic behaviors and almost identical absorption spectra and/or fragmentation patterns is a challenging task.This dissertation explores a different aspect of fiber analysis as it focuses on the total fluorescence emission of fibers. In addition to the contribution of the textile dye (or dyes) to the fluorescence spectrum of the fiber, we investigate the contribution of intrinsic fluorescence impurities (-) i.e. impurities imbedded into the fibers during fabrication of garments - as a reproducible source of fiber comparison. Differentiation of visually indistinguishable fibers is achieved by comparing excitation-emission matrices (EEMs) recorded from single textile fibers with the aid of a commercial spectrofluorimeter coupled to an epi-fluorescence microscope. Statistical data comparison was carried out via principal component analysis. An application of this statistical approach is demonstrated using challenging dyes with similarities both in two-dimensional absorbance spectra and in three dimensional EEM data. High accuracy of fiber identification was observed in all the cases and no false positive identifications were observed at 99% confidence levels.
Show less - Date Issued
- 2013
- Identifier
- CFE0004808, ucf:49740
- Format
- Document (PDF)
- PURL
- http://purl.flvc.org/ucf/fd/CFE0004808
- Title
- PERFORMANCE ANALYSIS OF LOW-POWER, SHORT-RANGE WIRELESS TRANSCEIVERS.
- Creator
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NEUPANE, USHA, Richie, Samuel, University of Central Florida
- Abstract / Description
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To address the various emerging standards like BluetoothTM, Home RF, Wi-fiTM (IEEE 802.11), ZigBeeTM etc., in the field of wireless communications, different transceivers have been designed to operate at various frequencies such as 450 MHz, 902-920 MHz, 2.4 GHz, all part of designated ISM band. Though, the wireless systems have become more reliable, compact and easy to develop than before, a detailed performance analysis and characterization of the devices should be done. This report details...
Show moreTo address the various emerging standards like BluetoothTM, Home RF, Wi-fiTM (IEEE 802.11), ZigBeeTM etc., in the field of wireless communications, different transceivers have been designed to operate at various frequencies such as 450 MHz, 902-920 MHz, 2.4 GHz, all part of designated ISM band. Though, the wireless systems have become more reliable, compact and easy to develop than before, a detailed performance analysis and characterization of the devices should be done. This report details the performance analysis and characterization of a popular binary FSK transceiver TRF6901 from Texas Instruments. The performance analysis of the device is done with respect to the TRF/MSP430 demonstration and development kit.
Show less - Date Issued
- 2004
- Identifier
- CFE0000319, ucf:46284
- Format
- Document (PDF)
- PURL
- http://purl.flvc.org/ucf/fd/CFE0000319
- Title
- AN EXPLORATORY FACTOR ANALYSIS OF SELF-REPORTED STATE AND TRAIT GUILT.
- Creator
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Lacerenza, Christina, Cassisi, Jeffrey, University of Central Florida
- Abstract / Description
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The construct of guilt has been a subject of debate among philosophers, theologians, sociologists and psychologists for centuries. Disagreements concerning guilt have emerged on the definitional level, measurement level, and conceptual level due to the various ways guilt can be experienced and interpreted. Researchers continue to empirically investigate various aspects of guilt in an effort to advance and refine our understanding of the construct; however, differences among researchers in...
Show moreThe construct of guilt has been a subject of debate among philosophers, theologians, sociologists and psychologists for centuries. Disagreements concerning guilt have emerged on the definitional level, measurement level, and conceptual level due to the various ways guilt can be experienced and interpreted. Researchers continue to empirically investigate various aspects of guilt in an effort to advance and refine our understanding of the construct; however, differences among researchers in assessing the impact of guilt on psychological well-being still exist. The purpose of this study is to investigate the internal factor structure of three prominent measures of guilt. This will enable us to develop a more concise guilt measure en route to reconciling these differences and better conceptualizing the construct.
Show less - Date Issued
- 2012
- Identifier
- CFH0004163, ucf:44815
- Format
- Document (PDF)
- PURL
- http://purl.flvc.org/ucf/fd/CFH0004163
- Title
- The effects of enzymes on activated sludge floc.
- Creator
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Stoddart, Terry Lee, null, null, Natural Sciences
- Abstract / Description
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Florida Technological University College of Natural Sciences Thesis; Dialysed activated sludge was used as a substrate to test for enzymes which can hydrolyse activated sludge floc. Two hundred and fifty aerobic and anaerobic microorganisms were tested against activated sludge for the presence of hydrolytic enzymes. These included known genera and organisms obtained by various enrichment procedures. Anaerobic digester mixed liquor was contacted with activated sludge agar under anaerobic...
Show moreFlorida Technological University College of Natural Sciences Thesis; Dialysed activated sludge was used as a substrate to test for enzymes which can hydrolyse activated sludge floc. Two hundred and fifty aerobic and anaerobic microorganisms were tested against activated sludge for the presence of hydrolytic enzymes. These included known genera and organisms obtained by various enrichment procedures. Anaerobic digester mixed liquor was contacted with activated sludge agar under anaerobic conditions. None of the microorganisms present in the digester liquor hydrolysed the floc. The following commercial enzymes were contacted with activated sludge singly, in combination, and sequentially under various physical and chemical conditions: protease, lipase, cellulase, pectinase, phospholipase C, trypsin, and glucuronidase. Although commercial enzymes and various microorganisms reacted with known substrate controls neither the enzymes nor microorganisms employed affected the activated sludge floc. Treatment of activated sludge floc with ethylenediaminetetraacetic acid resulted in gross deflocculation and release of humic substances. The floc particle, probably a combination of polymers bound in a complex manner, is resistant to enzymatic degradation. Several workers have reported on the enzymatic hydrolysis of polymers produced by axenic cultures isolated from activated sludge floc. It is unlikely that the results of their work can be extrapolated to the complex structure of activated sludge floc particles.
Show less - Date Issued
- 1977
- Identifier
- CFR0003513, ucf:53004
- Format
- Document (PDF)
- PURL
- http://purl.flvc.org/ucf/fd/CFR0003513
- Title
- Multidimensional Room-Temperature Fluorescence Microscopy for the Nondestructive Analysis of Forensic Trace Textile Fibers.
- Creator
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Mujumdar, Nirvani, Campiglia, Andres, Sigman, Michael, Harper, James, Rex, Matthew, Peale, Robert, University of Central Florida
- Abstract / Description
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The purpose of this dissertation is to advance nondestructive methodology for forensic fiber examination. Non-destructive techniques that can either discriminate between similar fibers or match a known to a questioned fiber (-) and still preserve the physical integrity of the fibers for further court examination - are highly valuable in forensic science. A challenging aspect of forensic fiber examinations involves the comparison of fibers colored with visually indistinguishable dyestuffs....
Show moreThe purpose of this dissertation is to advance nondestructive methodology for forensic fiber examination. Non-destructive techniques that can either discriminate between similar fibers or match a known to a questioned fiber (-) and still preserve the physical integrity of the fibers for further court examination - are highly valuable in forensic science. A challenging aspect of forensic fiber examinations involves the comparison of fibers colored with visually indistinguishable dyestuffs. This is not an uncommon situation, as there are numerous indistinguishable fibers pre-dyed with commercial dyes of virtually identical colors. Minimal chemical structural variations are actually encouraged by the dye patent process and commercial competition.The common denominator to forensic methodology is the fact that fiber analysis primarily focuses on the dyes used to color the fibers and do not investigate other potential discriminating components present in the fiber. This dissertation explores a different aspect of fiber analysis as it focuses on the total fluorescence emission of fibers. In addition to the contribution of the textile dye (or dyes) to the fluorescence spectrum of the fiber, we consider the contribution of intrinsic fluorescence impurities (-) i.e. impurities imbedded into the fibers during fabrication of garments - as a reproducible source of fiber comparison. Although fluorescence microscopy is used in forensic labs for single fiber examination, measurements are made with the aid of band-pass filters that provide very limited information on the spectral profiles of fibers. We take the non-destructive nature of fluorescence microscopy to a higher level of selectivity with the collection of room-temperature fluorescence excitation emission matrices (RTF-EEMs). The information contained in the EEMs was first used to select the best excitation wavelength for recording first order data, i.e. two-dimensional fluorescence spectra. Pairwise comparisons involved the following visually indistinguishable fibers: nylon 361 pre-dyed with acid yellow (AY) 17 and AY 23, acrylic 864 pre-dyed with basic green (BG) 1 and BG 4, acetate satin 105B pre-dyed with disperse blue (DB) 3 and DB 14, and polyester 777 pre-dyed with disperse red (DR) 1 and DR 19. With the exception of acrylic 864 fibers dyed with BG1 and BG4, the comparison of two-dimensional spectra via principal component analysis (PCA) provided accurate fiber identification for all the analyzed fibers. The same approach was later applied to the investigation of laundering effects on the comparison of textile fibers. The presence of brighteners and other detergent components adsorbed in the fibers provided spectral fingerprints that enhanced the fiber identification process.The full dimensionality of EEMs was then explored with the aid of parallel factor analysis (PARAFAC), a second order algorithm capable to determine the number of fluorescence components that contribute to an EEM along with their individual excitation and emission profiles. The application of PARAFAC was carried out unsupervised and supervised by linear discrimination analysis (LDA). The classification performances of PARAFAC and LDA-supervised PARAFAC were compared to the one obtained with supervised discriminant unfolded partial least squares (DU-PLS). The best discrimination was obtained with the supervised DU-PLS, which allowed the pairwise differentiation of the four pairs of investigated fibers.DU-PLS was then used to investigate weathering effects on the spectral features of cotton 400 pre-dyed with DB1, nylon 361 pre-dyed with AY17 and acrylic 864 pre-dyed with BG4. The investigated fibers were exposed to humid (Florida) and dry (Arizona) weathering conditions for three, six, nine and twelve months. In all cases, this algorithm was unable to differentiate non-exposed acrylic fibers from exposed acrylic fibers. DU-PLS was able to differentiate non-exposed cotton and nylon fibers from exposed fibers to Florida and Arizona weathering conditions. It was possible to determine the period of exposure to either Florida or Arizona conditions. It was also possible to discriminate between fibers exposed to Florida or Arizona weathering conditions for the same period of time. These results provide the foundation for future studies towards a non-destructive approach capable to provide information on the history of the fiber.
Show less - Date Issued
- 2016
- Identifier
- CFE0006838, ucf:51773
- Format
- Document (PDF)
- PURL
- http://purl.flvc.org/ucf/fd/CFE0006838
- Title
- Integrating the macroscopic and microscopic traffic safety analysis using hierarchical models.
- Creator
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Cai, Qing, Abdel-Aty, Mohamed, Eluru, Naveen, Hasan, Samiul, Lee, JaeYoung, Yan, Xin, University of Central Florida
- Abstract / Description
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Crash frequency analysis is a crucial tool to investigate traffic safety problems. With the objective of revealing hazardous factors which would affect crash occurrence, crash frequency analysis has been undertaken at the macroscopic and microscopic levels. At the macroscopic level, crashes from a spatial aggregation (such as traffic analysis zone or county) are considered to quantify the impacts of socioeconomic and demographic characteristics, transportation demand and network attributes so...
Show moreCrash frequency analysis is a crucial tool to investigate traffic safety problems. With the objective of revealing hazardous factors which would affect crash occurrence, crash frequency analysis has been undertaken at the macroscopic and microscopic levels. At the macroscopic level, crashes from a spatial aggregation (such as traffic analysis zone or county) are considered to quantify the impacts of socioeconomic and demographic characteristics, transportation demand and network attributes so as to provide countermeasures from a planning perspective. On the other hand, the microscopic crashes on a segment or intersection are analyzed to identify the influence of geometric design, lighting and traffic flow characteristics with the objective of offering engineering solutions (such as installing sidewalk and bike lane, adding lighting). Although numerous traffic safety studies have been conducted, still there are critical limitations at both levels. In this dissertation, several methodologies have been proposed to alleviate several limitations in the macro- and micro-level safety research. Then, an innovative method has been suggested to analyze crashes at the two levels, simultaneously. At the macro-level, the viability of dual-state models (i.e., zero-inflated and hurdle models) were explored for traffic analysis zone based pedestrian and bicycle crash analysis. Additionally, spatial spillover effects were explored in the models by employing exogenous variables from neighboring zones. Both conventional single-state model (i.e., negative binomial) and dual-state models such as zero-inflated negative binomial and hurdle negative binomial models with and without spatial effects were developed. The model comparison results for pedestrian and bicycle crashes revealed that the models that considered observed spatial effects perform better than the models that did not consider the observed spatial effects. Across the models with spatial spillover effects, the dual-state models especially zero-inflated negative binomial model offered better performance compared to single-state models. Moreover, the model results clearly highlighted the importance of various traffic, roadway, and sociodemographic characteristics of the TAZ as well as neighboring TAZs on pedestrian and bicycle crash frequency. Then, the modifiable areal unit problem for macro-level crash analysis was discussed. Macro-level traffic safety analysis has been undertaken at different spatial configurations. However, clear guidelines for the appropriate zonal system selection for safety analysis are unavailable. In this study, a comparative analysis was conducted to determine the optimal zonal system for macroscopic crash modeling considering census tracts (CTs), traffic analysis zones (TAZs), and a newly developed traffic-related zone system labeled traffic analysis districts (TADs). Poisson lognormal models for three crash types (i.e., total, severe, and non-motorized mode crashes) were developed based on the three zonal systems without and with consideration of spatial autocorrelation. The study proposed a method to compare the modeling performance of the three types of geographic units at different spatial configuration through a grid based framework. Specifically, the study region was partitioned to grids of various sizes and the model prediction accuracy of the various macro models was considered within these grids of various sizes. These model comparison results for all crash types indicated that the models based on TADs consistently offer a better performance compared to the others. Besides, the models considering spatial autocorrelation outperformed the ones that do not consider it. Finally, based on the modeling results, it is recommended to adopt TADs for transportation safety planning.After determining the optimal traffic safety analysis zonal system, further analysis was conducted for non-motorist crashes (pedestrian and bicycle crashes). This study contributed to the literature on pedestrian and bicyclist safety by building on the conventional count regression models to explore exogenous factors affecting pedestrian and bicyclist crashes at the macroscopic level. In the traditional count models, effects of exogenous factors on non-motorist crashes were investigated directly. However, the vulnerable road users' crashes are collisions between vehicles and non-motorists. Thus, the exogenous factors can affect the non-motorist crashes through the non-motorists and vehicle drivers. To accommodate for the potentially different impact of exogenous factors we converted the non-motorist crash counts as the product of total crash counts and proportion of non-motorist crashes and formulated a joint model of the negative binomial (NB) model and the logit model to deal with the two parts, respectively. The formulated joint model was estimated using non-motorist crash data based on the Traffic Analysis Districts (TADs) in Florida. Meanwhile, the traditional NB model was also estimated and compared with the joint model. The results indicated that the joint model provides better data fit and could identify more significant variables. Subsequently, a novel joint screening method was suggested based on the proposed model to identify hot zones for non-motorist crashes. The hot zones of non-motorist crashes were identified and divided into three types: hot zones with more dangerous driving environment only, hot zones with more hazardous walking and cycling conditions only, and hot zones with both. At the microscopic level, crash modeling analysis was conducted for road facilities. This study, first, explored the potential macro-level effects which are always excluded or omitted in the previous studies. A Bayesian hierarchical model was proposed to analyze crashes on segments and intersection incorporating the macro-level data, which included both explanatory variables and total crashes of all segments and intersections. Besides, a joint modeling structure was adopted to consider the potentially spatial autocorrelation between segments and their connected intersections. The proposed model was compared with three other models: a model considering micro-level factors only, one hierarchical model considering macro-level effects with random terms only, and one hierarchical model considering macro-level effects with explanatory variables. The results indicated that models considering macro-level effects outperformed the model having micro-level factors only, which supports the idea to consider macro-level effects for micro-level crash analysis. Besides, the micro-level models were even further enhanced by the proposed model. Finally, significant spatial correlation could be found between segments and their adjacent intersections, supporting the employment of the joint modeling structure to analyze crashes at various types of road facilities. In addition to the separated analysis at either the macro- or micro-level, an integrated approach has been proposed to examine traffic safety problems at the two levels, simultaneously. If conducted in the same study area, the macro- and micro-level crash analyses should investigate the same crashes but aggregating the crashes at different levels. Hence, the crash counts at the two levels should be correlated and integrating macro- and micro-level crash frequency analyses in one modeling structure might have the ability to better explain crash occurrence by realizing the effects of both macro- and micro-level factors. This study proposed a Bayesian integrated spatial crash frequency model, which linked the crash counts of macro- and micro-levels based on the spatial interaction. In addition, the proposed model considered the spatial autocorrelation of different types of road facilities (i.e., segments and intersections) at the micro-level with a joint modeling structure. Two independent non-integrated models for macro- and micro-levels were also estimated separately and compared with the integrated model. The results indicated that the integrated model can provide better model performance for estimating macro- and micro-level crash counts, which validates the concept of integrating the models for the two levels. Also, the integrated model provides more valuable insights about the crash occurrence at the two levels by revealing both macro- and micro-level factors. Subsequently, a novel hotspot identification method was suggested, which enables us to detect hotspots for both macro- and micro-levels with comprehensive information from the two levels. It is expected that the proposed integrated model and hotspot identification method can help practitioners implement more reasonable transportation safety plans and more effective engineering treatments to proactively enhance safety.
Show less - Date Issued
- 2017
- Identifier
- CFE0006724, ucf:51891
- Format
- Document (PDF)
- PURL
- http://purl.flvc.org/ucf/fd/CFE0006724
- Title
- A meta-analytic approach to examining psychosocial correlates of risk in HIV-diagnosed and HIV-nondiagnosed men who have sex with men.
- Creator
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Lacefield, Katharine, Negy, Charles, Beidel, Deborah, Dunn, Stacey, University of Central Florida
- Abstract / Description
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Human Immunodeficiency Virus (HIV) continues to disproportionately affect men who have sex with men (MSM). Gay, bisexual, and other MSM are estimated to account for two percent of the population, yet they constitute more than half of all individuals living with HIV in the United States (Centers for Disease Control [CDC], 2010). Collectively, both HIV-diagnosed (HIV-D) and HIV-nondiagnosed (HIV-ND) MSM report a variety of reasons for intentional and unintentional nonuse of condoms. Depending...
Show moreHuman Immunodeficiency Virus (HIV) continues to disproportionately affect men who have sex with men (MSM). Gay, bisexual, and other MSM are estimated to account for two percent of the population, yet they constitute more than half of all individuals living with HIV in the United States (Centers for Disease Control [CDC], 2010). Collectively, both HIV-diagnosed (HIV-D) and HIV-nondiagnosed (HIV-ND) MSM report a variety of reasons for intentional and unintentional nonuse of condoms. Depending on partner status, HIV-D MSM are in the unique position of having the potential both to increase risk of infecting others with HIV and to expose themselves to further complication (e.g., superinfection) when they engage in unprotected anal intercourse (UAI). HIV-ND MSM are at risk of seroconversion each time they engage in UAI with an infected partner or partner of unknown HIV status. Elucidating reasons for continued engagement in UAI specific to both HIV-D and HIV-ND MSM likely is an important step in the process of effective prevention. The current study employed meta-analytic methods to evaluate HIV-risk correlates in both HIV-D and HIV-ND MSM. In addition to several individual risk correlates, within the context of the Information-Motivation-Behavioral Skills Model, Behavioral Skills variables were related to condom use in HIV-ND MSM and Motivation variables were related to condom use in both HIV-D and HIV-ND MSM. A sufficient number of studies were not available to examine Information-based risk correlates in either subgroup. Results of the present study may guide future best practice in harm reduction for both HIV-D and HIV-ND MSM.
Show less - Date Issued
- 2013
- Identifier
- CFE0004874, ucf:49647
- Format
- Document (PDF)
- PURL
- http://purl.flvc.org/ucf/fd/CFE0004874
- Title
- Analytical solutions to nonlinear differential equations arising in physical problems.
- Creator
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Baxter, Mathew, Vajravelu, Kuppalapalle, Li, Xin, Mohapatra, Ram, Shuai, Zhisheng, Kassab, Alain, University of Central Florida
- Abstract / Description
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Nonlinear partial differential equations are difficult to solve, with many of the approximate solutions in the literature being numerical in nature. In this work, we apply the Homotopy Analysis Method to give approximate analytical solutions to nonlinear ordinary and partial differential equations. The main goal is to apply different linear operators, which can be chosen, to solve nonlinear problems. In the first three chapters, we study ordinary differential equations (ODEs) with one or two...
Show moreNonlinear partial differential equations are difficult to solve, with many of the approximate solutions in the literature being numerical in nature. In this work, we apply the Homotopy Analysis Method to give approximate analytical solutions to nonlinear ordinary and partial differential equations. The main goal is to apply different linear operators, which can be chosen, to solve nonlinear problems. In the first three chapters, we study ordinary differential equations (ODEs) with one or two linear operators. As we progress, we apply the method to partial differential equations (PDEs) and use several linear operators. The results are all purely analytical, meaning these are approximate solutions that we can evaluate at points and take their derivatives.Another main focus is error analysis, where we test how good our approximations are. The method will always produce approximations, but we use residual errors on the domain of the problem to find a measure of error.In the last two chapters, we apply similarity transforms to PDEs to transform them into ODEs. We then use the Homotopy Analysis Method on one, but are able to find exact solutions to both equations.
Show less - Date Issued
- 2014
- Identifier
- CFE0005303, ucf:50527
- Format
- Document (PDF)
- PURL
- http://purl.flvc.org/ucf/fd/CFE0005303
