Doctor of Philosophy (PhD), Ohio University, 2022, Mathematics (Arts and Sciences)

In Topological Field Theories (TFTs), there is a well documented correlation between 3-dimensional TFTs and braided monoidal categories. While braided monoidal 2-categories have been expected to have applications to 4-dimensional TFTs, there are very few known examples of braided monoidal 2-categories. The major goal of this dissertation is to present a categorification of a result of Pareigis, 1995. Namely, that modules over a commutative algebra in a braided monoidal category form a braided monoidal category. The categorified statement is that pseudomodules over a braided pseudomonoid in a braided monoidal 2-category form a braided monoidal 2-category. This result would be an example of constructing braided monoidal 2-categories from existing braided monoidal 2-categories. We approach this by constructing a new language which simplifies some of the complexities coming from relative tensor products of pseudomodules. The relationships between monoidal categories and multicategories has been well documented in Leinster, 2004. We define the notion of a multi-2-category, as well as the notion of a braided multi-2-category. We then construct braided pseudomonoids in braided multi-2-categories and examine pseudomodules over them. The main theorem of the dissertation is that local pseudomodules over a braided pseudomonoid in a braided multi-2-category forms a braided multi-2-category. A second result is a revision to the Joyal-Street definition of a balanced 2-category. We give a coherence for balanced 2-categories which was omitted in the original definition.

Committee: Alexei Davydov (Advisor); Sergio Lopez-Permouth (Committee Member); Marcel Bischoff (Committee Member); Nancy Sandler (Committee Chair) Subjects: Mathematics

Master of Science in Engineering, University of Akron, 2020, Civil Engineering

Over the past few decades, the amount of recycled asphalt materials, such as reclaimed asphalt pavement (RAP), used in asphalt pavements has increased. The addition of RAP to an asphalt mixture is sought to reduce the costs related to the production of asphalt binder and quarrying for new aggregates. However, the addition of RAP increases the stiffness of an asphalt mixture making it more vulnerable to fatigue cracking. In recent years, two laboratory tests, namely the Illinois flexibility index test (I-FIT) and the indirect tensile asphalt cracking test (IDEAL-CT), have been proposed for use in mix design and quality control/quality assurance to characterize the fatigue cracking resistance of asphalt mixtures at intermediate temperatures. This study compared the cracking indices obtained using the two tests for four different asphalt mixtures (12.5 mm Superpave surface, 19 mm Superpave intermediate, Type 1 Marshall surface, and Type 2 Marshall intermediate), short-term and long-term aged specimens, as well as plant-produced laboratory-compacted (PPLC) and laboratory-produced laboratory-compacted (LPLC) specimens. As expected, the test results revealed significantly higher cracking indices for the short-term aged specimens than the long-term aged specimens. The post-peak slope was observed to be the most sensitive parameter to aging. The test results also showed higher cracking indices for the surface mixtures than the intermediate mixtures, with the Marshall mixes exhibiting higher cracking indices than the Superpave mixes. The same trend was obtained using the two laboratory tests. Finally, the test results revealed that there is a significant difference between the cracking indices for the plant-produced and laboratory-produced asphalt mixtures, with the plant-produced mixtures exhibiting higher cracking indices than the laboratory-produced mixtures.

Committee: Ala Abbas (Advisor); Wieslaw Benienda (Committee Member); Nariman Mahabadi (Committee Member) Subjects: Civil Engineering

Master of Science, University of Toledo, 2020, Engineering (Computer Science)

In this study, an Intrusion Detection system (IDS) is designed based on Machine Learning classifiers and its performance is evaluated for the set of attacks entailed in the UNSW-NB15 dataset. This dataset is comprised of 2,540,226 realistic network data instances as well as 49 features. Most studies reported in the literature employ a representative subset of this dataset with predefined training and testing subsets, and containing a total of 257,673 records which this study also used. In light of relatively lower than expected performance of Machine Learning or Statistical classification algorithms tested on this dataset and as reported by others in the literature, this dataset was subjected to visual data analysis to explore potential reasons or issues which likely challenge Machine Learning classifiers. The consequent observations demonstrated the presence of class representation imbalance with respect to pattern counts and class overlap in feature space, which makes preprocessing strategies indispensable before this dataset can be meaningfully employed for data-driven model development for intrusion detection. For preprocessing, we implemented min-max scaling in the normalization phase followed by the application of Elastic Net and Sequential Feature Selection (SFS) algorithms. We employed ensemble methods using three base classifiers, namely Balanced Bagging, XGBoost, and RF-HDDT, augmented to address the imbalance issue. Parameters of Balanced Bagging and XGBoost are tuned for the imbalanced data, and Random Forest is supplemented by the Hellinger distance metric to address the limitations of default distance metric. Two new algorithms are proposed to address the class overlap issue in the dataset and applied during training. These two algorithms are leveraged to help improve the performance on the testing dataset by affecting the final classification decision made by three base classifiers as part of the ensemble classifier which employsa majority vote combi (open full item for complete abstract)

Committee: Gursel Serpen (Committee Chair); Ahmad Y. Javaid (Committee Member); Mohammed Niamat (Committee Member); Richard G. Molyet (Committee Member) Subjects: Computer Engineering; Computer Science; Engineering; Mathematics; Statistics

Doctor of Business Administration (D.B.A.), Franklin University, 2020, Business Administration

This exploratory, qualitative, case study focused on the post-implementation evaluation of food allergy management guidelines in higher education institutions. One in 13 children has food allergies and as the number of children diagnosed with allergies increases, the prevalence of food allergies on a college campus has also grown (FARE, n.d). In 2015, the national Food Allergy Research Education (FARE) organization launched a pilot program with 12 colleges and universities to implement voluntary food allergy management guidelines. In 2016, the initial 12-school pilot phase expanded to forty total schools. This study interviewed fourteen participants at fourteen of those institutions focusing on key aspects defined in the study's theoretical framework that employed the stakeholder theory and balanced scorecard as interpretive frameworks. Through the identification of eight themes, this research serves to benefit higher education institutions considering implementing food allergy management guidelines. The themes discovered by this study include - facilities, dining services, tracking students with food allergies, guest experience, collaboration among departments, utilizing students with food allergies, changing the organizational culture, and relationship building.

Committee: Andy Igonor (Committee Chair); Alyncia Bowen (Committee Member); Cynthia Johanek (Committee Member) Subjects: Health; Higher Education

Master of Science, University of Akron, 2019, Mathematics

The balanced minimum evolution (BME) polytope is a structure representative of a problem in biology, in particular in the study of phylogenetic trees. In this scope, the polytope is used to answer the question of how a set of species are related to one another. In this paper we explore generalized instances of the BME polytope for networks. For one of these generalized BME polytopes we focus on the discovery of new facets and their corresponding equations, while for the other we give the facets of the polytope and discuss the relationship that they have to another well known polytope outside of the field of biology. Furthermore, we also provide the dimension reducing equalities that were discovered which hold for every BME polytope and then prove their existence.

Committee: Stefan Forcey PhD (Advisor); Malena Espanol PhD (Committee Member); James Cossey PhD (Committee Member) Subjects: Mathematics

Master of Science, University of Akron, 2017, Applied Mathematics

Combinatorial methods have proved to be useful in generating relaxations of polytopes in various areas of mathematical programming. In this work, we propose a discrete-integer linear programming model for a recent version of the Phylogeny Estimation Problem (PEP), known as the Balanced Minimal Evolution Method (BME). We begin by examining an object known as the Balanced Minimal Evolution Polytope and several classes of geometric constraints that result in its relaxation. We use this information to develop the linear program and propose two Branch and Bound algorithms to solve the model. The second algorithm takes advantage of a heuristic known as a large neighborhood search. We provide experimental results for both algorithms, using perfect and noisy data, as well as suggestions for further improvement.

Committee: Stefan Forcey Dr. (Advisor); Malena Espanol Dr. (Committee Member); Patrick Wilber Dr. (Committee Member) Subjects: Applied Mathematics; Biology

MS, Kent State University, 2015, College of Arts and Sciences / Department of Computer Science

Recently in few papers, a balanced disk separator of graphs were recursively used to construct one or a small set of spanning trees that sharply approximate distances in a given graph. The best up to date approximation algorithms were obtained for multiplicative tree spanners and for collective additive tree spanners of graphs. In this thesis, we analyze a number of real-life networks, arising in Internet measurements, social and biological sciences, and demonstrate that they all admit small radius balanced disk separators. As a consequence, the one-to-one distances in those networks can be sharply approximated by the tree metrics. Furthermore, all those networks admit very simple distance and routing labeling schemes.

Committee: Feodor Dragan (Advisor); Hassan Peyravi (Committee Member); Mikhail Nesterenko (Committee Member) Subjects: Computer Science

Doctor of Philosophy, Case Western Reserve University, 2014, Biomedical Engineering

Electric nerve block has many potential applications in the medical field for treating sensory (e.g. pain, constant tingling, paresthesia), motor (e.g. spasticity, dystonia or reflex over-activation of muscles) and autonomic disorders (e.g. reduction of blood pressure or heart rate) by reducing activity in neural pathways. Current medical treatments often involve the repeated injection of chemical agents (such as Phenol or Botox) or the surgical transection of nerves, muscles or tendons to provide symptomatic care. Electric nerve block, using the right waveform, can be initiated instantly for a controlled reduction of neural activity, which completely returns as soon as the block is turned off. There have been several acute studies exploring different forms of electric nerve block but only very few chronic studies, leaving the field with insufficient information regarding the safety and efficacy of this promising new technology. * * * Three studies are described here; one in-vitro and two preclinical. They provide descriptions of optimal waveforms and technological solutions to facilitate the translation of electric nerve block technology from research to clinical use. In the first study, we quantified the efficacy and reliability of kilohertz-frequency alternating current (KHFAC) block, enabling bladder voiding post chronic-stage spinal cord injury. In the other two studies, the feasibility and safety of using combined KHFAC and charge-balanced direct current (CBDC) waveforms for an onset-response free nerve block are investigated in-vitro and in-vivo. * * * We report how electric-only, daily bladder maintenance was successfully achieved in awake subjects at the push of a button and how the induction of an onset-response-free nerve block without nerve damage was achieved. Essential alterations to the block and/or stimulation waveform generation circuit necessary to avoid unintended DC contamination are also described in this thesis. The data from the three stud (open full item for complete abstract)

Committee: Kevin Kilgore PhD (Advisor); Dominique Durand PhD (Committee Chair); Niloy Bhadra PhD (Committee Member); Kenneth Gustafson PhD (Committee Member); Jesse Wainright PhD (Committee Member); Narendra Bhadra PhD (Committee Member) Subjects: Biomedical Engineering; Biomedical Research; Neurobiology; Neurology; Neurosciences

Ph.D., Antioch University, 2014, Leadership and Change

A wiser socio-economic system, by design and not by chance, may well benefit from a series of design principles drawn from the well of wisdom. This dissertation focused on a refined set of eight components of wisdom through research designed to explore if, how, and when they are invoked by a group of experts participating in a futures discussion about organizations in their field of practice, American higher education. The aim was to explore a set of wisdom-centered design principles (denoted as Wise By Design [WBD]) for social innovation, specifically in the design of organizations that would thrive in the future. After four rounds of engagement with a panel of experts with approximately 500 years of accumulated experience in the field, six conclusions were reached: a) an organization could be seen as wise; if leadership, management, and innovation practices are augmented by wisdom; b) the use of design principles based on wisdom and futures inquiry could help organizations develop wise processes; c) wise people develop the ability to take an objectivized balanced perspective when confronted with situations, decisions, or requests for advice; d) wisdom could be described as a multi-channel sense-and-respond adaptive system with the higher purpose of flourishing of self and others; e) interoperability and dual hybridity, both administrative and academic, could enable institutions of higher education to thrive in the future; and f) this field of research could lead into a discussion on the value of exploring artificial wisdom. The electronic version of this Dissertation is at Ohiolink ETD Center, http://etd.ohiolink.edu and AURA http://aura.antioch.edu/

Committee: Alan Guskin Ph.D. (Committee Chair); Jon Wergin Ph.D. (Committee Member); Laurien Alexandre Ph.D. (Committee Member); R. Eugene Rice Ph.D. (Other) Subjects: Higher Education; Higher Education Administration; Management; Organization Theory; Organizational Behavior

Master of Science (MS), Wright State University, 2012, Educational Leadership

Authentic Leadership is an emerging leadership approach that is still in the formative stages of development. There has been noteworthy research on strategies to develop or enhance authentic leadership behaviors (Northhouse 2010) that can lead to high employee retention, however there has been only a small amount of research examining the relationship between authentic leadership and employee retention. This descriptive study examined the perceived level of authentic leadership on the four scales of the Authentic Leadership Questionnaire by retained and non-retained employees in one organization to determine if there is a relationship between authentic leadership and employee retention.

Committee: Scott Graham PhD (Committee Chair); Mindy McNutt PhD (Committee Member); Glenn Graham PhD (Committee Member) Subjects: Educational Leadership; Management

MCP, University of Cincinnati, 2009, Design, Architecture, Art and Planning : Community Planning

The health of a natural body of water is inextricably linked to the condition of its watershed. Land cover and land use activities within a watershed are the sources of nonpoint source pollution, the greatest water quality problem facing U.S. waters today, and are influenced by such wide-ranging entities as governmental agencies, industries, conservation groups, farmers, and private property owners. Because traditional regulatory measures have been inadequate in curbing nonpoint source pollution, collaborative watershed management has emerged as a means to improving and protecting water bodies. This study examines one collaborative watershed management program, the Lake Erie Balanced Growth Program, in terms of its effectiveness at developing multi-jurisdictional watershed plans that will likely be implemented in a widespread and consistent manner throughout the watershed. The study identifies the roadblocks encountered by the Balanced Growth Program pilot projects, such as mistrust among participants, the influence of politics, and governmental fragmentation, and offers recommendations as to how the program may be improved to overcome these roadblocks in the future. The study found the most significant problem emerging from collaborative watershed management is that of indifference towards healthy watershed behavior and cooperation in a collaborative effort. Future watershed management efforts should allocate more resources towards education and motivation of local governments particularly to encourage them to participate in collaborative watershed management and follow through on the implementation of the resulting watershed plan.

Committee: Menelaos Triantafillou MLA (Committee Chair); Allison Roy PhD (Committee Member); Lois McKnight MA (Committee Member) Subjects: Urban Planning

Doctor of Philosophy, The Ohio State University, 2007, Psychology

This study describes the psychometric evaluation of Super's Work Values Inventory – Revised (SWVI-R), an instrument comprised of 12 scales measuring the relative importance placed on the following work-related value dimensions: Achievement, Co-Workers, Creativity, Income, Independence, Lifestyle, Mental Challenge, Prestige, Security, Supervision, Work Environment, and Variety. These work values scales were internally consistent and showed predictable patterns of gender differences and similarities. Racial-ethnic differences in the relative emphasis placed on work values were also explored in this study. The factor analysis yielded four theoretically-consistent underlying factors, entitled the following: Environment, Esteem, Excitement, and Safety. Further, the scales and factors of the SWVI-R were largely related to the “Big-Five” traits of personality and the broader cultural value systems of individualism and collectivism, as predicted from prior research on relationships among these constructs. Additionally, the work values scales demonstrated adequate discriminant validity with two aspects of social desirability. Limitations of this study, as well as further research on and potential uses for this measure are discussed.

Committee: Nancy Betz (Advisor) Subjects:

Master of Science (MS), Ohio University, 2007, Computer Science (Engineering)

This research effort involves designing and implementing a resource directory (RD) for a Resource Area Network (RAN). The resource directory is an application that performs resource and peer management in a RAN. This Java-based implementation enables the RAN to support disparate resource types such as memory, files, file chunks, and web services as shared resources. The RD also allows for dynamic definition and modification of the resource types actively supported in the RAN. In addition, the search efficiency is enhanced by implementing a balanced binary tree algorithm within the peer network structure in the RAN. The algorithm reduces the height of the tree hence reducing the hop number for the search messages. The experiments conducted demonstrate RAN's ability to support and dynamically manage multiple resource types. The tests simulated on the sample networks demonstrate the reduction in hop number for search messages in RAN when compared with an unstructured network like Gnutella.

Committee: Chang Liu (Advisor) Subjects: Computer Science