University at Albany, State University of New York
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Novel Silicon Anodes for Improved Lithium Ion Battery
Get PDFLi-ion battery (LIB) have been dominating the development of electronics shaping our daily life owing to their good specific and volumetric energy densities. However, the technological advancement calls for higher energy, safer, lower cost, and large-scale manufacturing batteries.
Silicon is considered an excellent candidate for anode material for higher energy LIB. This thesis examines the potential of silicon as an anode in high-capacity LIBs where the role of silicon is studied at the frontside (FS) and the backside (BS) of the anode. At the frontside, the effect of deposition of silicon on graphite on the battery performance was studied. Graphite acts as a buffer to limit silicon expansion and provide a conductive matrix, while silicon increases the specific capacity. It is concluded that the battery performance depends mainly on deposition thickness, deposition temperature, and silicon phase. Data shows the correlation of these factors for optimal battery performance with capacity gain of 20%.
At the backside of the anode, we introduce a novel method to fabricate silicon-based anodes, in particular, nickel silicide anode. Nickel silicide offers high specific capacity, and higher conductivity compared to graphite anode. This novel method compromises of series of wet and dry cleaning of nickel substrate prior to reaction with silicon. This study demonstrates the success of the reaction forming nickel silicide with strong adhesion to the surface. The electrochemical performance showed improvement in comparison to graphite anodes. The novel anode shows that higher capacity gain depends on the phase of the nickel silicide, with nickel di-silicide showing the highest capacity performance and lowest fade
Trapped in the Screen: How Digital Dependency Shapes Our Bodies and Minds
Get PDFWith each successive generation, time spent on cell phones continues to increase, raising concerns about the long-term effects of digital dependency on both physical and cognitive health. Prior research has linked excessive cellphone use to a range of issues including poor posture, eye strain, disrupted sleep, increased anxiety, reduced attention span, and addiction-like behaviors. These concerns are compounded by sedentary lifestyles, which reduce physical activity and contribute to risks such as cardiovascular disease and obesity. This study surveyed individuals aged 18–30 through an online questionnaire assessing daily cellphone usage, physical activity, and sleep habits. Results revealed that both men and women reported spending over six hours per day on their cell phones. Statistically significant gender differences were found in screen time and physical activity levels, with women reporting higher cellphone use and lower physical activity. However, no significant gender differences emerged in reported sleep duration or quality. These findings may signal early warning signs of more serious long-term consequences, especially for women, who are already at increased risk for cognitive impairments such as dementia. Low physical activity, when paired with high digital engagement could further aggravate risks for long term cognitive impairment. Although this study’s small sample size limits the ability to generalize results, the patterns observed suggest a need for further investigation on a broader scale. As digital dependency deepens across generations, understanding its impact on both mind and body becomes increasingly critical. What does this mean for the next generation as they begin to age? Without intervention, current trends may set the stage for future public health crises rooted in the technologies we rely on today
Elementary Teachers Navigating Teaching during the Pandemic in New York State: A Phenomenological Study
No full textThis dissertation examines how five in-service elementary teachers navigated the challenges of teaching during the COVID-19 pandemic in New York State. It aims to understand how these experiences affected their teaching practices and professional growth and explores the internal and external factors influencing their ability to adapt and thrive in a rapidly changing educational landscape. The study employs a qualitative, phenomenological methodology through a single case study design, focusing on the lived experiences of five teachers from schools in New York State. Data collection includes teacher-created visuals, semi-structured interviews, artifacts, and a researcher reflective journal. The Interpretative Phenomenological Approach (IPA) is used to analyze the data, emphasizing the significance and impact of critical incidents on teachers’ professional growth. The study uses Fred Korthagen’s core reflection “onion model” to analyze teachers’ reflections on their professional growth trajectory and how their experiences shifted their thinking about themselves and their practice. The findings reveal that teachers’ ability to navigate the pandemic was influenced by their internal qualities, including resilience, adaptability, and reflection. The study highlights the significance of social-emotional learning, collaborative networks, and sustainable workload structures in supporting teachers during crises. It also emphasizes the necessity of transparent communication and robust support systems to promote teacher growth and well-being. The findings suggest that developing learning communities, promoting regular self-reflection, and providing clear structures for collaboration are essential for supporting teachers in times of change. The study offers insights into how educational leaders can better support teachers by leveraging their strengths and fostering a positive, growth-oriented environment
Conserved A-Rich Regions in the 3’ UTR of Zika Virus Differentially Affect Viral Gene Expression
Get PDFFollowing its discovery in 1947, Zika virus garnered little attention in the global stage until a rapidly spreading epidemic brough the virus to the global stage in 2015. Continuous advances in research have begun to further the understanding of the molecular biology of Zika virus, however much is still unknown. Much of our understanding of the virus comes from cross reference to other viruses within the same family, such as Dengue virus and West Nile virus. A commonality of these viruses is that they resemble cellular mRNAs and have a single-stranded positive-sense RNA genome that contains a 5’-cap but lacks a poly(A) tail in the highly structured 3’ untranslated region. Examination of these 3’untranslated regions revealed that they contain a number of A-rich regions which are localized to RNA structures. Despite both the A-rich regions and the structures being highly conserved, they remain unstudied.
To address this gap in knowledge, I chose three of the conserved A-rich regions and used well described reporter constructs to examine effects on the viral life cycle. I focused specifically on the production of infectious virus, translation, and replication. In my work I provide the first evidence of these A-rich regions having a functional role by identifying 3’UTR regions critical to the production of infectious virus. I further link these regions to roles in translation and potential modulation of host switching. Additionally, my research is the first to identify interactions between the Zika virus 3’UTR and the 18S component of the 40S ribosome
Can Deliberate Practice for Inner Skills Enhance Therapist Trainees’ Mindfulness and Presence When Working with Clients?
Get PDFA replicated single-case design was used to assess the effectiveness of therapist trainees’ engagement in deliberate practice for inner psychotherapy skills (Rousmaniere, 2019). Deliberate practice (DP) is a structured approach to therapist skill development that involves repeatedly observing and responding to real or simulated clients (Rousmaniere, 2016). It was reasoned that by attending to their inner experience while repeatedly being exposed to challenging clinical material (e.g., a client’s suicidal ideation) outside of therapy, trainees may reduce their experiential avoidance and thus be more mindful and present in sessions with actual clients.
During the five-week baseline phase of the study, four therapists, all advanced practicum trainees, reported their (a) mindfulness on the State Mindfulness Scale (Tanay & Berstein, 2013) and (b) presence on the Therapist Presence Inventory (Geller et al., 2010) after a randomly selected session with one client. Then, during the intervention phase of the study, participants engaged in eight weekly DP exercises drawn from Rousmaniere’s (2019) DP manual for inner skills with standardized video stimuli. In the week after each DP exercise, they completed the mindfulness and presence measures about their in-session experience with a randomly selected client. Over the course of the study, the four participants provided data about their sessions with 4 to 8 different clients (Mdn = 4.5).
Based on a series of visual analyses, nonoverlap indices and regression, results indicated that all four participants reported meaningful increases in in-session mindfulness, while only two participants reported improvement in their felt presence with clients. One explanation for the mixed results is that the DP activities focus on enhancing inner awareness more so than on how to be more present with clients.
Replication of this study with versus without supervisor feedback is recommended to explore whether expert guidance is needed to improve trainees’ presence during psychotherapy sessions. Other future research should be conducted more diverse samples and with the addition of a follow-up evaluation of participants’ in-session mindfulness
Accuracy of Balance Assessment Metrics Using Wearable Sensors
Get PDFBalance is a critical part of remaining healthy at all ages. Poor balance can lead to life-changing injury. Balance is typically assessed in a lab using a force-platform (FP), by comparing horizontal movements of the center of mass during trials with eyes open and eyes closed. The goal of this study is to evaluate whether inertial measurement units (IMUs) can be used to accurately measure balance. Simultaneous FP and IMU data were collected for 1 subject for 45s trials with eyes open (EO) and eyes closed (EC). We evaluate whether IMU and FP metrics for COM movement (max accel and RMSV) are similar and whether EO differs from EC for both IMU and FP data. The IMU showed strong ability to measure variations in displacement (RMSD), along with total length in the eyes open condition. It is not a strong tool for measuring perturbed balance. Data collection indicated that eyes closed p-values were greater than eyes open for the force plate but not for the IMU\u27s. When comparing IMU vs. force plate data, eyes opened and closed p-values were statistically significant for max acceleration but not for RMS velocity
An Analysis of Climate Change Communication in the Modern World: What Works and What Doesn’t
Get PDFEffective climate change communication is a broad and widely researched topic, attempting to address how to communicate the issue of climate change in a way that will not only lead people to believe in and to care about it, but also to act on the changing climate. While individual action is progress made, collective action is more effective and more often the goal of this communication. Climate change is consistently considered to be one of the most critical political issues due to its time sensitivity and exponentially increasing, drastic results. Scientists have agreed that climate change is an impending and crucial issue but have been unable to utilize this information to mobilize public support and action, which has led other scholars to work to understand how to best deliver this information in a way that promotes collective action
Rethinking Rural Identity: Reimagining Rural Politics
No full textThis work chiefly consists of a genealogical critique of rural identity. Tracing the development and deployment of the concepts of rurality and rural consciousness, I argue that our current depictions of rurality as “spatial other,” replete with its harmful stereotypes, stem from a misconception about the nature of power. Political theorists’ and political scientists’ appraisals of rurality suggest that the set of actions that define rural politics are a product of their relative powerlessness. Rural locales’ removal from the center of power in urban spheres means that rural politics is reduced to reactionary, violent, and conservative political thought and engagement. Conventional depictions of power as directional, agentic, and commodified modes of domination have been pressed into service amidst the construction of this rural monolith; the rural is always powerless, existing at the periphery of an urban “power center.”
Against this understanding of power, I argue that adoption of a directionless, discursive mode of power (the Foucauldian approach to power) might help us to problematize spatial identities that until now have always relied on the center/periphery or powerful/powerless distinction. To illustrate the force of this theory, I use empirical research from ethnographic interviews and participant observation that reveals the discursive construction of spatial identities – even in the face of apparent differences that bely identity itself. Taking this research into account, I conclude the study by critiquing the possibility of a political theory of the rural. I argue that rural identity, which has been bolstered by political scientists and political theorists alike, has severely restrained the possibilities of rural political action, and that continued problematization of spatial identities may ameliorate this harm
Essays on Robust Inference under Multiway Clustering
No full textThe first chapter studies wild bootstrap-based inference for regression models with multiway clustering. Our proposed methods are multiway counterparts to the (one-way) wild cluster bootstrap approach introduced by Cameron et al. (2008). We establish the validity of our methods for studentized statistics. Theoretical results are provided, accommodating arbitrary serial dependence in the common time effects – an aspect excluded by existing two-way bootstrap-based approaches. Simulation experiments document the potential for enhanced inference with our novel approaches. We illustrate the effectiveness of the methods by revisiting an empirical study involving multiway clustered and serially correlated data.
The second chapter studies jackknife cluster-robust variance estimators (CRVEs) on multiway clustering. Chiang, Hansen, and Sasaki (2024) and Chen and Vogelsang (2024) developed CRVEs for handling arbitrary serial dependence in linear regressions with two-way clustered panel data. However, conventional CRVEs often perform poorly in finite samples. We propose several jackknife CRVEs and demonstrate their theoretical validity. Through extensive simulations, we show that certain jackknife CRVEs deliver remarkably improved inferences. This enhanced performance holds even in the presence of two-way fixed effects. Notably, one of our new approaches significantly mitigates issues of undefined standard errors when CRVEs are not positive definite, ensuring robust and consistent inference across scenarios.
The third chapter introduces a projection-based wild bootstrap (PWB) method for inference in linear regression models with two-way clustered data. We examine all possible scenarios for the asymptotic distribution of the estimator—Gaussian and non-Gaussian—classifying them into five distinct cases. In one scenario, no procedure can achieve uniform consistency under a fully unspecified DGP; to the best of our knowledge, our method is the first to cover the remaining four. We identify and apply two diagnostic factors to distinguish between these scenarios. In addition, our procedure accommodates arbitrary serial dependence. Simulation results demonstrate the accuracy and flexibility of the proposed method, making it a robust tool for empirical work involving complex clustering structures
Dimensions Of International Students’ Social Well-Being And Their Measurement: Validation Of Social Well-Being Instrument For International Students (Swbi)
Get PDFThere has been an increase in the number of international students coming to the United States to study. For school administrators and teachers to provide appropriate support for international students, it is important to use an appropriate scale to understand the well-being of this population. The purpose of this study was to develop and validate a scale that measures the social well-being of international students and examine the relationship between social well-being and some dimensions of academic success. The study occurred across three phases: 1) item development, 2) assessment of psychometric properties of the scale, and 3) assessment of the relationship between social well-being and academic success. During item development, out of 78 preliminary items, 43 items were removed based on reviews by expert panels and cognitive interviews. With a sample of 701 international undergraduate and graduate students, the SWBI with 35 items was administered. An additional two questions were removed based on low item-total correlations and low discrimination parameters from the item response theory assessment. The final SWBI displayed good internal consistency with a Cronbach’s alpha of .94 and acceptable range of item-total correlations of all 33 items. Convergent validity was established with a significant positive association with the measures of life satisfaction. A principal component analysis yielded a single-factor structure for SWBI, and confirmatory factor analysis (CFA) results confirmed a good fit. Lastly, correlational analyses were conducted to examine the relationship between SWBI with some dimensions of academic success. The results showed that self-efficacy and perceptions of learning environments were significantly correlated with the social well-being of international students while no relationship was found between social well-being and GPA. Taken together, the SWBI scale developed through this study was a reliable and valid scale and could be used to measure the social well-being of international students. Significant relationships were found between the social well-being of international students and some dimensions of academic success. Implications and directions for future research are discussed